by Sue Margolis
She giggled and jerked her head, indicating that Rebecca should take a look. The room was empty apart from Max and Lorna, who were standing by the French doors gazing out onto the cheesy postcard English garden and hills beyond. Lorna was resting her head on his shoulder. He was holding her, whispering into her ear and stroking her hair. They looked so intimate, like lovers sharing secrets. Rebecca felt herself starting to shake. She was certain her legs were about to give way.
“Becks, you OK?” Zoe said. “You’ve gone ever so pale.”
Rebecca swallowed hard. “No, yes. No, I’m fine. Really. I just need a drink, that’s all.”
They carried on walking toward the marquee.
“And Lorna and Max are so well suited, don’t you think?” Zoe carried on. “Both absolutely gorgeous. And she’s dead brainy. Plus she’s so organized and the perfect hostess. I mean, a man like Max, highly intelligent, ambitious, needs a consort, don’t you reckon?”
Zoe was the kind of old-fashioned, unliberated girl who used words like consort in conversations about marriage.
“Maybe we should fix him up with the duke of Edinburgh,” Rebecca muttered.
Zoe burst out laughing. “You know what I mean, though. She always looks so poised, elegant and in control. Don’t you wish you were more like her? I know I do.”
Rebecca carried on staring. By now she was choking back tears.
“Now, come on, Becks, chin up. There’s somebody out there for you. You just need to get out more. Have you thought about learning to salsa? Adam and I have just started lessons. It’s such a giggle and great exercise.”
Then she said she really ought to go and mingle.
Without thinking, Rebecca headed straight back to the drawing room. She was just about to burst in on Max and Lorna and demand to know what the bloody hell was going on when she saw the wedding photographer, followed by half a dozen bridesmaids, heading her way. Probably about to take some photographs in the drawing room, she thought. She couldn’t possibly make a scene. As she stood there wondering what to do, she heard somebody behind her. She turned round. It was Guy.
“Poor old Becks,” he said, seeing Max and Lorna. “Trouble in Camelot, is there? You know you can always come and cry on my shoulder. Or any other bit of me you fancy.”
“Oh, just bugger off, Guy,” she said, pushing past him. She realized all she wanted to do was leave. She picked up her dress and started running down the hall.
“I’ll take that as a maybe, then, shall I?” he called after her.
As she reached the front door she pulled Val’s shawl out of her bag. “God, this won’t be enough,” she said. “I’ll get frostbite out there.”
Then she noticed an ancient battered Barbour hanging on the coat stand. She hesitated for a moment, then grabbed it up and threw it on over her dress.
A couple of minutes later she was standing at the end of the gravel drive, staring at the empty lane. In the freezing half light the countryside looked as bleak as she felt. She pulled the Barbour round her and felt the drizzle falling on her face. Only then did she realize that on top of being dumped by Max, she had no car, no mobile and no idea how she was going to get back to London. She stood there wondering whether to go back into the house and call a taxi. But she couldn’t face the thought of seeing Max and Lorna again. Then, quite miraculously, she saw it, putt-putting toward her. It couldn’t have been doing more than fifteen miles an hour. She held out her arm as if she were stranded in the rain at Oxford Circus.
“Tractor!” she yelled. “Tractor!”
13
Rebecca came into the kitchen and put the phone down on the table.
“Who was that you were speaking to?” Jess said, grating cheese onto the beans on toast she’d just made for Rebecca.
“Darren. He made me promise I’d phone to let him know I got home OK.”
Darren was the crooked-toothed young tractor driver who had taken Rebecca back to her car, lifted up the hood and immediately diagnosed her problem as damp in the electrics. As luck would have it, he just happened to have a can of WD-40 in his overall pocket because the tractor was always playing up the same way. He’d sprayed it over the engine and the car had started immediately. It had been all she could do not to hug him. Instead, she offered him a tenner for his trouble, but he wouldn’t hear of it.
Jess put the beans on toast down on the table. “Come on,” she said, “you’ll feel better once you’ve had something to eat.”
