‘You seem to deal with them with consummate ease,’ he said.
‘Now, sure, but there’ve been a few years of trial and error.’
He smiled. He was pleased, I guessed, to consider himself outside that category and yet surely he represented both trial and error by anyone’s standards.
‘So you had a stepfather after that?’
‘Two. Mum never got married again, but there was a baby with the first one and another two with the second, all boys. I’ve got three half-brothers. They still live close together, all have kids of their own even though they barely pass as adults themselves, and they still rely totally on her. Their girlfriends do too.’
(For the record, my mother keeps occasional contact by phone, but is apt to get hysterical when we meet and I have found the best solution has been for me to visit her; that way I have control of exit arrangements. Recently, for reasons I will get to shortly, I’ve seen more of her and, mellowing in my old age perhaps, have enjoyed her company and appreciated her advice.)
‘The last time I checked, there were six grandchildren and five girlfriends or ex-girlfriends involved,’ I told Rob. ‘If you set foot in that flat I guarantee that within five minutes you will be clutching a baby and listening to my mother complain about how exhausted she is. It’s the free-breeding underclass. There’s never enough thinking through of consequences.’
He laughed, eyebrows raised. ‘“Free-breeding underclass”? I’m not sure you’re allowed to say things like that!’
‘You are if you come from it, and I do.’
He considered this. His own background, I gathered, was solidly, unremarkably middle class and I assumed that his aversion to a committed relationship was through choice, not parental example. Looking at his complacent expression, I wondered for the hundredth time why it was that some people were set a gruelling and relentless steeplechase through life even before they’d learned how to walk while others got to coast around the track in glorious sunshine with a lackey running alongside to keep them fanned and watered.
‘Do you help them out?’ he asked.
‘You mean financially? Sure. But funds get gobbled up very quickly in that clan and you soon learn not to send good money after bad.’
‘So you wouldn’t ever go back into the fold?’
‘I’d rather die,’ I said truthfully.
‘That bad.’ He regarded me as if in a new light; he was thinking, I guessed, how my humble origins ‘explained’ me, but I could see that he was puzzled, too, by the illogical nature of it. For shouldn’t I be protecting the fruits of my ascendancy with a zealot’s single-mindedness, not imperilling it with a roll in the hay with him?
But he was nothing if not arrogant, and his interpretation, I could tell, was that my recklessness was the ultimate form of flattery – and no less than his due.
Maybe he was right. Maybe, like Elvis, he was irresistible.
‘I noticed you didn’t mention kids that time,’ he said.
‘When?’
‘In your list of things you want from marriage.’
‘Oh, children go without saying. You know we’re trying.’ I paused. Whatever else he drew from me that afternoon, I wasn’t letting him within a mile of that vulnerability. ‘But when I have them I don’t want their childhood to be …’ I fished for the word. ‘I don’t want it to be ordinary.’
‘In my experience, most people who grow up with everything say they would rather have had ordinary.’
I grimaced. ‘They think they would, but they don’t mean real ordinary, they mean snuggling up in matching onesies to watch their favourite Disney movie, cute little puppy for a hot water bottle. Real ordinary is your mother struggling and striving and falling asleep every night in an exhausted stupor. Or staying awake worrying if the eviction order’s on its way or whether the man coming home drunk is going to slap her around. Real ordinary is no money, no privacy, no education, no future.’
‘What an idyllic picture you paint of family life,’ he said, but mildly, no longer amused. ‘Well, you needn’t worry, because it won’t be like that for your kids. The silver fox will see to that. And you couldn’t be ordinary if you tried.’
‘You just mean how I look.’ It scared me sometimes to think what would have happened to me if I hadn’t been born pretty – a freak beneficiary of the cherry-picked highlights of two average sets of genes, making me considerably more appealing looking in conventional terms than either of my parents in their prime, and a different species, frankly, from my half-brothers. I might not have had the opportunity to escape, or I might have escaped, failed and been forced to return, which would have been far worse than not having left at all.
