The Money Pot

Mum you can’t not have a sixtieth birthday party.

I wished to be anywhere but in this room, where loud cheers erupt as I flush the candles of their existing flame. The room was full of over-exaggerated fancy dress, stupid frilly frocks that existed to show off a housewife’s figure. Narrow bell pants danced from side to side, a misrepresentation of the flamboyant seventies. I wanted to scowl at the inaccuracy.

The party is wholly my eldest daughter's idea, and taste.

Even the medallion orange of my three tiered cake is a horrid, abject shade. Mismatched flowers disguise themselves into a heart, fitting around the dreaded age and tag.

Laurel, 60.

My lips spread thin, the crowd erupting at the sight of the bold centrepiece. A knowing grin across many of their faces, after all the cheery colours did little to mask the truth.

I was old.

Past my prime with only a moulding home and an overflowing money pot to show for it. I was Laurel, the widower, the underachiever. The mum.

My email inbox had never felt more enticing, the promise of red wine born of an Italian winery just one of many European adventures the company had detailed. Small torments, like today, would all be worth it when the rest of my sixties are spent with wrinkled tan on honeyed coastlines.

1970,

“Laurel, gloves are a woman’s best friend in the garden, you must never go without them.” Mother admonishes, scrubbing my scraped hands under the cold tap until they are red raw. I fold my legs under one another up on the counter, weeping terribly.

“Look at the state of this, we have a dinner party to host tonight and these hands would be better cut off than this. No one will wish to dance with you now.”

The half-collected Hawthorns taunt me from where they rest on the kitchen table, and the small porcelain doll which unscrews to hold little coins will have to wait to be filled once more, “I only wanted to pick ‘em and sell them.” I sob out,

“God knows what people will think.” Mother continues to mutter, her face darkening, dragging the brush harder over the already thawed skin. She tuts as my weeping doesn’t come to a stop,

“Its no use crying over what you can’t undo.”

I hold my hand out for her to fit bandages over the ugly marks, small cuts hoping to itch their way free of the confines.

“It’s time to stop with these childish quirks, time to grow up.”

“But–”

“Do not be foolish Laurel, your Father would never be encouraging this flower business if you were born his son. He’s simply indulging you, it is better to pack up now before you are carried away with it.”

The caress of childhood shatters on a Thursday, barely ten years of age. Growing up I filled the porcelain doll with other, more careless methods but I never would step foot again in the garden.

And now, a neatly trimmed flowerbed on the front porch is the extent of it, and I only ever pick with gloves.

1975,

“Isaac, my mother will kill me if we stay out longer.” I whisper.

Rain patters against my jean jacket, soaking through with a deliberate intention to rack me with a chill. The year is well into winter and my teeth chatter their way into a grin as he takes my hand. “Do you always obey her?”

“Always.”

His cheeks are painted a reckless red, hiding boyish freckles I had spent far too long staring and then sketching. “And what will happen if, for once, you did something for yourself Laurel?” Isaac asks,

“Hideous scales will erupt across my skin, insides shrivelling as the demon comes to collect penance for my sin and that is hardly– no, it is nothing compared to when she arrives soon after.” I raise my arms dramatically.

He looks at me all funny, dragging us both into the road’s middle, swaying us into a gentle salsa. “You sure have a way with words. Maybe I should try to sound more elegant.” I giggle at his wiggling brows and try then to remember why Mother had been so against me spending time with Isaac Devonshire. Something about his age, coming from little money and wooing half the girls in town already.

“I want to spend forever with you.” He presses our foreheads hotly together,

“Travelling across Europe, writing plays until our fingers bleed. Drinking red wine in our one bedroom apartment where the wallpaper peels?”

He blinks, “Yes.”

It’s cowardly, nothing brave about the hungry desperation I lean in with. The storm bore as a singular witness to the confessions that slipped between the raindrops. Maybe I was a little in love, enamoured by the flared jeans he strutted around in. Taken with his gifts, singular daisies begin to pile into a bouquet beside my bed. Our shared kiss doesn’t weaken me, or hold my time captive like mother claims. It beats strong, alive in a way I can’t explain.

If I did have that time machine, this is the moment I would choose to relive over and over again. Lost in hopes and dreams of a rich unobtainable life with Isaac Devonshire. I never did find a way to explain that feeling, no matter how hard I chased.

