The Great Allotment Proposal (6 page)

Annie pushed her hair out of her eyes and straightened up, slowly uncurling her spine and arching backwards with a sigh. ‘That sounds like a much better idea. I think there are some little candles in there as well.’

As Annie and Jane put the final touches to the canes and the netting, Emily squeezed herself into the dilapidated shed and came out with a bag of tea lights, the wine and a big roll of white and blue bunting. ‘Look at this, it was from the ice cream van, wasn’t it? D’you remember? I’m going to string it up,’ Emily said as she handed the wine and candles to Annie and started tying the bunting to the fallen water butt and along to the highest branches she could reach of the damson tree.

Jane lit the candles with an old cigarette lighter she found in the shed and Annie poured the wine into plastic beakers and divided up the cherry pie. The pastry a little bit soft after sitting in the paper bags in the sun but, after all the allotment labour, their first mouthfuls felt like the best they’d ever tasted.

‘Did you know Enid?’ Emily asked Jane as she looked across at the bunting, the pennants flapping gently in the occasional gust of wind.

Jane nodded. ‘Her and Mum used to play poker. Practically every night. They were ruthless. I’d have to bow out after about the third hand. They’d bleed me dry.’ She took a sip of her wine before adding, ‘I think probably it was Enid dying that finished Mum off. Her friend had gone and that was it.’

‘Did you find the diary?’ Annie asked as she relit one of the tea lights that flickered out in the breeze.

‘What diary?’ asked Emily.

‘You know they found that letter about the corporal injured in the war?’ As Annie spoke, Emily shook her head.

‘I told you the other day. We found a letter in the cafe addressed to Enid about a guy who’d died in the war that wasn’t her husband. Remember?’

‘No, I don’t think you told me that.’

‘Or you weren’t listening.’

Emily made a face as if she was being told off by a teacher.

Jane cut in before they could start bickering and said, ‘We think there’s a diary. Or Holly thinks there’s a diary. I’ve searched Enid’s place but couldn’t find anything. Annie’s looked in the cafe. We haven’t asked Martha yet because she’s not that keen on the whole thing, I think she just wants her mum’s memory to rest and not have the past changed. But…’ Jane shrugged. ‘I kind of think Enid would want us to know. I think she’d like that we were chasing after her history. And anyway, I think it’s kind of exciting.’ She laughed. ‘See, you can tell I’ve spent a lot of time hanging out with two pensioners.’

Emily laughed, poured them all more wine, and then stood up to go and look over their patch. What had earlier in the day been a huge mass of green leaves was now individual plants trained into neat little rows and trailed up bamboo canes. The lettuces that had been shredded by the slugs had been plucked out and the smaller, less holey ones covered with arcs of netting held in place by damson twigs. What she now knew were carrots and beetroots had been salvaged from the bindweed, and the flowers – the dahlias, the sweet peas and the sunflowers – had all been rescued by Jane. The begonias were past it, unfortunately, and were on the compost heap. ‘I don’t think we’re going to win anything,’ Emily said, looking over her shoulder at the other two.

‘Never say never,’ Jane said with a shrug. Then, after a moment, asked, ‘Emily, how do you know Jack?’

Annie sucked in her breath.

‘Don’t be all dramatic, Annie.’ Emily scowled. ‘You’re so annoying.’

Annie laughed and turned to Jane to say, ‘She broke his heart by running off with Giles Fox.’

‘Giles Fox?’ Jane said. ‘Not the actor?’

Annie did a little nod.

Emily cut in, ‘I didn’t run off with Giles. Jack ran off to Spain.’

‘
The
Giles Fox?’ Jane frowned. ‘Really? The actor?’

‘You have been shut away with two pensioners, haven’t you?’ Annie shook her head in disbelief. ‘They were a full-on super couple. “Fox Hunter”? You must have heard of that, Jane? Emily and Giles. They were the nation’s sweethearts. Didn’t you know any of this? Everyone knows.’

Jane shook her head. ‘I’m really bad with stuff like that. I only know who Giles is because of that Jane Austen adaptation. My mum loved him in that. Do you still talk to him?’

