by Sue Welfare
No doubt Chrissie could confide in him, tell him her secrets and her fears, and no doubt he listened or at least pretended to, as convincingly as Bill or Andrew or even Sam57. Kate shivered. It was too dark a thought to contemplate for more than a few seconds.
She glanced back at the computer screen and then re-read the emails she had sent to Sam. She could feel a headache coming on. Such a shame that truth was such a difficult and poisonous pill to swallow. But she couldn’t have knowingly written to man who was married without saying something, it made her no better than Chrissie. Kate rubbed her eyes telling herself it was tiredness, not tension, her moods at the moment seemed to be as tidal as any ocean. Switching off the machine and heading upstairs to bed, Kate’s mouth was as full of a bitter taste as her head was full of bitter angry thoughts.
‘Why don’t you go home, Joe?’ Chrissie said briskly. ‘Come on,’ while trying to encourage him to his feet by getting to hers. ‘It’s getting late and I’ve got to be up early for work. Up you get.’
It was ridiculous. She had wanted to see him so much over the weekend, wanted to talk to him to make sure everything was okay, longed for some comfort, and now she would be bloody glad to see the back of him. Without Kate to balance Joe out he was a complete mess.
‘Do you want a hand, Mum?’ asked Robbie, appearing in the sitting room door. He had been home about half an hour but far from looking as if he was about to go to bed, he had showered and was dressed up like a dog’s dinner.
She shook her head, ‘No, you’re all right I can manage, love. He’s going home now, aren’t you, Joe?’
Robbie looked at Joe in disgust and then headed towards the hall.
‘Robbie?’
He reappeared at the door. ‘Yeh?’
‘You’re not going out again, are you?’
‘I’m just going to the club with some of the lads from work.’
‘Any idea what time you’ll be back?’
He grinned. ‘No need to wait up, I’ll probably crash round at Paul’s tonight.’ He lifted the holdall he was carrying. ‘But don’t worry I’ve got me toothbrush and a clean pair of pants in case I’m run over. I’ll see you tomorrow.’ He brushed her cheek with his lips. He smelt wonderful and she envied him so many things that it made the breath catch in her throat.
‘What is he doing here anyway?’
Chrissie shrugged. ‘I don’t know really,’ she lied. ‘He and Kate had a row, I think he’s just looking for a shoulder to cry on.’
Robbie tutted. ‘You want to get her to come round and fetch him then. He looks as if he’s going to throw up. He’s such a loser.’ And then when Robbie saw how upset Chrissie was, he continued more gently, ‘Are you sure you don’t want any help with him before I go? I could take him back next door. I’m used to dealing with drunks.’
Oblivious to the two of them, Joe took another pull on the can in his hand and belched dramatically. ‘She won’t talk to me you know. Won’t ring, Christ alone knows how many messages I’ve left on the bloody answer machine for her. She said she wasn’t sure that she wanted to put it right. What the fuck does that mean, eh? What am I going to do? She even won’t talk to me.’ He looked up expectantly at Chrissie and Robbie.
‘I love you,’ he spluttered, eyes filling up with tears.
Robbie glanced heavenwards as Chrissie waved him away. ‘Go on, off you go. Be careful.’
‘You too,’ said Robbie, casting one more glance at Joe.
‘Why won’t she talk to me?’ said Joe, turning his attention back to Chrissie. ‘We need to talk.’
Chrissie didn’t know what to say other than, ‘Kate’s not talking to me either, Joe. But she’ll be back on Friday, you can talk to her then. Come on, let’s get you home. It’ll be fine, don’t worry, you’ll sort it out. You need to give her a little more time, that’s all.’
A little more time? In her heart Chrissie doubted that Kate would ever speak to her again. A century wouldn’t be enough to heal the look of hurt and disbelief she had seen on Kate’s face when she walked into that kitchen. It was an image Chrissie was trying hard to forget but it kept resurfacing and now was so close that she could almost feel Kate’s breath on her face.
Slouched in an armchair, Joe shook his head, the gesture over-large thanks to God alone knows how many cans of lager. ‘It’s not right you know.’
