by Voss, Louise
‘Get on with it!’ Rachel heckles, poking him in the side.
‘OK, my wish then? My wish is that by next Christmas, I will have a nice flat in this nice part of England. And many boxes full of your good English crisps.’
Rachel laughs, but nobody else does.
‘Do you want some crisps now, Karl?’ Ted asks seriously. ‘We have some in the kitchen. Aren’t you full yet?’
‘No, thank you, Ted, that is very kind but it is a private joke with me and Rachel. There is one last part of my wish, that with the crisps in my flat there will be Rachel living also. Even though it has only been a very short time since we are together, I am sure of this.’
He sits down again, and they smile fondly at each other. Rachel does not look surprised, so they must have discussed this already. Everyone says ‘Aaah’, even Ivan, which is a miracle.
‘Ted?’
But I know Ted’s wish already. Ted’s face is purple, same as his party hat from the cracker. He need to watch that blood pressure.
‘Mine…’ he says slowly, ‘is to be able to dance with my beautiful wife, on our fortieth wedding anniversary, which, for those of you who aren’t aware of it, is next June, June the twenty-fifth…’
He stops speaking and his lip is wobbling a great deal. I need to help him out here.
‘Yes!’ I stand up and clap my hands together. ‘There will be big party! I am thinking about it already. We will do it at the tennis club, with purple and green balloons for Wimbledon fortnight, and a barbeque, and maybe even a Midweek tournament first. Lots of dancing, and whirly disco lights for my special dance with my darling but soppy husband. That is my wish, but also, there is another part of mine too: I want there to be a band, and I want to sing for everyone, on the stage. My career of singing may be a little bit late starting, but who cares? Better late than never, that’s what I say!’
Everyone claps and cheers, and I smile at the dream of it. I know what I will wear; my long royal blue dress what is all sequins. I will have to get matching shoes. Perhaps an evening bag with many beads to sparkle on it.
Ted gets up. ‘I’ll just get some more coffee on,’ he says in a funny voice, and leaves the room. I think I must give him a moment. Poor Ted. I can hear him blowing his nose in the kitchen.
‘My turn now,’ says Rachel as Ted comes back in, looking less purple. ‘Forgive me if I don’t stand up. But I’ve got a big wish. It’s an announcement, really, too. I have something to go with it. Karl, could you…?’
Karl right away jumps up and leaves the room. We all look at each other. What is going on? This year it can’t be a Wimbledon wish. And surely they are not getting married so soon, they only just met.
He comes back in with an armful of square, flattish parcels in Christmas paper, about the size of a record sleeve but thicker. He gives one to me, one to Susie, and one to Ivan. Then he checks the label on the last one and puts it on his own place mat.
‘I have to give you all your Christmas presents now, as part of this,’ Rachel says. She sounds embarrassed and her cheeks are pink. ‘Pops and Gordana, that one’s for both of you. Go on, everyone, open them. Sorry, Billy, I didn’t know you were going to be here. I haven’t got you anything.’
‘No problem,’ says Billy, raising his glass to her. His midwest accent sounds funny. What a mixture of accents, I think: my Croatian; Karl’s German; Billy’s Yankee Doodle Dandy.
‘Open them, everyone,’ repeats Rachel in her very English one, even more English in her awkwardness.
She takes a mouthful of the coffee at the bottom of her cup, but it must be cold, because it’s been there for ages. I think she just wants something to do with her hands, which are trembling. I have no idea what is in the packages. Ted rips the paper off ours first and holds it up: it’s a picture, a big rosebud with dew drops, crimson against a plain pink background. It’s lovely. I haven’t got my reading glasses on but it looks like a fuzzy photograph.
‘Thank you, Rachel, it’s very nice, darling,’ I say, leaning over and kissing her.
Ivan’s is a dark, heavy purple and black tulip head. ‘Thanks, Rachel,’ he says, a bit puzzled. I can see that he wonders why she give him a picture. Art and decorations and so on was Anthea’s business. He only bothered with electrical appliances and gadgets, or sporting equipment.
