The Bluebird Café (10 page)

‘So this is how love and passion are meant to end up,' said Abigail as they piled on to the coach. ‘Quick! Get the back seat!'

‘But the service was lovely,' said Lucy. She saw that Teague was wearing muddy desert boots. Paul looked pretty smart in comparison.

‘We should have brought a hip flask,' said Paul.

‘I did. Here.' Teague had it inside his jacket.

‘They assured me that the pigeons would be out of here!' The bride's mother was fuming. The tythe barn's resident pigeons had guanoed on the top table's tablecloth and flown off with some devils on horseback. It took three hours to get from the church to the watercress soup (conveniently served cold). Lucy realised that she had used the wrong spoon for her soup. She surreptitiously wiped it on her napkin and put it back with her pudding fork. It was all downhill from there.

‘Did you know that seventy per cent of married couples met at other people's weddings?' Teague told her.

‘Seventy per cent – no way!'

‘Studies have been done.'

‘No, that's ridiculous. Seventy per cent have
been
to
weddings
maybe.' They looked around the room and then at each other
and then at Abigail and Paul who were laughing at something. The pigeons probably.

Finally, pretty little net bags of sugared almonds arrived on their plates.

‘What the hell are these?' Teague picked his up as though it was an artefact, a find, and examined it.

‘Sugared almonds,' Lucy told him. ‘You're meant to keep it, or take it home anyway. Men don't always get them. A sort of going-home present, sort of good luck. They're called Bridal Flavours.'

‘An amulet against getting hitched like this,' said Teague. ‘Or a fertility symbol or offering, perhaps.'

Abigail looked sad. ‘Well, some of it's lovely,' she said.

‘This pink nylon net of sweets?' Teague was incredulous. ‘Think of the waste of the world's resources. The unnecessary squandering. The petrol burned to get all of these people here. The money they've wasted on all of these never-to-be-worn-again hats and clothes, that stack of presents. That white dress she's wearing must have cost a few grand. And what for?'

‘Actually, it was made by a Women's Fair Trade Cooperative in Central America and provided a year's income for a whole village,' said Abigail.

‘Seventy per cent of the country's economy pivots on weddings,' said Lucy. ‘Studies have been done. Didn't you know?'

‘I don't suppose Teague and I'll be getting married like this,' Abigail's reflection told Lucy's as they washed their hands. There were little baskets of pot-pourri, peach and apricot, and dispensers of M&S hand lotion between each sink. Nobody nicked them. The speeches were over and the dancing had begun.

‘We'd never be able to afford it. And I'd feel silly asking my parents if they'd pay for me to dress up as a cake. They thought they got me off their hands when I was eighteen.'

‘I would quite like to get married though.'

‘Mmm.'

‘I don't know why.'

‘Who said “Every woman looks like a bride in her slip”?' Lucy asked.

‘E. M. Forster? Diana Vreeland?'

‘That's “Pink is the navy blue of India”, isn't it?' said Lucy.

‘Was it the Duchess of Windsor? We'll just have to wear our petticoats anyway,' said Abigail, and they smiled at each other in the mirror.

‘Mine's black tactel.'

‘The very thing.'

John Vir's passion for Lucy was growing. He wanted to hold her tightly. He wanted to smooth that dark wing of hair back from her forehead. He wanted to run away with her, to run away from Gurpal and the boys, and his brother, the whole lot of them, the tick book and the van's dodgy suspension, the students buying frozen spinach to make vegetarian lasagne, when he had great fresh stuff, wilting by the box load, and braying at each other across the shop as though he and the family couldn't understand, the past-it fruit, and that tin of Tibet sandalwood talc that accused him and condemned him from its rusty island in the bathroom cabinet.

He wanted to start again with Lucy. They would have to go away somewhere. He longed for her. His longing nagged at him like toothache, like a wisdom tooth trying to break through. He thought that she must like him a bit … when they'd been to the Cash and Carry together … oh. But she was all tied up in that café. There was nothing for it. He would have to kill Paul.

He sat behind the shop counter and made a plan. He would push Paul into the freezer room and leave him there, then chuck him in the river when he was frozen. It would be so easy. He'd just wait until the next time Paul came in. He'd say: ‘How are you, Paul? Have you seen these beans we have in?' He'd have them by the freezer door. When Paul bent to look at them he'd just shove him in and bolt the door. Nobody would hear him scream. Easy.

