The Great Escape

by Fiona Gibson

  ‘I didn’t tease it out,’ he says in a mock-hurt voice. ‘You just told me.’

  ‘I suppose we did,’ Sadie laughs. ‘But what about you? Are you married, Felix?’

  He pauses, and for the first time, seems to lose his composure a little. ‘I was almost married,’ he says carefully.

  ‘Almost?’ Hannah repeats gently, noticing with alarm that his grey eyes have misted over and his pale lashes are fluttering as if to bat away sudden tears. Hell, now she wishes they’d stuck to the topic of her marriage.

  ‘What happened, Felix?’ Lou asks kindly.

  ‘My intended …’ He presses his lips together, as if mustering strength. ‘Well, let’s just say she had it off with my best friend Rashley – my best man, in fact – and chose the night before our wedding to make the big confession.’

  Hannah, Sadie and Lou fall silent. Felix rolls a stray truffle across the table with a finger. ‘That’s terrible,’ Hannah breathes.

  ‘God, how awful for you,’ Lou exclaims. Felix sniffs loudly and the girls glance at each other, wondering what to do next.

  ‘At least you knew,’ Hannah offers, ‘before you went through with it.’

  Felix nods and offers them a wobbly smile. His eyes aren’t just moist now; they are filling with tears, threatening to spill over any moment. ‘Bet you wanted to kill him,’ Sadie offers.

  ‘Well, yes, but I’m just a big old coward really, so I just …’ He shrugs. ‘I just retreated from the scene.’

  ‘And the wedding was cancelled?’ Hannah asks.

  ‘Absolutely, leaving a whopping three-tier cake with mine and Amanda’s name on it in rather tacky gold icing.’ He forces a laugh, and Hannah touches his arm.

  ‘Oh, Felix. And here I am, moaning about Ryan’s kids … it makes my worries seem pretty pathetic.’

  ‘Mine too,’ Sadie adds. ‘I mean, however tough it is at the moment, at least I trust Barney …’

  ‘Me too,’ Lou adds. ‘Spike wouldn’t have the energy to get up to anything anyway.’ Everyone sniggers, lightening the mood.

  ‘Right,’ Felix declares, wiping his eyes with the back of his large, fleshy hand as he stands up unsteadily. ‘Now if you’ll excuse me, girls, this business has made me quite upset, and I think we’re out of supplies so I’m going to get myself a little something from the bar.’

  ‘Of course,’ Hannah says, leaping up and quickly moving aside to let him pass.

  ‘Can I get you something?’ he asks.

  Hannah shakes her head firmly. ‘No thanks …’

  ‘No, we’re fine,’ Lou adds as he totters along the aisle and disappears to the next carriage. Hannah, Sadie and Lou stare at each other. ‘Jesus,’ murmurs Sadie.

  ‘Poor man,’ Hannah adds, and Lou nods in agreement. ‘Imagine his girlfriend doing that.’

  ‘And imagine having a friend called Rashley,’ Sadie jokes, ‘and using phrases like “had it off”.’

  ‘At least he didn’t marry her,’ Hannah adds, feeling strangely loyal to this drunk, jilted man, and unwilling to discuss him with other passengers in earshot – passengers who’ve been throwing each other amused and exasperated glances as Felix’s voice boomed through the carriage.

  ‘He seems heartbroken,’ Lou adds. ‘I wonder how long ago it happened?’

  ‘Must be pretty recent,’ Sadie observes, ‘to make him well up like that.’

  Hannah nods, and the girls contemplate the awfulness of such deceit, until Felix reappears, looking a little more together now, clutching a coffee.

  They finish the truffles, the conversation switching to lighter matters such as where they might go tonight. Twenty-five minutes later, as their train approaches Glasgow Central station, it would appear that Hannah, Sadie and Lou have made a new friend.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Back at his flat, Spike decides he’s misjudged Astrid Stone. He had her down as a free spirit, a beautiful creature concerned only with having fun and fantastic sex, the kind of girl who relishes kissing a guy she’s just met, virtually pulling him into a damp alley. So it seems bizarre, and totally out of character, that she’s demanding he split up with Lou.

  He paces around the small kitchen, filling the kettle, sloshing water into a mug containing the last teabag, then realising he didn’t actually boil it. He doesn’t want tea anyway. He wants – no, needs a drink, more than he’s needed one in a long time. Astrid has as good as dumped him – insulted him, anyway, with all that hairy boy business – and Lou will be two hundred miles away in Glasgow by now, so wrapped up in her beloved friends’ company that she won’t have given him a second’s thought. It’s pretty special to be rejected by two women in one day.

