In-Laws and Outlaws Read online

  “Oh my goodness . . .” I began to say but got no further as Meg (it couldn’t be anyone else so startling was her resemblance to Marjorie) spun around and landed me a pretty heavy punch on my jaw.

  “Unhand me young woman,” she shouted rather dramatically as I clutched my jaw. I was quite pleased to be addressed as young woman, especially after the paramedic who had made so free with the term ‘madam’, but I was less pleased to be punched on the jaw.

  “I’m not handing you.” I was unsure what the opposite of unhand was but I knew as soon as I said ‘handing’ that this wasn’t it.

  “I,” Meg continued in the same dramatic tone, “have done nothing wrong and yet you, you,” she repeated the word ‘you’ for emphasis while pointing at me accusingly with forefinger of the very hand that had just punched me, “decide to chase an old woman all the way along the King’s Road. It’s harassment. I could have you arrested.” She had gone positively puce with indignation. People were beginning to stare and I could see a couple of them surreptitiously filming us on their phones. That was just what I needed, a video of me having a fight with Meg on the King’s Road going viral.

  “I don’t think you’ve done anything wrong,” I said. I had to raise my voice rather more than I would have liked, but Meg was in such a state of fury that I felt I could only get through to her by shouting. “I thought I recognised you, that’s all. You look exactly like someone I know.”

  “So you’re not a store detective?” Meg looked at me through narrowed eyes.

  “No!” I exclaimed. “Why would you think I was store detective?”

  “Because you said you were.” Meg replied.

  “I didn’t,” I replied. “I bumped into you and you socked me on the jaw.” I rubbed my jaw at this point to reinforce that I was the injured party, but it really didn’t hurt very much. Meg is a lot shorter than me and it may have been an exaggeration to say that she punched me on the jaw, it was more of a glancing blow.

  “Who are you then?” Meg asked. “And why did you follow me?”

  “I’m Eve and I thought you were . . .”

  “Thought I was who?” Meg interrupted me, her eyes narrowing again.

  “Marjorie.” I said, almost in a whisper, hoping to convey apprehension. If, as I suspected, all was not well between the sisters Meg was more likely to look kindly on me if she thought I didn’t have a great relationship with Marjorie. “I thought you were Marjorie.” I almost whispered while glancing down nervously. The acting establishment didn’t know what it was throwing away when it blacklisted me.

  “Oh, my dear, I’m not Marjorie!” Meg put a reassuring hand on my arm and let out a hoot of laughter.

  “I know that now!” I exclaimed. “I was pretty sure of it the moment you hit me. You do look exactly like her though.”

  “We are twins so that’s hardly surprising. I’m Meg,” she said, extending her hand to me. “Nice to meet you Eve.”

  “And it’s nice to meet you too.” I shook Meg’s hand vigorously. “I have heard so much about you.”

  “Who from?” Meg asked.

  “From Helen,” I said, “and from Gideon. I’m Gideon’s girlfriend.”

  “How lovely, how very lovely. And how are they both?” Meg asked.

  “They’re well. Anyway,” I said, “it’s lovely to finally meet you but I should let you get on your way, goodbye.”

  “I’m not going anywhere in particular. I just popped out to do a little shopping.” Meg explained. “Couldn’t I least buy you a cup of tea?” I had been hoping she’d say that. “I feel I owe you something, having punched you.”

  “As long as I’m not interrupting you . . .” I acquiesced, “that would be lovely.”

  “And I should like a scone.” Meg said to the waitress in the tea shop we had found a little further down the King’s Road. “Now,” she continued. “I like lots of preserve on my scones, so you must bring at least three, no, four of those tiny little jars. Blackcurrant jelly, if at all possible, but definitely not raspberry jam, I can’t stand the pips.” Although it was after three Meg must have missed lunch as she was clearly very hungry. The table at which we were sitting was very small and I wasn’t at all sure that it would hold all the food she had ordered which, in addition to the scone, included a slice of asparagus quiche, a bottle of orange juice (“I don’t want any of that freshly squeezed stuff, it gives me terrible wind, and don’t open the bottle, I’ll see to that.”) and a pot of tea. She had also asked that everything should come at once, hence my concern about the ability of the table to hold it all.

  “This is very kind of you,” she said, “I can’t imagine how I managed to mislay my purse.” Rather than being treated to tea by Meg as promised, it seemed that I was going to have to pay as, having rummaged through her bag, Meg had announced that her purse was missing. She seemed remarkably unperturbed by this, simply saying that she was sure it would turn up.

  “So, you are my nephew’s lady friend?” she said, her lunch order finally complete.

  “Yes, yes I am.” I confirmed.

  “So you know my sister?” A flicker of disgust passed across Meg’s face for the minutest of moments. According to Claire we give our true feelings away all the time through tiny micro expressions over which we have no control. Meg’s micro expression told me that she really didn’t like her sister at all.

  “Yes, yes I do.” I replied.

  “And how is she?” Meg demanded to know.

  “Well, she’s . . .”

