CHAPTER 3
I lay with my man that night, hearing the wind throw a light patter of rain at the tent, murmurs of sound coming from all directions, including what was clearly someone making love. Sounds of life.

“She’s fragile, isn’t she, love?”

I thought about my answer for a while, and it struck me. “No, I don’t think she is. I think she has more strength than we have ever given her credit for. She’s nervous, but…”

“What, love?”

“It’s a common thing. I see it a lot with domestics, aye? You shit on somebody enough times, and they start to self-define as a victim, and then everything they go through, that shouts ‘victim’ as well, aye? We all end up forgetting the person”

“There’s more on your mind, love…”

I could feel my fists clenching, and I wanted to lash out at something, anything. Perhaps there was a man in me somewhere after all. Eric held me tighter.

“Nine, love. Those fuckers started on her when she was nine. What sort of fucking world do we live in, Eric?”

I could feel his own tears mow. “One in which people like you, and Ginny, and Naomi, and all the rest of them, in which you care. That’s what sort of world”

“Yeah, but too late, aye?”

“Too late, love? No. Look at yourself. Was Ginny too late? And you for Darren, and Chantelle? This whole group has made a difference for everyone in it, for so many others, yeah? They even turned me around”

I managed a chuckle at that. “Yeah, got you playing another instrument, aye?”

“No, got my eyes open to see what I had had in front of me for so long. Dum spiro spero. “

“You what? “

“Latin, love. While I breathe, I hope. Pandora’s gift. Call it what you want, yeah, but every time I see her and Darren look at each other, it’s hope I see. Look, she lost her childhood, yeah, but we can still let her be a teenager”

He suddenly chuckled.

“What’s funny?”

“Just thinking you missed out on teenager stuff as well, so…”

“So what, Eric?”

“Well…fancy some snogging and groping? If you can’t be a teenager again, why not act like one for a while?”

“Oh, you silver-tongued basmmmmfh”

My Eric knows when to shut up, and how best to shut me up. Neither of those is a complaint. I come back to what I wrote about making love after seeing Death walk past; there is nothing more life-affirming. The sleeping bags would definitely need laundering, though.

He was gone when I awoke.

Morning brought another stroll through damp grass with some of the others, another superb breakfast, another round of poking fun at each other, and a quiet whisper from Chantelle.

“Happy birthday, Annie”

I whispered back. “Happy birthday, Shan. Fancy scrambled eggs today?”

The sun was back, burning away the last of the night’s rain and drying the tents. Breakfast was as good as ever, and this time Steph was alone too. Grass widows, and I hadn’t even got the marriage out of the way yet.

“This is how I met Geoff, you know, in off his morning ride, all sweaty and yummy. Just be glad Eric hasn’t dragged you out today. Shan, cariad, want to go into the town this morning? We need some groceries for Tuesday, and there could be some sales on. Proper shoes on, though, not flip-flops”

“OK, but what’s Daz up to?”

“Got some practice on the drumming, ready for tonight. Don’t worry, we’ll be back for lunch”

As soon as Shan was out of earshot, I saw the wink from Ginny, which was as theatrically obvious as I should have expected.

“What are you girls up to?”

Ginny grinned, and mouthed the word ‘later’ just as two flushed men came into our erstwhile tranquillity demanding tea and sweating everywhere. Breakfasts, more tea, and a queue for the showers which, truth to be told, I needed just as much as Eric after the previous night’s teenagering.

Breakfast was therefore enlivened by some under table groping from Eric, and that again threw me. I was still, despite his attentions, thinking of my comments to Shan about men in dresses. It still caught me, every so often, no matter where I was or what I was doing.. Eric gave me a funny look.

“Annie, can we…”

Before I could react, he had me outside the tent.

“What’s up? Bad morning?”

“Sort of…”

“Man in drag or what?”

“How did…”

“Not only do I live with you, but I love you. I know how bloody fragile you can be. Someone had a dig at you?”

I sighed. “No, it’s odd, I’m all up and down, aye? Mood all over the place. I see the same situation, and it looks wonderful, then five minutes later, the same thing, it makes me want to curl up?”

“Hormones?”

“Could be. I’ll have to talk to Raj, it could be I need some more anti-bloke stuff. But, really, I think it’s just the time and place. Eric, where were we a year ago?”

He still had his hands on my shoulders, and he let them slide round me as he stepped forward into an embrace. “Lost, love. That’s where we were. Look…is it the surgery that’s got you worried? Because…if that’s the case we can always leave it”

I was astonished. Here was a man who had always shied away from…that…and either he was proposing leaving it in place or…

“Johnson, you don’t get out of an engagement that easily, aye?”

“I don’t want to. I just don’t want you seeing that procedure as central to me and you”

“But unless…we can’t marry”

“So?”

