The Silent Wife(100)
Today though, Anna was on her big-family-gathering best behaviour, snapping open her bag and handing out tubes of Baci chocolates to Francesca and Sam.
She hesitated, then passed me a little box, wrapped in the sort of paper that cost three quid a sheet. ‘Happy birthday, Maggie.’
Mum raised her eyebrows at me, Parker-speak for ‘That looks like it cost a bomb’.
I was fairly confident it wasn’t a garden gnome to match the one Mum had bought me: ‘I couldn’t resist him. As soon as I saw him, I thought of your new garden.’
I wasn’t sure what had made me laugh the most – the fact that Mum had spotted a gnome playing an accordion and somehow seen it as a must-have feature for our patio or Nico’s face when I opened it. I bet he was bloody delighted that, after all those evenings he’d spent clearing weeds, training a clematis over an archway and faffing about with pots to ‘draw the eye at the right level’, my mum had taken one look and thought, ‘What this place needs is a gnome.’
I picked carefully at the Sellotape, sensing Mum hovering, ready to stash the poppy-print paper to reuse another time.
Inside the box lay an antique silver and sapphire pendant. ‘It’s gorgeous, Anna. Thank you so much.’
She smiled. ‘It belonged to my mother. It was always a sadness to her that I didn’t have a daughter, but I know she would want you to have it.’
Tears pricked. I gave her a full-blown Parker hug. She accepted it rather than embraced it, but the fact that I even dared risk disturbing her scarf was such a huge step forward from when I first joined the Farinelli family.
But with the tact typical of a thirteen-year-old, Sam failed to disguise his lack of interest in Anna’s big ‘You have been accepted into our family’ gesture and butted into my thanks with a ‘Can I bring the cake out now?’ He was like a steam engine that needed a regular shovelling in of fuel. At least his rubbish father had served one purpose: Sam was already a good few inches taller than Mum and me and showed every sign of inheriting his dad’s slim frame. At my lack of resistance, he went running up the steps to our cottage. Anna did a quiet tut in deference to my birthday but that little telltale click of her tongue was still audible. I had failed to fall in with the Farinelli rules about eating – refusing to peel apples, finishing dinner with a big mug of milky coffee and never feeling the need to mop up sauce with a piece of bread. Hence I didn’t give a hoot that the kids would hoover up my birthday cake before we’d had a barbecue. Sausages, burgers, chocolate cake… it all went down the same way regardless of scoffing order.
I watched Sam go, glancing over at Nico grinning away, a man at peace with the world. These days he’d lost the tense look he used to have, no longer braced for bad news or another problem to resolve.
He leaned over and squeezed my hand, whispering, ‘Grow old with me, the best is yet to come.’
I wasn’t really into fridge magnet romance but since we’d moved into a home we’d chosen together, I’d finally stopped expecting him to realise there was a thinner, prettier, smarter wife hiding round the corner ready to do a better job than me. When I’d suggested my plan for this evening, he’d blown out his cheeks in surprise. ‘Crikey. That will make it a birthday to remember.’
‘Do you think I’m mad?’
He’d laughed, kissed my nose and said, ‘No. I think you’re kind-hearted and brave.’ He paused. ‘And sometimes a little over-optimistic. Which is all part of your wonderful charm.’
And now there was no going back. Despite my belief it would all turn out fine, I was jittering about, counting napkins and straightening forks as though it might make a difference to the outcome.
Although Anna had softened towards all of us in the wake of her perfect son turning out to be a complete shit, she hadn’t quite lost her desire to get the room to skip to her needs and wants. When Sam appeared with the chocolatey tower he’d made with Mum, she threw her hands in the air and said, ‘My goodness. Are you going to eat that before dinner?’
Mum got up to light the candles. She acted as though Anna was a small buzzing noise in the corner of a room that no one could identify. I took the stance of ‘It’s my birthday and it’s cake before carrots if it suits me.’
I nudged Nico. ‘Where’s Francesca?’
He got to his feet. I put out my hand. ‘I’ll go. Just hold the cake pyrotechnics for a minute. Let me see if she wants to join in.’
When we moved to Moneypenny Cottage – or as Sam called it ‘The James Bond Love Shack’ – the happy new start Nico and I imagined away from the bad memories of Siena Avenue wasn’t quite the party-popping triumph we’d hoped for. Francesca turned in on herself, acting as though she was a guest who’d overstayed her welcome but didn’t have anywhere else to go. None of her old posters made it up onto her bedroom walls. In fact, the general skankiness that had driven me mad in the old house – dirty plates, piles of clean clothes mixed with discarded underwear, make-up spilt on the carpet – had given way to a clinical and impersonal bedroom, despite us offering to take her shopping for a new lamp, duvet set and rug.
On the upside, she was no longer downright rude to me. I couldn’t deny it was a pleasure to be able to whip out the Bisto without being told that Caitlin made her flipping gravy with the chicken juices and flour. And she’d never brought up the flaming jewellery box again. In fact, Francesca was so furious about Caitlin having an affair with Massimo, she never mentioned her at all.