Present,

“Damn Ms. Bates. I didn’t know you had moves like that.” One of my daughter's friends calls to me across the dance floor, twirling with her girls. “You have to teach us.”

“Oh dear, my first boyfriend was very into salsa.” I wink,

“I knew you had it in you Ms.Bates.”

I recall the days my frock stayed upright, not catching and sagging at my chest. Or forgoing tights, displaying a slither of skin Mother would have fainted at the sight of.

“Have you ever thought of taking lessons in Spain?” One of the girls leans in, a breathless smile lighting up her face.

No one knew of the ticket waiting for me, shackled to the purchase button. One I was dreading to check out on.

Visions of Europe long since stopped plaguing me, I had given up on writing theatre while smoking an old fashioned cigar decades ago. Instead flashes of red sparkling dresses signalled me, like a moth to the flame or a dancer catching a glimpse of the waltz.

“Taking?” I tease, “I’d be teaching.”

1980,

“I can’t believe it.” The postcard feels fragile in my tight grasp, inches away from tearing apart. “Do not say you told me so.” I say, snapping at her, Mother. Who is perched on the rocking chair, a satisfied glint to her eye, despite her performative frown. “That boy was always more trouble than he was worth.”

“It’s cruel is what it is, there has to be something else, he wouldn’t.” My breath hitches, tears dripping onto the card, barely missing my dress by a fraction. The delicate floral held me softly, an easy comfort to its weave, wrapping at my hip and breaking away at the point my knee curved. I can’t bear the sight of my own hand against the postcard, sorrow in its weight as the metal of my ring finger catches in the light.

“What did you expect from a boy of no decent family? Who wished to travel to Europe despite you telling him it was a dream born from a childish whim, it is absurd to expect a woman to leave her family on such ideas.” Mother folds her hands across her lap, “No one expected him to show up for the wedding dear.”

I glare at her through my lashes, she may as well have struck me across the cheek.

Her own frock is simple, opting not to buy new, instead re purposing the years old hot pink that matched the pigs who squelched in farmland outside the hotel window.

Of course, she had known.

I thumb over his face attached with the postcard, one I thought to be safe, trustworthy. Half a decade spent devoting my life to, loving through its many faults. His mop of sandy beach bleached curls looked far too long, as if they needed to be cut again on the wooden stool in our bathroom.

They couldn’t, the letter detailed his betrayal, a midnight escape to Europe. I am not quite sure if my heart will mend.

1982,

It mends in a hospital room, stitching back together as a small hand wraps around my thumb. Quiet cries sing in a still room, announcing a life.

Marie Mary, born at six ounces and a head of ginger hair, wailed up to me. Jack snores noisily in a chair close by, as if he’d put the shift in, pushed another person from his body.

We’d met at one of my mothers dinner parties. He paraded around as a suave professor wishing to settle, gloating of playing board games every second night and filling the house with artsy paintings of butter yellow daffodils.

Mother loves him, and I know I can get there one day too.

The baby gargles, and I cannot rip my stare away. Enchanted by this tiny version of myself. It is everything and nothing all at once, because I would do anything for Marie Mary.

Including the removal of a certain letter and wad of cash hidden in my knicker drawer. There was no use for it anymore.

Dear my beloved Laurel,

I can not express enough my regret of what happened a year ago. The decision to leave you was rash and unfounded, and I regret it deeply.

America does not call to me the same way Europe does, I hear from my father that you have taken to a new man, I can not be too disappointed but I hope one day you may change your mind. My address is attached for your convenience, if you find the strength to come for me.

And know, I will always wait for you Laurel.

P.S I took those drama classes we always talked about, I hope it shows. I always did want to talk just like you.

Yours,

Isaac.

34 rue La Boétie

Paris

Île-de-France

75017

Cash mysteriously appeared in their shared money pot three days later, and Marie Mary slept peacefully in her new crib.

Present,

One baby with Jack had quickly turned into more, filling our house with enough noise to drown out the growing acceptance we would never be in love. It was okay, I loved Jack in other ways throughout our forty years together.

I miss it now standing at the open bar, knowing he would have always come back with two drinks. A Shirley Temple and a lager. Simple, and never different.

