by Meg Rosoff
Hugo opened one eye and pulled an earphone out.
‘Hi,’ he said, in what almost sounded like a pleasant tone of voice.
‘You want to do something?’
‘Like what?’
‘I dunno. Tennis?’ I knew Kit played; he’d brought a racket with him. Hugo probably did too, didn’t all Californians? ‘I’m not great, but I can usually hit the ball.’
‘Yeah, OK. Can I borrow a racket?’
I nodded and he unfolded himself from the sofa, sat up and ran his hand through his hair, which had all flattened on one side of his head. ‘I’ll just get some sneakers,’ he said.
He kind of loped upstairs to his room and came back wearing his flat white Converse. Not great for tennis. I had gel-soled trainers with extra bounce. Very pro. I handed him Mal’s racket, which was one of the better ones going, and he checked the tension on the strings, spun the racket in his hand.
We didn’t say much on the way over. One of the good things I’d discovered about Hugo was his capacity for silence. In that sense, he was better than almost anyone I knew except Gomez.
When we arrived I told him Mal had taught me to play but that he always beat me. Maybe he didn’t teach me the tricks of being a good player on purpose, so that he could keep winning, but it was way more likely that I just didn’t practise enough.
‘I played some at school,’ Hugo said.
‘Tennis at school? You should see my school. Athletics twice a month if it’s not raining, which it always is, gymnastics, which is a joke, and games, whatever that is.’
‘We had tennis, yoga, martial arts and meditation. Every day.’
‘Wow.’
We warmed up a little, just batting a few balls back and forth around the court, and he seemed to be running more than I was, which encouraged me. I was mostly getting the balls back to him and started thinking that at least I could give him a decent game.
‘You want to serve?’
I shook my head.
‘OK.’
His first serve was easy and I hit it back into the far corner, so close to the line that it kicked up a little chalk. It was a lucky shot, not representative of my skill, but I could see him frowning slightly, considering.
His next serve almost took my ear off. I barely had time to lift the racket when it slammed the ground a quarter-inch short of the line and exploded against the fence.
I stared at him open-mouthed. ‘Christ, Hugo. Where’d you get a serve like that?’
He shrugged and served again, a baby serve so I could hit it back.
I let it go. ‘Do it again.’
I watched this time to see how he did it. He didn’t look particularly athletic, his shoulders weren’t big and his arms didn’t bulge, but when he threw the ball in the air his whole body seemed to coil and then extend like a spring, so that when the racket made contact with the ball the force came from his feet and knees and the whole uncurling flow of his thighs and the muscles of his back and shoulders. It was awesome.
When he saw that there was no point playing full-fat tennis with me, he went back to serving softly and hitting the ball more or less directly into the path of my forehand so I could return it and not feel out of control. I was used to losing to Mal, who fancied himself a decent player, but this was something altogether else. Even the sound of the ball on his racket was nothing like mine, which made an average sort of thunk. His contact was sharp as a gunshot. I felt almost sick with jealousy and suddenly liked him better. He revealed himself slowly, did Hugo.
We played for an hour and Hugo never broke a sweat. Mostly he carefully returned my shots so I could hit them again. Then at the end of a rally, during which I almost felt I could play the game, he’d casually flick the ball just beyond where I could reach it, so fast I barely clocked it flashing past. If we’d been playing for real, the game would have been over in seconds.
‘I’m going to die if we don’t stop,’ I said at last, panting, and threw myself down on the bench. ‘I wish I could play like that.’
‘You could,’ Hugo said. ‘It’s just practice.’
‘I couldn’t practise enough in a lifetime. You make it look like high art. I’m just whacking balls around. It’s what we English are best at, you know, losing with grace.’
Hugo frowned. ‘This country’s weird.’
‘You can talk.’
A fleeting smile.
We headed back to ours for something to eat and a swim. The sun had been in and out all day. Hugo borrowed some trunks from the line and we finished last night’s leftovers, ignored the half-hour rule and went straight in. The waves were rough, blown sideways by the wind.
