“Rab,” Susan whispers, as Chris seats himself across from Mollie and begins talking to her in a voice too low to be overheard, “who is that?” Some relative, perhaps? His mother returned from wherever she disappeared to?
“I think she’s his best mate’s mum,” Rab answers. “She comes for lunch every Tuesday, when there’s nobody about. He makes summat special for her, and they sit and chat. Sometimes she cries.”
“She cries?”
Rab shrugs. “His mate’s dead, I think,” he elaborates.
“Oh.” Susan frowns. “I thought his best mate was his sous chef.”
“That’s ’is best mate now, but that’s”—Rab jerks a thumb in Mollie’s direction— “the mum of ’is best mate growin’ up.”
Susan glances back over at the table. Mollie’s talking quite animatedly, waving her knife and fork in between cutting pieces of meat and smearing it with mushy peas. Chris is laughing at whatever she’s saying and then chipping in with something. She guesses they’re trading memories. It strikes her as incredibly sweet that he’d do this for a lonely old lady.
“She’s nice,” Rab adds, watching them as well. “She talks to me sometimes when I’m here. I told her about my ma bein’ up th’ duff again.”
“Do you have a lot of brothers and sisters?” Susan asks.
Rab nodded. “Four ’n all,” he said. “Two each.” He shakes his head. “It’s a lot o’ work, and Dad’s away a lot. He works on the North Sea rigs, you see.”
“Oh.” Dangerous work that takes people away from their families for weeks at a time. She can feel the pressure on this young man’s shoulders to help his mother while also trying to start a career and a life of his own. She takes her own bowl into the kitchen and pats Rab on the shoulder. “You must miss him. Must be rough when he’s away.” He lifts his head and she looks him in the eye and says, “You’re doing a great job, Rab. You really are. You should be proud.”
He nods slowly. “Thanks.”
She pats him again and says, “Those tart shells should be cool by now. How about we make a ganache?”
By the time Mollie has finished her lunch, the tarts are filled: some with a decadent chocolate ganache, others with custard and glazed fruit, and the rest with the lemon curd. Susan finds some edible flowers in the refrigerator at the pastry station, and she and Rab carefully place one violet in the center of each lemon curd tart.
“Rab, you’ve done excellent work today,” Susan compliments. “It’s been a real pleasure working with you. Would you like to do it again?”
His face lights up and he nods. “Can we?”
“Of course!” She grabs a small plastic storage box and places one of each of the tarts inside. “Take some of these home—you’ve earned it!”
He glances toward Chris. “You sure it’s okay?”
“He won’t mind.”
“Then … could I just take the chocolate ones? Ma’ll like those best. She likes a chocolate nowadays. It’s how I know she’s ’avin’ a girl. It were the same wi’ my sisters.”
“Take as many as you like,” says Susan, picking up two other tarts and arranging them on plates. She thought it might be nice to give Mollie a sweet at the end of her meal.
With a smile, Susan approaches the table, but just as she reaches it, she realizes she’s made a terrible mistake. Something has changed here. Mollie has pushed her plate away and her head is bowed over her hands, folded in front of her on the table. Chris, face contracted in pain, is speaking very quietly, seeming helpless. Susan stops and hovers a few feet from the table, unsure what to do. Turn and run back to the kitchen? That seems … strange. But coming closer feels intrusive.
After a few excruciating seconds, Chris glances up and notices her. The expression on his face is now plainly What the hell are you doing?
“I’m sorry, I-I-,” Susan stammers, coming closer. As she does so, Mollie turns her head away and brings one hand up to further shield her face. “I thought you might like something for pudding,” Susan finishes, feeling like a world-class tit.
“Just leave them,” Chris orders sharply, warning her, with a look, to go. Quickly.
Susan jumps forward and puts the tarts down so fast the lemon one slides on the plate, tipping right over the side. The delicate pastry cracks in half and the lemon filling begins oozing onto the tablecloth. “Oh!” she reaches out to rescue it, but Chris swoops in first, roughly shoving the tart back onto its plate.
“Leave it—it’s fine!” he insists.
“That’s awright, dearie, thank’ee,” Mollie says. A quiver in her voice betrays the emotions she’s trying hard to conceal.
Susan backs away. “I’m sorry,” she whispers, mortified. “Sorry!” She turns, flees back through the kitchen and bursts out the back door and into the August sunshine.
Chapter Eighteen
Too Close for Comfort
“… so then I said, ‘That’s not on, and you know it, and you’re just being a wanker now—’”
“Lauren! Little pitchers!” Meg claps her hands over the ears of the son nearest to her.
“Muuuuuum!” Ali wails, ducking away from her.
“He always was a wanker,” Lauren’s friend (Kate? Kell? Susan can’t recall now.) responds, ignoring the murderous look Meg shoots her. Kate/Kell nudges a third girl with the elbow of the arm she’s using to text someone. “Remember when we all went to Porty Beach after the Freshers Ball, and he dared Leila to jump off the steps? And she landed on some rocks and fractured her ankle and whacked her head, and then we made him come with us to A&E and he sulked the whole time we were there, even though it was his fault we were there in the first place? What a dick.”
“Girls, will you please watch your language and—Hermione, I’ve told you time and again not to even look at that chicken! Out! Both you dogs! You are banished!” Helen herds the labs out of the dining room. Both cast mournful looks over their shoulders as they go, begging someone to intervene on their behalf.
“… Fascinating stuff, theater. I’ve always wondered how people do it. I mean, how do you manage to get so into so many different characters? Don’t you get confused sometimes?” Russell wonders, stepping aside so the dogs can pass.
“But that’s the genius of it, Russ!” Bernard leans over a platter of cold poached salmon. “That’s what makes her great. It’s why everyone wants to work with her, isn’t that right, Kay? It’s the same with Philip. It’s why this show’s going to amaze everyone—really amaze them, isn’t that right, Kay?”
“Hermione!” shrieks Helen as one of the dogs streaks back in and makes for the chicken. “Lauren, I told you—”
“She got away from me, Mum! I told you she’s impossible—you need to bring someone in to train her.”
Susan can barely hear her own thoughts over the cacophony of the Cox dinner table. It’s Wednesday, an unusual evening for a full-on family dinner, but Kay’s play opens that weekend, and Helen wanted a “welcome to Edinburgh, Kay, dear,” dinner before Kay’s evenings were all spoken for. The weather has not cooperated: the previous day’s sun gave way to a chilly, cloudy morning and then a chilly, rainy afternoon that barely tamped down the masses of people heaving up and down the city’s streets. There’s no crowd relief here either: Helen and Russell have invited loads of people, and they’re all clumped around the buffet-style spread on the table, awkwardly holding plates, no one quite in a position to move them all into another room. So the dining room feels too full and too warm. The windows have steamed up; the children are bored and whiny; and the host and hostess, who should be the ones directing traffic, stand talking with their guests.