by Fiona Gibson
“I didn’t think so.” Hannah grinned. Her face had changed over the past year or so; gone more angular, losing its childlike softness. He knew he should ask her about school, about exams and all those dad-type questions, but he suspected she wouldn’t want to fill the evening with study-related small talk.
“You can still come and see Zoë anytime you like,” he added quickly.
“I will. It’s just with the show being really close, and all the rehearsals and costume fittings, I haven’t really had time.”
That was girls for you, Max thought. Fickle and unfathomable. “Anyway,” he said, “how was Scotland?”
“Okay, apart from the end bit. I drew a lot—sketches of the hills and seals and stuff.”
“That’s great, Han. You’ll have to show me sometime.”
“They’re nothing special.” Max could detect a hint of tension in her smile. Perhaps he was capable of reading his own daughter after all.
“And Mum enjoyed her course?” he asked.
Pink patches sprang up on Hannah’s cheeks. “I think so.”
“Hannah,” he started, “is there something—”
“She’s thinking of leaving her job,” she interjected. “Has she told you? She wants to do stained glass full-time.”
“Really?” Max was incredulous. Was this something to do with Nancy’s fit of madness? When Jane had told him about his mother-in-law’s shock announcement—he did still view Nancy as his mother-in-law—he’d assumed it was some kind of sick joke. Abandoning her home, her entire London life—how could anyone behave so recklessly?
“She’s been at Nippers for ten years,” Hannah added. “She wants to try something new.”
Max was silent for a moment. “What about you?” he asked. “Your mum said she thought something had happened. With some boy.”
“Been discussing me, have you?” she asked. There was a tinge to her voice, as if something sour had landed on her tongue.
“No, it’s just that—”
“Yes, Dad, I was seeing someone,” she said curtly. “Turned out he was two-timing me.”
He smiled inwardly at her use of such a teenage phrase. “Sounds as if you’re best out of it.”
“I know.” She studied her menu nonchalantly. “Especially as the other girl’s pregnant.”
Max felt as if he’d been whacked in the stomach with his own crutch. “Pregnant?” he repeated.
“Yeah.”
He didn’t know how to respond. Had Hannah, too, been having sex with this two-timing jerk? He hadn’t the first idea how to broach the subject.
“It’s okay, Dad,” she said, touching his hand across the table, “I’m not that dumb.”
Max smiled weakly. “I’m glad to hear it.”
“To be honest,” she continued, “I feel sorry for her. Some poor girl landing herself with such a shit. And his mum—I went round to see him, and she thought I was the pregnant one. I felt sorry for her, too. She seemed kind of…fragile.”
Max nodded, trying to appear interested, though mustering any sympathy for his daughter’s ex-boyfriend’s mother was beyond him. What was it about the female psyche that made them so fascinated about people they barely knew? It was too hot in here, Max decided, flapping the neck of his T-shirt. The food smells, plus the smoke that was drifting from a table with five cackling women crammed around it—it was all conspiring to make him feel quite unwell. He wondered where the waitress had stashed his crutches. “Dad,” Hannah said, “are you listening?”
“Sorry, Han, I’m just feeling a bit—”
“What’s weird,” she continued, “is Celia seemed really nice. The kind of person, if I hadn’t been so upset, I’d have stayed and talked to for longer….”
“Celia?” Max could feel a trickle of sweat on his temple.
“Yeah, Ollie’s Mum. Celia Tibbs.”
The waitress approached their table. As if his arm were mechanically operated, Max flapped her away. “What’s wrong?” Hannah asked.
“Nothing. Nothing at all.” He snatched a menu from the table, realizing his hands were drenched with sweat, and pretended to focus on it. Celia Tibbs. It was hardly a common name; she had to be the same person. Celia, who had worked in his shop for one hot summer, who’d hung around him after work and been there when they’d all gone out to celebrate a great review in Your Bike magazine. She had a child of her own—he’d have been seven or eight then. “Bet you’re a wonderful dad,” she’d told him.