It was the perfect plan, until he realised that he'd got the idea from an episode of
The Bill
where some Indian brothers had burned the body of a rival in a tandoori oven. He'd be the prime suspect. He'd have to think again.

Meanwhile, he could try to see more of Lucy. The trips to the Cash and Carry could become regular. Perhaps she would come with him each time he went. He decided to ask.

‘Lucy,' he said, when she came in the next morning for her paper. ‘Lucy, perhaps you would like some more things from the Cash and Carry soon?'

‘Oh, when are you going?'

‘In the next few days.'

‘We do need some things – rice, nuts, you know. If it wouldn't be any trouble.'

‘Shall we go on Thursday then? About four o'clock?'

‘Great,' said Lucy. Why was she blushing? Why was her hand shaking? On her way out she tripped on a pile of unsold
Newses
.

‘Oh God,' she said, ‘I'm clumsy.' He rushed from behind the counter to help her up and knocked over a plastic tub of Rainbow Drops. It rolled off the counter and a confetti of the magic chocolate discs landed on her shoes and around her feet.

‘Sorry, sorry,' he said, ‘but you look good enough to eat.' They piled the Rainbow Drops back into the pot. Lucy realised later that he was still intending to sell them, dust and all, to the crowds of children who arrived in the shop less than sixty seconds after the infants school kicked out.

When Lucy got back to the Bluebird, Abigail was slicing aubergines for a terrine they had planned for the evening –
layers of fried aubergine with roasted peppers, basil and a cheesy mousse.

Lucy noticed a Rainbow Drop stuck to her sleeve. She prised it off and popped it into her mouth. Hundreds and thousands grazed her tongue and the roof of her mouth.

‘I was thinking,' said Paul later that evening. ‘You keep saying that you could do with some really good saucepans. Do you think that we should get married?'

Lucy's mouth fell open like a cartoon character's.

‘What, us?'

‘Well, we do love each other. We could have the reception here,' said Paul, as if that was an added bonus that would persuade her.

‘And Gilbert could be the toastmaster. I don't think so.'

‘Well, perhaps not,' said Paul. ‘It was just a thought.'

‘I'm going to the Cash and Carry with John Vir on Thursday,' said Lucy.

‘Oh.'

‘Would you help make a list?'

Lucy felt as though she was turning into someone else's mother; developing strong brawny arms from lifting pans, and mixing and kneading. Postcards arrived from friends travelling in Mexico and Cuba, or working in Australia, or worst of all from former best friends who were working in London. Purple ink from Tessa at drama school. ‘Course hard but am getting very THIN and playing Ophelia next month. Why don't you ever come up? Having a lovely time. Wish you were here.'

‘Do you?' thought Lucy. ‘I haven't got your phone number.'

‘I feel isolated,' she told Paul.

‘What from?'

‘Life.'

‘Mmm … I don't think your beans are sprouting.'

The bean sprouter, an expensive plastic box, wasn't working. Bean sprouts had started to disgust her. Sliced celery looked like maggots. She avoided organic produce now, too many insects to save or kill. Would irradiation kill them? Or make them grow bigger perhaps? They'd hatch in the oven and crawl out of pies and pastries; armies, legions of insects with plastic indestructible bodies and cellophane wings.

‘Oh, bean sprouts. What care I for bean sprouts?' said Lucy. But Paul had wandered away.

* * *

The next time Lucy saw John Vir he looked somehow different.

‘How are you?' she asked, trying to see what the difference was.

‘Fine, thank you, Lucy,' he said. ‘My sister, Shreela, is staying. She's a very good cook.'

He looked different because he looked fatter, heavier, but, to Lucy, in a good way, not flabby, more weighty.

‘Look.' (Why was she smiling at him like that?) ‘Why don't you and your boyfriend come for dinner one night?' It was an outrageous thing to ask. He didn't ask people to dinner! He never had visitors now except family, or the children's friends. He hadn't even discussed it with Shreela. She'd have to help him. He'd have to get rid of the kids that night, they'd ruin it, show him up, make him look old, keep calling him ‘Dad'.

