Men I've Loved Before

by Adele Parks

  ‘For who?’

  ‘Whoever,’ he said, with a huge sloppy grin.

  ‘For Giles?’

  ‘Not really. I just saw it in the toy shop and I thought it was sort of cute. Irresistible.’

  This wasn’t going away.

  Natalie wasn’t sure if Neil was waging a sly war of attrition. As she hadn’t been able to articulate her objections to having a baby beyond constantly reiterating, ‘I just don’t want one!’ maybe he held the vain hope that he could break her. Or maybe he simply could not help himself and was genuinely all-consumed by baby thoughts. Either way, the situation was dire.

  Natalie, an independent, autonomous, resolute thirty-three year old did what she always did in times of stress or uncertainty, she ran home to visit her parents. They still lived in Guildford, in the house where she’d lived when she was a little girl. She liked visiting Guildford, which is only thirty miles from London and a quick drive down the A3 from Chiswick. Guildford is a pretty place with a sturdy history (there were an inordinate number of hanging baskets and a Saxon castle). It is exactly the sort of place parents are supposed to live, safe, orderly and known. The high street is cobbled with granite setts and as a market town there are distinct occasions of bustle as the fabulous shops attract yummy mummies and affluent teenagers, yet Natalie also found that there was often a strange almost magical hush throughout the town, suggesting the sort of calm that other places only ever achieved when it snowed. As a child Natalie had believed that maybe the people of Guildford invested in rubber-soled shoes and they certainly seemed to talk in whispers, as though permanently in a library. Loud talking on mobile phones was very much frowned upon in Guildford. Residents would, if they could, put the offender in the stocks and throw rotten eggs (although quietly).

  Natalie’s parents lived in an ugly 1950s semi, which even back in the seventies had been sold as a ‘fixer upper’. Natalie’s parents were blissfully ignorant of the suggestion that interior design was the new sex and had never put much effort into fixing up anything much, other than the garden, which was a riot of colour and delicious smells. The house was boxy, with small windows, brown carpets and tatty, fraying wallpaper but the bringing up of four children meant that Brian and Nina Morgan had never had the money or energy to move. The only thing to recommend the house, and indeed the reason her parents had bought it in the first place, was that it backed directly on to the Pewley Downs, giving Natalie and her brothers a playground, complete with grasslands, that provided all manner of mini beasts and woodlands, that afforded countless dens and natural climbing frames. Despite the unreliable central heating and dated décor, the Morgans’ house always felt like a home.

  Natalie had rung ahead to tell her parents that she was visiting. This way she was more likely to cadge lunch or, at the very least, half an hour of their devoted attention. Her younger brothers had all ostensibly moved out of the family home but whenever Natalie visited she was, as likely as not, to find one or another of them (and an enormous bag of laundry) spread across the front room or blocking up the hallway. The boys sucked up time like black holes, they always had. They seemed to have a genetic need to be at the centre of everyone’s attention (a Y chromosome thing, perhaps) and so Natalie secretly had been a little relieved when Nina said that none of them was expected this weekend. Nat had a better chance of finding a quiet moment for a chat with her parents if there wasn’t a constant commentary from her brothers about their drinking, sexual, athletic and (occasional) career prowess.

  Besides the fact that their children seemed to live on a piece of elastic that sprang them home regularly, her parents had other calls on their time. They were busy sorts and if they were not given notice of her arrival, they would almost certainly have been engaged elsewhere. Nina taught piano to local schoolchildren. Brian liked to take long walks on the Downs; he carried a pointed stick and a hessian bag for litter collecting. Because Natalie had called ahead, Brian had got up two hours earlier than usual to do his Womble impersonation and Nina had cancelled three piano lessons. Neither parent thought to mention to Natalie that they’d adjusted their schedules to suit her. It put far too much pressure on the visit. They couldn’t quite explain why that would be the case but like so many truisms about family life, it was just the way it was. Natalie ostensibly hated it if they made a fuss of her but equally often she complained that she was largely ignored. They weren’t always sure what to do for the best. The compromise of making an effort but not admitting to it was in fact unlikely to please anyone but it was the policy they’d adopted. Brian and Nina wished Natalie visited more often, the way the boys did, and they didn’t quite understand why she didn’t.