They hadn’t acknowledged him being a dad or a husband that night they’d staggered drunkenly into her bedsit off the Holloway Road. There’d been a child’s bedroom, he remembered that much, but no son sleeping in it. “He’s at his gran’s,” she’d told him, adding with a laugh, “Good timing, eh?” One little mistake, that’s all she’d been. He could picture the well-worn teddy bear sitting on the bed, watching them reproachfully.
“I’ll have a poached egg salad,” Hannah said. “How about you?”
He tried to focus on the words. “The mushroom thing,” he muttered, picking the first thing that leapt out at him.
“Ugh. Can’t stand them.” He felt her frowning at him over her menu. “Are you okay, Dad? You’ve gone really pale. Is it your leg or something?”
“I’m fine,” he said, catching a waitress’s eye and indicating that they were ready to order, even though there wasn’t one hungry cell in his entire body.
41
Dear William,
I know things have been difficult these past few months. Now that you have promised to stop seeing Winnie, and have vowed not to contact her again, I hope that we can put this episode behind us and build a life together again.
Jane blinked at the neat, compressed handwriting. Winnie: the name was so old-fashioned as to be almost comical. Winnie and William—they could have been an old-fashioned comedy act. William seemed ill-fitting, too. Her mother had always called her husband Bill. Jane had almost forgotten that her father had been a William.
This isn’t because we have Jane. If you and I were to part I am sure that, at eleven years old, she would cope with that. No, I want to make a go of things because I love you very deeply. You destroyed my library and have made a concerted attempt to destroy our marriage but I refuse to let it turn to ash as my clippings did.
I forgive you, William, and I am prepared to shut the past few months in a drawer, firmly lock it and throw away the key. What do you think, can we talk about this?
Love always,
Your wife Nancy
Jane folded up the sheet of blue airmail paper and slipped it back into the file where she’d found it. She hadn’t intended to snoop through the drawers, hadn’t even realized her mother kept personal things there. She had planned to spend an hour or so checking through her mother’s mail, clearing out the fridge and doing a quick, superficial cleanup.
She forgave him, Jane thought, after everything he’d done. Her eyes had misted, and she wiped them against her sweater sleeve.
Her phone bleeped, and she fished it out of her pocket to read the text.
Window looks amazing know you won’t let me pay u but I must thank u somehow love m x
One little mistake was all it had been. Like her mother, Jane could have forgiven, but now it was ten years too late.
“You’ve done what?”
Jane gripped the phone as she cleared away the pencils and half-finished drawings that Hannah had left scattered on the living room table. “I’ve resigned, Mum. Well, not completely. I’ll do one shift a week until Sally finds someone else.”
“You’re misunderstanding,” her mother barked. “Why not make a clean break from the place? What’s all this one-shift-a-week nonsense?”
“Sally’s my friend. I can’t just leave her in the lurch.” And Hannah and I have to live, she added silently.
“You’re playing safe. If you’re going to make a go of—”
“Mum, I am! Three shops are stocking my work. I’ve advertised, dropped leaf lets
and cards off at every local business I can think of, carted panels all over East London…”
“And in between that,” Nancy added with a chuckle, “you’ve been salt-dough modeling or whatever it is you get up to with the kids.”
“I like salt-dough modeling,” Jane said huffily, wondering how this could possibly be the person who’d written such a forgiving letter.
“I suppose you have responsibilities,” Nancy added dryly.
“Yes, I do.” Jane sighed and gnawed the end of Hannah’s charcoal pencil.
“Are you eating? Have I disturbed your meal?”
“No, Mum. Anyway, how are things? Have you settled in?”
A small laugh. “Busy as anything. A full summer program set up and running with bookings already coming in. I suppose you’ve seen our new website?”
“Yes,” Jane lied.
“So, are you going to?”
“To…what?”
“Book a place for the summer school. We can offer a discount.”
