CHAPTER 45
Larinda’s head lay on my shoulder as the twin prop droned South, Rachel snoring gently across the aisle of the half-full plane. We had seen Will off on his own flight home, and there had been tears on all sides. I fully understood how he was feeling, for while I had found acceptance both at home and where I lived, he only had us anywhere near him, and one brief glimpse of the promised land to show him what could or might be.

We had returned happy and windswept from the National Park, memories and electronic equivalents full of pictures, and Mam had indeed pulled out all the stops for the dinner. Jim saw the funny side when she realised that she had forgotten to top up her supply of potatoes, and so he walked round to his pub for a bag, which apparently needed two people to carry. John just smiled at me as they left. Good food, better company; I have to say that, because the one drawback of Mam’s cooking is that she likes her vegetables ‘properly cooked’, as in boiled to death. A small problem, compared with the day’s delights.

To nobody’s surprise, after a team effort “No, sit down, old woman!” with the dishes, we ended up back at Jim’s pub, where the evening rounded off with a quiet, slow, comfortable drink. It seemed that the earlier fencing had sorted out the group’s dynamics, and people seemed comfortable with each other, apart from Jim himself and my friend. It all came to an end, though, when I heard a small sound coming from my left, and realised Mam was snoring. Too much in one day, clearly, and to my astonishment, and deep gratitude, Jim waited till we were clearly finished before touching her lightly on the shoulder.

“Time for your bed, Norma”

With that, he casually scooped her out of her chair, and with a pang I realised exactly how old, how small, she was. He insisted on carrying her all the way round to our house, like a small child in his arms, till we arrived at the front door.

“Can ye put us down now please, Jim”

“Can ye manage the stairs?”

“Aye; look, lad, just…only one man has ever carried me like that, aye? And that was ower the threshold of our first place…so, please, aye?”
.
I suddenly understood how she was feeling, and took her hand as Jim put her down.

“You OK, Mam?”

“Aye, I am that. Just, aye, again…Look, a busy day, lots of emotion, and yeez are all off the morn, so let’s say a goodnight, aye, and a real thank you. Jim, ye’re a canny lad, and that’s a fact, and I do thank you. You know where I am, and this door is open, aye?”

She nodded to the rest of us, and we withdrew, Rachel apparently needing to check something outside for a few minutes. Mam was dead on her feet, though, so I helped her up the stairs to her room, and was met on the landing by my lover.

“Bedtime, you. The rest are settling down, so let’s leave them to it and get a bit of time to ourselves, yeah?”

And so we did.

A lighter breakfast the next day, and a stack of sandwiches was waiting in the kitchen, divided into four bundles. Two cars saw us to Heworth, and there was emotion as we left. Mam was determined.

“How, Larinda, you look after my bairn here, aye? I shall be checking up! And you two…Rachel, Will, what I said to Jim last night, aye? The door is open, whenever you need, so I will see you again, aye?”

I put my hand on Rachel’s arm. “Rach, don’t get her wrong. That wasn’t a question…”

So off to the airport, with a last view of the bridges, and farewell to Will at the boarding gate. We waited while he phoned Von, before the hugs and the tears and the separation.

I realised I had fallen asleep myself only with the thump of the wheels going down, and after an interminable walk we were finally off the plane and in Gatwick’s South Terminal. Larinda had a coin in her hand.

“Right, you two, heads we get the train, and tails this one splashes out on a cab, yeah?”

There was a cough behind me, and I turned round to see the other John.

“I have my car…”

Rachel slipped straight into her usual stance, head back and arms folded. “And what exactly are you doing here?”

He looked awkward, clearly well out of his comfort zone.

“Em, I knew when you were going and when you were due back, so it was just a matter of finding out what time the flight came in. I thought I owed you something, and this would be a small thank you”

Rachel turned to me. “How many flights come in each day, Rob?”

“Three or four, I think”

“So do tell, John, how you knew we would be on the afternoon one?”

He blushed slightly. “I didn’t…”

Rachel dropped out of her attack stance. “You…you’ve been waiting? Since when?”

