Page 4 of The Golden Girls’ Road Trip

Simon leans across the table and places a small package down in front of me. It’s beautifully wrapped with a perfect bow in silk ribbon. I have to give Diana her due, she does do lovely presentation.

‘Happy birthday, Mum,’ says Simon.

The package is light and I hesitate with my fingers on the ribbon. It could be jewellery. Seventy is considered a significant birthday.

‘Diana chose it,’ Simon says with a shrug. ‘She’s so much better at gifts than me.’

I pull away the ribbon and pick off the Sellotape slowly, buying precious seconds to prepare my face. There have been gifts from Diana in the past, chosen specifically to make me feel old: blankets to wrap myself in when watching the television, a heated mattress topper, an odd combination of tartan slippers and a matching scarf. I’m hoping it is jewellery. How old could Diana possibly make me feel with a necklace or a bracelet?

‘This gift was chosen because there is something we want to tell you,’ Diana says at the moment I pull off the paper and lift the lid of the velvet box inside. There’s a gold brooch, which spells out a word, nestled on a padded cushion.

Grandma

I’m very aware suddenly of a buzzing in my ears. It muffles out the sounds of the restaurant. I can see that people are talking, but can’t hear what’s coming from their mouths. Simon and Leo are embracing again and Diana is looking at me expectantly. I know I’ll have to pull myself together; a lot hinges on this moment. If I don’t say the right thing, it won’t ever be forgotten. But there’s no denying that little stab of fear. Will it be this that brings me closer to my daughter-in-law, or drives us further apart? Babies change everything; this I know from experience.

‘I’m overwhelmed and completely excited for you both.’ I have no idea where the words come from, but luckily they arrive fully formed and the buzzing stops in time for me to hear that I actually sound quite normal. I push back the chair on some kind of automatic pilot, knowing I’ll have to make a gesture, and I turn to Diana, my arms open wide. She looks baffled and then realisation dawns. She gets out of her chair and steps into my embrace. It’s just about the most awkward act between two people, but when I see the look of pleasure on Simon’s face, I pull her in a little closer.

‘I’m thrilled for you,’ I say into her hair and unwittingly take in a mouthful of her hairspray.

‘Goodness, thank you, Connie.’ Diana sounds a little choked, so I loosen my grip.

The waiter arrives with the bottle of Champagne, so we all sit back down and wait for him to pour. I take Simon’s hand across the table and give it a squeeze.

‘I wasn’t sure if a brooch was your thing really, but Diana insisted you’d love it.’

‘I do,’ I say, running my fingertips across the letters, hoping no one suggests I try it on. I love the sentiment, but perhaps not the brooch itself. Now desperate for a drink, I raise my glass of Champagne before Leo has the time to toast, and knock half back in one go. I look up to see the three of them with their glasses raised.

‘Sorry, so thirsty,’ I say, drinking the rest and reaching for the bottle to top up my glass. Suddenly remembering Ruby waiting patiently in the car park for me and the drive home, I reluctantly push my drink just out of reach.

‘Well, congratulations all round then,’ Leo says. ‘Happy birthday, Connie, or should I say, Grandma!’

I feel overwhelmed at the thought of a baby in the family. I didn’t really think it would happen for them. Of course, it is wonderful, but it also raises lots of conflicting feelings.

‘And such great news, you two. When’s the baby actually due?’ Leo asks.

‘December,’ says Simon. ‘Can’t believe I’m finally going to be a dad. I’m certainly going to be a better one than mine was.’ There’s no edge to his words. Simon always accepted what I had told him; that he was the result of a fling, and it was always just going to be the two of us. Of course fling sounds so much more acceptable than assault. But that is something I have managed to bury. It seems that if you repeatedly tell yourself something didn’t happen, after a while it’s just possible to believe it.

‘Of course you will be, darling – there’s no competition at all,’ Diana says, and then with a sideways look at me: ‘I chose wisely.’

‘You’ll be a fantastic father, Simon,’ I say, steadfastly ignoring Diana’s gaze. ‘The trick to being a good parent is to always have your child’s best interests at heart, even before your own.’

‘Travelling around the country in a camper van?’ Diana snorts.

‘Maybe,’ I say. ‘We had a wonderful time.’

‘Well, we want good family foundations for our child. I appreciate you enjoyed your lifestyle back then, but two parents and a permanent home is our way. To be honest, Connie, I’m not really sure I’d take advice from someone who doesn’t speak to her own parents.’ This last is delivered quietly and with a little giggle as if she’s really only joking, but it cuts into me in a way that her other jibes haven’t before. It makes me squirm in fact. Is it her pregnancy hormones or is she upping her game? After all, there’s more at stake now: a baby. I look across at Leo to see his reaction to this sharp barb, but he’s busy looking at his phone again. Simon is reading the label on the back of the Champagne bottle. Love really is blind it would seem.

‘If you had known my parents,’ I say quietly, ‘you wouldn’t have talked to them either.’

She doesn’t say anything to this, but a knowing smirk briefly touches her face.

The food arrives then, lifting the lick of tension that’s beginning to creep in, but as the waiter places each plate down, Leo’s phone begins to ring and even though he’s staring at the screen he still manages to look surprised.

When I first met him at Simon and Diana’s summer barbecue last year, I saw an uncomplicated man, three years widowed and ready to find someone new to spend the rest of his life with. That was certainly how Simon had portrayed him to me. Simon was always bringing Leo’s name into conversation. Even before I’d met him in person I felt as if I knew him. He was a top bloke at work and then a top bloke who’d lost his wife, then it’s so sad that Leo is on his own and he’d love to meet you. By the time I was standing in Simon and Diana’s garden, sipping an ice-cold gin and tonic and navigating a plate of charred chicken wings and coleslaw, I was fairly sure we were being set up. But, when Leo invited me out for dinner it seemed like the most reasonable thing to say yes, even if it had been orchestrated by my well-meaning son. And we had a nice time; he’s a nice man.

Before I knew it we were on another night out and then another. There was hand-holding and yes, kissing too. I hadn’t had any sort of relationship for quite a few years. In fact it had been a good ten years since I’d had the pleasure of another person’s lips on my own, the joy of waking up in someone’s arms and the talk of when we would do it again. And I was becoming a bit lonely, returning from each of my trips away to an empty flat, feeling a good deal older, a good deal more weary.

And then there’d been sex, which came as a bit of a surprise. It had been lovely and I was glad to see that I was still desired, but Leo had cried afterwards and said he felt as if he was being unfaithful to his late wife. I tried so hard to reassure him, but we went back to holding hands, which flew directly in the face of what my mother had always told me was possible.