by Meg Rosoff
I reached for my telescope, and though I couldn’t make out faces at that distance, it was definitely a basset and definitely Mal and Kit, nearly half a mile away.
I’d barely seen Kit in days. He hadn’t even been to the shop for milk, much less flirtation or sex by the side of the road. It was as if our little encounter meant so little to him he’d forgotten all about it.
Where we were concerned, Kit had gone to ground. My stories to explain his behaviour made a nice companion volume to Mattie’s. Seeing him with Mal, my first thought was relief; Mal would put him straight on any number of socio-sexual confusions. Who else but Mal – the elder statesman of youth, with his memory of sex and intrigue still intact? I wondered if they were talking about me.
I watched for a while but there wasn’t anything to see.
One odd result of Mattie’s and my shared obsession was an unspoken desire (more on my part than hers) to share space. It puzzled Mattie, who couldn’t fathom what we had in common all of a sudden. If there hadn’t been years of alienation to fall back on, we might have seized the moment to discover shared interests.
I heard her come in some time later. It was impossible not to. As lovely as she was to look at, she walked like a thug.
I went downstairs, silently, to freak her out.
‘Where is everyone?’ I asked, and she jumped.
‘Don’t know, don’t care.’
Fine. I flopped down on a sofa and pretended to read.
Time drifted as we waited for something to happen.
Something finally did. That perennial wildcard, Hugo.
24
Ten days left till the wedding, and all at once I understood the danger of giving summer a destination. It became a steeplechase, and no matter how many dramas occurred along the way, all anyone really thought about was the finish.
With that in mind, and the odd atmosphere that no one could quite pin down, we didn’t feel much like running the tennis tournament. But it was an annual event of such long standing that no one dared suggest skipping it.
Everyone played, there were no seeds, we arranged the matches by luck of the draw and the stakes were about as low as humanly possible.
The only other person who’d played Hugo was Alex, who constantly begged everyone for a game, but who played so badly no one wanted to waste the time. There was some suspicion that Hugo was coaching him, but no amount of coaching could turn Alex into a threat.
Kit had been playing genial knockabouts with Mal and Mattie but his game was more rumoured than proven. I had a bit of an instinct, however, not to mention direct experience regarding his general strength and skill. I pretty much figured he could play.
Hugo refused at first to participate, but Tam and Alex got on to him and ragged him half to death, and Mum finally took him aside and had a quiet word, which no doubt went along the lines of ‘We’d really like you to join in’, with the emphasis on really, in a tone of voice more usually employed in military conscription.
The first rounds were played one weekend, one set per pair, the second rounds took place the following Saturday, two sets plus tiebreak if necessary, and the final was played on Sunday, the following day. The intervening week wasn’t for resting, it was just to make sure anyone with a job who might have to be in London could participate, though people with actual jobs were a bit thin on the ground this year.
Round one went like this: Mum played Mal and lost. Alex played Hugo and lost, just, in a game of unrivalled good cheer. Hugo even seemed to enjoy the match, which was practically the first time I’d ever seen him enjoy anything. Alex slammed balls at him at random, failing entirely to hit them about half the time and whacking the remainder all over the place, but Hugo returned them regardless with a great show of effort so that Alex genuinely thought he’d played well.
Tamsin was out of commission so Mattie also played Alex, who wanted a second chance. Their game might as well have been a boxing match, for all its amiability and finesse, and Mattie beat Alex decisively. Dad lost to Hope in a surprise upset, and that just left me to play Kit.
Tennis, as we know, was not my sport. Sport, in fact, was not my sport. So when I took my place cross-court from Kit, six foot two glowing inches of muscle and stealth, the best I could do was to lose with grace.
I had no intention of losing with grace.
Instead I played every shot like a grenade, aimed at his face, slammed a backhand directly at his crotch, insisted balls were out when they clearly weren’t. Days and weeks of sexual frustration and fury guided my hand. There wasn’t a single moment during which I thought my tactics might be effective, but I didn’t care.