  They sat in the garden, clasping mugs of steaming tea. The Morgans were outdoorsy types and only ever retreated indoors if rain fell like slivers of glass. On this September day the air was cold and damp, drizzle threatened, but it wasn’t actually pouring. Besides, the garden was aesthetically superior to anywhere in the house, even in autumn when the rose bushes were becoming thorny twigs once again and the borders needed tending to.

  ‘The greenhouse needs a good wash,’ commented Nina. She wasn’t telling her husband that he had to wash away the grime and algae accumulated on the glazing, but since the dirt reduced the amount of light that could get through to the plants inside, she thought her observation made it perfectly clear that the task needed to be done by someone.

  Brian recognised the directional hint for what it was, it had taken years but he now had the knack of knowing when Nina was managing him gently.

  ‘I’ll get to that this afternoon,’ he replied mildly, ‘with a hose and a stiff brush.’ He didn’t mind. Part of him looked forward to slowly spraying and brushing every panel in turn. If a job was worth doing, it was worth doing well.

  ‘So, any news?’ asked Nina, turning to Natalie. Natalie wondered if the question meant, ‘So skipped your period yet? Grandchild on the way, is it?’ But then she realised that was ridiculous, Nina had never asked her such a thing. Why would baby-making be top of Nina’s mind? Neil’s weird behaviour was making Nat paranoid.

  ‘I got a promotion.’

  ‘Oh, well done! That’s fabulous news. Tell us all about it.’

  Natalie was happy to describe the exact nature of her new job and to recount the humorous circumstances that had surrounded the appointment. She told of the scattering files, fluttering like butterflies across her boss’s office, and the water spilling like a tidal wave across his desk. Her parents laughed at her self-deprecating humour but inwardly shone with pride that their daughter was doing something so interesting and important.

  ‘I bet Neil is proud,’ said Brian.

  ‘Hmmm,’ replied Natalie, not actually committing or commenting. Nina, with a woman’s intuition for recognising intrigue or a secret, pushed a little harder.

  ‘Did he take you out for a meal? How did you celebrate?’

  Natalie didn’t have the energy to enter into a deception. Wasn’t that why she was here in their garden so she could confide in them, explain her problem, get their perspective?

  ‘I haven’t told Neil about my promotion,’ she confessed. Brian and Nina became rigid. Brian had been slouching against the wall, nursing his tea mug in one hand; now he was stiff and upright like a flagpole. Nina’s smile and gentle curves seemed to vanish as her jaw and shoulders squared. With finely tuned animalistic instincts they sensed an issue. Natalie saw the concern flood into their eyes and felt guilty. They were too old to hear this. They were too weary to still be listening to her problems. Yes, for years they had oozed sympathy when she had fallen over at school, in front of a crowd or, worse, fallen out with her crowd, both regular states of emergency for a child. They’d sat through the door-slamming stage and the agonising over spots, boys and the ‘what to wear for a party?’ stages. They had been as wise as their limited experience had allowed when she’d applied for universities and they’d sympathised when she didn’t get her first or second choice, then cele
brated when she got decent results. She’d run home to them when her flat had been infested with mice and when her bag had been snatched, she’d called them when her suitcase had got lost en route to a hot holiday destination. But this. The baby thing. This wasn’t something that could be fixed by opening a packet of digestives or even calling the insurance company.