‘Please don’t tell me you surf too,’ I said, once I’d got used to the water.
‘Nah,’ he said. ‘Tennis and swimming. Scuba. Bit of cross-country. Soccer. Basketball.’ He thought. ‘Baseball, lacrosse, tae kwon do. Kickboxing. That’s it.’
I shook my head. ‘We grew up on different planets.’
‘I guess.’
‘So what’s LA like?’
‘It’s OK.’ He shrugged a little. ‘I’m used to it. What’s London like?’
I had to think. ‘Noisy, dirty.’ I swam sideways. ‘But I like it. It’s home.’
Hugo was taller, he could touch the bottom. ‘LA’s not home. Nowhere is.’
The simplicity of this pronouncement startled me. How could nowhere be home? Home drove me insane most of the time but in a pinch it was everything – house, parents, siblings, friends, school. ‘What about …’ I hesitated.
‘My mother? Brother?’
‘Your father?’
‘What about him? I’ve only met him twice.’
‘You and Kit don’t …’
‘No,’ he said, looking straight at me for once. ‘We don’t. I’m not sure she fucked either of them more than once. Or anyone else for that matter.’
Oh.
Hugo dived under the water and I watched him swim two powerful strokes before I lost him in the murky sea. He came to the surface some distance away, caught a wave towards the shore, clambered out and shook his head like a dog. He didn’t turn back, just picked up his towel and headed up to the little house. I watched him go, thinking about what he’d said.
What I’d read as dislike turned out to be something else. Damage?
19
When we were kids, the six weeks of summer holiday felt like an unfathomably deep moat between the end of one school year and the start of the next. But now we were older, time accelerated, and by the time the rhythm of summer declared itself it was nearly half over. Wedding plans seemed to play into this; when you’re running out of time to organise a party it focuses the mind. The boat trip was still to come and the tennis tournament always signalled Nearly September, which made it something of a melancholy event. In the meantime, there was no word from Florence, not even an RSVP to the invitation, which discomfited Hope as she’d figured Florence’s appearance would double as a trip to collect the boys.
With unease bordering on dread, I thought ahead to the day Kit and Hugo would leave the beach – Kit by way of London for his RADA audition, Hugo, with his mother, back to LA. Kit and Hugo would hang out with old friends, rekindle whatever relationships they had in real life. With any luck Kit would return to RADA. Hugo had another year left of school.
And what about us?
Kit appeared in the shop again the next day, just as my shift was ending. He said he’d give me a lift home on his bike.
‘You’re not seriously suggesting I sit on your crossbar?’ But when he leaned in I caught a whiff of salt and sweat and I wanted to breathe it forever.
I started down the road at a jog and he followed on Mal’s crummy bike, riding with arms folded across his chest, pedalling slowly and steering with his hips. He started singing to me in Italian, like a gondolier, until I pushed him and he grabbed the handlebars to stop himself crashing.
He settled for rolling beside me with one hand on my shoulder so I di
d all the work pulling him along. My whole body vibrated under his fingers.
About a quarter of a mile from home he suddenly let go, and without a backward glance sped off as if he’d just remembered the time.
A few hours later, he flip-flopped up the beach.
I was finishing the cardoon, drawing in the spiky thistle flower with a purple pencil. ‘You disappeared in a hurry.’
‘Always leave ’em wanting more.’
I felt a genuine flash of contempt. ‘You’re joking.’
He laughed. ‘I remembered something I promised to do.’
Uh-huh.
No other explanation was forthcoming. ‘There,’ I said, and held up the drawing for inspection.
He looked carefully. ‘I’d like to have that.’
‘Hands off. It’s for my portfolio.’
‘Will you do me another sometime?’
‘Nope.’
He ran his hand along the inside of my leg.
‘Mmm …’ he said, and I shoved him hard.
‘You are such a slut. It’s not Mattie you like, it’s anyone.’
He looked hurt then. ‘I adore Mattie,’ he said. ‘She’s gorgeous. But you … you’re something else.’
‘Yeah.’