When I turned, I saw Rob had taken my remark seriously and had raised himself onto a bent elbow to study me. ‘No, much more than that. I don’t know how you’ve reinvented yourself, but you’ve done a superb job. You’re a one-off.’
‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’ I smiled then, rolling from his grip, covers pushed away, subconsciously giving him the opportunity to admire me.
‘You should. You’re one of those women you read about in novels but who don’t usually exist in real life. Just when you think she’s a sociopath she opens the lid on a well of feminine vulnerability.’
I laughed, delighted enough to do it properly, loudly, heedless of Felicity or whoever else might hear through walls or ceilings (there was no crime in laughing, was there?). ‘Did you really just make that up on the spot?’
‘Of course I did. I am a writer. A bad one, admittedly, and with no plans to venture into romantic fiction.’
‘Well, thank you. It’s a great relief to know I only seem like a sociopath.’
‘That’s only to me,’ he admitted. ‘You’re considered sweet and unaffected by everyone else. The whole of Lime Park Road is in love with you, from what I can gather: Caroline, Liz, Joanne, Mel, all the men …’
His observation was correct. If the women had taken remarkably little effort to win over, the men had required none. Joanne’s husband Kenny was becoming a particular fan. One recent weekend I’d strolled past his house with Liz, both in the short summer kaftans I’d picked out for us in the boutique on the Parade, surprising him as he worked in his front garden. He’d been practically stuttering with excitement at the sight of our bare legs and it was all we could do not to howl with laughter.
‘All the men except you,’ I pointed out.
‘I’m subject to restrictions, remember?’
‘You certainly are.’
We smiled at one another in easy silence.
‘You’ll end this, won’t you,’ he said, at last, ‘the moment you get pregnant?’
And I remember the question particularly for the response it elicited, definitive and startling: Yes, but hopefully that isn’t going to happen … Those were the words that sprang immediately, treacherously, to mind, blindsiding me with their violence.
‘Of course I will,’ I told him, betraying not a flicker of this and even raising an eyebrow, as gleeful and wicked as he expected. ‘And if I don’t, Jeremy will.’
‘Ha ha.’
But something had been said that afternoon, and we exchanged a look that was unusually tender for us before we put our clothes back on and went our separate ways.
Normally, when I was in Rob’s flat, I turned my phone to silent, just in case one of the builders called and, hearing it through the wall, got it into his head to come and find me. The kitchen complete by then, they’d moved upstairs to the bathrooms, their tools and voices more audible than ever to my first-floor neighbour, which presumably meant we were also more audible to them. (If the workmen ever had any suspicions of impropriety, they certainly didn’t share them with me and, thankfully, they never saw Jeremy to get the chance to share them with him.)
Later, I would continue the habit of silencing my phone; the house was rarely empty, what with decorators, cleaners, people hired to do all the things I had neither the skill nor the will to do m
yself, but could continue to ‘oversee’ from elsewhere.
But we all make mistakes, which meant, inevitably, there came cause to regret an oversight of my own. One Thursday in July, Rob and I were in his bedroom as usual, windows closed and music on to camouflage any errant moans, but I’d left my phone in his kitchen and failed to turn off the ring. It was a proper summer’s day, the London heat brash and insistent, and his living-room windows were open to the street. When I finally recovered it I found I’d missed three calls from Gemma.
As soon as I was home I called her back.
‘I came to visit you,’ she said, ‘but you weren’t in.’
I halted mid-step. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. I was at the gym all afternoon.’
She made a noise of contemptuous dismissal that I chose to ignore.
‘Didn’t the guys let you in so you could wait?’
‘No, no one answered the door, which was why I was calling you.’
‘They must have turned off the electricity so the bell didn’t work. What a shame. Are you still in the area?’ I asked, pleasantly.
‘No, I’m back at my place now.’
‘Not working today?’
‘Of course I’m working, Amber, I work every day. That’s what a full-time job is, remember?’ She gave a snort of dissatisfaction. Gemma belonged to that tribe of women who liked to make those who didn’t work for a living feel morally inferior while at the same time secretly craving just such a sabbatical for themselves. I supposed the two behaviours must be linked.
