Size Matters (29 page)

‘Hello Jay. Been a long time, hasn't it?' Delphine stepped back slightly to inspect her, brazenly looking her up and down, taking in, Jay imagined, every inch
gained over the years, every last ounce, every frizzing, grizzling hair. Was she, Jay wondered, about to tell her she was a lot less than all right?

‘You look really well.' Delphine decided, smiling. ‘But where's Mum?'

‘Chiropodist! Didn't you know?'

‘
Chiropodist
?' Delphine laughed. ‘Her only daughter comes home after ten years on the other side of the world and she's gone to have her bunions trimmed?'

‘Corns filed, actually, but yes, I'm afraid she has. It was unmissable, apparently,' Jay told her. ‘Come on, let me push the trolley. The car's through here.'

‘You look just the same, apart from the hair. Suits you short,' she remarked to Delphine as they loaded the baggage into the back of the Golf.

‘You don't look the same,' Delphine said. ‘You look . . .'

‘Older? Fatter? Well I am. So are you. It's what happens.'

‘I was going to say, softer,' Delphine told her, climbing into the passenger seat. ‘But I see you're as bristly as ever.'

Oh don't start, Jay thought, switching on the car engine, or it's going to be a very long few weeks.

‘So you met Charles, then,' Delphine went on as they got under way. ‘What did you think?'

Ah, a tricky one. What could she say? Very nice for a pimp? Unfair, that. Jay negotiated the selection of roundabouts at Hatton Cross and concentrated on getting into the right lane at the lights.

‘We had an excellent lunch for him,' she said eventually. ‘He was very good company, very easy to geton with. How . . . how did the two of you actually meet?'

‘Thought you'd have asked him that,' Delphine said. ‘Obvious question, really.'

She was right, it was, and of course she, or possibly April, had asked him. She had a feeling that Delphine already knew this.

‘We met at a dinner and dance in Perth. Charles was there with some friends.'

‘I didn't know people still had dinner dances. It sounds like one of those Masonic ladies' nights that Win used to go to.'

A bit of a time warp, that, she thought, remembering Win getting togged up in sparkling finery a couple of times a year to go to what she called a ‘do'. She always used to get Audrey to come round, ostensibly to stitch up a bit of hem or advise her about jewellery, but April had said it was just to show off. Then she'd sweep out of the front door with her escort, trailing a fur stole that she boasted was mink but Delphine, playing on her cousins' love of felines, told them was actually Abyssinian cat.

‘It wasn't Masonic. It was the Perth Latin American Society Ball. I'd been giving a tango seminar in the city.'

‘A . . . what?'

‘I've been a dance teacher for the past five years. Didn't you know?'

Jay laughed, ‘I'm surprised I didn't. Win still does that thing she does when she talks about you.'

‘Oh heavens, does she? Not the old “my
Delphine
”? You'd think I was still twelve!'

‘I suppose it's just a mother thing. Most of them do it. I expect I will, and then Imogen in her turn,' Jay said, contemplating the idea of laid-back Moggie turning into a version of her great-aunt Win.

‘A mother thing? I wouldn't know,' Delphine said. Jay bit her lip.

Delphine had been only in her early thirties and not long married for the second time when she'd gone to
live in Australia with Bill-the-boozer. There was so much about her that Jay no longer knew, such as had it been a sadness, or not, that she had no children? As the car pulled up at the house, she wondered if they would now become close enough for things like this to come out. One thing she suddenly remembered as she parked, switched off and opened the door, was that Delphine used to sneeze in the presence of cats.
Not
good timing then to have acquired a new, attention-needing kitten.

‘I brought a cake. One I made this morning,' Win announced immediately as Jay let her and Audrey in through the front door later that afternoon. ‘I didn't think
you'd
have made one,' she added, peering past Jay to see if there were unexpected telltale signs of baking – flour scattered across the floor possibly, viscous eggshells all over the worktop, a searing smell of burning perhaps. She looked satisfied to have been proved right.

‘That's kind of you. Delphine's upstairs, having a shower and a bit of a lie-down. I'll give her a shout.'

