Summer Holiday

She got out a mirror that magnified by thirty and stuck it on the wall tile. When she had wanted to be a vet, she had asked for a microscope for her birthday and, for about six months, had studiously examined everything under it, from ants to scabs. But it was never as good as the science programmes where you could see the chomping hairy mandibles of a beetle or the inside of a wobbly pink human intestine. She loved her magnifying mirror, though. You could see only a little bit of your face at a time, which was fascinatingly hideous. Her eyebrows looked like spindly thorn thickets, with outlying stragglers. She plucked them and checked her chin to make sure nothing was growing there. Age, her grandmother had once told her, may give you wisdom but it also gives you excess hair and fallen arches. Age is not for wimps. God, it would be so easy to get depressed about everything drooping and growing hair.

Meanwhile, there was a nose to be attacked. Its pores were the size of bubbles in a yeasty bread mix and needed to be dealt with. That took a few minutes, and while it was relaxing after its pummelling, she peered up her nose. Bodies. So complicated. Hair inside nostrils to sift out particles in the air. Skin, with its pores opening or closing. She imagined her entire body as a vast collection of pulsating sea anemones, expelling and swallowing minute motes.

She dabbed toner everywhere, then mixed up a face pack with organic powder she had been given as a birthday present. It smelt of damp nappies, but was exceptionally good at calming down punished skin.

Back on the sofa, under a thick layer of night cream, she flicked through the channels. Telly was so boring on Saturday night. She shifted to Sky and rolled down the things she’d recorded, settling on a drama series about Sherlock Holmes, which had been getting good reviews. The cushions were comfy, the temperature was perfect and Dr Watson had a very good bedside manner. He had barely got his feet under the valance before she was fast asleep. She woke up as the credits were rolling and decanted to bed without cleaning her teeth.

The next day, Miranda woke up with a spring in her step and took a moment to remember why. Oh, yes. Towpath clearing. She quickly checked the time, having forgotten to set her alarm. It took her a moment to work out that the digital clock actually was showing five thirty-seven a.m. – the earliest she had woken up naturally since she’d last had jetlag.

She bounced into the bathroom and smiled at herself in the mirror. Natural light made you look so much better. She brushed her teeth with fennel toothpaste – bought because it was the sort of thing Nigel sneered at – then mint, because it felt fresher, and virtually skipped into the shower. ‘Oh, what a beautiful day,’ she trilled, as she shaved her legs.

She had two pieces of toast and a boiled egg, which she had undercooked so seriously that it looked like a jellyfish in a shell. She squiggled it around with a spoon to make it less offensive, then wolfed it down. She was ravenous so she followed it with a bowl of cereal and leapt into the car.

She arrived at the towpath with a tub of salad, a vegetable wrap, an apple, a banana, a smoothie and a bag of organic carrots.

‘Don’t tell me, you’re more hung-over than a quadruple bypass patient on an operating table,’ Alex commented, as she reeled off the list to him while they waited for the others to arrive.

‘Actually, no,’ she said primly. ‘I had an early night after dining on sushi.’

‘You were knackered?’ he sympathised.

‘Yes, I was.’ She smiled. ‘I know it sounds pathetic, but I really was a bit wiped out. A combination of fresh air and a little exercise.’

‘It’s what happens if you’re not used to it.’

‘And you?’

‘Well, I suppose I’m used to it.’

‘I meant what did you get up to last night?’

He hesitated. ‘I had to have a meeting with my father.’

‘Have a meeting with him? You mean you went to see your dad?’

‘No. It was a meeting – it’s complicated. But I didn’t get back till … erm, back until late, so I didn’t have a huge amount of sleep.’

‘And how was that?’ she asked idly, to keep the conversation going.

‘Fine,’ he said. And bent down to do up a shoelace that didn’t need tying. ‘So, no aches and pains, then? No massage required anywhere?’

‘You offering?’ she asked, addressing his ear.

He stood up. ‘I think I possibly am,’ he said, his green eyes alight.

He’s only saying that because he feels safe, she thought. Because I’m so much older. Because I’m no threat. Treating me like he would his mother. But she couldn’t prevent a tingle of excitement. ‘Shoulders could do with a rub, then, if you really don’t mind.’ She turned to present them.

His hands were strong and she winced a little as he worked on her.

