by Ali Mercer
But it wasn’t, because she was too ashamed.
Through all of this, Becca shone: a bit of life that Rachel, miraculously, had helped to bring to the world, a twelve-year-old girl who was blissfully, innocently preoccupied with her own business. French vocabulary, the new jeans she wanted, when could she have her ears pierced, why couldn’t she have a dog? Rachel continued to dole out the usual sorts of answers, cajoling, prevaricating, encouraging, reminding, and, on occasion, making excuses. (Mitch’s allergies were the excuse for not getting a dog. Also, Mitch just didn’t like dogs. But the onus was still on Rachel to justify the refusal.) The sense of going through the motions persisted. She loved Becca with all her heart, and yet even that was not enough to bring her out of the Deep and plug her back into the living present. She watched her daughter tenderly but as if from somewhere else, as if she were a ghost.
And she saw Becca with Mitch, and she was grateful to him for the ordinary, glorious pleasure he took in spending time with their daughter, talking to her, sharing things with her: exhibitions and art galleries, the new game they had bought for the Wii, old episodes of Friends. And she hoped that the kind of attention he gave Becca, his implicit respect for her, his willingness to talk to her and listen to her, his instinctive protectiveness, would make Becca strong. Strong in ways that Rachel herself had never been. All Rachel had was willpower, her desire to show people what she was made of, but that had ebbed away now and left her with nothing.
What she wanted for Becca was for her not to have to feel she had to prove herself: to know that being herself was enough, and was safe. To know beyond a shadow of doubt, even to the point where it was possible to take this for granted, that she was loved. To have a firm foundation; to have love like a home to come back to.
Already, somewhere in the Deep, the question was beginning to form, and was all the more irresistible because it was so painful to her. Wouldn’t Becca be better off without her mother?
She wasn’t even particularly worried about the drinks for parents of Becca’s classmates. She’d made the effort to find a babysitter, overruling Becca’s protests that she didn’t need one and was perfectly capable of looking after herself; maybe Becca was right, but Rachel had begun to see potential dangers everywhere, and she’d only spend the evening worrying if she knew Becca was alone in the house. Mitch had suggested that he could stay home and mind Becca instead, but it was a long time since they’d been out socially as a couple. Surely it would be good for them? Maybe it would even help her to feel a little more normal.
And Mitch agreed to go because she wanted to, but not without grumbling about how boring and pointless it would be, and how the other men would be corporate types who would talk about their careers and investments and personal bests and he’d rather just stay in with the telly. She would remember that, later, and wonder what would have happened if, instead of protesting that they never went out together any more, she had thrown her hands up and said, Fine, don’t come, I’ll go on my own.
Maybe it would have been better.
Or perhaps the moment of reckoning would have just come another time.
There was a signal failure outside Barrowton the evening they were due to go out, and her train home was delayed. When she got back Mitch was terse and preoccupied; having not wanted to go out at all, he was now anxious not to be late. But they were anyway, finally arriving at the Merry Miller pub about an hour after the drinks gathering had got under way.
It was a dull, potentially rainy evening, and the other parents had sensibly not attempted the beer garden, but had settled around a long table inside. They were mostly mothers, with only one other dad besides Mitch – so he needn’t have worried about being left out of any man talk. Most of them were a little pink in the face; obviously a couple of drinks in, and maybe a little more relaxed than was, strictly speaking, good for them.
Mitch went off to the bar to get a round in, and one of the mothers, a woman with very curly hair – double-barrelled surname, something-Jones – moved her designer bag from the chair next to her so Rachel could sit down.
‘Have you been at work today?’ She had red wine stains on her lips.
Yes, and what did she have to say for herself? Not much. She’d had a rotten day, and a humiliating meeting with Elizabeth Mannering, her new manager, who had expressed concern about a few slip-ups she’d made lately and wanted to supervise her more closely. If Rachel had been feeling more buoyant she might have tried to turn what had happened into some kind of mildly entertaining anecdote. But really, what was funny about screwing up at work because your mother had died and you’d lost your nerve?
