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Authors: Kate Saunders

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She loosened his tie, saying he looked hot. “Look who's here,” she said, nodding toward me.
He smiled down at me. “So you've enticed Rapunzel out of her tower.”
“She's not called Rapunzel,” Frederick said. “Her name's Cassie. And guess what—she's never seen anyone's willy before.”
This was true—I forgot to mention the interest we expressed in each other's privates. Once my initial shyness had worn off, I wanted to know everything.
Jimmy said something like, “I wish I could say the same—I've been eyeballing willies all day.”
Phoebe laughed, and said, “Don't, darling—what if she repeats it? They won't let her come back.”
“Well, we can't have that,” Jimmy said. “It's taken us too long to get to know Cassie. We want her to come back very soon. Don't we, monkeys?”
“Yes,” Frederick said firmly. “I like her, and I like her bottom.”
 
That was the start of my acceptance into the Darling family. Ben and Frederick became my first proper friends. We played and fought and giggled, through long summer days that seemed to have no beginning and no end. Gudrun and Phoebe found that they could pass me to and fro over the garden wall through a hole in the trellis. I was automatically included in any treats that were going on. As the year moved on, I joined them at the pantomime and the zoo, Madame Tussaud's, the Tower, and all the other attractions enjoyed by well-off London children. Phoebe threw in educational outings, as a sop to my parents, and I have happy memories of strolling round the National Gallery and the Wallace Collection, where men in peaked caps told Frederick off for sliding across the parquet and strumming the radiators.
Jimmy very quickly forgot there had ever been a time without me. I got my full share of hurling and tickling and hair-ruffling. He was a warm-blooded, passionate man who loved the company of children. He was given to shouting, but I was never scared when Jimmy shouted at me. It was all part of the package, as harmless and exhilarating as a stiff breeze. It meant I belonged.
Frederick (to my own father's icy irritation) liked to throw clods of soil at our windows to bring me out. Ben called to me over the wall every time Phoebe made a batch of cakes. Once, when I was for some reason unavailable, he kindly posted a chocolate brownie through our front door. The three of us were a team. I look back now, and it pierces me to think how sweet Phoebe was, opening her arms and her heart to the prickly little animal I must have been.
My parents did not approve of the Darlings. Nothing was said, so I can only guess at the reasons for this. I think it was something to do with control. My father feared chaos, and had trained my mother to avoid emotional actings-out that might be dangerous. But they put up with the amount of time I spent next door. In fact, they were relieved to have me off their hands when Gudrun was otherwise engaged. They often implied that the responsibility of a child was painful, and that the Darlings were somehow too crude to mind about it.
This was how it went on for the next few years. The Darlings and I went to different schools, but kept up the easy, informal shuttling between the two houses. Our two sets of parents managed a distant cordiality. Every Christmas, the Darlings invited my parents over for a drink (and what a pair of ghouls they looked amidst the tinselly clutter). One day, however, the relationship shifted into a different gear.
It was a desolate afternoon in February, just before my seventh birthday. I arrived home to find an empty house. I had been driven home by the mother of a schoolmate, who roared off the minute I climbed out of her car. It dawned on me gradually that nobody was coming out to receive me. Not Gudrun, not my mother, not my father. The house was blind and shuttered, cold as a tomb. I remember ringing the bell for ages, and hearing its forlorn echo through the empty rooms.
I wasn't exactly afraid. I was mainly anxious about doing the right thing, whatever that might be. I wasn't surprised. A kind of fog settled
around me, as I accepted what seemed to be the completion of a long process. They had finally made me disappear. There was nothing to do except sit on the doorstep and wait for something to happen, so this was what I did.
Phoebe found me when she came home with the boys, twenty minutes or so later. I was shivering stoically and doing my French homework. I was taken aback by her concern, and startled by her indignation. She smiled, to show it wasn't me she was cross with.
“Oh dear,” she said. “There's been some silly mix-up. Come and have tea with us, and we'll sort it out.”
