CHAPTER 64
When we got back from France, I had a phone call.

“Sh’mae, Sar, beth wyt ti’n ‘neud penwythnos nesa?”

“Hi, uncle, Tony’s working next weekend, but I’m off, and Jim’s still off school of course”

“You got room for a couple of smugglers for the weekend? The boy and me, we thought we’d have a run over and get a bit of beer, like. You can come along if you want”

I laughed. “We’ve just got back from cycle camping there!”

He laughed back. “Yeah, but, you don’t have much room for wine and chocolate and that on a pushbike, girl! Will that Alice be about?”

“I can ask, but she has passport issues, as you might guess, and we’d need to arrange for Andy to cover for her I’m sure she’d love to. Of course, Suzy might be off, but if you drag two of us along, she’d probably have to work. I’m assuming Suzy is the reason Hywel is coming over….”

“Oh, yes, he’s quite taken with her, he’s been a bit silly with women since Meriel buggered off, but your friend seems to have hit the spot”

“I think they’ve been hitting each other’s spots rather a lot….”

I held the phone away from my ear while he roared. A thought crossed my mind: was my taste in men based on my family? I grew up with big, hard men, and that was what I went for. Steph’s husband was attractive, in his way, but there simply wasn’t enough of him. Arris’ Steve, however…..oh, yes.

I made a call to the shop after he hung up, and had a sort of four-way chat on speakerphone with Andy, Suzy and Alice. I decided it was my turn to take a bullet for the team.

“Look, guys, if I come in, and work with Andy and Anne, that leaves you two free to take the trip with the boys. I’ve just got back, so it’s no big deal. I can have a word with Enid, or even Janet, to look after Jim for the day. Then we can have a family meal on the Sunday. Sound like a plan?”

Suzy was quick off the mark. “I’ve got a spare bedroom”

Andy was just as quick. “Wouldn’t you need two? Ow!”

Alice was a bit more sensible. “Would Jim like to come anyway?”

“Good thought, that woman, I’ll ask. It might help keep the behaviour adult, but not TOO adult!”

He was definitely up for yet another boat ride, yet more ice cream on the beach, and yet another trip to the huge sports store at Coquelles. Little boys, just like big boys. Show them something shiny they can unscrew, and they are in rapture. Then again, I think Suzy had her mind on some slightly different sense of unscrewing. That brought something to mind.

“Andy, how’s Bev coming along?”

That turned into a long conversation. I can sum it up in four words happy and in love.

So, that Friday evening, the trusty mini bus arrived outside our house and a whole gang of us were straight off to the Red Lion to refuel the boys, sitting outside with Pie in the August warmth. They kept it sensible, though, with an early start the next day they needed to, and we left the van parked up outside ours while Suzy drove the boys back to her place. They were getting into that almost mundane stage of a relationship, where nothing exciting seems to be happening beyond the simple pleasure and companionship of the other’s presence. The dance is done, the courtship is over, the fair maiden’s hand is won, and it is time to settle down for the journey.

Saturday morning they were off bright and early, with a letter each for two of them, one from Tony to give permission for Jim to leave the country with his great uncle, and one from Alice’s doctor to explain why her passport didn’t match. I covered the shop, leaving Pie in Enid’s care, and Andy looked as happy in the flesh as he had sounded on the phone.

“We’ve set a date, Sar, for the registry office. It’s third Saturday in October. Can you make it? Bev needs some bridesmaids…”

I laughed out loud at that. “Maid, Andy? I’m in my early forties, married, and a mother, how does that qualify me as a maid? Matron, perhaps!”

“No, Bev’s asked her sister to do that one for us, so you are going to have to do the sweet young thing bit, just don’t fight for the bouquet, you are disqualified!”

“ ‘Sweet young thing’? I am a hard-rocking biker chick, I’ll have you know, I have a reputation to uphold!”

“Yeah, yeah, and you are also the softest touch I have ever met. However you want to come to the wedding, we want you there. No big dress, nothing like that, we’ll save that for a blessing later, if we want. We are just after a good day with friends and family, that’s all.”

“I think we can give you two that! Keep us up to speed, and I’ll get Tony to check his roster. Who are you inviting?”

“Well, my family and hers, of course, and work, and I’d like your mother in law along if she wants to come. I can’t imagine Alice without her, if you see what I mean!”

“How does it feel, Andy?”

“How does what exactly feel?”

“Being able to say ‘we’ all the time?”

His smile answered me well enough.

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The dirty stop-outs were back about eight that evening. The van was positively groaning under the weight of beer, and Arwel insisted on dumping a couple of cases of Shepherd Neame in the house for Tony. Jim was now the proud owner of a pair of ‘proper cycling shoes, Mum!’ and Alice and Suzy seemed to have bought the hypermarket out of cheese, coffee and chocolate. Once Pie’s excitement had died down, we had a late tea, largely consisting of French bread, pá¢té, wine (funnily enough) and yummy cakes. It was clear the girls had managed to steer their men into at least some shops that weren’t entirely devoted to alcohol. They’d even got some shopping for clothes in…shoes, of course, in Alice’s case.

‘Their men’. It seemed to fit, somehow, with Alice and Arwel. as well as Hywel and Suzy. Perhaps it was the lack of sexual tension there; One pair knew they’d be rutting like weasels later, the other pair knew there was nothing like that on the menu, and each in their own way was therefore relaxed about it.

Some of the new coffee brewed, we took our seats in the living room, Jim stretched out on the floor with his dog, and I let Alice and Suzy know the date Andy had set. Alice was thoughtful.

“I’ll need to have a word with Margaret, then, see if we can get a couple of locums in to cover. I don’t think any of us wants to miss out on that one, but if necessary I’ll work it”

“We'll sort it one way or another…oh, dear, what has that dog been eating?”

I love Pie to bits, but he snores, as he was doing cuddled up to Jim, and he farts, noxiously, which puts a strain on the relationship. Tony chose that moment to return home, just as the windows were opened.

Family life….

The next day, Enid and Alice were over to start the preparations. Potatoes and carrots peeled, broccoli and cauliflower chopped, oven on, table opened right out and set for eight. I had taken a cue from the carvery up the road and prepared two roasts,a chunk of beef and a piece of gammon. Thank god for a double oven, the previous owners had obviously liked to cook. The Yorkshire puds would go in at the end, of course, but Enid had the batter ready.

Arwel had asked, in all innocence, if Jim wanted to take his bike for a ride along the seafront, and I saw the first old-fashioned look ever from the boy. I ride to Canterbury. I have just come back from a cycle touring expedition in wildest France. You want me to ride my bike a few hundred yards each way on a cycle path? In the end, they walked down to the sea anyway, while Tony did his boring name-all-the-ferries bit and Pie romped in the water, and we women did our stint as galley slaves.

Apart from Suzy, who was staying as close as she could to Hywel without actually undressing.

It was a true family Sunday lunch, gentle conversation interrupted only by the need to chew and the odd admonition to a little boy about dinners and dogs, Arwel seeming even more attentive to Alice. There were definitely things going on there, and I just hoped neither would be hurt. Yes, I was worried about my big, hard uncle as much as poor, fragile Alice.

We finished off with bread and butter pudding, and custard of course, and then three men slumped in the armchairs and snored while the rest of us cleared up.

For the first time in my life, I wondered if being female was a rational choice.

No, not really. Not given the alternatives snoring in the living room.