by Susan Lewis
Though Fiona’s eyes showed understanding, she continued to push. ‘They’re grown ups too,’ she reminded him, sliding an arm along the back of the sofa. ‘Do they blame you for the way she is?’
Though he’d have preferred to be distracted by the prominence of her nipples showing through the smooth satin of her blouse, he said, ‘I’m not sure. I don’t think Charlie does, but Oliver is very mixed up. And let’s face it, if she’d been happy, if I’d been there more in the early years, she might not have felt the need to drink the way she does, so you could say that in some way I am to blame.’
Sighing, Fiona shook her head as she replied, ‘I have a one-word answer to that, but I don’t think you want to hear it.’
The flicker of a smile crossed his lips. ‘Probably not,’ he agreed, and was about to go and refill his glass when he remembered he might no longer be welcome to stay the night. If he wasn’t, he’d better quit drinking now.
Seeming to read his mind, she gestured for him to continue. ‘Go ahead,’ she said, ‘and top mine up while you’re at it. If this is going to be goodbye, I see no reason to hold back on anything now, do you?’
‘Will someone please shut that idiot up,’ Oliver complained, as he drove his friends through the winding country lanes of North Somerset towards the outskirts of Cheddar.
‘Yeah, gag him,’ Alfie shouted over his shoulder to Rob, who had the misfortune to be sitting next to a desperately rampant Jerome in the back seat.
‘You don’t even know if it is Kimberley Walsh in the video,’ Rob reminded Jerome as he grabbed him in a headlock.
‘Let me go, man.’ Jerome fought himself free. ‘I’m telling you, Sophie Ash told Mark Johnson, who told Nick Jersey, that it’s definitely her, and Sophie should know, because she’s the one who did the, you know, waxing thing.’
Wincing as he glanced in the rear-view mirror, Oliver said, ‘Fifty quid says they’re winding you up mate, and if they are, you’re going to find yourself in deep trouble if you ...’
‘Come on, you said yourself Kimberley’s the type and you agreed it looks like hers.’
‘I said it could be,’ Oliver protested, ‘because how would I know what hers looks like when I’ve never even seen it?’
‘I have,’ Alfie informed them, ‘and I’m telling you, I’m not convinced.’
‘Because you’ve probably never seen it bald,’ Jerome pointed out.
As all four of them burst into laughter, Oliver turned up the music – The Streets was one of his favourite bands.
‘Is Lara going to be there tonight?’ Alfie demanded.
‘Who?’ Oliver asked.
Alfie gulped a laugh.
‘Lara Patel’s been coming on to him,’ Jerome piped up from the back, ‘and she’s definitely going to be there. Lara Patel,’ he added dreamily. ‘Now that is one seriously hot babe.’
‘Is anyone not hot to you?’ Rob asked, meaning it.
Breaking into more laughter, Alfie began rocking to the music as Oliver drove on down over the hill knowing they were heading in the right direction, but no more than that. ‘Does anyone know where this place is?’ he shouted over the music.
‘Yeah, like that’s why you’re giving me a lift,’ Rob shouted back. ‘Lisa’s my ex, remember? It’s how come we’ve been invited.’
‘And what’s the deal?’ Alfie wanted to know, lowering the sound. ‘We’re all staying over, right?’
‘It’s cool. Her parents are away so she’s got the place to herself.’
‘So how many are supposed to be there?’ Jerome wanted to know.
‘Dunno, she never said, but I’m guessing about fifty, or a hundred. Who knows? Who cares?’
‘What’s the score with weed?’ Alfie asked. ‘Not that I’ve got any, but do you reckon someone else will?’
‘We won’t know till we get there. The big deal is booze.’
‘Well, we’ve got plenty of that,’ Jerome grinned, holding up his third can of beer since setting out from Alfie’s.
‘Christ, you lot are already half smashed,’ Oliver grumbled.
‘Keep cool. Not far to go now,’ Rob assured him, and flipping open another can he passed it over to Oliver. ‘Even if you manage to down the whole lot before we get there, you still won’t be over the limit,’ he assured him.