‘Hey, can we all have one of those?’ asked Teresa, emerging from her scruffy Fiat with a cooler bag that contained her lunch.

Alex merely grinned and carried on massaging Miranda. ‘How’s that?’ he asked.

‘Me love you long time, meester,’ she responded, in a higher voice than she’d meant to use, actually feeling rather hot and bothered and trying hard not to be turned on.

Will’s Land Rover pulled up, drowning Alex’s response, but it appeared to signal the end of his ministrations and they got to work soon after.

It was a beautiful day and Miranda stood up frequently to stretch and look about her. On the canal, a shimmering drake was bothering a drab duck in an area of dark, still water. She knew she should be appalled by the huge expanse of green duckweed and algae bloom, but it was the most brilliant colour. It made the bank on the other side look positively dull.

She had stuck her hair into a large clasp at the back of her head, but red-gold curls had escaped and had glued themselves to her face by the time the call for lunch went up. ‘Phew,’ she said, as they walked back to the meeting area. ‘It’s awfully hot and sticky.’

‘Maybe you should wash it,’ said Alex, as he went past.

She snorted.

‘I’m so sorry,’ he said apologetically. ‘Something a friend of mine used to say every time I said it was hot and sticky. Reflex action. Really. Sorry.’ He did look a little pink around the ears.

‘It’s fine. Honestly. Don’t worry about it. I’ve heard worse. Much worse. And I definitely could do with a freshen-up.’ She grinned. And now she was embarrassed. ‘A freshen-up.’ That was so bloody Surrey.

It was peculiar how, even at her age, she reverted to being a teenager, given half a chance and a following wind.

After lunch, they worked with fewer breaks to clear the last stretch of towpath they were dealing with that weekend. Miranda wondered whether she would do the volunteering thing again. It had been a nice idea, but apart from Alex, she didn’t like the others much. They were all a bit holier-than-thou, with bad skin and terrible hair. She smiled at that. Hers had gone mad with the combination of heat and sweat. She took off her glove and wiped her brow with the back of her hand. Her nails were filthy, even though she hadn’t done anything without gloves on. Yuk. That must be from the inside of the gloves. Someone else’s body detritus.

By five o’clock, it was all done. The team gathered gratefully in the shade of a tree – now shorn of its lower branches – and drank bottles of water. Will thanked them all for their hard work and said that anyone who wanted to see the job through to the end was welcome to come again. Everyone except Miranda intimated that they’d be doing just that.

She couldn’t decide. On the one hand, it would be a waste of the wicking shirt and the trousers if she didn’t. On the other, she might just go and get a job.

She got into the Jaguar and was sitting with her eyes closed, anticipating the drive home, when she was startled by a knock on the window. ‘Alex. You gave me a fright,’ she said, her heart beating unnecessarily fast.

‘Sorry.’ He smiled. ‘Again.’ He leant his forearm on the car roof. ‘I’m sorry for my very poor attempt at humour earlier. Can I take you for a drink to make up for it?’ He hastened on before she had a chance to speak. ‘There’s a really pretty little pub about a mile away. It’s on your way home. They do coffee. Or … erm … other things, if you don’t want a drink of an alcoholic nature?’ he ended, raising his eyebrows hopefully.

‘How could I possibly say no?’ she answered. ‘A nice glass of something sounds just the job. Only the one, mind you, since I do have to drive home.’

Alex began to explain where the pub was, but saw that she had lost him beyond turning left on to the main road. ‘Tell you what, why don’t you follow me?’

‘Much easier,’ she agreed.

It was a relief to get the air-conditioning going in the car. She tuned in to Radio 2 and jigged along to ‘Honky Tonk Woman’, singing the few words she knew and humming the rest. She was going to a pub with a dreadlocked eco-warrior. Not that he was a warrior, but it was a very sexy word redolent of a bygone age when men were men and women wandered about in long skirts applying harts-horn and experimenting with plaits.

‘Whoa, lady,’ she said aloud, running her hand along the nape of her neck and lifting her hair to get a bit of ventilation.

The verges were verdant with flowers, trees and bushes, all bursting into life. It was like a scene from a 1950s film with euphemisms for sex. Peonies exploding. Pods popping. Stamens thrusting. Miranda felt an excitement she hadn’t experienced since the very first blind date after her divorce, when she’d thought that she was going to be properly pillaged. How misplaced that had been.

