The Mother-in-Law(5)

I tell Ollie’s family the story (minus the dream), my arms spinning around me as I talk quickly and without a pause, as I tend to do when I get nervous. Tom is positively enraptured at the storytelling, patting his son on the back at intervals as I talk.

“So tell me about . . . all of you,” I say, when I’ve run out of steam.

“Nettie is the finance manager at MartinHoldsworth,” Tom says, proud as punch. “Runs a whole department.”

“And what about you, Patrick?” I ask.

“I run a bookkeeping business,” Patrick says. “It’s small now, but we’ll expand with time.”

“So tell me about your parents, Lucy,” Diana jumps in. “What do they do?”

“My dad was a university professor. Retired now. And my mother’s passed away. Breast cancer.” It’s been seventeen years, so talking about it is uncomfortable rather than upsetting. Mostly the discomfort is for other people, who, upon hearing this news, have to figure out something to say.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Tom says, his booming voice bringing a palpable steadiness to the room.

“I lost my own mother a few years back,” Patrick says. “You never get over it.”

“You never do,” I agree, feeling a sudden kinship with Patrick. “But to answer your question, Diana, my mum was a stay-at-home mother. And before that, a primary schoolteacher.”

I always feel proud to tell people she was a teacher. Since her death, countless people have told me what a wonderful teacher she was, how she would have done anything for her students. It seems a waste that she never went back to it, even after I started school myself.

“Why bother having a child, if you’re not going to stick around and enjoy her?” she used to say, which is kind of funny since she wasn’t able to stick around and enjoy me anyway, dying when I was thirteen.

“Her name was . . .” I start at the same time as Diana stands. We all stop talking and follow her with our eyes. For the first time, I understand the term matriarch, and the power of being one.

“Right then,” she says. “I think dinner will be ready, if everyone would like to move to the table.”

And with that, the conversation about my mother seems to be over.

We have roast lamb for dinner. Diana prepares and serves it up herself. Given the size of their house I almost expected caterers to show up, but this part of the evening, at least, is comfortable and familiar.

“I was so impressed to hear about your charity,” I say, once Diana is finally sitting rather than serving. “Ollie is so proud of you, he talks about it to anyone who’ll listen.”

Diana smiles vaguely in my direction, reaching for the cauliflower cheese. “Does he?”

“You’d better believe it. I’d love to hear more about it.”

Diana spoons some cauliflower onto her plate, focusing intently on the transaction as if she was performing surgery. “Oh? What would you like to hear?”

“Well . . .” I feel under the spotlight suddenly. “I guess . . . what gave you the idea to start it? How did it get off the ground?”

Diana shrugs. “I just saw the need. It’s not rocket science, collecting baby goods.”

“She’s humble.” Tom pushes more lamb onto his fork, still chewing what’s in his mouth. He shoves the forkful into his mouth and keeps talking. “It’s her Catholic upbringing.”

“How did you two meet?” I ask, realizing that Ollie has never told me this.

“They met at the movies,” Nettie says. “Dad saw Mum across the foyer and sparks flew.”

Tom and Diana exchange a glance. There is affection in their gaze but something else too, something I can’t quite place.

“What can I say? I knew right away that she was the one. Diana wasn’t like anyone else that I knew. She was . . . smarter. More interesting. Out of my league, I thought.”

“Mum came from a well-to-do family,” Nettie explains. “Middle class, Catholic. Dad was a country boy, no connections, no money. Nothing but the shirt on his back.”

I take a moment to undo the unconscious conclusion I’d come to the moment I walked into the house—that Diana had married Tom for his money. It’s a sexist thought, but not a ridiculous conclusion to come to, seeing the disparity in their looks. The fact that she’d married him for love raises Diana a few notches in my opinion.

“And how about you, Diana,” I ask. “Did you just know?”

“Course she did!” Tom says, framing his face in his hands. “How could you not, seeing this face?”

Everyone laughs.

“Actually I’ve been trying to tell him I’m not interested for thirty-five years but he just keeps speaking over the top of me,” Diana says wryly. She and Tom exchange a smile.

After her earlier formality, it’s nice to see this side of her. I allow myself to hope that once we’ve spent some more time together, she’ll let me into this inner sanctum of hers. Maybe one day I’ll even start helping her with her charity? Diana might not be the easiest nut to crack, but I’d get there. Before long, we would be the best of friends.

I was thirteen when my mother, Joy, died. Mum was aptly named—always having fun, never taking herself too seriously. She wore kerchiefs and dangly earrings, and she sang loudly in the car when the radio played a song she liked. At my birthday parties, she came in fancy dress, even though none of the other adults did, and she had a pair of tap shoes that she liked to wear from time to time, even though she’d never learned how to tap.