Cherry Blossom Dreams (13 page)

‘Yeah – well, he’s hoping it won’t come to that.’

‘You know, you and Zack could always just come to the party. You could have a look round for Monty at the same time.’

‘No, thanks. I don’t intend to be anywhere near the place when you get caught and Mum and Leo go ballistic! Though it’s going to be quite cool seeing the looks on their faces when they find out
you’re
the one responsible and not me!’

Before I could even respond we heard the front door open.

‘Granny!’ I went through to the hall, where she was taking off her coat. ‘What did you think of Blossom House? Did Mum show you the box?’

‘What?’ She looked a bit dazed.

‘Blossom House? You just went to see it, didn’t you?’

‘Oh, yes, it was … it was …’ She seemed to forget my question before she’d even answered it. ‘Actually I’m rather tired. I think I’ll go straight to bed.’

I looked quizzically at Sean as Granny moved slowly up the stairs, looking as if all the energy had been drained out of her.

‘What is it with Granny and Blossom House?’ I murmured.

Sean just shrugged, clearly a lot less intrigued by the situation than I was. And if I’d expected Mum to throw some light on the matter when
she
came home twenty minutes later, I was wrong. It turned out Mum was totally anxious for a different reason. I’d completely forgotten that tomorrow was the Big Lunch. At long last Granny and Leo were going to meet – and Mum was already panicking about it.

That night it took me ages to get to sleep, and on Saturday morning I woke up filled with anxiety and excitement. Lily started sending me texts before I’d even got out of bed, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to concentrate fully on preparing for the party until I’d made it through lunch with Leo and Granny.

I also had to hope that Sean and Zack found that snake in time – not that Lily thought a snake on the loose was a good enough reason to cancel our party. It was just that I’d rather not have to worry about Monty making an appearance in addition to everything else.

Mum was worked up too, though of course she didn’t know anything about what I was planning for this evening. All
she
was thinking about was lunch.

‘Maybe I should have booked something a bit more formal,’ she said with a worried frown when Granny was upstairs getting dressed. ‘But I know Granny likes the pasta there and –’

‘The pizza place is fine, Mum,’ I reassured her swiftly.

‘Yeah, Mum, pizza’s a great idea,’ Sean agreed, adding with a grin, ‘If it was a steakhouse there’d be way too many sharp knives!’

Mum glared at him. ‘Carry on like that and you can stay at home. This is very stressful, Sean. There’s nothing to joke about.’

‘Come on, Mum. You need to chill out,’ Sean said impatiently. ‘Do some deep breathing or something.’

‘Yes, Mum. It might help,’ I agreed.

‘Just watch where you do it,’ Sean warned. ‘You don’t want Granny tripping over you and nearly breaking her ankle like she did that time when you were meditating on the kitchen floor.’

‘Poor Mum,’ I murmured after she’d gone upstairs to meditate in her bedroom. ‘She’s really worrying about this.’

‘Yeah,’ Sean agreed. ‘She needs to loosen up. I mean, at the end of the day, Granny will still be on her side whether she stays with Leo or not. Granny just wants to make sure Mum’s not about to do something stupid, that’s all.’

‘Yeah, Granny’s just trying to protect the three of us as usual,’ I agreed.

We were both thoughtful for a few seconds before turning to face each other. ‘Poor Leo,’ we both said at once.

Granny was unusually quiet when she eventually came downstairs, but I quickly dismissed the idea that she could be worrying about meeting Leo. Though she might have been mentally compiling her list of interrogation questions for him.

Sean had already left the house to meet Zack for their last-ditch mission to rescue Monty, and Mum had just finished her meditation session, which seemed to have calmed her down.

Trying to draw my grandmother out a bit, I asked her, ‘Granny, did Mum show you that old trunk we found in the shed at Blossom House the other day?’

There was a momentary pause before Granny replied stiffly, ‘I believe she mentioned it, but I had no desire to go traipsing through all that long grass and weeds to look at some old box.’