‘What’s this got to do with your Christmas wish? Not thinking of becoming an art dealer, are you?’
She smiles mysteriously, but says nothing.
Susie opens hers last. It’s a beautiful dandelion clock, up close, each individual fluffy stem glowing silver against the black background. I cannot tell if it’s a photograph or a painting. I look more closely at my rosebud, and realize it is a painting.
‘Oh!’ says Susie, and for some reason she starts crying. She gets up and hugs Rachel. ‘Oh Rach,’ she says. ‘It’s gorgeous.’
Suddenly I get it. Rachel did not buy these pictures. ‘My darling, you surely didn’t paint these yourself?’
She nods, half-proud, half-embarrassed. ‘I did. Do you like them?’
There is a big noise as everyone talks at once, a big noise of praise and delight and surprise and admiration. The paintings are so much life-like.
‘But what’s this got to do with your Christmas wish?’ asks Ivan. In a very worried sort of a voice.
I do not think any of us are too surprised when she tell us.
‘I wanted to let you all know at the same time.’ She is holding Karl’s hand very tight. ‘I’ve decided…’
She looks at Ivan and gulps. Then she speaks in a big rush. ‘I’ve decided that I’m not going to play professionally any more. My wish is that …by next Christmas I’ll have finished my first term at college. Art college. I want to do a degree in art.’
There is total silence, except for the distant sound of Jackson serenading the dead turkey outside the larder door. Susie’s eyes are sparkling and she is smiling a big smile, even with her face still wet from tears.
Everyone else is staring anxiously at Ivan, who has gone the colour of the Stilton. He look for a moment like he is going to cry too, but not in a good way.
Then slowly, slowly, he push away his chair and stands up. Oh no, darling, don’t walk out, I beg him in my head. Don’t do this to her, it’s not fair. I can see the big muscle tick-ticking away at the corner of his jaw, and it seems like it’s going in time with the tick-ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner of the room.
He walks over to Rachel. Karl squeezes Rachel’s hand more tighter. Rachel is shaking so much now that she knocks over her port, and it makes a stain on my beautiful lace tablecloth. The stain is the same colour as the rose she painted me. Karl picks up the glass and mops at the spillage with his napkin, not letting go of Rachel’s hand even though it means he has to cross his other arm awkwardly over his body to reach it.
It’s like the whole room is holding its breath. Ivan leans down – and then he hugs her. She puts her arms around him and hugs him back. He doesn’t say a word.
I know my boy – sometimes he doesn’t speak because he doesn’t want to. Other times he doesn’t speak because he can’t. Now is one of those times. He can’t.
He kisses the top of her head. Then he walks back and sits down. Nods once at her. Smiles. And that’s the end of it. It’s over. Rachel’s new life begin here.
Chapter 53
Susie
Long walks were one of the things Billy and I always did well together – surprisingly, considering his general inactivity for much of the rest of the time.
Some of our best chats had been tramped out in time with our marching feet and the backdrop of a spot of impressive scenery. Perhaps it was because our legs were the same length; we could keep pace perfectly.
Something about the rhythm of it always used to turn us on, too. Some of our best sex was had after, or during, a long walk – all that fresh air and blood rushing around the body …And it always helped us figure out problems too, away from the stale fami
liarity of our home, puffing out the cobwebs of our discontent and our dreams.
Up in the thin air of the Adirondacks we set up Billy’s new mechanics’ business. In the Ozarks, I told him the sorry story of my marriage to Ivan in more detail than I’d ever told anyone else; and then Billy leaned me backwards over a hollow fallen tree-trunk and made it all better. Across the smaller peaks and glassy waters of the Lake District, scuffing through an autumn carpet of orange and red on a holiday soon after we got engaged, we discussed having kids. That conversation lasted for miles, I recalled, and never was really concluded.
Billy reminded me of it as we did circuits of Bushy Park, near Hampton Court, on a damp foggy Boxing Day. There were no mountains for us to walk up in south-west London, but there was an austere beauty to the bare ancient chestnut trees, and the deer skittering across the grass lent an otherworldly quality to the setting, despite the fact that we usually preferred to be alone in our landscapes – and we were far from alone. Families were out in force: little girls in bright-coloured wellies and ladybird or frog mackintoshes, new and shiny like the carefully pedalled trikes and brand new Christmas scooters bumping over the ruts as parents strolled behind issuing warnings and injunctions.
