Kitabı oxu: «The Holiday Swap»

Chapter 2 – Daisy. White elephants

‘Bloody hell, I needed that.’ Jimmy wiped the froth from his mouth with the back of his hand, put his pint glass down on the table and raised an eyebrow at Daisy before scrummaging about in his pockets. ‘There you go.’

It was a box. An enormous, blue, scary box. Well, it was tiny, actually. As in ring-size tiny. But inescapable. It was that white elephant in the room. Daisy understood now why they called it that. You couldn’t actually not look at it.

Her stomach lurched. Not the fluttery feeling of anticipation that she sometimes felt when Jimmy started to slowly unbutton her shirt and his fingertips brushed her skin, it was more like the feeling of fear when Barney took off with her and she was wondering how the hell she was going to stop him before they ploughed through a group of unsuspecting picnickers. That heart-in-the-mouth moment before she knew for sure if he was going to slam the brakes on, spin round, or launch his huge body into the air and go for it.

It hadn’t been her imagination, or dodgy hearing because her bobble hat was pulled down over her ears. He had said the words that had made her nearly amputate her fingertips with a liberal wrapping of plastic twine.

We should get hitched.

She took a gulp of lager and glanced round, hoping nobody was looking at them, but knowing that she was probably just about to hit the number one slot for gossip-worthy news.

‘How about it then, Daisy, are you up to the job of making an honest man of me?’

His Adam’s apple bobbed nervously and there was a sheen of anxious perspiration across his brow. Not a look she associated with the solid, dependable, and slightly cocky man she more often than not shared a bed with. She wanted to throw her arms round him, reassure him, and scream with delight, like they did in the films. But it wasn’t happening. All she could force out was a wobbly mad-woman laugh.

‘Come on.’ His grin was all lopsided. Why, oh why couldn’t she grab the box? ‘You’re making me nervous here, put me out of my misery.’ He lifted the lid, encouraging a positive response.

‘Oh Jimmy.’ She put one finger out, not quite daring to touch the diamond that she should have been desperate to see. ‘It’s lovely, you’re lovely, wonderful.’ Oh God, she was sounding like a bad greetings card, and she was going to cry. It suddenly hit her, and her stomach lurched as she looked at the ring, the words that had automatically tumbled out of her mouth summed it up. That was the thing. She thought he was ‘lovely’, which maybe wasn’t quite the same as being madly in love in an ‘I want to marry you kind of way’. ‘It’s just a shock. I didn’t expect…’

‘To be honest,’ the look had turned to bashful Retriever now, ‘I know we’ve always kept it casual.’

Yeah, thought Daisy. At the start, Jimmy had always been the one to say it was daft to get too involved; he didn’t like commitment of any kind. Not even the kind that meant he’d agree to accompany her to the wedding of one of her best mates. And, to be honest, she realised now that it suited her; it had worked. She’d soon moved on from that crazy-crush elation because the cheeky Jimmy had noticed her as a teenager (which was rather a long time ago now) to the realisation that maybe they weren’t a match made in heaven. They were comfortable. In a few years’ time maybe they’d be too comfortable. Oh God, surely when you agreed to marry a man, your toes should still be curling up and your skin prickling all over when he kissed you?

But she still liked him, loved him in a best-buddy way. Now she felt two steps behind him, when he was finally saying he was ready to commit it all seemed a bit surreal. A bit too late – if he’d said this a couple of years ago she might well have leapt into his arms and a life of washing his clothes and wandering down to the local every night.

‘It was my old man that put me up to this, actually.’ He really was looking sheepish, and something inside Daisy rose up in suspicion.

‘Your dad?’ Since when did his father turn Cupid? Romantic proposals were so not the image she had of his dad. Not that this was turning out to be particularly romantic, so far.

‘He asked when I was going to get my finger out and give him some grandkids; told me to get on with it while he was still young enough to kick a football.’

‘Let’s get this straight. It was your dad’s idea? Your dad told you to ask me?’

