‘Nope,’ she’d say, pushing it away with a sigh, then she’d tell Rohan to order ‘pav bhaji or chana puri – and maybe some veg samosas?’ instead. But, once the attention had moved away from her, she would slide her hand gently back out toward the dosa, pull it towards her and eat it greedily with the sambar running down her wrists. The first time I witnessed this decimation of the rejected dosa, I looked at Rohan with a laugh ready to burst, but he refused to meet my eye, and I learned right there and then that no one laughs at Meena Allerton.

Anyway, the dinner for which I’d had to pull myself away from my easel was the ‘at-least-monthly’ dinner we took with Meena and Clive.

Eight

Meena was already at the table when we arrived at the restaurant; there was no sign of Clive, but this was not unusual. Rather than reschedule if her husband couldn’t make it, Meena would come without him, desperate, I’m sure, not to get out of the habit of the monthly meeting lest it set a precedent.

The restaurant had embraced the heatwave, its huge glass doors zig-zagged back to open up the place completely to the pavement. I was glad to see Meena was seated at a booth a little way back and to the side from this edge – blame the PTSD if you like, but I couldn’t relax too close to the edge. Meena was dressed in pale-blue jeans and a kurta, which made her look almost ordinary and that created a dissonance inside me; ‘ordinary’ was not a word anyone would naturally associate with my mother-in-law, a formidable woman known in the community for her phenomenal ability to raise both funds and awareness for whichever causes she chose to champion: premature babies, abused women, cancer research.

When Meena saw us walk in, she stood up and clutched Rohan to her, hugging him tight and ruffling his hair as if he were a child home from his first day at school. I looked away until she was ready to let him go, then she and I had our usual slightly awkward hug and air-kiss – not that she didn’t love me. Just not as much as she loved Rohan.

‘Abigail, how are you?’ she said, openly scanning me for signs of early pregnancy.

‘Good, thanks. And you? Hot, isn’t it!’ I said, ignoring the sinking of the shoulders that showed she’d seen nothing of interest.

‘Daddy has a meeting tonight,’ she said in reply as we took our seats, and Rohan and I nodded as if we knew what she meant. Clive was long retired and, although he kept his fingers in some philanthropic pies, I suspected his Monday evening ‘meeting’ might involve the pub. Again, there were things that were never spoken about in this family; certain dignities that were upheld without questions being asked.

‘Mili might come, though,’ she added.