The Foster Husband

by Pippa Wright

  I’m sure she doesn’t mean it to sound like a corporate merger – expensive family heirloom in exchange for stake in successful family business – but her announcement does sound a little like something one might read in the business section of the paper rather than the giddy gushing of a future bride.

  ‘And’, she continues, ‘we’ve decided that we should use the wedding as an opportunity to show people that Baileys’ can expand beyond just holiday cottages and tourist events – we should be looking at moving into other areas: weddings, parties, fêtes, that sort of thing. We can use the wedding as a showcase for our contacts and expertise. And of course we can get discounts from all of the suppliers if we promise to use them again for future events.’

  ‘Gosh, you’ve given this a lot of thought already,’ says Mum, looking somewhat stunned.

  ‘Of course,’ says Ben affably. ‘Whatever my Prue wants, she gets. We think a wedding in the New Year should give us enough time to set it all up how we want it.’

  ‘But that’s only three months away!’ says Dad.

  ‘Plenty of time,’ Prue dismisses Dad with an airy wave of her hand. ‘The sooner the better, and it’s not like we have that many events in the winter anyway. Don’t you see – we can turn the business into a year-round concern, so we’re not just dependent on the tourist season and visitor numbers?’

  ‘I like having the quiet winter season,’ says Mum gently.

  ‘You can still have that, Mum,’ says Ben. ‘Of course you can. As you head towards retirement it’s only natural that you’ll want to play less of a role in the business. You too, Dad. Prue and I understand that. It’s the natural order of things for you to step down and make way for the energy of a new generation.’

  Dad moves as if he’s going to stand up and I see Mum pull at the edge of his frayed jumper to stop him.

  ‘We’ve thought of everything,’ says Prue.

  ‘You certainly seem to have done that,’ Dad agrees bitterly.

  ‘But Ben,’ I say, spotting a small flaw in their business plan. ‘You can’t be planning to stay at the Alexandra until the wedding, can you? Surely you can’t commute from Bristol every day? Are you going to move in here?’

  ‘No!’ both Dad and Prue exclaim simultaneously.

  She shoots Dad a warning look before answering. ‘Of course not! You know I don’t believe in living together before marriage.’

  ‘Oh,’ I say. I did know it, of course, but I thought it was less of a moral position and more a sign that she hadn’t met someone she wanted to live with.

  ‘I mean, Kate,’ says Prue, frowning. ‘It didn’t work out so well for you, did it?’

  ‘Prue, love,’ admonishes Mum, ‘that’s unkind.’

  ‘Not wrong, though,’ I agree sadly. ‘I suppose living together before marriage isn’t a guarantee of anything really.’

  ‘Exactly,’ says Prue. ‘Which is why Ben is going to move in with you instead.’

  ‘With me?’

  ‘That’s right, sis!’ grins Ben, as if bestowing his presence on me is a gift that he is certain will delight me. ‘Prue said you’ve been lonely all on your own in the bungalow, and I need somewhere to stay while I whip Baileys’ into shape. So it all makes sense!’

  ‘Just wait a minute,’ I say, holding out my hands as if I can ward Ben off physically. ‘Wait one minute, you two. You can’t railroad everyone into doing what you want just because it suits you. Why should I share my house with Ben? Why can’t he move in here?’

  ‘It’s not your house though, is it?’ snaps Prue. ‘Granny Gilbert left it to both of us. And there isn’t a spare room here, and there is at Granny Gilbert’s. You mustn’t be selfish, Kate. Try to think of what other people need.’

  ‘Mum!’ I plead, turning to my parents as if I’m a teenager again. My head swims with alcohol and I can’t form my thoughts into coherent enough sentences to argue back. ‘You can’t agree with this.’ They both stare at me, mute in the face of the force that is my sister.

  Ben reaches over to nudge my arm chummily. ‘Come on, sis, it’ll be fun. Bit of bonding with the in-laws and all that. I promise I’m house-trained.’

  ‘Ben, I’m sure you’re a delightful housemate—’ I begin.

  ‘Then it’s all settled,’ he beams.

  ‘No, look, wait, we need to discuss this,’ I protest.

