‘How come?’ Freya says. ‘You never have any money.’
‘’Cos I’ve got a job. At Jules’s shop. Starting tomorrow.’
I put a hand on the kitchen counter to steady myself, while Saul, blithely unaware, continues. ‘Why do you think I’m getting up at eight on a Saturday morning? Which reminds me. I need a lift into town in the morning. I’ve got to be there by nine.’
‘Saul.’ I wipe my hands on the tea towel. ‘I forgot to say. Jules is sorry but she made a staffing error. She can’t take you on after all. I’m so sorry.’
‘Really? Shit.’
‘I know. But you’ll find something else . . .’
‘Not so loaded after all,’ Freya quips, and Saul pulls a face at her.
‘At least I won’t have to get up early on a Saturday,’ he says.
‘You don’t mind?’ I ask, anxious.
‘Only about the money.’
‘You don’t mind forgoing invaluable experience selling booties and Babygros?’ Pete says. Saul flushes and grins at Pete. ‘You don’t have to pay for the ticket anyway. It’s my treat.’
‘You would never have been up in time,’ Thea says to Saul. ‘You’re a lazy slob.’
Saul gets up and chases her, screaming, out of the room, and Freya follows.
I pour Pete a glass of wine. He sits at the kitchen table and flicks through his mail.
I catch another waft of Freya’s perfume and realize that its effect on me isn’t because it’s so powerful, it’s that I’ve smelled it before. It has uncomfortable associations. The last time I smelled it was at Jules’s house when Saffie came downstairs. She was wearing it the night she says my son raped her. Saffie and Freya are friends. It’s understandable they would want the same perfume at their age. But now I wonder what they talk about to each other. I wonder what Freya says to Saffie about Saul. Or, more pertinently, what Saffie says to Freya. I wonder if Saffie’s rape allegation might become the stuff of school gossip.
‘Are you OK?’ Pete asks, looking up. ‘You look upset.’
‘I’ll tell you later,’ I say.
*
After supper, when the children have dispersed to their rooms, there’s a ping on my phone. I find it lying beside the cooker where I slammed it down earlier. It’s a tweet.
@Hollyseymore bitchwhodeservesraping #feminazi
‘Oh,’ I say out loud.
‘What’s up?’
‘Nothing.’ I put my hand over the screen.
‘What is it?’ Pete frowns. ‘Are they still trolling you? Holly? You have to tell me. Let me see.’
I hand him the phone.
‘Bloody hell,’ he says.
The phone pings again. This time, the tweet reads, @Hollyseymore likesitrough #feminazi
Pete reads it, then drops my phone onto the table.
‘This is going too far,’ he says. ‘Who is it?’
Freya comes into the kitchen then, asking where her headphones are, followed by Thea complaining that Freya won’t play with her. She’s shut herself in their room to listen to music. So Pete and I are in our bedroom before we find a moment alone.
I sit on the edge of the bed. He reaches out to me and I get the little electric pulse his touch always arouses in me. But I lift his hand, place it back on the duvet. ‘I’ve been trying to deal with this on my own. But I can’t.’
Foolishly I find I’m close to tears again. What’s wrong with me? I’m not usually prone to crying. But since Jules’s visit, and her allegation, the tears have been poised, ready to fall. I try to get the words out.
‘Come here,’ Pete says, his hand on my shoulder now, pulling me down towards him.
I swing my legs under the covers and snuggle into him.
‘I don’t blame you for feeling upset,’ he says. ‘It’s really nasty, this trolling stuff. Perhaps you should stop attending those consent discussions?’
‘I can’t,’ I say. ‘They’re important. The students can’t run them on their own. But anyway, Pete, that’s not why I’m upset. It’s something else. Worse.’ I shut my eyes. ‘I wanted to sort this out with Jules, but it seems as if Jules has got it in for Saul. That’s what’s upsetting me more than anything. That she can believe such things about him.’
‘Hey, hey. Slow down. I’m confused here. One thing at a time.’
I take a deep breath and turn onto my side so I’m facing Pete.
‘Two weeks ago while Jules and I were out, Saul went round to use her internet. And Saffie says . . . I want you to know I don’t believe her, before I go on . . .’