“I can’t keep coming to Scotland! I’ve got stuff to do here, Mum, like—”
“What’s so important that you can’t give yourself a week off, now you’re only working one day a week?”
Jane burst out laughing. “I’ve got…stuff.”
Nancy snorted, then her voice softened as she said, “We’d like to see you.”
“We?”
Nancy paused. “Conor asks about you. Thank goodness for him, is all I can say, working with this drunken imbecile…”
Something twisted in Jane. She wanted to say, What do you mean, he asks about me? He could have got in touch if he’d wanted to. “I popped into your house today,” she said quickly. “It was strange, being in the archive room without you.”
She heard her mother take a breath. “You could do me a favor and clear it out.”
“What would I do with it all?” Jane asked.
“I don’t really care. It’s only stuff, Jane. I’ve had enough of hanging on to things that no longer fit into my life.”
The house seemed too quiet after the call. Hannah was at Zoë’s birthday do, and Sally was coming round later to share a bottle of wine. Stuff, Jane thought, casting an eye around the living room. So much stuff she’d accumulated since moving here ten years ago. The house had been pleasingly empty the first time they’d walked in. Plain pale walls, plain faded carpets, the only artifice being those window boxes filled with blowsy plants. She’d tried to remember to water when she noticed them reprimanding her with their sagging heads.
So he’d been asking about her, had he? Jane wondered if the laundry-basket Dalek was still in one piece. Lewis, unlike Hannah, struck her as a careful child who’d look after his possessions. She doubted if Conor had to rake under leaves for lost Dr. Who figurines.
Jane found a notebook between numerous drawing pads under her desk. The pages were the flimsy airmail kind like her mother had used for her Dear William letter. She found a pen on the table and wrote:
Dear Conor,
I’m writing to apologize for leaving without saying goodbye and for avoiding you after the night we spent together. As you know, Hannah had an asthma attack and I felt terrible for not being there when it happened. I know that my being with you didn’t make it happen, but as a parent—as I’m sure you know—you can always find a million and one reasons to blame yourself for anything.
Mum says she sees a lot of you. She seems to have settled in well and is keeping Archie in line. I think about you often, Conor, and especially that night we spent together. It might sound crazy, but since Max and I split I haven’t met anyone who I’ve felt anything for, and there you were. I’ve felt quite restless since we came home—which has turned into a kind of productive whirl, and I’m inundated with work over the next few months. In fact, there’s enough to keep me going until the end of the year. I have almost given up the day job as it’s always been a reason not to throw myself into my business wholeheartedly—a kind of security blanket.
Why am I telling you this? I feel as if I know you, even though we spent such a short time together. Just that one night, and look what happened. I hope you and Lewis are happy and that the Dalek put in a fearsome performance at the costume contest. I also hope you like the panel I left for you, and that you have managed to find a home for it.
With love,
Jane
She looked down at the page. What was she thinking, spilling out her feelings to him? She’d been home for four weeks. He could have got in touch—found her number or e-mail on Archie’s computer, or asked her mother for it. As for the panel—couldn’t he have thanked her, even if he hadn’t liked or wanted it?
It was obvious, she realized with crushing certainty, that Conor had no plans to contact her again. A one-night stand—that’s all she’d been to him. When the next batch of students arrived he’d pick one out to befriend, asking her round for supper and taking her up to the foothills of the mountain to see the broken-down church.
Tear pricked Jane’s eyes as she reread her letter. They weren’t the words of a responsible adult but a hormonal fifteen year-old who couldn’t even keep geraniums alive. She ripped out the page, scrunched it up in her fist and fired it across the room, scoring a direct hit in the waste bin.
Then, telling herself that she had nothing to fear—that she was just late, and probably panicking over nothing—she headed upstairs to the bathroom to do the pregnancy test.