Raising the can and catching Jerome’s eye in the mirror, Oliver said, ‘Here’s to you mate, and finding the bald one.’
As Alfie and Rob howled with laughter, Jerome insisted, ‘You’re going to help me though, right? Promises are promises and I cannot leave that party without getting some action.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Oliver assured him, starting to get in the mood now, ‘we won’t send you to Durban a virgin, because we’re all going to get some action tonight, you just wait and see.’
Chapter Nine
SYLVIE WAS SITTING in her car outside the tall iron gates of Fiona’s estate. She’d followed Russ here two, maybe even three hours ago. She didn’t know when; she’d lost track of time. She might even have fallen asleep. Sometimes sadness did that to her, robbed her of knowing, closed her down and didn’t release her again for a while.
She knew what was going on in inside, because it would be what went on with every woman he met. What a fool she’d been to trust Fiona. She was no different to the putains who threw themselves at her husband, just because he was famous – or used to be – and because he was so charming and good-looking and ready to satisfy all their cravings.
She had never been enough for him. Not once, in the entire twenty-five years they’d been married, had she as much as looked at another man – or not in the same way as he looked at other women. She’d never wanted anyone else, and she still didn’t. The men she slept with now, she didn’t set out for it to happen, and she didn’t know their names, but they were kind and fun and always left in the morning without making any fuss. Sometimes she wondered why she needed them, then she remembered they were a substitute for Russ.
She’d left her home for him, her family, her country. It was true, when they’d first come into each other’s lives she was already in England, working as an au pair in Kensington, but she’d never come intending to stay. Then she’d met him and from the first time they were together she’d known she would never go back. He’d loved her so much then that he’d had to see her morning, noon and night. He’d wanted her in his bed, his world, the rest of his life. He’d married her less than six months after their first meeting. Their families had been shocked – they’d been so young, yet had felt so mature, as children always did at that age – but eventually everyone had come round.
Her parents had considered him the son they’d never had.
His parents had always seemed baffled by her, but she was sure they’d loved her in the end. She’d definitely loved them, gruff and boringly English though they were.
The boys had brought everyone together and had kept them that way – how could they not? Both families adored the boys. They were the centre of everyone’s world.
They still were, but they were starting to live their own lives now, the way they should. Charlie had already gone and Oliver had only returned for a while.
Her heart dissolved in the heat of pain and loss.
If she’d been able she’d have had more children, three, four, six, seven, but after Oliver it had not been possible. Strangely, Russ had seemed sorrier not to have had a daughter than she had. She loved her boys. They were everything to her and she’d have loved more.
Russ was devoted to their boys too, she’d never doubted that, but their innocent affection had never been enough for him, the way it had for her. It had taken her a long time to learn that, but she’d definitely learned it now.
He was in that house with her best friend.
Earlier, she’d tried to call her father, before remembering she couldn’t. It was funny how that still happened from time to time. He’d been dead for almost five years and yet in many ways it felt as though he was still th
ere, going about his day in the small, leafy suburb of Paris where she and her sister had grown up. It was hard to believe that place no longer existed, bulldozed to make way for an autoroute. Perhaps it did still exist in another dimension.
She’d like to go to that dimension now. Somewhere, anywhere, as long as her father was there, and her mother, the parents who’d loved her and whom she’d always been able to trust.
Rain trickled down her windscreen like tears, while grief poured into her heart like a storm. There was a bottle on the seat beside her, untouched, unopened. The need for it was clamouring, clawing, promising its guarantee of release. It would dull the pain, throw the cries of longing and despair into a distant, other domain. A domain that echoed with what might have been, with what could never be now.
Her father was dead; Russ had gone, he was inside with her best friend.
Picking up her phone she pressed in his number.
Would he ignore the call when he saw it was her?
Would he dare to answer and lie?
There were six rings before he picked up.
‘I know where you are,’ she told him, gazing along the black drive towards the house.
