Like my dad leaving my mother. I watch him help Audrey to some cheese, his gnarled hand firm on the knife, the blue veins standing proud from the pressure. I can almost feel his potter’s grip from when he used to wrap me in a towel at bathtime. I collect the pudding bowls from the cupboard and, as I set them down, see that he and Audrey are holding hands under the table.
*
Somehow, we end up keeping the cats. David intended them as child substitutes for his broody lover, and brought them to dinner en route to staying the night at what Dylan likes to call, with no little irony, his vicar-cage. After coffee, and having been banned from doing the washing up, Dad and Audrey have gone to bed. Dylan sits at the grand piano: a present from Matt to me when he was made a consultant. Its glossy lid is home to framed photos – two dozen or more: our wedding, a skiing trip, parties, christenings. I have my hair up. I have a bob. I have stick-on flicks. I have a henna rinse. I am blonde. I’m with friends; I’m holding their babies. Matt is kissing me.
Dylan is playing the piano. A female ball of fur and bones has commandeered his lap. Dylan is running through the songs to a Stephen Sondheim musical he hopes to stage to raise money to repair his church roof. His mother, Pamela, is threatening to audition. The male cat jumps off David’s knees, and saunters into a piano leg.
‘That cat’s got Amber’s sense of direction!’ guffaws Matt.
‘Better that’, I snap, ‘than that he has your sense of humour.’ Matt rises to close the front shutters and plants a noisy kiss on my head as he passes.
‘You guys!’ says David, whose hair reminds me of a startled grey mammal. I watch him flick cat fur from his combat trousers. Let’s hope it doesn’t fly up and get caught in the braces on his teeth. When I stop my silent bitch-fest, I realise that Dylan has been making up a song about the cats, which he has christened Tim and Tallulah.
‘Keep them!’ cries Dylan, thudding a final chord before swivelling round on the stool.
‘Now I know how Mary must have felt before the Angel Gabriel,’ says Matt, solemnly.
My insides curdle. Has Matt changed his mind about having children? ‘Don’t be daft, Dylan,’ I say quickly.
‘Why not? I’m running a retreat in a couple of days’ time, so, as much as David wants me to have them—’
‘Don’t be daft,’ I repeat, buying time for Matt to ride to my rescue, slay this evil offer and keep our pairing intact. As a psychiatrist, he’s rigid on boundaries. Apparently patients hate his professional neutrality, and attempt all manner of personal intrusions. They quiz him, wanting him as their special friend, their surrogate parent. And Matt smiles (at least I always picture him in his office smiling, since he’s always smiling at me), and scribbles a note or two on a pad. Then he wonders aloud why they want to know. This annoys them intensely, which makes for more notes, more smiles.
‘Sounds like a great idea,’ says Matt.
I glare at my husband. ‘Are they house-trained?’ I ask, as if remotely interested.
‘They’re barely five weeks old.’
‘Dylan tells me you’ve decided not to have kids—’ I note the way David slips this in, as if to say, Dylan’s told me everything about you ‘— so you won’t have to worry about small hands accidentally shutting them in the washing machine.’
‘It’s not their welfare I’m worried about,’ I snap.
‘And they do so match your Farrow & Ball paintwork,’ he adds, raising an eyebrow. I meet his look with one of my own, as a nickname for him, ‘Camp David’, takes up residence in my head.
Matt is on his haunches by the fireplace. One kitten is on its hind legs, tugging with its front paws at Matt’s sleeve; the other is being tickled, eyes half-closed in apparent ecstasy. A parent playing with the children. I feel a sharp stitch in my left side. ‘Dyl, why me?’
‘Because we’re like family, you and me. Friends are the new family—’
‘Like white is the new black,’ smirks David. I want to slug him.
‘And they’re sooooo adorable,’ says Dylan, watching Matt and the cats.
‘So, you have them, Dyl—’ Then I stop, realising in that moment that all three men are now looking at me in a particularly complicit way. My chest feels tight. I rub my collarbone.
‘All right,’ I say with a sigh. ‘But only until you’re back from your retreat.’ I watch as Matt rises to close the French windows. ‘Then you must have them. You’re the broody one around here.’
