Page 8 of The Golden Girls’ Road Trip

‘You wouldn’t know it from your parting gesture,’ I say, grinning, and Gita puts her hands over her eyes.

‘I know, I couldn’t help myself. Farin said I should ask her for a reference. What do you think?’

‘I’d certainly be interested to see what she’d write,’ I say with a laugh.

‘I’m sure there’s something else out there for us. Don’t despair, Connie. Catch you later,’ she says and then, pushing back her plastic chair, she steps over the low retaining fence onto the grass and walks away.

I’m not entirely convinced there is anything out there for me now, work wise. I trained as a bookkeeper many years ago. It was the sensible side to my life and one that worked well as I never used to travel that much in the winter months and could concentrate on my private clients, getting ready to submit their tax returns. I found more joy in the odd jobs I used to do on the road though: fruit picking in the French countryside, casual kitchen work in tucked-away restaurants, pulling pints at the Munich Beer Festival.

Now though, those days are over. I’ll be a wife for the first time in my life and maybe I’ll have to sell my van because Leo isn’t keen on travelling. It’s a new stage, a new path and one that I’m sure I can embrace if I try hard enough. I buy another latte and look up the train times on my phone.

4

John Lewis in Oxford Street is full of people making use of the free air con, and even the climate-change activists marching outside are occasionally dumping their placards to pop their heads through the doors for respite from the sweltering afternoon temperature. And who can blame them.

The changing rooms are not cool though. The assistant said that the unit had broken down on this level, and I stand in front of the mirror, knowing I’ll have to buy this dress because I’m sweating into it. The cream and lavender silk is sticking to my skin and the matching jacket has the beginnings of wet patches under the arms. I pull it all off and hang it back up while still in just my underwear, then I take a tissue from my handbag and pat myself dry. It brings back unpleasant memories from my menopause years and I’m thankful that at least that’s over.

I have quite the collection of shopping bags now and decide to treat myself to a cold drink in the roof café before I leave. Simon phones me as I take my first sip of the cloudy lemonade.

‘Hi, Mum, where are you?’ he says as soon as I pick up. It’s always his first question and it’s a fair one, because over the years, I could have been anywhere. The furthest I’ve travelled under my own steam is down to the beautiful city of Messina in Sicily after stopping in Reims, Strasbourg and Milan on the way. I took the car ferry across with the camper van I had at the time – a trusty old Bedford – but even that was struggling by the time I reached the island. I worked in an enoteca, a wine shop, for a week to pay for the repairs and then limped home. It was one of the most wonderful experiences of my life, but also one of the loneliest.

I’ve always been compelled to travel and ironically it was my parents who started it.

The summer of 1970 and I was in disgrace. Unable to articulate what had really happened the night of my parents’ house party, I’d gone along with their assumption that I’d seduced a family friend, a married man, because they’d seen me flirting with him. The truth would have meant attention I really didn’t want, and packing me off to Scotland sounded appealing. I’d have gone to the moon not to have to see his face again.

They sent me to my aunt’s hotel in Inverness by train from our home in Kensington. I remember the look on my father’s face as he drove me to the station in silence. Twenty minutes in the car with him was far worse than a week’s worth of my mother’s whiplash tongue. He made it perfectly clear that he thought I’d let him down. Then arriving in Scotland, somewhere I’d never been before, and lovely William meeting me at the station. He worked in my aunt’s hotel gardens and had been sent to pick me up. He’s the only person who really knows what happened that summer – that summer that shaped the rest of my life.

My thoughts return to my conversation with Gita and then I remember that Simon is on the other end of the phone I’m holding to my ear.

‘I’m in the café in John Lewis in London.’

‘That was not what I expected you to say,’ he says.

‘Is everything okay?’

‘Yeah, all fine, it’s just that you said you wanted me to come with you to the wedding venue to sort the wine and finalise a few things. I can finish early tomorrow and meet you there?’ he says. ‘It would be good to tick those last boxes and it will probably make Leo feel better. He’s a bit out of the loop in Peterborough, not knowing how long he’ll be there.’

‘Sure, of course,’ I say. ‘If you can spare the time, that would be great.’

*

I’m exhausted. I can’t remember the last time I hit the shops in such a big way, and as I head back to the station to catch the train home, bags swinging beside me, I feel the bite of a blister on my heel. I have a dress and jacket, shoes and underwear. There was something special, if a little embarrassing, about picking up a beautiful set of matching underwear at my age. For once it wasn’t a quick purchase of an offer on three for two bras, and knickers that come in a multipack. It reminds me that perhaps I should make more of an effort. I’ll be living with Leo soon and surely he deserves not to see my faded old pants.

We haven’t really made a definitive plan about where we’ll live. Originally, when Leo proposed, he said he wanted me to move in with him but he hasn’t mentioned it since then. The sensible thing is to move into Leo’s place in Pevensey Bay now I’ve lost my job and don’t need to be in Brighton. His bungalow has a garden, which my flat doesn’t. His bungalow has an open-plan kitchen-diner, which mine doesn’t, but his bungalow also has more than a hint of his late wife about it. I won’t speak ill of the dead, but goodness, the woman had a penchant for chintz. The whole house is stuffed full of Brenda’s knick-knacks and dried flower arrangements. The curtains even have those swags and tails surrounding them in peach florals rather reminiscent of my wedding bouquet. I suddenly feel a bit nauseous and wonder if it’s acceptable for married people to live in separate houses.

I have to run, but just make it on board before the train slides out of the station. Settling into a seat next to the window, I rest my head against the glass and silently congratulate myself on not being as decrepit as my years would suggest.

A couple sitting opposite have their fingers entwined and I watch as the man strokes his thumb across the woman’s knuckles. They don’t need to sit as close as they do – there’s plenty of room – but her body moulds to his at every point from shoulder to ankle. They’re young, maybe late twenties or early thirties, and I lose that spry feeling as something closer to nostalgia pricks at me. It isn’t like that with me and Leo, of course it isn’t – we’re old, older. I look away, suddenly feeling every one of my seventy years.

I’m not a vain person. I’m not worried about people thinking I look old; I don’t look in the mirror and panic about the lines around my eyes. I happen to be pretty fit and healthy. My face isn’t sagging more than anyone else my age, and I still have a robust head of hair. I choose not to dye it and when I wear it down, it sits around my shoulders in a muted blonde-grey mane. But, this couple are in their prime, and mine – I have to admit – has evaporated into my history.

My phone vibrates in my pocket again and, as I pull it out, I see Leo’s name on the screen. Moving away from the couple, I walk through to an empty carriage. There’s a magazine discarded on the seat next to me and I pull it onto my lap and pick at the corner of the cover while I call Leo back.

‘Hi, you,’ he says as he answers. ‘Are you on your way back from the shop?’

‘Actually I’ve been doing some wedding stuff.’

‘That’s great!’ he says, his voice not as bright as his words. In fact, he sounds tired, or possibly resigned. Perhaps he’s had a busy day in the café or maybe Fiona is draining him with her unhappiness.