‘Nonsense,’ she replies with a bat of her hand. ‘Chicken nuggets for the boy, what about for Mum?’
‘Scrambled eggs on toast would be great, please,’ I reply, ordering from their all-day brunch menu.
‘Coming right up,’ she replies as she trots off to the kitchen in her kitten heels. ‘Talk amongst yourself, I’ll be able to chat from the kitchen.’
Clara disappears through a multi-coloured strip curtain before remerging behind a serving hatch.
‘Londoners?’ Henry asks.
‘Guilty,’ I reply with an awkward smile.
‘And you say you’ve just moved here?’ Clara quizzes.
‘Yes,’ I say. I feel like I’m being grilled, but I have nothing to hide. ‘We’re renting Apple Blossom Cottage.’
‘Oh, lovely place,’ she replies. ‘Just stunning.’
‘Yes,’ I reply, but my little white lie prickles my throat. I cough to clear it.
‘You not like it?’ Henry asks.
‘It’s so beautiful from the outside – Frankie has never seen anything like it…the inside is just a little sparse and it needs a good spring clean,’ I explain. ‘And there’s not really too much in it.’
‘It was the Nicholsons’ holiday home – they had it for years, but since it’s just been sat empty. I suspect they took all their mod cons with them.’
‘It seems that way,’ I reply.
Henry picks up a newspaper and begins to flick through the pages. The East Coast Chronicle looks like an interesting read. The front cover is an appeal for help to find Rufus the chocolate Labrador, who never came home after taking himself for his usual walk to the seafront. I’m guessing this is the dog we heard all about on the radio and it warms my heart to know that he’s back home safe. It also amuses me to see that this is front-page news here, rather than yet another story about gangs or tube strikes – further proof, if it were needed, that moving here was a great decision.
‘Well, I’m sure we can survive without a TV tonight.’ I look at Frankie, who swallows hard. I don’t think he’s convinced, but I’m sure he can go a night without playing Nintendo. ‘We definitely need to clean though, it’s far too dusty to sleep in. Is there a Co-op or a Tesco Express or something nearby?’
Henry scoffs.
‘We have a local shop but they’ll be closed,’ he replies.
‘Oh,’ I say, wondering if I can get the job done with hand sanitiser and toilet roll.
‘I can give you some cleaning products,’ Clara says as she places my food down in front of me. ‘Just a few more minutes for yours, my love.’
Frankie smiles politely. I’m proud of him for being a sweet kid with such great manners, but he’s got that unfiltered honesty that all kids have, and I’m worried about how he’s going to react to the not-McChicken nuggets that Clara is making him. The last time I tried to make him some – promising him they would be just as good – he told me they tasted like poison.
‘You’ve been so kind to us already,’ I insist, taken aback by the kindness these complete strangers are showing us. ‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘We’re neighbours now, think nothing of this,’ Clara says as she places Frankie’s dinner in front of him. ‘There you go, my love. My famous chicken nuggets.’
Frankie glances down at the plate of chicken nuggets, proper, thick-cut chips, peas and a large dollop of ketchup. Frankie loves ketchup, but – like most kids – he hates peas.
I raise my eyebrows at him, silently communicating for him to say thank you.
‘Thank you,’ he chimes politely.
‘You’re welcome,’ she replies, ruffling his hair. ‘I’ll go get you some drinks.’
With Clara in the kitchen and Henry distracted by his paper, I lean over to my son and whisper into his ear: ‘If you try it – or at least pretend you’re eating it – I’ll buy you a TV for your room.’
I think every good mum has bribed her child at some point. I know that I probably shouldn’t, but Clara and Henry have been so good to us, I don’t want to offend them.
Frankie nods, sighs and picks up his cutlery.
I finally tuck into my own food which is not only much needed after a long day, but absolutely delicious.
Clara places two glasses of apple juice down in front of us.
‘They’re from local trees,’ she tells us. ‘But let me know if you want anything else, or a nice cup of tea.’
‘Again – thank you so much,’ I say, starting to sound like a broken record, but I really can’t thank them enough.
I watch Frankie theatrically pretend to eat his food – it’s kind of cute – until he accidentally drops his knife, which makes a loud noise on the floor.
‘Not to worry,’ Henry says, pulling himself to his feet. He grabs a clean knife from another table, hobbles over to Frankie and begins to cut his food (which up until now had only been pushed around his plate) for him.
‘Try this,’ he says, stabbing a piece of chicken with the fork, offering it to Frankie.
Frankie looks over at me. I purse my lips and plead at him with my eyes once more.
I watch as my son takes the chicken, chews it and swallows with a much more convincing enthusiasm than before.
‘Try it with the peas, it tastes much better,’ Henry insists, stabbing another piece, this time making sure to get some peas with it.
Frankie looks back over at me, but he knows what he needs to do. With Nintendo on his mind, he takes the food down in one bite.
‘Good lad,’ Henry says, handing Frankie the cutlery back. As he does so, I notice Frankie staring at Henry’s hand. Upon closer inspection, I realise that he’s quite badly scarred from something.
Henry notices Frankie staring.
‘I got blown up,’ he tells him, before turning to me. ‘Falklands.’
As Henry hobbles past me he places a hand on my shoulder and whispers into my ear: ‘I have kids who didn’t used to eat their greens either.’
‘Thank you,’ I reply.
‘No bother,’ he says. ‘Just heading to the little boys’ room.’
Clara, still wearing her Forties outfit under her apron, places a bag of cleaning supplies down next to me before taking a seat at the table next to us. She cradles her cup of tea in her hand as she chats.
‘Just the two of you moved here?’ she asks. She sounds friendly enough, but you’d be amazed at the variety of easy-to-read physical reactions you get from people when they find out you’re a 31-year-old single mum.
First there’s the unabashed judgemental response. You can practically see the mental mathematics going on behind their eyes, as they try and work out if a 31-year-old has an 8-year-old, how old was she when she irresponsibly got knocked up? For some it’s done with the ease of Will Hunting whereas you can see others itching to use their fingers. Twenty-two – that’s not so bad, is it? I see them wonder. These people will almost always decide that, yes, it probably is bad. Some people just think that kids should be born into loving, conventional family units and there’s nothing you can say that will change their minds.
Next up are the people who feel sorry for me, who think about how awful it must have been for me to find