Page 30 of The Little Board Game Café

‘What can I get you, Bill?’ said the waitress with a smile.

‘Two full English. Extra black pudding for me please.’

‘And a large pot of tea?’ she said.

He nodded. ‘Yep, creature of habit.’

They’d been here before many times, but Emily looked round with renewed interest now that she was a Future Café Owner. At the table next to theirs, two children were colouring in whilst their parents looked at their iPhones. At another, an elderly couple were sharing a crossword and a Danish. A group of friends were chatting over the weekend papers and a woman sat on her own in the corner, engrossed in a novel.

‘This is the sort of place I’m going to run,’ Emily said.

‘A garden centre? What do you know about gardening?’

‘No, a café like this. Busy but relaxed at the same time. Somewhere you can chill out with a book or a paper and not feel awkward if you’re on your own. The kind of place where the waitress knows your name.’

‘Your mum used to go on about running a café.’

‘I know. I’m going to make her proud.’

Dad took out a handkerchief and dabbed his eyes, just as the waitress brought over a tray with a large pot of tea, two mugs and a jug of milk.

‘Shall we let it brew?’

Dad nodded. ‘You know, Em, I never thought Peter was right for you. He’s a nice enough chap. Impressive – owning his own company, even though he didn’t actually start it himself.’

‘So why didn’t you think he was right for me?’

‘I always thought he wanted to change you,’ he said, ‘into a mini-version of his mother. But it wasn’t just that. You never seemed that – what’s that modern phrase? You never seemed that into him.’

Emily was about to ask if he’d been borrowing Kate’s self-help books, when the waitress arrived with their breakfasts and they turned their attention to the food: crispy rashers of back bacon, sunshine eggs, mushrooms with a hint of garlic, Bury black pudding and hash browns. Of course, the hash browns were the best bit, especially dipped in those egg yolks. Without being asked, the waitress brought some hot water over and Dad gave her a smile as he topped up the pot.

‘I thought I’d buy some begonias for your mum’s grave,’ he said when she’d gone. ‘What do you reckon?’

*

Whenever she visited Thornholme, Emily always stayed until Sunday teatime. Of course, this time, she could have stayed longer, given that she wasn’t working, but she wanted to get back to Essendale so that she could go to the estate agent’s first thing on Monday morning, before she lost her bottle. She spent the rest of the weekend batch cooking for Dad, determined that soups, stews, lasagnes and curries would fill his freezer by the time she caught the bus home.

Dad had always hated cooking. Not only hated it; he wasn’t much good at it either. Family legend had it that even the neighbours’ Labrador once refused to eat his custard. After her mum died, they’d lived on boiled potatoes, tinned peas and packets of stuff from the freezer. Findus crispy pancakes, Vesta curries and her own particular favourite Birds Eye’s boil-in-the-bag chicken and mushroom casseroles. All you had to do with those casseroles was put the bag in a pan of boiling water. Emily was reminded of them years later when she first saw one of the contestants on MasterChef cooking salmon sous vide. Who knew that boil-in-the-bag would one day become trendy?

After a couple of months, she’d taken over the kitchen, carefully recreating all Mum’s favourite meals: the Lancashire hotpot with best neck of lamb topped with layers of sliced potatoes; the rich stew with its beefy sauce and chunky carrots; the chicken dinners with generous helpings of gravy and roasties. It was an improvement on the ready meals, but even though Emily knew her mother’s recipes by heart, they never tasted quite as good. She could never get the outside of her ginger cake to be quite as crunchy, or the inside quite as sticky. Nevertheless, Dad was well-fed for his first few years as a widower, but Emily suspected he’d gone back to ready meals when she left home. Heaven only knew what he lived on these days.

‘There’s no need to go to all this trouble, Em,’ Dad said, looking at the steaming Tupperwares all lined up, waiting to go in the freezer once they’d cooled.

‘Isn’t home-made better than supermarket ready meals?’

‘Yes, it is. Nothing like a home-cooked meal.’

There was a pause. She knew what he was thinking, what he really meant. There was nothing like one of Mum’s home-cooked meals.

‘Mine won’t be quite as good, Dad, but they’re the next best thing,’ she said gently.

She packed his freezer and cleaned up the kitchen before they said their goodbyes.

‘You know, Dad, I would love it if you came for a visit. Essendale’s only fifteen miles away. Two bus rides.’

Dad shook his head. ‘I dunno, Em. Maybe one day. Perhaps when you’ve got your own place.’

She knew he wouldn’t come. He had seldom ventured out of Thornholme since her mum passed. His world was limited to the house, a few local shops, the garden centre, the pub and his wife’s graveside. He’d been to Peter’s house only once, for Sunday lunch when they’d first got engaged. Nothing would persuade him to broaden his horizons even a little; God knows Emily had tried over the years.