David taps his watch and reminds Dylan of his eight o’clock Communion tomorrow morning. He goes out to his car and returns with a cardboard box, which contains all the paraphernalia novice parents of juvenile cats need for those crucial first nights at home. Dylan is hunching on his jacket. Watching him flick his Pre-Raphaelite curls out from under the collar, a sudden rush of feeling floods my body. His eyes are red and watery, as if leaving the cats behind constitutes a loss of insurmountable proportions.
There is a pause. David, hovering by the car, clears his throat. I have this fleeting sense, perhaps incorrect, that David is prompting Dylan, that he’s taking control.
Dylan looks at me again, and this time his squeeze at the tops of my arms is just a little too sharp. ‘Darling, I meant to tell you earlier. David and I, we’re thinking of adopting.’
Chapter Three
I AM STANDING in bare feet, gripping the basin in one hand. With the other I pull at strands of blonde hair along my parting – I do not need to use the bathroom mirror in front of me. My fingers detect subtle textural differences, dropping those that feel too smooth, too regular, gently tugging until one strand remains between thumb and middle finger, a strand slightly thicker than all the rest, and therefore from experience more likely to be a darker shade, a strand punctuated by coarse ridges suggesting the beginnings of a fracture, a place of weakness. Prepubescent cats for a week I can just about cope with. I pull, absorbed in the friction between my fingers, skimming the bumps, soothed by the monotony. Dylan, actively gay and my oldest friend, suddenly (Yes! All right, Matt, not overnight, but you know what I mean) acquiring a lifetime commitment to children he’ll raise as his own is altogether different. I take the shaft of hair in my left hand, inching my way along it with my right, scoring it with my thumbnail, enjoying the resistance between hair cuticle and finger, making the hair curl like scissors scrolling ribbon for a parcel. If I increase the pressure just slightly, I’ll hear the hair snap at its point of tension, split ends feathering into existence.
Instead, tonight I pull the strand right out of my scalp. I feel the root tear from its follicle, feel the small bead of pain, see the bulb’s creamy globule of oil wobble in the air as I exhale. The planes of my face in the mirror are harsh yet strangely passive, my untugged hair flat and closely cropped (I am going through a vague Mia Farrow phase). I am aware of a fierce ache in my upper arms.
Chapter Four
‘I DON’T KNOW WHY you’re worrying, yaar,’ sighs Nicole, easing a column of chocolate hair over her shoulder. ‘Dylan’s gay. He’ll never be approved.’
I stop tipping my chair, and watch my colleague drink her first iced coffee of Monday morning. Such breaks are rare. We work hard, as headhunters, recruiting to fill senior corporate vacancies. It’s not exactly rocket science, but I’ve got the knack of helping people fit together. Pity I had no joy with my parents.
I’ve decided this morning to confide in Nicole – hence the caffeine break. Nicole and I are the only female partners in the firm. We wear linen trouser suits and hide our laptops in grosgrain handbags, which sit at our feet like spaniels.
‘What do you mean, approved ?’
‘Well, adoption agencies are very picky.’ Nicole’s voice, as much as her sentiment, soothes me. Her New Delhi lilt always sounds intelligent and precise; it makes me believe her implicitly. ‘They prefer you to be under thirty. Which Dylan, like us, is not. And married, which Dylan could claim to be, but only to a higher being.’ Nicole sips her drink through beautiful, cushioned lips. ‘A
nd you must be deemed sensible, na, which Dylan most definitely hasn’t been since he tried to become treasurer of the College Boat Club—’
‘Only because he fancied the cox. Dylan couldn’t move through water if you sewed on an outboard motor. But he’s a vicar.’
‘Absolutely. And you have to be straight.’
‘Seriously?’
Nicole sets her drink down on my desk blotter and proceeds to finger-comb her hair. ‘Actually, I’m not sure about that one. He could go abroad, where the rules aren’t so strict.’
I choke on a mouthful of coffee. ‘You mean, he might get a child from overseas?’
‘Absolutely!’ laughs Nicole, picking up her cup again and noisily sucking a mixture of chilled milk and air through the straw. ‘But stop being so xenophobic, yaar? We foreigners aren’t quite as awful as you might think. And Dylan’s bound to make you godmother. How many would that make in your portfolio?’
