by Adele Geras
‘I … this …’ Gareth heaved a huge sigh and ran a hand through his hair, which made it stick up comically. He had his ridiculously traditional pyjama top on: blue, piped with dark brown and for all she knew he’d put the bottoms on again too while she was in the bathroom. They hadn’t, as a couple, ever slept naked. From the beginning, Gareth always put his pyjamas on straight after they made love; Nessa did the same, but she never wore a nightdress when she slept alone. The mere touch of cool linen on her bare skin made her feel deliciously sexy. She’d suggested it to Gareth once when they were on their honeymoon and he’d looked panic-stricken so that was that.
‘I want a divorce, Vanessa.’
Don’t speak, she told herself. He never called her Vanessa. Her heart was thumping rather loudly and quickly and she blinked. Here we go. Should she pretend ignorance? Or admit that she knew all about Melanie? Divorce! What was he talking about? Did he really want to break up the marriage? A terrifying thought came into her mind: this house. Buggered if she was leaving. Gareth’s money. How would it work out for her? What about Tamsin? Custody arrangements, tears – a trauma for their daughter, whom she loved beyond everything and who must not on any account suffer because of her father’s stupidity. What should she do? She said, more to buy time than because she hadn’t heard or understood, ‘What did you say?’
‘I’m asking you for a divorce. I’m in love with someone else. I want to be with her. I’m so sorry, Nessa. Truly. I didn’t mean it …’
‘Mean what? What are you talking about? You’re not making sense.’
‘Well, I thought it was just an office flirtation. You know how it is …’
‘Do I?’ Nessa’s voice was icy now. ‘You mean you’ve done this office flirtation thing before? Before this?’
‘Well, it was nothing serious before. Not really …’
‘How dare you say that? How dare you? Are you really saying you’ve been unfaithful to me often?’
‘It didn’t mean anything, honestly. And it was only once or twice. That’s all.’
‘ALL?’ Nessa was screaming now. ‘ALL? I can’t believe it. And this suddenly, this new thing that you want to divorce me over – that’s different, is it? That does mean something, right?’
He nodded, blushing. ‘She’s … I love her. And – well, she’s pregnant.’
Nessa put her head in her hands. She hadn’t been expecting that, and found that the thought scared her. Then she looked at Gareth and spat out the words.
‘Pregnant! I see. So this new baby suddenly takes precedence over our baby. Our Tamsin. Suddenly, you don’t give a shit about her, do you? She means nothing to you. You’re about to get a new model. How convenient!’
‘Stop it, Nessa. You’re mad. Of course this baby won’t take Tamsin’s place. You know she’ll always be my darling daughter.’ A look of terror crossed Gareth’s face quite suddenly as a thought occurred to him. ‘You’re not going to stop me seeing her, are you? I’d fight it in court. You can’t do that, you really can’t.’
‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ said Nessa, scrambling for the moral high ground even though for a split second the idea of giving Gareth full custody, simply because she knew he wouldn’t want that, shimmered before her like a mirage. She smiled sweetly as she went on, ‘No, you can have more than your fair share of childcare, never fear. I’ll make sure of that. Let’s see how Melanie manages with a new baby and a possibly quite traumatized eight-year-old. She’ll have her hands full. Probably won’t fancy fucking you quite so much as she did in the office. It does take it out of you, having a baby. You’re never quite the same again, your priorities get rearranged.’
‘How d’you know her name? I’ve never told you. Go on, tell me how you found out.’
‘I read an illiterate text from someone called Melanie. On your phone, when you left it in the car, remember? You’re an incompetent adulterer, as well as being a total bastard.’
Gareth was ashamed of himself. Nessa could tell from the way he looked down at his feet and chewed on his bottom lip. But he pulled himself together and tried to convey a kind of bravado.
‘Have you ever thought that you’re part of the problem, Nessa? Have you any idea what it’s like to be married to someone as cold and selfish as you?’
‘Oh, so it’s my fault, the fact that you can’t keep your hands off the secretaries, is it?’ She stood up and went to the door and held it open. She said, ‘I’ve had enough of this discussion for now, thanks. You can leave. Leave this house and don’t come back. I’m getting in touch with our lawyer first thing on Monday and filing for divorce. Mental cruelty, infidelity, you name it. I’m going to screw you for every single penny I can, I’m warning you. You can go and live with Melanie. You deserve one another.’
