‘Don’t be a wimp. Just the one.’
‘Who’s being a wimp?’ Daisy said, carrying in the tray: herb teas for her and Milo, coffee for Ollie and me, nothing for Em.
‘Milo’s talking about going to bed.’
‘I don’t blame him. It’s been a long day.’
‘But we’ve not had our sketching competition. So he can show us up.’
‘For fuck’s sake, Ollie, leave it alone.’
‘Well, OK then, darling,’ Ollie said, pronouncing his words with a pedantic accuracy that betrayed him more than if he’d slurred them, ‘let’s play Scrabble instead. Or Monopoly. Or have a debate about something. Politics. Religion. They always get people going. You choose, Daisy. No? Milo then? Em? Ian? OK, good idea. Let’s talk about sex. More specifically, the problem of sustaining a sex life when you’ve been with someone for ten years or more. Isn’t that why marriages break up?’
‘Ollie, for Christ’s sake.’
‘I’m not being personal, sweetie, just making a general point. It’s obvious: the need for sex brings people together, but once they’re together the need wears off. There’s something faintly indecent about it, like having sex with the family pet. And it’s so routine it scarcely registers. Ian and Em, let’s take you. We’re all friends here, you can be honest. When was the last time? Last week? Last month? Last year? I bet you can’t remember. That’s fine. I can’t remember the last time, either. Sex isn’t for people over forty. It’s for kids, or for having kids, not for us lot.’
I looked at my reflection, upside down in a dessert spoon, with candles flickering over my head. I didn’t dare look at Em, who if she wasn’t yet tearful soon would be. Even her hands, on the table, seemed reproachful: We should have told them about our problem. If we had, Ollie wouldn’t have said what he just did.
‘Shut up, Ollie,’ Daisy said, ‘you’re embarrassing everyone.’
‘Only you, my love,’ he said, back on track. ‘I’m trying to explain why even the best of people can stray. Because they’re trying to recapture a lost excitement. Hence love affairs, and fuck-buddies, and dogging, and all the rest. I don’t sit in judgement. What I’m saying — this is important — what I’m saying is that I understand.’
Daisy passed me the coffee pot as if he wasn’t there. I didn’t blame her. Alcohol had mugged him and scarpered with his brains.
‘Milo? Daisy? Anything to contribute? No? Let me make my other point then. When two people have been together a long time, they might not make love as often as they used to. But that doesn’t mean they don’t love each other. Take Daisy and me. We’re solid as rock. She might have her head turned now and then. But she won’t ever leave me. Tell them, sweets.’
‘Tell them what?’ Daisy said. ‘That you’re drunk? They can see that for themselves.’
‘Me, drunk? This is my right hand and this is my left hand, I can stand well enough and speak well enough — what’s drunk about that?’
Defiant, he poured himself another.
‘I think I ought to go,’ Milo said.
All he meant was go to bed, but Daisy heard it differently.
‘You’re not going anywhere,’ Daisy said. ‘Ollie doesn’t know what he’s saying. In the morning, when I remind him, he’ll apologise to us all, and if he doesn’t then I’ll go.’
‘Tell you what,’ Ollie said, not so out of it as to miss the chance of a barristerial flourish, ‘since no one seems to appreciate my presence, let me be the one to go. Night-night.’
Smiling and nodding, he grabbed the edge of the table with both hands, a manoeuvre that pivoted him into a standing position but also jerked the table. Several glasses tipped over. The wobble sent him lurching backwards but he steadied himself on the wall behind and, with great deliberation, like someone avoiding stepping on cracks, made his way across the room and down the corridor.
‘I’m sorry,’ Daisy said, once he was out of earshot. ‘He gets like this sometimes. He won’t remember any of it in the morning. It’s nothing personal, Milo.’
Milo, nervously sipping his herb tea, looked unconvinced.
‘When he’s drunk, he misjudges his tone,’ Daisy said. ‘I should have stopped him earlier.’
‘He wasn’t implying …’ Milo said.
‘Of course not. He’ll be mortified when I tell him tomorrow.’
‘I’ll get to bed, then.’
Milo wandered off in a daze, his bare feet printing the damp tiles. If he knew what was good for him, he’d clear off before Ollie woke. Good riddance: his presence had all but ruined the weekend. Not that the fault for tonight’s debacle was entirely his. In being attentive to Daisy, he had simply been polite — as everyone except Ollie could see.
Once he was gone, Em burst into tears.
‘Don’t tell me Ollie’s upset you too,’ Daisy said, reaching for her hand. ‘What is it?’
While Em sobbed, unable to speak, I too reached for her hand, my fingers closing on Daisy’s as I did, the three of us locked together at the table, the two women in my life and me.
‘Tell me, love,’ Daisy said, drawing her hand away though I could sense she longed to keep it there.
Between us Em was a heaving mess.
‘Let’s get you to bed,’ I said.
‘What upset you?’ Daisy said.
‘I’ll take her upstairs.’
‘What was it Ollie said?’
‘She’s in no fit state.’
‘I know you want to tell me, love.’
‘Bed’s the best place.’
‘Fuck it, Ian, leave her where she is.’
So I left her where she was and she told. The works. With me there to hear. I suppose I could have left them to it.