  They looked tired. Not at all how she imagined them in her head when she brought them to mind. Her father was absolutely white-haired now, he often tripped up over his own feet when he was walking anywhere. He wouldn’t ever discuss it but he found it a nuisance that he needed two pairs of glasses, one for long distance and one for short. It was irritating always having to swap between the two, even worse in the summer when sunglasses were required. Nina was baffled by all things modern. She had been quite an ‘it’ girl in her day and in her small town. She’d been regarded as fashionable, fun and funky. But her youth, squandered in the seventies, sometimes seemed so irrelevant she might as well have been born in Tudor times. What the hell was a laptop, or an iPhone? One of the boys had been so excited about a notebook; another, his blueberry or something. Neither item turned out to be what she expected. She wasn’t even comfortable sending a text and if she did she would insist on spelling everything properly and using the correct grammar. All these gadgets made her feel so old. As did the fact that O levels were extinct and even their replacements were under threat. Internet dating was practically de rigueur. Women went to bars without underwear to guarantee free drinks from the landlords. In her day they’d burnt bras, discarding undergarments for political reasons, not to get drunk. What was the world coming to?

  Natalie had only arrived half an hour ago but in that time Brian and Nina had told her that her eldest brother had split up from his long-term girlfriend, which was a shame, everyone had liked her and Nina had been hoping that there might be a wedding to look forward to at some point. The middle brother still hadn’t settled on a career or, rather, he did not have a settled career. He was in a band and so earned his money by working at a biscuit factory. The shifts were convenient for his night-owl lifestyle but his parents couldn’t help but wonder if he would ever put his impressive academic qualifications to use. The youngest son was travelling somewhere in Asia, he hadn’t called for three weeks so no one knew his exact whereabouts. He’d sent one email but it hadn’t been specific about location. Apparently he was outside a ‘mind-blowingly beautiful shrine’. It irritated Natalie that he was so lazy and such a poor correspondent. It was selfish.

  As it would be selfish of her to bring more worry to her parents’ door. They needed her to be the successful one, the sorted one, the one who was happily married, with a good job and a clear vision of exactly where her life was going. All of which was true. Natalie did know where her life was going. It was just that Neil seemed to want to go in a completely different direction. To have a baby or not to have a baby was not an issue one could compromise on. It’s not as though you could have half a baby or a baby for some of the time. Natalie sighed. What would be the point in bringing up this issue with her parents? They couldn’t offer a solution. They wouldn’t understand. No one did. All they would do was ask themselves what they’d done wrong to make her think this way. It seemed to be a default setting for a parent to blame themselves for their child’s irregularities and they would see it as irregular. They might be tempted to dig deep, look for explanations. Digging wouldn’t help. Not at all.

  ‘Why haven’t you told Neil?’

  Natalie didn’t say she was terrified an announcement of this sort (of any sort) might lead to another row as Neil would insist on re-exploring their status quo. Undoubtedly, Neil would view the promotion as either a stumbling block to her having a baby or a great way for them to save before the event and perhaps secure better maternity leave conditions when his imaginary baby was born. He would not be able to see the promotion for what it was: something quite apart from his fantasies. She knew this because he’d made sure that just about every conversation they’d had in the last month had found a way back to discussing starting a family. Last night Natalie asked him what he wanted for supper, fishcakes or toad in the hole. He replied by telling her about the importance of fish in a child’s diet, especially in the early years. When she mooted the idea of them buying a new car, something fun and sporty, he said a two-seater was ridiculous if you were planning a family. But she wasn’t planning a family. Nat felt she couldn’t admit to her parents that she’d decided it was better to just get on with the new job without mentioning it to Neil. While she was based in the same office, Neil wouldn’t notice she’d been promoted. He wasn’t noticing anything about her now. None of this would comfort her ageing parents. Instead she lied.

  ‘I’m going to surprise him when I get my first big pay cheque through. I might buy something nice for the house. He’s been after a flat screen TV.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure he’d want to be involved in choosing his own TV,’ said her father, his concern now instantly switching to Neil.

  Although Natalie was the one who regularly checked the household drains for blockages (she made sure outside grids were clear of leaves and moss, and was sensible about disposing of cooking fats), and although she took the car to be serviced (where she was able to check confidently that terminals had been cleaned and protected from corrosion with a layer of petroleum jelly or grease), and although she could succinctly explain the offside rule, Brian was old-fashioned enough to believe that there were certain things that were (and always would be) Man’s Work. Reading Which? magazine to select any sort of gadget was just that, even if the gadget was a set of hair straighteners.

