Page 45 of Venus Was Her Name

‘Where do you want me to start… oh, I know. He was a control freak, a violent bitter man who took great delight in punishing Gran for falling in love. Not with him, with you.’ God, she was annoyed and exhausted by it all. She needed to sit so yanked a chair from under the table, and it seemed like everyone else was weary too, so followed suit, apart from Joe who remained on his feet. Chairs scraped while Joe stared, like he was waiting to be sentenced by Judge Edie, who knew it all by heart and was about to sum up.

Martin Lowe, Edie’s grandad was one of those men who nobody would suspect of being an out-and-out narcissist. Instead, he portrayed himself as a decent chap from a nice suburban family who were, according to her gran, very proud of their son who’d earned a scholarship to the posh grammar school, then went off to university and after training to be a teacher had secured himself a good job at a school down south, in a little city called Ely.

Mrs Lowe bragged to everyone who would listen about her wonderful son who was off to pastures new and so did his dad who drank in the pub where Bobbie worked. And then he went and ruined it all by taking up with ‘that awful Bobbie Carter’ when he came home for a visit.

Bobbie knew Mrs Lowe had never liked her: she had a way of talking just loud enough to be overheard while she sipped her lager and lime. It was no surprise because they’d never exactly got on the first time around. Bobbie and Martin had a bit of a fling when they were eighteen, but he’d gone off to Loughborough University and that put an end to all that. Bobbie hadn’t been all that bothered, while Mrs Lowe was ecstatic.

The thing was, Martin had never got over Bobbie so when he saw her again, working behind the bar at their local, looking so forlorn and, as it turned out, in a bit of a pickle, he was re-smitten. Gran admitted to Edie that her romance with Martin was in the truest sense rushed because time was of the essence, thanks to her ever growing stomach, and an unfortunate form teacher literally dropping dead in a playground miles away. Hence, Martin was due to take up his position straight after Christmas and they had to head southwards and set up home.

It had all sounded so perfect to Bobbie who was still wounded and angry. Martin had already found a very nice flat on the outskirts of the city, one he could easily afford on his new salary. And he would have a lovely, grateful wife to make it all habitable for him. It was all one-sided though, or so Bobbie thought. Being fully aware of her predicament, Martin was more than prepared to bring her unborn baby up as his own, on one condition – that it would be their secret and when it was born, the child would take his name. Bobbie agreed but with a condition of her own, that if her baby took his family name, she would choose its first.

Having struggled on her own for far too long, feeling hurt and betrayed by the man she loved, Bobbie had simply taken a chance. It would be a fresh start in a place that sounded wonderful, somewhere away from the smoky city where her baby– her and Martin’s baby, would have the best start in life with a mum and dad. Not live the one she had, in and out of foster homes for most of her life. They would also be miles away from Mrs Lowe senior.

None of her friends knew she was getting wed, or why, simply because they’d have talked her out of it or worse, one of them might have let it slip about Joe. Bobbie Carter intended to spirit herself away without any fuss and start again. Gran had described in all its dreariness her wedding ceremony at Leeds registry office.

Standing beside her stony-faced husband, Mrs Lowe senior had dabbed her eyes throughout, that was when she wasn’t scrutinising the cut of Bobbie’s dress, suspicion leaking from every pore of her poker face. After making some weak excuse, Martin’s friend from school had rushed off, leaving the meagre wedding party, comprising of his beady-eyed aunt and bored-looking uncle to endure a painfully polite meal at the Toby Inn Carvery.

Perhaps to make it easier for Edie, her gran had made light of it all by recalling the knife that sliced the beef, saying she’d imagined Mrs Lowe senior probably wanted to use it on the bride. Nobody bothered with dessert or coffee, a small mercy according to Gran, and after apologising again for not being around for Christmas, it was finally time to say goodbye to Leeds and the potential in-laws from hell.

The disappointed parents begrudgingly drove the newlyweds to the station and after unloading their suitcases, Bobbie’s brown leather one filled with all her worldly goods, they didn’t stay to wave them off. Once settled in the carriage, Bobbie had sucked in tears, telling herself to ignore what she’d heard through the toilet doors at the pub, privy to a conversation between Mrs Lowe and her pinch-faced sister. As she headed south towards her future, the hope she held in her heart for her and her baby outweighed the bitter prophecies of doom.

However, years later, Bobbie concluded that Mrs Lowe senior was on the money, and wholeheartedly agreed with her detractor because the marriage was in fact a sham, a failure, and definitely did end in tears.

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