I was happy at once. I loved having tea with the Darlings, and wasn't normally allowed to do it on a school night. I wasn't allowed television on a school night, either—which may have been good for my burgeoning intellect, but made me an outcast in the playground. My father had drawn up all these rules. He was an authentic lentil-scoffing, humorless middle-class killjoy. At the Darlings' I could expect forbidden foods like fish fingers and Penguin biscuits, forbidden books about animals who talked and wore tweed, and incredibly forbidden American cartoons. I trotted into the warmth behind Ben, feeling that things were looking up.
The boys and I sat round the kitchen table in the basement, all horribly overexcited by the novelty of the situation. I can see us now—Frederick and Benedict in their gray prep-school jerseys, me in my blue pinafore, all three of us singing loud enough to make the crockery rattle. The inimitable Frederick had learned a new song. The words were simply “willy-bum” in various combinations, sung to the tune of the William Tell overture (try it at home—willy-bum, willy-bum, willy-bum-bum-BUM!). Benedict, a musical child, soon found that the words went to many other tunes. How little it takes to make children happy. The joke seemed exquisite to us, and infinite. Odd that I should associate this sense of timeless happiness with the day I was abandoned by my parents.
Because this was, essentially, what they did. The details didn't emerge until Gudrun returned the following day, from an unauthorized jaunt in Wales with her boyfriend. It seemed that my parents—not bothering to wonder where Gudrun was—had left her a note on the hall table, to the effect that they had gone to a conference in Vienna.
On that first evening, they might as well have fled to Samarkand for
all anyone knew of their whereabouts. The house remained dark and empty, and Phoebe became increasingly worried. “You'll have to stay here tonight,” she said, almost to herself. “And Jimmy can drop you at school in the morning.”
The boys and I thought this sounded terrific. We ate ginger biscuits and watched
Star Trek
, and I felt this was really living.
Jimmy came home when it was dark. The boys hurled themselves at him, giving him the news headlines and singing the willy-bum song.
“Hello,” Jimmy said, a small boy under each arm, “it's Cassie—what are you doing here, my lovely?”
Phoebe pulled him away to the other end of the long open-plan kitchen. I heard her telling him, in a low, stricken voice, what had happened. I had apparently been deserted with only the clothes I stood up in. What on earth should they do?
Jimmy said, “That pair of—” followed by a string of strange words which I didn't understand then, but can now imagine. I saw, in all its glory, Jimmy's intense dislike of my father, his polar opposite. Jimmy despised my parents for forgetting their only child, and almost hated them for making Phoebe cry. I saw her sobbing into his shoulder, deeply hurt that there should be such cold hearts in the world.
We—the boys and I—might have started to be frightened. Jimmy, however, had a talent for making everything all right. He poured Phoebe a glass of red wine and led a rousing chorus of the willy-bum song. He made me giggle by suggesting silly things—tea towels, cushion covers—I'd have to wear in bed because I didn't have my nightie. In the end I wore a pair of Ben's pajamas, and Jimmy gave all three of us piggybacks upstairs.
I never found out exactly what happened between my parents and the Darlings. When Gudrun came back and the note from my parents was found, Jimmy pounced on the contact phone number and gave my father a dressing-down that nearly melted the receiver. The upshot of it all was that the shamefaced Gudrun was only allowed to bring round a bundle of my belongings. Jimmy refused to hand me over until I was claimed by a parent. In the meantime, I was to stay with the Darlings, in the blessed land of sweets and television. Even better—it was arranged that Phoebe would give me tea and supervise my homework
every day
.
Now I really was part of the family. The arrangement continued until my parents' divorce. It was the best thing that ever happened to me, as I often told Phoebe. She shared Jimmy's dislike of my father, but she staunchly maintained a bridge between me and my mother, when the whole relationship might have been lost forever. That's just one of the things I owe to her.