‘What does she say?’ Pete asks.
I look into Pete’s soft grey-green eyes, trying to gauge his possible reaction. He’s the best listener. It’s what I was so attracted to when I first met him at Jules and Rowan’s. When I found I could talk and talk to him and he would never look bored. Even when I regaled him with my concerns about Saul, my mixed feelings about leaving London, he would just nod and go on listening. He doesn’t judge. He doesn’t react. And so I can tell him.
‘Saffie says Saul raped her.’
Pete flings the duvet back. Sits up. ‘She what? Whoa . . . hang on a minute,’ he says. ‘That’s a very serious allegation.’
‘I know. You know. Jules knows. I just don’t think Saffie understands how serious it is.’
Pete asks me to tell him all the details. I dredge up everything Jules told me again, including Saul, allegedly, saying she was ‘asking for it’.
At last, Pete sighs and says, ‘And you think it’s a lie?’
‘Pete! How can you even ask that? Of course it’s a lie. I just can’t work out why she’s lying. Saffie’s known Saul all her life. I’m her godmother. Why would she say a thing like that about Saul when they used to play together as kids, for goodness’ sake? They were like brother and sister. I don’t understand why she would turn on him like this.’
‘You’ve asked Saul? Whether something happened between them?’
I swallow and look at Pete. ‘I tried. I probed.’
‘You probed?’ Pete straightens up. ‘You have to ask him outright, Holly. You have to check every last detail against what Saffie’s said.’
‘I can’t tell him she’s accused him of rape. It will devastate him.’
‘You’re overprotecting him again, Holl. You have to be upfront with him.’
‘No, I don’t. Not with him as he is at the moment. When the bullying only stopped a while ago. He’s still so alone here. He’ll be gutted to know something so heinous has been said about him. Especially since it’s Saffie who’s said it. It will destroy him.’
‘If he’s got nothing to hide, he can tell us, and we can get to the bottom of it.’
I put my face in my hands.
‘Saffie gave Jules intimate details,’ I say through my fingers. ‘She’s made it sound very plausible. She’s not going to retract it now.’
‘Fuck.’
‘But it isn’t true. Saul was on the internet all that evening. Besides, he’s never had a sexual relationship with anyone. And when he does, he’ll respect them. He lives with me, for goodness’ sake. Saul knows better than anyone about sex, love, mutual affection. He just would not do this.’
I pause. Have I ever had the ‘sex’ talk other mums refer to? Or have I skirted round it, assuming that my son would have picked up all he needs to know by virtue of living with me? Because I’ve discussed my consent sessions with Pete over dinner?
‘Why would Saffie tell such a blatant lie?’ Pete asks.
I shrug. ‘She’s been acting out lately. Who knows?’
Pete and I both fall silent for a while. Then Pete says, ‘Bloody hell. This is crap.’
‘I know.’
I look across at him, sitting up in bed, his face impossible to read.
‘Pete, I need to know you don’t believe Saffie, do you?’
His expression shifts, from perplexity to helplessness.
‘I can’t imagine Saul has it in him, no,’ he says at
last. ‘Of course I can’t. But it’s such an outrageous accusation. What on earth has triggered it?’
The sense I get when I look at Pete is of a vast sinkhole opening up under the ground, which I had only recently begun to believe could feel solid and safe again.
*
I lie awake, only falling into sleep towards dawn. When I open my eyes, it’s eight. There’s a smell of coffee drifting up from the kitchen and of batter frying. I push back the duvet, grab a dressing gown and go downstairs.
Pete’s girls are dressed, eating pancakes at the kitchen table.
‘Isn’t it a little early for you to be up on a Saturday morning?’ I ask, filling the kettle. ‘You haven’t got ballet this morning, have you, Thea? And you’ve finished your exams, Freya. You could both have had a lie-in.’
The windows are steamed up with condensation from the warm kitchen. It’s cold outside. I rub a clear patch in the misted window. Frost glistens on the grass and on the rose bushes and branches of the apple tree in our small, tattered garden. Yellow windfalls lie all over the grass. I’ve forgotten to collect them and they’re beginning to rot.
‘We’re going to Mum’s,’ Freya says.