‘Six, at last count.’
Nicole pouts her approval. ‘How on earth do you tell them apart?’
‘It’s all on a spreadsheet.’
‘Achha? A spreadsheet.’ We both laugh – Nicole because she assumes I’m joking, and me because I know I’m not.
‘Of course, it doesn’t just feature godchildren. It records all the kids of people I know. Look.’ I click my mouse and, when I’ve located the right file, swivel the screen to Nicole. I list out the columns: ‘Date of birth, full name (including Hebrew alternatives where appropriate), eye colour, presents bought, presents requested, hobbies, allergies—’
‘Ye-gods!’ says Nicole, in that slangy, old-fashioned Hinglish of hers that I adore. ‘Boys’ names in blue, girls’ in red?’
‘And duplicates are underlined.’
‘Don’t you get bored of being so anal?’
My skin prickles. I have to remind myself that Nicole is my friend. ‘Don’t all godmothers do this?’
‘Dominic was made a godfather once, but he can’t remember who to.’
‘Oh, right. You and Dominic still—?’
‘On and off, yaar. Can’t remember why, but there we are. Probably something to do with the fact that he doesn’t keep banging on about having kids.’
I smile. With that defiant, if suspiciously un-English, ‘e’ (Nicole’s parents spent their honeymoon in the former French colony of Pondicherry), Nicole was apparently often overheard as a child voicing a desire to grow up to be an expensive toy. A First in Psychology and a successful career appear not to have dimmed such ambition.
*
During the morning, my mood seesaws. Interviewing candidates, or phoning them to tell them they’ve got the job, are absorbing tasks. Also, my dad rings, to let me know that he and Audrey got home safely this morning. We chat, although I steer clear of mentioning Dylan’s announcement. But, between one task and the next, panic flares up like toothache in a cavity. Dylan is planning to have children. How could he! And, how could he – in the sense of how will it happen? I grip the sides of my desk until my knuckles are tinged with white.
My friends fall into two camps: not gay and straight, as Matt once scientifically observed, but child-ful and child-free. On the one side, I’m aware of an ever-increasing regiment of wailing, overtired creatures, whose self-obsessed behaviour is acted out in the name of their demanding offspring. On the other side stand Matt and me.
Our outriders are Dylan and Nicole, flanked by Jenny and Clive, who, despite being the first of my college gang to marry, have never seemed inclined to spawn. Which we all tease them about, since one would fear for children born to a father with such a droopy, unfashionable moustache and a mother who has a penchant for bright, voluminous knitwear. Clive is a skinny management consultant. There is something of the angle-poise about him. Jenny is not skinny. She has an amazing singing voice, mellifluous with a rasp to it, honey dripping over the honeycomb. But she is one of life’s mice; and I have always been privately intrigued, given her size, how easily someone as talented as Jenny can recede into the background. Perhaps that’s why she favours such raucous jumpers.
That Dylan is now switching sides constitutes, in my humble opinion, an act of extraordinary selfishness and betrayal.
*
‘So, yaar, what have you bought the twins?’ asks Nicole, extracting a pack of moist tissues from her bag and wiping her manicured fingers before tackling her sandwich. (We regret to inform you of the temporary closure today of the staff canteen due to staff training.)
‘They asked for guitars,’ I reply, as I prise open a tub of salad and select the one cherry tomato. We have both had our respective client lunches cancelled and are relishing the freedom of eating without cutlery. ‘Serena and Harry will kill me.’
Nicole shakes her head. ‘Serena won’t. With five daughters in the house, another hundred decibels won’t make that much difference. And Harry won’t notice – he’s a teacher. He’s congenitally oblivious to group disruption. Nicole dabs at the corners of her mouth. ‘Now, ask me what I’ve bought them. I have bought’, she continues excitedly, ‘a bead kit for Eloise to braid her hair, and glittery playing cards for Esme. And, unlike you, I’m not even their godmother. I am so kind!’ she laughs. ‘Those children will remember my presents for the rest of their lives.’
‘Don’t be daft. Do you remember what your godparents gave you when you were five?’
‘Not much need for godparents, given that several generations of my dad’s family all lived together in the same compound in Delhi.’
