Diane forced a smile. ‘George isn’t perfect but he’s no more likely to play Tamzin up than any lad of nineteen – and a lot less likely than some.’
‘I suppose James has already given the poor lad the third degree. She’ll never grow up if he has his way. She needs to get out and about; she shouldn’t really have been allowed to flunk out of university.’
‘But her depression …?’ began Diane, doubtfully.
‘Oh no, has James been filling you up with that?’ Valerie closed her eyes and groaned theatrically, so, hopefully, missing Diane’s horrified blush at the mention of James filling her up. ‘Young girls get the blues, it’s nature. Periods, boys, hormones – all part of the agonising process of being a teenager. Isn’t Bryony the same?’
‘Not really.’
‘Lucky you. Pain in the derrière.’ She switched subjects before Diane could protest that clinical depression was a million miles away from teenage moodiness. ‘My dear brother tells me you’re going to be a grandma. Congratulations! What a scream to be a granny in your forties. Gareth was a bit shell-shocked but I think he was pleased. Are you? Takes a bit of getting used to, I expect, but new babies are so delicious. Tamzin was a perfect poppet.’ And then, with hardly a pause for breath she added, ‘I’ve enjoyed chatting, I hope you’ll come again. And could you bring me in a little bottle of voddy next time? Do you think you could? I get terribly peed off without even a glass of red to liven up meal times.’ She laughed, lightly, as if to show how unimportant the subject was.
Carefully, Diane replaced her coffee cup in its saucer and pushed it onto the little side table. ‘Sorry,’ she said, awkwardly.
Valerie looked knowing. ‘Because James will make a fuss?’
‘Um … because I’m not happy doing it.’
Valerie turned to pull open the little door to her locker. ‘I’ll give you the money, of course, I’m not asking for an early Christmas prezzie.’ Deftly, she extracted a £20 note from a dark-red leather purse and tried to push it into Diane’s hand. ‘That’s lovely, thanks such a lot.’
Shaking, Diane put the note back down beside Valerie’s cup. ‘Sorry,’ she repeated, weakly.
Valerie’s colour rose and her eyes glittered but her tone remained friendly and polite. ‘Don’t worry. Doesn’t matter.’
Diane found Bryony waiting at the car. Her sweet little face was white and shuttered and she sat in silence as Diane drove.
‘Dad offered me money for a car,’ she burst out, finally, as Diane steered through the lanes towards the safety of Purtenon St. Paul. ‘He said that I’d need it if I wanted to live at home for a while with the baby.’
Diane pulled her thoughts away from James. The heat in his eyes, tonight. ‘You will feel isolated without a car. I should know; I’ve done it for long enough.’
Bryony turned to stare out of the window at the garden-like fields. When she spoke again her voice was small. ‘I must be more like you than I realised, Mum. I told him to stuff his money. He hid it from us until it was forced out in the open, didn’t he?’
Diane concentrated on slowing the car enough to get through a speed camera – just around the slight bend after a long, inviting straight – without sullying her virgin licence.
‘Didn’t he?’ repeated Bryony.
Diane sighed. ‘Yes. But he says that he had his reasons.’
Bryony snorted. ‘I can afford a banger with what I’ve got in the bank. I’d rather have that. If I let him buy me a car, every time I get into it I’ll remember he doesn’t really want me to have it.’
Diane sighed inside for her daughter and her hurt, pinched, little face. It was a strange thing for her to have to cope with, fatherly deceit on a grand scale. ‘You know, don’t you, that what he did was aimed at me and not at you?’
‘Does it make any difference?’
‘I’m not sure,’ Diane answered, slowly, ‘but I think so. Your father loves you very much, whatever his faults are. His love for you is beyond question.’
‘Right,’ said Bryony ironically. ‘It’s a neat theory that his crappy behaviour was all about you and old grudges but your motivation was good. He kept his shitty money to himself for selfish bastard reasons. And Granddad did almost exactly the same thing: he didn’t leave you any money so that automatically cut me out, too!’
Diane let out a gurgle that could’ve been either laughter or a sob. ‘I’m sorry, Bryony. My bad relations with other people have rather deprived you, haven’t they?’
‘None of it was your fault.’
‘Neither Granddad nor Dad would agree with you there.’ Diane drove on in silence, powerless to do anything but let Bryony glower out of the window in peace.
Presently, Bryony shifted in her seat. ‘I’m getting too fat for these trousers. Mum, if I buy some maternity jeans, will you make them really cool for me?’
‘Of course I will.’ On impulse, she slowed the car. Here was something she could do to make her daughter feel better. ‘We can go shopping now, if you want?’
Bryony brightened, though protesting half-heartedly. ‘But we’re nearly home.’