‘I remember only too well,’ I said easily. ‘So how did you happen to be down here?’
‘I was in Wimbledon for a meeting and it wasn’t worth going back to the office, so I thought I’d hop on a bus and swing by your place, see how the house is going.’
‘It’s really coming on.’ I started to report in fastidious detail guaranteed to bore less long-suffering (or envious) types than her off the phone, but she was having none of it and had soon interrupted me.
‘It was weird, but when I rang your number I could hear your phone going.’
‘Well, it can’t have been mine.’ I pictured my phone on Rob’s kitchen counter, mere feet from the yawning windows. ‘It must have been someone else’s.’
‘No, I tried three times and I heard it each time. It was like it was coming from the house next door, Rob’s place. I even called up to the window, but no one heard me. I went to ring the bell, but the old woman downstairs came out and told me he wasn’t in.’
The hairs on my arms rose at this first warning of proper danger: I’d already said I’d been at the gym, I couldn’t now change my mind and say I’d been next door. Nor could I make up a story about losing the phone since I was speaking into it now. As for Felicity covering for us, had she been fortuitously mistaken or had she known what she was doing? It didn’t bear thinking about.
‘How peculiar.’ Only then did my brain fully engage. Remembering Gemma’s interest in Rob (she’d had no problem recalling his name, she’d casually ‘hopped’ on a bus from Wimbledon, which was quite a distance away and not a direct route), I put two and two together: she’d come not to see me so much as in the hope of seeing him.
Comfortable now, I set about handling this misunderstanding. ‘Well, never mind, we’ve managed to connect now. Listen, talking of Rob, I’ll be sending invitations to our party soon. You’ll definitely come, won’t you, Gem? He’ll be there, and he was still single last time I checked …’
She agreed she was looking forward to it, and at last I was able to guide the conversation to the safer ground of Imogen’s pregnancy, the news that she was expecting a boy. All proceeded predictably after that and the incident was never mentioned again, but it alarmed me immensely to think of her standing under Rob’s window while he and I caroused in his bedroom twenty feet away. And how easily the scene might have differed: what if she had rung the doorbell and, not getting a response, decided to wait? Or what if Felicity had let her pass, saying, ‘I heard Amber on the stairs earlier, why don’t you go on up and try the door?’
Or, worse, what if Jeremy did come home early one of these days and heard my phone, hunted it down like a malfunctioning smoke alarm. Finding himself at Rob’s door, hearing sounds of life inside – hearing my laugh – noting how long it took Rob to answer and that he was only half dressed when he did, what would he think?
And where was I in this catastrophized tableau? Hiding in the wardrobe or under the bed, my clothes clutched to my naked body, a high-heeled shoe left behind, just visible from the door?
As I say, it didn’t bear thinking about.
‘Another cake?’ exclaimed Felicity, standing at her open door. ‘You’re spoiling me.’
All those names Rob had listed, the names of the neighbours who adored me: hers had not been included.
‘It’s the least I can do,’ I said. ‘Victoria sponge, this time – I took a chance.’
‘You do have a guilty conscience, don’t you?’
‘Not that guilty,’ I said with a giggle, ‘otherwise I’d have baked it myself.’
‘But you don’t have a kitchen yet,’ she said kindly.
‘I do, actually. That’s what I came to say: downstairs is all finished now, so it’s just the bathrooms to go. I probably don’t need to tell you what a relief it is to see light at the end of the tunnel.’
‘That is good news.’ Felicity urged me towards the living room, saying, ‘I have my friend Vanessa here. Go and say hello while I fetch you a cup of tea.’
The friend was in her late fifties, heavy enough for her smile to be engulfed by the flesh of her face, and dressed from head to toe in an ill-advised putty-grey. Rising from her seat, she eyed me with the air of having been sidelined by her own kind, stirring in me the instinct to take her in hand and transform her future. (Wouldn’t that be a worthier use of my time than deceiving my husband?) I wondered if she might be the depressed one with whom Felicity went walking; perhaps I should go with them one of these days, be their little cheerleader.