‘She'll be very jet-lagged,' Win told Ellie, who had arrived from school minutes ahead of her aunt and grandmother. ‘It stayed with me for weeks after I got back last time I went over there,' she said, sitting down on the kitchen sofa and stretching out her legs, rotating her ankles as if she was remembering being on the plane and doing her anti-thrombosis exercises.

Delphine followed Jay down the stairs. She'd already unpacked, showered and was now dressed in sleek black trousers and a soft pink cashmere sweater. How had she managed, Jay wondered, to have not a single crease in an outfit that was straight from a suitcase? Had she packed each item with tissue paper or sneaked in a travel iron?

‘You look amazingly unruffled,' she commented to her.

‘I hung it all up in the bathroom while I was showering,' Delphine told her. ‘Works every time. Got to smarten up to face Mum, you know what she's like . . .' Delphine said, taking a deep breath as they approached the kitchen.

‘I don't know why you didn't come to stay with me. I've got a lovely spare room you know,' Win started in as soon as the greetings were over.

Delphine grinned past her mother towards Jay. ‘I thought I should stay with my matron of honour,' she said. ‘We've got outfits to co-ordinate.'

‘I could have done that. I'm your mother. And I'm good at hats,' Win sniffed, helping herself to a second slice of her own lemon drizzle cake.

‘I know but . . .'

‘Well it's true we've got shopping to do.' Jay came up with an instant brainwave. ‘And we're not just staying here, I'm taking Delphine to a spa for a bit of pre-wedding pampering,' she told them, ‘The weekend before the big day.' She glanced at Delphine, who looked relieved at this solution.

‘Suits me. And also I've got to go to the apartment and do some sorting out as well, and Jay's helping me with that. So you see . . .'

‘Yes I see.' Win sighed, surrendering all hope of her spare room being occupied by anyone other than her own fat poodle. ‘Still, at least you're here, and in one piece. You're looking very well, I must say. Not spreading into middle age yet, like Jay has,' Win commented, surveying her daughter with satisfaction.

Audrey looked at the ceiling and tutted. ‘Win, you've no manners have you?' she told her sister. ‘And when someone's travelled twelve thousand miles, do they really want to discuss what shape everyone is?'

‘I'm only saying,' Win went on, ‘that Jay was getting quite plump. You've lost a bit of weight lately, haven't you dear? You're almost looking quite trim these days, compared.'

‘Yes, you do look quite well,' Delphine said, sounding unflatteringly surprised. ‘Though I must share with you one sure-fire tip for your shape:
side-fastening
trousers.'

You were supposed to say thank you for comments like that, Jay conceded as she felt Win and Delphine and Audrey staring at her hips. Somewhere in the midst of that lot you were supposed to sift out a compliment. She tried very hard, but failed to interpret anything but the negative. All that calorie-counting, all that carbohydrate avoidance. Right now she wondered if it had all been worth it.

‘It's only going to be a small affair. Just our family plus Charles's best man,' Delphine told Jay as they pulled into the lane beside Harrods and waited their turn in the car-park queue. ‘But all the same, I want it to
look
right. I know just the colour I want you to wear.'

‘But surely . . .' Jay began, for about the fortieth time. She didn't get any further. She never did. This time it was because it was their turn in the queue and she had to climb out of the car, hand her keys over to the attendant and drag out her handbag from under the seat. Delphine climbed out of the passenger door, clutching her own, much larger, handbag containing the essential pieces of fabric for which a co-ordinating outfit had to be tracked down for Jay.

It was going reasonably well, so far. Delphine had only upset Greg once, commenting that now he was older, surely it was time to move on to less dramatic tastes in household decor. ‘You'd find adding a selection of soft furnishings very
soothing
,' she'd told him,
as if all the glass, chrome and steel in the house represented an overlengthy attachment to juvenilia, as suspect as if he was still hanging onto posters of the Bay City Rollers.

‘I don't want to be
soothed
,' he'd replied, patiently but aping her tone. ‘If I want to be
soothed
I'll have a large Scotch and soda, thank you very much.'

