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Shay put down her buttering knife and came to sit at the table.
‘Mum, it all worked out fine.’
But Roberta was wrapped up in a confusion of memories, knotted as old wool.
‘I never wanted to be the one who split up the family, you know. I didn’t want you and Paula to be spending a weekend with me and then a weekend with him, us arguing about where you’d be at Christmases. I forgave him the first time, it was only fair that I let it go and I tried so hard to mend it, every time it broke but I couldn’t.’
Roberta was agitated now. Shay took her mum’s hands in an effort to calm her.
‘I nearly asked you if you’d take me to see him, you know, but I couldn’t face it. I’d rather think of him happy withherthan like that. He should have had his chance, I held on to him longer than was fair and I can’t forgive myself for that. I’ve made so many mistakes. I’ve messed it all up.’
‘You haven’t messed anything up.’ Shay grabbed the kitchen roll from the work surface and tore off a square to give to Roberta, who was sniffling now.
‘Oh, I have,’ insisted Roberta, pressing the tissue against her eyes to blot the tears that were coming. ‘If only I hadn’tgone, it would have been all right then. I wouldn’t have known any different.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Shay said gently.
‘He was right, we should have stayed. That would have been best for her. We shouldn’t have taken her away,’ Roberta explained impatiently as if Shay was dense for not understanding.
‘Best for who, Mum?’ asked Shay. It was hard to watch her mother in this mode, her frustrations apparent as she tried to put the pieces together in her head. It seemed as if she had two different jigsaws going on here, though.
‘Her. Best for her.’
‘Who’s “her”?’
‘Shay,’ said Roberta, at volume. Then realisation shone through the clouds in her mind that she was talking to the person she was talking about. She shook her head. ‘Oh, I’m getting mixed up. I don’t know what I mean. I’m all over the place. Those builders next door have done something to my brain. I’ll end up in the funny farm, I will.’
‘I hope not,’ said Shay, relieved that her mother was back in the room with her again, away from whatever thoughts were torturing her.
‘If I do, I won’t get Paula coming to visit me, I know that much,’ said Roberta, after blowing her nose on the kitchen roll. ‘She told me that it upsets her to go and see her father in that place,’ Roberta huffed then. ‘So we can safely assume that if anything happened to me, she wouldn’t come and see me. I don’t know how she grew to be so unfeeling. She doesn’t get that from Harry and I’m pretty sure she doesn’t get it from me either.’
‘She doesn’t,’ said Shay. ‘She’s another family throwback, one who howled at the moon.’
‘I caught her going through my drawer when she didn’t think I was looking.’
Shay bristled. ‘What drawer?’
‘The drawer in the dresser, the one with all my documents in it. You know, bills and bank statements.’ Roberta paused before adding, ‘I thought to myself, I bet she’s looking for my will. I expected it.’
‘Surely not,’ said Shay, though she wouldn’t put it past her sister.
‘My old will’s in there but not my new one. I changed it.’
‘That sounds very mysterious,’ said Shay. ‘Are you leaving everything to the local dogs’ home?’
‘The old one has you both down as executors and everything halved.’ Roberta was deadly serious now and not in the mood for joking. ‘I left it in there to avoid trouble.’
Shay braced herself for an answer she wouldn’t be able to make sense of but her mother’s brain had switched track to her once sharp self.
‘My new will is lodged with my solicitor David Charles, you do remember me telling you?’
‘Yes, I remember,’ said Shay.
‘Dagmara has a copy as well, as surety. All my funeral arrangements are written in it. I want Mr Goodchild to handle it, he does the best buffets.’
‘Mum, don’t talk about this stuff,’ Shay waved her hand to fend it off.
‘I want you to listen, Shay, while I remember. I left that old will in the drawer to appease Paula if she went looking for it, because there will be trouble after I’ve gone and I’m sorry that I’ll be leaving it with you to sort. I haven’t told you this before but I’ve given Paula money over the years. She was desperate to bail out that halfwitshe married but that’s up to her what she does with her inheritance.’
