She tried to shift in her seat. It was difficult when she was jammed in between Ed’s new assistant, Tim, and Vicky, who stank of CK One, and whose voice was growing louder all the time.
Jenny glanced around the table at the company, trying to remember everyone’s name. With Tim was a mousy girl called Emma. On the far side of Vicky sat a purple-haired woman called Bella and her girlfriend, Fran, who had consumed the lion’s share of the bread and was now lustfully eyeing up the remains of the raspberry roulade. Ed, with his face growing redder by the minute, was squeezed in next to Dom, their wedding photographer, and his wife Tess. And then there was Guillaume. Ten of them, at the garden table and benches that could just about seat six. There was barely room to move.
As the evening progressed, however, Jenny found herself relaxing. It would be too much of a shame to stay anxious in such a setting. The garden smelled of fresh grass and night-scented stock and the occasional whiff of lavender floated in on the breeze. Suddenly, Jenny yawned and as she did so wondered if she could maybe get everyone to take their glasses further down the lawn in a while. She could pull out deck chairs and leave them to lounge around in the warm night. Maybe then it would get dark enough for her to slink off to what she realised was her much-longed-for bed.
She glanced around the table. At least everyone else looked like they were enjoying themselves. People sat close to each other, picking at leftover bread and cheese, the hum of conversation ebbing and fading as the evening drew in around them, softened by the glow of the candles she had arranged all around the seating area. The patio itself was lit with tall candles in storm lanterns, and coloured fairy bulbs glowed above their heads, strung around the edges of the sun parasol that still remained open over the table and into the branches of the magnolia tree just above.
After a time, Fran and Bella excused themselves from the table and strolled a short way toward the end of the lawn. Jenny heard the click of a cigarette lighter as they sparked up behind her. At the sound, and the first fragrant waft of marijuana, Tess, too, jumped to her feet with a “Ooh, do you mind if I join you?” and soon the gentle hum of their voices came from the direction of the plum tree in the corner, down near the rear entrance gate as the joint was passed around between the trio.
The movement away from the table of the women lessened the crush of bodies nicely and there was almost a palpable sigh of relief as the guests spread out a little further and claimed an inch or two more personal space.
Jenny turned her attention to Guillaume, who was sitting back in his chair, his eyes closed momentarily. She watched for a moment, drawn to the sight of lamplight from the French windows falling on his cheek. She observed him as he raised his glass to his lips and took a small sip, savouring the wine in his mouth before swallowing, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down with the motion. He had removed the kufi hat and the bright blue of his tunic contrasted with the dark brown of his skin in the fading light. Jenny jumped as Vicky’s voice suddenly broke through the silence. She realised that for an instant she had forgotten that everyone else was there.
“So where you travelled to, Guillaume?” Vicky demanded loudly, picking up her glass, sloshing the liquid from side to side violently as she raised it to her already stained lips.
Jenny was unexpectedly annoyed by the way that Vicky mispronounced Guillaume’s name. ‘Gee-yum,’ she called him.
“Ed says you been away for a proper long time?”
Guillaume turned slowly, opening his eyes to look directly at Vicky. He didn’t answer for a while, instead taking his time in leaning, replacing his glass on the table with his right hand while slipping his left into his pocket, and shifting his position slightly so that he could see her better.
“I’ve been to my homeland,” he began, his voice deep and coated with wine. He spoke slowly. “To Africa.”
Vicky stared back at him, taking advantage of the extra leg space to swing one bony knee over the other and push her chest out slightly.
“Was you doing charity work then? Helping the starving and the poor and all that?” she asked, swinging her foot slightly under the table. Jenny could feel the vibration underneath her on the bench.
Again, Guillaume stared for a moment before replying.
“I’m from Botswana originally,” he explained calmly. “It was a journey of discovery, seeking out my roots, my family heritage. I also spent some time in Cape Town – my parents live there now.”
