Netta had made the custard with four egg yolks and a pint of double cream, so that it flowed like ivory silk, and then she had sprinkled a half-inch layer of demerara over the top and placed the dish under the hottest setting on the grill until the sugar had shivered and run. It had set, afterwards, into a sheet of toffee glass that would take a rap with a rolling pin to break. It was a sophisticated gift, she felt, a truly grown-up pudding that would remain so even after she had written ‘GOODBYE PAUL’ across the top with tiny blobs of clotted cream. She had got as far as the ‘A’ when the doorbell rang.
‘There is a very peculiar smell in that lift,’ said her mother, speaking as soon as the door was open, ‘it’s one that I can’t quite put my finger on. Natalia, what would you say that smell was?’
‘Blackcurrant air-freshener, I thought. You all ready, Bri? Your train’s going in half an hour.’
‘Yup, just give me two minutes. Where’s Glenn?’
‘Talking to one of the workmen outside. What’s all that building stuff that’s going on down there?’
‘No idea.’
‘Can I use your loo?’
‘Second door off the hall.’
‘It wasn’t just air-freshener,’ continued their mother. ‘I’m sure I detected an undertone, a tiny wisp of something else. Lester?’
‘Yes, Mamushka?’
‘What did you think that lift smelled of?’
‘Puke, Mamushka. Who’s Pa?’
‘Sorry?’ said Netta, to whom the question had been addressed.
‘On top of that dessert thing. Who’s Pa? It says “Goodbye Pa”.’
‘When I put on a few more blobs of cream it’ll say “Goodbye Paul”, and he’s the doctor who lives here. Do you want a lick?’ She held out a spoon.
‘No thank you,’ said her nephew, visibly shocked. ‘Cream gives you heart attacks. Can I have a go at those binoculars?’
‘Of course you can. The view’s even better in the living room – it’s not blocked by the chimney.’
‘Ah yes, now, the view,’ said her mother, following Lester. ‘That’s what I’ve come to see.’
Netta finished the last two letters, and placed the Pyrex dish at the centre of the kitchen table. For a moment she wondered if she should leave a note as well but the usual farewell sentiments, the ‘thanks for everything/give me a ring/see you again/drop by any time you’re in Glasgow’-type epithets, seemed emptily verbose. She’d remember Paul every time she looked at the one remaining chickenpox scar on her forehead and he’d remember her whenever he ate crème brûlée, but she knew that they wouldn’t stay in touch; the world simply didn’t work like that. Although Paul would almost certainly receive a Christmas card and a selection of recycling literature from Glenn every year for the whole of the rest of his life.
‘What are you grinning at?’ asked Natalia, re-entering.
‘Nothing much. I’m all set.’ She picked up her luggage of three Tesco carriers and a handbag. ‘You ready, Mum? Lester?’
‘I had no idea that one could see quite so much detail from up here,’ said her mother as they walked towards the lifts. ‘I was looking at Market Square through the binoculars and I’m almost certain I saw Lucy Procter not only playing truant but smoking. I’ll have to have words on Tuesday.’
‘So, Bri, you totally desperate to get home?’ asked Natalia.
‘Yes,’ said Netta; there was just a trace of reservation in her answer and her sister looked at her curiously.
‘Is that a yes but I hear?’
‘It is, actually. I mean, obviously, I can’t wait to see Mick, but I won’t have any of the girls at home. For the first time ever. I was just thinking about it today in the flat, making that pudding. Most people start as a couple and end up as a family, don’t they? I did it the other way round, I’ll have to learn what it’s like when it’s just the two of us. I hope we don’t kill each other.’
‘I think you’ll find,’ said her mother, ‘that over the next year or two your mood swings will start to settle down and you’ll become a lot less irritable.’
‘Mum, I am not going through the menopause.’
‘Christ, Mum,’ said Natalia, outraged, ‘I’m a year older than Bri and I’m nowhere near that stage – we’re young women, we’ve got half our lives ahead of us, we could climb Mount Everest, we could –’
‘What’s a menopause?’ asked Lester.