The photograph of Marc – that was his name – had shown a stocky man with close-cut hair in the Russell Crowe mould, standing by a stallion with muscular nostrils and a look in its eye. She had spent about three hours getting ready – even bought new clothes and underwear to emphasise the new leaf she was turning over.

And then she had met him. She would literally have preferred to have had dinner with his horse.

His wallet had been bursting with platinum credit cards and fifty-pound notes – he had made sure she noticed them when he took out a picture of his new Labrador. But he had been an unreconstructed bore who could barely wait for her to finish a sentence before he was leaping in with long, tedious stories, all of which he started, ‘I must tell you about this funny thing that happened to me …’

Under her breath, she replied, ‘No, you don’t have to tell me and it won’t be funny.’

Her mobile phone startled her by ringing very loudly where it nestled in her crotch. She put the hands-free earphones in and answered.

‘Hi, Mum.’

‘Oh, hello, Lucy. Listen, I’m driving so I might lose you if I go into an iffy patch. How are you?’

‘Fine. How are you?’

‘Feeling pretty good, actually. Everything okay, or were you after something?’ She might as well cut to the chase, since Lucy generally only phoned to lecture her about splitting up the family or how she should invest her cash.

‘Hmm. I saw Dad yesterday and he said you still had some of his books, which you said you were going to give him back. I thought I’d save you a trip by picking them up from you this week.’

Miranda bristled. She consciously kept her voice light. ‘I wonder which ones they are. He did take the couple he’d read, and the yard of books he bought at Sotheby’s to put on his office bookshelves,’ she said sweetly. ‘Sorry. You’re going to have to tell him to give me a ring and let me know what he’s talking about.’ He wouldn’t because he was a coward and that was why he had drafted in Lucy to ask her.

‘Leatherbound books, he said,’ Lucy countered, obviously having been briefed by Nigel.

‘Yes. The ones he bought by the yard, as I said. No doubt he’s finished reading them all and is desperate for the sequels,’ she said bitchily. Nigel read the Financial Times, the Telegraph and some magazine called Square Mile, which she’d once read in the bath in the absence of anything racier.

‘He says you know which books he’s talking about. Apparently you claimed they were yours, but Gran says they were definitely hers and she gave them to Dad.’

‘Well, I’ve no idea what you, he and she are talking about,’ she said waspishly.

‘Do you think you could check when you get home, though?’ asked Lucy, relentlessly.

‘Not tonight. I’m on my way to a …’ She paused, unwilling to get into a conversation about where she was going and with whom ‘… friend’s house. For dinner. I’ll be late.’

‘Oh.’ Lucy sounded put out. ‘Well, I’ll tell Dad you’ll do it in the morning, then.’

‘No, you won’t,’ countered Miranda. ‘You’ll tell him to give me a ring and explain what I’m looking for.’

‘I’ve already told you what you’re looking for. Don’t be mean, Mum. Which friend are you having dinner with?’

‘Eh?’

‘Which friend are you having dinner with?’

‘Lydia,’ she said foolishly, no other name coming to hand quick enough. Damn. Trust her to pick the wife of one of Nigel’s best friends.

‘On a Sunday?’

‘Well, it was supposed to be lunch, but I was busy. So I’m dropping round now.’

‘It won’t be a late one, though, knowing Lydia and Justin. He’s like me, up at five every morning. I must ring him – I heard a rumour about Standard and Poors.’

Miranda’s eyes widened. Drat and double drat. That would be the cat put firmly amid the pigeons.

‘I’m sorry, I can’t hear you very well, Lucy. If you can hear me, lots of love. Speak to you soon. ’Bye.’ She clicked the off button and glanced down to switch the phone off altogether. Ridiculous. Lying to your daughter about going to a pub with a young man.

‘Young man.’ She couldn’t help putting on an accent. Like that actor in the sketch show. Who was he? She couldn’t remember his name. Someone dressed as an old woman, ogling the man who came round to fix the boiler. Fix the boiler – oh, that’s a good euphemism, she thought.

Feeling a little discombobulated, she concentrated on the camper van ahead.

They pulled off at a crossroads and within ten minutes were in the car park of a pretty pub with a bright display of hanging baskets at the front and a little beer garden at the back. ‘Why don’t you grab a spot outside and I’ll get you a drink?’ Alex said, holding her door open as she got out of the car.