Shaking himself awake, Russ rolled away from Fiona as he said, ‘What are you doing? Where are you?’
‘If you look outside you’ll see me.’
Russ got up from the bed, his heart thudding with disbelief as he went to the window and parted the heavy drapes. At the end of the drive two headlights were staring straight at him like the eyes of a predator.
Surely to God, it couldn’t be her.
‘Sylvie, what are you doing?’ he cried.
‘I came to see you,’ she told him, ‘but you were already on your way out, so I followed you here.’
His head was thumping, the world was turning crazy. ‘What the hell for?’ he shouted. ‘What are you trying to prove?’
‘My point. And I think I have. Does she think she’s the only one?’
Turning from the window, he began snatching up his clothes.
‘Let me speak to my friend,’ she said.
Ignoring her, he put a hand over the phone as he said to Fiona, ‘She’s outside.’
Getting up from the bed, Fiona reached for a robe. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked.
Right now he had no clear idea, but he couldn’t let Sylvie just sit there, gazing through the bars like a preying, or wounded, animal pleading to come in.
‘Is she drunk?’
‘I don’t know, but I think we have to assume she is.’ Going back on the line, he said, ‘I’m coming out.’
‘Why?’
‘Why do you think?’ he almost yelled. ‘I don’t know what the hell’s got into you. Are you going to start stalking me now, is that what this is about?’
‘You have no right to be angry with me ...’
‘I have every damned right.’
‘You said you wanted me to come home.’
‘But not like this. Couldn’t you have rung? For Christ’s sake, why am I even having this conversation?’ and ending the call he threw the phone on the bed and hauled on his trousers.
‘I should call a taxi,’ Fiona suggested. ‘If she’s drunk, we can’t let her drive away from here.’
Before he could answer he heard a loud crash outside and whipped back the curtains again. ‘Jesus Christ, she’s trying to ram down the gates.’
By the time he’d raced downstairs and thrown open the front door she was already driving away.
‘I’ll have to go after her,’ he said, as Fiona joined him at the door.
‘But you can’t!’ she protested. ‘You’re over the limit.’
His eyes closed in frustration.
‘Call her and tell her to go to your place. At least it’s not as far.’
Back upstairs, he snatched up his phone and pressed in the number.
No reply.
To her voicemail he said, ‘Sylvie, I want you to go to Clyde Court. Do you hear me? Please don’t drive back into Bristol tonight. I’ve been drinking so I’ll have to get a taxi, but I’ll meet you there.’
*
Oliver was sprawled out on a sofa, a beer in one hand, a spliff in the other and Lara Patel’s beautiful dark legs hooked indelicately over his. There were bodies everywhere, writhing to the beat, lolling about the floor, swaying in groups, smooching against walls ...
Last seen, Jerome was on his way to a bedroom to live his dream with Kimberley Walsh, who’d admitted to being in the video and was prepared to prove it, if Oliver was interested. He might have been, because he’d had enough to drink by then, but he’d promised Jerome, and Kimberley hadn’t seemed too bothered about who wished to see proof of her exploit. Nor did Jerome seem very bothered by the fact that Alfie had already been there tonight, and a couple more blokes were probably lined up to take over once he’d finished.
She was a girl, Kimberley Walsh.
A slut, was what Thea had called her, and Oliver couldn’t really argue with that.
He had no idea where Thea was now, nor did he care. All she’d been interested in was his mother’s appearance on the news a couple of days ago, and why he’d never told her his father was famous.
Who the hell cared that his father used to be famous?
What did it have to do with anything, for Christ’s sake?
All he wanted was to forget about his effing family for once and have a good time.
He’d been able to tell from the way Thea had rubbed herself against him when they’d danced that things would go his way if he played it right tonight, but though he’d started to, he’d soon found that he was more interested in having another drink and a smoke than he was in getting it on with her. Maybe it was the fawning tone of her questions that had turned him off, or perhaps he’d never really fancied her anyway. He wasn’t going to bother analysing it. What was the point? She meant nothing to him.