  Natalie didn’t say that she’d be delighted if Neil’s attention reverted back to a normal pastime like making endless cost and performance comparisons between various flat screen TVs but to do so she’d have to persuade him to put down the baby naming book. Instead, she nodded and said, ‘Maybe you’re right.’

  Nina changed the subject. ‘Sweetheart, your father and I have been having a big clearout. A spring clean if you like.’

  ‘It’s just turned autumn.’

  Nina chuckled and shrugged at her own inefficiency. ‘Yes, so we’ll be in time for Christmas or ahead of the game next year. We have a couple of boxes of your junk that we need you to sort through.’

  ‘You mean the items that I hold dear and have unlimited sentimental value.’

  ‘Yes, if you say so,’ smiled Nina indulgently.

  Natalie had lived in a series of tatty bedsits and flat shares throughout her twenties. She’d once been victim of a break-in and, more times than she could remember, she’d been a victim of damp so she’d developed a habit of bringing home all her prized possessions for safe keeping. Brian often drily remarked that long after she’d flown the nest she returned to feather it. Her ‘prize possessions’ included a handful of old CDs that she had now uploaded on to her iPod (but she still couldn’t bring herself to let go of the original discs), a number of books she’d read in the mid-nineties (an eclectic mix ranging from Thomas Hardy to Patricia Cornwall with Armistead Maupin in between), a clutch of certificates for swimming lengths and perhaps even her degree certificate (she never could find that) and numerous photo albums, negatives, postcards, letters and other relics of the past.

  Natalie and Neil had lived in their grown-up home for over five years now and she was vaguely aware that she owed it to her parents to retrieve the boxes and store the stuff in her own home. But she’d never done as much for two reasons. One, the Chiswick terrace was tight on space and, two, the memorabilia belonged to a different era. A different Natalie. The memories showcased Natalie the teen and twenty-something girl around town. Natalie before she became a wife. Natalie didn’t want to obliterate the Athena postcards and yellowing books but she didn’t think they fitted in to her stylish home which was full of carefully selected, thoughtful pieces from Habitat and Heals. They were too much about where she came from, not enough about where she was now or where she was
going. She’d been happy not to have to deal with the messy boxes but it appeared Nina had decided it was crunch time.

  ‘We’re going to take in a lodger. A Chinese student. We responded to an advert that the university placed in the Surrey Advertiser.’

  ‘The cash will come in handy,’ clarified her father.

  ‘And we miss having young people around the house,’ added Nina. ‘So you see, we’re going to need the cupboard space.’

  Natalie nodded. ‘OK, OK, I’ll go and take a look at the stuff now.’

  Natalie pushed open the door to the smallest bedroom of the house which had always been hers. The boys had shared two rooms between the three of them. Their consoles and stinky sports kits had taken up more space than her range of Boots 17 make-up. Natalie’s room, while the smallest, was the prettiest. It caught the morning sunlight and was closest to the bathroom and she’d always liked it. When she was a girl the room had been decorated with flowery wallpaper, flowery curtains and flowery bedspread, none of which matched, thus creating the not unpleasant effect of a wild, overgrown country garden. As it was odd for her parents to make any effort with décor, Natalie was surprised to find that they had stripped the wallpaper and painted the walls a neutral magnolia and that the faded, embroidered bedspread had been replaced by a plain green duvet. The room was ready for the new lodger to stamp his or her personality on to it. Natalie didn’t mind at all. Generally, she was a very practical woman. She could never understand her friends who insisted their parents keep their childhood rooms as shrines to what once had been. Natalie wasn’t interested in that. She looked forward. She took what she needed from her past and kept it with her as she moved forward. This wasn’t her room now and it hadn’t been for a long time. She knew that in the unlikely event of ever needing to return to this house, the decorative state of the walls would not define home for her. She had a home with Neil. This room belonged to her parents and it was theirs to do with as they pleased. Plus, she supported the idea of an overseas lodger. A lodger would provide them with a new interest.