‘Lexia Sutherland is moving back north?’ Tara Fairbairn offered. ‘We know that, Pandora, we do read the local paper. And we’re all really excited—’
‘No, no, that isn’t what I was about to tell you all. Much, much more exciting news…’
‘Who’s Lexia Sutherland when she’s at home?’ Janet Sykes, Westenbury Golf Club’s Ladies Captain frowned across the table at Tara.
‘A WAG… You know…’ Tara’s eyes were bright with excitement.
‘I didn’t know Lexia Sutherland was a girl guide now,’ Jennifer interrupted. ‘You never told me that, Pandora.’
‘A guide?’ Pandora snapped, her reddening neck and tone of voice betraying the cool and collected air she’d assumed as the harbinger of good news, now that all attention round the table was being directed towards Lexia. ‘What are you talking about, Jennifer?’
‘Tara just said she was a WAGG, didn’t she? You know, the World Association of Girl Guides…’ Jennifer DB, as the county’s Chief Guider, was persistent in her determination to acknowledge Lexia Sutherland as a member of the guiding fold.
‘No, I didn’t,’ Tara frowned. ‘The gorgeous Lexia Sutherland is not only the most superb singer and performer of this century, but she’s married to Theo Ryan—’
‘And who is Theo Ryan when he’s at home?’ Janet Sykes frowned at Tara.
‘Well, I’m assuming, seeing he’s married to Lexia Sutherland, that he’ll be at home with her, Janet.’ Tara pointed her glass towards the Ladies Captain and continued excitedly, ‘He’s one of Ireland’s greatest footballers and, because Lexia is married to him, she’s therefore classed as a WAG – Wives and Girlfriends, they were dubbed in the Nineties. I’ve never been called a WAG,’ Tara went on somewhat sadly. ‘We’re not encouraged to accompany our footballing partners to World Cups anymore.’
‘Right, can we get on?’ Pandora, desperate to bring her guests under control, rang her little bell once more and, again, shook her head at Sheila who’d put one step forward before retreating back where she’d started, and who was now dithering between the huge kitchen’s island, where plates of smoked salmon were ready to be picked up, and the waiting guests at the kitchen table.
Juno smiled sympathetically in Sheila’s direction, but Sheila, who appeared to be in the middle of doing her own kitchen version of the Hokey Cokey, had eyes only for Pandora and the signal to serve her starter, and was biting her lip with the concentrated effort of waiting for the go-ahead.
‘Can we get on?’ Pandora smiled through gritted teeth as those who’d not been aware of Pandora’s and Juno’s relationship with the iconic Lexia Sutherland were brought up to speed by those who were. ‘Now…’ She paused for effect. ‘I’ve invited you lovely people here tonight for a reason…’ She paused again and frowned, before adding, ‘not you, Scott – with your being so new to our little community, I really didn’t know whether you swing or not…’ Scott’s, Tara’s and Juno’s eyes met over the Emma Bridgewater crockery and glassware. (Please, Juno pleaded silently, let it not be true that her sister was in the process of introducing Scott Butler to some neighbourhood swingers’ club.) Pandora gave a little squeal of laughter. ‘Sorry, I’m so excited, I can’t get my words out properly. Sing. I don’t know whether you sing, Scott.’ Pandora paused for breath and smiled fondly at her potential new protégé who, still in shock at the thought of his having to throw his keys into a bowl at the end of the evening, nervously cleared his throat. ‘Now, the rest of you here tonight are all in my… all in the Westenbury Warblers…’
Dr Jennifer DB, the sycophantic Josie Gledhill and the Ladies Captain nodded with a slight smirk at one another and then at their leader who went on. ‘We, the Westenbury Warblers, have been invited to put forward to Sir – I beg your pardon – Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber himself, plans to put on the musical of our choice…’ Pandora broke off to smile beatifically at the table as ‘ooh’ ‘aah’ ‘really?’ and ‘goodness’ floated back towards her and then held up a hand – rather in the manner of Donald Trump – to get attention back towards herself once more. ‘Now, there’s a long way to go. As your choir mistress, I received a letter from Andrew’s Really Useful Group giving details of a competition to perform a musical of our choice in the summer. I didn’t say anything to anyone at the time for fear of disappointing the choir if we were turned down. At this stage, I just had to give details of the size of our choir, our past productions and performances and some idea – although not binding – of which musical we might be interested in undertaking…’
‘But, Pandora,’ Janet Sykes interrupted, ‘surely that was a choir committee decision and not one for you to make by yourself?’
‘Well yes, Janet, absolutely. I totally agree with you, but…’ Pandora broke off and had the grace to look slightly shamefaced. ‘I thought the letter was some unsolicited mail, you know, some circular, and didn’t bother opening it. In fact, to be honest, it nearly went in the bin. Can you imagine?’ She gave a theatrical little shudder and then went on. ‘And, again to be quite honest, I thought we were too small a choir to even be considered. So, with just a day to go before the deadline, I filled in the form and sent it off. This was ages ago – last summer in fact – and I’d totally forgotten all about it until I received this at the beginning of the week.’ Pandora held the letter aloft.