Rebecca fell heavily onto a kitchen chair and began toying with a few beans. “Where’s Lipstick?”
“Gone to see her builder and nag him about how long everything’s taking.”
Rebecca carried on toying. “I’m not really hungry.”
“Eat,” Jess commanded. “It’ll do you good.”
“Anybody ever told you you’d make a great Jewish mother?” Rebecca smiled.
As she shoved a forkful of food into her mouth she suddenly realized how hungry she was. A moment later she was scooping up beans like a famished cowboy taking a pit stop in the middle of a corral.
“I just can’t believe Max could behave like such a slimy bastard,” Jess said, taking a bottle of white wine out of the fridge.
“Tell me about it. I mean, you think you know somebody. Then something like this happens.”
“On the other hand,” Jess said thoughtfully, “there is a possibility—slim, I’ll grant you—that Lorna and Max might not be having an affair.”
“Yeah, right,” Rebecca said, her mouth stuffed with food. “That’s why they were draped in each other. I don’t get it. A few minutes before we’d been snogging. How could he two-time me like this? And with me there, in the same house, right under his nose. What sort of a person does something like that? When was he going to tell me, when their kids started university?”
Jess put two glasses on the table, sat down and began pouring the wine—a full glass for Rebecca, a splash for herself. “OK, it’s a long shot, but maybe they were just being affectionate.”
“Affectionate,” Rebecca repeated.
“Think about it. You said yourself they’ve known each other for ages and it’s not as if he had his tongue down her throat.”
“He didn’t have to,” Rebecca said, picking up her wineglass. “Look, you weren’t there. You didn’t see how they were together. I told you the other night, it’s her he wants. I reckon he just saw me as some bird to have a bit of fun with. Come on, why would a bloke like Max Stoddart want to get serious with a woman who turns up at a wedding dressed like Peggy Bundy’s matron of honor?”
“Easy,” Jess came back. “You were brave. Dead brave. And that’s why he loves you.”
Rebecca grunted.
“Look,” Jess said, “I’m not saying he definitely isn’t having an affair with Lorna—all I’m suggesting is that you may have read too much into what you saw. After all, you were feeling pretty vulnerable today. You’d had the breakdown, then the dress thing. Max is a decent bloke. He wouldn’t string two women along like this. Plus, from what you’ve told me, Lorna is vile. What can he see in her? I bet the phone goes any minute and it’s him worried sick about you and wanting to know why on earth you ran off.”
“You reckon?” Rebecca said, allowing herself to believe for a moment that Jess could be right.
When eleven o’clock came and the phone still hadn’t gone, she decided the idea that Max and Lorna weren’t shagging was utterly preposterous. How she could have even considered it, she had no idea. Then Jess discovered the phone had been off the hook for hours.
“Probably Harrison,” she said.
Irritated with Harrison, but at the same time vaguely cheered up because there was a credible explanation for Max’s silence, Rebecca went to soak in the bath. Afterward, she took the phone to bed with her. Just in case. She tried to read, but couldn’t concentrate. Finally, around midnight, she fell asleep sitting up, the phone still in her hand. Then, a few minutes later it rang, jolting her awake. In a flash sh
e pressed the connect button.
“Hello? Max? Is that you?”
“OK,” the unfamiliar, jolly male voice came back, obviously from a room full of people, “I’d like to order one chicken tikka masala, two lamb passanda, a prawn rogan josh and four stuffed paratha …”
“Sorry, you’ve got the wrong number,” she mumbled.
A second later it rang again.
“Look, will you stop phoning me. This is not the Star of India.”
“Rebecca? That you?”
“Max?”
“Oh, thank God. I’ve been trying to get you for hours.”
“You have?” she said, her face brightening. “Sorry about just then. I thought you were a wrong number.”
“I think I must have tried forty times.” There was genuine panic and concern in his voice. “And look, before you say anything, I know what you saw. That Guy creep told me. But it’s not what you think. I can explain.”
She almost laughed. He sounded like the guilty lover in a bad Hollywood romance.
“Don’t tell me,” she said sarcastically, “you were comforting her.”
“Yes, actually.”
