Her shoulders round and she leans against the worktop for a moment. Then, takes a deep breath and straightens. ‘I just wanted to be part of things. While I still can.’
‘What do you mean? You’re only sixty-seven!’
Our eyes meet and suddenly I feel weak; because all at once I realise there’s more to what she’s saying than a simple reference to her age. She picks up the knife again and resumes slicing the cucumber into thin, neat pieces.
‘Mum?’ I prompt.
‘Oh, it’s nothing!’
‘Mum!’
So she tells me how she found a lump three months ago. About a biopsy she never mentioned, an excruciating wait for results. About the fact that when she was finally told that it was nothing serious, she’d been flooded with relief. But that over time this had given way to unease, then anxiety about her mortality.
‘It shook me, that’s all,’ she tells me, her eyes still on the cucumber. ‘Made me consider… well, some of the bigger questions.’
I put a hand on her arm and she stills it. I take the knife from her and lay it down gently, then turn her towards me, a hand on each upper arm. ‘Mum,’ I say. ‘You should have told me.’
‘I’d have only worried you for no reason!’ she says dismissively. ‘You have enough on your plate as it is.’
‘You don’t need to… Listen, Mum, when something like this happens, I want to know, OK?’
She nods, her mouth wobbling slightly. Then seems to right herself. Her shoulders straighten, she turns back to the cutting board. ‘Yes, well,’ she says. ‘Thank you.’
‘You have to give me a chance, Mum,’ I say softly. ‘Give me a chance to be there. To love you.’
As I look at her, methodically chopping, I realise we’re much more alike than I thought.
28
HAL
Louis clambers into Betty and I’m a little embarrassed. She’s messy from the trip, and there’s the definite smell of food lingering in the upholstery, made worse by the heat. ‘She’ll clear out in a minute once we drive,’ I tell him.
‘Sure, of course,’ he says and I wonder if we’ve now moved into the era where he feels he has to humour me.
Praying that Betty’s cooling system won’t get overloaded during the short drive, I signal and turn onto the road, just behind one of the many Citroëns that seem to be defying the ageing process and rattling on against the odds.
‘Your van seems quite modern compared to that,’ Louis quips, nodding to the powder-blue and rust-coloured 2CV coughing out black smoke in front of us.
I laugh. ‘You know, I could get another car if I wanted,’ I say. ‘I just like Betty.’
‘I know, but she’s hardly a babe magnet, is she, Dad? I mean, do you ever think it might be the reason why you haven’t?—’
‘Haven’t what?’
He shrugs. ‘I dunno. Settled down, I guess.’
I smile. ‘I don’t have a problem in that area. I just… I suppose I haven’t met “the one” yet.’
He nods, once, and we drive in silence to the Château de la Chèvre d’Or, a restaurant and bar recommended by Vivian. In all honesty, it’s not how I pictured our stag night, back when Louis first mentioned the engagement. I’d thought I’d host it in Cambridge, staggering from bar to bar.
But time is short, and a meal together as father and son will just have to do.
When I’ve managed to squeeze Betty into a tiny parking space, we then follow the signs to an archway cut into a stone building that must be centuries old. In silence, we make our way up the winding stone stairs and finally reach a curved door which grants us access to the hotel restaurant. A waiter dressed in a blue suit shows us to a table on the terrace and it’s then that I realise exactly what Vivian had been on about. Beneath the terrace, the ground tumbles away and we’re treated to a stunning view of the ocean. There are trees and stone walls and small buildings below, but in so many ways it feels as though we’re on a ship, taking off on a voyage.
‘Bit posh,’ Louis mutters to me as the waiter pulls out my chair for me to sit.
‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘But it’s an important day.’