42
Hannah wasn’t sure how Zoë had managed to rake together a collection of friends for her birthday dinner. They were occupying the largest table in the Italian restaurant, tossing and flapping their hair like changing-room curtains. Veronica sat at the farthest end of the table like a queen surveying her subjects. Everyone, Hannah realized as she twirled linguine around her fork, was blond, apart from her. She felt like a different species. “So,” whispered the girl beside her, “I presume you’re the latest?”
Hannah frowned. “Latest what?”
“NBF.”
“Don’t know what you mean,” she said with a shrug.
“New best friend.” The girl grinned, showing gleaming pink gums.
Hannah tried to catch Zoë’s eye, but she was too busy laughing theatrically with a girl who kept throwing her head back, as if she were having trouble controlling her neck muscles.
“It’s the way she operates,” the girl added. “Gets super-close to someone, hangs out with them all the time, then drifts away and moves on to someone else.”
“No, she doesn’t,” Hannah said hotly. Even listening to this girl’s remarks was making her feel disloyal. No wonder Zoë preferred being with her if all her schoolmates were as bitchy as this.
“A toast, everyone!” Veronica was saying, standing up now and gripping the stem of her glass.
“We’ve all been there,” the girl railed. “We’ve all been the NBF.”
“To my beautiful Zoë,” Veronica announced, “happy birthday, darling.”
Everyone cried “Happy birthday” and, in perfect synchronization, a waiter glided toward them with an enormous platter laden with fairy cakes. Each fairy cake had been intricately iced with spirals of piped icing. “It’s okay, Hannah,” Veronica brayed over the table, “they’re all natural colors. I was very specific about that. They won’t set off your asthma or anything.”
Hannah smiled tightly. “Thanks.”
“D’you have asthma?” chirped the girl beside her.
“Um, yeah.”
“That’s a shame. Listen, some of us are going clubbing after this. Want to come?”
“No, thanks,” Hannah said stiffly, “I’m going back to Zoë’s. I’m staying there tonight.” She tried again to catch her eye—send her a let’s-get-the-hell-out-of-here code—but Zoë was swooshing away in the direction of the loo, closely followed by her mother, who was clattering across the polished floor in her Emma Hope wedding shoes.
Hannah had hoped they might lie around gossiping in Zoë’s bedroom, but Zo�
� seemed distracted, and more interested in admiring herself wearing her new earrings. “They’re lovely,” Hannah said. “Who gave you them again?”
“Amelia.”
“Who’s Amelia?” Hannah asked, aware of the strained tinge to her voice.
“She’s just started at our school. She’s dead clever and has this really cool family. You won’t believe it but her mum’s a fashion designer. Amelia gets to pick anything she wants from the collections. She’s going to be a model.”
“Oh,” Hannah responded, picturing the girl who’d kept throwing her head back and filling the restaurant with extravagant laughter.
“You’d like her,” she added. “She’s a laugh. Completely mental.”
Hannah watched Zoë twirling the earrings between her fingers and checking her reflection from all angles. She hadn’t told her about visiting Ollie’s flat, or Ollie’s mother blurting that stuff about the pregnant girl. “It’s just fizzled out,” was all she’d said, “and I’m glad. He was just messing me around.”
“I’m proud of you,” Zoë had said, and Hannah had felt vaguely ashamed for being so grateful for her friend’s approval.
She picked up a copy of Glamour magazine but couldn’t summon up the enthusiasm to read it. Hannah was aware of a hollowness inside her—a feeling of something missing. She could hear Dylan playing a guitar in his room. Zoë’s cell phone rang, and Hannah saw her face light up as she took the call. “Hi Amelia. Yeah, I’d love to—what time? Okay if I bring Han?” Hannah kept her eyes firmly fixed on the magazine. Are Your Friends Toxic? the headline read. Find out if your buddies truly deserve you. “Honestly,” Zoë continued, “I’m really up for it. There’s nothing much happening here.” She finished the call, her eyes gleaming excitedly. “We’re going to town,” she announced. “New club in Covent Garden. Amelia’s mum knows the manager and he’s put our names at the door.”