  ‘What’s to discuss?’ asks Prue. ‘You said you were lonely – I thought I was doing you a favour.’

  ‘You led me into that conversation!’

  ‘Kate, Kate,’ says Prue, shaking her head sorrowfully. ‘We all know you’ve had a hard time lately, but don’t let it turn you bitter. Everyone says you’re spending too much time on your own. Mum and Dad are worried about you – don’t you see? Ben and I are trying to help you.’

  It’s typical of Prue to present her best interests in a manner that makes it seem as though she is being the generous one. But to suggest that I am being selfish in my desire for a bit of privacy and peace in which to mourn the end of my marriage is too much. Not to mention that if Ben is living at the bungalow, Prue will be there all the time too. It’s the worst of all possible worlds.

  ‘Wait,’ I say, an inspired thought finally fighting its way into my fuddled brain. ‘Wait, I’ve had a better idea. ‘Why don’t you both live in the bungalow together and let me move into Mum and Dad’s? Wouldn’t that be a better plan? It’s only a matter of weeks, really – surely even you can relax your principles for a few weeks, Prue?’

  She smiles a tight little smile. ‘Relax my principles? I might have known you’d suggest such a thing. You can’t just switch your principles on and off like a tap when it suits you, Kate. Principles are something you have to stick to, no matter what. They’re non-negotiable. You don’t just drop them when they get in the way of what you want. It’s like marriage – you take it seriously or you don’t do it at all.’

  She does, at least, have the grace to look momentarily sorry for what she’s said.

  ‘I took my marriage seriously,’ I say quietly. ‘I took it very seriously, Prue.’

  ‘That’s enough, Prue,’ says Dad. ‘There’s no need to go dragging your sister’s problems into this.’

  ‘The way I see it,’ says Ben, barrelling heartily into the conversation, as if we are all happily chatting instead of seething with anger, ‘is that we will both be solving each other’s problems. Right, sis? Right, roomie? I think we’re going to have a lot of fun together.’

  ‘So that’s settled then,’ says Prue.

  12

  Ibiza

  The island was a different place this year. I’d always stayed right in the centre of San Antonio, sharing an apartment with Sarah, since we were on the same schedule and that meant we wouldn’t end up waking each other up by coming in at different times. It wasn’t as if we spent much time there anyway, just dropping down for a few hours’ sleep in between running the Hitz Does Ibiza events and getting as much dancing in as possible as soon as our responsibilities were over. I’d seen too many of my colleagues go fully feral to countenance caning it during the working day – Sarah had lucked into her job after her predecessor had disappeared on a 24-hour bender some years ago – but at night pretty much anything went as long as you were able to get up in the morning. And no matter what, I did get up in the morning. As late as possible.

  Matt had a totally different attitude to the island, though, insisting his team was put up in a villa outside of town, with verandahs, olive groves and a pool. I still had my San Antonio apartment, but I’d ended up spending every night at Matt’s villa so far, and since the rest of his department seemed to be out all the time, it was almost like having the place to ourselves.

  ‘Basher,’ he whispered in my ear.

  I rolled over onto his side of the bed. ‘Mmm,’ I said, keeping my eyes closed as I rested my head next to his. He slid his arm around me and pulled me closer.

  ‘Get up.’

  ‘What’s the time?’ I aske
d, opening one eye a crack. Matt had told me, in that annoyingly grown-up way he had of managing to know something about absolutely everything, that the Ibizan architecture is mostly white in order to reflect the heat of the sun, but jeepers it’s a cruel, cruel thing to be exposed to that much stark brightness first thing in the morning. Even the inside of our villa was nothing but harshly reflective surfaces. It was like waking up under a spotlight in the dentist’s.

  ‘Six,’ said Matt.

  ‘Six! Ugh, what are you waking me up at six for, you mentallist? I didn’t get in until two.’ I pulled the covers over my head. The only time I’m interested in 6 a.m. is when I haven’t been to bed yet. Otherwise I really don’t want to know that such a time even exists.

  ‘I know,’ said Matt. ‘You woke me up to bang on about some hassle with a presenter.’