Emily shook her head. She’d felt herself clam up at the mention of his name, at Annie précis-ing her past so casually. Her standard,
‘That’s private,’
answer was on the tip of her tongue, but there was something about the evening that stopped the words on her lips. Something about having got her hands dirty with these two women. They’d dug and weeded and sweated together and the wine they were drinking was like a prize and the candle light and the black, empty allotment site around them like a moment out of normality. Emily had never worked to the point that her fingernails were thick with dirt, her hair was frizzy from sweat, her skin void of all make-up, her back and arms aching, her hunger from manual labour. She was starting to feel about the allotment patch how she felt about her EHB Cosmetics products. The pride she had in developing something new from scratch. But rather than completely in control of every detail of it, she was being led by someone else. She was being told what to do. Which happened very rarely in her life. Jane had made her trust her. It didn’t matter that it was over some little seedlings and trailing sweet peas, it was trust nonetheless and Emily wasn’t used to that.

So instead of saying,
‘That’s private,’
she found herself saying, ‘It was ages ago now. He has a whole other life. And I try not to think about it too much because I can still get upset, which is stupid because it was so long ago.’ She came back to the table and reached over to grab her wine. When no one else spoke, she found herself adding, ‘But I just think sometimes, if only I hadn’t agreed to marry him. If only I’d just let it play out without a wedding. I think then it all would have been different. Less of a fairy tale for everyone.’

She could feel Annie watching her, unsure if she’d ever said any of this to her or not. Unsure if she’d ever said it out loud to anyone. She put the glass back on the table and walked over to the damson tree before saying, ‘But the press love that it happened. They love that there was that magic, that people got behind it. And it just built and built. They loved the engagement after so long together, they loved all the planning. God.’ She covered her face for a moment thinking about it, then looked back up at the two of them. ‘I think they just wanted us to be the characters from the film. For it to be as intense and crazy as it had been on screen. And then Adeline came along and to them, destroyed it all. She was the perfect villain. I was the poor, tragic Cinderella left standing at the altar and he was clearly led astray. And now I’m their poor, tragic spinster. Doomed to be eternally single.’ Emily raised her hands up to a damson branch and pulled against it so she was arching forward. ‘They’ve basically ruined every relationship I’ve ever had since.’

‘So what do you do?’ Jane asked.

Emily let go of the branch so it flipped back and she had to do a jump forward to right herself. ‘I don’t have them any more,’ she said, and wandered back over to the table. ‘At least, not serious ones anyway.’

Chapter Nine

As head of the Cherry Pie Show committee, Jonathan White, Annie’s brother, had called an urgent meeting for Saturday afternoon. When the time came, they all gathered around the noticeboard in the centre of the allotment. Emily stood out from the general gardening masses, dressed in a gold and white playsuit and her wellingtons. She had a hangover from the wine they’d drunk the night before at the allotment, she’d slept really badly mulling over everything that had happened with Giles and her past, and this whole gathering was just too provincial and boring for her. She was only there because Annie had promised her a slap-up brunch at the cafe afterwards.

‘Gather round, people.’ Jonathan was standing on an orange box at the front. He clapped his hands and said, ‘If you could stop talking at the back. Annie, is that you? Stop talking. This is an important meeting.’

Annie shook her head, her eyes closed for a second or two as if she had to let anything her brother said just roll off her. Jane giggled under her breath. Emily wasn’t listening, she was messing on her phone and yawned twice before saying, ‘Do we have to be here?’

‘I’m afraid to say there’s been some bad news about the show,’ Jonathan started, then stopped and cleared his throat, pausing for effect like he was delivering an
X Factor
verdict. ‘I’ve been in discussions to try and rectify things and I hasten to add this has been quite a bit of time and trouble—’

‘Jesus, Jonathan, just tell us what’s happened!’ Martha shouted from where she was standing at the back. She had her rake with her and bashed it against the floor when she spoke.

Emily glanced up from her phone and sniggered.

‘I was coming to it, Martha, thank you,’ Jonathan said, breathing in through his nose and glaring at the people in the back row. ‘Unfortunately we’ve been told that the primary school will be undergoing renovations, beginning when term ends, meaning a clash for the Cherry Pie Show this year. Currently there is no alternative option for a venue of that size.’

‘The primary school?’ Emily muttered to Annie under her breath. ‘Is that where the show’s held?’

Jane nodded.

‘Are you kidding? All this work everyone’s doing and it’s held at the primary school. Where at the primary school?’