Resting a hand on Lara’s thigh, he took another deep drag of the spliff and let his head roll back against the sofa as he passed it on. Lara turned his face to hers and gazed into his eyes.
‘Hey you,’ he murmured softly.
‘Hey you,’ she murmured back.
As they started to kiss he felt the desire for it draining away.
‘What’s wrong?’ she frowned as he stopped.
He put a hand on her face, gazed at her mouth and tried again. This time it worked, and as the kiss deepened and his head started to swim he felt himself rising towards a place he really wanted to be.
Then a swathe of freezing air blew across the room.
They both looked round and peered through the fug to see what was going on over by the door. Some girls had turned up.
‘It’s Milly Butler and her friends,’ Lisa, their hostess, declared. She was wrapped around her boyfriend on a nearby chair and didn’t bother getting up, merely waved to the newcomers and told them to help themselves to anything.
Resuming the kiss with Lara, Oliver started using his tongue and raking his fingers through her hair.
‘Do you want another drink?’ he asked when they paused to take in air.
‘Sure,’ she replied.
‘Another of the same?’
She nodded and swung her legs to the floor to let him get up. He staggered and almost fell on to her.
In the kitchen he found Rob and a few others engaged in heavy debate about something serious, though it didn’t sound as though any of them knew exactly what it was. He cracked another beer and dashed some Bacardi into the glass he’d brought with him.
‘Hey!’ Rob called, pulling him over. ‘You know all about this.’
‘All about what?’
‘The technique they use to transmit images from lunar modules.’
‘You’ve got to be kidding,’ Oliver protested.
‘No. Nathan here reckons ...’
‘I’m out of here,’ Oliver interrupted.
As he made his way back into the main room he saw a couple of the newcom
ers chatting to Lara, so leaning over the back of the sofa he put her drink in her hand and went to join Alfie, who was studying a surreal-looking portrait on a wall between two windows.
‘Someone you know?’ Oliver quipped.
Alfie turned to look at him, too stoned to register who he was straight away. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ he slurred. ‘Thought you were with Lara.’
‘I am, sort of. How come you’re on your own?’
‘I’m with the one who looks like Duffy. Forgotten her name ... She’s gone to the loo.’
Feeling his mobile vibrating in his pocket, Oliver fished it out, and seeing it was his mother an angry darkness came over him. He turned it off, but a moment later turned it back on. She was ringing again. ‘What?’ he barked into it, moving towards an empty corner so no one would hear.
‘It’s Mum,’ she told him.
‘I know. What is it?’
‘I am calling,’ she said haltingly, ‘because I went to see your father ... He is with someone else and I am very sorry, Oliver, but I cannot bear to go on like this ...’
‘Mum, for Christ’s sake ...’
‘Please listen,’ she begged. ‘I am so very unhappy. It is too difficult for me this way ... I love you very much, you know that, don’t you?’
His insides were starting to burn hot with fear. ‘I’m not listening to any more of this ...’
‘No, don’t hang up. I must say goodbye to you and make sure that you know ...’
‘Just stop.’ His voice rose. ‘If you’re saying what I think you are ...’
‘Yes, I am, chéri, but don’t worry. Everything will be fine. Ca serait mieux si je partais ...’
‘Mum, don’t do this to me,’ he cried, and thrusting his drink at Alfie he began stumbling and crashing over bodies to get out of the room. ‘I’m coming, OK, just don’t do anything before I get there.’
Lauren was trying very hard not to be upset and angry, she understood that things didn’t always go the way they were supposed to, but she just couldn’t help feeling crushed by the way tonight had turned out. She’d been so looking forward to it, had bought her dress specially and brought her flute. It wouldn’t have been so bad if Donna had been there, at least then she’d have had someone to talk to. Donna had really wanted to come, but at the last minute her dad had suddenly said they were spending too much time gadding about in the week, never telling anyone where they were going, and he’d had enough. Donna needed to knuckle down and study this weekend.