‘Read it out, Pandora. Go on.’ While Juno adored singing, and Pandora was forever trying to get her to join the Westenbury Warblers, the couple of rehearsals she’d gone along to hadn’t really been her thing, especially with Pandora in charge, and she’d not made any commitment to the group. She had made up her mind, with Fraser disappearing for the year, to join one of the local Rock Choir groups that were springing up everywhere, but this was something different. She really quite fancied getting involved with putting on a musical; she loved musical theatre – had probably sat through just about every production going – but adored South Pacific and The Wizard of Oz. Juno could really see herself as Dorothy.
It was a good job the starter was a cold one. As Pandora proceeded to read the contents of the letter, Sheila sighed deeply and adjusted her black leggings whose elastic appeared to be cutting into her waistline.
‘Dear Pandora.’ Here Pandora paused for effect at the writer’s chummy use of her first name.
‘Thank you so much for your interest in the Really Useful Group’s current competition for groups and choirs to perform the musical of their choice. I’m delighted to inform you that your application has been accepted… blah, blah… and, subject to your choice of musical from the list below… blah, blah… of which I must be advised by the 28th February at the latest, as well as confirmation of the number of those taking part…’
‘But Pandora, do we have enough members to put on a whole musical?’ Jennifer DB looked doubtful. ‘How many singers did you specify would be taking part?’
Pandora looked decidedly shifty. ‘Oh, I said we had around a hundred and fifty.’
‘A hundred and fifty?’ Both Jennifer and Janet spoke at the same time.
‘We’re lucky if we manage half that at any rehearsal,’ Jennifer went on. ‘And that’s when we’re putting on the concert which leads up to all the little choirs joining up for the huge concert at the Albert Hall. People do love the pull of the Albert Hall, you know,’ she added for the benefit of Scott Butler who was looking perplexed, as well as at his empty wine glass.
‘Well,’ Tricky Dicky came to Pandora’s rescue, ‘if you were to put on The Sound of Music, for example, you’d only need Captain Von Trapp, Julie Andrews, a few Nazis, a couple of nuns and… was it seven… children?’
‘But the choir doesn’t have children,’ Jennifer argued. ‘You have to be at least twenty-one to join the Westenbury Warblers although, if you recall, Pandora, I did suggest lowering the age to sixteen to up numbers…’
‘Pandora, do you think we should eat?’ Juno was starving, it was going up to nine and, she noticed, Sheila was beginning to look mutinous. ‘We can eat and discuss at the same time, can’t we?’
Pandora frowned but glanced at Sheila and nodded as, immediately, both Tara and Juno jumped up and went over to help with plates and the bread basket. Food, Juno thought. Halleluiah!
*
While Pandora’s singing mates argued among themselves as to the feasibility of putting on the production of a full length musical, Juno accepted Mikey Fairburn’s topping up of her wine and, once she’d eaten the smoked salmon starter and devoured enough bread to sink a duck, sat back slightly, the better to observe Scott Butler. He’d not made any attempt over the last hour that they’d been sitting at the table to catch her eye, and she began to wonder if she’d imagined the slight frisson between the pair of them when he’d dropped her off at home earlier that evening, seemingly pleased that she was also actually going to be a guest at Pandora’s little do.
Juno realised she was obviously out of practice with the little nuances that went with flirting with an attractive man. Of course she was; she knew she’d never really been the overly flirty type of girl, although had totally envied the girls at school and then at university to whom flirting and getting off with a particular love object was seemingly second nature. Her first couple of years at university had really been spent keeping her head above water. While Ariadne and Pandora had always been the clever ones at school, segueing seamlessly from constantly top of the class at primary school to straight As at GCSE and A level and then both onto Cambridge, racing through exams with little effort, Juno had to really study hard in order to keep up the standard the pair of them had set with such ease. Lexia, as far as she could see, just hadn’t bothered with academia, her only aim in life to be the star in a number one girl band. So, while there’d been a couple of boyfriends up in Aberdeen, by the time Juno was in her fifth year, Fraser was on the scene and that was it really, she supposed. At a time when she was away from home, feeling not only vulnerable, but awful guilt that fifteen-year-old Lexia was having to bear the brunt of their mum’s despair and mental instability when Dad left home, Fraser was a nice solid rock on whom she felt she could depend. A pregnant Juno and Fraser were married on her twenty-fifth birthday (ridiculously young, she felt now) and, despite being taken on as an extremely junior house officer in a small cottage hospital in Aberdeen, Juno was a mother not very long afterwards.
So, let’s face it, she mused as she sat at her sister’s table, heels kicked off and at that lovely stage of drinking when the world and all that was in it seemed full of promise, she was up for it. Up for what, Juno wasn’t overly sure, but something was stirring in her toes (and it wasn’t her hallux rigidus) and working its way north as she took surreptitious glances across at Scott Butler. He was engrossed in conversation with both Tara who, flirting shamelessly with the good doctor, obviously had the hots for him, and the very pretty redhead who, Juno later found out, had been asked not only to balance Pandora’s table as the single woman to match Scott’s status as single man, but whom Pandora had headhunted, and was in the process of poaching, from Midhope’s largest choir with the nausea-inducing handle of ‘The Midhope Melodymakers’.