Vicky responded by taking another slug from her glass. The leg-swinging grew more violent and Jenny resisted the urge to reach under the table and grab Vicky’s knee to make her stop.
Vicky held her confrontational pose as she stared back across the table at Guillaume, trying to think of a response.
She didn’t have to, as it happened. Ed, flushed from the beers and wine, piped up instead.
“Gui, man, tell Jen where you were staying and who else stayed nearby while you were there? You’re gonna love this, Jen.”
Guillaume looked at his friend for a moment and then at Jenny dismissively. She stiffened as he turned his attention to her. For some reason, she felt a little panicked. For a moment, she wished that she could be like Vicky, could draw herself upwards, set her jaw in a firm line, thrust out her chest. Instead, she glanced nervously at the others around the table who were staring at Guillaume, and sank slightly back against the cushion, wishing that she could sink further into it.
Guillaume looked down at his hands and then back at Jenny.
“I had the pleasure of seeing the Princess of Wales at a party while I was in Cape Town,” he said dismissively, reaching again for his glass and swirling it against the candlelight before taking a generous swig. His face showed distinct disinterest in a response from Jenny.
Jenny coughed lightly and felt her cheeks colour. “Diana. Wow!” she managed, before focusing her attention on shifting in her seat. Without realising it, she sat on her hands. A spark of annoyance ignited in her at her own discomfort. At Ed for bringing it up. She loved Princess Diana. Pored over pictures of her. She couldn’t help it – the woman fascinated her. So much so that she was in the habit of designing dresses with her in mind.
An awkward silence fell over the table, broken only by Vicky’s voice after a moment. “So what’s with the costume?” she said suddenly, pointing at Guillaume, a hint of tipsy laughter in her voice.
At that moment, the atmosphere changed again. Ed flashed his sister a glare which went unacknowledged. Jenny glanced at her from under her lashes – she was still too embarrassed by the awkward moment that had just passed to look up.
Guillaume, at whom the remark was directed, froze midway towards reaching for his glass. Slowly he raised his eyes to Vicky, his expression cold.
“This is traditional African dress,” he responded in a low voice. “What on earth made you think it was a costume?” There was no humour in his tone – in fact it was filled with even more contempt than the glare he had given Jenny a moment ago.
Jenny looked at Vicky and saw her squirm slightly. Something in her relaxed, the heat taken off her for a moment. She secretly even began to enjoy it a little. Like when someone else in school gets into trouble and you’re thankful it’s not you, she thought.
“Well . . . it ain’t exactly from Jack and Jones, now is it?” Vicky responded, showing no discomfort, staring brazenly at Guillaume who glared at her.
“No. It’s not.”
From the corner of her eye, Jenny saw Ed try to warn Vicky off with a long-practised look. The intended recipient, however, never even acknowledged it. Instead, she continued to return Guillaume’s cold expression with defiance.
“Ed said your dad worked in an embassy or something, am I right?” she asked.
Guillaume nodded.
“So he’s a diplomat, then?” continued Vicky.
Sometimes she did this, Jenny acknowledged. Showed that somewhere along the way she had actually listened, that something had gone in and that she had a deeper understandin
g of things than she let on. The fact that Vicky wasn’t a quarter as stupid and inattentive as she came across was what made her dangerous, in fact.
“That’s right,” replied Guillaume, casting a glance at Ed as if to ask why exactly his sister was prolonging this moment.
There was something about the timing of the response when it came, about the exact beat on which Vicky delivered it, that turned the air electric for a moment. The guests who remained at the table felt it. There was a collective intake of breath. Even the smokers under the tree paused in their chatter for a moment and stared back at the scene.
“So he’s a diplomat then,” Vicky confirmed. And paused. “Not the fucking Lion King?”
There was silence for a moment. Jenny couldn’t be sure but she thought she saw something run through Guillaume, like a bolt that hit him. She cringed, sure that he would launch into some attack, and then, knowing Vicky, she’d respond by standing up and shouting profanities at him, jabbing the air with her French-manicured nails, her accent slipping, her language growing even coarser.