‘All right. Could I have a half of whatever the local beer is, please?’

‘Crisps?’

‘Salt and vinegar, please.’

‘An excellent choice, madam. They’ll complement the ale beautifully.’ He flashed her a big smile and walked into the saloon bar.

Miranda sat on one of the benches under a stripy umbrella. There was a slight breeze and her hair danced. She closed her eyes to enjoy the moment. It was delicious. There was a soft murmur of bees and the susurrant sound of plants drifting in the gentle wind. She could hear a couple chatting at another table, but not loudly enough to disturb the rustic peace.

Bit annoying about Nigel and the books, though. If she hadn’t had children with him, she could quite happily never speak to him again. She hoped there wouldn’t be any marriages just yet. The ex-wife of the father of the bride. Or the father of the groom – although it was unlikely that Jack would be tying the knot any time soon. And Lucy? Miranda loved her daughter, but she could be trying, and her boyfriends had almost always been annoying. Although, to be fair, not annoying to Nigel.

She opened her eyes and turned to the young couple she’d heard talking. They were holding hands over the wooden table with empty glasses in front of them. She thought wistfully of her lost youth. Had she ever looked like that? She supposed she must have done when she first met Nigel. Or had she? Her head had been full of other things, like not having to work unless she wanted to. And Nigel had been the human equivalent of the wardrobe full of fur coats in the Narnia books, a window on to a different world. A world of adults making adult decisions, like where to buy a house. Organising a mortgage. Choosing stuff that wasn’t crockery and cutlery, saying things like, ‘Oh, yes, a king-size bed is much more suitable,’ and knowing that they were married, so it was a proper marital bed. Then, of course, the ultimate grown-up thing – even though you could get pregnant from the age of about twelve: having a baby. It had been odd telling Dad. Absolute proof that she was having sex. That a man was actually … she searched for the word that Nigel had used … ‘banging’? Or was it ‘slamming’ her?

‘What’s making you smile?’ asked Alex, ending her reverie with his arrival.

‘Nothing. Rambling through memories. Can’t even remember now. Pff!’ She clicked her fingers. ‘A moment that’s gone in a flash of – What beer have I got?’

‘That is one interesting flash,’ he dropped a packet of crisps in front of her, ‘and it’s called Brakspear. A fine drop of ale, if I do say so myself.’

She downed half of it in one. ‘Excuse me. A bit thirsty.’

‘Can I interest you in a thinly sliced potato drenched in a delicious marinade of sea salt with a hint of balsamic?’

‘Don’t mind if I do.’ She reached into the bag and took a few.

‘England on a balmy evening like this is heaven, don’t you think?’ He necked a pint of very pale apricot liquid.

‘Gorgeous. Why would anyone be anywhere else?’

‘All we need now is the thwack of leather on willow.’

‘That’s the sort of dodgy thing they get up to in the shires,’ she said.

‘Not a cricket fan, I take it?’ he asked.

‘You are?’

‘Love it. A game of strategy. The only thing my father taught me,’ he said, and stopped.

‘He must have taught you more than that.’ Miranda tucked a stray curl behind her ear.

‘Not much,’ he said curtly. ‘What will you be doing next week?’

Miranda raised her blue eyes to his leaf-green ones. ‘Something rather akin to what your father taught you … not much. I’ve got a few friends I’ll be meeting up with, and a play at the Barbican that another friend has press-ganged me into seeing. It sounds like one of those experimental pieces where I’ll spend the entire evening wondering whether I’ve missed the point, and concentrating desperately to see if I can grasp something to talk about intelligently afterwards. And no doubt coming up with the stock word … “interesting”. Apart from that, same old, same old.’

‘You should get more involved with the eco side of things then,’ he said, taking another long sup of his drink.

‘Maybe. Is that lime and lemonade?’ she queried.

‘Lime and soda with a dash of Angostura bitters. Tastes almost alcoholic, but allows me to retain my driving licence. You have children, I think you said?’

‘Two. One in banking, the other on a rather extended gap year.’

‘As in?’

‘As in over a year now, and not much to show for it,’ she said, with a sigh.

‘Except that he can probably hold his own with anyone, has a better view of the world than those who don’t travel more than ten miles from their own door, and speaks a few languages?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’m very proud of him. My ex-husband thinks he’s wasting his life.’