  ‘Sorry,’ I mumbled into the covers, mortified. My memories of last night were a little hazy. I’d ended up in the bar with Sarah, Kirsty and the crew until far too late, ranting about the diva demands of a Hollyoaks actress with Hollywood pretensions. I thought I’d got it out of my system before I came home to Matt. Clearly not.

  ‘Come on,’ Matt insisted, tickling my ribs. ‘I’ve got something to show you.’

  I pulled the covers down from my face and squinted at Matt, who looked hideously fresh and awake, tanned against the white sheets.

  ‘Matt, if what you want to show me is your cock, I don’t want to see it until eight at the very earliest. Or feel it. Understood?’

  ‘Believe it or not,’ said Matt, grinning, ‘it’s not all about shagging.’

  I snorted in disbelief. Since Matt and I got together at the Christmas party, it had been pretty much all about the shagging. I had been given a gold loyalty card at my local waxing salon, so frequent were my visits there of late. We barely went out, we didn’t do coupley things, we weren’t hand-holding at the cinema or whispering sweet nothings over dinner. We were just having sex. Lots of it.

  ‘I mean it, Kate,’ insisted Matt, yanking at the covers. ‘Irresistible though you are in the mornings, that’s not what this is about.’

  I scowled. I’m not good at surprises, unless I’m the one in charge of them. ‘What is it about then?’

  ‘Get dressed and meet me out front in ten minutes,’ he said.

  I sighed heavily. ‘I’ve got Sarah picking me up at ten,’ I warned him.

  ‘We’ll be back in time,’ Matt promised. ‘Trust me.’

  And strangely I did trust him.

  So, despite it being 6 a.m., and despite my lack of interest in doing anything other than sleeping, I dragged myself out of bed and pulled on a denim skirt and a vest top. I scraped my hair up off my face, and covered my wincing eyes with sunglasses.

  Outside, Matt sat on a scooter, revving the engine.

  ‘Do you know how to drive that thing?’ I asked nervously. Suddenly my outfit, which had seemed perfect for the warm morning, felt like insanity. As if I was offering up my bare arms and legs to be cheese-gratered by the Spanish tarmac.

  ‘Nope.’ Matt grinned. ‘But how hard can it be? Put this on.’

  He handed over a helmet. I took it reluctantly.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘I promise I’ll be careful. I won’t let you get hurt.’

  ‘Oh, that’s what all the boys say,’ I teased, trying for a light-hearted tone to banish my fears. Matt patted the seat behind him and I told myself to get a grip.

  Back home in London, if someone had said to me, ‘Why don’t you get on the back of a motorbike with someone who’s never ridden one before?’ I’d have said no without even thinking about it. But Matt’s boyish enthusiasm was contagious, and the morning was beautiful; bright and clear and still cool enough to raise slight goose-bumps on my arms. Fuck it, I thought.

  I shouldn’t have worried. God knows where Matt had borrowed the scooter from – for work we were all ferried around in expensive air-conditioned cars that were loaned to us by the sponsors – but it soon became clear we were in no danger of being done for speeding. The engine strained and spluttered as Matt urged the bike up the hill away from the villa, and by the time we’d got to the end of the long stony drive that led to the main road, I’d relaxed enough to stop gripping his waist like a terrified baby monkey.

  Instead of turning right towards San Antonio town, Matt steered away towards Santa Inés, or so the sign said. It’s weird, because I’ve been to Ibiza more times than I can count, but it’s so much a place I come to for work that I’d never given any thought to exploring the island. I know there’s meant to be this amazing hidden Ibiza outside the superclubs and foam parties and sunburned package trippers, but if I was going to go on holiday, there’s no way I’d come back here to find it. I liked to get in, do my job, get wasted and get out. I could have been in Blackpool or Bognor for all the attention I paid to my surroundings.

  As we chugged along at a comically slow speed I saw the island opening up before my eyes. Unable to speak to Matt over the sound of the popping engine, I let my mind wander along with my gaze. Stray goats chewed on desiccated branches by the side of the road, unconcerned at our passing. I saw one ruminatively working away on a plastic bag. I wondered who lived in the isolated houses up in the hills – not the glamorous gated villas for holiday visitors, but the whitewashed old ones with the washing pegged outside and a rusting water tank nearby. It seemed so remote and far away from everything that mattered. I had the former country girl’s horror of life away from an urban centre.