‘Amber lives next door,’ Felicity explained to Vanessa, joining us. By now, she knew not to cut any cake for me, but automatically planted a plate with a large slice on her friend’s lap. The cream oozed over the line of jam, the sponge springy and yellow; it put me in mind of an open wound.
Her gaze still fixed on me, Vanessa moved her fingers blindly towards the cake as she spoke. ‘So you’re the one who … ?’
‘Who keeps bringing me these delicious offerings,’ Felicity finished for her. ‘Can you believe my luck, Nessy?’
Though my brow remained smooth, I frowned internally: what had Vanessa been about to say before Felicity interrupted her? You’re the one who sneaks upstairs twice a week to have sex with your neighbour … But I knew better than to put the words into their mouths (that was what the cake was for). I knew better than to let paranoia take hold.
‘I’m the one they all hate,’ I said amiably. ‘They have voodoo dolls of me they stick pins into every morning at eight o’clock when the drilling starts up again. And I don’t blame them, either. I would hate me too.’
‘Oh, you know that’s not true,’ Felicity said. ‘I’ve never known anyone so popular; she has adoring fans coming out of her ears, Nessy, just look at her!’
‘I can see,’ Vanessa exclaimed, as if in the presence of Angelina Jolie. She scooped the overflowing cream with her finger before noticing the fork Felicity had supplied. As she gripped it, coincidentally at exactly the moment Felicity picked up hers, I had the peculiar image of the two of them coming at me with their tiny weapons, jabbing at my arms and legs, forcing a confession from me.
‘And what about that enormous bouquet of flowers I saw being delivered to your house a few days ago?’ Felicity continued. ‘There must have been two or three dozen red roses – the poor deliveryman could hardly stand up under their weight.’
‘They were from Jeremy. My husband,’ I added, for Vanessa’s benefit. ‘It was our wedding anniversary.’ T
here’d been other lavish gifts, too; jewellery, shoes, another brace of my favourite candles, as well as indulgent praise over a champagne dinner for my medal-deserving fortitude during the building works. (‘I must admit, I’d thought you’d be tearing your hair out by now,’ he’d said. ‘But you’ve been quite stoic.’ Stoic? The poor darling.)
‘How many years have you been married?’ Vanessa asked.
‘Five. We had a whirlwind romance so I can’t remember us not being married.’
‘He’s a very nice man, your husband,’ Felicity remarked. ‘Strikes me as a one in a million.’
‘I’m glad you think so,’ I said.
‘I’m glad you think so.’
I stared at Felicity. Had she actually said that? She couldn’t possibly have, could she? I checked Vanessa’s expression – unruffled, lips dusted with icing sugar, eyes on her plate – and decided that I must have hallucinated.
‘I hear you met my friend Gemma the other day.’
‘Oh yes,’ Felicity said. ‘A very cross sort of girl, isn’t she?’
‘Was she rude to you? I’m sorry. She’d come out of her way to see me and was probably frustrated I wasn’t in.’
‘She was insisting she’d heard your phone in my flat or Rob’s, but I told her you were probably at the gym.’
‘Yes, I was,’ I said. ‘Thank you for being so helpful, Felicity.’
‘You’re very welcome. I would have invited her in to wait but, as I say, she was a bit bad-tempered.’
Well, praise the Lord for Gemma’s surliness, I thought. There was still hope that Felicity had missed any clues to impropriety on the day in question, but Gemma, were she to have been granted access to number 38, most certainly would not.
Felicity had been right about the guilty conscience. I drank my tea much too quickly, almost scalding the roof of my mouth, before pleading a lunch date with a friend in town.
‘She’s everywhere, this one,’ Felicity told Vanessa, as I left.
Indeed I was, a social butterfly no less – I had nothing better to do, after all – and during those summer months Jeremy and I were constantly at soirées on the street. Other than at large gatherings it was rare that we overlapped with Rob, but whenever we did I sensed that he relished seeing me out of context rather more than I did him.
The Sudden Departure of the Frasers Page 16