The flat was silent. Record label: gone. The duo: gone. Bruce: gone. Elf fled to her bed – hers, no longer ours – curled up under her blanket and in that stuffy womb sobbed her heart out. All over again.
On Day Nine, February rain batters the Holloway family’s mock-Tudor windows, erasing the muddy garden and Chislehurst Road. Lawrence, the besuited boyfriend of Elf’s older sister Imogen, is acting oddly. ‘So, um …’ He half stands, sits down again, then leans forwards. ‘So, um …’ His fingers check his tie. ‘So, um, a … an … a, surprise announcement.’ Imogen gives him an encouraging smile, as if Lawrence is a nervous student at a nativity play.
My God, thinks Elf. They’re getting engaged.
One glance tells her that both her parents are in the know.
‘Not that Mr Holloway’ll be surprised,’ says Lawrence.
‘I’d say we’re on “Clive” terms now,’ says Elf’s dad. ‘Eh?’
‘Don’t steal the lad’s thunder, Clive,’ instructs Elf’s mum.
‘I’m not stealing anyone’s thunder, Miranda.’
‘My God!’ Bea, Elf’s younger sister, acts concerned. ‘Lawrence is turning purple.’
Lawrence is indeed blushing impressively. ‘I’m fine, I—’
‘Shall I call nine-nine-nine?’ Bea puts down her champagne glass. ‘Are you having an attack?’
‘Bea,’ Elf’s mum uses her warning voice, ‘enough.’
‘What if Lawrence combusts, Mummy? It’ll take more than bicarb of soda to get Lawrence-stains out of the carpet.’
Normally Elf would laugh at this, but since Bruce left, nothing’s funny. Elf’s dad takes charge. ‘Carry on, Lawrence, before you get cold feet about joining this mad-house.’
‘Lawrence is not getting cold feet,’ insists Elf’s mum. ‘Are you, Lawrence?’
‘Ah-uh-um … not at all, Mrs Holloway.’
‘If Daddy’s “Clive”,’ asks Bea, ‘shouldn’t Lawrence call you “Miranda”, Mummy? I’m only asking.’
‘Bea,’ groans their mum, ‘if you’re bored, buzz off.’
‘And miss Lawrence’s mystery news? It’s not every day your sister gets engaged.’ Bea puts her hand to her mouth. ‘Oops. Sorry. Was that the mystery news? It’s just a wild, wild guess.’
A car backfires on Chislehurst Road. Lawrence puffs out his cheeks, relieved. ‘Yes. I asked Immy to marry me. Immy said …’
‘“Oh, go on then, if you insist,”’ reports Imogen.
‘Clive and I couldn’t be more thrilled,’ says their mum.
‘Unless England wins the Ashes,’ says Elf’s dad, coaxing his pipe back to life. He gives Lawrence his corny wink.
‘Congratulations,’ says Elf. ‘Both of you.’
‘Let’s look at the ring, then, Sis,’ says Bea.
Imogen takes a box from her handbag. Everyone draws close. ‘Gadzooks,’ says Bea. ‘That didn’t come from a cracker.’
‘It cost someone a fair whack,’ says Elf’s dad. ‘My my.’
‘Actually, Mr Hollo— Clive, my gran left it for me, for …’ Lawrence watches Imogen slip it on ‘… for my fiancée.’
‘Isn’t that moving?’ says Elf’s mother. ‘Clive?’
‘Yes, dear.’ Elf’s dad gives Lawrence an arch look. ‘Two magic words you’ll be saying often, from here on in.’
Mum and Dad are a double-act, Elf thinks, like Bruce and me were. Grief for ‘Bruce and Elf’ squeezes her ribcage. It hurts.
‘So,’ says Elf’s mum. ‘Let’s toast the happy couple, shall we?’
They all raise their glasses and chorus: ‘The happy couple!’
‘Welcome to the Holloways,’ says Bea, in a Hammer horror voice. ‘You’re one of us now … “Lawrence Holloway”.’
‘Thanks, Bea, but’ – Lawrence gives his future sister-in-law an indulgent look – ‘it doesn’t quite work like that.’
‘That’s what the last two said,’ says Bea. ‘They’re under the patio. Every year our patio is extended by one yard and Elf’s murder ballad, “The Lovers Of Imogen Holloway”, gets a new verse. Odd.’
Even their mum smiles at this, but Elf can’t find it in herself to join in. ‘Let’s lay the table.’
Bea studies her not-quite-herself sister. ‘O-kay.’
Elf has recorded a solo EP, ‘Oak, Ash And Thorn’; a duo EP, ‘Shepherd’s Crook’, with Bruce; her song ‘Any Way The Wind Blows’ was recorded by American folk singer Wanda Virtue, who put it on a million-selling LP and released it as a Top Twenty single. With her royalty cheques, Elf bought a flat in Soho, an investment that even her father begrudgingly approved. Elf can play a ninety-minute set of folk songs in front of three hundred strangers. She can handle drunken hecklers. She can vote, drive, drink, smoke, have sex and has done all five. Yet bring her back to her family dining table, let her see Uncle Derek’s watercolour of HMS Trafalgar, which she used to try to magic herself into like the children in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, or the liveried stockade of Encyclopaedia Britannica on the sideboard, and Elf’s adult persona peels away, revealing the spotty, sulky, insecure teenager within. ‘That’s plenty of beef for me, Dad.’
‘It’s only two slices. You’ll fade away to nothing.’
‘You do look pale, darling,’ observes Elf’s mum. ‘I hope you’re not going down with Bruce’s mysterious … lurgy.’
Elf extends her lie. ‘Laryngitis, the doctor said.’
‘Such a pity he missed Immy and Lawrence’s big news.’ Elf is dubious. She suspects her mother of keeping a charge sheet of Bruce’s crimes. These include living in sin with Elf, fuelling Elf’s delusions that music is a career, being a male with long hair, and being Australian. She’ll be happier about our bust-up than she is about Immy and Lawrence’s engagement.
Outside, rain bombards the crocuses to silky mush.
‘Elf?’ Imogen, and everyone else, is watching her.
‘Crikey, sorry, I, uh …’ Elf reaches for the mustard pot she doesn’t want ‘… Miles away. You were saying, Immy?’
‘Lawrence and I are hoping that you and Bruce will play a few songs for us. At the wedding reception.’
Tell them you’ve split up, thinks Elf. ‘We’d love to.’
‘Jolly good.’ Elf’s mum surveys the plates around the table. ‘If everyone has Yorkshire pud, dig in.’
Knives clink and the men make appreciative noises.
‘The beef’s out of this world, Mrs Holloway,’ says Lawrence. ‘And the gravy’s amazing.’
‘Miranda loves cooking with wine.’ Elf’s dad cracks open the old gag. ‘She’s even been known to put some in the food.’
Lawrence smiles as if it’s the first time he’s heard it.
‘Will you still teach,’ Bea asks Imogen, ‘after the wedding?’