The youngest son rings from university. Unless he is replying to our anxious texts with one-word answers, we never usually hear from Zac.
“Hello,” I settle into my chair, hoping for a long chat, in which I can subtly quiz him about who he has met, what he has been doing, and what he is eating.
“Can I learn to drive?” he asks, getting straight to the point.
“Drive?”
“Yeah,” he says.
“Um. Yes,” I say. “I suppose we can arrange lessons in the holidays …”
I am surprised by this request, because Zac was offered driving lessons for his 18th birthday, just as his older sisters and brother were. Like them, he had declined. City children don’t see the point. With a flash of a travelcard, they have buses, trains and tubes at their disposal.
When I suggested driving lessons to my daughters, Megan and Lily, for their joint 18th, they said they would like to learn to drive a car, “just enough”.
“Just enough for what?” I asked.
“So that we could drive away from an emergency.”
“Emergency?”
“You know,” Megan said. “An escaped dinosaur. An invasion. A flood. Something unexpected.”
“So do you want lessons or not?”
“Not really,” Lily said. “We’d rather have money for clothes.”
I wonder if Zac’s desire to drive will wane when he realises that we won’t be providing a car, even if he does pass his test. Not while we live in London. Normally, he gets about on his bike. My partner, Ed, has several bikes. Both my sons and I have one each.
Our shed is full of gardening clutter. So the bikes live in the kitchen, where scratchy handlebars and pedals ruin the paintwork, and the floor is stained with oil drips. With Zac at university, I was grateful that there was one less cycle in the house. Then Tom, his cousin, came to stay in Zac’s empty room. Tom, being from the countryside, can drive, but as he can’t park his car in London, he has brought his bike. I glare at the heap of metal propped in the bay window. The space would be perfect for a two-seater sofa, a place to relax over coffee, perhaps read in the morning sun. Instead, light falls on a pile of tangled crossbars and dirty tyres.
At least my daughters are not cyclists. They show even less interest in riding a bike than in driving a car. As far as they are concerned, bicycles are dangerous and messy; also, it is impossible to look cool in Lycra.
Saturday morning; Ed clears out the undergrowth from behind the shed and discovers my old Raleigh bike, c1989. The boys are ridiculously excited, exclaiming over its narrow tyres, racing handlebars and ancient gears. When I find an old photo of myself on it, wearing a headband and matching jacket with shoulder pads, they fall about laughing.
Ed, oldest son Jake, and Tom extract trailing ivy from the spokes. When it is mended, oiled and polished, revealed in its original turquoise glory with a new comfy seat, the boys ride up and down our road and take photos of themselves on it to post to Instagram and Facebook. Megan and Lily appear, curious to find out what the fuss is about. They are persuaded to have a go. They wobble at first, looking terrified. But it is true, you never forget how to ride a bike, and soon they are pedalling around the streets, ringing the bell at jay-walking pedestrians like seasoned couriers.
I ask Ed what he thinks it is worth, and where we should advertise it.
“Hmm,” he murmurs, not meeting my eye. “Seems a shame to sell it.”
“We can’t keep it!” I squeak. “There’s nowhere to put it.”
“Now Zac’s at university …”
“Tom’s here. He’s got a bike.”
He gives an airy wave at Megan and Lily. “The girls might want to use it …”
“They don’t ride bikes,” I say, triumphantly. “They hate them.”
Lily saunters over. She flicks the bell with a proprietorial fingertip. “We could use it for local trips.”
“But you said bikes were dangerous. And messy!”
She shrugs. “It was quite fun,” she says. “I’d forgotten.”
“And,” Megan interrupts. “It is vintage. Retro stuff’s pretty cool.”
Some names have been changed