‘Well, yeah, but then I got to thinking. I mean, why not? We love each other.’

This was going from bad to worse. She had thought maybe they did. But now he’d made her actually think about it, she was wavering. She loved him in the way she loved Mabel, Barney, her best mate Anna, her parents, her chickens (well at least her favourite chicken)… but did she love him? As in big heart, forever together. He was cute, he was kind. He chopped wood like a trouper. He knew just the right way to rub her aching feet. He hardly complained at all when she watched ‘Love Actually’ for the twenty-third time. He still loved her even when she was wearing a fleece with holes in and didn’t have any make-up on.

They had matching Christmas jumpers. He loved Mabel.

So why was she messing about? It could be perfect. Was it just some stupid unrealistic romantic notion that she wanted to be swept off her feet – not be asked the question in the middle of a field as she wrapped twine round a gatepost, almost like it was an afterthought.

She’d been watching too many rom-coms, read too many happy-ever-afters. This was real life. In real life you were happy, compatible, had known each other since you were knee- high to a grasshopper, as Grandad used to say.

In fact, this probably was how Grandad and Grandma had made the decision.

They were comfortable. Like two old slippers rubbing together.

Oh Gawd, she didn’t want to be an old slipper. Not yet.

The groan started to come out of her mouth and she did her best to change it into a non-committal squeak of what could have been mild interest. Or a pig sound.

Jimmy was not deterred. ‘I can just give my place up, daft me wasting money on rent. I’ll move in with you, and we might even be able to afford to tell Hugo to piss off.’

She didn’t want to tell Hugo to piss off, even though he could be irritating. She wasn’t really sure she was ready to let Jimmy move into the little cottage, her little cottage.

They seemed to be skipping from infatuation (on her part), to slippers-and-pipe comfortable, without doing the madly-in-love bit in the middle.

Surely there should be one of those, even for her?

‘I can help, you know, mend fences to keep that Houdini horse in,’ he gave a reassuring smile, ‘I know how hard it is for you to keep on top of that place, and I’m not always there, but I can be. So, what do you say? February wedding before I get busy on the fields?’

February! He was giving her deadlines now. She spluttered up the mouthful of lager. ‘There’s no need to rush into this is there?’ And gave a weak smile.

He could move in. Live there. With her. Instead of just spending the odd night at hers, losing odd socks under the bed, leaving the loo seat up, and emptying the milk carton, he could do it all the time. With all his socks. His socks would be happy – paired off. They could fall asleep in front of the TV together (him and her, not the socks) every night. She could cook his dinner while he mended things. They could do couple-things.

All the time.

Forever. Never set foot outside of Tippermere, never meet anybody new. Live on roast dinners and apple pie for the rest of their lives. Okay she was pushing it a bit there. They could go to the restaurants in Kitterly Heath, or rather she could. Jimmy was quite happy doing the same thing day in day out. He didn’t want to explore, he didn’t want excitement, oh God, he just didn’t have any of the dreams she did.

She perched on the edge of her seat. That was it. She’d got it, he didn’t share her dreams, he was happy with what he’d got and deep inside she thought, hoped, that one day she’d find a little bit more.

She really did feel queasy now. No way could she say that, it would be more shocking than the proposal, and it had only just occurred to her. And she’d sound deranged if she said it. He’d set off some weird kind of chain reaction inside her.

But he was nice. And maybe nobody would share her mad dreams, well not a man. Maybe this was all there was. She slumped back.

‘Go on then, say it.’ The pint glass stopped, halfway up to his mouth as he realised that her open mouth wasn’t signalling a delighted yes. ‘Daisy? Say something, please, I’m beginning to feel a bit of a dick.’ His gaze darted round, furtively checking out for listeners-in.

‘It’s just,’ putting her hands under her thighs and shuffling down so nobody could see her didn’t seem to be helping, ‘I’m not quite ready to be thinking about grandkids for your dad, and…’ It was one thing him feeling a bit of a dick, she was beginning to feel a real cow.

