‘No, Duncan, don’t you get involved now. You never usually want to be involved. It’s always me who has to do the tough love while you stand behind me encouraging our daughter to put her health in jeopardy.’ Lizzie made a face, crumpet still dangling. ‘“Nothing wrong with Dominos in moderation as long as you avoid the stuffed crust”. “You are what you eat… and no one ever wanted to be a guava”. It’s not funny! None of this is funny! I’ve lost one daughter. I don’t want to lose another one!’
The crumpet crumbled and Lizzie crumpled, folding her body in on itself like she was an origami swan someone was making very badly.
‘Mum,’ Keeley said, rushing forward and putting her arms around Lizzie’s slender frame, drawing her close. ‘It’s OK. I’m fine.’
‘You’re not fine,’ Lizzie said, the words rushing out through the tears, voice muffled against Keeley’s bright red festive jumper. ‘And you definitely won’t be fine if you eat giant crumpets and sugary jam.’
‘Is the jam that sugary?’ Duncan asked. ‘Because if that’s the case I’m not sure Tommy Forrester needs the boost. He’s stopped playing squash completely now, you know. Something to do with a frozen calf.’ He put a finger to his temple. ‘At least I think that was his injury. Although, thinking about it, it might have been what he had planned for Christmas dinner…’
‘Mum,’ Keeley said softly. ‘I do watch what I eat. All the time.’ She caught a look from her dad then and rephrased. ‘Most of the time.’ She sighed. ‘More often than not. But… it’s Christmas.’
‘It’s November,’ Lizzie countered, raising her head from Keeley’s shoulder. ‘People who say “it’s Christmas” the moment Halloween is over should be… tied to a chair and made to listen to… Piers Morgan.’
‘Lizzie!’ Duncan exclaimed.
‘Well!’ Lizzie remarked. ‘This is Keeley’s life we’re talking about. And she’s ready to play chicken sticking steel into electrical appliances and gorging on food stuffs that are going to stick to her arteries like… like…’
‘If you say Piers Morgan again I’ll have to tell your father,’ Duncan warned. ‘He has a framed photo of him in his study.’
‘Like…’ Lizzie continued.
‘Like the chocolate cake Bea used to make.’
Keeley finished the sentence, tears filling her eyes. Someone had to actually say her sister’s name instead of skirting around it like the word ‘Bea’ would curse them for the rest of the decade. Still now, just over a year on from the devastating traffic accident that had taken Bea from them, the pain was still so raw. This was the second Christmas without her. During the first Christmas without her everyone was reeling from the trauma and Keeley was still in hospital.
Everything was suddenly quiet. A tear snaked down Keeley’s face and she dashed it away with the back of her hand. She couldn’t chance getting any kind of dampness on her newly coloured hair. Her best friend Rach said the ‘light brown with copper highlights’ was legit from a subsidiary company of L’Oréal, but Keeley suspected she had got a whole pallet of them from Adie at Price Squash. She apparently wasn’t allowed to shower until at least tomorrow.
‘That cake,’ Duncan said, finally on ground level and licking his lips. ‘It was good. We should make it again. As a family.’ He paused briefly before adding, ‘Bea would like that.’
‘It wouldn’t be the same,’ Lizzie remarked.
‘We don’t know that,’ Duncan replied. ‘Until we try it.’
‘It might be nice,’ Keeley suggested. ‘My kidney and I promise not to actually absorb any.’
Lizzie sucked a breath in through pursed lips. ‘Oh, that’s right, make fun of me!’
‘Mum, I wasn’t. I…’ Keeley started. But it was too late. Lizzie had turned away and was marching from the kitchen, loose-fitting yoga pants creating a breeze.
‘Can you smell burning?’ Duncan asked, sniffing.
‘Dad, I don’t really smell anything,’ Keeley answered.
Duncan dashed forward, taking hold of the pan on the hob. Keeley leaned over his shoulder, looking inside. The red cranberries had done more than reduce. They now resembled hard black rabbit droppings and the sauce was less coulis and much more tar.
‘Oh dear,’ Duncan said, also looking into the pan. ‘Your mother’s not going to be happy. That was meant to be turning into a cranberry and jalapeno salsa to pep up her book club’s nibbles this afternoon.’
‘Dad,’ Keeley breathed, as her dad put the pan down on a ring that wasn’t hot. ‘Is Mum OK?’
Duncan put a hand to his short grey beard and mused for a moment. ‘Your mum hasn’t ever really done “OK”,’ he answered. ‘She generally ranges from “pallbearer” to “Elton John in his heyday” and nothing in between.’
‘I know,’ Keeley answered. ‘But she’s more “pallbearer” at the moment, isn’t she?’
‘Well,’ Duncan said, ‘it’s the time of year, isn’t it? The anniversary… of losing Bea… and you… getting up on your feet and getting your strength back… and… Christmas coming and…’
‘And?’ Keeley asked. She sensed her dad was holding back on her amid the fumes of cranberry and whatever possibly lethal lung-burning gold spray her mother had been trying to coat the fir cones with. She could feel her throat furring up.
‘Well,’ Duncan said again, ‘I think, as much as she does seem to love all these festive coffee mornings and nibbles with the neighbours, it’s all a bit of a… time filler.’ He looked directly at Keeley. ‘If you want my opinion, which your mother makes very clear she rarely does want… she keeps herself busy so she doesn’t have time to think.’
Keeley nodded. She knew exactly what her dad meant. Since Bea had died Lizzie had more hobbies than I’m a Celebrity had witchetty grubs. If it wasn’t Krav Maga, it was yoga. If it wasn’t yoga, it was fundraising. If it wasn’t fundraising, it was dinner or tea parties with people who had never had much to do with the Andrews family until Lizzie needed them to fill a blank diary…
‘Listen,’ Duncan said, putting a hand on Keeley’s shoulder. ‘This isn’t your worry to bear. It’s mine. And, as her husband, the one that’s meant to know her best, I’m keeping a close eye and—’
‘Hiding in the man-cave any chance you get?’ Keeley suggested.
‘No,’ Duncan said. ‘I’m just… hoping it will all run its course. It’s not been that long and she can’t keep this pace of hobbies up forever.’
‘Mum has always been very determined,’ Keeley reminded. ‘It could really actually last forever.’ Particularly when no one could predict exactly how long you got with forever…
‘Have a crumpet,’ Duncan whispered. ‘Just take some fruit and seeds to go with your lunch. I’ll go and check on Mum. Give her the bad news about the cranberries.’ He smiled. ‘Wish me luck.’ He drew the side of his hand across his throat like it was a knife.