‘They have a little hall.’ Annie shrugged.

‘Seriously?’

‘Annie, I’m not going to ask you again,’ Jonathan said. ‘You really are disturbing the meeting.’

‘Oh for god’s sake, Jonathan,’ Martha sighed really loudly. ‘Get off your bloody high horse. Or your orange box.’

A general murmur of laughter rippled through the crowd.

‘Thank you, Martha.’ Jonathan tilted his head a touch and raised his eyebrows at her with a glare. ‘If you don’t have anything positive to add, I wonder if you need to be here.’

Emily took a step closer to where Annie and Jane were standing and whispered, ‘He’s such an idiot. I don’t know how you grew up with him, Annie.’

Martha raised her brows. ‘He’s a little toad. Always has been.’

Jonathan clapped his hands together to silence them. ‘So what I’m proposing,’ he went on speaking really loudly to pretend he couldn’t hear the chatter at the back. ‘What I’m proposing is – and I think this really is the only option – that the event itself must alter in order to secure a new venue. My feeling–- supported by key members of the show committee – is that we make this year’s competition a more selective event. It’s something some of us have been suggesting for some time and it feels that now, with this necessary change, that the time has come.’

While there were a couple of nods up at the front, the general murmurs of the crowd suggested they weren’t entirely convinced by this idea. ‘With this in mind,’ he went on, ‘We find ourselves looking for much smaller spaces for the competition and the possibility of creating something much more upmarket. I’ve already had a word with Barney from The Dog and Cherry and he’s happy to allow his function room to host the event. I know a lot of you have been working very hard to take part in this year’s show, but I think this really is not only the only option, but the best option. Yes, Jane?’ Jonathan nodded towards Jane’s upraised hand.

‘I thought the point of the Cherry Pie Show was exactly that it did include everyone. If we make it select then we make it elitist and the heart goes out of it. Even when my mum could barely get out of bed she would make pie for the bake off—’

‘There won’t be a bake off.’ Jonathan shook his head.

‘Are you kidding?’ Jane frowned. ‘What about the home crafts section?’ Jonathan shook his head. ‘The Young Photographer Award? Jonathan, you can’t just cut certain events that people look forward to all year?’

‘Jane.’ He held up a hand. ‘Let’s not get too emotional—’

‘Oh for goodness sake!’ Jane waved his comment away and took a couple of steps backwards.

Jonathan carried on. ‘We have to work within the parameters, I’m afraid, Jane. I know there are people dabbling in handicraft who want their patchworks to be seen by everyone, but we have to see what the big hitters are and that’s always the flowers and the vegetables. The committee will decide on the select criteria of entry.’

Annie turned away, rubbing her hand over her face. ‘I cannot believe I’m related to him,’ she sighed.

Emily was watching the crowd – Martha shaking her head with her eyes closed, Jane flushed pink on her cheekbones, visibly fuming, two elderly ladies in the middle of the crowd whispering, Annie's mum looking round anxiously, a couple of the guys in the front, including Jack’s brother Ed and his dad, all had their hands raised to ask questions.

She thought of her evening with Annie and Jane the night before and tried to remember when the last time she’d made a new friend was. She had hundreds of acquaintances but who, in the last five years, had she talked to quite so frankly about Giles? No one. She’d seen
“A friend said…”
written in front of enough quotes about her in the papers to stop talking honestly to anyone just in case. Yet last night, as the tea lights flickered and the bunting flapped, they’d sat there into the night talking like they’d all known each other for ever. It wasn’t just Emily who’d opened up, but Annie had talked about what it was like having a new stepson in River and how hard it was to get Matt and him talking like equals. Jane had sipped her wine and slowly said more about what it was like living with her dying mother. And Emily had seen in her – the woman who had turned up in crappy clothes and who she’d instantly judged as having a sweet but dismissible demeanour – a core of strength that came from watching a person you love deteriorate. Her whole life held on pause so her mother could have her final years as she wanted them.

Would Emily have done that for her mum, she had wondered as she lay in bed. Their relationship was full of so many little knots burrowed too deep to even try and untie. A lifetime of Emily’s hatred of the different stepfathers she’d had to endure duelling with her mother’s insistence on getting them a start in life by any means possible. And yet now her mother had admitted that perhaps it might have been a mistake – now that she herself had married for love.