‘Oh. Silly me.’ The glass went down with a clunk and he snapped the box shut, and then it was engulfed by his large hand. He stared at the table and his whole body seemed to close down, block her out.

She could prise his fingers open. Declare undying love. Give up on everything but him.

‘Jimmy, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…’ Daisy put her hand over his; the rough, weathered hand she was so fond of. If she was clear in her own head what she meant, this would be easier to explain. ‘You’ve just caught me… you mean a lot to me, you know that.’ Lame, that was so lame.

‘Sure,’ the box disappeared back into the inner packet of his waxed jacket, ‘want another beer?’

‘I just need a bit of time to get used to the idea. I’m in shock.’

‘You shouldn’t need a bit of time, Dais.’

‘I didn’t expect…’ If she’d had a warning, then she would have talked herself round.

He gave a weary sigh, then stood up. ‘I thought you’d be pleased. It’s what women want, isn’t it?’

She’d ignore the bit where he’d just lumped her in with half the population. ‘It’s just, well, sometimes I think I haven’t actually lived, you know done things.’ There were ways to say this without sounding loopy. ‘I, we, shouldn’t settle down yet. I’m too young.’

‘Young? Lots of people get married younger than us; look at my brother Andy.’

Oh yes, randy Andy, who was intent on giving the Tippermere population a boost single-handed.

‘And what do you mean you haven’t done things? Like what? You do lots of stuff. It’s that Anna, isn’t it?’

‘What is that supposed to mean, it’s Anna?’

‘Well you’re always chatting to her.’ He towered over her, beginning to look belligerent. ‘She’s told you I’m not good enough for you.’

‘That’s just not fair, Jimmy and you know it. I like Anna, she’s my friend, but I can make my own mind up about what’s right for me.’ Anna did think she could do better. Younger. More exciting. ‘And she’s never said you’re not good enough for me.’ Well, she had never actually said it in so many words.

‘Well, she’s the one that’s told you you’ve not lived.’

‘Well, actually it was you that just said I needed to lighten up, have a bit of fun.’ But he did actually have a point about Anna. She had told Daisy more than once that she needed to get a life (as in one that didn’t centre round a grumpy horse, her naughty dog Mabel, and Jimmy), but it wasn’t Anna’s voice in her head. In fact it wasn’t a voice at all, it was her heart pounding so hard it was echoing in her ears, something deep inside screaming out Help!

Jimmy’s mouth twisted stubbornly. ‘I meant we needed to get out more.’

‘You mean come to the pub more often.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with coming here for a pint now and then, or isn’t it good enough for you now?’

‘I didn’t say there was anything wrong. But maybe you’re right,’ switching it back to him had to help, concentrate on the positive Mum always said, ‘I do need to lighten up and get out more. I mean I used to have all these dreams about walking barefoot on some beach in Greece, or riding in the Canadian Rockies, or …’

‘Or swimming with dolphins. Yeah, yeah, just like in those daft magazines you read. Daisy, that’s all crap, real people like us don’t do stuff like that, you just read about it.’

‘Anna does.’

He scowled. ‘People like us don’t go hang-gliding, or jumping off cliffs or whatever it is. We’re happy as we are.’ He paused, the killer pause. ‘I bet your parents never did stuff like that.’

Bull’s-eye. She didn’t want to be like her parents, even though she loved them. They’d spent their lives tied to a farm; milking cows and cutting crops. Making hay between showers. ‘No, but I want to.’ What had he unleashed? An hour ago, before he’d asked her to marry him, she’d thought she’d been more than happy with Mabel and Barney, with him. With mucking out stables, hacking down the lanes, shampooing and clipping dogs, with being Daisy.

Now she was insisting she wanted to jump off cliffs. Which she didn’t want to do at all. Ever. She hated standing on the edge of anything, even a high wall. And the dolphin thing was a no-no. It had taken a very patient teacher and a lot of swimming lessons before she’d been able to splash her way across the width of the local swimming baths still clutching a float, mewling like a drowning kitten.