  Spike takes a gulp of cold tea, spits it out in disgust onto a collection of dirty mugs heaped up in the sink, and peers into the fridge. No wine or lager in there – just wholesome veggies, which Lou is always so eager to foist upon him. She’ll be suggesting colonic irrigation next. There are chicken breasts too, flabby and beige and completely unappetising. Spike bangs the fridge door shut so hard its Wallace and Grommit magnet pings off, and he inhales deeply, overcome by a desire to rebel.

  Maybe Charlie will come out tonight. It’s not even six o’clock, and the whole of Friday night beckons. He pulls his phone from his pocket, sees a missed call from Lou and plays her voicemail message. Hi love, on the train, bit delayed but never mind, having such a laugh with this guy, tons of champagne and truffles … There’s a gale of laughter in the background. Bye, honey! she trills. Having a laugh with what guy? What, the stranger who helped with her suitcase? And what’s she on about truffles for? Maybe he misheard. He knows he should call her back, but right now, still agitated over Astrid, he isn’t sure he’d be capable of sounding normal. No, alcohol is what’s needed. He calls Charlie, and while the phone rings, he rifles through the cupboards for a beacon of hope in the form of a forgotten bottle of beer or wine or even some liqueur chocolates left over from Christmas.

  ‘Hey, mate,’ Charlie says, ‘how’s it going?’

  ‘Good, good,’ Spike replies.

  ‘Much on this weekend?’ Charlie is obviously somewhere lively and bustling, having a great time.

  ‘Er, not really,’ he says. ‘Lou’s away, y’know, off to Glasgow with her friends so I thought I’d see what turns up.’

  ‘Ah, right … well, hopefully something will. Listen, mate, I’ll catch up in the week, okay? I’m doing a sound check for this band, this studenty thing …’

  ‘Are they any good?’ Spike asks, pulling out a bottle and examining the label: Cabernet Sauvignon. Yesss! Cabernet Sauvignon Red Wine Vinegar. Ah.

  ‘Not bad,’ Charlie says, then to someone else in the background, ‘Yeah, just mic up the bass, would you? I’ll be with you in a tick … Er, you can come tonight if you like,’ Charlie adds, clearly distracted now as someone is shouting for him in the background. ‘Mitchell Hall. The band’ll be on just after nine. I can put your name on the door …’

  ‘Yeah, maybe. There’s a few things happening but I might drop by …’

  ‘Need a plus-one?’

  ‘Er, no. It’d just be me.’

  ‘Right. Great. Well, maybe see you later, mate.’ There’s a shriek of feedback in the background, and Charlie is gone.

  Spike hangs up and stares at the bottle of vinegar on the worktop. Well, he’s not going to drink that, even if it does have wine in it. Reaching up to the wall cupboard, he searches among Lou’s cereals – gravelly mixtures that look as if they’ve been swept up from the bottom of a budgie’s cage – until, right at the back, he spots a large, dusty green bottle. Spike takes it out. Père Magloire Fine Calvados, reads the elegant type on the label. Isn’t calvados brandy? And this Père Magloire – there’s a picture of him, some old bloke in a kind of robe and a nightcap, like Wee Willie Winkie’s. A priest, maybe. So it’s practically religious.

  Spike pulls off the stopper, inhales the potent aroma and pours out a generous measure into a Let’s Bounce mug, i
ts logo arranged in a jaunty curve. Taking a large gulp, and perching on a kitchen chair while the warmth spreads to his throat, Spike decides that perhaps this Friday night isn’t going to turn out too badly after all.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Ryan and Petra treat each other with the utmost courtesy. There’s something about his ex-wife that makes people do things for her: open doors, walk on the roadside of pavements to protect her from being splashed or mowed down by oncoming trucks. Ryan did this instinctively when they were together. Her diminutive stature made him feel more solid and masculine, which he quite enjoyed, although he’d also found her brittle nature unnerving. Lurking at the back of Ryan’s mind had been the perpetual low-level worry that one day, without warning, Petra might literally snap.

  He’s making her coffee now – strong, black, no sugar, in the bone china cup that she likes – while Josh and Daisy gather together the last of their things for a weekend at her place. ‘So I thought we might pop into the Portrait Gallery,’ she tells Ryan as he places the cup in front of her.