Chrissie was thinking much the same thing, there was no way she wanted to end up with Joe by default. It wasn’t fair, she wanted a man of her own, a man who she had chosen, who would love her and look after her and hold her in the night and tell her that everything would be all right and mean it. With Joe almost exactly the reverse was true; he was not so much an equal as a high maintenance hobby.
Joe hadn’t made any effort to move, a little gobbet of spit clung to his chin. He hadn’t shaved for days and looked as if he might have slept in his clothes.
‘Come on, you have to go home now, Joe,’ she said, more forcefully this time, grabbing hold of his free hand and attempting to pull him to his feet. It was like trying to move a sack of damp pebbles.
Joe looked up at her and blinked, once, twice, his big eyes filling up again as he pulled her down on to his lap. He stank of beer and worse and crushed her to him so that she could barely breathe, let alone move.
‘You know that I love you really, don’t you, Chrissie?’ he slurred, as she tried to extricate herself. Chrissie grimaced levering herself back onto to her feet. Men could be so naive – they had no idea that sometimes love alone was nowhere near enough.
For the first few moments when Kate woke on Wednesday morning she had absolutely no idea where she was, just a blissful sense of free fall; sunlight flooded in through cream nets, the air was still with just a distant soporific hum of traffic. Far from panicking, Kate had a sense of peace and calm and being totally at ease, which lasted for as long as it took for her head to fill up with thoughts about Joe and Chrissie, Sam57, and Andrew the vet. Odd how overnight he’d turned into another source of pressure.
It felt almost as if she had been robbed. Getting out of bed, Kate wondered if there was any way to make the cacophony of voices in her head shut up.
It was early – before seven – but despite there being no hurry Kate showered and went downstairs, not wanting to be alone with her thoughts.
In the sitting room, Maggie was already awake and flicking through the channels on early morning TV. She looked exhausted and Kate wondered how much sleep she’d had.
The only comforting thing, Kate noticed, was that she had the walkabout phone tucked alongside her. Kate hoped that once she had picked up her messages Maggie had rung Guy and wished him goodnight and snuggled down with him. She suppressed a smile. Odd how quickly things change.
Odd, too, how quickly life settled down into a routine; she made tea, helped Maggie to get up and dressed, sorted out breakfast for the two of them, while Maggie hopped off to the bathroom – they had tried the shower trick and it worked a treat – and then Kate opened up the French windows to let the day in before settling down in the dining room to get on with her work.
Along with everything else, Kate had a peculiar sense of unreality; being back at home with Maggie felt as if she was playing house. This couldn’t be real life, this was the de-stressed, uncomplicated version of living that didn’t have Joe or Chrissie or the boys or running a house in it.
Kate glanced up at the clock; thinking of pressure and responsibility, she ought to ring Joe before it got late and even more awkward. Time to open the door and let real life back in. She let the clock register in her mind so she could work out if he would be too busy with breakfast and sports kit and getting the boys off to school, or on his way to the office, to talk to her. If he was going in to the office, that is – Kate couldn’t remember what he was doing this week or whether he had any work booked or not. Glancing down at the dining table, Kate realised that for the first time in God knows how many years she was no longer custodian of Joe’s diary.
Her own was open on today’s date and on the page was a neat list of work things waiting to be worked through, ticked off, mailed out. She had a deadline for an advertorial on a coach tour to Biarritz, a couple of recruitment ads, and half a dozen telephone interviews to do for the in-house catering magazine that her agency handled.
‘Jake swimming club @ lunch time,’ was all it said in the top right hand corner of the page, the piece of the page she allocated to domestic arrangements. If Joe was away or had something on, Kate usually duplicated the information here but it appeared that she hadn’t written anything down for him at all this week. Nothing, as if he had never existed. Gone. Kate stared at the page.
No Joe; it was a scary possibility. What would she do if they really couldn’t go back, couldn’t fix it? What would life be like if they couldn’t find a way home from this? It was almost impossible to imagine. They had been together so long. Kate had grown up with Joe, so many of the big milestones in her life had been marked in his company.