The boys quickly accepted the relationship. Frederick, who was a tease, nicknamed me “Grimble,” after the boy in Clement Freud's story whose unreliable parents go to Peru without telling him. I didn't like the nickname, but was honored by Frederick's attention. He was our leader, though I was closer at that time to Ben. When Frederick wasn't around, Ben and I were free to live up to our ringlets with teddy bears' picnics and other harmless, girly pursuits. We had a pointless game called “Cotton Houses,” which involved nothing more than sitting against a wall with our duffel coats on backward and the hoods over our faces.
I'm beating back a whole flock of memories that rise up whenever I remember my peculiar, borrowed childhood. The past becomes more important every day. You have to store up every moment and treasure it, as we all learned six years ago, when Jimmy died. It was liver cancer, and it wore him out in a matter of months.
They never accepted living without him. Phoebe, though sweet and humorous as ever, carried a spike of anguish in her heart. In my sadder moments, I used to think this anguish was slowly killing her. But let's call things by their right names. Phoebe was dying of leukemia.
When I left work that evening, I hurried along Piccadilly toward the tube station thinking about anything that would distract me from the arctic waste that was the future. She was going out so gently that it was still possible to carry on, if you pretended time had stopped.
I
t was a lovely spring evening. I emerged from the tube into a shimmering, opalescent light that made the bricks of the old houses look as soft as velvet. I thought, as I had often thought, that Hampstead had the air of being a secret village, in another dimension to the rest of London. Perhaps everyone feels this way about the place where they grew up. Hampstead Village was both reassuring and mysterious. The square, old-fashioned lampposts, glowing pale and eerie on the edges of the wild Heath, have always made me think vaguely of Narnia.
I went into the off-license to buy a bottle of wine for Phoebe, and then my footsteps turned automatically toward the street where I had once lived. I could pass my old house without a pang, but I couldn't approach the Darlings' without a warm, homecoming glow. This was still where my triumphs mattered most, and my failures least. The big rectangular windows were golden in the blue dusk. For a moment, as I ran up the steps, I thought of those windows with their lights extinguished, and my throat contracted with fear.
Phoebe's bones felt hard and sharp under her jersey. She was wearing the cashmere polo neck of deep, dark Christmas red that I had bought her just before Jimmy died. Her eyes were huge above the soft collar, and her face seemed to have shrunk. But her smell was just the same. Perfumes didn't really register with Phoebe. She carried her own scent, a mixture of sponge cake and tea rose.
“Cassie—oh, how lovely. I was praying you'd bring wine.”
She didn't want to be asked how she was. She wanted me to fall into
exactly the old relationship, so that was what I did. “All right,” I said, “let's have it. Why the dramatic summons?”
“Food first,” Phoebe said. She was excited, and rather pleased with herself. I heard Jimmy saying, “Watch her, Cass—I can feel one of her daft ideas coming on.” He and I never stopped teasing her about her ideas. After Jimmy died, it was left to me to talk her out of starting impractical businesses and unlikely charities. What would it be this time? I didn't care. I hadn't seen Phoebe so animated for months.
“The boys are out,” she said. “Which explains the deathly hush below.”
Before Jimmy died, the basement had been made into a flat for the two boys. Phoebe's double drawing room had had a new kitchen installed at one end. I put down my briefcase and tried to be useful. The round table was already beautifully laid. There was a bouquet of salad, and a bowl of ruddy nectarines. I opened the bottle I had bought and poured us each a glass. Phoebe sipped hers absently, intent on stirring a small saucepan on the hob. She was most herself when preparing food, which she did exquisitely.
“Ben's at the Festival Hall,” she told me, over her shoulder. “He somehow got his hands on a ticket for Alfred Brendel, lucky boy. And Fritz has gone to Sheffield, to see a friend—well, you remember Toby Clifton, don't you? He's in
Macbeth
at the Crucible, playing Donalbain.” (It was odd to remember how long Phoebe and Jimmy had resisted calling their Frederick “Fritz,” when the nickname had been set in cement for at least fifteen years.) “I'm glad he's got a decent part at last.”
“Donalbain is not a decent part,” I couldn't help saying. “It's about the smallest part you can have in
Macbeth
, without being billed as a piece of furniture. You don't have to talk up the achievement of everyone else's sons.”
