LITMIR.BIZ

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I thought I knew pretty much everything), I would have liked to have been as firm as she was with the love of my life.

      I could see her now, coming in, but decided to duck from her until I’d got rid of Dad. Watching her in silhouette I was struck by how old she looked; my dad just looked like a jolly, chubby, balding, middle-aged man, of which there are approximately ten million in Britain; good yeoman stock. My mother was painfully thin for her age – I was always trying to get her into milkshakes because of that brittle bone thing – and walked as if she was in pain. If you looked closely she was beginning to get a hunchback. Once your world is cracked open, you can’t go back, I think. She never could. I can barely remember the carefree, normal way me and my mother used to relate when I was a teenager – normally, with sulks and huffs and slamming doors. I didn’t behave very well either. But now, she was more like a housebound grandmother, and she trusted nothing.

      God, Tashy was brilliant back then. I couldn’t decide which was worse: losing my dad or losing Clell. In fact, I was so wrapped up in my own misery, I was hardly there for my mum at all, something I will never forgive myself for. Tash and I had a grand tearing-up of Clelland’s letters (which I still read anyway; he was having a great time. I only ever got three, ’cos I couldn’t reply to any of them. What with? ‘Dear Clelland. My life is shit. Love Flora?). I got my head down and got out as quickly as I could, and I’d been trying my best to have fun ever since. Looking at Ol, I wasn’t sure it was working.

      It was a bad age for me. I thought it was because nobody could ever love me that I would always be alone. After all, if you love only two men, and they both leave at the same time, it doesn’t bode well.

      There’s a reason we never forget our first loves, as Tashy has patiently pointed out to me many, many times. Our young little hormone-seething bodies have never felt anything like this before. Your brain doesn’t know what’s happening to it. After the first one, at least you’ve got some forewarning of the triple whammy that’s going to happen to your head, your heart and your groin. You understand what is going on, even if that doesn’t give you much more power over it than you have at sixteen.

      And, as has also been noted, if your first love kisses you hard on the lips then disappears (or goes to Aberdeen – technically the same thing), and travels all over the place in the holidays, and then you go to Bristol, it’s hard to get a proper handle on the whole deal. You haven’t watched them grow fat or old, or watched them mess things up or, heaven forbid, stayed with them and watched the infatuation curdle. And as you grow up and learn the inevitable compromises of real love, it’s hard not to remember the unlined face and innocent excitement, especially if you think the other person might feel the same.

      Or, of course, even remember you that well.

      We were standing to watch the speeches. Oh God, Max, no, please.

      ‘Why is a woman like a computer?’ he began ponderously, and there was a palpable shift in the audience as everyone prepared themselves to laugh at something that wouldn’t be in the slightest bit funny.

      ‘You can turn it on whenever you like …’

      Clelland kept sneaking glances at me standing beside him, and – I couldn’t help it – I was curious too.

      ‘Three-and-a-half-inch floppies …’ droned Max.

      ‘I thought it was you!’ said my mother, loud and too bright. She appeared from nowhere, with too much powder on, looking nervous.

      ‘I’m your daughter,’ I said rather sharply. ‘Who could you mistake me for?’

      ‘Goodness, I don’t mean that. I just meant … where were you? I was worried.’

      She looked around anxiously. I did too, instinctively checking where Dad was. She started to quiver if he got too close.

      ‘Just chatting to people,’ I said. I didn’t want to reintroduce Clelland to her. I’d spent enough emotional time with my mother; I didn’t like her getting upset over me.

      ‘All right. Well, don’t go too far, will you, darling? I hardly know anybody here. I can’t think why Tashy invited me. All these young people!’

      ‘Don’t be silly, Mum. You know Tashy’s mum and dad!’ In fact, Jean chose that moment to put her hand up and wave. ‘There you go!’

      ‘But they’re the parents,’ my mother said as if talking to an idiot. ‘They’re very busy at weddings. Well, so I hear. Who knows, eh?’

      I’d been waiting for the first one of these. I was amazed it had taken so long. I realised Clelland was close enough to hear every word of this.

      ‘Erm, yeah, Mum.’

      ‘You and that lovely chap. So good together. And you’ve been together so long! You must be next. Oh yes, there’ll be a wedding soon for us, I think. Darling, think about it! It’ll be such fun! We can do it all together.’ And she tapped my arm in what she clearly thought was a reassuring manner. I saw Clelland raise his eyebrows.

      ‘Ah! There you are, Olly! Hello, darling! It’s Mummy!’

      Unlike my father, my mother adores Olly and, it has to be said, he’s very good to her. I think he does know that because I don’t have any brothers he’s the only man in my mother’s life at all apart from the postman, and so he treats her well. She is a bit – well, very – clingy.

      This ‘call me Mummy’ stuff has to stop, though. It really has to stop.

      ‘Hello, Mummy,’ said Ol, bending down and giving her a hug. I think perhaps what annoys me most is that sometimes I think Olly gets on with my mother probably better than I do. And vice versa. I often think they’d probably do better on their own.

      My mother turned round. ‘I won’t say a word, dear!’ she mouthed to me.

      Clelland leaned over. ‘Aren’t you going to reintroduce me to “Mummy”?’ he said, with a glint in his eye.

      ‘She probably didn’t recognise you,’ I said. ‘What with all the disappearing and everything.’

      ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘You. Disappearing. To Aberdeen. Remember?’

      He started. ‘I remember you not replying to any of my letters.’

      ‘It was a busy summer.’

      ‘Damn right,’ he said, and looked annoyed.

      ‘… goes down on you,’ said Max.

      ‘So you’re getting married?’

      I shrugged. ‘God, no … I mean, I might, I haven’t decided …’

      ‘Hasn’t he asked you?’

      ‘That’s not the point.’

      ‘Are you going to force him into it against his will?’ he smiled.

      ‘Only if I really, really have to. And just with guns and dogs and things, nothing major.’

      ‘I’m sure you won’t have to. You should get married.’

      ‘And what makes you the great authority?’ I asked, panicking suddenly.

      Why was I panicking? This was ridiculous. And anyway, he wasn’t wearing a ring: I’d checked.

      ‘I’m thinking about it.’

      ‘Oh, yes? Who’s the lucky girl? Haggis McBaggis, famous fisher lady of Aberdeen?’

      ‘Hello,’ said a beautiful dark-haired girl, suddenly appearing out of nowhere.

      ‘Who’s this?’

      ‘Well, she fishes,’ Clelland says, ‘but only for compliments. This is Madeleine.’

      ‘What are you saying about me?’ the girl said. ‘Ignore him, he’s unbelievably rude.’

      ‘See?’ said Clelland.

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