Chapter 7: Emily Takes Up the Story

Emily Plays Her Ace

I have never felt less like partying than on the eve of the company cruise. When the subject was first mentioned I immediately thought how wonderful it would be if Alan asked me to share a suite with him. Someone actually suggested that but we all just laughed at the idea – including me. Every time there was a change in the plan, I hoped that this would be the moment when Alan saw the light. Even this week, when it was reduced to two couples, I had a faint hope.

I had to steel myself to go to the party in the first place and my mood was not improved when Amanda spent the whole evening flirting with my man. Alan, bless him, did not even notice her blatant advances but I was still angry at her presumption. My only consolation was when Jenn sought me out wanting me to spend the night with her. We had previously decided that the cruise should start on Friday evening and our separation would begin then.

Not that I really wanted to spend the night licking her fanny – I didn’t much like either the taste or texture – but I enjoyed the warmth of her embrace, and I get seriously turned on when she uses her clever tongue on my virgin slit. The evening got worse when she disappeared halfway through without saying a word. I felt even more obliged to stay to the bitter end.

I had a few more drinks than the two glasses of wine which are my normal limit, but it didn’t lift my depression. I had a forlorn hope that Jenn would already be tucked up in bed in my flat but no such luck. Foolishly, I decide to take a sleeping pill which I knew would make me even more depressed.

I slept soundly but woke up late feeling sluggish and unrested as I had known I would. If I hadn’t promised Mum that I would be there in time for lunch, I would have turned over and gone back to sleep. As it was, I dragged myself up, showered and dressed, finishing up leaving an hour before I intended. My plan was to stop in Stirling and spend some time looking around the shops, but I hadn’t the heart for it, so I drove straight on arriving at Mum’s door shortly after nine.

When I let myself in, Mum was standing in the kitchen in a rather flimsy nighty cooking a full Scottish breakfast. ‘That was quick’, she remarked without turning round. I was puzzling over this greeting when a man wandered in, fully dressed, but with his hair still wet from the shower. It was the young curate or assistant minister or whatever they call them, and he had clearly been in the house for some time.

Mum turned, saw us standing eyeing each other and waved a spatula between us. “Hi Em, you remember Hamish from the church, don’t you?” She appeared to be totally unembarrassed standing there with her nipples clearly showing through her nighty and only very brief knickers covering her lady bits. I was embarrassed enough for all three of us. “There’s plenty for all of us, so sit down and tuck in,” Mum continued unabashed.

I picked at my breakfast while Mum and Hamish shared the village gossip with me and discussed the places we should look out for on our holiday trip to the Highlands. It was surreal. My mother, a most respectable matron, was widowed eighteen months ago and had no business sitting here half-dressed with a young lover, an aspiring minister to boot. Mum had confided before that she had rather a wild youth, but this was ridiculous.

Breakfast over, Hamish prepared to depart. He would enter the little copse at the bottom of our garden and join the footpath that would take him back to the manse. “Maisie will want to feed me,” Hamish laughed. “But I can probably divert her by playing with her tits. The woman’s insatiable.” I assumed Maisie is the minister’s wife. When he left, they shared a casual peck on the lips and a promise that he’d be in her bed waiting when we got back from our trip.

While they were making their fond farewells, I began clearing up after the meal building myself up into a fine rage. Here I was an unfulfilled virgin lusting after the man of my dreams, and she was fucking a man closer to my age than hers. My father, I argued, was hardly cold in his grave – well, his urn, if you want to be pedantic. As soon as the door was closed and she returned to brew more coffee, I let rip.

She let me rant for some time, until I ran out of mere words and resorted to tears. At that point she took me into her arms and began soothing me. That calmed me down somewhat, enough at least to listen to her reasons for bedding Hamish. “I know I’m far too old for him although he insists he wants to marry me. I tell him that I’m not cut out to be a minister’s wife. I’d tell some of these old biddies to keep their noses out of other folks’ business for a start.” She did get me laughing at that, but she didn’t touch the well of misery that was drowning me.

“At least I’m getting my needs seen to!”

