Page 7 of The Pieces of Us
WOMEN HELPING WOMEN HELPING WOMEN! The placard looms over my head, the painted letters tall and solemn like the woman holding it high in the air. I grab my mother’s arm. ‘What’s that?’ I ask her, pointing.
‘Women’s rights,’ she mutters, her mind elsewhere – on whether the butcher will have any cheap cuts of beef left, on how many potatoes she’ll need to make soup for eight of us, on the tender skin on her heels where the most recent blisters have only just recovered.
‘What kind of rights?’ I’m fifteen, often described as young for my age – whatever that means – but what I lack in maturity I make up for in persistence.
Mam doesn’t reply, just takes hold of my arm, not as a gesture of affection but to hurry me along through the crowds.
We need to get to those cheap cuts of beef before the rest of the local women, whose Saturday afternoons revolve around getting a hot meal on the table for their husbands’ return from the football stadium.
Whether they’re celebrating or commiserating, they expect meat and two veg with a pint of something to help ease them into the evening.
I try to slow down and look back at the small group of women and their placards. I can only make out the words battered women and priority need .
‘It’s politics,’ Mam says, tugging on my arm.
I’d heard animated voices – mainly male ones – downstairs when I was in bed, talking about politics: Scottish independence and oil and nuclear weapons. The voices got louder as the sky grew darker, but I’ve never heard them mention battered women. ‘What do battered women need?’ I ask Mam.
She makes a sharp turn to the right, pulling me into the greengrocer’s, leaving my question unanswered. ‘Go and get two cooking apples and two pears for the crumble. Your grandmother’s coming for tea tomorrow, and you know what she’s like if she doesn’t get a pudding. That’s a good girl.’
When I find her again, she’s got an armful of potatoes and is talking to a tall man in a smart black suit. I hover awkwardly at her side, my hands clutching the fruit. I loosen my grip on the pears, knowing from experience that they bruise easily when they’re too ripe.
‘This is Mr Dunlop, Beth. A friend of your father’s.’ My mother introduces me, making sure to add my title: Eldest Daughter.
‘Hello,’ I say, hoping I’m not expected to shake his hand, because mine are full of fruit.
‘I’m the eldest in my family too,’ Mr Dunlop says, and he has a smooth voice, his east coast lilt notably different from the Ayrshire accent I’m used to.
The voices in the school playground and at our dinner table are thick and coarse – my mother’s soft Irish tone, like music to my ears, a welcome exception.
‘We speak the language of Burns,’ my father tells her when she tries to mimic us, and she always laughs.
Mr Dunlop is still looking at me. ‘We firstborn children have to set a good example, yes?’
I feel the colour wash over my cheeks, the heat rising the longer his blue eyes rest on mine. ‘Yes,’ I say. I don’t necessarily agree but I don’t want to be rude.
‘She’s a good girl,’ my mother confirms.
‘Well, I’ll let you ladies get on with your errands. It was nice to meet you, Miss Muir. Enjoy your weekend.’
‘Who is he?’ I whisper as Mr Dunlop walks away.
‘I told you. A friend of your father’s. He’s a very important businessman,’ Mam hisses, her mind back on the potatoes.
But mine stays on the charming man in the black suit, who didn’t blink once when he looked at me.
All the way home I look for his dark form on the streets, but he’s lost in the cloudy sea of brown and green raincoats.