Curly-haired double-barrelled-Jones had been at work, too, as it turned out.
‘Just a couple of days a week at one of the colleges in Oxford,’ she said. ‘You work full time in London, don’t you? Honestly, I can’t think how you bear that awful commute. Still, at least you’ve got Mitch to keep the home fires burning. It must be wonderful being married to a real artist. I saw the painting he did of your garden, the one the Chadstones have – it’s absolutely gorgeous.’
She was referring to a small watercolour Mitch had done the previous winter, as a kind of experiment; it wasn’t a medium he’d ever made much use of, and when he was younger he’d been dismissive of it, regarding it as the sort of thing that keen amateurs might dabble in. He’d long since lost that youthful arrogance, though. She had been delighted to see him working on something of his own, a piece of work that wasn’t a commission or a reproduction, and when they’d had the Chadstones round for dinner and Mary had admired the painting, she had encouraged Mitch to let them buy it. She had thought the sale might boost his confidence, and that he might do more along the same lines. But then he’d gone back to turning out exactly the same kind of work as before, and had been, if anything, even more down on himself than ever.
‘It is a lovely painting,’ Rachel agreed.
‘He’s so gifted. I’d love to be able to paint, wouldn’t you? Has he ever painted you?’
‘He did once. You might be surprised by how boring it is,’ Rachel said.
‘Boring?’
‘Being painted. Lying about doing nothing for hours. I don’t know, I think maybe I’m a bit too impatient to make a good muse.’
‘Oh, I’m sure you’re not. After all, it’s all about doing something for someone you love, isn’t it?’
In the corner, the mother who sped round Kettlebridge in a silver Mercedes was deep in a giggly conversation with another woman Rachel had never seen before. They had to be talking about sex. They were laughing in that show-offy, conspiratorial, naughty-us way that meant they were getting it, and discussing it, and didn’t mind who knew it.
But Rachel was not getting it, and they were the last people she would want to confide in.
She got up and said she was going to see if Mitch needed any help bringing their drinks over from the bar, and went to join him.
He was loading glasses onto a tray. He didn’t turn and see her, and she was just about to call out his name when Mary Chadstone arrived and swooped down on him as if there was nobody else in the room.
As if greeting a long-lost lover.
He stopped what he was doing and they embraced, courteously but fondly. And then, when they let each other go, he reached forward to tuck a strand of her hair behind her ear.
Rachel immediately felt like a voyeur. As if she had just witnessed something private, something she had no right to watch but was drawn to anyway: something that she couldn’t help but recognise as attraction. And when she approached, she felt as if she was interrupting them.
After they had all settled back at the table Mitch and Mary didn’t even talk to each other all that much, and the evening rolled on more or less as might have been expected. But Rachel couldn’t shake her impression of what she’d seen.
It was ridiculous to be so upset, it was nothing, all he had done was touch her hair… and he had been glad to see her, well, that was
no surprise, since he didn’t really know any of the others. They were old friends, a little bit of flirtation didn’t mean anything.
But it wasn’t just flirtation. It was more than that. It was worse than that. It was tenderness.
She drove Mitch back home with questions and possible answers chasing themselves round her head. Are you having an affair? Are you attracted to her? Is something going on? But it was ludicrous. Crazy. What evidence did she have?
Why should she need evidence? You only needed proof if you couldn’t trust somebody to tell you. And if you couldn’t trust your husband, weren’t you already in trouble?
He didn’t ask why she was so quiet. She parked, as usual, just in front of the bridge that led to the house. Becca must have gone to sleep long ago; the only light on was in the sitting room, where the babysitter would be waiting for them.
And then she went for it.
‘Mitch,’ she said before he could get out of the car. ‘Have you been seeing Mary?’