Jay had stepped in here, fast, diverting Delphine by taking her upstairs for another look at the bridal outfit. Delphine had brought with her from Australia a loose, lacy coat in a sort of bricky pink, with a matching sleeveless dress underneath. The price of it almost took Jay's breath away and she wished she thought it as stunning as its cost deserved. Instead, she only just managed to stop herself saying that it rather reminded her of the late Queen Mother. So Delphine, she could see, was still dressing older than her years. As a child she'd preferred nice neat skirts and blouses to jeans and T-shirts, then there'd been the Jackie Kennedy teen phase. Jay had assumed she'd now have sort of caught up with herself and in middle age have landed in a clothes realm where she'd always been comfortable. And yet, even now, she seemed to want to be looking ahead to the next generation. Another few years and the going-away outfit she'd be shopping for would be the one she planned to wear in her coffin.

‘So you see,' Delphine explained to Jay about the colour, ‘that's why I want you in something peach. It'll
tone
.' Oh it would, that was undeniable. But not, in Jay's opinion, attractively.

‘But shouldn't it be the bride in the lighter colour?' she'd suggested, brightly, thinking it would be quite useful to get something in a rich cocoa brown, perhaps with, if Delphine insisted, peachy accessories. But no. It had, for some deep reason, to be a particular pinky, orangey, pale peach.

‘You'll look like . . .' Imogen had started.

‘. . . a trifle,' Jay had finished for her. ‘Yes I know, Barbara has already pointed this out and found it hilarious, thank you very much.'

‘Well the two of you together will, definitely,' Imogen agreed. She'd even, brave girl, said the same to Delphine, who had simply looked at her in a chill way and said, ‘Don't be silly.'

At least the cats weren't causing any problems. ‘I'm not allergic to short-haired pedigree cats,' Delphine had declared. ‘Only cross-breeds. Burmese have very fine fur and don't shed much of it.'

It was a difficult season to buy for. Late spring could be as freezing as February or as flaming as June. Delphine stalked ahead of Jay through the Harrods halls of designer wear, occasionally flicking a rail or two here and there and tutting at what she saw.

‘Should have brought you something from home,' she said, dismissing with a sniff the top-flight couturiers of all Europe. Eventually, Jay persuaded her to go along to Harvey Nichols and guided her surreptitiously in the direction of the Ghost concession.

‘They're doing the colour you're looking for this season,' she told Delphine. ‘I happen to know. Let's just see if there's anything . . .'

And, oh joy, there was. Jay tried on a selection of peachy dresses and jackets till she found the perfect (to her) combination of bias-cut dress and an embroidered jacket that nipped in and out at the waist and had delicate fluted sleeves. For choice, she'd have gone for the dress in a less pound-enhancing colour but Delphine liked it though she tweaked and twitched at the fabric, hauled up the hem that trailed almost to the floor and deplored her cousin's shortness, plumpness and general lack of posture.

‘It's being a cleaner,' Delphine said loudly. ‘All
that stooping with a mop.' The assistant, who'd been counting on a sale, tittered and went to help another customer, leaving the two women squaring up to each other in the changing room.

‘What's wrong with cleaning?' Jay demanded.

‘Nothing! Don't get in an egg about it!' Delphine said. ‘All I mean is . . . I know exactly what you need. Quick, get changed. You need to try this on with Magic Pants. We'll go get some.' Jay hauled the clothes off, handed them to Delphine who told the assistant to keep them for her, and allowed herself to be hustled down to the underwear department.

‘We're supposed to go to Agent Provocateur,' she told Delphine, reminded of Charles's knicker request. Or did he want Delphine in a velvet basque? Or a pearly thong like a . . . lap dancer. Don't even go there, she thought, as Delphine pointed her in the direction of some decidedly
non
-exotic pants.

‘I've got plenty of fancy underwear already, thanks,' Delphine said, rifling through a rack of big, functional knickers.

‘There! That's what you need under that dress!' she declared, hauling out her choice. ‘They'll take pounds off. It'll make all the difference. Buy at least two pairs.'

Well it was worth a shot, Jay thought, though she did wonder where the flesh actually
went
. Would it squelch over the top of the pants, or squidge unappealingly out beneath the legs? Or did it go inwards, pressing against her internal organs so that she absolutely wouldn't be able to eat? If that was how they worked perhaps she should wear them all the time. Leaving no room for a fully functioning digestive system would certainly solve the problem of how much to eat. Putting even a tiny morsel of sustenance into her mouth would simply be out of the question.