Phoebe smiled, suddenly looking years younger. “I might have known you wouldn't be impressed.”
“It's not bad for a boy, I suppose. At least he's in gainful employment.”
“He's got a good leg in tights,” Phoebe said, draining pasta over the sink. “Perhaps it'll lead to something.”
The tagliatelli was fresh, and cooked to perfection. Phoebe served it with a creamy mushroom sauce. I ate with gusto, to draw attention (hers and mine) from the fact that Phoebe hardly ate at all. The fork looked
enormous in her hand. Afterward, she made a pot of tea and we moved to the deep sofas beside the log fire. The scents of woodsmoke, food and Phoebe mingled deliciously.
She said, “I asked you here because I need your help.”
“You know I'll do anything.”
“It's not something I can talk about in front of the boys. You see, it's about the future.”
“Oh.” I had that contraction in my throat again. Phoebe had never spoken to me directly about the approaching change.
“Not in a nasty way, darling,” she added gently. “The first thing you have to understand is that I'm fairly reconciled to dying. I'd rather not, but everyone has to do it some time. And you know I can never be happy in the old way. Not without Jimmy.”
“I know.”
“I'm not exactly religious,” she went on, “but I've been thinking a lot about what I should expect, after all the dying business. And I can't help being absolutely sure that there'll be a way of being with Jimmy. I couldn't tell you how or why I'm so sure, but I do have this strange confidence. I think I might almost be looking forward to it.”
You'd think I'd cry, wouldn't you? Even with a lead weight on my chest, however, I didn't. I was beginning to discover that when things are really bad, you don't.
Phoebe poured tea, and pushed a plate of homemade macaroons toward me. To please her, and to show her that I was still her Sensible Girl, I put one in my mouth. It was ash against my tongue.
“But of course, I'm worried,” Phoebe said. “I'm getting more and more worried about the boys.”
“Why? What's the matter with them?”
“Oh, nothing—I didn't mean—it's just that I'm so worried about leaving them. Who on earth will look after them? How will they cope? I suppose what I mean is, who will love them?”
I was sturdy, swallowing fear. “I think it's safe to say they'll never be short of love. Half the women in London are in love with them.”
“It's not just the love,” Phoebe said, fixing me with her earnest brown eyes. “Who will buy their food? Take care of their washing? If they stay in this house, they'll never be able to run it properly. They have no idea
what things cost. They're not ready to be orphans. I can't throw the two of them straight into the world.”
“Do you want me to talk to them, or something? Assist their stormy passage into real life?”
“It suddenly came to me this morning,” Phoebe said, “so I rang you straight away. We have to find wives for Fritz and Ben. If I know they're safely settled and cared for, I can die in peace.”
I was deeply moved—moved beyond tears, to the very core of my bones. This mother's heart would burn with love long after the body around it had turned to dust.
But I was also slightly irritated. “So you want me to provide the wives?”
“Well, since you're always telling me your women friends can never find nice men, I thought—”
“Phoebe, my girlfriends are brilliant, beautiful and successful. Yes, a surprising number of them are single—but they're not desperate. Not one of them deserves to be lumbered with your layabout sons.”
Phoebe was still smiling. She never minded my criticism of her adored ones, because she simply didn't believe I meant it. “You said yourself, hundreds of girls fall in love with them.”
“Yes—floozies and slappers and aging rock chicks.”
“All we'd have to do is find some nice girls, with a proper sense of responsibility.”
“Why can't Fritz and Ben learn responsibility for themselves?”
“That's what you always say,” Phoebe said calmly, “and you know they never will. I can't possibly leave them until I've seen them settled. Why are you laughing?”
“You're like someone in a Victorian novel, fretting over unmarried daughters. I could just about take your plan seriously if Fritz and Ben were a pair of eighteen-year-old girls.”
“Come on, Cassie.” Phoebe was impatient and eager. “Will you help me or not?”
