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Django McCabe and the Nit-Pickin’ Chicks

Though only three years separated the oldest and youngest of the McCabe sisters, Cat had always been very much the baby of the family. She was a little shorter than Pip and Fen, her features more petite. She lacked Pip’s aptitude for performing, to entertain, which gave her eldest sister her apparent sassy confidence. Nor did she have Fen’s self-containment, her ability to seem so quietly self-possessed, so attractively serene. While Pip and Fen had encountered the various dramas in their lives head-on and for the most part single-handedly and discretely, Cat had always simply stood there and cried loudly for help. It wasn’t that she was particularly feeble, nor was she excessively attention-seeking or spoilt; Cat was accustomed to being looked after because there was something about her that inspired others to care for her. Ben believed it was to do with the arrangement of her features; her large eyes set winsomely around the childlike upturn to her nose which led down to the natural pout to her lips. It compelled one to offer protection, even if it was not specifically needed or asked for. However, Cat’s strength was that she was never too proud to ask. She’d grown up knowing that what made her feel strong and able was the presence of her support network, her sisters in particular.

When Cat had gone to live in America with a relatively new boyfriend (as Ben was then) and brand new job, everyone anticipated floods of tears to wash her soon back again. But the anticipated plea to be rescued never came. Her letters and e-mails and phone calls attested to her happiness, and her occasional visits home confirmed this. Her apparent self-sufficiency was a source of joy and relief for her family and soon enough they were delighted for her that she’d gone. Not half so thrilled as they are now, four years later, that she has come back.

Being swept north by rail for their family reunion, the McCabe sisters were initially preoccupied with three-way inane grinning and quietly assessing physical details and changes.

‘So.’

‘So?’

‘So!’

‘You’re back.’

‘I am.’

‘For good?’

‘Indeed. For better, for worse.’

‘I do love your hair,’ Pip told Cat. ‘When you e-mailed to say you’d gone short and red, I had visions of a ginger buzz-cut.’

‘It’s very gamine,’ Fen said whilst hastily retying hers into a hopefully smoother pony-tail, ‘very Audrey Hepburn. God I feel a dowdy frump.’

‘You don’t think it’s too short?’ Cat asked them. ‘And you’re sure you like the colour? Yours is so much longer,’ she said to Fen, ‘and darker.’

‘That’s probably because it’s greasy,’ Fen said. She took a twist of her hair and scrutinized the ends. ‘I can’t remember the last time I went to the hairdresser.’

‘Go this weekend,’ Pip said. ‘Django will know somewhere.’

‘When did he last go to a barber?’ Cat interrupted. ‘You’re not telling me he’s chopped off his pony-tail? I expected things to change while I’ve been abroad – but nothing that drastic.’

‘It’s still his crowning glory,’ Pip assured her with a smile.

‘How’s he been?’ Cat asked.

‘Fine and dandy,’ Pip said. ‘Same as ever, really.’

‘It’s funny, initially I’d curse him for not having e-mail, but actually I loved receiving his letters and writing back,’ Cat said. ‘I’ve kept them all. They’re hysterical. He’d send me the TV listings page every single week so I could keep up with Corrie.’

‘Zac and I bought him an answering machine for his last birthday – but he took it back,’ Pip said. ‘I suggested a mobile phone – but you can imagine what he said.’

‘Talking of birthdays, I wonder what we’ll do for his,’ Cat said brightly. ‘Can you believe he’ll be seventy-five this spring?’

‘He’ll either throw a huge party – or go on a retreat,’ Pip said. ‘In which case we’ll make him a surprise party.’

‘Yes!’ said Cat. She gazed at the sleeping baby nustled up to Fen in a papoose. ‘Cosima is so beautiful,’ she said dreamily, watching Fen’s fingers tap out a mother’s instinctive, gentle rhythm against the baby’s back. Absent-mindedly, Cat rolled her thumb against her wedding ring. ‘Still no plans to wed then, Fen?’ She felt Pip glance at her.