Another thought occurred to her and she added, ‘Does Melanie know we’re still screwing? Not ten minutes ago, you were huffing and puffing all over me. Does she know that? I might text her to tell her what a fabulous lover you are, I don’t think! Well, you’re not answering. Does Melanie know you’re still making totally inadequate love to me?’
Gareth had the grace to hang his head. ‘No – no, she doesn’t. And what do you mean, totally inadequate? You’ve never complained. You always seemed – well, quite satisfied.’
‘I’m a good actress, you bloody fool. You’re about as sexy as cold rice pudding. I bet you told her I was a cold fish and didn’t let you come anywhere near me.’ From his silence, she knew she’d guessed correctly.
‘I knew it. You’re disgusting. Just go and sleep somewhere else. I don’t really care where – the sofa, the spare room. Somewhere where I can’t see you. Go on. Go now.’
‘But—’
‘Don’t say another word, okay? I swear, if you say one more thing I’m going to pick up this lamp and hit you with it.’
‘I’m going, I’m going …’ He looked silly with his pyjama bottoms clutched in his hand and Nessa almost laughed as he left the room. When he’d gone, she sat without moving for a long time. I’m not getting into that bed again, she thought. It’ll be a symbolic gesture. ‘I’ve let him make love to me in it knowing he had someone else. I’ll buy a new one in the morning. I’ll ring up a moving firm and give this one to charity. She leaned forward, pulled the duvet off (that would go as well – all this linen – she wasn’t going to use it any more ever. This was going to be a clean sweep) and, wrapping herself up in it, lay down on the chaise longue. She was further from sleep than she’d ever been in her life and intended to use the rest of the night to work out what she had to do next. Talk to Matt. Talk to Ellie. Talk to Justin. It had suddenly become more important than ever to get a slice of the deal he was cooking up. Tears came to her eyes. Mickey. If only Mickey were here. For a second or two, Nessa wondered whether she could drive through the night and wake up her friend for a comforting chat. Mickey wouldn’t mind but she’d wait till morning. She’d go and see Matt and then her mother and get that part over with. Then she’d drive to Mickey’s cottage. Should she warn her or just turn up? Tomorrow, she thought. I’ll decide tomorrow.
*
‘Coffee, Ness?’ Lou looked across to where Nessa was sitting at the kitchen table, with Mum and Dad on either side of her, leaning towards her in a supportive manner. If it looks like a crisis and sounds like a crisis, Lou thought, then it is a crisis and yes, your sister coming in first thing on Sunday morning announcing that she was about to be divorced does count as something dramatic. If anyone had asked Lou what was the least likely thing to happen, ever, it was this: Gareth going off with a secretary from work. The cliché of clichés was being re-enacted right here in the kitchen, and Lou couldn’t help being interested on a purely gossipy level, while at the same time being unable to squash completely a feeling of low-level resentment. Nessa’s stuff, Nessa’s concerns, always seemed to trump her own. But you’ve got nothing important to divulge, she told herself, trying to be kind. Nessa’s whole life is … is what? Her sister didn’t look as though
she’d missed out on sleep. Lou searched most particularly for signs of late-night weeping, and there wasn’t a red-rimmed eye to be seen. But what a surprising thing this was! Lou had always thought Gareth was completely devoted and under Nessa’s thumb. He did everything she suggested and seemed to have no opinions of his own, but perhaps this was the result. Maybe he’d found a person who liked doing what he thought he’d like to do. Maybe he hadn’t been devoted so much as henpecked. Being married to Nessa had to be totally exhausting. Her sister liked describing herself as having high standards but to Lou it often looked as though she was simply more bossy and pernickety about most things than other people.
‘No, thanks, Lou. I’m in danger of caffeine overload. Green tea of some kind?’
‘I’ve got all sorts.’ Mum jumped up and went to the cupboard, taking out a wooden box neatly subdivided into little sections: green tea with jasmine, with orange, with lemon, with Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all – you could take your pick.
‘Oh, God, anything,’ said Nessa, sighing. Lou took the teabag from her mother and poured boiling water over it. Nessa hadn’t been too distressed to care about what she was going to drink from. ‘I can’t bear those thick mugs,’ she always said, and Mum had got into the habit of using the delicate china teacups when Nessa was around. Today, even though she’d come to the house in what was supposed to be a terrible state about the ending of her marriage, she’d made a point of repeating her ‘no mugs’ mantra when a drink was proposed.
