Page 2 of Autumn at the Oak Leaf Café
‘Well, me and Brentwell are glad to have you back,’ Jonas said. ‘Even if it’s only temporary.’
‘Probably not my little brother, though. I imagine he’ll start with the whole return-of-the-golden-child thing as soon as he sees me.’
Jonas laughed. ‘I think he has other things on his mind.’
‘I can’t believe he’s getting married. My slimy little brother is actually getting married. What’s she like? Does she keep paper towels in her purse to dry his sweaty palms?’
‘Don’t be unkind,’ Jonas said with a smile. ‘She’s actually very nice, is Amy. She’s a little bit OCD, though. He told me she organised his sock drawer, lining them all up by their order in the colour spectrum, with the toe bits all pointing inwards. He said it makes his eyes go funny to look at it.’
‘Good on her for taking him off the streets,’ Madeline said. ‘I imagine there were street parties among the single women of Brentwell when they found out.’
‘Don’t be horrible,’ Jonas said. ‘They look very happy together. So, let’s talk about you. How long are you planning to stay? Are you going to get a job now you’re back? Of course, you’re welcome to your old room at mine for as long as you like.’
‘Thanks, Dad. I don’t know, though. I really just came to pay my respects to Mum. I’ll probably get a job for a bit, but I’m not sure how long I’ll stay. I’ve been away a long time, but most of the people I knew before I left are still here. It’ll be weird seeing them again. I don’t know if I’ll fit in anymore.’
‘Well, let’s take it a day at a time.’ Jonas put his empty chips carton into the plastic bag the shop had given them. ‘Wow, that filled a hole. Are you ready? Let’s get you home.’
2
Ghosts
Redfield,their suburb of Brentwell, to the southwest of the town centre, looked almost spookily like Madeline remembered it. Mr. Davies at Number 14 still had his purple Robin Reliant, and the broken hinge on the hanging sign outside the Redfield Tavern still hadn’t been fixed, even though Matt, the landlord, had been promising to get it done since Madeline had been old enough to buy a drink. One of the trees along Redfield Canal, which joined up with Willow River, had been replaced by a sycamore sapling, but the other nine in the row on the embankment on the tavern’s side still stood as they always had.
‘A lorry slipped on ice last winter and ran into it,’ Jonas told her by way of explanation as she craned her neck out of the car’s side window to look. ‘It was all right, but one of the roots on the road side got disturbed, and kids kept tripping on it. A shame, really.’
‘I imagine Amy struggles with it.’
‘She closes her eyes when they drive past, Eric told me,’ Jonas said. ‘By the way, are you planning to catch up with any of your old friends while you’re home?’
‘I’m not sure.’
They pulled into Lock Keepers Lane and came to a stop outside Jonas’s quiet suburb house. ‘I saw Lucinda the other day in Tesco,’ Jonas said. ‘She had a newborn with her.’ He grinned. ‘I assume it was hers.’
‘I saw she was pregnant last time I stalked her on Facebook,’ Madeline said with a smile. ‘I don’t know. We haven’t really kept in touch.’
‘Come on, you have loads in common. She sells holidays. You go on them.’
‘It was a working holiday,’ Madeline said. ‘As in, I only get to bum around pools on weekends. It’s not quite the same, though, is it? I mean, I’ve been out of the country a while.’
‘She’s put on weight too,’ Jonas said. ‘I doubt you’ll be running any cross-country races together like you used to.’
‘That’ll be having kids for you,’ Madeline said.
‘You know, I wouldn’t be disappointed if you found out,’ Jonas said. ‘I’m not holding out on Amy putting up with Eric long enough to provide me with some grandchildren I can hammer at chess and Connect 4.’
‘Don’t give up, Dad.’
‘Not for a couple more years. Talking of children, are you going to see Rory while you’re home?’
‘Dad … are you suggesting that Rory is a child, or that he’s the closest person I’ve so far come to having a child with?’
Jonas, having finished reversing up the drive, leaving the car pointed like an arrow down at the kerb, switched off the engine and shrugged.
‘Ah … maybe both?’
‘He wasn’t that bad, Dad. We were just at different stages of our lives.’
‘You mean that you wanted to be an adult while he wanted to continue getting hammered and attempting to jump across the canal on a Friday night? If he’d got a couple of feet closer to the far edge, it might have knocked some sense into him.’