‘Right.’ He folded his arms, confidence returning. ‘Tell you what then, you spend December doing whatever these things are.’

‘December!’

He ignored the interruption. ‘I’ll wait, then we can announce it at Christmas. Go on, you get on with it, go and do things. Then you can come back home, eh?’

He could have added ‘when you’ve come to your senses’, but he didn’t. She could see it in his eyes though.

‘But I can’t do much in December, it’s too cold, and I’ve no time to plan, I—’

‘Daisy, be fair.’ He looked her in the eye, an earnest frown on his normally happy face. ‘You can’t just expect me to hang around for ever while you think about doing stuff. If it’s that important to you, then get on and do it. Unless it’s just an excuse, and what you’re really trying to do is tell me to sod off?’ He cocked his head on one side, and the normal twinkle wasn’t in his eyes.

‘Of course I’m not, Jimmy, we have a great time, it’s just…’

‘I’ll get that drink.’

They had another beer. He dropped her off home.

‘Do you really, really want to get married?’

‘I’ve asked you now, Dais. I can’t exactly un-ask, can I?’

Daisy crashed onto the sofa and didn’t object when her Irish Wolfhound Mabel climbed onto to her lap. ‘Why did he have to ask?’

Mabel didn’t answer, just flopped sideways so that her back legs dangled over the edge. Whatever happened, it meant things had changed between them forever. They couldn’t just go back to how they’d been.

‘Oh Mabel, what am I going to do?’ The dog wiggled her eyebrows, then rested her hairy chin on her paws and gave a heavy sigh. ‘He’s right. He’s blown it now. You can’t un-ask a question like that, can you?’ And you couldn’t announce an engagement when your fiancée-to-be hadn’t said yes, could you? ‘I need to talk to Anna.’

***

Anna kicked her Ugg boots off, pushed Mabel’s tail out of the way, and plonked herself down on the sofa – stretching her feet out towards the fire. Still clutching her bottle of wine. ‘Come on then, spill.’

Wriggling her way out from underneath the front end of Mabel, Daisy wondered what on earth she was supposed to add. Her text to Anna had said it all, and rather succinctly, she’d thought. Jimmy proposed, what the hell do I do now?

‘There isn’t exactly anything else to spill. I’ll get some wine glasses and a corkscrew.’

‘So you are sure he actually meant to propose, Daisy? He wasn’t just mucking around?’

‘He had a ring.’

‘Wow, I didn’t know he could be that organised. Did it fit? Did it have a huge diamond?’

‘I didn’t try it on, that would have been weird.’ She daren’t even touch it.

‘A ring is kind of, er, conclusive. Shit.’

‘I didn’t think he wanted to get married.’ Jimmy didn’t do surprises, and he didn’t do organised. He was just Jimmy.

‘But you love him, don’t you?’

‘I thought I did.’ Daisy looked glumly at Anna. This was what people waited their whole lives for, wasn’t it? Falling in love, being proposed to. Nest-building. Having children. Growing old together. Oh bugger, she’d just written off her whole life.

‘I take it from the look on your face that you’ve worked out you don’t.’

‘Well, I am very fond of him.’ Yuk, what kind of a word was ‘fond’?

‘Daisy! You either do love the man or you don’t.’

‘It’s not that simple. I mean I do, really, really like him. We get on.’ Which was enough for some people. She loved him, they were compatible, had reasonable sex (even if the headboard didn’t bang as much these days), they shared a sense of humour, they got on. She loved him like she loved Mabel and Barney (but obviously it was platonic with them).

She’d always just assumed they’d carry on together. As they were. Without a ring. With separate homes. Have fun. It wasn’t that she was expecting some man to sweep her off her feet; sexual frisson seemed to have largely passed her by. Which was fine, but did she really want to deny herself the possibility of ever having it? To give up on the hope of even the smallest fizz?