“I miss your father.” I whisper to Marie Mary, who finally flags down a bartender, a terrible sixties song someone must have thought I’d know playing loudly over the speakers. “Me too.” She mumbles close to my ear, a hand coming to squeeze my shoulder.

But my daughter couldn’t know, for she hadn’t once looked for a husband or children. Nose deep as she pushed her career to the limits,

“I’m proud of you.” I say.

Maybe I could spare a few coins to visit her in Europe, and see the mirror into a life so opposite to my own.

1996,

“University?”

“Yes Mum, Donna is going to tour some up in New England. Please can I go with her?” Marie Mary scrapes the rest of her food into the bin. Bone dry chicken with burnt brussels sprouts and meagre looking new potatoes. A Laurel special, Jack dubbed it.

“I didn’t know you wanted that.” I chewed the potato, it was still hard. She throws me an exasperated look, “How else would I become a surgeon?”

Ever the overachiever, our eldest, traits born from being the daughter of a professor. Certainly not passed down from me, the secretary that scraped by with a mostly finished high school diploma.

“There’s even an option for study abroad semester in Barcelona. I mean Mum come on, it’s Europe!”

I stab the potatoes now, “I think it's a wonderful idea.” Jack offered, sat at the head of the table, pretending to enjoy his meal.

Her eyes light up too brightly, smile too wide for me to ever think of saying no. My stomach doesn’t stop churning,

“Sounds lovely, how much is the train up?”

That damn money pot would never be full again.

2019,

Tubes covered half of Jack’s face. Lips that were once stained burgundy, wet with wine, now devoid of their warmth.

I place a tender kiss upon them. “I’m sorry Jack.” I apologise, the room empty but for us. Our daughters are only a wall away, holding one another in the hall.

“I’m so sorry.”

There was only one way it would end, when we married at twenty one and thirty two. The solace of another was never promised, only enjoyed to escape life’s loneliness. I’ve always known he would leave me one way or another.

I was to be forever cursed by a freewheeling man with a selfish regard for people, and oh did I still love him a little. Even after all this time, but the man I married? He lay covered in a speckled gown, no rhythm to his chest in the hospital bed. He never experienced that. Or maybe he did, and he was just as lost as I was when we met.

Thank you Jack, for your company in life.

“Mum, I can help pay for the funeral.” Marie Mary tucks a greying hair behind my ear, but I shake my head, cupping her cheek gently, “You can not be a brilliant big doctor if you’re scraping all your pennies together.”

I bring the hammer down on fragile pottery, weeping harder than the moment Jack passed, shattering it into a million pieces. Shards are camouflaged between the coins and notes.

He deserved the send off.

Present,

“Can I talk to you for a second?” My youngest asks. Sweet, angelic Claire.

Who I remember covered in mud all her childhood, often talking of woodland creatures and her friends, the plants. Undoubtedly Jack’s daughter if you put them side by side, but mine in every other way. Teaching over the top theatrical performances to her in the solace of our living room, watching as she performed identical monologues in school plays, and later productions.

We find a desolate corner of the party, devoid of balloons and banners. “Claire hunny what’s going on? You’re scaring me.”

She bites her lip. “I’m pregnant.”

Oh.

“Are you mad?”

A little.

“No.” I shake my head, struggling to imagine my blue eyed baby holding one of her own. “Of course not, that's brilliant news. I’m so happy for you.” I try to smile convincingly,

She beams, “You’re going to be the best Grandma. I know it, and we can teach them all about The Wind in the Willows and Little Women.” My hand finds hers, “Hunny it sounds like a dream, how far along are you?”

“A few months.”

“And the father?”

Claire averts her gaze back to the party, fingers coming to press against her temple. “About that–”

“We’ll figure it out.”

The money pot collects dust in a chequered kitchen cabinet, if you were to pick it up it would be no heavier than a feather. There is no rattle, rather truths noisily begging for release. They would tell you this, life is not liveable without sacrifice.

It is a burden all people must carry, a weight that doubles for a woman. For she will always pick up the sledgehammer and drive it deep into herself, shattering deeply coveted dreams and ambitions

I will never own an overflowing money pot again. It’s clear to me now as I cradle a scared Claire in my arms, whispering hushed assurances. Mine would stay empty so that her’s can always remain full.