I loved her so much for her blind love. Though the idea of tracking down solvent wives for the boys was ludicrous, I couldn't refuse. I would do anything for Phoebe.
Almost anything, I should say. “Of course I'll help you,” I said. “But
before we start, I must make one thing very clear. I know what you're thinking, and the answer is no.”
Her eyes widened innocently. “What? What are you talking about?”
“You're hoping I'll marry one of them myself.”
Phoebe laughed, not at all guilty. “Why not? You've loved them both since you were tiny.”
“They're like my brothers.”
“Not any more. It wouldn't take much for you to fall for one of them properly.”
“Sorry, but I would have done it by now.”
“I'd be so happy to know they were with you!”
“I couldn't marry both of them, anyway,” I pointed out. “Why don't you advertise for a nanny?”
Her optimism wavered. I softened my tone. “Sorry, but I'm spoken for.”
“Matthew.” Phoebe had met Matthew several times. I had taken him to Sunday lunch at the Darlings', on a day when I knew there would other people present to take some of the blame for the inevitable smoking and swearing.
“Yes,” I said.
“So you think Matthew is the one.”
Hadn't I told her this? “Yes,” I said again.
“I didn't realize he'd proposed.”
“Well, not proposed exactly. Not in so many words.” This was a sore point. Matthew talked about marriage, but very distantly. It always seemed to be part of his ongoing fantasy about picking up a tip from a client, making a huge killing on the market and retiring at thirty-five. He had said he loved me, but not often—not nearly as often as I wanted to hear it. And he had never said, in so many words, that it was actually me he wanted to marry.
“So you're not engaged yet?” (She was as bad as Betsy—this obsession with having it all official.)
“Not officially,” I said. “We haven't set a date.”
“Oh well,” Phoebe said. “I'm a bit disappointed for the boys, but Matthew struck me as terribly nice. His lovely begonia is still a mass of blossoms.”
I laughed at that. I liked the way Phoebe coupled people with the plants they gave her.
And as soon as I had laughed, I could have cried. Matthew had to ask me soon. I wanted Phoebe to see us married.
Phoebe's mind had moved back to the “problem” of her boys. She reached for a notebook and pen on the little table beside her. “I thought we'd start by making a list of all their best qualities.”
“Their selling points,” I suggested, trying to keep a straight face. This wasn't going to be a long list, so the new notebook was a bit superfluous. Oh God, had she bought it specially, thinking it would make us more businesslike? Jimmy would have howled.
“That's right,” Phoebe said happily.
“Okay.” I realized she was waiting for me to say something. “Shall we start with Fritz?”
“Good idea—I knew I was right to enlist you.” Beaming, Phoebe scribbled in her notebook, muttering the words as she went. “Frederick James Darling—widely known as Fritz—age thirty-one—professional actor.”
Her pen hovered. She was quiet. Unkindly, I didn't fill in the silence. I wanted her to see that there was precious little left to say, as far as selling points were concerned.
“Lovely singing voice,” she added.
Another stretch of silence.
“Absolutely sweet to his mother.”
I let out a snort of laughter. “What a catch!”
Phoebe asked, “Don't I make him sound good enough?”
“If anything,” I said, “you're talking him up too much. ‘Professional actor' might make some poor girl think he's had a decent job.”
Her candid brown eyes were reproachful. “We won't get very far if you can't be positive.”
“Sorry. You know Fritz and I have a habit of sniping at each other. I'll start being very polite to him.”
“Oh no, you mustn't do that,” Phoebe cried, “or he'll guess we're up to something, and the whole plan will be ruined!”
I took a moment to process this, and another moment to cast around for the right argument. “Phoebe, the boys have to know about the plan.”
She was shocked. “Certainly not! That would spoil everything.”
“But of course they have to know,” I said. I saw that I had hit one of the submerged rocks of obstinacy in her gentle character, and made my voice firmer. “We'll never marry them off unless they cooperate.”
“But darling,” Phoebe begged, “if we go and tell them, it will all be so cold and unromantic! It might make them self-conscious. They might not show their natural selves.”

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