“Oh, Max. Come on. Do you really expect me to believe that?”
“But I was. Honest. You have to believe me. Lorna’s godfather had just died that morning. Lord somebody or other. Apparently they were very close. She hadn’t wanted to come to the wedding, but because Lorna and Zoe are cousins, Lorna’s mother had put pressure on her to be there. She’d had a couple of drinks and she just broke down. All I did was give her a hug.”
“Looked like a damned sight more than a hug to me.”
“Rebecca, it was a hug. I promise. There is absolutely nothing going on between me and Lorna. Why on earth did you run off like that instead of waiting to talk to me?”
“The two of you were all over each other. I had all the information I needed.”
“But you didn’t. You got it all wrong.”
“And it wasn’t just me who thought there was something going on. Zoe did too.”
“I’m sorry,” Max said. “It must have looked awful, but it was all completely innocent. Her godfather had just died. Honest. There is nothing going on.”
She let out a long, slow breath. “Really?”
“Promise.”
“Jess said there might not be.”
“Well, she was right. I’d come round now, to show you precisely how much there isn’t going on between me and Lorna, but I’m actually in a taxi on my way to Waterloo to catch the Eurostar.”
He explained that a meeting with one of his French contacts that had been planned for Monday had been brought forward to Sunday morning. Apparently the chap was off to South America for a conference. On top of that several people he had lined up to go on the record about the nuclear story were getting cold feet and having second thoughts about taking part in the film. As a result he was going to have to work on them all over again.
“I’m busy all day tomorrow, so I may not get a chance to phone you.”
She told him that was no problem and asked him how long he was going to be away.
“Probably until the end of the week.”
“I’ll miss you,” she said.
“I’ll miss you, too. And I’m sorry I upset you.”
“I’m sorry I overreacted and ran out like that.” She smiled and snuggled down in the bed. “Speak to you soon. Take care.”
She fell asleep almost immediately, the smile still on her face.
She was woken briefly at seven by Lipstick slamming the front door (she was going to Manchester for the day to see Stan) and slept until just after nine. She wouldn’t have woken then, if it hadn’t been for all the shouting. Half asleep and petrified something had happened to Diggory, she leaped out of bed. She ran into the hall, her head spinning because she’d stood up too quickly. She saw Jess crouched by the front door, yelling through the letter box.
“Get away from me, you depraved sicko. If you don’t go away right this second, I’m calling the police. How could you come round here, wearing that … that THING?”
“But it’s not what you think,” Ed’s slightly muffled voice came back. “Just open the door and take another look.”
“No. I’ve seen enough. Look, Ed, I’m past caring what you get up to on your own, but don’t start drawing me into your sordid little half life.”
“Jess,” Rebecca said, frowning. “Do you mind telling me what’s going on?”
“It’s him. Autoasphyxiation Man.”
“What?”
“OK, if you don’t believe me, take a look.”
Rebecca bent down and peered through the letter box. Two eyes were staring back at her out of a hideous black mask. It was made of molded rubber and covered in silver studs—sort of Village People meets Hannibal Lecter.
“Eeeew,” Rebecca said, suddenly noticing the anteater snouty bit and screwing up her face. “Scareee.”
“What did I tell you?” Jess cried, half hysterical, half triumphant. “It’s the thing I found in his suitcase.”
Rebecca looked a second time. The mask was like nothing she’d seen before. She felt the hairs stand up on the back of her neck.
“’Morning, Ed,” she said, deciding the willy-nilly had sent him mad and the only approach was to humor him. “All right?”
“No, I’m not bloody all right. I want to come in and talk to my wife.”
“I can hear you’re upset, Ed,” she soothed, sounding like some “please lay your anger on the table and share it with the group” shrink.
“Well, then bloody open the door.”
“I’m not sure I can do that just now. You see, Jess is a bit perturbed by your—er—face furniture.”
She asked Jess how Ed’d gotten into the building. Apparently one of the neighbors had let him in on her way out.
“OK, I agree it was a mistake to put it on,” Ed said. “I just thought if she saw me wearing it here, in broad daylight, she’d realize it wasn’t what she thought. Right, I’m taking it off.”
