‘You think I have a gift?’ Tansy asked.
Cathy smiled. ‘I do… Tansy… you know how you told me you hate your college course…?’
‘I don’t see the point in it. What am I going to do with A levels when I don’t want to go to university?’
‘I don’t know about that, but what if you did something you enjoy? Would they let you swap onto a different course?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like catering. You like cooking and it might lead to a job you like. At least it might feel like less of a waste of time.’
‘That’s a brilliant idea!’ Matthias said, beaming at them both. ‘What do you reckon, Tans?’
Tansy was thoughtful for a minute. ‘I always thought the thickos did catering.’
‘I think perhaps that’s a bit unkind,’ Cathy said gently. ‘Look at it objectively and forget your preconceptions for a moment. What job could you see yourself enjoying? What would you be happy to go in and do, day after day?’
‘I don’t know,’ Tansy said, and Cathy sensed a little impatience in her tone now. Perhaps this was the wrong day to talk about this and perhaps Cathy was the wrong person after all. She and Tansy were getting along better but she couldn’t expect miracles and she couldn’t expect a transformation of their relationship overnight.
‘You should give it some thought,’ Matthias said. ‘I think it might suit you a lot better than what you’re doing now. You said yourself that you don’t see the point in your A levels. If you don’t know what you’re going to do with them, is it worth doing them at all?’
‘It’s always worth doing these things,’ Cathy said. ‘If they make you happy and get you to where you want to be. That’s the real question you’ve got to ask yourself… Anyway…’ She picked up her wine again. ‘That’s probably a conversation for another day. One when we’ve had less wine.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ Tansy said, looking from one to the other. ‘I’d have to talk to Mum too.’
Cathy was surprised to hear that Tansy would want to discuss anything with her mum after all she’d said about her, but maybe it was a good thing. Maybe she was getting to a place with Michelle where they could get along, even if they weren’t living together. She half wondered if Tansy might go back to her mum’s house in the new year, though Matthias had made it clear that Tansy was going to be with him until she finished college at least. This hadn’t been as much of a problem as Cathy might have thought, considering they could at least get moments of privacy at her house if they couldn’t at his, and so she hadn’t made much of a comment on this. Matthias still wasn’t completely convinced that it was good for Tansy to be in the same house as Michelle’s boyfriend, Shane. Tansy had come clean and admitted that she’d been as much to blame for the animosity as him and that he’d never threatened her with violence of any kind, but their relationship was still far from healthy and Matthias was of the opinion that there was no need to subject her to that at close quarters when there was a perfectly good alternative available.
‘I wonder where we’ll all be if we’re sitting around this table again this time next year,’ Cathy said.
‘I should hope we will be,’ Matthias said. ‘Got plans elsewhere, have you?’
‘I’ll be here if you are,’ Cathy said.
‘Ugh!’ Tansy cut in. ‘Seriously, if you two are going to do this all day…’
‘I’m afraid you might have to get used to it,’ Matthias said. ‘We’ve had a lot to drink.’
‘True,’ Cathy said.
‘God, then I’ll have to go to Erica’s.’
‘You can’t,’ Matthias said. ‘I’ve had too much wine to drive you over there.’
‘I’ll walk.’
‘Good luck with that.’
Cathy giggled. Tansy looked like she wanted to bang their heads together as if they were a couple of naughty kids.
‘You’re right,’ Cathy said as she managed to stop laughing. ‘We’re being very silly.’
Tansy looked sceptical for a moment. But when Matthias offered no comeback, she seemed satisfied and cut into a roast potato. Cathy sent a steamy glance Matthias’s way. They did need to behave today but, the way she felt about him right now, that was going to be very hard.
Epilogue
A year to the day had passed since that first Christmas lunch at Matthias’s house. Cathy had remarked more than once on how quickly it had flown by and how she couldn’t believe they were all sitting around the same table once again. But in that fleeting year, so much had changed in her life that she barely recognised herself as the same person who had laughed at Matthias’s lowly Christmas sausages. They’d all changed: Matthias, Tansy, the folks at the cookery club. For a start, the members of the cookery club were all minor celebrities. At least, most of them felt like it, and it had done wonders for their confidence.
On the shelf in Matthias’s living room, Cathy’s cookbook took pride of place. Not the old exercise book, still tea-stained and largely illegible, nor the copy Fleur had given to Cathy last year, filled with amateur photos of cakes taken on phones and Comic Sans typeface – they were two of Cathy’s most treasured possessions and were tucked away in a chest at her house. No, the cookbook on the shelf at Matthias’s house was one of his most treasured possessions, because he loved completely the woman who’d written it.
Inside, the typeface was crisp and classy. Cathy had no idea what this one was called but it looked good. The pages were adorned with high-resolution photos of her creations (she suspected they’d been tampered with by the photographer to make them look better after she’d presented them but had let it slide) and photos of members of the cookery club hard at work in the kitchens of St Cuthbert’s. They all looked as if they were having the time of their lives – the images of them frowning at their mixing bowl or each other, or looking less than delighted with their lives had been quickly deleted from the camera roll of the professional photographer who had come to capture the essence of what they and the cookery book were about. It was about community and friendship, about people coming together to make their lives better, to enrich their own and by doing so enrich each other’s. And on the final page was a huge photo of them all together as a group, Cathy at the front with her hands tucked into the pocket of her apron and a beaming, welcoming smile on her face. It said, come on in everyone; you can all cook with us.
‘How much money do you think the book has raised for the vicar’s charities so far?’ Matthias asked as he poured wine into Cathy’s glass.
‘I haven’t had the exact figures yet,’ Cathy said. ‘They’re done quarterly and the book only came out in October. I hope it’s going to be a decent amount.’
‘I think any amount is amazing. Most people would have taken the royalties for themselves.’
‘Yes, but it was the vicar who made it all happen really. It was the least I could do, and I’m glad to be able to help some good causes. Besides, if the YouTube channel keeps on gaining subscribers at the rate it’s doing right now I’ll be able to live off the revenue coming from that quite comfortably. Not that I’d ever leave Fleur, of course. I still can’t believe people want to watch me cook.’