Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Emma

Crushed Clematis

‘Are you all right, love? Les and I were worried when you didn't turn up last night.' Betty and Les are waiting for her in the Flower Cabin, Les peering at her over his wife's head–a double-decker of concerned faces.

Emma was hoping to sneak into work unnoticed. Mind befuddled by lack of sleep, she cannot seem to articulate her apology or explain her attempts at research; the harshness of the morning light illuminating their inadequacies. Just behind the door, she catches a flash of a high-viz jacket.

Tamas's large face peers at her from around the back of the door. ‘Les says you promised to come to his talk– I am sure it was very good. You must have been ill. This is what I was saying to Betty.'

‘Decided on an early night, I expect,' Betty suggests. ‘Perhaps you weren't feeling quite the thing.'

‘Always better to be safe than sorry when it comes to your health,' Les adds, nodding, his beard brushing the top of Betty's curls.

‘Yes, sleep is often the best medicine,' Betty says, and Emma wonders if they are back to swapping clichés, or is Betty throwing her a lifeline? She tries to read the look on Betty's face– concern, but is there sympathy, too?

‘You do not look ill.' Tamas comes out from behind the door and stands with his head on one side. ‘You look healthy and strong. Like my cow.'

She feels like a cow, a prize exhibit, framed by the door, for all to stare at. They are all waiting for her to speak. What can she say? That she was frightened of being in a room full of strangers? That this fear of people is getting worse? That she had hoped, here, among the flowers, she might be safe, be able to make new connections, but now she thinks she may have made a mistake? That she feels useless and ashamed?

Still they wait. And still, she has no words.

She hears Tamas take a deep breath– a precursor to speech. She knows anything is better than being hit by another of his sledgehammer comments, so she says, quickly, ‘I just couldn't face it.'

Which of course is true, but she tries to hide the pain of this truth by making herself sound jolly– like it is all a bit of a joke. She means to add an apology, but she's stopped dead by Betty's startled blinking. And worse than this, Les looks hurt.

It is Les who reaches across the gap between them. ‘Never mind. Next time, eh?'

And then the three people in front of her start to busy themselves with their work, and she can do nothing, say nothing. The idea of explaining her tentative research seems ludicrous. So, she steps through the door, takes off her jacket and joins them. She has nothing more to offer– not even a coffee cake that without sugar never stood a chance.

After a few minutes, Les leaves the Flower Cabin to work elsewhere in the garden centre, and Betty offers to fetch Emma and Tamas coffee from the café, adding, ‘And do you fancy some cake? I made a Dorset apple cake last night after the talk.'

Emma mumbles her thanks and is left alone with her shame– and Tamas. He is silent for some minutes, unloading and sorting the boxes, before giving her the delivery note to sign.

Then he starts. ‘I think Les really minded that you were not there. He was sad. Do you not find the Titanic a fascinating subject for a talk? I myself find it of enormous interest. Or is it that you do not like Les and Betty?'

To divert him, and herself, she asks, ‘Where is it that your accent is from, Tamas? I can't quite tell.'

He stands up tall with his hands on his hips. ‘You must guess.'

‘Netherlands?'

‘No!'

‘Finland?'

‘No!'

She still thinks it might be Scandinavia. ‘Norway?'

‘Ha! You are getting cold! But then Norway is a country full of snow,' and he gives a great laugh.

Before she can say any more, Betty has returned, carrying their coffee and cake. Emma knows her face is burning as she says, ‘I'm really sorry about last night, Betty.'

She wants to add that when she said, ‘she couldn't face it', ‘it' meant the other people, the prospect of feeling conspicuous and terrified. It was not the thought of listening to Les's talk. She can't seem to form the sentences she wants and as it turns out, Tamas has the last word anyway.

‘Look, now I see, you have such large feet! Your shoes, they look like boats! It is good. With those feet you will never fall down.'

At the end of the day, as Emma is bringing in the flowers that form the display in front of the Flower Cabin, Betty remarks, mildly, ‘Love, there's no need to have cake if you don't fancy it. Or you could have given it to Tamas– I'm sure he'd have liked a second piece to eat in his van,' and Emma realises Betty must have found the discarded cake that she had surreptitiously hidden, uneaten, in the bin.

She starts to blurt, ‘No, it's not that…' but gets no further. How can she explain that she threw the cake away because she didn't think she deserved it and she feared it might choke her?

So, she says nothing and turning to collect the next basket of flowers knocks over a bucket of pink clematis with her size-ten boats.

A fitting end to her day.