“Claire. Your language.” Golden drew back half in fun and half in genuine shock. The strongest word she’d ever heard her friend use was ‘bugger’ and that was when she’d been really angry with the chef who’d sent her shepherd’s pie so soggy it looked like soup.
“Well, I am a bitch, am I not? Ask anybody here and they’ll tell you it’s true.” Then she smiled. “You’re the only one who sees me for who I really am – a poor, lonely old woman desperate for friendship.” She laid a hand on her br**sts and said the words with such drama that Golden couldn’t help but laugh at her antics. Then Claire fixed her sharp gray eyes on her visitor. “So why were you late? You told me you’d be here at ten o’clock.”
Golden shrugged, not the least bit intimidated by Claire’s sudden change in demeanor. “It must have been the thunderstorm. It took me a while to fall asleep so I got up late this morning. How was it for you? Did the wind and thunder disturb you?”
Claire heaved a sigh. “Oh, how I wish. I’m half deaf, as it is. I slept through it all, my dear, like a lamb.” Then she reached out to pat Golden’s hand. “But who cares about me, an old bat on her way out of this rat race called life? Let’s talk about you, dear. How are things with you?”
“I’m alive and well, Claire, so I’m giving thanks,” she gave the old lady a crooked grin, “as should you. Old bat or no, you’re going to be around for a long time. It’s the crankiest ones who live longest. You know that.”
That got her a laugh from Claire. “You naughty girl. But really, how are you, dearie? Last time you told me you were looking for work. Did you find any?”
“Yes and no.” Golden grimaced. “I got a temp position at an event which didn’t quite work out the way I’d planned. I never even got paid.”
“Never got paid? Tell me the name of the company and I’ll have my solicitor write them a strong letter. Outrageous.” The old dame bristled with indignation.
“No, no,” Golden said with a laugh. “It wasn’t their fault.” She proceeded to tell her story, leaving nothing out, not the shock of being dragged on stage, not the humiliation of her fall, not her precipitous flight to the refuge of her home.
If she had expected sympathy – which she hadn’t – she got none from Claire. On the contrary, she was rewarded with loud guffaws that made a nurse come running to check if everything was all right. “What were you thinking?” the woman asked, wiping away tears of laughter. “One would think it takes some training to be a model.”
“I wasn’t thinking anything,” Golden said in self-defense. “It was taken out of my hands.” But she was grinning just as broadly as Claire was. She was glad she had given her friend a good laugh because, with a smile on her face, Claire looked like a new woman. With the frown smoothed away, the tightness gone from her lips and her eyes sparkling with mirth, she looked surprisingly young and carefree, like she’d lost twenty years in the blink of an eye. Golden could see the happy woman she used to be and she couldn’t help but wonder what had made her the person she was now – confrontational, disagreeable and downright rude.
But she wouldn’t ask. One day when Claire was good and ready she would share her story. Golden was sure of it.
Golden ended up spending over an hour with Claire but when she glanced at her cell phone and realized it was twenty minutes before noon she began to rise. “I have to go now,” she said as she collected the half eaten pudding that lay on Claire’s lap. “If I stay out too long Mother will begin fretting and then my cell phone won’t stop ringing.”
“What? How old are you, girl? Seventeen? Eighteen?”
“I’m twenty,” she replied, “and I know I’m a tad too old for my mother to be keeping me on such a tight leash but that’s just the way she is.”
“The way she is?” Claire planted her palms on the bed and pushed herself up on the pillows. “What mother would expect a young lady of your age to be forever at her beck and call?”
Golden only smiled. How could she begin to explain? Who would understand the nature of her mother, so needy and dependent? Unfortunately that had always been her mother’s downfall, a determining factor in her choice of life-long companion.
Golden was reaching for her handbag when Claire stopped her. “Sit down, child. Sit down and explain yourself. What kind of prison are you living in, with that mother of yours?”
Here we go again. Golden almost sighed but she sucked it back in. She’d gone over this with Claire before. It wasn’t like she hadn’t explained her situation at home but her friend was past eighty and prone to spells of forgetfulness which meant Golden had to sometimes backtrack and tell her story all over again.
She sank back into the chair she’d been trying to vacate. It was no use telling Claire she had to go. She knew from past experience that the elderly woman would insist on having her way. Five more minutes. She would give her that and then she would have to go.
“It’s not that bad,” she began, giving Claire her usual reassurance. “Mother is just overly protective, that’s all. Maybe a bit too attached but I don’t mind.”
Claire’s lips tightened. “She’s that way because of that man she married after your father died, isn’t it? What did you say his name was? Manchester?” Her brows furrowed. “I may know his people. Manchester from what county?”
Golden shook her head. “I have no idea. But it doesn’t matter, Claire. As long as she’s happy.”
Claire’s eyes narrowed. “But are you happy? What with the wretched man in your father’s house and his good-for-nothing son dropping by at any hour, you must be in a tizzy half the time.”
“Oh, Claire, it’s not that bad.” Golden reached out and touched her hand, regretting that she’d shared so much of her private life with her. If she weren’t careful she would be the cause of Claire working herself into a royal fit over her situation and she definitely did not want that. “And please forget I ever told you those things. I’m handling things quite well. There’s no need to fret over me.”