‘I can’t understand him,’ Mum said. ‘Such a lovely house and child and a wife like you, Nessa. It’s madness. Don’t you think if you hold your ground, he might think better of throwing everything away? Come back to you in the end?’
Lou wanted to smile but stopped herself. In her mother’s world, husbands always came back and that was always the best thing, the desirable option.
‘I wouldn’t have him if he did,’ Nessa said, stirring her tea. ‘He can go and see what life with Melanie is like. He’ll have to pay maintenance for Tamsin till she’s eighteen and I’m certainly keeping the house. I can, can’t I, Matt?’
‘Of course – you’re the injured party. In any case, the house is in both your names, isn’t it?’
Nessa nodded. ‘I made sure of that,’ she said. ‘God, it’s such a drag. This whole thing. I don’t need it now. There’s a lot going on at Paper Roses and the thing with the will – too ghastly. I didn’t sleep a wink last night. Not a wink.’
Through the kitchen door, Lou could see Poppy crawling about in the hall. She’d been in the kitchen, milling about under the table where they were all sitting, and even Mum, whose attention was usually fixed on the child during her every waking moment, had been distracted by Nessa’s sudden arrival and what she had to say. Now Poppy was playing quite quietly with a set of Dinky cars that used to belong to Justin. Dad must have brought them down from the attic. Lou wondered whether she ought to go and pick her up and take her for a little walk in the buggy while this was going on – how long was Nessa staying? For lunch? All afternoon?
She listened to her sister going on and on, looking very far from desperate. Up all night? Either Nessa was lying or her make-up was spectacularly good. She looked as pulled-together and smart as ever. The fact that she’d got up this morning and done her face so perfectly said everything really. This divorce was obviously a logistical problem; a financial one especially, but Nessa’s heart wasn’t broken. No way. It occurred to Lou to wonder whether part of her wasn’t quietly happy. If she hadn’t been properly in love with Gareth (and Lou didn’t have the sort of relationship with her sister which meant that she could ask her outright) then this might be a kind of relief, even though it was a drag and a nuisance in all sorts of ways at this stage.
The unmistakable splintering noise of something shattering – glass? A window? – cut across the conversation.
‘Poppy!’ Lou shouted, and ran out of the room. Poppy was shrieking. ‘Oh, darling Poppy … are you hurt? What’s the matter?’
As she scooped her daughter up into her arms, Lou was dimly aware of her parents just behind her; of Nessa standing by the kitchen door and of the hall floor covered in thousands of pieces of porcelain, like a scattering of sharp-edged white leaves. She buried her face in Poppy’s neck, murmuring over and over again, ‘It’s okay, baby, it’s okay. You’re fine, darling. Nothing’s hurt. Nothing’s wrong.’
After a few moments, Poppy began to calm down enough to sniff and ask for a bottle. Mum, Dad and Nessa had gathered in the doorway to the kitchen. Mum looked heartbroken, as though a living person had been accidentally harmed.
‘God,’ said Nessa, ‘aren’t little kids amazing. All those tears, and when they stop they’re not a bit blotchy or revolting. Fantastic powers of recovery.’
‘Give her to me,’ Phyl said, putting on a brave face. ‘I’ll get her bottle. I think I’ll put her down for a nap. Come to Granny, precious, come on.’
Lou handed her daughter over and felt a bewildering mixture of emotions. She wanted to say no, it’s me, I’m her mother. I should do it, but Phyl was already scooping her up. She was obviously sad about the vase, but Lou wondered why she’d put it in the hall after all her efforts to make the house child-proof. Maybe she thought it was too big and heavy to come to any harm.
‘God, Mum, it’s your lovely Chinese vase. I’ll clear it up,’ she said. ‘I know how much you love it – how on earth did Poppy manage to smash such a huge thing?’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Matt, presenting Lou with the dustpan and brush he’d already fetched out of the cupboard under the stairs. ‘Those vases are fragile. God knows, Mother used to say that to me often enough. Turns out she was right. Doesn’t matter about the vase, Lou, really. But Poppy could have been seriously hurt. I dread to think …’
‘But she wasn’t, Dad,’ Lou said. ‘She’s fine. I think she pushed one of those cars too hard and it must have crashed against the china. There’s no carpet just there. Or maybe she pushed it over and it was falling on the wooden bit of the floor that made it break. I’m so sorry, Dad. I know Mum loved that vase.’