‘What are you thinking about? You’ve got a weird look on your face.’ Anna was peering at her, one eyebrow raised.

No way was she going to say sex, or excitement, or thrills. She’d never hear the last of that. ‘Nothing.’ She wriggled, pretty unconvincing then, even to her own ears. ‘Jimmy is great, but,’ she’d moved on to squirming, which was better, ‘it’s not that I’m not grateful.’

‘You’re not supposed to be grateful, you idiot, you’re supposed to be excited.’

But she wasn’t. That was the problem.

She covered her face with her hands. ‘I ignored him the first time he asked.’

Anna laughed. ‘That is so mean.’ Then she frowned. ‘And it’s not like you at all.’

Daisy peeped through her fingers. ‘Well he mumbled, and I was busy tying the gate together and I thought maybe I’d misheard.’

‘You hoped you had, you mean. So you made him ask again, twice, and then said no! Oh, poor Jimmy.’

‘Shush, I didn’t mean it, and I didn’t say no. Oh, Anna, the second I saw the ring I just felt… oh God, this sounds awful.’

‘Spit it out then.’ Anna was looking more intrigued by the second. ‘This is better than an episode of EastEnders.’

‘If you’re not going to take me seriously, then I’m not going to talk about it.’

‘I am. Honest, cross my heart.’

‘I just felt,’ if she said it quickly it might not sound as bad as it did in her head, ‘is this it? Is this all there is?’

Anna giggled. ‘Sounds like a song,’ and she started singing.

‘This is my life, Anna.’

‘Another song.’

‘Sod off, it’s not funny. What the fuck am I supposed to do now?’

‘Well, you’re sounding a bit philosophical even for you – is this all there is? – roll on death and maggots eating your rotting corpse.’

‘I didn’t mean that, you know I didn’t. It’s just…’ She gazed out of the window into the blackness, but knew that in the morning the beautiful rolling hills that she did love would be there.

She had Mabel, she had her horse. It should be enough; she should be satisfied.

‘Spit it out then, Dais.’

‘Well, I haven’t been anywhere.’

‘And you haven’t shagged anybody else? Is this what it’s really about?’

Everybody in the village knew that Daisy had never fallen in love with a playground buddy. She’d never sneaked fags or kisses behind the bike shed, she’d just been Daisy. Then Daisy had left school and turned into Daisy and Jimmy.

‘I’m not talking about shagging.’

‘So? Can’t this dog go on the floor?’

‘She’s asleep, don’t be mean. Look, you went on proper holidays when you were a kid, didn’t you?’ Daisy said, slightly accusingly, at Anna, feeling like she wasn’t being taken seriously. ‘All we ever got was a week in a caravan in Tenby, cos Dad had to get back to the cows.’ And the chickens, and the hay-making. She sighed. ‘Not that there’s anything wrong with Tenby. But we were supposed to go to France once, then there was a ferry strike. Dad said what will be will be and never tried again.’

Anna topped up the wine glasses. ‘So you’ve never even been to France?’ Daisy shook her head. ‘Or Spain?’

‘Nope.’

‘Greece? Italy?’

‘Now you’re being silly.’

‘Isle of Wight?’

‘You’re making me feel worse now, not better. I thought friends were supposed to help. I did go to Cornwall once.’

‘Well it’s a start, it used to be a separate country didn’t it?’

‘Dad was competing with a prize heifer in the Royal show. We were only there for two days.’

‘Okay, better than nothing I suppose. Just. Won’t Jimmy take you somewhere, you know, if you get married? You could have a blow-out honeymoon.’

‘He’s like Dad, he likes what he knows.’ Daisy sighed. She’d actually always liked that side of him, until it had come to the crunch. She knew where she stood with Jimmy, he was like a comfortable old fleece – the one you always grabbed. ‘He did go to Ibiza with Andy and the gang for a stag do, but that was it, and he kept saying how glad he was to be home.’

