CHAPTER 60
I got the chance to catch up with Anne later, as she had taken the morning off for some church event or other.

I have no real interest in such things except in as they affect me or my loved ones, as I think I have made clear. She was in on time for the afternoon, which was all that mattered, and she was in a sparkling mood.

“I take it you have heard the news about Bev and Andy, Sar?”

“Thank you, Anne, yes, the honeymoon was very nice indeed. And, oh yes, I have had chapter and verse about those two.”

“I can’t say I actually approve of the situation from a moral standpoint, but Andy does seem to be taking his responsibilities seriously. I must admit, though, marriage is not something I would have expected to see him entering into. He’s really come along since Suzy took him in hand, hasn’t he?”

“I don’t think he knew he had it in him, Anne”

“Well, he certainly must have had it in her…”

What the hell? Off-colour jokes from Anne? “You feeling a bit frisky today, girl?”

“Just been a good morning, is all. That little task Pat found for me is a Godsend in so many ways. Jon says that it helps us see exactly how much we are helping the poor, so unlike just giving money or old clothes.”

Who was Jon? Well, it wasn’t a question that would be answered by telepathy, so…”Who’s Jon?”

“You remember, that colleague of Tony’s, at your wedding. He turned out to be another of Pat’s merry band of aid organisers. He is amazingly well read on theology, a sort of self-taught DD. We’ve been working through some of the deeper meanings in ‘Song’ together.

I thought, ‘I bet you have’. The naughtiest book in the bible, and he’ll be explaining it as allegory rather than lust. Watch the quiet ones, they can be sneaky. I resolved to prod Tony for some information on this ‘Jon’, just in case. She was still speaking, though.

“Andy says they are going to have a registry office wedding, so the child has legitimacy, and then organise a blessing later. This is getting expensive, Sarah, and it’s all your fault. “

“Anne, are you complaining about being forced to go shopping for a new outfit? Are you sure you are a girl?”

Alice was listening to this last exchange with a smile. Though she excelled at making her own stuff, particularly bloody cardigans, she did like her days in Canterbury trawling through the clothes shops. It’s a bit difficult to knit your own shoes, even though some of today’s youth fashions look as if they have tried exactly that, and despite her painful experience at the hen night, she was showing a true feminine addiction to what Siá¢n, always with a wistful expression, called “shooooooooooooooz”. Enid’s little electric foot spa thing must be very nearly worn out by now. Once again, an old memory surfaced, of spending my first shift in a pair of very high heels and regretting it after no more than two hours. Ow.

I spoke to Tony, who was on earlies that week, over tea, a simple bacon broth with proper dumplings. I wanted to know about this Solomon analyst who was apparently making such an impression on a confused and vulnerable–yes, friend. She had always been a friend, since the day she had arrived, it was only her odd obsessions combined with Alice’s rebirth that had soured things between us.

“Jon? Very quiet lad, never winds anyone up. Just gets on with it at work, but he’s never been a party animal. Don’t know if he actually drinks, though he does come out on team events. Doesn’t surprise me he’s a bit on the gospel side, but he’s never shouted about it.”

“Well, he’s got her studying the only dirty book in the Bible with him”

“As a chat up technique, love, that has got to be the most specialised I have ever heard of!”

Tony filled in some more details about his colleague, but there was one that surprised me. He was divorced, something that threw all sorts of curve balls into the mix. Watch and wait, Sarah, watch and wait.

“Oh, one more thing, I let Steph know we were going over and she’s going to be around, doing some stupid thing with ropes and her husband on the cliffs near Mowingword”

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Finally, we were free from school duties to make our expedition into the West, leaving work in the hands of Anne and Andy and the Signature Twins.. Suzy and Enid rode with Alice as Pie dozed in his basket behind them, and the three of us led the way. We peeled off the M4 after Bristol and had a cuppa in the dismal services at Aust, because I wanted to cross the old Severn Bridge rather than the bland new one. It was so much easier in a car, as I remembered days of utter terror on the bike, dicing with other vehicles while fighting a ferocious side wind. And usually in the rain.

There is a cycle path over the bridge. In a word, ‘No!’.

This was different, the high arc of the suspension bridge giving expansive views over the muddy wastes of the Severn as the first low hills of Wales approached. We came down the other side and immediately onto the second, smaller bridge that took us over the Wye and into my country. Home, ish.

Along and over the Wysg at Casnewydd, and then the scurry around the capital as the road goes up, down, under and seemingly sideways. It’s not the same as it was when I was younger; the pretentiously-named Celtic Manor golf resort lowering over the road rather than the industry I remembered.