‘I’ve got a friend whose parents thought exactly the same. He now runs one of the biggest student travel agents in the world. Hugely successful. Rolling in dosh. Gives loads of it to charity.’

‘And now has ecstatic parents?’

‘And now has ecstatic parents,’ he echoed.

‘Not that Jack’s doing much at the moment. If his emails are anything to go by, he’s learning how to surf in Indonesia.’

‘A necessary survival skill. Imagine how useful that could be if there was a sudden deluge and your house was washed away.’

‘I’d be in the house, surely.’

‘And he’d be coaxing you out of the window on to his surfboard as you were heading for the weir.’ He nodded sagely.

She laughed. ‘Is that how you ended up doing this canal-clearing thing?’ She gestured airily.

‘No. I did it to – erm – annoy someone,’ he said.

‘Your father?’

‘Yes. He thinks it’s all about capitalism. We don’t always see eye to eye.’ He grinned. ‘It’s a long story. And you have to get home, you said.’

‘Did I? I meant I can’t drink much because I have to drive home. I can certainly make time for what sounds like an interesting story. There’s nothing I like better than hearing about other people’s complicated home lives.’

‘Since you have one of your own?’

‘Well, it doesn’t sound as exciting as yours. But I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.’

‘Depending on where we start with the life history, it’ll take a lot longer than one drink,’ he said, his eyes crinkling attractively.

She put her head on one side, considering. ‘Fine,’ she said, after a few seconds. ‘And what would you suggest in that case?’

‘Have dinner with me,’ he pronounced, his even white teeth showing between what she had thought were eminently kissable lips since the moment she’d met him.

CHAPTER FOUR

While he was at his minor public school, Nigel had been called before the headmaster to explain how he had come to be in possession of a packet of cigarettes and a hip-flask full of whisky. During the complicated explanation he had given, in which he had blamed dark forces and a boy who was swotty, spotty, blond and a bed-wetter, he had discovered an aptitude for lying. It was standing him in good stead now, but what he needed were the books his mother had given him and which he had mixed up with two yards of leatherbound dictionaries bought in a drunken moment from Sotheby’s.

When Miranda turned on her mobile phone on Monday, there were several texts and voicemail messages, at least half of which related to the books. ‘Pesky blighter,’ she said aloud, making an avocado, cottage cheese and tomato sandwich for breakfast – she’d had no dinner the night before. There was also a message from Alex, suggesting dinner on Wednesday at Zuma, a very smart restaurant in Knightsbridge. That struck her as odd because he didn’t look the type who would know its name, even less frequent it.

Was he expecting her to pay? Or go halves? Well, if that was the price of hanging out with younger men, she supposed she’d have to bite the bullet.

The trouble was that she had recently put what was left of her cash into a copper-bottomed scheme that Lucy had organised. It had been paying such rich dividends that she had taken out a mortgage on the house and piled in more. She envisaged it growing year by year into a kind of enormous, bouncy pension that she could lie around on in her old age – but it left her very short for day-to-day expenses. That was one major disadvantage in not having Nigel to sort out the finances. And the reason she needed a job.

She composed a text, saying she would love to have dinner with him, then hesitated over whether to put an ‘x’ at the end of the message. She put it on, took it off and put it on. Then took it off just before she pressed send. A date. With a man who was only a bit older than her daughter. Or thereabouts, since she didn’t know for certain how old he was. If he was thirty, he was thirteen years younger, therefore two-thirds her age. Or was that three-quarters? Her maths had always been a bit foggy, particularly round fractions.

She finished her breakfast, and put the items in the dishwasher. Oh dear. Is that one of those non-eco things I shouldn’t be doing, like brushing my teeth without using water? Or was it okay as long as the dishwasher was full? But that meant there would be bits of dried food mouldering away in it, smelling like a teenager’s bedroom.

After a quick shower (saves on water), Miranda threw on an orange and cream Diane von Furstenburg dress and carefully put on her makeup. She had a hair appointment at eleven thirty, which would leave her with just enough time to get to the Lanesborough, near Hyde Park Corner, which did a very fine pot of loose-leaf tea. There she would do battle with her mother. It was a ritual she felt sure neither enjoyed much, but it had become so entrenched in their lives that it would be difficult for them to back out now.