We were sitting in her living room when she dropped that bomb. She had showered and dressed while I cleaned up after breakfast, and we had taken fresh cups of coffee through with us. Neither of us mentioned our plan to be on our way and have lunch on the road.

My initial reaction to Mum’s gibe was deep hurt and shock. Surely a mum would be understanding about her daughter’s troubles instead of rubbing her nose in her failures? It seemed like the final blow to my shattered self-esteem. Then my scientific training kicked in forcing me to concede that she had a point. It only seemed like yesterday that Dad died and yet here she was, at fifty plus, with a new younger man warming her bed. I have spent six years worshipping Alan Stuart without getting any closer to him.

I had just accepted that I was jealous of my own mum when she swooped on me, engulfing me in her arms. Perhaps she’s a mind reader but more likely that she read the expressions chasing each other across my face as my mind raced. The floodgates opened and I collapsed, weeping in her arms. She joined me in a good cry, holding me to her breast and rubbing my back like a baby with colic.

After a long time, she told me that she had been worrying about me for some time, but the illness and later death of Dad put my troubles to the back of her mind. Now it was time for us to ‘take up arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing end them,’ as the Bard of Avon said. “But first we need a little help,” she said getting up and bustling off. For a fleeting moment, I thought she had gone to fetch a doctor or the minister to diagnose my problems.

I should have known that Mum had a more practical solution. She came back with two large snifters of brandy which she keeps for medicinal purposes. “First of all, I should say that your choice of partner couldn’t be better. Alan is definitely husband material and a bit of a stud to boot – if he lived a bit closer, I might have taken a run at him myself. He’s been sniffing at your bait since you went to uni but you haven’t been able to land him in all that time.

“I think even Doctor Watson could work out that you’re using the wrong strategy. When you were a wee lassie, we talked about everything but in the last few years I’ve let my worries about your dad’s health come between us. Now, I can see that you’re at the end of your tether so we’re going to sit here talking until we find a solution. Bugger the holiday, your future is top priority. It may just be my suspicious nature, but I’m not sure that whoever is advising you now has your best interests at heart. You want him and, judging by how he acted when your dad died, Alan wants you, so why aren’t the pair of you sharing a bed?”

My flood of tears dried up to be replaced by a tsunami of words. For years, I have prided myself on my independence but now I realised that I needed help. What’s more, this familiar, cosy room was the right place to seek help and the woman with her arm around me was the best person in the whole world to advise me. My thoughts spilled out of me, often incoherent, but heartfelt and Mum listened to it all, interrupting only occasionally to seek clarification.

I told her that it was all my fault because I wasn’t good enough for Alan; I told her how beautiful, sophisticated Jennifer admitted to lusting after him; I said that Alice, who could have any man she chose, only left Alan alone out of regard for me; and I told her how Amanda, businesswoman and gorgeous daughter of a knight, had flirted with him throughout the previous evening. How could I hope to succeed?

As I gained confidence from Mum’s quiet support, I found the courage to tell her of the moment I thought I had won. She remembered sending me off with Alan for my interview and had heard of my success and about finding lodgings. Now I added the events on the way to Aunt Pat’s house which I’ve been going over in my mind ever since. I recalled how close he and I had become in the aftermath of dad’s death and how I sensed that he was on the point of embracing me. Once we had got past the first, passionate kiss, I knew all would be well.

Then I let my bitterness show as I described how he suddenly went cold on me, hardly getting out of the car to see me to the door. About how we returned to distant friendship afterwards with no mention ever made of the tensions there had been between us on that night. Then I told her of my change of tactics after the events of Manic Monday, as Alan calls it, admitting that the new strategy was as useless as the old. Having spent years doing everything I could think of to please him, I was now ignoring him; the idea is that he’ll realise what he’s missing.

By the time we were finished it was late afternoon and I was sitting on the draining board sipping a glass of wine while Mum prepared dinner. We had missed lunch and all the emotion had given me an appetite. While she worked, we talked about the village, even about the weather and the effect on the number and generosity of the tourists who flood into Callander in the summer. It wasn’t until we had eaten, cleared up and returned to the living room with glasses of wine, that Mum resumed our discussion.