Instead, he laughed.
With a slow rumble that started in his belly, Guillaume opened his mouth wide and bellowed. There was sudden relief in the air as the other guests nervously joined in – a feeling that a crisis had been averted. As if the king had forgiven the jester and wouldn’t cut his head off after all.
And as Guillaume belly-laughed, throwing his head back, his broad shoulders shaking as he did, Vicky stared at him, as proud as Punch of herself. And she allowed herself a giggle, checking the others with a glance to ensure that they had witnessed it too. One up for Vicky, again.
And Jenny watched her as the expression grew into one of smugness, and her posture relaxed and became even more flirtatious as Guillaume’s laughter subsided and he leaned across the table in Vicky’s direction, catching her eye, suddenly interested.
Jenny saw the look that passed between them as Vicky copied him. And in an instant, she realised there was something there, that electricity flowed between them. And much as she didn’t like her husband’s best friend, and much as she didn’t like her sister-in-law, she suddenly realised that what she didn’t like the most was the prospect that something was going to happen between them. Jenny Mycroft was amazed to find that she didn’t like that most of all.
Chapter 15
November 1998
Jenny
There is a fanlight over the front door of 17 Pilton Gardens. And on winter mornings, when the sun hits a certain angle, it throws a beam of light down the hallway and onto the top step down to the kitchen. And it’s here that I’m standing on a nippy November morning. A Monday. Watching my husband sit at the kitchen table.
And I am absolutely livid.
What on earth does he think he’s doing? What was so hard about keeping it all together, if not for his own sake but for Bee’s? She is in nursery. He drops her off every morning, regular as clockwork. And then comes back home and does this until it’s time to pick her up again.
I want to hurt him. I try to stare so hard at him that I burn a message in through his stupid, thick skull. How could you be so foolish, Ed? How?
He looks up, suddenly. Looks straight at the beam of light that the fan-shaped window sends down the parquet tiles of the hall. Looks right at me. I wonder for a second if he can see me – I stare harder, think harder – I so want to talk to him right now. So want to smack reason into him and then hold his hand and talk and see if this can’t be fixed somehow.
He doesn’t look well. His eyes are bloodshot. He’s still being ridiculous about sleep – I’ve gone past sympathy for him at this stage. It’s been almost a year for heaven’s sake. And he’s got Bee to take care of. He can’t just fall apart. Wander around like something undead – which, technically, from my viewpoint, he is – eating crap, not bothering to wash or clean his teeth or change his socks or anything.
He’s unshaven, too, verging on having a full beard which makes him look like he’s been held hostage somewhere for years. I’m married to bloody Brian Keenan. Or at least I would be if I wasn’t in this stupid half-life place, whatever that is.
He looks back down at his coffee again. As if he thought he saw something, but didn’t actually. That stupid, stupid man. With everything before him. All that success that he had when we met first, when we left college. All he had to do was doodle on a post-it and his bosses were turning it into a film franchise. For heaven’s sake, before I died they had been talking about creating action figures from some of his characters. Collectibles.
So what’s this? This before me. So far from an action figure as to be virtually compost? He’s like a tree with damaged roots. A stump that’s just letting the ivy grow all over it. This is my husband. Smelly and unshaven and tearful and broken.
And unemployed.
It would have helped of course if he’d been able to make it into work every now and again. He did make a start, I’ll grant him that. Going through the motions, working every hour he could manage in fact.
And then he pretty much just stopped.
The crying in front of the TV got worse after a while. And he finally caved and gave up sleeping in our bed, dragging a duvet down to the living room – a duvet that he hasn’t changed since Betty stormed round one weekend about a month ago and changed it for him, actually – and making the sofa his bed, leaving Bee to bump down the stairs on her bum in the mornings to find him there, telling him to “Wakey wakey!”, not knowing or understanding, of course, that he might only have dropped off half an hour beforehand.