  “Isn’t she?” Meg pursed her lips in disdain. You didn’t need to be an expert in micro expressions to read that one. “And Malcolm, how is Malcolm?” Meg’s face lit up as she asked about Gideon’s father. There was nothing in my acquaintance with Malcolm to indicate that he could cause anyone’s face to light up, but there it was nonetheless. “Is he well?” Meg leaned in, clearly warming to her subject now that all talk of Marjorie was out of the way. “I do hope he’s well,” she added.

  “He’s . . .” I began.

  “And Helen and Ian?” Meg’s questions were coming so thick and fast I barely had time to answer one before she was on to the next. “Are they well? Are they happy?”

  “He’s Gideon now. Ian that is. He uses his full name.” I explained.

  “Yes, I’m sure he does.” Nothing about Meg matched Marjorie’s description to Helen. She didn’t seem in the least gaga to me, and I didn’t think depressive recluses went out to tea. “I don’t blame him, you know,” Meg continued. “He couldn’t help it.”

  “Gideon? To blame? What for?” What was she talking about?

  “I wasn’t talking about Gideon!”

  This was intriguing, but I wasn’t destined to find out who Meg was talking about as she stopped her stream of questions to pop a forkful of quiche into her mouth. “I adore asparagus,” she said, having finished the quiche in no time flat. “I would eat it all the time if I could afford to. Don’t you love asparagus?” I had honestly never given asparagus much thought.

  “Mmm, yes, it is delicious.” I replied.

  “Do you have any secrets?” Meg suddenly asked out of nowhere.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Oh, ignore me. I’m just a silly old loon.” She laughed as she rotated her right index finger next to her temple. I had been observing Meg quite closely as she tucked into her meal. She was a little thinner than Marjorie, although only very marginally, they were both a little overstuffed. Not that Marjorie had always been plump. “When I was young I had trouble keeping my weight up,” she had once told me, “I had to eat and eat and eat just to maintain a normal weight. You can have no idea!” she had concluded while looking me up and down appraisingly.

  Apart from this very slight discrepancy in their weights, the similarity between the two women really was remarkable. Their hair was styled in a similar manner, and they wore similar clothes, although it was clear that Meg’s were rather more bargain basement than Marjorie’s. Meg’s mannerisms were also disconcertin
gly familiar, to the point where I had to keep reminding myself that it wasn’t Marjorie sitting opposite me.

  “When did you last see Marjorie?” I asked, as Meg piled butter and blackcurrant jelly onto her scone.

  “Oh, sometime ago,” she replied evasively.

  “A long time ago?” I asked, wary of appearing pushy.

  “Just a normal amount of time.” This was proving a very unproductive meeting. “Well, this has been lovely, I must say,” Meg suddenly announced, having eaten everything on the table, “but I really must go.”

  I don’t know what I had expected from a meeting with Meg. I had hoped, I suppose, for a bit more than simply being out of pocket for a second lunch that I didn’t eat in the same day. As it was, it seemed that meeting Meg was to be a dead end.

  “Well, this has been lovely,” Meg repeated, gathering up her things, and slipping a bowl containing little paper tubes of sugar into her bag in the process. And when I say bowl, I mean literally the bowl and all its contents. It jostled for space with the little jars of blackcurrant jelly she hadn’t consumed and the orange juice she hadn’t opened. “So if you’ll just give me your phone number I will call you anon.” Meg tapped the side of her nose as she spoke.

  “I’m sorry?” I replied. “My number?”

  “We have more to talk about, don’t we? We are potential allies. So I must have your number.” She stopped fussing with her bag to look me in the eye.

  “Why don’t I take your number?” I countered, glad that this wasn’t a dead end, but also hoping to retain some control over the situation.

  “Oh, I don’t have a phone!” she exclaimed.

  “You mean you don’t have a mobile phone?” I queried.

  “I mean I don’t have a phone, any phone, they are so terribly expensive, don’t you think?” Meg removed a pen from her bag and, grabbing a napkin from the table, thrust them both towards me. I dutifully wrote my number on the napkin and handed it back, wondering where this strange alliance might lead.

  “Thank you,” said Meg, putting it in her already bulging bag. “And now I really must be going.” And with that she swept off dramatically. Rather too dramatically as it happened, as she managed to bump into a woman at another table causing her to spill her tea and knock a chair to the floor on her way out. I wasn’t sure whether or not I would hear from her, or even if I really wanted to, but there was nothing more I could do, so having paid the bill, I headed off home myself.

  CHAPTER 12

  The weeks went past and winter gradually gave way to spring. I heard nothing from my brother or from Meg so I consigned them both to the very furthest reaches of my mind and simply got on with my life. Marjorie had also been put on something of a backburner, as she and Malcolm had gone on a very long, very expensive cruise to the Antarctic that lasted from the beginning of March right up until Easter.

  Marjorie, so she told me, had a passion for penguins and had, for many years, harboured a longing to see them in their natural habitat. While it was unsurprising that I knew nothing of Marjorie’s love for these flightless sea birds, that neither Malcolm nor Gideon had had the slightest inkling either was odder. The reason behind this never before mentioned mania did become a little clearer, however, when I discovered that the woman next door (Meryl Bloody Streep) had been on just such a cruise the year before and had rammed it down Marjorie’s throat ever since.