He narrowed his eyes, like a cat. ‘Something … else.’ His fingers on the inside of my thigh.
I held my breath.
‘I think about you,’ he said, staring up at the sky. ‘I know I shouldn’t but I do. I think about you way too much.’ And then he turned his gaze on me.
The electricity coming off him could have lit a cruise ship. Oh God, I thought. But that’s not what I said.
‘You know what, Kit Godden? You’re a spoiler. You won’t be happy till you’ve ruined my sister’s life.’ I sounded ridiculously dramatic, even to me, like some insane version of the love police.
‘Totally unfair,’ he said, removing his hand from my leg. ‘I’m not going to ruin her life. I like Mattie, but you’re not suggesting I spend the next fifty years with her, are you?’
Well, no, I wasn’t. I’d believe anything as evidence that it was me he wanted, not her.
Was it necessary for him to be madly, fatally in love with either of us? Was mad, fatal love the only honest love? On the one hand, of course not. On the other, who set out cold-bloodedly to have an affair without even the hope of real feeling, the kind that might last? Was it just naivety on my part, thinking that’s how it should happen?
He looked at me, all at once razor sharp, voice low. ‘There are things I want to know about you. Questions I have.’ His eyes held mine and my whole body shivered.
‘I’m not in a rush,’ he said. ‘Aren’t you tempted?’
Tempted? Me? That was like asking if I was tempted to get wet in a rainstorm. By the time you finished the question I was already soaked.
I picked up my drawing pad. ‘See you around,’ I said.
I walked away. Resolute. Hard. Collapsing.
20
Tamsin got a rosette in her first affiliated jumping class. Mal worked on his lines. Mum finished the jacket. Invitations were answered. Nearly forty were expected for the wedding meal, despite Hope’s insistence on an intimate affair. Mal’s parents were coming, and his married sister; aside from that it was friends. It would take place mostly on the beach and we’d all cram into the house if it rained. Hope seemed calm enough, reading steadily through a pile of books by her hammock. When you asked if she was nervous, she opened her eyes wide and said, ‘About what?’
They’d decided on a vegetarian menu despite Mal’s longing for a hog, because it made catering for a wide range of eating disorders easier. Hope made a list of ingredients, calculated quantities, ordered a great deal of local wine (English Pinot Noir, courtesy of global warming) and three cases of French champagne. Glasses came from the winery. Hope hired four local girls to help with food prep and waitressing on the day (‘You kids are guests’) and Mum’s depthless prop cupboard provided tablecloths for the trestle tables in light green and blue.
‘Why is no one making me a wedding outfit?’ Mal was half a bottle in.
‘I’m happy to rustle you up a little something, Malcolm dear.’ Mum smiled sweetly at him. ‘But I’d have to know more about the desired effect.’
‘The desired effect? Isn’t it obvious? Love god, finest actor of his generation, sensitive intellectual, saviour of womankind …’
Hope didn’t even glance up from her book. Mum looked thoughtful. ‘I’m thinking sky-blue velvet? Matching embroidered waistcoat and … sandals?’
‘No Panama? Pshaw!’ said Mal, filling another glass. ‘This is exactly why I’ll end up getting married in a swimsuit and tweed jacket. Nobody takes my haberdashery requirements seriously.’
‘I didn’t know you had haberdashery requirements, my darling.’ Hope reached out to stroke his arm, but he slapped her away.
‘Don’t patronise me. I shall provide my own attire and surprise you on the day.’
‘Not too surprising please.’
‘Righty-ho.’ Mal turned to Alex. ‘Can you sew, my good lad?’
‘Sew?’
‘Wield a needle. Tickle a buttonhole. Let out an inside seam.’ Mal wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. ‘If anyone’s interested, I dress to the—’
‘No one’s interested,’ Hope said. ‘I think it’s time we ate.’
Mal took Tamsin’s arm and headed for the kitchen. ‘You’ll help me find something to wear, won’t you, my dear one? We can have matching outfits. That would make me extremely happy.’ Tam beamed.