‘Whoa, kid,’ Dad called from the sidelines. ‘This is not the Wimbledon final.’
‘Good thing too,’ said Kit, who hadn’t strained to hit a single ball.
It wasn’t till I faced him on the tennis court that I realised how angry I was. He looked puzzled and a bit miffed at the level of aggression directed at him, and my anger only grew as I realised he had no idea why I might even be upset.
I lost every point, though he allowed me to play a few rallies to the end, probably just to see if he could keep the ball in play. Lord knows it wasn’t fast tennis, and it certainly wasn’t good tennis, but his command of the game was so good that a scenario formed in my head to distract me from losing with honour.
I glanced over at the onlookers and caught Hugo’s eye. He was thinking exactly what I was thinking. And the look on his face was pure dread.
When the set finished (six games to love), I walked off court without a backward glance. No jokey handshake at the net, no banter, no jovial bowing to the crowd, no crying foul or demanding a rematch. Kit just shrugged, as if to say, No idea what that was all about. The onlookers appeared puzzled, except for Mal, who turned away.
We all repaired to dinner, and when Kit tried to put his arm around me, I ducked out and placed myself next to Hope.
Hugo remained silent and strange, though the game had brought him into firm alliance with Alex. He’d encouraged Alex from the start, said he had potential and offered to coach him. Alex was more interested in bats than balls, but as the kid least likely to attract attention from the family, least likely to be singled out for possible talent, least likely to be in on the joke, Hugo’s offer pleased him immeasurably. The thought that we’d all misjudged Hugo had occurred to me some time ago, but I watched it take root with the rest of the family. Mum in particular, who’d been too busy to take much notice of Hugo, looked pale with regret and made a special effort to be nice.
He was still liable to get up and walk off without a word, not saying when or if he’d be back, but I was growing accustomed to his weirdness. His best quality was not being bothered about where we went or what we did when we spent time together; he just brought along a sketchbook or something to read and could settle wordlessly for hours.
Sometimes I forgot about him altogether, and was surprised when I stood up and saw he was still there.
It was a weird relationship, a bit like mine with Gomez, only with less conversation.
Mum said she was pleased we were getting on better. Kit stayed away. As furious as I was, I missed him trying to seduce me.
The wedding was right on track. Mum and Hope did a trial run with trestle tables and rented folding chairs; the green and blue tablecloths looked glorious in the unmown grass with the sea beyond. Hope wanted to use local ingredients as much as possible, so they spent days visiting farmers’ markets. She found a lavender-and-herb farm run by two women who had once worked in finance, a chef who specialised in foraging courses, and a pick-your-own raspberry-and-strawberry farm only a few miles up the road. All recipes were tested on us so we got to argue about what we liked best.
At dinner Hope always asked Mal how the lines were going, and Mal always gave a sample recital. We were getting to know Hamlet pretty well.
‘Get thee to a nunnery,’ Mal said to Hope. ‘Why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners? I am myself indiff
erent honest, but yet I could accuse me of such things that it were better my mother had not borne me.’
‘What things?’ Hope frowned. ‘Is there something I should know?’
Mal threw her a kiss. I glanced at Kit, who was all over Mattie.
Tamsin nearly always slid into dinner late. Despite her broken arm, she spent more time than ever at the yard thanks to her new friend, a boy of all things, who kept a big chestnut gelding called Bilbo, and liked to have someone (Tam) admire his jumping.
‘Which I do,’ she explained, ‘because he’s incredible.’
The horse or the boy?
Tam was trying to cut a chicken leg with one hand, steadying the meat with her cast. ‘Which are you more nervous about,’ she asked Mal. ‘The wedding or the play?’
Mal frowned at her. ‘Do you even have to ask? What could be nerve-racking about marrying yon glorious wench?’
‘Anyway, it’s only a play,’ Mattie said, and Hope went pale.
‘Oh my God, do not ever say that about Hamlet.’
Alex sniggered till Tamsin whacked him.