They’d met when she was eighteen, doing a job at a recruitment agency in the long summer before she went to uni. Staying with her aunt in London had seemed like a huge adventure. She’d even got a buzz hopping on the bus into work every morning. It was like Kate had finally grown up, finally arrived. Meeting Joe had been the icing on the cake. Compared to the guys in Denham, he had seemed so worldly and so knowing. Kate allowed herself a wry smile; hard to believe it was the same man really. They had known each other for nearly twenty years now. Jesus, could it really be that long?
She’d gone out with Joe all the time she was at uni. Him driving up to see her in a battered Mini van, her travelling down by train until they could afford to get a place together. They’d got married a month after she graduated. Kate sighed; all those years ago it had seemed like they were on the edge of a huge adventure. What could she possibly ever put in their place? Worse still, what if Chrissie hadn’t been the first? What if there had been others? In her imagination one became a dozen and then a dozen more. How long had Joe been playing her for a mug? For a moment Kate had a glimpse of life without him.
She closed her eyes, making the effort to still her mind.
At around twenty past nine, when the rush and panic ought to be over, Kate picked up the phone, tapped in her home number and waited. Someone picked it up on the ring before the machine cut in.
‘Uhuh,’ said a familiar voice.
‘Danny?’
‘Mum?’
It would be very difficult to work out who was the more surprised.
‘What on earth are you doing there?’ she said. ‘You ought to be at school.’
There was a peculiar little pause; Kate could almost see him scrabbling round for a half-decent excuse. ‘Overslept,’ was the best he could come up with at short notice. ‘But I’m going now. Well, in a few more minutes, I’m just waiting for my toast to do.’
‘What about Jake? Where’s Jake?’
‘He’s still here too but I’ve got him up. He’s just doing his teeth and looking for his kit.’
‘What on earth is going on –’ she began, and then decided annoyance probably wouldn’t do any good at all. ‘You’ll need to ring the school and tell them that you’re on your way. This is not on, Danny, what happened? Did you forget to set your alarm? Where’s Dad?’ demanded Kate, meaning will you please pass the phone to him.
There was pause and then Danny said, almost as a throwaway remark, ‘I dunno. He’s not here.’
‘What? What do you mean he’s not there?’ Kate was genuinely stunned, her mind instantly galloping around looking for an excuse and explanation, almost as desperate to defend Joe as to condemn him.
‘Dunno. He wasn’t here when I got up this morning.’
‘What do you mean wasn’t there, when did you last see him?’ Kate asked, trying hard not to let the panic drown her voice.
‘Last night, ‘bout half ten. After Bill went home I went upstairs to finish my homework off, and Dad was down here watching the box.’
‘Right, okay, well, maybe he had an early meeting and forgot to say anything, probably thought you should be able to get yourself sorted out,’ Kate said, taking a deep breath. ‘Get yourself ready for school and I’ll – I’ll …’ what could she do? She was two hours’ drive away. ‘I’ll sort it out.’ It sounded good.
While Kate was trying to think, her brain was mawkishly shifting through the possible permutations. In an instant she had Joe swinging from a beam in their bike shed, his face crimson, tongue hanging out like a kipper tie. Or maybe he had been squashed under a night bus like a beetle – this despite her rational mind telling her that the most likely explanation was that he was round at Chrissie’s or possibly Bill’s. Although Joe being at Bill’s did come as an afterthought.
Or maybe he was still in bed sleeping it off? Had Bill’s comment about Joe not coping well been a polite euphemism for pissed out of his skull? That was also highly possible. Joe’s way of coping with stress almost inevitably involved running away and hoping a grownup would come along and sort it out for him.
‘You okay, Mum?’ asked Danny cheerily. ‘How’s Granny Maggie?’
Kate coughed to fill the silence, ‘Yes, I’m fine, love, just fine, and Granny’s fine – a bit tired and very sore but she’s okay. Go and get you and Jake sorted out and I’ll ring you later.’
‘Okay, see ya,’ said Danny.
‘Give my love to Jake, and love you too.’
There was a little pause and then Danny said, ‘Miss you.’
