Meredith handed Maisie’s mum a dainty cup with matching saucer and Maisie a plastic tumbler of weak orange squash. Maisie didn’t mind because the old lady always had an exciting biscuit tin to make up for the blandness of the drink. Would it be sponge fingers, with one side coated in glorious granulated sugar, pink wafers that dissolved in your mouth, or sticky Jammie Dodgers with jam so thick and solid it was impossible to pull the two biscuit sides apart without serious crumblage? She peered in the tin and helped herself to four chocolate chip cookies, tilting her body so her mother couldn’t see, and returned to the floor to look for more pieces of edge.
‘He was with that … that woman. In public. All bosoms and low-cut tops. I should have known – he was never short of female admirers. I used to think how lucky I was he’d chosen me. He was such a good-looking man, with those perfect teeth and twinkly eyes …’
A quiet child, as it wasn’t worth trying to compete with the general level of noise in the household, Maisie was often forgotten and consequently privy to many inappropriate conversations. She sat silently in the corner or tucked herself behind the sofa and learned far more about life than many children her age. Only the other day she’d been colouring in butterflies under the dining room table and overheard Lisa talking about doing stuff with her boyfriend in the back of his Fiesta. The ‘stuff’ wasn’t specified but Lisa’s friend got very excited about the announcement they’d got the third base. Maisie knew about Ben smoking weeds (was that dandelions? Stinging nettles? Or that stupid sticky stuff that clung to your clothes like Velcro?) and her mother’s anxiety over flushing hot things and lots of early men on pause.
Maisie was the forgotten child, watching from the wings, absorbing the atmosphere and listening as rowdy voices carried up the stairs or doors slammed – all the time wondering why everyone was so unpleasant and shouty. And then she would close her bedroom door – assuming Zoe wasn’t sprawled across one of the twin beds, headphones on indicating she was off-limits for conversation – and play with her Sylvanian Family to reassure herself this was how it was supposed to be. They never threw their Sony Walkmans across the bedroom, burst into tears for absolutely no reason or slammed down the remote control, storming out the house saying ‘the oestrogen levels in this house are suffocating’. And Mummy Cottontail rabbit would never launch Daddy Cottontail’s belongings out the window of Rose Cottage and make him live somewhere else.
‘Little ears,’ reminded Meredith, and Maisie’s mum glanced across at Maisie, having momentarily forgotten her youngest daughter was with them. ‘Don’t let your tea get cold, Bev.’
Meredith returned the teapot to the tray, pulled the suction lid from a metal biscuit tin decorated with a Victorian ice-skating scene and offered it to Maisie again as her four cookies had mysteriously disappeared … She abandoned her puzzle and skipped across to see what other exciting treats lay within. Bourbons – yummy. Unlike the Jammie Dodgers, these would pull apart and she could lick all the chocolaty scrumminess off before devouring the crunchy biscuit bits.
‘You know you said your mummy split up the tea set between your sisters?’ Maisie asked her elderly neighbour, thinking of her Sylvanian families. The Cottontail family had a miniature tea set that was made of actual, real china. All the pieces were white, and every single cup and saucer was carefully returned to the miniature dresser after she’d finished playing. Since Daddy had moved out, she’d become obsessed with keeping things together.
‘Yes.’ Meredith settled into her dark green velvet easy chair.
‘Can’t you just put it all back together again?’ Maisie paused to lick her Bourbon and then scrunched up her face. ‘Ask your sisters for the cups and saucers back and have it all in your house? It’s what your granny wanted.’
‘If only it was that simple, but you know what sisters are like.’ Meredith rolled her eyes and gave Maisie a conspiratorial smile. ‘They’d rather force down the last cream bun and make themselves sick than share with a sibling. Besides,’ she continued, ‘Gamma used to say it was the sort of tea set that would always find its way to the right person and I spent so many years hoping that person was me. I asked my sisters from time to time if they were willing to part with their pieces but Essie wanted to pass her cups down to her own children, not that she had any in the end, and Irene took great pleasure in announcing she’d given them away. So I guess it wasn’t meant to be.’
Maisie felt for the old lady. It was horrid when you couldn’t get things to stay together. And, yes, she understood all too well that sisters – especially big ones – could be mean and uncooperative.
‘You know we were talking about how the pattern sort of doesn’t look finished before?’ Her thoughts were jiggling about but they kept returning to that funny old teapot.
Meredith nodded, smiling at the talkative child and adjusting the crocheted circular cushion behind her back.
‘I was wondering what it was supposed to be. It’s just squiggles and lines.’ Maisie stepped forward and traced a sticky finger across the stark black jaggedy outlines of shapes that made no sense to her.
‘Ah, that’s the joy of the thing. It can be whatever you want it to be. Just because an object is designed to be a particular something, doesn’t mean your brain can’t interpret it as something else.’
The weird things that Meredith said really made you think. Maisie liked the idea of things being what you decided they were. After all, the fluffy green rug between her bed and Zoe’s was actually a magic carpet but she hadn’t told Zoe.
‘Have you ever seen an abstract painting?’ Meredith asked the inquisitive girl. Maisie shook her head and Meredith leaned forward and pulled a book from the slatted shelf under the oval coffee table. It was called Finding Joy in Modern Art. She opened the book and flicked through the pictures. They were a miscellany of colours and shapes. Maisie took a few tentative steps towards her and peered over the top of the book. Nothing was actually anything but Maisie thought she glimpsed a face or an animal lurking in the muddle.
‘I’m sure the artists had something very definite in mind when they created these images, but when I look at this picture …’ Meredith tilted the book in Maisie’s direction, ‘On White II by a very clever and innovative Russian artist called Kandinsky, I see horses and a bird in the sky, a stopwatch and a chequered racing flag – so to me as a young woman this was a picture about horse-racing, maybe at nearby Newmarket. But when I was older and read more on the subject, I learned it was supposedly about life and death. In the end, does it matter what he intended when he painted it or what I thought I saw? It made me think and looking at it made me happy because it reminded me of a special day I had at the races with a young gentleman I knew at the time.’
Maisie could tell the memory wasn’t really a happy one by looking at the old lady’s face. It was like when Mummy said to Grandma how delicious her fruit cake was and then put the whole foil-wrapped loaf in the pedal bin as soon as they returned home.
‘I admire the skill in a Gainsborough or a Turner, but I do so love the challenge of a Dalí or a Klee.’
Maisie studied the curious picture – noting the sharp black lines, slicing across the canvas, the jumble of colour and the tiny chequerboard patterns. For a few moments she was reflective, then she looked back at the teapot.
‘I think it’s jigsaw puzzle bits,’ she said. ‘All floating around the teapot, needed to be put back in their puzzley holes.’
‘I think so, too,’ said Meredith, and Maisie gave a gap-toothed grin. ‘Keep the book, sweetheart. I know you’ll treasure it.’
Nigel was clinging to the door of his cage as soon as Maisie approached the sideboard. He wasn’t daft and always began to hare around the bottom floor of his cage when he heard her return from work, occasionally optimistically launching himself at the small, square door that opened like a wire drawbridge to the outside world. Maisie pulled back the hook and the door fell forward as he waddled towards her, ever hopeful of a tasty treat. She scooped him up and he nestled happily in her soft, warm hands, munching on sunflower