I put my head on the table, trying to fathom what would be the right thing. The only thought running round my brain was ‘rock, hard place’. Just as I was steeling myself to go up to the attic to see if the mess was really as bad as the chaos I’d glimpsed from the fifth rung of the ladder, the doorbell went. Through the frosted glass, I saw the outline of a raincoat that looked like a little turquoise marquee.
I threw the door open. ‘Mum! Are you okay?’
‘Thought I’d pop in on my way home. Just finished doing the early shift with Daphne.’
I frowned. ‘Daphne?’
‘Yes, the old lady who’s losing it, the doolally one who thinks the Germans are coming.’
‘Of course. Come on in. You’ve missed Sam. He’s already gone to school.’
‘I see plenty of him, it’s you that I need a photo of to remind me what you look like.’
Guilt rushed through me. ‘Sorry. It’s been a bit…’ I stopped. I couldn’t tell her how bad it really was, though sometimes I ached for the days when all three of us squashed on the couch in her flat in front of Deal or No Deal, Sam’s legs across our knees, taking it in turns to imagine what we’d do if we won the top prize.
Mum always said the same. ‘I don’t want anything, but I’d like to see you and Sam set up somewhere of your own. Just enough to know when I peg out you’ll be all right. And maybe a nice bloke for you, Mags.’
And then we’d tease her about having one foot in the grave before she was even sixty. She’d tickle Sam and although we could hear Mr Emerson shuffling across the floor upstairs and the louts kicking the bins downstairs, I was happy. I belonged.
So I couldn’t tell her now I’d achieved her dream, even without Noel Edmonds’ help, it wasn’t all that. I was finding it hard to meet her eye. Mum had perfected the ‘nowhere to hide’ stare.
‘Any chance of a cup of tea?’ She didn’t take off her coat or march in and bung on the kettle like she normally would.
‘Are you keeping your coat on?’
‘Didn’t dare take it off in case I made the place look untidy,’ she said.
‘Don’t be silly. Give it here.’
I grabbed her coat and bustled her through to the kitchen. She looked around, her gaze settling on the new coffee machine in the corner. Nico had bought it, an all-singing, all-dancing, grind your own beans chrome monster: ‘Sold a couple of those deluxe summer houses this week and a couple of ride-on lawnmowers, so I’m having a little celebration.’ I knew it had cost nearly as much as the rent on Mum’s flat for a month. And while she wouldn’t know the prices of gadgets designed to ‘make coffee just like the Italians do’, she wasn’t stupid either.
I forced a laugh. ‘Yep, that’s Nico’s new toy. You know what a fusspot he is about his coffee. Do you want to try some?’
‘If you’ve got time.’
My shoulders sagged. ‘I’ve always got time for you, Mum.’
My eyes started to prickle. Mum usually breezed in, full of stories about the people she looked after, but today she seemed out of sorts. With hook and eye carnage upstairs, Nico barely speaking, never mind Francesca, Mum huffing and puffing might just about finish me off.
‘I’m sorry I haven’t been round. It’s been a bit full on here, sorting out the workshop and getting the business up and running again.’
Mum brightened. ‘Is it finished? Can I see it?’
I switched on the coffee grinder to give me a second to think. ‘It’s nearly there. I’ll invite you round for the great unveiling.’
Mum would have known how to get Francesca onside, even in the face of the disappearing keepsake saga. She always had the right word for everyone. Even the hard-nut hoodies on the estate stepped back to let her pass, elbowed each other out of the way and curbed the worst of their language when Mum went striding by with her cheery ‘Hello, my lovelies’ as though they were all dolled up in Scout uniform, offering to pick up litter and wash cars.
But as her only daughter, the single receptacle of all her modest dreams and ambitions, I couldn’t make myself utter the words, ‘This marriage lark is not all it’s cracked up to be.’ I didn’t even want to admit to myself that Francesca hated me so much she’d deliberately ruined something really precious to me.
I finished making the coffee, watching her resist the temptation to look at the bottom of the mug to see what make it was. I smiled. ‘Have you had a car boot sale lately?’
Mum clapped her hands. ‘You know that funny little stool that was in the corner of the lounge with the plant on it? Some old boy bought it for fifteen quid last Saturday. Gave half of it to Sam towards a new pair of goalie gloves.’