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Tom had picked a garden centre cafe for Mother’s Day lunch. Kitty, eyeing the warehouse-like building as they pulled into the carpark, thought he could have picked somewhere fancier, but she had to admit that Beth liked garden centres. At least her hinting to Fearne that they should go out to lunch instead of expecting Beth to cook had been taken on board.
Beth, of course, was just delighted that they were having Mother’s Day lunch on Mother’s Day. They were early, and the server who seated them and gave them menus said “It’s lovely to see so many daughters bringing their mothers here .”
Kitty was considering ways to metaphorically strangle him as Beth said airily “Oh no, we’re here to have lunch with our son.” The server retreated in confusion and they had a nice ten minutes to chat and consider the menu before Tom and Fearne arrived, Fearne full of apologies and commentary on their drive up from Sheffield. Tom was carrying two bouquets which he presented to them. Kitty was impressed as they seemed tailored; she had tiger lilies and Beth purple tulips, a great favourite of hers. She wondered if that was points to Tom or to Fearne.
Once everyone had ordered (the same server had come back and Kitty had taken evil pleasure in watching as he tried to pretend he wasn’t trying to make sense of their family) Fearne said “The photos from your holiday looked lovely.”
“Yes, Liverpool was wonderful, we had a great time, the music museum was fun and we really enjoyed the performances we attended.”
“You mostly enjoyed not having to be up early for school,” said Kitty. Turning to the others she added “I thought she was going to sleep the holiday away.”
Beth coloured. “I’m sorry about that, and there it was your birthday too!”
Kitty hastens to reassure her. “It were fine, you’d earned that rest, we had been up late. And we still had lots of time to explore.”
“You’d never been to Liverpool before, Kitty?”
“No, never.”
“I hadn’t been there in years, it’s seems a lot fancier these days, or maybe it’s just the places we visited. Oh, and we brought this back for your kitchen.” Beth handed over a small package with the gift they’d picked out.
“Oh, we have something for you too.” Fearne looked almost nervous as she dug in her purse and retrieved two envelopes, handing them over.
The fronts of the card they each pulled out was a black and white photo — no a scan — and inside she’d written ‘Congratulations on becoming a grandmother.’ Kitty read it and turned back to the front image. The scan was very crisp and clear and showed absolutely nothing Kitty could recognise as a baby, which she was basically fine with, but the message it contained was clear, and huge.
Beth, after a quick indrawn breath, was enthusiastically congratulating them both, with the same delight she’d shown when Fearne had first said they were trying. Kitty searched her own feelings for a similar reaction, but she wasn’t feeling much of anything.
Beth was asking when they’d first known — several week earlier and they’d been waiting for the scan date. And how was Fearne feeling? — mostly good just a bit of morning sickness that tended to hit in the evening so she was glad it wasn’t effecting work yet.
Kitty sat back, and watched Tom’s face and reminded herself this was very different to when she’d first realised about him.
Fearne asked them to keep it on the down low for now and then the food arrived. As the other two got busy adding condiments, Kitty watched Beth take a moment to compose herself. She caught her eye and mouthed “Okay?”
Beth took a big breath, nodded, and smiled at her, then unfolded her napkin.
As they eat Fearne asks how the band is going.
“Oh,” says Beth, “we have an interview this week.”
Kitty expands “We did that gig on Valentine’s day and suddenly all these people want to interview us, which is strange because it was not a big audience.”
They’d had three interview requests come in, though Jenny Lennocks had her suspicions that one was just fans trying for some face time. The band had bickered over who would front for them - Jess and Beth had done the only previous one - and eventually decided to parcel them out: Jess and Miranda to do one of the queer publications; Nisha, Kam and Holly the other; and Beth and Kitty a hyperlocal paper with the hopes that they would be least likely to ask relationship questions. Jess had rather wanted to do that one as publicity for the Duke so Kitty had to promise to mention working and rehearsing there.
“Oh, you are becoming famous. Let me know when it goes up and I’ll share it.” Fearne’s friend group seemed to delight in hearing about the band.
“I will, Kam will be very pleased if you do.”
After Tom pays for their lunch they wander around the garden centre. Beth thinks she’ll just get some seedlings for the vege garden, so Kitty grabs a cart and they follow along behind her. Kitty spots a ridiculous garden statue — two tiger cubs playing — and puts it in the cart. When Tom sees it he casts around for something equally awful and adds a wind chime made of metal butterflies. Kitty adds a cactus shaped like a rabbit. Tom spots a shiny sunflower shaped bird feeder and then Fearne points out a large orangutan to Kitty, who crows with laughter and levers it onto the trolley. When Beth turns around with a carefully selected tray of mixed seedling lettuces she is astonished.