Kate wanted to cry. ‘Me too. Can you just check Dad’s not still in bed and then I want you to get yourself off to school. I’ll ring and let them know you’re on your way and if Dad turns up in the meantime tell him to call me.’ Kate didn’t like to add, ‘So that I can ask him what the hell he thinks he’s playing at,’ although she was certain Danny could fill the gaps in for himself.
‘What, before they start dredging the Thames?’ he added as a final shot.
Kate smiled wryly. Danny might have his father’s looks but he most definitely shared her sense of the macabre.
‘What do you mean, he’s not there?’ said Bill incredulously. ‘Of course he’s not here; I wouldn’t have let him leave the boys on their own.’ Now Bill sounded affronted and indignant as well as concerned.
Kate wasn’t altogether sure why she rang Bill first – maybe it was because she could use the sympathy, maybe it was because she held out a frail hope that at the last minute Joe had come good and not scuttled next door to Chrissie’s.
‘Do you want me to see if I can find him?’
They both knew exactly what Bill meant.
‘No, but I’d be grateful if you could check up to make sure the kids have gone to school.’
‘Sure, no problem, anything else?’
Kate wondered whether to ask him to check in the bike shed just in case, but realistically Joe wasn’t the hanging kind. ‘No. Oh yes, wait, Bill. How much had Joe had to drink last night?’
The silence told Kate everything she needed to know. ‘And how drunk was he when you left?’
‘He wasn’t really drunk, Kate, he was just a couple over, you know how he gets. I told him to get himself off to bed.’
‘Thanks, Bill,’ she said.
‘Let me know if he’s at Chrissie’s, if not, I mean if there’s a problem, I can have the boys tonight if you like.’ Momentarily Kate reconsidered the bike shed, wondering if Bill knew something that she didn’t.
‘Thanks, I’ll let you know how it goes,’ was all she could manage before hanging up.
Kate rang the school, and Joe’s mobile, which was switched off, leaving the most obvious number until last.
Chrissie didn’t answer the phone, not that Kate had really expected her to.
Kate let it ring and ring until the machine cut in and then said, ‘Hello, Chrissie, this is Kate. I need to know if Joe is there. Joe, if you’re there and you get this message, call me.’
On
ce she had hung up, work went very slowly.
Bill rang to say that as he was going round to her house he’d met the boys on their way to school and that Chrissie’s house looked all shut up. He’d knocked on the door but there were no signs of life.
No sooner had Kate put the phone down than it rang.
‘Kate?’
‘Joe, where the fuck have you been? The kids have only just gone to school.’ Kate couldn’t help herself, it wasn’t the most useful way of starting a meaningful dialogue but she was furious. ‘Anything could have happened to them.’
‘Don’t take that tone with me. Why didn’t you ring? Why didn’t you answer my messages? I was worried.’
‘So worried that you got completely hammered.’
‘Who told you that, oh let me guess. Bill, the boy wonder. For your information I wasn’t drunk.’
‘Really, so what was it then? Malaria?’
‘Stress. I only had a couple of cans. Where were you when I rang?’
‘Out.’
‘Yeh? Out where?’
How come she was defending herself? Wasn’t the shoe supposed to be on the other foot?
‘I took Mum out to a house-warming party in town. But it doesn’t matter what I was doing.’ A vivid image of sitting side by side with Andrew flashed unbidden through her mind and made her blush furiously. ‘Where were you?’
‘You care?’
Kate felt the fury rising up, ice cold and unstoppable ‘You want the truth, Joe? At this moment I couldn’t give a tin shit where you were or who you were with, but I do care about what happens to the boys. You’re supposed to be at home looking after them.’
‘I was, I just nipped out for a little while and anyway, they’re old enough to look after themselves for a few hours; it’s you mollycoddling them that’s the problem, that and you up there gadding around with your mother.’ He sounded petulant and peevish and thuggish.
What else was there to say? Presumably Joe had decided that this was not the moment to talk about all the things that he’d had on his mind the night before because he said, ‘I’ve got to go,’ and slammed the phone down, leaving Kate listening to the uninspiring burr of the open line.