He froze. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean sleeping with her. Or thinking about it. Or both.’
‘Of course not. Why do you say that?’
‘She’s always liked you. Do you remember when they last came round for dinner? She couldn’t praise you enough. Oh Mitch, you’re such a great cook, Hugh never cooks, you’re so talented, your paintings are so brilliant, we absolutely must buy one─’
‘As I remember it, you were the one who encouraged them to buy that painting.’
‘I thought it’d make you feel better to have a sale.’
‘Not to them. Not particularly.’
‘Well, she didn’t exactly turn down the chance, did it? I guess it gave her an excuse to you round to theirs to hang it. Was that when she made her move?’
‘Rachel, that’s ridiculous. I don’t know why you’ve got this idea into your head. Come on, we’ve both known Mary for ages. She’s married to my oldest friend. Our daughters go to school together. We aren’t attracted to each other, and even if we were, we wouldn’t do anything about it. Why would we take the risk?’
‘But you touched her,’ Rachel said, and began to cry. ‘You touched her the way you used to touch me.’
And Mitch held her and soothed her and reassured her. He would never do anything to her, he loved her, she was just tired and overwrought, was there anything else that was worrying her? And she allowed herself to be consoled.
Twenty-Seven
Rachel
Whatever secret mixed feelings Rachel might have had at the prospect of change in Leona’s life, they don’t last the journey to the airport.
She hasn’t seen her since Leona’s leaving do soon after Easter, and what with one thing and another, they haven’t managed to get together with Viv since the evening in Rachel’s bedsit. First, they’d postponed meeting up because Viv had been laid low by a cold, and then it had been difficult to rearrange because Leona had been working non-stop on getting her business off the ground. Now, seeing Leona for the first time in a couple of weeks, Rachel is shocked by the change in her.
Leona is almost unrecognisable as the self-possessed bohemian who had greeted Rachel that first day at Fun-to-Learn just over four months earlier, or even as the friend who had confided to Viv and Rachel that she had been invited to meet her daughter, who had cried with them and let them comfort her, and who had been both overwhelmed and full of hope. Now she’s pale and petrified; it’s almost as if she’s travelling towards another loss rather than a miraculous reunion.
As they turn away from the check-in queue she makes a visible effort to rally. She looks at Rachel but without focus, as if she can’t really pay attention to her any more.
‘You should go,’ Leona tells her. ‘Get back to work. I don’t want to keep you – you’ve done more than enough for me. Don’t hang around here. I’ll be fine.’
‘OK. If you’re sure… Before I go, I have a present for you. For luck,’ Rachel says.
She had to do something. She’d felt so bad about not being unambiguously happy for Leona when she heard the news, this is a gift for herself as much as for her friend. It’s a small gift, anyway, something that won’t take up too much space. She rummages in her handbag and brings it out: a chunk of unpolished rose quartz in a clear plastic bag. She’d bought it on impulse from a stall at Kettlebridge market that she’d browsed one Saturday with Becca.
‘It’s meant to promote healing,’ she says, ‘and unconditional love.’
Leona takes it and examines it; her hand closes tight around it.
‘Thank you,’ she says, and steps forward to give Rachel a hug. Today she smells soft, talcum-powdery, like lavender; she’s someone who is always changing her scent.
Leona withdraws first and heads off in the direction of security, pausing only to look back over her shoulder and wave before she’s lost in the crowds. She still has the crystal in her fist.
Suddenly alone in the airport, Rachel is disinclined to rush back to the car. There will be plenty of work waiting for her back at the office. And yet she can’t really believe that any of it is urgent. It seems like a problem from somebody else’s life.
In a little over two hours’ time Leona will be in the air on the way to her daughter. She may be nervous now, but surely then her fears will fall away, as she puts more and more distance between her present self and the person she had been that morning and last week and last year, and then, eventually, arrives somewhere completely new.