  “She seems to think she’s the only one that can afford to cruise to the Antarctic, the stuck up madam,” Marjorie had told me as we sat waiting for Malcolm’s coffee machine to do its worst following another spectacularly awful Sunday lunch. “Well, I shall go and I shall see a polar bear as well. See how she likes that!”

  “That’s unlikely,” said Malcolm, entering the lounge bearing a tray.

  “I don’t see why.” Marjorie snapped.

  “Because polar bears live at the North Pole,” he explained, tenderly placing the tray on a side table.

  “But that’s where we’re going!” Marjorie exclaimed, clearly exasperated with Malcolm.

  “No, we are going to the South Pole, or rather the Antarctic.” Malcolm explained.

  “Well, the tour operators promised polar bears and penguins so that’s what I shall demand.” Marjorie continued. “If there aren’t any polar bears, I for one shall want to know the reason why.”

  “Because they don’t live there,” Malcolm muttered under his breath as he handed me my coffee cup. “And I am paying for it, not you,” he added before, I’m pretty sure, also winking at me. But polar bears or no, with Marjorie thousands of miles away Gideon and I were free to do as we pleased with our time, and with no need for me to find ways to avoid spending any of it with his mother.

  Everything in my garden was therefore pretty rosy and it was with real pleasure that I accepted an invitation from Helen to accompany her and her children on a day out. What could be more fun, I thought, than the chance to spend some time with my future sister-in-law and her children, so soon to become my nieces and nephews? I was, I thought, about to become part of a real family, and what said ‘real family’ more than a family day out? Nothing, that’s what.

  “I’m sorry it’s such short notice,” Helen said when she phoned. “Celeste was supposed to be coming but she’s got one of those twenty four hour bugs and doesn’t think she’ll be up to it. So, anyway,” Helen continued, “there’s a spare ticket and I could do with some adult company so if you fancy it . . . ?”

  “It sounds lovely,” I replied. How I would come to rue those words. “Let me know which train you’re on from Clapham Junction and I’ll hop on at Chiswick and away we go!”

  The first intimation I had that my day was going to be far from lovely was when I attempted to get on the train. I did manage to board, but it was touch and go. The thing that hit me first was the noise. It was ear splitting. It sounded very much as I imagine hell (which someone did once say was other people) might. The carriage was packed to the rafters with humanity. Each and every one of them, adults and children alike, seemed to be shouting at the top of their voices.

  “Stop that! Put that down! Sit still! No! Because I say so!” The chorus of adult voices was pitched at a very slightly lower tone than that of the children, who were like a squawking back drop out of which no specific words were identifiable. It sounded, when all put together, like a raging torrent and I couldn’t imagine how it could get any louder until, once we reached our final destination, it did.

  “I suppose I thought it was an actual park,” I yelled to Helen as we surged forward on a tidal wave of humanity towards the entrance to the theme park.

  “I’m so sorry,” she yelled back, “I thought you knew.”

  “No,” I replied, “but it’s fine. And anyway, it’s all about the kids, and I’m sure they’ll have a great time.” I said, although I wasn’t convinced that anyone could have a great time here. It looked very much like the kind of place slave labourers are forced to build to prove what fun the inhabitants of totalitarian states are having.

  Having finally negotiated the entrance I naively thought that queuing would be over for the day. Turns out that the main thing one does in theme parks is queue, for hours and for everything. Helen and I decided that the best way to negotiate the differing wishes of four children (best being a relative term as there is no good way to do such a thing) was to split up, taking two each. We would then meet up at a prearranged time and place for lunch. I headed off with Martha and Ruby in tow while Jake and Hector went with their mother. If I thought that taking the two younger ones would mean I was spared the more terrifying rides I was mistaken.

  “I want to go on this one,” said Martha, dragging me towards a heart-stoppingly huge roller coaster. It rose vertically into the air for several miles, before plummeting an equal distance back down. I felt sick just looking at it. I have never understood the appeal of roller coasters. Why, when life holds so many physical and mental challenges, are so many people prepared to pay good money to be terrif
ied? Civilisation has, I would suggest, gone a bit far when it starts making machines whose sole purpose is to scare the user witless. What, after all, are planes are for? And least, for the price of a near death experience, planes take you from one place to another. Roller coasters simply land you back exactly where you started. Pointless, utterly pointless.

  “All right,” I agreed reluctantly, “we can go on it, but you should appreciate the risk you’re running.” I had noticed, as we made our way through the park, that several of the more outrageously awful looking rides had cut outs of children next to them, sometimes several. I assumed that they were a record of the number of child deaths that had occurred, much like the cut outs one sees by the roadside in France at accident black spots. I was relieved, therefore, when Martha explained that they were there to denote the minimum size of child allowed on the ride.

  “So no one has actually died on any of these rides?” I confirmed.

  “Of course not,” Martha scoffed, “do you think they’d let children on if they could kill you?”