Fen balked. ‘What an odd thing to say.’

‘Sorry – I just mean, you know, since you now have a baby.’

‘Shock, horror, an illegitimate child? Is that what you’re implying?’ Fen said.

‘Blimey Fen, I was only teasing,’ Cat said, because she had been. She glanced back at Pip who, ever the diplomat, decided it was a good idea to change the subject.

‘I’m hungry,’ said Pip.

‘I’m hungry now too,’ said Fen. ‘Do you think Django’s made a late lunch for us?’

‘Followed almost immediately by an enormous tea with just time enough to burp before a Spread for supper?’ Cat laughed.

‘I’ll go and buy sandwiches for us,’ said Pip.

‘And salt-and-vinegar crisps!’ Cat called after her. Fen smiled at her. Cat turned her gaze out to the English countryside zipping by outside the train. So different to Colorado, where she had remained in awe of her surroundings. Here, the scale was comfortingly familiar, if a little tame by comparison, the colours darker, damper.

‘Sorry about before,’ Fen said. ‘I’ve been horribly snappish, lately. I hate it and I can’t help it. I’m just so tired. And – well – things at home have been a little strained.’

Cat watched Fen’s gaze drop. She’d been shocked by the physical change in Fen, the wan complexion, the dark eyes, puffiness here and a general lankness there. Objectively, Fen had always been the true beauty of the three of them; her features and complexion adding refinement where Pip was just pretty, where Cat was simply cute. Today, though, Cat noticed a certain pallor now veiling this.

‘Is it Matt?’ Cat broached, though she’d intended to seek details from Pip later.

‘I don’t know, Cat,’ Fen said, a tear clouding one eye, ‘but I think it might be me. My love for my baby is so primal and complete that sometimes I feel like running away so it’s just the two of us.’

‘Don’t do that,’ Cat said and she reached across the melamine for her sister’s wrist, ‘please don’t do that. I’ve just come thousands of miles to be back in my family fold. I want Cosima to get to know her Auntie Cat. And when I am pregnant, I’ll need you within arm’s reach to tell me how to do it all properly.’

Fen smiled. ‘I’ll need bloody long arms to stretch to Clapham from East Finchley,’ she said.

‘Clapham is not, I repeat not, permanent,’ Cat said. ‘You know I’ve always had a thing for Tufnell Park.’

‘It’s good to have you home,’ Fen said, ‘but it’ll be even better to have you on the doorstep.’

Pip returned. ‘Cardboard bread with rubber cheese in between,’ she announced. ‘Don’t anyone tell Django what we’re about to eat.’

Peeping through the window, it is a joy for Django to behold his three precious girls spill out of the taxi. Momentarily, he turns away from the sight and offers a prayer of sincere thanks to all the gods and spirits who have ever interested him at any stage during his life. He can hear their laughter and their excited chatter. Will you look at Cosima – how she has grown in the last month. How naturally Fen has the baby against her. See the sun spin gold through Pip’s hair. And Cat, that can’t be Cat! Cat was the little girl with the jaunty pony-tail. Who is this beautiful woman? And what’s with the red hair!

Django had intended to position himself in the hallway, so that when the girls opened the door he’d be there; his arms flung wide, like a celebrity tenor on an album cover. In the event, he is as excited as they are and he strides out to meet them, booming his welcome. The only member of the family who does not cry is Cosima. She regards the grown-ups with her solemn unblinking eyes, absorbing all the facts and details as if logging the information that when you haven’t seen your family for a long time, you leap about and sob and touch each other’s hair a lot.

‘I’m still stuffed from tea-time!’ Cat whispered to Pip while Django tinkered in the kitchen. ‘Those scones were like cannon balls. Never mind enough to feed an army – enough to sink the navy!’

‘Shh,’ Pip said.

‘Has he been well?’ Cat asked quietly. ‘Hasn’t had flu, or something? It’s just that he looks a little tired to me, a bit peaky, since I last saw him.’

