Lily the Tiller by Deborah McKinlay

Author:Deborah McKinlay
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781911293583
Publisher: Impress Books

Irene had kept her secret, not told anyone where she was going. She had imagined that she never would tell anyone where she had been. She could barely tell herself. For the second time in a week her mother was being cared for by someone else, and this time at night, well, evening at least – a first. For the second time Irene had passed on The Instructions; for her mother’s pills, her needs and done some guilty pillow-plumping before she’d left, checked and checked again… You’ll be all right, Mother? The assurance tonight had come from Mother’s own dry lips. Yes, she would be; no attendant enquiry as to where Irene was going. Irene had offered an explanation of sorts – a friend, an old friend, not someone Mother knew. Mother would be fine. She was sat in the kitchen with Ruth and Lily – a hub come suppertime now that Ruth had moved into the flat with her girls. The night times as jolly as coffee-time had been before, more so – much. The good bits of the day, the friendship parts were expanding, like the evenings, twilight starting to draw out. The dead weight of going-home time, once the darkest shadow of Irene’s days, now seemed like some years-gone-by memory, some tinkling sound way out at sea.

‘Spit ‘em out then,’ Nick The Builder said.

Irene raised an eyebrow. Sipped her glass of white wine. She hadn’t even known what to ask for, he had suggested it. It was nice – made Irene think of lemons. And grass.

‘Your demons,’ Nick said. ‘We're too long in the tooth not to start this thing off right.’ Nick was a plain talker. ‘Any particular reason you haven't married?’ he asked. He had a pint of ale. He lifted it and drank, watching her over it.

‘I had my mother,’ Irene said, running her fingertip around the outside of her glass, making a line in the condensation. Then, liking his arrow approach and keen to warrant it, she said, ‘And I didn't have any offers.’

He dipped his head, eyed her. ‘You're aloof. Might put some men off.’ His tone was pragmatic.

Not you, though, Irene thought, please not you. Maybe she was aloof. He seemed to know a lot about this sort of thing. More than her, not that that was much to say of anyone.

‘What about you?’ she asked.

‘I was married,’ he said. ‘For twenty-four years. First five were pretty good and the last five were bad. The rest we were married. We're divorced now.’

‘Children?’

‘A daughter,’ he said. ‘Lives up north with her bloke.’

She nodded at this – parenthood, a world she could not comment on, like so many others. It made her feel… lacking in use.

Sensing something in her, discomfort, if not its source he said, ‘When I said “long in the tooth”, I didn't mean to say you were old. Just – not a kid. Not a silly kid, playing games. That's what I meant. I liked that about you first time I met you.

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