The Things I Know(52)

‘Charming. Bloody charming!’ Mrs Potts shook her head and emptied the bottle into her glass. ‘And where, if you don’t mind me asking, are you thinking of staying?’

Thomasina stared at Grayson, wondering what came next and already casting her mind as to where she might go and whether it would be possible for him to go with her.

‘Well, I was hoping that, if it was all right with you, I could sleep here, but if that’s too cheeky then I can go and find a hotel.’

She watched the woman consider this, knocking back the wine as she eyed her up, slipping further and further down in her chair until she looked positively slumped and could barely keep her eyes open. She now roused herself enough, however, to continue shouting, albeit with less coherency.

‘You can stay if y’like. There’s a blow-up bed of his dad’s somewhere. He was an arsehole! What an arsehole! Walked out on us, he did, like we was nothing . . . Chucked away, no longer wanted! Just up and went, without so much as a by-your-leave! Snuck out in the dead of night! Coward. You heard the like of it?’ She drained her glass again. ‘He left me and the boy – just went!’ she shouted, slurring her words. ‘Bastard!’

Thomasina snuck Grayson a look and closed her eyes in a slow blink, knowing that to hear his dad spoken about in such terms could not be easy.

‘Well, how lucky was Grayson to have you, staying put and looking after him. You must have been both a mum and a dad to him.’

‘I was!’ His mum suddenly beamed, clearly delighted by the compliment. ‘I am!’

‘Well, there we go.’ Thomasina sipped the wine again and pulled a face at Grayson as the less than palatable brew clung to her tongue.

‘So, what d’you want to talk to him about? What do you want to tell . . . to tell him?’ Mrs Potts hiccupped.

‘Oh, lots of things,’ Thomasina began. ‘I wanted to tell him about one of my chickens.’

His mum slapped the arm of her chair. ‘A chicken?’

‘Yep, Daphne, one of my hens – a chicken.’

‘To eat?’ Mrs Potts screwed her face up.

Thomasina shook her head. ‘No, not to eat. I had to bury her. In the car park of the pub. She was killed by my cousin Emery.’

‘Oh no!’ Grayson spoke with a tone of sorrow, as if he knew how much this would mean to her, and she was glad.

‘Yes, I’m afraid so.’ She smiled sweetly at him over the rim of her glass, trying to be brave, and the look of understanding he gave her was enough to make her heart flex. All she wanted was to remove herself from this pantomime and lie in his arms while he quietly held her tight.

‘You took a chicken to the pub?’ his mum shouted.

‘Yes.’ Even she snickered at the absurdity of the statement.

‘His dad was an arsehole!’ Mrs Potts yelled, as if Thomasina’s tale was of no interest and she was desperate to get her message across.



Thomasina stood next to Grayson and the two cleaned their teeth. It felt lovely, performing this intimate task side by side. She sat on the edge of the bathtub while he changed into his striped pyjamas, and they acted without embarrassment, as if they’d been doing this for years.

‘I’m sorry about Daphne,’ he whispered. ‘I know how much she meant to you, that pretty little hen.’

‘Thank you.’ She swallowed the lump in her throat.

She glanced at Mrs Potts as she crossed the narrow hallway, his mum now snoring noisily in her chair, head back and slack-mouthed.

‘Should we move her into her room?’ She looked to Grayson for guidance, concerned for the woman’s welfare. ‘I can help you, if you like.’

He made a kind of tsk sound and shook his head. ‘She does this most nights. She’ll be okay. She’s never still there in the morning.’

Thomasina understood that this was normality for him and slipped into his room, closing the door behind her.

‘You’re right, this is a very small bedroom.’

‘With a very small bed.’ They both looked at the narrow mattress.

‘Well, I seem to remember, not so many nights ago, we fell asleep on a rug on the side of a river in the dark. We should consider a bed a rare treat. No matter how small.’ She thought about that wonderful, wonderful night.

‘I guess. I couldn’t imagine you being here, not when I compared it to that lovely room at Waycott Farm.’

‘And yet here I am.’ She shrugged.

‘Yes, here you are. I can’t believe it.’

‘When I saw my little Daphne dead, I just wanted to see you. I knew you’d get it, how awful it is.’ She bit her bottom lip. ‘Although I felt a lot better the moment I set out for London. I feel brave.’

‘You are brave. And it is awful, about Daphne.’ He was silent for a second or two in reverence.

‘Your mum, she seems . . . Is she . . .’

‘She’s an alcoholic,’ he interjected. ‘I don’t know why I didn’t tell you. Actually, I do know,’ he corrected himself. ‘I shied away from it because when she’s drunk she’s unpleasant and when she isn’t drunk she’s marginally less unpleasant.’

‘It can’t be easy for you.’ She leaned back on a walnut-coloured chest of drawers.

‘I’m used to it.’ He picked at a loose thread on the collar of his pyjamas.