‘I think he’s been fine,’ said Pip. ‘He certainly hasn’t said anything to the contrary. He’s probably been slaving over the stove all week, preparing for our arrival.’ She spied a copy of the Racing Post. ‘Or else he’s put all his money on some old nag and lost the lot.’

Cat walked around the living-room, fingering objects, lingering over framed photos, feeling the heavy brocade of the curtains, running her hands over the worn warm upholstery, filling her nostrils with the scent of home. It was like remaking her acquaintance with the essential elements of her personal history; reminding herself how everything looked and felt and smelt and should be, while at the same time reasserting her own presence in this sacred family space.

The Spread was simmering and sautéing and roasting and steaming. Elements of it were happily marinating, or being chilled, or else ripening at room temperature. All the pots and pans were in use and every utensil had served many a purpose. The various scents emanating from oven and hob joined forces to create an olfactory explosion that, to Django, was as contradictory yet ultimately pleasing as a jazz chord.

The point of cooking and the point of jazz are essentially one and the same, Django thought to himself as he ran a sink of water and half a jar of Bar Keeper’s Friend to soak all the knives. It’s about an element of surprise, of revelation and re-education. Of experimentation. Like when the African pentatonic scale met the European diatonic scale and jazz was born; a sound that was initially bizarre, disconcertingly discordant. It simply required one to open one’s ears and one’s heart to the flattened third and seventh notes and suddenly the aural pleasure of the blue note coursed through one’s veins. Likewise, one’s initial concern that Tabasco and tuna may be odd accompaniments to duck with a celery stuffing, dissipates when one shrugs off preconceptions of convention and allows the tastes to speak for themselves.

‘Not too dissimilar to Kandinsky either,’ Django mused as he left the kitchen in search of his nieces, ‘seemingly an arbitrary cascade of colour and shape yet utterly grounded in structure and purpose. Jazz, Cookery, Abstraction. It’s all art.’

He found them in the living-room and observed them unseen for a nostalgic moment. Just then, the girls could have been any age. The scene was immediately familiar and timeless and the continuity was poignant. ‘By golly,’ Django declared, ‘sing hey for the return of the nit-pickin’ chicks.’

The nit-pickin’ chicks looked up at him. Fen stopped plaiting Pip’s hair, Pip stilled her hands from massaging Cat’s foot, Cat brought her head up from Fen’s lap and ceased tracing patterns on her sister’s legs.

‘Django, you’re not going all sentimental on us are you?’ Pip asked, resuming her massage in a businesslike way. The girls laughed. Privately, they each felt suddenly very sentimental, in an affirming way. It had been years since Django had referred to them as the nit-pickin’ chicks, because it had been such a long time since they’d sat in their huddle with their hands almost absent-mindedly working on each other.

‘Stop fiddling,’ Django said. ‘Let’s eat.’

‘I’ll just check on Cosima,’ Fen said.

‘You were only up there half an hour ago,’ said Cat, ‘and she was quiet then.’

‘You’ll see,’ Fen said, slightly defensively, feeling entitled to her knowing nod, ‘you’ll see.’

‘It transpires that Cat hasn’t just come home because she misses your cooking,’ Pip told Django, slipping her arm around his waist, ‘she’s come home to breed.’

Django took a moment. ‘Wonderful!’ he then said, placing his hand on Cat’s head as if blessing her. ‘Another reason to celebrate. There’s some champagne somewhere. It may well be in the bottom drawer in your room, Pip.’

‘I could look in on Cosima for you while I check,’ Pip suggested to Fen.

‘No,’ said Fen decisively, ‘I’ll go. I’ll do both.’

‘The meal is organic,’ Django told her, ‘mostly. Shall I purée a little for Cosima for tomorrow?’

‘No, thanks,’ Fen said, hoping she hid her alarm.

‘The sauce is relatively orange,’ Django elaborated.

‘That’ll be the Tabasco,’ Fen said, ‘which isn’t really appropriate for a six-month-old baby.’

‘It’s never too early to prepare the palate,’ Django said.