‘I asked Miranda what she knows about it,’ Mum told me, as she passed Granny the butter for her toast. ‘It turns out it belonged to the old lady’s husband. And guess what? He was a magician too!’ She turned to Granny. ‘No wonder that box reminds me of Dad’s! Miranda says the old lady was his assistant as well as his wife. Apparently she was really tiny and a bit of a contortionist, so she was very good at fitting inside small spaces –’

Suddenly Granny clanked her knife down on her plate and demanded, ‘Annabel, are you
deliberately
trying to upset me?’

‘What?’ Mum looked surprised. ‘What on earth do you mean?’

Granny narrowed her eyes and announced that she intended to get the first train home after lunch.

‘What? But Leo’s planning to take us out this afternoon!’ Mum protested. Leo had arranged a trip to a nearby stately home where the cakes are to die for.

‘I shall meet the boy at lunchtime and that will be quite enough time spent together for both of us, I should think,’ Granny replied briskly.

Now it was Mum whose eyes became slats. ‘Leo’s not a “boy”, Mother!’

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, Annabel, don’t be so touchy! I’d love to hear what the two of you call
me
behind my back.
Your
trouble is you take everything far too personally!’

‘Oh yes?’ Mum retorted angrily. ‘Well, what about you?
You
seemed to take it pretty personally when I was talking about some other magician having a wife who actually
supported
him! You were always so mean about Dad’s job!’

At that point you could have heard a pin dropping on our kitchen floor.

I gaped at Mum.

‘Yes, well … I think I’ll just go upstairs and pack now,’ Granny said a little shakily.

As Granny left the kitchen I turned to Mum and gave her a stern look.

‘Well, it’s
true
!’ Mum said defensively. ‘Your grandpa loved his job. And he was good at it too. He really made me believe in magic.’ Mum stopped and I saw that her eyes had filled with tears. ‘You know … I was away travelling with your dad when your grandpa died. I couldn’t even get back for the funeral. And then when I got home, all his stuff was gone. She didn’t even wait to see if I wanted anything …’

‘Maybe she couldn’t stand seeing all his things around her when he wasn’t ever coming back,’ I said, trying to console her with the first thing I could think of. Though I had to admit what Granny had done did sound a bit mean. I’d never really thought before about how Mum still missed her dad, whereas Granny seemed to want to forget that he’d ever existed.

Frankly, I was beginning to think I didn’t understand my family at all.

At a quarter past one Sean and I were waiting inside the pizza place with Leo. My brother and Zack had spent the morning searching Blossom House for Monty to no avail. Now our minds were on the next challenge of the day.

Or ‘Granny versus Leo’
,
as Sean had dubbed it.

‘I’m starving,’ Sean muttered as he stood up to go and inspect the salad bar.

I went with him.

‘Might have known Granny would keep him waiting,’ Sean said as he prodded the potato salad with the serving spoon.

‘He’s dressed like it’s a school day,’ I pointed out as I glanced back at our table, where Leo was sitting rigidly with his eyes glued to the door.

‘I know. He could do with losing the tie,’ Sean agreed. ‘He looks like he’s here for a job interview.’

‘Poor thing, he’s really nervous,’ I murmured.

‘Yeah,’ Sean agreed and there was something in his voice that almost sounded disappointed. ‘You’d think he’d be a bit … well, braver … wouldn’t you? I mean, he stood up to Mr Jamieson that time when he bawled him out for wearing trainers to school after he broke his toe. You’d think he could handle Granny!’

‘Oh well … she’s not here yet,’ I said, trying to sound more confident than I felt. That’s when I saw what my brother was doing. ‘Sean, don’t,’ I warned him, but as usual he ignored me.

You see, whenever we go anywhere with one of those fill-up-your-own-plate buffet systems, Sean sees it as a personal challenge to cram as much food as possible on to his plate. The challenge also includes making it back to our table without spilling anything. He’d failed on that point the last time and the lady at the next table to ours had ended up with her handbag covered in coleslaw. His behaviour really embarrassed Mum (and me) but no matter how cross Mum gets each time, she can’t seem to make him stop doing it.