I stop and turn and look at them. ‘But it’s your weekend here,’ I say. ‘What do you mean you’re going to Deepa’s?’
‘Dad’s idea,’ Freya shrugs.
Pete comes into the kitchen from outside. He’s fully dressed in jeans and his outdoor jacket.
‘What’s happening, Pete?’ I ask. ‘It’s the girls’ weekend here.’
‘Ah. Just been scraping the car. There’s a frost. Deepa’s asked if they could go over there. Her dad’s made a surprise visit from Delhi. He arrived late last night, and she texted early this morning saying she wants them to see their grandpa. You don’t mind, do you? You didn’t have any plans for them?’
I shake my head. Though I have. Of course I have. I always make plans the weekends they’re here. ‘Nothing special. It’s just . . . I was looking forward to spending time with you girls. Thought we could have had a pizza and a film tonight.’
My stomach’s churning. The conversation Pete and I had the night before haunts me.
‘Aww. That would have been so nice,’ Thea’s saying. ‘Do we have to see Grandpa, Dad?’
‘Thea, shush,’ says Freya. ‘Mum wants us to go. You’ll hurt her feelings if we don’t.’
‘But we’re hurting Holly’s feelings by going,’ Thea says.
‘It’s fine.’ I run the back of a finger down her cheek. ‘I’m not hurt, darling, just surprised. I didn’t realize he was coming this weekend.’
‘It was unexpected,’ Pete replies. ‘Deepa sends her apologies. For the short notice. Come on, girls, eat up. Grandpa’s only there for a short time and he wants to make the most of it.’
Before I know it, it seems, they are up off their chairs, pulling coats on, grabbing their weekend bags and Pete is hustling them out of the door.
Pete turns to me as they get into the car. ‘We’ll talk later.’
‘Are you spending the day with Deepa’s father as well?’
I don’t mean to sound upset. We have, so far, managed to remain civil about our blended family. I tolerate Pete spending family holidays with Deepa and the girls, and Deepa tolerates us having the girls every other weekend at our house. She let them spend last Christmas with us, only the second since Pete and I got together. And I accept that there are times when they prefer to stay at hers, that it should be the girls’ choice, especially when there’s a family occasion like this one. But Pete has agreed to talk with me about Saul once he’s had a chance to process what I’ve told him. It now looks as though I’m going to be tormenting myself all day alone.
‘I’ll stay for a bit. Then I thought I’d pop to the library in town and catch up on my assignment, but I’ll be back this evening,’ Pete says. He grabs my collar, pulls me to him and kisses me quickly on the lips. ‘Love you,’ he says. Then he turns and walks out to his car, and I watch him pull out into the road and drive away, the girls in the back.
I clear up the suddenly vacant kitchen, the plates, a mug of coffee half drunk, the pancake pan still smouldering.
‘Where is everyone?’ Saul comes in, grabs the cafetière and pours himself a mug of coffee.
‘Pete’s taken the girls over to see their grandfather. He’s made a surprise visit. D’you want a pancake? There’s plenty of mixture left over.’
I make the pancakes and he scoffs two with bacon and maple syrup in quick succession, then stands up and says he’s going to cycle down the river and take some photos.
‘Really?’
‘I want to capture the landscape in this frost. And anyway, I need to get some exercise. I spend too much time sitting around.’
‘That’s true,’ I tease. ‘It just seems a bit out of character. You could’ve had a longer lie-in since you’re not working after all.’
‘I need to get out.’
‘Well, wrap up warm,’ I say pointlessly as I watch him set off.
It’s a mixed blessing having a house that overlooks the green where I can see Saul’s comings and goings. I can’t stop myself going to the front window in the sitting room, observing his lanky stance as he bends over his bike to pump up the tyres. The solitary figure he makes as he pedals away, in his trackie bottoms and with his beanie pulled down over his brow. I wonder if this sudden display of energy is a sign of enthusiasm for the future, now he’s found his photography course. Or whether he has something on his conscience.