Despite the size of the scones, the aromas from the pots and pans were too tantalizing to resist and appetites magically expanded to meet the quality and quantity of food prepared. Though the menu was predictably unorthodox and though they started with dessert because Django didn’t want to risk the lemon-and-rum soufflé collapsing, traditional manners had always been proudly upheld in the McCabe household. Don’t hold your knife like a pencil, elbows off the table, don’t talk with your mouth full. Between courses, after polite dabbing with napkins, news and plans were discussed.

‘A toast to absent menfolk,’ Django said, charging his glass, ‘to the accountant, the publisher, the doctor.’ He took a sip. ‘There was plenty of food for them, you know, even if you lot want second helpings.’

‘But we didn’t actually want them here,’ Pip said as if revealing a secret. ‘We wanted you to ourselves.’

‘And Ben’s mum wanted him to herself,’ Cat reasoned.

‘Next time you come, you bring your boys,’ Django said. ‘This stew will be good for days – you’re all to take a tub home.’ He topped up his glass again. ‘Well, another toast. To the clown.’ Everyone chinked Pip’s glass. Django cleared his throat: ‘To the art historian.’ They raised their glasses to Fen. And then they all looked at Cat. ‘What shall we toast you as?’ Django asked her. ‘Sports journalist? Redhead?’

Cat looked concerned. ‘I’m not sure.’

‘But you so love the cycling world,’ Pip said, ‘and you had such respect as one of the few female reporters.’

‘And you’re married to the doctor of one of the world’s top cycling teams,’ Fen said.

‘Ex-team doctor,’ Cat pointed out.

‘No more gallivanting around the globe with that circus of Lycra and bicycles then?’ asked Django.

‘No,’ Cat laughed though she looked a little forlorn. ‘I’ve fallen out of love.’ Pip and Fen jerked with concern. ‘With the sport,’ Cat clarified. ‘So has Ben. Too many drugs, too much cheating.’

‘So, what’ll you do?’ Pip asked again.

‘I’m not sure – maybe write more widely. Maybe not just yet.’

‘And are you back for good?’ Django asked. ‘Or is this a pit stop?’

‘This is home. This is where we want to start a family. Maybe I’ll take a leaf out of Fen’s book – and yours, Django – and make motherhood my career.’

‘No finer, more noble job than that,’ Django said, ‘mark my words.’

‘You forgot to add knackering,’ Fen laughed. ‘Academia was a breeze in comparison. Not that I have any desire to go back to it.’

‘But you’re so talented,’ said Cat, ‘you’ve had stuff published. You’ve lectured at the Tate. You’re the authority on the sculpture of Julius Fetherstone. You have all those hard-earned letters after your name.’

‘Art is still my great love – just because I choose not to work in that field doesn’t negate that,’ Fen shrugged and continued more defensively. ‘I’ve gone for a change of career. Raising my baby is just as challenging, as stimulating – and far more time-consuming.’

‘I suppose I’ll have to see which comes first – a blue line on the dipstick, or a job offer,’ said Cat.

‘I’d like to propose a toast,’ said Pip, ‘to my sisters, to our Django. To family.’

Django makes his announcement over strong Turkish coffee and enormous petits fours. He clears his throat and asks for silence, please, ladies.

‘No doubt my impending milestone birthday has been the cause for much speculation – and I hope you haven’t already planned a surprise party.’

‘You’re not going on a retreat are you?’ Cat asks.

‘On my seventy-fifth birthday?’ Django objects. ‘Good Lord no. I have no intention of retreating anywhere. Quite the opposite. They’ll be coming out of the woodwork, far and wide, because I’m going to throw a party.’

‘Here?’

‘Of course here,’ Django says, ‘a huge rollicking knees-up that will rewrite the significance of May 16th in history. I’m going to have a party that’ll be totally, eye-openingly unsuitable for someone of such an age.’

Cat, Fen and Pip gawp at him.

‘You’re all invited,’ he assures them earnestly, ‘along with anyone who thinks they might ever have known me.’