the word; it was disconcerting. Memories flooded back as her thumb traced the pattern around the pot and up the handle. Although not unhappy memories, they sat uncomfortably with her because they took her back to a troubled time in her life nearly twenty years ago …
Meredith Mayhew had lived next door for as long as Maisie could remember. A funny old dear with tortoiseshell cat-eye glasses either perched on her elegant nose or on her aluminium-coloured shampoo-and-set hair. She always had a neatly pressed collar on her polyester print dress or floral cotton blouse, and there was invariably a string of beads hanging under the collar and around her neck. Sometimes jet black like small, shiny olives; sometimes bright red like ripe cranberries; occasionally, on high days and holidays, iridescent pearls. And, like many older ladies of Maisie’s acquaintance, she always smelled of Parma Violets and talcum powder.
There were several years of exchanged pleasantries over the garden fence between Meredith and her mother, often as Maisie tumbled cartwheels across the lawn, or sat cross-legged, threading daisy stems together to make chains whilst her mother hung out a never-ending line of cotton tops, branded jeans and more odd socks than she had pegs for. (How is that growing family of yours doing? Oh, you know. Eating me out of house and home. Cue an eye-roll and a flustered expression. You’re always welcome to pop in for a cup of tea. If only I had the time, Meredith, but I never get so much as five minutes to myself …)
All this changed on a blustery morning in April, as the scampering wind scraped the branches of an overgrown buddleia across the wall outside her bedroom window, even though the day was bright and inviting. A seven-year-old Maisie woke to Zoe perched on the edge of the twin bed, headphones on and staring straight ahead. Competing with the buffeting wind from outside was the sound of someone pummelling on the front door.
‘Come on, Bev. Be reasonable.’ The voice was pleady and distant.
‘I’ll give you sodding reasonable,’ her mother’s voice shrieked from the hall. Bleary-eyed and half-asleep, Maisie stumbled out of her bedroom to witness her irate mother launching a brown leather shoe out the landing window – three black sacks of clothes and books at her slippered feet.
‘Owww. That got me across the shoulder. Look what you’re doing, woman.’ Her dad’s troubled voice floated in through the open window and across to a bemused Maisie. What was Daddy doing on the outside?
‘It was meant to land smack bang across your lying, cheating mouth and break a few of those perfect teeth of yours,’ her mother yelled, pulling back a Russian shot putter’s arm, pausing to take considered aim, and launching its companion on a similar trajectory. Open-mouthed, Maisie watched as her mother heaved up one of the sacks and tipped the contents out the window, giving the bag a final shake, before it was caught by a gust of wind and carried into the stratosphere.
‘And I’m changing the locks. You’ll have to find somewhere else to live because you aren’t welcome here any longer.’
‘Why does Daddy have to live somewhere else?’ Still in her Hello Kitty pyjamas, Maisie returned to her bedroom to ask Zoe what the confusing scene was all about – it was Saturday so neither Lisa nor Ben would surface until the afternoon. Zoe wasn’t quite a teenager like her older siblings but she was at high school so practically a grown-up. She kissed boys and everything.
‘He’s got this … friend that Mummy doesn’t like. In fact, she’s only just found out about her. But it’s complicated,’ Zoe sighed.
Maisie thought about this for a moment and her eyes expanded as she processed the information and its consequences. Inwardly, she resolved to steer clear of that new girl in her class. All showy-offy and sly. Mummy wouldn’t like her at all.
The verbal warfare continued through the open window as her mother stomped backwards and forwards along the landing, scouring the house to seek out all vestiges of her husband. The lawn was now a colourful and abstract display of one man’s possessions as the owner chased loose sheets of paper across lawns and pavements. Amused neighbours gathered at the edges of their gardens, intrigued by the spectacle, as he repeatedly begged his wife to let him in.
But the lady was not for turning. Her father eventually scraped together his scattered belongings from the front lawn and drove off in his company car. And Meredith Mayhew, who had remained inside for the duration of the showdown, opened her front door, walked purposefully down to the road, U-turned up her neighbour’s drive and gave the front door three sharp knocks. It was opened by, Maisie’s sobbing mother, floundering around in a world that had collapsed overnight, and in which she was now bereft of adult companionship.
‘The offer of tea still stands. The kettle is on and we only have to talk if you want to.’
‘I’d like that,’ her mum replied between sobs, and the older lady ushered her down the front path with Maisie trotting behind, determined not to lose both parents during the course of a morning.
Meredith’s house was the semi attached to their house. Everything was mirrored. And considerably tidier. And smelled less like stinky socks and overused deodorant. As she walked into the kind lady’s living room, Maisie felt all fuzzy and peculiar – a bit like when you had to stand up in assembly and talk to the whole school, and were worried everyone would stare and laugh. She sat on the edge of the floral-patterned sofa, her small feet barely reaching the Chinese rug that covered the centre of the room. Maisie crossed her chubby legs in front of her and then uncrossed them again. They sat in silence for a few moments until Meredith reappeared with a tray.
‘Drink this,’ Meredith ordered, picking up a curious black and white teapot and pouring a steaming stream of dark brown tea into a dainty cup. The tulip-shaped cups and saucers matched each other, but didn’t match the pot – Maisie always noticed things like that. ‘It will take the edge off things, Beverley. I promise.’
Unable to drag her eyes from the teapot, Maisie felt the pricklings become more intense. Meredith looked across at her as Maisie stared, transfixed, and rubbed her small hands up to her shoulders and down to her elbows.
‘Are you okay, dear?’ she asked, returning the teapot to the tray. Maisie’s wide eyes followed her movements, as if hypnotized.
‘Um …’
‘Can you feel something?’ She bent over the little girl, her voice breathy and excited. ‘Gamma used to go all peculiar and tingly whenever she brought out this tea set. She was so insistent it was like a family and should be kept as a whole. “Split the set; split the family,” she used to say. It had been in our family several generations, so she was very attached to it. But then it isn’t a set any more …’ The old lady looked sad, Maisie noticed. ‘And my darling teapot so misses her companions.’
Maisie shook her head but kept her lips firmly pressed together, not wanting to be associated with a mad, old and long-dead relative of Meredith’s. There was something funny about the teapot, but at seven, she couldn’t even begin to articulate what it might be. And with two grown-ups both staring at her, she wasn’t inclined to try.
Maisie uncrossed her arms and stared down at her blue T-Bar canvas shoes.
‘I think we’ve all got rather more on our minds than a silly old teapot – no offence,’ her mum sniffed.
‘Of course. I suppose I always wanted to believe there was something unworldly about the teapot or even that I might feel it too …’ Meredith’s voice tailed off and she placed it back on the tray.
Maisie’s mum lifted the delicate bone china cup to her trembling lips, eyes red-rimmed and posture defeated, and half-sipped,
