them a start in life by any means possible. And yet now her mother had admitted that perhaps it might have been a mistake – now that she herself had married for love.
For Emily that had shaken her base instinct for life: You did it by whatever means possible.
If that was a mistake – the traipsing round after the money and the lifestyle – then that meant things could have been different. And if they had been different, would they have been better?
Giles Fox had been the holy grail. Rich, successful, famous. And, ten years older than her, he would protect her, keep her safe. As her mum had said, eyes bright, Emily would never want for anything. Except, as she soon discovered, love. But that had never been on the tick box agenda. Along with being treated like an adult. Never quite being allowed to feel part of the crowd. Part of his gang. Her mum was on the phone from France telling her to go for it, get to LA, move in with him ASAP, while Enid – in retrospect her main touchstone to reality – was saying,
‘Calm down,’
telling her to watch what she was doing and who she was doing it with. To be careful. But what was the point of telling that to a wilful seventeen year old – headstrong, beautiful and broken-hearted – with the reins to her own life at an age where any little steer of rationality was going to be determinedly ignored.
That’s what she’d thought lying in bed last night. That’s what had rolled over and over again in her mind till she finally dozed off in a hazy half-light of early morning.
Now, as she stood looking at the women next to her, all she could think about was friendship. Friendship grown here, on Cherry Pie, gave the impression of having roots sturdier than any of the ones she’d forged in her normal day-to-day life. They were the bloody bindweed of relationships.
It was only then that she remembered they were doing all this for Holly. Their friend. And for Enid. A woman with a personality as big and strong as Emily’s, who she had butted heads with and refused to listen to but who she would now like to go back to and say, ‘
You were right.’
She couldn’t let Jonathan turn it into some miniature Chelsea Flower Show. The Cherry Pie Show was loved
because
it was haphazard and bizarre. Because people knitted tea cosies and felted little animals and baked cakes that didn’t quite come out as hoped. Because there was a prize for the ugliest vegetable as well as the best.
When she’d been living on Cherry Pie as a teenager, the show hadn’t been held at the primary school. It had been in a marquee on Montmorency land. Bernard had thrown the doors open, stalking round proudly as he tasted pineapple upside-down cakes, judged the dog show and handed rosettes to the vegetable prize-winners. It was the Cherry Pie Show that had inspired Jack and Wilf’s disastrous festival.
She thought of the photograph of them all pinned above Jack’s bed.
‘You want somewhere to hold the Cherry Pie Show?’ Emily shouted just as Jonathan was about to step off his orange box, the new plans a fait accompli.
He paused and glanced at the voice, surprised. ‘I’m sorry, did someone say something?’
Emily moved herself to the side of the group so she was standing alone for the crowd to see her. ‘Yeah, I said something,’ she said, suddenly feeling everyone’s eyes on her, big and wide like cows at a fence.
Emily wasn’t rustic, she wasn’t homemade jam and handmade quilts, she wasn’t a cup of tea and a slice of vanilla sponge, she wasn’t community, she wasn’t tradition. But she
was
suddenly about friendship. About the things in her past that had made her happy. The things that, being here, she was remembering. The things that when she took hold of them made her feel like her feet were on the ground rather than scurrying through the air at a rate of knots. ‘I said, do you want somewhere to hold your show? Somewhere big enough so that everyone can be a part of it?’
Jonathan
For Emily that had shaken her base instinct for life: You did it by whatever means possible.
If that was a mistake – the traipsing round after the money and the lifestyle – then that meant things could have been different. And if they had been different, would they have been better?
Giles Fox had been the holy grail. Rich, successful, famous. And, ten years older than her, he would protect her, keep her safe. As her mum had said, eyes bright, Emily would never want for anything. Except, as she soon discovered, love. But that had never been on the tick box agenda. Along with being treated like an adult. Never quite being allowed to feel part of the crowd. Part of his gang. Her mum was on the phone from France telling her to go for it, get to LA, move in with him ASAP, while Enid – in retrospect her main touchstone to reality – was saying,
‘Calm down,’
telling her to watch what she was doing and who she was doing it with. To be careful. But what was the point of telling that to a wilful seventeen year old – headstrong, beautiful and broken-hearted – with the reins to her own life at an age where any little steer of rationality was going to be determinedly ignored.
That’s what she’d thought lying in bed last night. That’s what had rolled over and over again in her mind till she finally dozed off in a hazy half-light of early morning.
Now, as she stood looking at the women next to her, all she could think about was friendship. Friendship grown here, on Cherry Pie, gave the impression of having roots sturdier than any of the ones she’d forged in her normal day-to-day life. They were the bloody bindweed of relationships.
It was only then that she remembered they were doing all this for Holly. Their friend. And for Enid. A woman with a personality as big and strong as Emily’s, who she had butted heads with and refused to listen to but who she would now like to go back to and say, ‘
You were right.’
She couldn’t let Jonathan turn it into some miniature Chelsea Flower Show. The Cherry Pie Show was loved
because
it was haphazard and bizarre. Because people knitted tea cosies and felted little animals and baked cakes that didn’t quite come out as hoped. Because there was a prize for the ugliest vegetable as well as the best.
When she’d been living on Cherry Pie as a teenager, the show hadn’t been held at the primary school. It had been in a marquee on Montmorency land. Bernard had thrown the doors open, stalking round proudly as he tasted pineapple upside-down cakes, judged the dog show and handed rosettes to the vegetable prize-winners. It was the Cherry Pie Show that had inspired Jack and Wilf’s disastrous festival.
She thought of the photograph of them all pinned above Jack’s bed.
‘You want somewhere to hold the Cherry Pie Show?’ Emily shouted just as Jonathan was about to step off his orange box, the new plans a fait accompli.
He paused and glanced at the voice, surprised. ‘I’m sorry, did someone say something?’
Emily moved herself to the side of the group so she was standing alone for the crowd to see her. ‘Yeah, I said something,’ she said, suddenly feeling everyone’s eyes on her, big and wide like cows at a fence.
Emily wasn’t rustic, she wasn’t homemade jam and handmade quilts, she wasn’t a cup of tea and a slice of vanilla sponge, she wasn’t community, she wasn’t tradition. But she
was
suddenly about friendship. About the things in her past that had made her happy. The things that, being here, she was remembering. The things that when she took hold of them made her feel like her feet were on the ground rather than scurrying through the air at a rate of knots. ‘I said, do you want somewhere to hold your show? Somewhere big enough so that everyone can be a part of it?’
Jonathan
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