The Comfort Food Café

Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen

W hen I let myself back into Hyacinth later that evening, it feels cold and empty. Not even Gary is there to greet me, and I miss the warmth of the Aga.

I walk around, touching the radiators and finding that they are all working fine. I guess it’s just me, then.

I close the curtains, and switch on the lamps, and try to make it as cosy as it can possibly be. It doesn’t work, and I slump onto the sofa feeling miserable and lonely.

Gabriel and I have decided to just be friends, but I can tell from the way he is acting that we might not be close friends. He will keep me at arm’s length, and retreat back into his closed-off little world. His emotional sleeping bag. I know him well enough to predict that he will rarely be seen in the village, that he will be too busy to socialise, that he will isolate himself in every possible way. He will become his great-uncle, despite his best efforts.

It broke my heart to leave him there, but I had to accept his decision. Part of me even thinks he’s right. That whole scene was so draining I have nothing left in me, other than sadness. We came close to something special, me and Gabriel, but in the end we were both too broken to grasp hold of it and keep it safe.

He is the more obviously broken one. He carries his traumas and his scars around with him wherever he goes, and clearly feels safer alone. But I’m not without bruises myself, and it’s been hard to trust another man again. Gabriel hasn’t betrayed me in the same way that Richie did, but the sense of desolation I am feeling now comes close. My whole life here in Budbury is tied up with him, and I can’t imagine it any other way.

I drag myself up and switch on the Christmas tree lights. As I sit down again, I realise that their insufferably cute festive energy seems to mock me.

‘You can shut up as well,’ I say, considering throwing my boot at the tree.

I am all cried out after my meltdown in the car, but I am hurting so much that I feel paralysed by it. I’m glad the kids are still out with their dad, because I don’t want them to see me like this. I have vowed to myself that they will never have to suffer because of my feelings ever again. I am the mother, and they are the children, and from now on, Sophie will be able to live her life fully and without concerns for the mad woman back home. Even if I’m down, I will not show it.

And maybe, I tell myself, I won’t be as down as I think, for as long as I think. I’m not sure I actually believe that, but I need to have some hope.

I decide to give myself a pep talk, out loud, because perhaps if I say these things out loud, I will believe them, perhaps they will feel more real, and less like a big fat lie.

‘I have a life here,’ I announce to the Christmas tree. ‘I have a job and friends and a potential new career. I will learn to fill my days without Gabriel, even if it doesn’t feel like it right now. My heart will go on, and I will survive.’

I’ve slipped two very appropriate songs into that pep talk, and I decide to sing them both. I think maybe I need some sleep, or possibly a month in a sensory deprivation tank.

I’m still working my way through Gloria Gaynor’s classic when the kids get home, and Sophie immediately joins in with the chorus. Ben starts doing the actions and walking out the door when we point at it, and Gary jumps around in delight at all the fun. Before long we are all laughing, and then Sophie goes to the kitchen and brings through the biscuit barrel and a multi-pack of Monster Munch. I still have a lead weight in my guts where happiness used to live, but everything feels a shade lighter.

‘So, how did it go?’ I ask, glad that Richie decided to just drop them off and run for it. We’ve said as much as we needed to to each other earlier, and it’s not his fault that it indirectly led to my whole world being smashed in with a sledgehammer.

‘Okay,’ says Sophie, perched next to me, slightly tipsy. ‘I mean, it was a bit weird, but once I got my head around it, I was happy. We were coming up with baby names. I suggested Velma for a girl, ’cause she’s the coolest of the Scooby Doo gang, and Velma for a boy, ’cause she’s the coolest of the Scooby Doo gang.’

‘Interesting. I’m sure Valerie will be delighted with that idea. Ben? Are you all right?’

Once the dancing stopped he became quieter, more subdued, and I remember the conversation I overheard. About him still harbouring hope that his dad and I would get back together. That was never going to happen anyway, but it’s most definitely not going to happen now.

‘Yeah, it was just a surprise is all. I don’t know Valerie very well, but she always comes off as one of those women who don’t shit, you know?’

‘No, I don’t know!’

‘You know, those women who are so pristine and so perfect you can’t ever imagine her having anything as messy as a bowel movement? And I know you’ve not been to her house, but it’s like a show home: everything is silver and grey and chrome, and one of the new chairs still has the plastic wrapping on it! I just can’t picture her dealing with a baby.’

‘Well,’ I reply, secretly laughing inside at his scathing description, ‘I’m sure she’ll be fine. And your dad knows what he’s doing.’

‘Does he, though? Didn’t you say he almost let me drown in the bath once because he was checking the Aston Villa results on his phone? And didn’t he drop Sophie on her head, which explains a lot?’

She punches him in the kidneys, and I say: ‘Well, you didn’t drown, did you? And Sophie just bounced, so that was all right. Anyway. You two will be fantastic siblings.’

‘This is true,’ he says, gazing theatrically into the distance. ‘I have so much to teach them.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like this!’ he announces. He pulls off his socks, and inserts a fragment of beef Monster Munch between each toe. He holds his foot out, and Gary obligingly starts licking and nibbling to get at them.

I laugh, and say: ‘Well, that’s something you don’t see every day! But stop now, because crisps aren’t good for him. Or us.’

I shove one in my mouth as soon as I say this, which spoils the effect. We chat some more, and eventually they go off up to their rooms.

I stay downstairs for a while afterwards, tidying up and letting Gary out into the garden. I join him out there, shivering, looking at the snow collecting on the tops of the trees, the hazy outline of the hills bathed in starlight. It is peaceful and calm and pure, and it helps.

I sit on the sofa again, and realise that I don’t want to go to bed. I can give myself as many pep talks as I like, but the loss is still jagged and sharp. I have a Gabriel-shaped hole in my life, and it makes my heart ache.