‘Here… you’ll need a writing pad,’ Matthias put in, pulling one from the drawer and dropping it onto the table with a pen.
Cathy handed her recipe book over and Tansy began to check what they had, making notes of where there wasn’t enough. Cathy smiled up at Matthias and he smiled back. The fact that Tansy hadn’t complained or pulled a face was good, surely? That was progress?
When she’d finished she tore off the page and gave it to Matthias.
Cathy followed him out to the hallway and stood at the front door as he got his coat on.
‘Just as if you live here,’ he said, smiling down at her as she saw him out.
‘Not quite,’ she said, but she liked the image anyway.
He leaned down to kiss her lightly. ‘I won’t be long. Try not to get into a punch-up while I’m gone.’
‘I’ve never been in a punch-up in my life and I’m not about to start now.’
‘Glad to hear it – see you shortly.’
He closed the door behind him, throwing the hallway into gloom again. Cathy made her way back to the kitchen to find Tansy already weighing out the things they did have. She glanced up as Cathy came in but said nothing, turning her attention back to her task.
‘So…’ Cathy began, scrabbling for a conversation opener, ‘how’s it going staying with your uncle?’
‘Alright,’ Tansy said.
Cathy reached for the tea Matthias had just made for her and waited, but there was nothing more.
‘Do you think you’ll stay long term?’
‘Don’t you want me here?’
‘It’s none of my business,’ Cathy said. ‘I can’t tell Matthias who to have here.’
‘No, you can’t. He’s always got my back and I’ve got his.’
‘I’ll bet you have,’ Cathy said. ‘It’s lucky you’re so close and you have good family around you.’
Tansy glanced up with the sneer that Cathy was far more used to seeing.
‘But they are,’ Cathy insisted. ‘I’ve got nobody.’
‘You’ve got a house – Matthias told me.’
‘Yes, but there’s just me living in it.’
‘At least that’s somewhere to live. If I didn’t have Matt I’d be living on the street.’
‘I’m sure your mum would never allow that to happen… she’s your mum, after all.’
‘Have you met my mum?’
‘No, but—’
‘Then you don’t know what she’d allow.’
Cathy was silent for a moment. She sipped at her tea while Tansy poured the flour she’d just weighed out into a bowl.
‘Have you spoken to her since you left?’ she asked finally. She suspected her question would be met with the usual sullen rebuff but she asked it anyway. She had to make some kind of conversation and she didn’t know anything about Tansy except that she quite liked to bake and that she had just left home and moved in with Matthias. They’d pretty much covered the baking topic – at least they would throughout the afternoon. The second one seemed like a conversation more worth having.
‘No,’ Tansy said. ‘I’m not going to either. If she can’t be bothered to phone me then I’m not going to bother phoning her.’
‘She hasn’t even phoned you? But you’ve been gone for days!’
Tansy straightened up and regarded Cathy coldly. ‘Look, you don’t have to pretend you care. I’m not going to get in the way of you seeing my uncle so you don’t have to be my friend. I don’t need to get in the way…’ she added, putting her head down to the recipe book again. ‘It never works out.’
‘One day it will,’ Cathy said firmly.
‘Yeah, you keep thinking that,’ Tansy said. ‘You’ll see.’
Cathy put down her mug and folded her arms. If they were going down this road then come on, she thought, bring it on. Let me know what’s in store. ‘OK. Why don’t they work out?’
‘Well,’ she said, in a tone that implied Cathy must be a bit slow if she needed Tansy to enlighten her, ‘he loves Sidonie, doesn’t he?’
‘They’re divorced.’
‘So?’
‘He can’t go back to her.’
‘Doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to.’
‘He seems happy enough now.’
‘Yeah, well, he’s not going to cry to you about it, is he?’
‘I can tell.’
‘How?’
‘I just can.’
‘Whatever…’
Cathy picked up her cup again. For all her bravado, she couldn’t deny that the thought of Matthias still being in love with Sidonie had rattled her. It didn’t matter that it had come from Tansy and that it might well be a lie to stir up trouble – Tansy’s favourite pastime, apparently – the prospect of any nugget of truth in it was unnerving. What if he did still love his ex? It would explain why none of his relationships since then had worked out.
No! Cathy gave herself a mental shake. That wasn’t it at all. A man who looked at Cathy the way he looked at her couldn’t still be pining after someone else. If his relationships thus far since Sidonie hadn’t worked out, it was because they hadn’t been the right relationships for him.
She looked down at her mug to see it was almost empty. As it so often did, the act of clutching a warm cup seemed to soothe her in times of crisis or uncertainty, and she decided quickly to make another one.
‘Do you drink tea?’ she asked Tansy.
‘Yeah.’
‘I’m going to make another one – do you want one too?’
‘If you want.’
‘Do you take sugar?’
‘Two.’
Cathy set about making drinks, the kitchen now silent once more. She’d seen which cupboards Matthias had gone to for the cups and teabags so it wasn’t too difficult to locate them again. When she was done she put Tansy’s on the table next to her and sat down with her own.
‘Did you do any cooking before you came to the club with Erica?’ she asked.
‘I cooked my tea at home most nights.’
‘But not cakes?’
‘Mum doesn’t buy in food like that. She mostly gets frozen and stuff in tins.’
‘You know, if you’re resourceful you can make good cakes with things out of tins.’
‘Maybe I’m not resourceful then.’
‘What I mean is I could show you.’
‘I’m never going home again so it doesn’t matter now.’
‘You’re going to live here permanently?’
Tansy looked up. ‘Why not?’
‘Won’t your mum miss you?’
‘She won’t care.’
‘I think she might.’
‘You don’t know her!’ Tansy snapped. ‘Stop thinking you know what’s going on here because you don’t!’
‘I want to help, that’s all. If I knew more about it maybe I could.’
‘So you can get me out of the way and have Matt all to yourself? You’re just like her!’
‘Like your mum?’