There were a few seconds of silence after which they heard Ed move away from the letter box and begin a whispered conversation.
“Who’s he talking to?” Jess snapped. “Omigod, I bet it’s one of his perv cronies from the autoasphyxiation club. Christ, there could be dozens of them out there.”
Rebecca looked through the letter box, but Ed and his companion were outside her field of vision. The conversation went on for a couple of minutes. Then: “’Mornin’, ladies.” It was another male voice—older and vaguely familiar. “This is Tony, your milkman, speaking. I would just like to say that after giving the matter careful consideration, I have come to the conclusion that the gentleman here is definitely not a perv.” Before buying his milk round, Tony had spent donkeys’ years as a barrister’s clerk and always spoke as if he were giving evidence in court. He cleared his throat. “While the article in question would appear to be somewhat unusual in design, I have looked at the label and can confirm it is in fact a Japanese cycle mask.”
“A cycle mask?” Rebecca said.
“No doubt about it,” replied Tony, “and a very fancy one it is, too.” She heard him pick up the empties and clink off down the hall.
“Don’t believe him,” Jess said to Rebecca. “I’m telling you, it’s some pervy sex toy my husband puts on before hanging himself from the door frame and shoving gerbils up his arse.”
Ed cried out in frustration. “For Christ’s sake. How many more times do I have to go over this? The shop threw it in when I bought my bike, but I never wore it. Will somebody just listen to me when I say I’m not a perv? You can phone the shop and ask if you don’t believe me.”
“Don’t you dare open that door,” Jess hissed, as Rebecca reached for the catch. But she was too late. It was already open.
“Hiya,” Rebecca said with a nervous smile. She couldn’t help worrying that Tony had been lying as Jess had suspected and really was a fellow perv. “Come on in.”
“Thank you. Now then,” he said, handing the mask to Jess, “look at the label.”
“Nippon Cycle Corp,” she read. She looked at him, a distinctly hangdog expression on her face. “OK, promise me you don’t stick gerbils up your arse.”
“I promise you, I do not stick gerbils up my arse. Now then, come and give me a kiss.”
Reluctantly, looking back at Rebecca for approval, she moved toward him. A second later they were in each other’s arms.
“Actually, I stick budgies up it,” he said, grinning.
Rebecca went back to bed with the Sunday papers while Jess and Ed sat in the living room, making up and playing with Diggory. After an hour or so, she poked her head round the living room door to offer Jess and Ed coffee and bagels.
“It’s OK,” Jess said, her face full of smiles. “I’ll think we’ll have something when we get home.”
An hour later amid tears, thank-yous and I’ll-miss-yous, they’d loaded up the car.
“By the way,” Rebecca said, “you were right. Max rang late last night. There wasn’t anything going on between him and Bloody Lorna.” She explained about Bloody Lorna’s godfather dying. “I made a bit of a fool of myself.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Jess said. “So long as the pair of you are back on track.” Then she gave Rebecca a hug.
Rebecca began folding up Jess’s camp bed. Despite the overcrowding and Jess’s slovenliness, she was going to miss her and Diggory.
She spent the afternoon cleaning the flat. By six the kitchen and bathroom were positively gleaming. Then she put on her PJs, opened a bottle of Penfolds and settled down to watch Antiques Roadshow. About eleven she took herself to bed with one of her Seinfeld vids. She was woken in the small hours by Lipstick letting herself in, yakking loudly on her mobile. Rebecca’s bedroom door was open and it was impossible not to hear what was being said.
“If I play my cards right,” she was saying, “I should have the money pretty soon.”
Rebecca frowned. What money?
“No, I don’t know exactly when, but the whole thing’s been a total breeze up till now. It shouldn’t be much longer. You should have seen me in action, babe. He was a total pushover. Talk about putty in my hands. No, I don’t think there’ll be any problems. I’m so excited, babe. I just can’t wait for us to be together again. It’s been so long. But we have to think where to go. D’you know where I’ve always fancied? Brazil.”