“And it would be harder to adopt…”

There it was, out in the open at last.

“Ah. I did suspect, you know…”

“And?”

“Yes. I would. I’ve been watching you with Darren and Chantelle, I even watched you with your dolls, yeah? All the doubts I could ever have had about you, you just wash them away. That’s what is eating at you, isn’t it?”

He was right, of course. With Kirsty getting bigger daily, Kelly dancing around her parents, the two youngsters, I was faced each morning with my utter inability. What purpose does a woman have if she can’t give birth?

“And you are thinking, why am I here if I can’t be a mum? Because you do more mothering than half of Crawley, yeah? Here’s a question: where is Shan’s birth mother?”

“Last heard, pissed off to Ireland, why?”

“Who has mothered her then? You, that’s who. And Ginny, and Kate, but it is you who made the difference, aye? That’s motherhood, not the ability to squirt out kids. Any mammal can do that, any cow, any bitch. It’s what they do afterwards that makes them mothers, Annie”

He held me for a while longer. “Now, we just need rid of one little girl this morning, so go and clean your face and let’s get to it. Things to do, people to see”

Steph and Kirsty duly disappeared off with Shan as we sorted the debris, and once the car had pulled away Jan was straight into Shan’s sleeping space.

“Got them!” she said, holding up a pair of well-worn flip-flops. “Off we jolly well!”

Together with Ginny and Kelly, she dragged me out of the campsite and down to the collection of stalls clustered around the big eating area and---oooh, that was a nice skirt---I was dragged straight past things I wanted, things I suddenly NEEDED, and up to a tent with a display of clogs outside. The penny dropped, and Ginny grinned at me.

“She’s been watching Kelly, and the dance sides, and I could see, we could see that she was jealous as a little jealous thing from Jealous Town, and so all we needed was her size. And these crappy old things, I mean, look, you can see every toe in them”

I had to laugh at Ginny’s enthusiasm.

“You think she wants to dance?”

“Fuck, yeah! She’s a teenager, Annie!”

“Can I suggest something, love? We had a chat last night, and we sort of agreed to call this weekend a second birthday. I mean, it’s where, you know, last year…”

“What, where you got shagged half to death by Bianchi Boy? Ooh, what a pink one!”

The insanity evaporated as if she had changed channels, so typical of her.

“Yeah, that’s the sort of thing we had in mind, love. We have been easing her along, Kate and I, and it’s been twitchy on the steering. Like adopting something wild, yeah?”

“She’s better though, aye? Now?”

Ginny’s smile was softer, as Kelly nodded agreement. The younger woman stepped forward and kissed my cheek.

“Yes, she is. She’s not ‘better’ as in ‘all healed’, and I don’t think she can be, but she’s happy, and that is what counts”

“And you? You happy too”

Kelly grinned, the answer in her face, and Ginny gave the answer.

“We all are, Annie, fuck yeah, happier than many of us have been for years. It leaks around the edges and splashes onto others. They get all infected with it, like a sort of happy chlamydia. What?”

She looked at the stares we were giving her, and shrugged.

“Well, I thought it was a good analogy, so fuck you two. Now, clogs…”

Within half an hour, the shopkeeper had drawn a paper outline of each foot and fitted them to her range of shoes. Kelly looked at what was on offer, and pointed.

“Those. The sides come up just enough to give a good fit but not so far that she can’t roll her feet for some of the ornamentation”

Ginny snorted. “Shoes…”

Kelly bristled. “Instruments of skill and passion, woman!”

Ginny laughed, and paid, and I tugged them back to the dress shop, where they had the skirt I had spotted, and in several sizes, and there were tops, and…

“Ginny, what size is she?”

“Eight at the moment”

I collected two outfits, and then spotted the coloured paper behind the till.

“Birthday present…could you? Ta!”

We wrapped the clogs inside skirt and top, and then I dragged the other two off to the arty place, and some work with a calligraphy pen, and finally a cuppa from the pie shop, which was thankfully some distance from the pig roasting place that year. Not today, Annie, not today.

We left the package on her sleeping bag, as Dennis grinned understanding, and I slipped into my own purchases, a mid-calf Indian print cotton skirt and matching kaftan top.

The kettle had just boiled when they returned, bringing eggs and bacon and stuff for pasta out of the car, Chantelle glowing as the wind pushed her hair around her face.

“Nice outfit, Annie! All floaty, lahk!”

“Go and get into your flip flops, girl, and we can start making a bit of lunch”

Five seconds later we heard her squeal. Thirty seconds after that she was in front of us, in her own floaty outfit, the clogs on her feet, card in hand and tears on her cheeks. Darren was obviously burning to go to her, but Dennis had his hand on the boy’s arm, gently holding him back. Shan read the card aloud.

“To Chantelle, and a new life. From your family and friends”

Steph started handing round the tissues.