Mattie was the opposite of happy. Nervous, unsure of herself, eating less and biting her nails till they bled. She had lost weight and it didn’t suit her; the sharp outline of her cheekbones made her look older. I, on the other hand, surfed a wave of promise. When all this is over, I thought, I can stop making a stand. When he’s at RADA and I no longer live at home. When life is real. Then, maybe. Then. I could find out how patient he really was.
‘How do you think Kit and Mattie are getting on?’ Mum was picking thyme in the garden.
Hope shrugged. ‘They seem reasonably happy to me.’
‘I’d hate for her to get hurt. She seems completely mad about him.’
‘It’s summer. It’ll be over soon no matter what,’ Hope said.
Mum sighed. ‘Poor Mattie.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I’d have killed to hook up with a guy like that at her age. At least he’s not forty and married.’
‘Forty?’ Mum blinked.
‘It was very romantic at the time.’
I’d never heard this story. ‘Romantic with who?’
‘Whom.’
‘Romantic with whom?’
‘You shouldn’t be listening,’ Hope said. ‘My tutor at drama school. It lasted a couple of years. But I was older than Mattie – nineteen or twenty.’
‘And you met Mal after?’
‘I was still seeing the tutor when we met. I kept both going for months.’ She looked thoughtful. ‘Mal grew on me. But it took time.’
I hadn’t heard this version of their love affair before. ‘He always says it was a coup de foudre.’
‘It bloody well was,’ Mal said, emerging from the house with more glasses.
‘For him, not me.’
‘Oh, thanks very much.’ And went in again.
‘So what changed your mind?’ Mum was in reporter mode.
Hope hesitated. ‘I don’t know. I grew accustomed to his face, like the song says.’
‘That’s it?’
She shrugged. ‘Who knows? Over time, I didn’t get sick of him. Plus, he was mad about me.’
‘Mad about the boy …’ Mal sang from the kitchen.
‘Stop eavesdropping!’
‘And then one day I realised life without him wouldn’t be nearly as nice as life with him.’
‘You crazy romantic fool.’ Mum bundled up her fistful of herbs.
I thought about this for a minute.
‘Hey, why the long face?’ Mal burst out again and fake-tackled me to the ground, performing a one-sided stage fight with all the sound effects as I tried to roll away.
‘Get off me, psycho!’ And then Mal was away on Psycho, complete with the knife and the shower music, and by the time I crawled out from under the movie montage, I was exhausted from panting and laughing at once. When I looked up, I saw Kit watching us with an odd expression. Mal saw him too and missed a beat, but then was off again, on to Shakespeare mixed with Fred Astaire, doing a sand dance while reciting To be or not to be.
Hope shook her head. ‘Can you believe I’m going to marry that dork?’
Any of us would, given a chance.
21
Going to work was an escape, not just for the change of scene, but to get away from the creeping claustrophobia on the beach. All the fresh air that blew in with the Goddens at the start of summer was beginning to turn stale and an undercurrent of anxiety hummed through the house. It pissed me off. Summer was for pleasure and boredom, not chaos and doubt.
At work I knew that if Lynn was in a bad mood, it was because there hadn’t been enough rain for her allotment or her husband had come home drunk again. Denise, whose shift overlapped mine, was twice my age and mainly interested in gossip magazines. It was all very restful.
‘Will you look at this,’ she’d say, pointing to some famous film star, tutting and shaking her head. ‘Why would anyone hook up with a sex addict? If I had the kind of choice she does I wouldn’t touch him with a bargepole.’
Because he was the closest they had to a genuine local celebrity, Denise and Lynn were dead keen on Kit Godden.
Whenever he came to the shop, he shuffled and stammered so charmingly that Lynn always said afterwards, ‘You’d never know he was practically famous himself. So natural.’
Kit’s version of natural was a carefully constructed illusion. I was learning a lot this summer, most of it stuff I didn’t want to know.
When I told Kit that the ladies fancied him, he came up to meet me after work, bought all the newspapers for Mal, Your Horse magazine for Tam, and Country Life for Hope because she liked looking at stately homes.