‘Something that I’m clearly not allowed to mention,’ said Bel, pressing the button to summon the lift. ‘It was simply a tiny little passing comment,’ she added. ‘You don’t object when I make tiny little passing comments, do you, Lester?’
‘No, Mamushka.’
‘So you won’t mind if I just correct your pronunciation very slightly. It’s Mamooooshka.’
He repeated it obediently, and Natalia caught Netta’s eye and made a throttling gesture.
There was the usual ping and the lift doors opened to reveal first a neat little blonde girl in a short white coat and then Crispin in full braggadocio flow: ‘… and what they don’t show you on the TV, of course, is that you have to actually lean your full body weight on the trocar to really shove it through the tissues and it makes an incredible sort of crunching sou–’ At this point he noticed Netta, and it was as if a pin had been stuck into a puffer fish.
‘Hello Crispin,’ said Netta, kindly, ‘how’s the nose?’
‘Bit better, thanks,’ he said, almost inaudibly.
‘Black eyes nearly gone, I see.’
‘Yes.’
‘And have the nosebleeds stopped?’
‘Yes thank you, Netta.’
‘Good. Well I’m off home now, so I’ll say bye-bye.’
‘Bye-bye.’ Brief anguish flared in his eyes as the words emerged and he hurried off down the corridor, the girl giving him puzzled looks.
‘What was that?’ asked Natalia as they entered the lift.
‘I’ll tell you,’ said Netta. ‘But basically, it’s about the unexpected satisfactions of being nice …’
Glenn was waiting for them outside the doors of the Eddery Building, a yellow flyer in his hand. ‘There are four fundamental categories of listing in the West Midlands,’ he said. ‘There’s Grade A, which are buildings of national importance including both outstanding grand buildings and the fine, little-altered examples of some important style or date, then there’s Grade B+, which –’
‘I’m so sorry to interrupt you,’ said Bel, ‘but isn’t that your young doctor friend over there.’ She raised a hand. ‘Hello, dear. Hello! Or, rather, goodbye!’
Paul, a good fifty yards away, smiled and waved.
‘– are buildings that might have merited A status but for relatively minor detracting features,’ continued Glenn, reading from the flyer, ‘such as impurities of design, or lower-quality additions or alterations. Also buildings that…’
Netta watched as Paul turned and continued along the path towards X-ray, Carrie by his side. He was looking, as usual, large and rather rumpled, but there was a definite sense of purpose about him; still a domesticated bear, she thought, but one who was at last beginning to remember where he’d left his door key.
‘… and in view of its extraordinary adherence to the decade’s vernacular we are issuing a tentative preliminary B2 categorization, which covers buildings of local importance or good examples of some period or style.’ Glenn finished reading and looked up expectantly.
‘You mean,’ said Natalia, who had been listening rather more attentively than her sister, ‘that they’re wanting to preserve this heap of crap?’ She pointed a disgusted finger at the scaffolding that surrounded the Eddery Building.
‘It’s just a tentative preliminary B2 listing,’ said Glenn again. ‘My friend’s the structural engineer and he says it’s dependent on the degree to which preservation is possible under current budgetary restraints.’
‘They’re listing it?’ said Netta.
‘As a tentative preliminary B2 listing.’
‘A listed building,’ said her mother, wonderingly. She looked up at the concrete and glass. ‘My goodness. My goodness. Well, of course, your father was always very go-ahead.’
Netta stared at her, and then her sister jingled the keys of the hire car. ‘It’s time, guys,’ she said, ‘chop chop.’ Bel took Natalia’s arm.
‘Auntie Brianetta,’ said Lester as they followed on behind, ‘what does “go-ahead” mean?’
‘Er …’ Netta gathered her thoughts. ‘It’s quite an old-fashioned term. It means being … full of ideas, and energetic and dashing.’ She looked down at him and gave the back of his head a little rub. ‘It’s a compliment,’ she said.