“What on earth are you going to do with all that?”
“We could put him in the entry alcove?”
“I’d come home after dark one night and he’d scare the lights out of me.”
Kitty takes pity on her and jettisons their gathered treasures.
They decide to make the most of the nice weather and go for a walk along the river and have a look at the old lock, but it turns out there is no easy walking access from this side of the Calder. So they get back into the cars to drive across to the other side.
As they wait for a break in the traffic onto the main road Kitty asks Beth how she felt about Fearne’s news.
“I’m delighted, of course, I just, I guess it gives me a pang, that it’s coming so easily for her. They’ve been trying for less than a year and Martin and I tried for so long.” She shakes her head. “I’m being very stupid, I would never want them to go through what I did, and this is such a good thing. Kitty, we are going to have a grandchild.”
“We are.” Kitty grins back at her, finding she can feel the joy when Beth is saying it to her.
“And how about you? What are you feeling?”
“Yeah, I reckon it makes sense that you feel weird about it. I’m a bit freaked out by the whole thing. I only saw baby Tom for such a short time.” She stops to think for a second, then chooses her most practical worry to tell Beth. “Will you show me, what to do when they want me to hold ‘em?”
“Of course.” Beth’s free hands comes out and pats Kitty’s knee, Kitty puts her own over it briefly, as they turn into the carpark by the canal where Tom and Fearne have stopped. The warmth relieves Kitty, she doesn’t have to do this alone.
The water swirls below them as they cross a footbridge to a towpath between the canal and river. Beth and Fearne start talking about plants and birds and Kitty finds herself walking next to Tom.
Well she thinks, might as well try talking about serious stuff with him too. So she dives in. “You excited or terrified about the baby?”
He turns startled eyes on her. “Terrified. Um, I am excited, but yeah, terrified.”
“You know you’ll be fine? I mean Martin was a bit of an idiot husband but it seems like he did you right as a dad, yeah? You’ve got lots of good parental example to follow.”
Tom nods.
Kitty soldiers on. “At least you didn’t get brought up by the men on my side of the family. Ya could have made a right great shotter.”
She watched Tom think about that, wide eyed.
“Reckon it’s pretty normal to be scared, right? Most dads shit themselves a bit when they realise they’ll be taking a kid home from the hospital, no instruction manual included.” She pauses, then adds “And I have to say that thinking about it is making me glad I skipped out on all that.” She bumped her shoulder against his arm. “You’ll do fine. And if it gets too much you’ve got a surplus of grandmothers to drop him on, right?”
He nods, looking oddly like her words have helped.
“Seriously, I’m made up for both of you.”
Fearne calls Tom to look at a canal boat and Beth drops back to walk with Kitty. They pass under the arch of the rail bridge, and Kitty says “I sat under a bridge that night, outside Hebden, after.”
Beth knows which after, the night of the talent quest, almost ten months earlier. “That’s where you went? I searched all around, tried the Pack Horse bridge, went into the White Swan and up and down the roads. I didn’t think you would have gone that far down the tow path in the dark. Though I really didn’t know where you’d gone.”
“I thought I’d destroyed everything. I was so angry, at him, at myself. Just found somewhere to hide. I’d let you down, proved Tom right, that I was just a low class troublemaker.”
Beth takes her hand, interlaces their fingers. “I just wanted to find you and make sure you were okay. Even back then you were so important to me.” She raises their hands and kisses Kitty’s fingers, then leans in and kisses her on the mouth. “I’m still sorry about how everything went down after that, but I’m so glad you came home.”
“So am I.” Kitty kisses her back, and they turn and follow Tom and Fearne down the path, hand in hand.
Once they have said their farewells and are back in the car Beth says “The best thing about this grandbairn is we get to do this together.”
As Kitty turns towards her with soft eyes she continues “The second best? Start thinking about what our gift of baby’s first musical toy should be.” She giggles wickedly and Kitty throws back her head and laughs.
“Actually, could that make a song?”
“What, babies and music?” Kitty tries to mime a baby playing drums, it doesn’t really work.
“The way you worry about every little thing with your kids, and then spoil your grandkids because they can do nothing wrong.” Beth had been watching the parents around her becoming grandparents for many years.
“Maybe? It’s about second chances, innit?”
“We could give the chorus to our glorious back up singers, as the generation in between.”
“They can channel Chloe, arguing with their parents.”
Kitty starts singing phrases and Beth sings ideas back at her as they drive towards home.