Juno decided, after the main course of an admirably delicious lamb tagine which accompanied her fourth very large glass of wine, that not only was Scott Butler really rather gorgeous, but if she was to be up for whatever it was she was thinking of being up for, then she’d like to be up for it with the good doctor. Unfortunately, she realised, he hadn’t looked her way all evening. He was entertaining Tara and the redhead with tales of his travels and, while Tricky Dicky to her left was apprising her for the third time that evening of his first ever hole in one as well as boring the pants off her with how Brexit was going to be affecting Boothroyd, Boothroyd and Dyson, she was becoming beautifully relaxed with an excess of Merlot and, at the same time, having the loveliest visions of what she might get up to with the good doctor were she to ever have her way with him. It was lovely, really. It was Friday night with the prospect of no work for the next four days, she was pleasantly tipsy and, best of all, having sexual fantasies about her new work colleague which she knew, practically, would never materialise into reality.
Juno had just, oh so very slowly, unbuttoned her white work shirt to reveal her best, laciest Janet Reger bra (that was a fantasy for a start; there was nothing in her underwear drawer fancier than a greying M&S balcony) and her head was thrown back against the (windowless) wall of her new cell at the surgery as Scott Butler reached forwards, when Jennifer Danton-Brown barked, ‘Your mother’s banana cake, Juno, or one of my special meringue Mont Blancs?’
Juno jumped slightly as Jennifer interrupted her shamelessly salacious conduct with Scott Butler over the surgery desk, the peaks of her own Mont Blancs, erect with alcohol-fuelled fantasies, melting to nothing at Jennifer’s demand for her choice of pudding.
‘Now, Juno,’ Jennifer said as she allocated the last of her meringues round the table and Juno’s mum’s brick sat to one side of the table, as unsullied as the Virgin Mary, ‘with your Fraser away for the duration, you’re going to have lots of time on your hands.’
Was she? Juno stole one more glance at Scott Butler who was involved in a seemingly meaningful conversation with the pretty redhead, and sadly nodded her agreement. It didn’t look as if she’d be spending any time acting out her fantasies with the good doctor opposite. Juno sighed and concentrated on what Jennifer was saying. ‘I don’t know about that, Jennifer. With Fraser away, I’m going to have double the parenting roles – just me to take Tilda to horse events and Gabe to football practice and matches. Just me to…’
‘So, I’m sure we can put you down for the Westenbury Warblers and this new Andrew Lloyd Webber venture.’ It was a statement rather than a question and Juno quailed somewhat under Jennifer’s steely eye. ‘Pandora is going to need all the support she can get, particularly with the re-appearance of your sister—’ Support? Why was Pandora going to need support? ‘—and with singing ability obviously rife in your family, you too must be able to hold a tune as well? Hmm? Hmm?’
Juno was about to counter Jennifer’s argument by saying it wasn’t a known medical fact that the singing gene necessarily ran in families, but then had second thoughts. What the hell. She would – depending on what musical was decided upon – get involved with this Village Singing lark if it managed to get off the ground. If it was going to be The Sound of Music, forget it. No way was she going to be a nun or one of the kids dressed in lederhosen made out of someone’s bedroom curtains. Pandora, as choir mistress, would drive her mad she knew, but Juno was sure she could get Izzy – who was always singing something, usually Abba, round the surgery – to have a part and even though Ariadne, who was a fabulous singer, would initially scoff at the very idea of getting involved, she bet she could, with a little persuasion, bring her along for a laugh, too.
‘I think this singing competition sounds great,’ Juno suddenly announced to the table when there was a lull in the conversation. Pandora stopped in the middle of pouring ridiculously dainty cups of coffee and looked across at her with some surprise. As well she might, Juno thought; she didn’t think the pair of them had agreed on anything as kids, and there’d been little let up to their differences of opinion and disagreements over the years.
‘Really?’ Pandora was pleased. ‘You know, I think we have what’s needed to put on a great performance – it’s never easy to obtain the rights to Sir Andrew Llyod Webber’s musical scores when you want them, and here we are being handed them on a plate just about. It would be churlish to not make the most of this wonderful opportunity – and who knows, if we all pull together, we could actually win. Goodness, wouldn’t that be something?’
Juno knew the wine was making her mellow and much more open to Pandora’s musical ambitions than had she been stone cold sober and, more than likely, by the morning, with a hangover, the house to clean and the pile of ironing that Doreen had pretended she’d not seen, she’d be having second thoughts and eschewing any absurd notion of getting herself involved with the whole daft idea of Climbing Every Mountain or Following The Yellow Brick Road. But, just for the moment, she felt relaxed and amiable and willing to go along with any absurd idea of Pandora’s that, not only would she be able to garner enough support for this little venture but could, as was her dream, possibly win into the bargain.