I struggle to imagine what having lots of relations around must feel like. Both my sets of grandparents died in the war, neither my dad nor my mother has siblings, and by the time I was four my parents had lost touch with the couple they’d made my godparents.
‘But that’s not the point,’ continues Nicole. ‘These girls will remember me—’
‘—when they’re in therapy with Matt,’ I laugh, ‘whingeing about the stereotypical presents they got as kids. We scar them for life! We buy them the presents we wish we’d had as children. And, when they grow up, they’ll do exactly the same.’
‘At least we give presents and bother to show up for parties, na. Remember last year? Very bad form to forget a godchild’s birthday. Still, Ed was single back then. I wonder if he’ll make it to the party this afternoon in person, or simply delegate to the lovely Louisa.’
I stop chewing. ‘Ed won’t be at the party.’ I fork my salad leaves lazily, whilst Nicole prods my arm, demanding clarification. ‘You and I are collecting Louisa en route.’
‘So he’s coming on later?’
‘Ed’s left Louisa.’
‘Achha! When? How?’
‘Last week. On a plane. With his new woman.’
‘Ye-gods! Typical Ed. He’s so fickle.’
‘And Louisa’s so pregnant.’
Nicole’s beautiful brown eyes widen. ‘So that’s why we haven’t seen them for months!’
We pick at our meal in silence, although my appetite, at least, has dwindled. It seems the only thing to do.
Chapter Five
THE NIGHT I wore my white jeans and cooked him coq au vin, Matt told me about his sister. When he was six years old, nearly seven, his parents told him they were going to have a lovely surprise, a miracle – which turned out not to be the genuine Springboks rugby shirt he’d been begging for, but instead a brother or sister, and Matt could choose the name. He called the baby-to-be Lesothosaurus, after his toy dinosaur, but his parents said it had to be a proper name, and began calling the bump Carl or Hannah, depending on whether it was kicking in Mummy’s tummy or just fluttering. But Matt did get to help paint the room overlooking the orange orchards as a nursery, and got to tell all his friends at school that a baby was coming in time for Christmas.
And one night the baby came, although Harvest Festival was only just over. Matt woke to the sounds of a wounded animal groaning, and people running up and down the corridor. When he opened his door, the maid Phoebe rumbled past him in a blur
of blue cotton, carrying the huge saucepan she used for making stews, and slopping water on to her large maroon slippers and the carpet. The howling got louder, followed by low moans, and seemed to be coming from his parents’ bedroom. Lesothosaurus in his hand, Matt was about to check out the source of the noise, when his father burst out of the room, pushing Phoebe in front of him, and screaming at her to get more water, more towels. Phoebe heaved her frame down the corridor and, when she passed Matt standing in his doorway, the tears streaming down made her black face all shiny.
‘Don’t shout at Phoebe,’ he yelled at his father, and slammed shut his bedroom door. He went to sleep with his hands over his ears.
In the morning, his father came and sat on his bed. His hair was all messed up and his eyes were bloodshot, the same as when he and the farm manager would return from a day in Johannesburg, selling oranges at auction. His father said he was sorry for shouting and he hoped that Matt would forgive him. And then he screwed a clump of blanket in his fist, and told Matt about his little sister, a delicate angel too good for this world, who had come for a visit and then gone away.
His father was looking at the wall. Matt had an uncomfortable churning feeling in his tummy. So, with his hand clutching Lesothosaurus under the bedclothes, he asked in a whisper whether he was going to be sent away soon, too. And his father had fled the room.
Chapter Six
DEARLY BELOVED.
Dylan married Matt and me in his church. The building squats in a cul-de-sac like a toad, between a 1960s tower block and a derelict candle factory. Carbon black from decades of grime, its buttresses and stumpy spire are as warts on a natterjack. But appearances can be deceptive. Inside, there’s a reredos of beaten gold beneath a dado of carved alabaster. From the nave, one’s eye is drawn high above the altar to a triptych of stained-glass windows, representing in glowing colours the Father, Son and Holy Ghost of the Trinity. In their design are patterns of such richness and dreamlike unreality that each window blends into one harmonious composition. They are windows of such beauty they feature in guidebooks.
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