  ‘Right, what’s on?’ he asks.

  ‘A pop-art exhibition, pretty child-friendly. I think they’d like that, don’t you?’

  ‘Er, yeah. Sounds good.’ Petra is perched on the edge of a kitchen chair as if wary of sullying her small, hard bottom and is taking small sips from her cup.

  ‘And I thought we might do a bit of shopping,’ Petra adds, fixing him with her almond-shaped grey eyes. Her black bob is immaculate, as if expertly smoothed into place during the millisecond she’d spent waiting at Ryan’s front door before he’d scampered to open it.

  ‘Looking for anything in particular?’ he asks.

  ‘Well,’ Petra shrugs, ‘I really should get the kids something nice to wear for your wedding, seeing as you don’t seem to have got around to it.’ She emits a tinkly laugh, and Ryan can’t decide if she’s being snide or not.

  ‘We’ve tried,’ he murmurs, ‘but there’s been a distinct lack of enthusiasm, to be honest.’ Petra raises her brows, the tiniest gesture that says, That’s because they don’t want you to marry that silly artist girl. Ryan takes a big gulp of coffee, willing the kids to hurry up. It isn’t that being alone with Petra makes him feel uncomfortable exactly; he’s known her since university, when they were just eighteen years old. It’s more a sense of sadness that this single, fragile-looking woman of thirty-seven, whom he’d once loved to the point of distraction, feels it necessary to adopt such a cool, businesslike manner with him. It unsettles him to see Petra sitting three feet away from the gigantic stainless steel fridge that used to be their fridge – chosen by her – and whose contents she would carefully monitor to ensure nothing slimy ever lurked at the back.

  Petra sniffs and frowns. ‘I think I can smell gas, can you?’

  Ryan lurches forward, realising he’s been leaning against the oven’s gas controls, inadvertently turning one on. ‘Oh, God,’ he says, quickly switching it off and swooping towards the table to pick up Petra’s empty cup. Realising he’s treating her as if she were an invalid, or royalty, he gives himself a mental shake.

  ‘So how long’s Hannah away for?’ Petra asks as he washes then dries the cup, for far longer than is necessary.

  ‘She’s back on Sunday night.’

  ‘So it’s her hen party, is it?’ Petra hadn’t had one before she and Ryan had got married; she’d had an intimate dinner with friends.

  ‘I suppose so,’ Ryan replies, ‘but really, it’s just a chance to get together with her best friends. They hardly see each other these days.’ Hell, what’s taking the kids so long? Ryan wants to yell upstairs to tell them to get a move on, but doesn’t want to make it sound as if he’s desperate to chivvy Petra out of the house.

  ‘Not long till the big day now,’ Petra adds, glossy lips forming a teasing smile.

  ‘Nope. Just a couple of weeks now …’

  ‘All organised?’

  ‘Well, yes. We’ve kept it pretty simple, just the registry office and a bit of a buffet and party afterwards … nothing flashy.’

  ‘A buffet?’ she repeats. Ryan is aware of how Petra feels about buffets: food sitting out for too long, prodded by too many fingers.

  ‘It’s less formal than a sit-down thing,’ he explains, starting to sweat now.

  Petra smiles. ‘I know you, Ryan Lennox. Bet you’re stressing and panicking like mad. I can see it all over your face.’

  ‘Well,’ he says, wondering what she can see exactly, ‘I just want it to go smoothly, you know …’

  ‘… And I bet Hannah’s being all casual and free-spirited about it, taking everything in her stride.’

  ‘Um, she’s managing it pretty well,’ he says, a trace of irritation in his voice. Hell, what are the kids doing upstairs? After all this time – three years since she left him – Petra still possesses an uncanny ability to read every thought that’s skittering about in his brain. Yes, he’s stressing, and not only because of his flappy suit trousers or the fact that, now he thinks about it, perhaps a buffet seems a bit cheapskate after all. And what if Petra’s right – not that she’s said anything exactly – and the food is all curled-up and sad-looking? Even more alarming, he has a horrible feeling that, ever since they started making wedding plans, Hannah has acquired the air of someone who would dearly love to run away.

  ‘Anyway,’ Petra says, ‘I bet she’s excited.’

  ‘Who?’ he asks.