‘Mattie, how is it that you get more ignorant as you get older?’ Mal looked genuinely upset. After waiting for a reply that didn’t come, he stood up and left the table. It was so unlike his normal behaviour that we all felt a bit stunned. Hope went after him, returning a minute later.
Mum sighed. ‘He’s been quite touchy lately, hasn’t he?’
‘He’s genuinely terrified about the play.’ Kit had his arm around Mattie, who’d stuck her lower lip out but didn’t appear to be suffering remorse. ‘I don’t blame him,’ Kit went on. ‘And on top of it all, the wedding. Timing could have been better.’
‘Well I am sorry.’ Hope glared at Kit, and it was one of the few times I’d ever seen her angry. ‘God forbid our wedding should get in the way of Mal’s career.’
‘I was just thinking,’ said Kit quietly, ‘how hard it must be to enjoy the happiest day of his—’
‘Don’t bother,’ Hope snapped, and left the table. Mum got up and began clearing plates.
‘Never mind.’ She placed a hand on Kit’s shoulder. ‘Weddings have a tendency to unsettle people.’
‘Kit has a tendency to unsettle people,’ Alex muttered.
I glanced at Hugo. His face was flushed and he vibrated like a steel string. The violence you occasionally glimpsed in him frightened me.
The sky over the sea was clear and pale but in the other direction it had turned an almost greenish black.
I nudged Hugo. ‘Let’s get out of here.’
He followed me down to the sea and we sat on the sand. Neither of us spoke, but he seemed to relax a little in my presence. When it started to drizzle, he stood and returned to the house, so I set off along the long path round the back of the lagoons on my own, coming out at the end of the houses where great thickets of hawthorn and scrubby damson provided a windbreak for the fields beyond. The trees made strange configurations, dense, but filled with clear passages at ground level; perfect for what we’d imagined as kids were cosy dens for foxes and badgers. When the drizzle turned to rain, I crawled into the centre of a thicket, something I hadn’t done in a decade. Inside was cramped but dry. It was a good place to sit out a storm.
Watching the rain drip off the hawthorn, I shivered a little in my damp clothes. I’d go home in a few minutes and put on something dry.
The last of the sun struggled out from behind cloud cover and voices drifted over from the next field. They came closer and I sat silent, secure in my thicket.
Voices. I recognised Mal’s. Bloody Hamlet.
‘What is the reason that you use me thus? I loved you ever: but it is no matter. Let Hercules himself do what he may, the cat will mew, and dog will have his day …’
And then, ‘Mal,’ I heard. ‘Mal … Oh God, Mal.’
Followed by silence. Not quite silence. Not silence at all.
I couldn’t see. I wasn’t sure what I was hearing.
What was I hearing?
No, I thought. Impossible. Not that.
25
My sister never again looked as beautiful as she did that summer. Throughout her life people continued to remark on her loveliness, but to me she was never the same again. Something fell away.
For what felt like forever, nobody knew. I doubted myself. What was there to know? Perhaps nothing. As the hours passed, my brain second-guessed what it couldn’t quite believe.
While I doubted, Hugo drew pictures, Mum sewed, Hope read, Mattie paced. I could see Mattie going through all the options in her head, desperate to be the person Kit loved, not merely the one he sometimes liked. That person was worthless.
Eventually, even the way she walked looked broken.
I didn’t know what to do. I barely knew what I knew.
There was always Hugo. At first I avoided him, terrified that he’d confirm what I’d overheard. Hope asked what was wrong and I claimed I was worried about Mattie. She looked at me, sighed, and said nothing.
I searched for meaningful looks: a glance, the brush of a hand. Nothing.
For a day or two the world heaved with funfair mirrors and distortions, betrayals, uncertainties, false motives, smokescreens. Villains who smiled. Weeping mad girls.
When I picked up my telescope to survey the beach, it swung towards the hawthorn scrub, seemingly of its own accord. Did I see a figure there? Two figures? The telescope burned my fingers. I threw it down on the bed.