Today Sean had piled up an absolute mountain of food on to his plate and I closed my eyes and sent up a prayer as he set off across the room with the precariously arranged salad stuff looking fit to topple off at any moment.

‘Ta-dah!’ he announced proudly as he placed the loaded plate down on our table without mishap. It was heaped with pasta salad, rice salad, bean salad, potato salad, coleslaw and just about everything else at the salad bar except for any actual green stuff. He saw Leo’s shocked expression and laughed.

‘You know what that looks like?’ I told my brother in disgust. ‘Like the slops container after school dinners.’

Sean just kept laughing.

Just then our waiter arrived with the garlic bread Leo had ordered for us to munch on while we were waiting. Sean was about to dig in – he loves garlic bread – when Leo’s hand shot out to grab my brother’s wrist.

‘You can have some after you’ve eaten all of that,’ he told him, pointing at the grotesque mountain of salad which we all knew my brother had no intention of actually finishing.

I think Sean thought Leo was joking at first.

‘Come on, Leo! There’s no need to start acting like Granny! She’s not going to like you any better for it!’ he teased.

Leo remained sombre, raising a finger at him like he was telling off a young child. ‘You don’t deliberately waste food.’

Sean immediately went on the defensive. ‘Especially not if
you’re
the one buying it, I suppose? Well, Mum said
she
was going to pay for lunch, so you don’t have to worry!’

‘Sean, shut up,’ I hissed at him.

Leo was looking angrily at my brother. ‘Sean, do you ever watch the news? Because I can’t believe you’re completely unaware of what goes on in other parts of the world … the
developing
world, for example …’

My brother instantly looked uncomfortable. I mean it was easy to see where Leo was going with this.

‘
You don’t deliberately waste food
,’ Leo repeated just as sternly as when he’d said it the first time. He paused for a moment, giving Sean a searching look. ‘Do you?’

Sean didn’t answer him.

‘Do you?’ Leo repeated, glaring at my brother.

Sean looked like he was finding it hard to swallow.

And right at that moment Granny and Mum arrived.

Leo jumped up straight away and started shaking Granny’s hand as Mum did the introductions and apologised for being late.

Granny sat down next to me and immediately started to stare at Leo like she was examining an item in a shop, trying to decide whether or not it was worth buying. I could see Leo beginning to go a bit pink under her scrutiny.

I winced as Sean dug his fork a bit too vigorously into the food mountain on his plate and accidentally dislodged the entire potato salad section, which tumbled half on to the table and half into my brother’s lap. I saw him glance warily at Leo, and I saw Granny noticing the glance.

Mum suddenly shoved back her chair saying she needed to use the ladies’ room. That was typical of Mum – opting out as soon as the going got tough. I felt a bit cross with her as I watched her leave the table. After all, this had to be way more difficult for Leo than it was for her. I mean,
she
wasn’t the one being inspected by Granny.

Suddenly Sean whispered to Leo, ‘I’m sorry.’

Leo nodded. ‘Eat half of it,’ he said quietly.

‘OK.’ Sean was looking relieved.

That’s when I noticed the expression on Granny’s face changing slightly. There was a flicker of surprise as she looked at Sean, then Leo, then back again, as if she was reassessing something or other. Then she reached out and helped herself to garlic bread. ‘So … Leo … I see you’ve started lunch without us. You young people and your appetites, I don’t know!’

‘We were starving, Granny,’ Sean protested. ‘We’ve been waiting ages for you!’

Granny eyed my brother with amusement. ‘Well, at least you weren’t allowed to starve for
too
long, Sean.’ She turned back to Leo. ‘I must say it’s good to know that you’re experienced when it comes to dealing with children, Leo. Though I should think it must be extremely difficult to keep discipline when you’re so close to your pupils in age, mustn’t it?’

I gaped at her. What was she trying to do?

‘Um, well, I don’t think that’s really a problem, thank goodness,’ Leo said with a forced smile.