Billy gazed at them. He’d always taken it harder than I had, us not having children of our own.
‘Was that anything to do with it?’ I asked abruptly. ‘Kids, I mean.’
We still hadn’t talked properly yet. He had slept on a camp bed in Ted’s office last night (Ivan, Karl, Rachel and I taking up all the other available spare beds in the house), and I hadn’t suggested he shared my bed. I let him be in the dog-house, and he had humbly acquiesced. I’d half-expected, half-hoped that he might creep into my room in the dark of night, but he hadn’t, so I had lain awake, itchy with frustration and long-suppressed lust, dying for my Christmas cuddle but not quite ready to forgive him yet. Not sure that I would be able to forgive him.
Billy reached out and took my hand. I was wearing woollen gloves but I could still feel the warmth of his touch. Ever since I was a little girl I’d always loved the feeling of wearing gloves and holding hands with someone.
‘It’s hard to explain,’ he said cautiously.
‘Try.’
A squirrel shot out of a patch of long grass nearby and hurled itself up the closest tree, hotly pursued by a yapping cocker spaniel. The dog’s owner, a rotund woman in a red jacket that made her look like a lagged hot water tank, called out to it: ‘Trevor, stop it! Naughty boy!’ Then she turned to us. ‘Sorry! Isn’t he dreadful? Did you have a nice Christmas?’ – as if we were old friends.
‘Yes, thank you,’ I replied politely. The woman opened her mouth to say something else, but I allowed Billy to drag me away before we got engaged in any more of a conversation. We had rather more important things to discuss.
‘I thought you said Brits weren’t as friendly as Americans?’
I grimaced. ‘Only when you don’t want them to be…So. Kids. Was that it? Or did you tell Eva that I didn’t understand you? Come on, Billy, we’ve never even talked about all this, and it’s time we did.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘But to be fair, it’s not like you gave me a chance. You kicked me out and then you went to Europe.’
I stopped walking, outraged. ‘Oh right, so if I’d said we needed to talk, and I hadn’t gone to Italy, you’d have dumped Eva then and there and everything would’ve been fine? I don’t think so!’
Spaniel Woman was catching us up, with a determined look in her eye and another conversational gambit hovering on her lips. We ducked off the main path, through the long, wet grass, to avoid her.
‘No, I’m not saying that at all. But we should’ve talked earlier. We talk when we go on walks, but, Suze, how many years has it been since we went on a walking vacation, or even for a hike? We stopped walking, and we stopped talking. I was so busy at the garage, you were always at work, or with Audrey, or planning your next trip to see Rachel; or emailing Rachel; or talking to Rachel on the phone – I just felt shut out of your life! You never included me in anything, I felt like a spare part. And yeah, maybe if we’d had kids of our own, we’d have been more of a family.’
We stopped to let a herd of deer stroll past, which at least made the spaniel and her owner run in the opposite direction. Not so brave now, are you, Trevor? I thought, watching the dog yelp and scarper. I was furious with Billy.
‘You felt shut out? We hardly ever had the bloody house to ourselves, with all your buddies round the whole time buying pot and then staying half the night to smoke it. What was I supposed to do, since I don’t smoke? Sit on the sofa in silence with you all, or talk about Spinal Tap for seven hours on the trot?’
‘Suze, that’s not fair. I was always asking you if we could do more stuff together. I got all those brochures for photography classes, and we were going to take up t’ai chi, remember? I wanted us to have folk round for dinner once a month, a proper dinner party, but you just made a joke about us not having enough trays, and that was that. It never happened. I wanted us to put some weekends aside to redecorate the house, remember, but you were always too busy, and I so wanted it to be a joint project.’
