‘Floraaaaa!’ Ailish came tottering round the table and gave her a hug. ‘Hiii-yiiii! How are you?’
Ailish always wore heels. In her bare feet she’d have been about five foot nothing. Her hair was streaked blonde and cut in a feathered crop, her eyes carefully made up in purples and greys as if to match the kitchen. In fact, this was possible. She had a small mouth and nose and slightly upward-slanting eyes all close together in the middle of her face. Neil called her the Toxic Chipmunk.
‘How about this weather?!’
This was a dig at Flora’s suggestion, when Ailish had first mooted the idea of a May barbeque, that it was a bit risky.
‘I know!’ Flora beamed back at her. ‘Perfect! We haven’t even brought the umbrellas I had lined up!’
‘I think May often is the best month in Scotland, isn’t it?’
Mia grabbed Beckie’s hand and they ran to the door and out into the sun.
Flora wanted to run after them, to pull Beckie back inside.
Neil thought her reservations about Mia were ridiculous. And they probably were. Mia was no doubt just what she seemed – a funny, rather naughty little girl who had no real malice in her. A girl who loved playing outside and using her imagination, who loved creating all sorts of worlds to run around and get grubby in.
It was ridiculous, to jump to conclusions about Mia being a bad influence on their daughter and being responsible for what Beckie had done to Edith, when Mia didn’t even go to the same school; and neither one of them, as Neil had pointed out, had ever witnessed Mia being unkind to another child. To ban Beckie from seeing her best friend, for no good reason, would probably just make things worse.
Neil was right.
Annoyingly, he usually was.
But Flora couldn’t help worrying about what Mia might do, unsupervised, when there were no adults watching. She was Ailish’s niece, after all – and, let’s face it, she was basically feral.
She set the Tupperware container with her mini-quiches on the worktop. The table was shabby-chic-ed to within an inch of its life, all vintage china and pastel plates and scented candles in moulded green glass holders.
Neil was standing staring around him as if he’d just landed on another planet.
‘Iain and the boys are out there’ – Ailish waved a hand at the open door – ‘burning a range of meats he hunted down last night in Tesco.’ She had a high, little-girl voice. ‘They could probably do with another of the tribe to stand looking at it while it burns to a crisp.’ Giggle.
Men Are So Funny And Hopeless was one of the themes of The Chipmunk Show, as Neil called Ailish’s Facebook posts, and no doubt there’d be some photos up there tonight of Iain grinning hopelessly at a charred burger.
Neil scuttled outside. Not that he’d relish the prospect of two hours with ‘Iain and the boys’, but anything was presumably preferable to this.
And he’d be able to keep an eye on Beckie out there.
‘Take a pew,’ said Ailish.
At least the coffee was always good. Flora glugged it and shovelled up macarons amidst the giggles and shrieks as Ailish held court, relating the latest outrage perpetrated by her ex-sister-in-law, Mia’s mother, who had an important role as the villain ‘She’ on The Chipmunk Show. It seemed She had thrown away the tap shoes and unitard Ailish had bought Mia a fortnight ago, last time Mia had been staying. Mia usually stayed with Ailish and family rather than with her father, Ailish’s hopeless brother, on the weekends on which he was supposed to have her.
And now She was refusing to take Mia to tap dancing classes.
Marianne: ‘Why do people like Her even have children, if they can’t be bothered with them?’
The faces round the table were flushed, bright-eyed, eager. A pack turning on their prey. A mob at a witch’s trial.
It was what Ailish did. What women like her had always done. She’s strange, She’s weird, She’s a freak. Compare and contrast Her with amazing Me.
It was at times like this that she most missed Pam. Her old life. Ruth’s life.
‘I could sort of understand it if Mia was running around going to a load of other activities, if taking her to tap once a week was going to be a problem because She couldn’t fit it into their packed schedule. But the only organised activity She can be bothered taking Mia to is blooming rock climbing!’
Intakes of breath and pained faces.
‘It’s like She really is trying to turn her into Arya Stark. Next Christmas it’ll be a sword called Needle! Stick ’em with the pointy end!’
Flora felt a shiver go right down her body, from shoulders to thighs.
No.
No.
This was just Ailish being Ailish.
She had to try to keep a sense of perspective here. What would Pam have said?
Pam would no doubt have agreed with Neil that Mia’s mum was doing a great job, giving Mia a free-range, old-fashioned childhood, letting her play outside with her friends most days after school in their village, not caring if she got muddy or ripped her clothes, and resisting all the pressure there was these days to do so many organised activities that there was no room left for kids to do their own thing and use their imaginations.
And Pam would probably also have agreed that Mia was good for Beckie, who might come back from playing with her with a graze on her hand or a cut on her chin, but bubbling with excitement as she related their latest adventure.
But surely Pam, as a mother, would see the dangers that Neil couldn’t?
Flora was going to have to speak to Neil again. Insist that she really wasn’t happy about Beckie playing with Mia unless they were closely supervised.
‘I – actually, I did a bit of rock climbing myself as a kid,’ admitted Katie, flushing. ‘It’s meant to be good for… for coordination and suppleness…’
‘Well, maybe if it’s properly organised and safe,’ Ailish conceded. ‘On one of those indoor walls or whatever. But the place She takes her is just some Clampit’s farm. Probably not even certified or licensed or anything – it’s just this farmer who’s got a quarry on his land and has decided to make a fast buck by getting a load of kids dangling off it on ropes.’
‘You know,’ said Katie, flushing all the more, ‘I sometimes think we wrap them in cotton wool to an extent that’s – in its way – more of a problem than letting them take some risks.’
Ailish looked at Katie as if she’d just suggested they take their offspring to the nearest motorway and turn them loose on the hard shoulder.
But Katie, for once, wasn’t backing down. ‘Like we did when we were their age – going out playing on our own and getting into scrapes… climbing a drainpipe, or being chased by the parkie, or swimming in a river… Never did us any harm. Quite the opposite.’
‘Maybe you were lucky,’ said Flora, and she couldn’t quite keep the edge from her voice.
Ailish looked at her.
She hastily invented: ‘A boy… in my class at school… this boy, he was drowned in a river. A group of boys were messing around one lunchtime, and he drowned.’
Ailish raised her eyebrows. ‘Were you there?’
Flora could feel her face flushing. Her heart pumping. ‘Not when it happened, but… I was in the playground when the other boys came running back, soaking wet and crying, and… I’ve never liked being in the water since. I think that’s why Beckie doesn’t like swimming – she’s probably picked up my feelings about it.’