‘Oh, that would be lovely. When?' (Was she sounding too keen?)

‘Um, Wednesday?' (That gave him nearly a week.)

‘Oh, we can't, the café … but we are closed on Sunday nights …'

‘Sunday then?' he asked.

‘Great. I'll just tell Paul. He won't be doing anything unless it's a bird-watching thing or something.'

Every room in John Vir's house was painted blue, sky blue, a shade that in a smaller expanse might have been nice. The floors were covered in lino in a pattern of orange bricks. There were no books. The sofa seemed cast from concrete. The younger Virs had put up some Formula One posters, and there were pictures of Ganesha the elephant god and Shiva, and a puppies
calendar dating from Mrs Vir's time. Those puppies would be at least great-great-great-great-grandparents by now. It made Lucy want to cry, ‘But all it needs is a woman's touch!' like Doris Day's friend in
Calamity Jane,
and to quickly run up some pretty gingham curtains. They had brought a bunch of pinks for Shreela.

‘So, Shreela,' said Lucy, ‘do you run a shop as well?'

‘I'm a barrister.'

‘Oh, right …' said Paul.

‘Shall we eat?' said Shreela, and she strode away on neat navy blue legs.

The table was set for four. The young Virs had seemingly been banished or had deserted. It looked like a real dinner party, white household candles from downstairs burned. His plan was taking shape.

They had poppadoms, of course, with hot lime and brinjal pickle, Paul's favourite. They were going to pig out. Shreela told them about her practice. She had often seen Cherie Booth at dinners, but they hadn't actually met.

John Vir was busy in the kitchen. He wrenched open cupboards, fumbled crazily amongst half-empty packets, crumpled paper napkins, greasy jars, petrified sugar, spices that had turned to dust. Not there! Not there! He slammed doors shut and skidded down the orange lino stairs to the shop. Boxes tried to trip him, bales of loo paper jostled him, a supermop bopped him on the head.

Yes! there were a few packets there, behind the Lucky chicken noodles: MSG flavour enhancer as used in all the best restaurants and take-aways in Southampton. ‘Use Very Sparingly' the packet told him.

‘Dad, how much are Kotex Superplus?' yelled Gurpal from the front of the shop.

‘£1.73,' he called over his shoulder, as he sped towards the stairs.

‘Do you want a little bag?' Gurpal asked the student girl who for some reason looked close to tears.

‘It hardly seems worth it now,' the girl said, as Gurpal tried to cram the packet into what was a very little bag. ‘I'd better have some paracetamol too.'

‘What are you
doing
out there?' Shreela called.

‘Giving it the finishing touch,' John Vir called back, smiling at his unintended pun.

‘You want some help?'

‘NO!'

Two white unbreakable plates with orange borders were carried in.

‘Ladies first,' he said, and placed them in front of Shreela and Lucy. A deep yellow curry on a fragrant pile of multicoloured rice. He brought in the dhal, the plate of warm chappatis, another dish of aubergine, one of okra. ‘All vegetarian tonight,' he said. Paul's plate had a dark green border, his own an orange one. They tucked in.

‘This is great,' said Paul. ‘Just like from a take-away … that's a compliment. I mean, it's great.' He drained the water jug into his now smeary glass.

‘Too hot for you?' asked John Vir, a little spitefully.

‘No, I'm just really thirsty,' said Paul.

‘Paul is one of those thirsty people, you know, always having a glass of water,' said Lucy, but they didn't seem to know. ‘This is really delicious,' she went on, racking her brain for something to say.

‘Oh, Shreela did all the hard work,' said John.

‘I love to cook,' said Shreela. Now they should be on safe territory.

‘Oh, so do I!' said Lucy, even though a vision of potato peelings in cold, muddy water, of damp, gritty yellowing spinach leaves, of the last time she had grated her thumbnail on the cheese grater loomed behind her eyes. ‘Well, sometimes I love to cook, it's different now that I do it for a living, and a not very good living …' Paul looked a bit surprised and hurt at this.

‘Could I possibly have some more water?' he said.

A red fist was biffing the back of his skull. His heart raced. He was sweaty and freezing and boiling. He lurched into the bathroom and made it just in time. He managed to run his face under the cold tap, gulped mouthfuls, gallons of water. It was 2 a.m. He wished for death.