‘He is nice though, Jimmy. You do get on.’

‘My whole life is nice, Anna, that’s the problem and I hadn’t really thought about it properly until he asked.’ Had her cornered, more like. ‘But I do love him,’ maybe more in the old-fleece than mad-passion way, ‘and all this.’ She waved expansively to take in the cottage and everything outside. The world as she knew it. ‘But I just sometimes get this feeling that if I’m not careful I’ll miss out on a whole load of stuff.’

‘Like?’

‘I don’t know. Everything. I’m being daft, aren’t I? This should be enough. I should just know he’s the one for me.’

Anne grinned. ‘How should I know? Miss Footloose and Fancy-free, that’s me, but,’ the smile slipped, ‘you know what, girl? Maybe you need to sow some wild oats,’ Daisy rolled her eyes, ‘well not shag around or anything, but get away from Cheshire. I sometimes envy you, you’ve got everything while I’m just dashing round wasting my life, so I’m not going to hand out advice. But maybe you just need to get out there, go somewhere.’ She shrugged. ‘Then you’ll appreciate Jimmy and all this, or,’ she grinned, ‘never come back.’

‘I’d never not come back,’ Daisy protested, ‘it’s my home.’ She peered at Anna over her glass. ‘I could go away though, couldn’t I?’ Actually go somewhere, rather than just think about doing it.

‘You could. And you’ve got a deadline, so we need to come up with a plan, book flights to exotic locations.’

‘Anna!’

‘He’s given you an ultimatum, Dais, and it’s the best thing that could have happened to you. You can’t put it off – you either live a bit, or,’ she paused, and this time did look up, ‘or you give Jimmy an answer now.’

‘You know I’m not going to do that.’ She stared at Anna. She was right. It was her chance to actually do something.

‘If you stay here before you know it Jimmy will have moved in,’ she picked up one of Jimmy’s socks off the chair next to her and wrinkled her nose, then flung it in the air – it hit Mabel on the head, ‘and you’ll be married and have a brood of Jim and Jemima’s.’

‘He said you’ve got until Christmas,’ Anna’s voice softened, which was dangerous, so Daisy concentrated, ‘I know you’re still not sure, and you’ve got to be. This could be the most important decision you’ve ever made in your whole life.’

‘I’ll be fine. I’m perfectly capable of making my own decision.’

Anna sighed. ‘I’m not having a dig, it’s just you’ve kind of settled into middle-aged bliss without doing the bit before. You said yourself that you didn’t want to end up like your mum, giving everything up and becoming a farmer’s wife.’

‘I don’t.’

‘Well at least she had stuff to decide to give up, didn’t she?’

‘I think she had a pretty high-powered job, though she doesn’t say much. She used to fly all over the world.’

‘Exactly, and what have you done, Daisy Fischer? You said yourself that you’ve never been abroad. Let’s face it, you hardly ever get more than fifteen miles from Tippermere.’

‘Okay, I’m hopeless. Can we leave me alone now and talk about the weather?’

‘You’re not hopeless; you just need to take this opportunity.’

‘I am going to. I just need to think, decide what I really want to do, where I want to go.’ No way was she going to let Anna book her a ticket to Bangkok, or wherever she had in mind. But she was going to do this. It was just a case of deciding what ‘this’ was.

‘Now you’re talking. The world is your oyster.’

Not that she’d ever even had an oyster. ‘But who do I go with? I don’t know anybody but you.’

‘Well actually, it would be better if you went with yourself, just you, Daisy. Otherwise you won’t see anything and you certainly won’t meet,’ Anna’s eyes were positively gleaming with fun, ‘anybody. But I’ve got a better idea.’

‘What?’ Daisy really didn’t like that look in her friend’s eye.

‘I’ll tell you tomorrow, when I’ve done some checking. Come on, drink up, I’ve got another bottle of wine in my bag.’

Daisy groaned. Anna knew she was a pushover after two glasses of wine, she’d agree to anything.