“If I’d cooked myself pasta I would have been using a different pan...nowhere near heavy enough. If I’d made a ham sandwich I would have had nothing to tackle him with except a crust of bread. So I’ll be filling the fridge with bacon from now on.”
“Bacon can be a lifesaver—I said the same thing myself.” Sean leaned in and kissed his mother-in-law gently on the cheek. “You’re a formidable adversary, Kathleen. Good to see you on your feet.”
Liza felt like the only adult in the group. Was she the only one seeing the seriousness of this situation? It was like dealing with the twins.
“How can you possibly joke about it?”
“I’m deadly serious. It’s good to know that I can now eat bacon with a clear conscience.” Kathleen smiled at her son-in-law. “You really didn’t have to come charging down here on a Friday. I’m perfectly fine. You didn’t bring the girls?”
“They had work to do. Exams coming up. Teenage stress and drama. You know how it is.” Sean hauled their luggage into the house. “Is the kettle on, Kathleen? I could murder a cup of tea.”
Did he really have to use the word “murder”? Liza kept picturing a different outcome. One where her mother was the one lying inert on the kitchen floor. She felt lightheaded and a little dizzy—and she wasn’t the one who had been hit over the head.
Of course she knew that people had their homes broken into. It was a fact. But knowing it was different from experiencing it.
She glanced uneasily toward the back door, now boarded up.
“A kind man from the village came and did it first thing. You look very pale.” Kathleen patted Liza on the shoulder. “You get too stressed about small things. Come in, dear. That drive is murderous...you must be exhausted.”
Murderous. Murder.
“Could everyone stop using that word?” Liza exploded, and her mother raised her eyebrows.
“It’s a figure of speech, nothing more.”
“Well, if we could find a different one I’d appreciate it.” She followed her into the hall. “I feel shaken up, and I wasn’t even here. How are you feeling, Mum? Honestly? An intruder isn’t a small thing.”
“True. He was actually large. And the noise his head made when it hit the kitchen floor—awful. It was the first time I’ve been thankful that your father insisted on those expensive Italian tiles. I’ve broken so many cups and plates on that damned surface. So unforgiving. But in this case the hard surface worked in my favor. It took me an hour to clean up the blood.”
Liza didn’t want to picture it. “You should have left that for me to do.”
“Nonsense. I’ve never been much of a housekeeper, but I can mop up blood. And, anyway, I prefer not to eat my lunch in the middle of a crime scene, thank you.”
Her mother headed straight for the kitchen. Liza didn’t know whether to be relieved or exasperated that she was behaving as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. If anything, she seemed energized, and perhaps a touch triumphant, as if she’d achieved something of note.
/>
“Where is the man now? What did the police say?”
“The man is in the hospital, recovering from his head injury. The police took a full statement from me, and some photographs, and said they’ll keep me updated on his condition—although I won’t be sending him a card or flowers, I assure you.”
Her mother fussed around the stove, pouring boiling water into the large teapot she’d been using since Liza was a child.
Everything about this room was achingly familiar. With its range cooker, and large pine table, the kitchen had always been her favorite room in the house. Every evening after school Liza had done her homework at this same table, wanting to be close to her mother when she was at home.
Her mother had been one of the pioneers of the TV travel show, her spirited adventures around the world opening people’s eyes to the appeal of foreign holidays from the Italian Riviera to the Far East. Every few weeks she would pack a suitcase and disappear on a trip to another faraway destination. Liza’s schoolfriends had found it all impossibly glamorous. Liza had found it crushingly lonely. Her earliest memory was of being five years old and holding tight to her mother’s scarf to prevent her from leaving, almost throttling her in the process.
To ease the distress of Kathleen’s constant departures, her father had glued a large map of the world to Liza’s bedroom wall. Each time her mother had left on another trip, Liza and her father would put a pin in the map and research the place. They’d cut out pictures from brochures and make scrapbooks. It had made her feel closer to her mother. And Liza’s room would be filled with various eclectic objects. A hand-carved giraffe from Africa. A rug from India.
And then Kathleen would return, her clothes wrinkled and covered in travel dust. And she’d bring with her an energy that had made her seem like a stranger. Those first moments when she and Liza were reunited had always been uncomfortable and forced, but then the work clothes would be replaced by casual clothes, and Kathleen the traveler and TV star would become Kathleen the mother once again. Until the next time, when the map would be consulted and the planning would start.
Liza had once asked her father why her mother always had to go away, and he’d said, “Your mother needs this.”
Even at a young age Liza had wondered why her mother’s needs took precedence over everyone else’s, and she’d wondered what it was exactly that her mother did need, but she hadn’t felt able to ask. She’d noticed that her father drank more and smoked more when Kathleen was away. As a father, he had been practical, but economical in his parenting. He’d make sure that they were safe, but spend long days in the office where he worked, or locked in his study. There had been no games of hide-and-seek in the garden, no puzzles at the kitchen table, no quiet reading or casual conversation.
Liza had never understood her parents’ relationship and had never delved for answers.
During school holidays a severe-looking woman called Mrs. Bumble had been enlisted to look after them—an arrangement just barely tolerated by them all.