  ‘Hannah, of course!’ Ryan blinks at his ex-wife. What kind of comment is that? He can’t say she isn’t excited; yet if he agrees, he’ll be implying that she’s over the moon to be marrying him, fantastic prime catch that he is. And Ryan doesn’t feel like a catch. He feels weighed down with the baggage of his first failed marriage, plus his children who make no secret of the fact that they resent Hannah being part of his life. How will it be when they’re married? Will everything magically sort itself out? ‘You’ll have to ask her – she’s probably cursing the day she said yes,’ he says with forced joviality, awash with relief as the children appear with their packed weekend bags.

  ‘Ready at last.’ Petra smiles at her children, then turns back to Ryan. ‘So, empty house this weekend, huh?’

  ‘That’s right.’ He leans back, taking care not to switch on the gas again.

  ‘What’ll you do?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Got a bit of work to catch up on. We’re pitching for this new bar snack range and I’ve got to dazzle Marcus with some brilliant ideas first thing Monday.’

  ‘Oh,’ Petra chuckles. ‘Well, we’d better let you get started then. Don’t want to get in the way.’ With that, she clops to the front door, swooping out to her little red car into which the children hop obediently, before turning to wave goodbye.

  Petra waves too, which is unusual. Her smile is brighter, her brittleness momentarily softened by … what exactly? Pity for Ryan that he’s marrying the sort of woman who has a hen weekend? Petra is starting her car now – a shiny red Corsa whose interior smells new, even though it’s four years old. ‘It’s not that kind of hen party,’ he wants to call out, but she’s already pulling away.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  When Sadie studies her reflection in the mirror on the scuffed lime-green wardrobe in room 232, she sees not a mum of two, with tension and tiredness clouding her eyes, but the woman she used to be.

  Sadie Vella, who graduated from Glasgow School of Art with a First in textile design and for whom the whole world was waiting. Not a dishevelled mother who gets ticked off by strangers for losing her babies’ shoes. Hannah is curled up on her own bed in their bleak but perfectly serviceable triple room, applying mascara with the help of a mirrored compact, and Lou is in the bathroom, wrapped in a towel and teasing out her wet curly hair with a comb. What Lou sees in the mirror isn’t a picker-upper of squished chicken nuggets, or a fisher-outer of rank nappies from the ballpool. She sees her younger self, cheeks radiant, eyes shining and alive. ‘I don’t think we should go to the old places,’ comes Han
nah’s voice from the bedroom. ‘Let’s just go out with open minds and see where we end up.’

  ‘See where the night takes us,’ Lou chuckles, wandering back into the bedroom to join them.

  ‘We could try Felix’s bar,’ Sadie suggests.

  ‘Funny, wasn’t he,’ says Hannah, ‘with the coolbox picnic and everything?’

  ‘Truffles!’ Lou laughs, smoothing moisturiser onto her face. ‘Who travels with a supply of truffles?’ Her mobile rings, and she retrieves it from her single bed. ‘Hey, Spike. I tried to call you earlier. Everything okay?’

  ‘Yeah, pretty good,’ he says. ‘So how was your journey?’

  ‘Such a laugh,’ Lou enthuses. ‘We met this man who runs cocktail bars. He had a whole stash of champagne with him, and truffles, can you believe it? We were just saying, who on earth travels with—’

  ‘You sound drunk,’ Spike cuts in.

  ‘Oh, I’m not. Just a bit … well, happy, I guess.’ Still gripping her phone, Lou tips the contents of her make-up bag onto her bed.

  ‘So what was this guy like?’ Spike asks.

  ‘Funny. Strange. Not strange in a creepy way or anything, but there was something about him, you know? The way he drew things out of us, how we really felt about our lives and where we’re all going …’ She laughs. ‘I don’t know. It sounds a bit mad. We were probably all just over-excited.’

  ‘Yeah, sounds like it,’ he says curtly. ‘So … you sat there with this weird stranger, drinking his champagne, telling him your innermost secrets?’

  Lou stops rummaging through her make-up and frowns. ‘It was just a laugh. God, he was only being friendly …’

  ‘I just don’t like the idea of it, that’s all.’

  Hannah and Sadie are looking quizzically at Lou. She rolls her eyes and inhales deeply. ‘I am a grown-up, honey. I think I can just about look after myself.’

  ‘Yes, but he could have spiked—’

  ‘What, the champagne? Don’t be crazy. Anyway, we saw him taking out the cork right in front of us.’