And then he took a holiday. Straight after Bee’s birthday. Some time off, he told the crew at Brightwater. They were very understanding – how could they not be? Ed Mycroft? Newly widowed cash cow wants to take some time out? Take all the time you need, mate.
Except what didn’t seem to get through Ed’s thick skull was that they didn’t mean it literally. He took the holiday – told them he was taking Bee away for a couple of weeks, off down to the coast, sea air, ice creams, cockles and mussels alive alive oh and all that. Except he didn’t of course. He just hid out at home, dropping Bee to nursery each day as normal. Ignoring the phone. Ignoring his parents, his sisters – everyone.
Ed took a holiday all right. A holiday from the civilised world and when eventually the three weeks were up, he didn’t feel up to it, he said. Had a little headache. So he took some sick leave. And still Brightwater said nothing. Told him that if he felt like it they could help arrange someone to talk to. A gentle nudge, despite the fact that they were giving him more breathing space.
And now, here we are, with winter approaching, and none of their nudges have worked. His boss, calling unannounced for a “little chat”; his mates from the office – Tim, for what he was worth – Gavin or the other one – the one with the little beard – Fred. One by one they were ignored or dismissed at the front door with the excuse that he was too busy looking after Bee at that precise moment. And of course when they came back, he was wise to them and hid.
I can’t blame them, of course. You can’t have an employee – even if he is your star employee – suddenly decide that coming to work isn’t an option any more. They’ve called it ‘suspended’ but we all know it for what it really is. Fired. They did their best to help, after all.
But nothing can help this man. This helpless man with no job and a dirty beard and greasy hair that’s skimming his collar.
And a little girl who is so helpless and who depends on him and trusts him and needs him and loves him.
So why can’t he provide for her? Isn’t she enough to make him want to go on? He was the strong one, after all. It’s not like I was so amazing that he can’t possibly manage without me. Especially not when I . . .
This isn’t good enough! I long to shake him by the shoulders! How can he forget about Bee? He is everything that she has. He is all that she has. He needs money to feed her and clothe her – it’s not good enough that she goes to nursery wearing the same clothes for
days, little dinner stains appearing day after day until the staff there are kind enough to pretend that she’s covered them in paint or spilled some water on them and then change her – usually into some other child’s spare clothes. It’s embarrassing to see her coming in the door dressed in something clean, something fresh.
Most of all, Bee needs an example. She needs someone to get up in the morning and dress himself in clean clothes and make her toast with jam and tickle her and get her to help him with the post like he did up until that day in June when that stupid magazine subscription reminder arrived; the subscription that I can never renew for a magazine that I barely even read. He’d managed to just about hold it together until then. Why not now? Why is it getting harder for him instead of easier?
Bee needs a dad, I think, forcing the thought at him with every limited resource I possess, in whatever being this is that I am. Forcing, forcing. Staring and looking and thinking and wishing.
And I knock the coffee cup over.
It’s as much energy as I can muster. And that’s all it is. Energy. And what use is it?
Oh, that I could muster up his job back! And his self-respect.
Ed gets a shock. He jumps backwards and looks around him and then at the cup, the contents of which are slowly draining over the side of the table onto the floor. And then at his hand. Which was nowhere near the cup, but it’s the only way that he can make sense of it: that somehow he knocked the cup over himself.
I’m sorry, I think, and try to force that at him too, but I can’t make thoughts appear in his head. Only useless things are in my remit nowadays. Mind you, that’s all I was capable of when I was alive too.
Get it together, Ed, I think longingly. This mess has gone on far too long and I don’t just mean since I died.
I watch as he slopes over to the sink and picks up a cloth. He has absolutely no idea what to do with himself, I realise. He is just existing. He is a shell, a shadow, a putty man instead of the artistic, vibrant boy-in-a-hurry that I married. I want that man back. For Bee’s sake of course. She cannot have a putty man for a father. He cannot do that to her.
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