A display of silk scarves in a cabinet catches Rachel’s eye and she pauses to examine them. Not that silk scarves are really her thing, but who knows? Maybe they could be. Maybe she could change, too.
‘Rachel?’
Did she imagine it? She turns and sees a silver-haired man in smart casual clothes – jacket, chinos, open-necked shirt – with a small carry-on suitcase at his side. He is smiling at her with exactly the sort of slightly puzzled fondness that you might expect from a former boss whose protégé had fallen spectacularly from grace as soon as he left.
‘Hello, Frank,’ she says.
They kiss, as two former colleagues might be expected to do: lightly, without really touching. He stands back and looks her up and down. Not just puzzled. Concerned.
‘I’m sorry I didn’t reply to your email,’ she says. ‘It’s been a difficult time.’
‘I gathered,’ Frank says. ‘I heard a little bit about what happened. I would have persisted, but I didn’t want to hassle you when you were in the thick of going through something. It seemed like nobody had heard from you. It was as if you’d dropped off the face of the earth.’
‘It was a bit like that,’ she agrees.
‘I’m so glad to have bumped into you. It’s reassuring to see you, actually. You look well. Whatever’s been going on these past few months.’
‘You look well, too. Retirement obviously suits you.’
‘I’ll let you in on a secret; I actually really miss the office. I’ve been trying to do a little bit of consultancy work. Pro bono, some of it. If anybody actually wants an old dog.’
‘You can teach them the old tricks. I’m sure you can persuade them they’re new.’
He beams at her. ‘That’s what I’m hoping.’
He’s always had this ability to seem to not be taking himself, or life in general, too seriously, and it’s contagious; she can feel her mood lightening. A passer-by jostles them together, and Frank puts his hand quite naturally on her arm, then moves it away.
‘I’ve often thought about you, wondered how you were getting on,’ he says. ‘But I thought it wouldn’t be right to bother you. I knew you knew where I was. Where are you off to today? Somewhere nice, I hope?’
‘Just dropped a friend off. I’m about to head back to work, actually. How about you?’
‘A couple of days in Geneva. Work-related, actually; I’m involved with an international charity that’s based there. One of those consultancy projects I mentioned. But my flight doesn’t leave for ages.
Look, do you have a few minutes? Maybe we could grab a coffee? It’s too good a coincidence not to take advantage of, us both being here, surely?’
Next thing she knows she’s following him to a café. He somehow secures a table with a good view of the passing human traffic just as its previous occupiers are leaving, and attracts prompt service from the weary-looking waitress. Then he turns to Rachel and says, ‘So, where are you working now?’
And Rachel finds she’s happy to answer. With another former colleague, maybe she would have been more defensive, but Frank has the gift of making you feel better about whatever it is you’re doing. So she tells him about Fun-to-Learn. And then, unbidden, she tells Frank about her exit from her old job.
‘I probably shouldn’t say this, but from what I hear these days Elizabeth Mannering isn’t all that secure either,’ he says. ‘If you get in touch with any of the others you’ll probably hear all about it. Did you ever think of working for yourself? You know, going freelance. Setting up on your own. I used to be terrified that you’d leave me to do exactly that.’
‘That’s the kind of thing you can do if you’ve got a rich husband or low overheads,’ Rachel says. ‘Maybe I will one day. I just don’t feel in the right place to even begin to think about it right now. I’m just happy to have some regular money coming in.’
‘Fair enough. And self-employment can be lonely. You might miss the social side of office life.’
‘I could probably cope with that,’ Rachel says. ‘When I started where I am now, all I wanted to do was keep my head down and get paid. I had absolutely no intention of getting to know anybody.’
‘Yeah, I bet it didn’t turn out like that.’
‘No. It definitely didn’t. Actually, the friend I just dropped off here is someone I know from work.’
The waitress brings over their order: an espresso for him, a cappuccino for her, and two Danish pastries – hers with icing and cinnamon. Just like the old days.