Surprise Me

I’ve tried to talk to Mummy a lot, over the last six months. Many times, I’ve sat on that sofa of hers and tried to bring up different subjects. I’ve tried to explain why I cut my hair off. And why I flipped out. And why I can’t be treated like a child any more: shut out while the grown-ups confer. I’ve tried to explain how wrong the whole ‘Lynn’ thing was. I’ve tried to explain how mixed up my feelings are about Daddy. I’ve tried over and over to have a proper, empathetic conversation, the kind I feel we should be having.

But everything bounces off. Nothing lands. She won’t meet my eyes or acknowledge the past or shift position an inch. For her, Daddy is still the golden, untouchable hero of our family, Joss is the villain, and I’m the turncoat. She’s locked in a kind of ossified reality, surrounded by her photos of Daddy and the wedding DVD, which she still plays when the girls visit. (I won’t watch it any more. I’m done with it. Maybe I’ll revisit it, in ten years’ time or so.)

So the last time I went round for brunch – just me – we didn’t even talk about any of it. We talked about where Mummy might go on holiday with Lorna, and she made Bellinis and I bought a set of stacking rings – so versatile – at the special one-off price of £39.99 (normal price for all five items: £120.95). And at the end, she said, ‘Darling this has been so lovely,’ and I think she really meant it. She likes the bubble. She’s happy there. She’s not interested in bursting it.

‘Mummy!’ Tessa comes running into my room, dressed in her chosen outfit – Chelsea top, tutu skirt and glittery trainers. There was just a nano-second when I considered laying down the law and forcing her into the adorable, dusty pink Wild & Gorgeous dress I’d seen online. But then I stopped myself. I’m not going to force my girls into dresses, or hairstyles, or thoughts that aren’t theirs. Let everyone be who they want to be. Let Tessa wear her Chelsea top and Anna her Gruffalo costume. They’ll make perfect bridesmaids. Or whatever they are.

‘Daddy says, “See you there,”’ she announces.

‘OK.’ I beam at her. ‘Thanks.’

We haven’t done the whole ‘spend the night apart’ thing – I mean, this is a renewal of vows, not a wedding – but we decided to arrive at the venue separately. Keep some magic, at least.

And Dan hasn’t seen my dress, either, so he doesn’t know that I’ve splashed out on the most elegant, strapless pale-grey Vera Wang concoction. At least, it wasn’t me who splashed out. Mummy offered to buy me a big-ticket dress for the occasion and I agreed without hesitation. It’s Daddy’s money that’s paid for it. I reckoned he owed us.

Dan and I had a bit of a money conversation, a few weeks after I cut my hair off. I admitted I’d thought for a long time that he was prickly about my father’s wealth, and he shrugged, looking uncomfortable.

‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘It’s fair to say I was prickly about a lot of things regarding your father.’ Then he confessed that he does have a bit of a hang-up about providing for the family, and I said, ‘Like your dad,’ and he didn’t contradict me.

So then I tried to prove that we could in fact live on my income (if we made a lot of changes) so the old stereotypes were dead. And if he was a real feminist he wouldn’t feel the need to be the breadwinner but could support the family unit in other ways. And Dan listened politely and agreed with everything and then said, ‘Actually, we’ve got a big new order coming in, so is it OK if I carry on contributing financially, just for the moment?’

Thank God.

I spray myself with Maze lily-of-the-valley perfume – a gift from Joss – then step into my shoes and head downstairs to find the girls peering at Dora.

‘I want her to talk,’ says Tessa, who has just seen Harry Potter for the first time. ‘Dora, talk.’ She addresses the snake bossily. ‘Talk.’

‘Talking snakes are not in real life,’ says Anna, glancing at me for confirmation. ‘Made-up things are not in real life, are they, Mummy?’

‘No,’ I say. ‘They’re not.’

I’m never going to tell them that my made-up friend came to life. They don’t need that kind of complicated, weird stuff in their heads. When they meet Joss, she’ll be Joss.

‘See you, Dora,’ I say, shepherding the girls out of the kitchen. I won’t say I’ve got fond of Dora, exactly, but I can look at her. I can kind of appreciate that she’s an amazing creature. Especially as I know she’s moving out of the kitchen. (Yes! Result!)

Basically, our whole garden is being revamped. The Wendy houses have already gone, and the girls barely noticed. Instead, we’re having a new outdoor room for Dan, all glass and wood, in which he’ll have his office and a special space for Dora. And we’re starting a vegetable patch.

‘If you’re such a bloody gardening expert,’ I said to Dan one night, ‘why aren’t we eating home-grown rocket every day?’ And he laughed and phoned up his mate Pete who does landscaping, and together they drew up a whole garden design. They even planned to put in some hardy annuals. Whereupon Dan suddenly remembered me trying to interest him in the garden before, and apologized for having been so distracted. He didn’t need to. I get it; he had a few other things on his mind.

Then we invited Mary Holland round to have lunch and help plan the herb garden. (Partly to show her – and each other – that there are no hard feelings or misunderstandings left.) It was great, because John looked over the fence from next door and started joining in the discussion. So then he came over, too. And we ended up with this rather high-powered gardening forum, all to discuss a tiny herb bed.

Since then, Mary’s been back to visit us a few times – she gets on well with Tilda, too. (‘I can see why you were worried,’ Tilda breathed in my ear, about five seconds after meeting her.) Meanwhile, Dan has taken to popping over to see John and talking about his work (whilst quietly making sure the fridge is full) and I do feel as though our existence has opened up a bit. We’re doing a bit less watching our past life on DVDs. A bit more building our own present life.

The girls can even have their own bedrooms now that Dan won’t need the study. (Except of course they don’t want their own bedrooms and wept when we mentioned it and Tessa wailed, ‘But I will miss Anna!’, clinging to her as though we’d suggested Anna go and sleep in the gulag.)

The car is waiting in the road, and as I shut the front door, I have a flashback to our wedding. Daddy leading me out of the house. Me looking like a Disney princess. Like so many things, it seems a lifetime ago. A different me. Today, there’s no one to lead me and the girls out of the house. There’s no one to ‘give me away’. I’m not a thing to be handed over, I’m a person. And I want to commit to another person. And that’s the end of it.

Quite nice to be in a posh car, though. As we glide along, the girls wave at passers-by, and I redo my lip gloss several times and run over what I’m going to say. Then, before I feel quite ready, we’re pulling up in front of Willoughby House. And even though I know this isn’t my actual wedding and I’m not a bride, and it’s really not a big deal … I still feel a whoosh of sudden nerves.

The driver opens the door and I emerge as elegantly as I can, and passers-by stop to point and take pictures, especially when Anna gets out in her Gruffalo costume, holding her bouquet. We’ve all got winter bouquets of eucalyptus wound round with ivy, which Mary dropped round this morning, together with a buttonhole for Dan. All from the St Philip’s Garden. She gave me a massive hug, and said, ‘I’m so, so pleased for you,’ and I could tell she genuinely meant it.