Past the stink of Port Talbot, with the hills crowding close at times, and my old haunt of Morriston, and we were heading for the home stretch. The slowest part, of course, but Jim was showing off his memories of the last trip, which kept him from getting fractious.

Finally, finally we were back in sight of the sea. Elaine had offered beds to the three girls, while we took space at my old home. I realised it was my first visit as a married woman, and my insides went to mush. So much had changed.

Boy, dog and grandfather were reunited, and promptly set out for the bit of beach below the Slade. I was deeply happy at the way my parents, particularly my Dad, had taken to Jim, and Elaine’s suggestion came back to me. I hoped to get time to talk to all three of the people involved while we were here, but first it would be a cup of tea. After the long drive, we were going to have an evening in the Rugby Club, and I anticipated enjoying more than a couple of beers.

The evening was warm, despite the sea breeze coming in, and I put on a simple cornflower printed cotton dress with minimalist straps, matched with some comfortable flat sandals, while Tony and Jim went in shorts and polo shirts, dad and lad matched. Alice was n a more substantial Summer dress, to protect her lack of assets, as was Enid, while Suzy simply made me laugh out loud. While the rest of us were dressed comfortably for a family evening in Summer, she was n a rather tight minidress, in lemon, and heels.

And make up. I had a momentary vision of Anne on her knees in church--–no, don’t go there.

“Hywel?” I asked. She blushed.

The two great apes were waiting at the club for us, pints in hand at a table set outside where Pie could be welcomed. Once more we made quite the group, Uncle Gethin and Aunt Gwen joining us as well as the two girls. We should start demanding bulk discounts, I thought, though that might be outweighed in the landlords’ eyes by the quantity of food the four men could dispose of in a sitting.

Aunty Gwen was all smiles and hugs as she inspected my new ring, and Uncle Gethin was in a similar mood with my husband, so that was one possible irritation out of the way. I was more interested, though, in watching how Hywel and Suzy danced round each other. It was a vignette of modern manners: they had met briefly, immediately launched into sweaty sex, and were now trying to decide whether they actually liked each other. Alice, on the other hand, was nattering with Arwel as if they had known each other from childhood.

Once the first round of drinks merged into the second, I collared my sisters and Tony and strolled a little way off onto the edge of the pitch, the sun warm on my shoulders.

“We need to talk, you three, while we have the time and are sober enough. Tony, I’m going to get straight to the point: these two are broody, and are hoping to sort that out. They want to know if you will consider knocking them up”

Elaine snorted. “You don’t mince words, do you, chwaer fychan?”

Tony looked just a little shocked. “Can I assume that this little project will not involve me actually doing the, er, knocking? Do I get a say?”

I explained the girls’ proposal while the two of them looked sweatily nervous. He listened impassively.

“What happens if I decide I would like to be a dad to my own child? I would love to help, obviously, or perhaps not so obviously, but…”

Elaine was squeezing her wife’s hand. “You would always have access. We would sign any agreement you wanted, we just think that if we are going to pick any man, we want one we know, trust and love.”

He was almost in tears, I saw. “You know who Jim is? He is the only thing I have left of my Annie, and if I could have given him a brother or sister …we were never given the opportunity. If he could have a cousin, or two, perhaps….”

He pulled himself up, visibly. “Let me think. This is a big thing, and if we do it, it must be right. Look, there’s Steph. Let’s go and feed, and please, for now, change the subject”

I hate her. She has much better legs than me, and in her dinky little sundress the world and its second cousins could see. Cow. I was impressed, as always, by the pure grace of her husband Geoff. Whatever he did, however he moved, it was smooth and, well, elegant, without ever being anything other than utterly masculine, and what a smile. Increase his mass by about fifty percent, and I might actually be tempted.

I caught Hywel’s eye, and he nodded. He had kept quiet at the wedding, at my request and his own instigation, but I could see he wanted to say his piece this time. As Geoff got in the drinks and ordered their food, he walked over to her and said, in Welsh,

“Never expected to see you back at this club, Steph”

His meaning obviously hit her right away, as she turned white, and immediately looked round for Geoff, which touched me. I put a hand on hers.

“It’s OK, he’s no threat”

Hywel smiled. “No, not me. I remember you well, girl. Sarah tells me you still tackle like a train, though I suppose you keep that for hubby now”

Suddenly he was hugging her, and she tensed before relaxing and hugging him back. He laughed.

“What, with this family, you think we look at the outsides?”

He indicated his father and Alice, deep in conversation, and laid an arm over my shoulders. “When I say about looking at the outsides, though, don’t go bending over n that dress in front of Dad, you’ll stop his heart”

Geoff was at her shoulder now, looking puzzled. She switched back to English for his benefit.

“Love, this is a very old friend, from my school days, that I never knew I had….”