I cornered Hugo in the kitchen of Malanhope’s. ‘Are you avoiding me?’
‘Yes,’ he said, which against all odds made me smile.
‘What’s going on?’ I blocked the door so he couldn’t escape.
And there it was, the gaze I’d last seen down the lens of my telescope. Eyes intense, unblinking. He said nothing.
I grabbed his arm and his expression hardened. Yes, I thought, I bloody well know you hate being grabbed. Personally, I hate lies, betrayal, emotional havoc, mayhem – but you don’t see me complaining.
He took a deep breath. ‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ he said.
I waited, teeth and fists clenched against whatever it was I was going to hear. Get on with it, I thought. Just talk.
I waited.
‘The thing is,’ he said, and without knowing why, I felt a sudden surge of affection for him, for being so awkward and so purely what he was. The beautiful brother was a desert oasis, a landscape hung upside down in a shimmer of heat. Hugo was the real thing.
‘Last summer …’
Last summer? I waited.
Hugo began to speak without looking up. ‘We spent last summer on the coast north of Rome with a director friend of my mother’s – Antonio, he was called – and his new wife, Giulia. I think Florence and he had a thing once. The villa was massive, fifteen bedrooms at least. Extended family came and went all the time. There were cooks and housekeepers, dinners for twenty every night. I’d never seen anything like it. Kit made himself at home, took the launch across the bay to swim, played tennis every morning, made friends with everyone including the cook, convinced Giulia to teach him Italian. They all fell for him, il bel Americano. He ended up spending more and more time with Giulia while Antonio was in Rome. It didn’t matter that she was twice his age. And when her daughter arrived for the summer, he started hanging around with her, which enraged Giulia. She called Antonio back from Rome and there was an almighty scene. Florence claimed it was all a terrible mistake, but no one believed that. We were ejected that same night, no one even suggesting we wait till morning.’
‘He was “hanging around” with the daughter?’
‘Yes.’
I thought about this. ‘Well, why not. Good-looking American boy, beautiful Italian girl, it’s a pretty obvious recipe for intrigue.’
Hugo glanced up. ‘She was twelve. What I’m trying to tell you is that he’s a wrecker.’ He looked me straight in the eye. ‘He likes to see what he can get away with. It’s a game with him.’
Hugo shrugged. ‘He’s an emotional black hole. He sucks the light out of people.’
For a moment I felt a kind of vertigo. I wanted to say, Yes, of course last summer sounds grim, but wasn’t this different? Everything felt so real to me, the whole world Kit Godden created. But when I put it that way, even to myself, I realised exactly how big the fantasy had grown. Smoke and mirrors. A puppet master pulling strings. Us, dancing.
Without exactly knowing why, I leaned in and kissed him and he kissed me back, both of us poleaxed with shock and sadness and desire. I was shaking so hard I could barely stand.
I pulled away. ‘Hugo?’
It wasn’t much of a question and he didn’t answer. So I told him what I’d seen. Not seen, exactly. Heard. What I imagined was taking place, what appeared to be taking place.
He looked at me and nodded. A short, unhappy nod. ‘I didn’t know about Mal,’ he said. There were tears in his eyes.
‘Maybe I’m wrong?’ I hoped so desperately to be wrong that for an instant I felt certain he’d say, Of course you are, don’t be an idiot, and it would all be over.
‘Oh God,’ was all he said. He looked sick, distracted.
We stood perfectly still for a long time.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I have to go.’
I dragged myself back home. Look normal, I thought. Look normal.
There was drama still to come. Despite a crushing desire to bring the curtain down on the summer, it wouldn’t end. Another week. A wedding and tennis still to come.
Saturday arrived and so did the semi-finals. The atmosphere on the beach was unbearable. And yet life went on, while everyone pretended to be fine.
Hope played Mattie and won. They hugged afterwards and swore that their daughters would play each other in the tournament someday.
That just left Kit to play Hugo. Hope would play the winner.