“About seven thirty. I am retired now and it allowed me time to look at some of the aeroplanes”

Her voice was softer. “You have been here nearly seven hours, watching each arrival?”

“Just those from Newcastle. There are some with British Airways as well, in the North Terminal…”

He shook himself, courage gathered. “Look, you have all been very kind to me when I have been nothing but unpleasant to two of you. I felt, I wanted to do something to repay that, so I have my car, and I have waited, and I shall deliver you home if that is what you wish. What you will accept. If that is all right”

Larinda once more showed me why I loved her, why she was so different to Von. She could have asked around, to see how we felt about the lift; she could have been effusive in her gratitude. Instead, she simply put her bag down at my feet.

“Give me five minutes, John, while I get some fresh milk from Marks’. Want some, Rach?”

Translated, she meant that we should simply treat it as a normal fact of life, and make him less nervous. Rachel nodded.

“I’ll come with you, girl. Might have some treats there for later”

John slumped as they moved off, relief evident. “I have the car in the short term car park”

Shit. That must be costing him a fortune. “John, we should give you something towards the cost”

He stiffened up again. “No, Rob, or whatever it is the others call you. You have made a difference in my life, and you have done it despite our past, so that is an end to it. They will be back soon, so I will say this now, between us. There is something wrong about you, something I have not worked out fully. Wrong…that is not the best word. I am not the most social of creatures, but I am nothing if not an observer”

Ah. “Not now, eh, John? Maybe, some day. Have you spoken to the WWT yet?”

His face brightened. “I have indeed, and they will take me on. I get the promise of a sweat shirt and a badge, which may appeal to others, but it at least shows that I have some minor authority”

“John, as far as I am concerned, you are a major authority, on birds, that is. Here come the girls. Can you make me a promise?”

“What would that be?”

“What you have done today is kindness itself, but a touch, well, beyond normal, aye? Next time…just ring and ask. It’s what friends do”

One word, and he clearly felt it. Friends. The girls’ return distracted him, fortunately, and we were soon at his car and loaded. Larinda kept up a prattle of inanity that was obviously designed to break the mood, and when she mentioned the other John and Jim, he laughed.

“So you have two pairings of friends with the same names, then? How peculiar”

Rachel giggled, in a slightly embarrassed way. “Trust me, John, they couldn’t be more different! What’s in a name, yeah?”

He laughed, and it was such a normal sound. “And which of them is it that has caught your eye, Rachel?”

Larinda slipped in “Well, the other John being gay…”

I looked across at Rachel, and she was simply smiling, and something I should have realised leapt up and danced in front of me. Jim was different. Her experience of masculinity had largely been as a punchbag, a woman who needed to be Told, as that nasty joke had it, and she had seen Jim cry for his lost love, accept his puff of a brother as being nothing more nor less than a brother, and in dancing attendance on Rachel he had stepped aside from his own interests whenever someone else’s came up.

What had it really meant to her, watching what should have been the same sort of person she had married, the same macho arsehole, simply pick an old lady up like a child in order to see her safe home to bed? Just like John, she was learning to see, and the world was looking better for it.

John dropped us all off at my place, and phone numbers were exchanged with a promise to have a proper meal again, and John asking me to pass on his best to James. That was one thing that didn’t surprise me, to be truthful, for I suspected that John did see a lot of himself in the boy.

He drove off, and I sighed. “Work tomorrow, girls. Rach, you want to take the spare bed? Go in together, give them all something to talk about?”

“Yeah, if that’s OK with your other half here”

I laughed. “My place!”

“No, not any more. Way you two carry on, it’s definitely your plural place, yeah?”

Larinda picked up her bag. “Yes indeed, girl, so get in, and get changed”

She stonefaced our open mouths.

“Told you, she don’t get away from me, whatever she is. I saw more girl in one weekend that in the whole of the fifth form hockey team, so I might as well start getting used to it. So in, and change. Rach, you know where the kettle is”

“Oy, ain’t I the guest here?”

“Yeah, but if she’s gonna be in a skirt, I’ll still pick it for her!”