  My thoughts unfurled as the scenery spread out in front of me, the hypnotic buzz of the scooter drowning out any anxieties, and I’d entirely lost track of time when we started to descend again, down towards the startlingly turquoise sea of a small bay. The water was so clear I could see the rocks and corals beneath, and the skeins of seaweed rocking gently back and forth with the tide. Two small fishing boats were moored at buoys in the bay; paint peeled on their wooden hulls, and nets hung over their sides, drying in the sun. When Matt pulled the scooter up alongside a weather-beaten old hut, a table of fishermen looked up from their breakfasts and nodded acknowledgement.

  ‘This is it,’ he beamed, as proud as if he had created this picture postcard scene all by himself. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘It’s amazing,’ I sighed, drinking it all in.

  The rocky shore rose up sharply all around us, so that we were hidden away from the rest of the island, protected in this tiny inlet. It was hard to imagine the high-rises of San Antonio were only a few miles down the coast. From here all that was visible beyond the stony embrace of the inlet was the sea, stretching out uninterrupted to the horizon, as if it went on forever.

  Matt leaned over and dropped a kiss on the tip of my nose. ‘You know, you even look cute in a bike helmet.’

  ‘Oh shut up,’ I laughed, taking it off as quickly as possible. No one looks cute in a bike helmet, and I knew it.

  Matt grabbed my hand and led me over to the only other table outside the hut, a rusting metal one with alarmingly rickety legs. Squinting inside the hut, dark and dim in contrast to the bright outside, I could see two more tables and a rough bar, at which a few more fishermen stood, their yellow waterproof trousers hanging over chairs behind them while they drank. Their work was already done for the day and their relaxation was contagious. I could almost forget I had a full day of work ahead of me; it felt like I’d left it far behind. I stretched my arms up over my head, yawning loudly in the sunshine.

  ‘Bored already?’ asked Matt, a slow smile spreading over his face as he watched me visibly unwind.

  ‘Yeah, massively,’ I said, smiling back. ‘I can’t believe you’d bring me somewhere so hideous. Look at this place. I mean, they don’t even have a DJ.’

  He laughed. ‘I knew you’d love it. The food’s pretty much fish or fish, by the way, with a side order of fish. But they do a ferocious coffee.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ I said. And though I normally ate little more for breakfast than half a piec
e of toast on my way to the bus stop, I could feel my stomach growling in anticipation as the smell of frying fish wafted over to us from the kitchen.

  The patron stepped outside, wiping his beefy hands on the front of a stained apron. His darkly tanned face was wrinkled by the sun and wind, and he squinted at us underneath impressively huge black eyebrows. He didn’t bother with anything like menus, just lumbered over to stand by our table, raising one heavy brow expectantly.

  ‘Si?’

  I smiled as winningly as possible, hoping a cheery demeanour would compensate for a complete lack of Spanish vocabulary. He merely raised the other eyebrow.

  To my amazement, Matt suddenly began speaking in what sounded, to my uneducated ears, like perfect Spanish. He pointed over at the fishermen, indicated the two of us, and answered the patron’s gruff questions with confidence. I stared at him open mouthed.

  The patron’s face broke into a vast smile, exposing a gold tooth that winked in the sun, like a shiny reward for Matt’s unexpected fluency. He slapped Matt heartily on the back and burst into a torrent of words, of which I could understand not one. The fishermen over at the next table looked up, laughing, and one of them raised his glass to us.

  ‘Since when did you speak Spanish?’ I asked, as the patron retreated back inside, still chuckling.

  ‘Impressed?’

  ‘Of course I am,’ I said. ‘You’re a man of hidden talents, Matt Martell.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re beginning to see it,’ he said, leaning forwards. Our lips touched and the fishermen started whistling. We broke apart, grinning and holding hands under the table where they couldn’t see.

  ‘So what was your big drama last night?’ asked Matt, tickling my palm with his thumb.

  I squinted at him in the sunshine. ‘I thought you said I told you all about it last night?’

  ‘You did. I didn’t say I listened, though.’