I supposed he was right. Billy had at various times tried to get us to do more stuff. I hadn’t thought he was all that serious about it; I’d assumed they were just more of his stoner ideas that would never happen. It never before occurred to me that the reason they didn’t happen was due less to his lethargy and more to the fact that I’d ignored them or poured cold water on the suggestions. Guilt began to prickle at me.
He stopped walking. A heavy drizzle was beginning to surround us, coating our faces and settling on his hair like dew. He had tears in his eyes.
‘It wasn’t just that, Suze. I’ve been feeling for ages that …well, that you weren’t really mine any more – maybe that you never felt you were; that you’d been running away from Ivan and you rushed into getting engaged to kind of make up for the crap marriage you had with him, without ever intending to commit. You just talked about him and Rachel and Gordana all the time, and your life in England, and the fact that you wanted to come back here one day, and that you didn’t like Kansas —’
‘I do like Kansas! I loved our house, and living in Lawrence, and being engaged to you. I thought we were happy; I thought that was committed!’
‘But I didn’t know that. You always seemed like you wanted something different to what you had. You never said you were happy. And if you liked being engaged to me, why the hell wouldn’t you marry me?’
A flock of crows all suddenly rose as one from a big bare oak tree, cawing so loudly that I had to speak up to be heard. They flew over our heads to settle on the branches of a different tree, all flying as if they knew exactly where they were going. Why couldn’t we have been more like that? Why was it so difficult to communicate, even with the ones closest to us? There’d only been me and Billy – how could it have been so easy for us to misread each other’s needs?
‘I didn’t know it meant so much to you. I thought you understood how scared I was of getting married again, after the first one went wrong. I thought we were OK as we were. I’m sorry, Billy. I just didn’t know it was upsetting you so much.’
‘You hardly ever even said you loved me; not with passion, anyhow. Only B.I.L.Y.’
‘I liked B.I.L.Y.,’ I said miserably. ‘I thought that was our thing; our way of saying it. I’m sorry if you needed me to spell it out.’
He sighed. ‘Yeah. No, you’re right. It was. But it’s not just that. I mean, we used to have a great sex life – but we haven’t for years, have we? No wonder I thought you didn’t want to marry me.’
‘You were always up half the night after I’d gone to bed. I was tired from working. You often worked weekends.’ I felt angry again, and defensive, like he was trying to blame me for the fact he’d cheated on me.
‘You shut yourself off from me, Susie. I tried to talk to you, but you stonewalled me. I thought you didn
’t love me anymore. Then I met Eva—’
‘Where did you meet her?’ I hadn’t wanted to ask, but curiosity got the better of me.
‘At a show, at Liberty Hall. Leon Russell – remember? I asked you if you wanted to come with me, but you said no, so I went on my own. She was at the bar at the same time as me, and we got talking, ’cos she was on her own too. She listened to me, Suze. I just felt, for the first time in years, like I was really connecting with someone, the way I wanted so bad to connect with you, but couldn’t …I know it was wrong, and I feel truly awful about it, please believe me. Now I’ve hurt Eva as well as you, and I can’t forgive myself. But I couldn’t pretend to her any longer. When you went away, I just couldn’t bear it. I used to go and sit in our yard at night, looking at the empty dark house and petting the cats. They were always real happy to see me. But I’d sit there and cry, because I’d lost the one person I love more than anything, and I didn’t know what to do to make it right again. I’d destroyed everything we had together, just because we couldn’t talk properly.’
He was really crying now, in that hopeless way that men did; dragging his sleeve across his eyes, all wet-mouthed and red-faced, his shoulders shaking silently.
I hugged him, loving the way that we were the same size. With Ivan, I’d always had to crane my neck to reach up to kiss him. Since both our legs and trunks were the same length, it meant that Billy’s mouth and mine were exactly opposite each other’s too, and all we had to do was to lean forward and …I leaned forward. He tasted of salty tears, garlic and, faintly, old pot. It was the best taste in the world. He kissed me back, hiccupping slightly. He smelled wonderful too.
‘It’s not all destroyed,’ I whispered, the rim of his ear soft and velvety against my lips. ‘I still love you, really, Billy, I always did. I was devastated when I found out about you and Eva. I’ve never, ever not wanted to be with you.’