I stay and stare out of the window when he’s gone. The grass on the green glistens with frost, and the trunks of the trees are more like pieces of industrial scaffolding than anything natural, shiny grey, their leaves frozen and etched in white. The windows in the yellowish Cambridgeshire brick houses opposite are dark. On the other side, where the new estate begins, cars, their windows made opaque by the ice, are a sign that the commuting contingent of the village has returned for the weekend. At last I turn from the window and have to stop myself from ringing Jules. Saturday is when she persuades me – the reluctant jogger – to do the park run with her. I miss her morning call, her insistence I will feel better after it, the coffees we would have had in the cafe to reward ourselves. I wonder if she’s missing me too.
Jules and I have barely ever gone more than two days without speaking to one another. On holiday with Archie and Saul once, in Scotland, where there was no mobile signal, we wrote to each other. Long, handwritten letters, sent in envelopes with proper stamps. Jules has been my sounding board for almost every thought I’ve had over the last twenty years, and, as far as I know, I am hers. Yet the things that were said yesterday in London, in my office, have driven a wedge between us and it feels unbearable.
*
Before I know it, I’m upstairs, pushing open Saul’s bedroom door. My compulsion to search for clues comes from the same source I imagine a wife might feel when she’s been told by a ‘well-wisher’ that her husband is having an affair. She might not believe it, she might not want to find evidence that will prove her worst fears, but she is driven to search his wallet, his pockets, to scrutinize receipts, bank statements, texts, emails. It’s more a search for disproof than proof. I’m searching Saul’s room to find evidence that Saffie lied. Or perhaps what I’m really looking for is clues as to who my son is these days. He’s moving away from me as he reaches his mid-teens, which is absolutely, as Pete says, as it should be. But he’s still my son. He is still, deep down inside, the boy I gave birth to, nurtured, treasured and brought up on my own since he was ten. I need to know who this person is becoming. The person for whom I would lay down my life.
The surfaces in Saul’s room are thick with a silvery layer of dust you can write your name in. I haven’t cleaned it in weeks. But Saul’s tidy for a teenage boy. I’ve heard other people describe their sons’ bedrooms as pits or dumps or festering holes. Saul’s room is organized, his schoolbooks lined up on his desk, his vinyl and CDs ne
atly stacked on shelf units, his clothes put away in drawers. There are posters on his walls, pictures of Kurt Cobain, with whom he has developed a fascination, and of contemporary bands, tickets from concerts he went to in London before we moved. There’s a pile of photography magazines next to the bed. And a book of John Donne’s writings. The collection I left in the loo.
Saul’s computer is an old one Pete gave him when he replaced his. I try to log on, punching in the password Pete always used: Arsenal 2014. Nothing happens. I try a few other ideas but get the same response: ‘The password you have used has not been recognized.’
It doesn’t surprise me. Any self-respecting teenager would change their password. I give up on the computer and look at his fitted cupboard, with its drawers and compartments. These days, I usually toss dry washing onto his bed for him to put away himself and never go near his cupboard. I find it touching that he’s this organized when I’ve never taught him to be so. And am not like that myself. His boxers have been folded up and stashed in lines, and his socks are balled and kept in a separate drawer. He has a bigger drawer beneath this where he has folded his T-shirts and hoodies. I lift them and put them to my nose to smell the washing powder I’ve used on them since he was a little boy.
The scent conjures days we spent together in our London house after Archie died, Saul curled up next to me, grounding me when everything felt as if it was disintegrating, when nothing felt safe anymore. He used to smooth the two lines he said I had on my brow. He was always checking in those days whether I was all right. Always ensuring I was smiling or laughing. Have I been too dependent on Saul? Did I lean too heavily on him? Is he finally trying to make a break from me?
Then I pull out the biggest, bottom drawer and stop, shocked. There’s a tub of protein powder and a pair of dumb-bells. Saul’s never been the kind of boy who worries about his body shape. Of course, though, it isn’t just girls who are under pressure to look a certain way these days. Boys are bombarded by images of men with six-packs and biceps and waxed, bronzed torsos. If Saul has been worrying about what he looks like, I had no idea! Is this behind his sudden interest in cycling? Is he trying harder to fit in than I realized? Should I have been more aware, got him a gym membership, encouraged him to join the sports events all the local boys participate in?
I Thought I Knew You Page 8