‘It doesn’t matter, Lou. As long as Poppy’s all right …’
‘She’s fine, Dad.’
‘Unlike me, Matt,’ said Nessa. ‘Can I have a word? I’ve got to go soon, and I want to know how to proceed.’
‘D’you mind, Lou?’ Her father looked bewildered.
‘No, go on, Dad, you go and talk to Nessa. I’ll clear this up. Then poor Mum won’t have to see it in bits. I’m fine, honestly.’
Left alone in the hall, Lou began sweeping china into the dustpan. There was a folded piece of paper lying in the midst of the white fragments. What’s that doing, she wondered. Someone must have dropped it in there by mistake. It was the sort of thing a child would do, but it certainly wasn’t Poppy. This was a whole sheet, neatly folded and curling up a little at the edges as though it had been there for some time. Curious, she put the brush and dustpan down and unfolded the paper. A letter, handwritten in a spidery, obviously foreign hand. Fleetingly, she wondered why it was that Continental handwriting was so different from British. It must have to do with the way children were taught to write – what was this? She peered at the paper.
The date was July 27th, 1985. This letter was over twenty years old:
Dear Mr Barrington,
You will please forgive this bad English I write. Many years I do not write in this language. I find a copy of your romance, Blind Moon, in the shop of second-hand books and now I read it, I must ask you questions. I think the woman you write of may be my younger sister though you have changed her name. She left us to go to North Borneo and married an Englishman. They are different times then. My family do not speak to her again. I do not write to her. I am shamed of this. But maybe you make everything up. If not, if you are indeed son of Louise, my sister, then please answer me soon. I am sixty-five years old. Louise is sixty-seven if she has lived. My family never speak of her, but we think
she died in North Borneo, perhaps in a camp like you have written. Your book I read with horror, because I am so sad. Please reply to this address: 4, Rue du Treixel, Paris 14ème, France. I am obliged to you.
With true regards,
Manon Franchard.
Lou sat back on her heels and read the letter three times. What did it mean? And why was it in the vase? Constance must have thrown it in there. Frowning, Lou tried to reconstruct what might have happened. Her grandmother was trying to keep a bit of fan mail away from her husband but why had she not simply torn up this letter? Dad had told her that Constance always dealt with the post and didn’t show Grandad everything. She was jealous of any publishing success he had and for sure she kept things hidden from him when it suited her. This letter was particularly one that she wouldn’t want him to see. She’d have justified this. Lou could almost hear Constance’s voice, definite and confident, speaking to her from the past: I’m not having him going off on a wild goose chase to find his aunt in France, which is full of confidence tricksters anyway. She’s probably a wily woman chancing her arm, claiming a relationship with a writer just to profit from it in some way. She doubtless thinks he’s making pots of money. He’s not seeing this and that’s flat.
Well, okay, that was fine but this person knew that Grandad’s mother was called Louise. Would a confidence trickster know such a fact? And why had the letter been posted into the vase? It was a mystery – perhaps someone had come into the room and she’d panicked, stuck it down there thinking to retrieve it later and then forgotten about it. She’d have thought of it as trivial, nothing to occupy her mind for very long. Once she’d dismissed the writer as a nutcase and a foreign one at that, she’d have lost interest in the letter and in everything it contained.
Rue du Treixel, Paris. Perhaps it wasn’t a trick. What if this Mme Franchard was who she said she was? There was no one around who would even know whether Franchard was the correct name. Grandad’s aunt. Dad’s great-aunt. If she’d been sixty-five in 1985, she might easily be dead. I could write to her, Lou thought, and wondered whether she ought to tell Mum and Dad. Part of her longed to keep this small mystery to herself, but that wasn’t fair. Dad was more closely related to this Mme Franchard than she was. She couldn’t not tell him, not show him the letter. But Nessa was there in the study, monopolizing him, when he wasn’t even her father. Lou smiled. Didn’t matter how old you were, you still had the same old childish jealousies lurking somewhere in your head. But honestly, she thought, why hadn’t Nessa gone to pour out her heart to her mother? Now that Ellie no longer lived abroad, she was just as available as Dad – but of course he was a solicitor. Nothing like getting free legal advice, and a good dollop of sympathy into the bargain. Briefly, she wondered what Gareth’s girlfriend was like. She imagined a restful type, the exact opposite of Nessa.