I wasn’t made to stay. And Em was protective of me, up to a point, describing the problem as ‘our problem'. But in other respects she didn’t spare me at all, complaining that I had been slow to seek help and slower still to see that IVF was the only option. Her description of our sex life as ‘normal and healthy’ was especially unfortunate: it must have suggested to Daisy that I still wanted Em, when I’d told her I didn’t.
Since half the conversation was conducted in whispers, with Em in Daisy’s arms on the sofa and me banished to a wicker chair, I wasn’t close enough to hear every word nor sober enough to retain them all. I confess that’s true of the evening generally: because my hearing’s bad, and I was drinking heavily, I may have occasionally got things wrong. For instance, I could have sworn that it was Ollie who chose sex as a topic for debate, yet Em later complained that it was me. If so, I wasn’t thinking straight, failing to see where it might lead. But it’s just not true that I ‘egged Ollie on’ or that I kept topping up his glass in order to ‘make trouble'. Sometimes Em completely misses the point.
I must have nodded off as I sat there because next thing Daisy was the one wailing.
‘Where’s Archie? He ought to be back. What time is it?’
‘It’s 12.13,’ I said, trying to hide how ominous that was, twelve and thirteen being two of my least favourite numbers.
‘If he’s out there in the rain, he’ll be catching his death.’ Daisy scanned her mobile for a message. ‘No reception again. What if he’s been trying to call? We should never have let him go.’
I offered to take Daisy in the car and look for him. But Em said I had drunk too much and that she would. They left me to clear up — to dump the silver curry trays in the bin, wash the plates and cutlery, gather up the bottles and wipe the rice grains and curry blots from the table. It was past two before they got back, without Archie, and rather than come through to the living room, where I sat waiting in the dark, they went straight upstairs. Not ready to follow, I bullied Rufus outside for a tour of the orchard. The air was black and soupy, fine rain swaying in it. Cries of pain — prey and predator — echoed from the fields. Finally, around three, I headed upstairs, climbing in beside Em’s moist body and wishing Daisy was there too or instead.
Monday
I was woken by shouting below. In the dark I couldn’t find my watch but a hint of lemon behind the curtain suggested dawn. It was easy to guess what was happening. Milo, waking early or not having slept at all, had packed, dressed, shushed his daughters from bed and — hoping to make a quick getaway — urged them downstairs. Only to find that Ollie was waiting or had heard him descending and gone in pursuit. The shouts were muffled; they seemed to come from outside, Milo having stuck his luggage in the boot, and his key in the ignition, before Ollie confronted him. Would Ollie use only his fists? The alcohol that had sedated him at the dinner table would have worn off by now. There were knives in the kitchen, swords on the wall, pitchforks in the outhouse. Was that a little female voice I could hear, frightened and protesting? I felt sorry for Natalie and Bethany, forced to watch. Milo might be younger and fitter, but the adrenalin of righteousness was pumping through Ollie. The violence would be severe.
I was tempted to leave them to it. But the sound of that other voice — a woman’s not a girl’s — made it impossible. It was one thing for Ollie to chop Milo to pieces; that had a certain justice. But I didn’t want Daisy getting hurt as well.
Shoving a T-shirt on with my boxers, I crept downstairs to find the front door closed. The shouts weren’t coming from outside but from the living room. I ran along the corridor and turned the handle, expecting sweat, panic, pools of blood. Even the best of men sometimes forget themselves and Ollie had been pushed beyond endurance.
There he was, sure enough, in pale blue pyjamas. And Daisy, with a silk dressing gown pulled loosely over her nightie. Both in a rage. But not with each other. They were shouting at the person between them: Archie.
I can’t deny a sense of anticlimax.
‘And now, on top of everything, you’ve woken Uncle Ian,’ Ollie shouted.
‘Don’t mind me,’ I said. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Archie just got back.’
‘We’ve been frantic,’ Daisy said, her face pallid and her eyes red. ‘Why didn’t you tell us where you were, Archie?’
Archie’s hair hung in rats’ tails. Mascara had run down his cheeks. His trainers were slurried with mud.
‘We’ve been through this, Mum.’
‘I’ve still not had a proper answer. I called you at 1.15 and got a ring tone. Why didn’t you pick up?’
‘I was with people. It wasn’t cool.’
‘Not cool to speak to your own mother? Just to tell me you were OK?’
‘I called you back.’
‘When? Em and I waited in the car for twenty minutes.’
‘Then I texted.’
‘I didn’t get a text.’
‘I sent one.’
‘There’s no reception here. You know that, Archie.’
‘Yeah, and that’s why I didn’t call earlier.’
I’d been right about it being dawn. The light was poor, with rain pocking the panes, but the birds were in full chorus.
‘So where were you?’ Daisy said, renewing the attack.
‘The gig got rained off so we went back to someone’s.’
‘Someone’s?’
‘Jed, I think he’s called.’
‘You think. You told us you were with friends from school.’
‘I was. Then I met some new people. There were a lot of us there.’
‘Doing what?’
‘Hanging out.’
‘Taking drugs, you mean.’
‘No, Mum. I’m clean.’
‘And how did you get home?’
‘Walked.’
‘On your own?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You’re soaked.’
‘It’s raining, in case you haven’t noticed.’
‘Don’t get smart with me.’
‘You’re not my keeper.’
He had said the same to his father on the tennis court. Perhaps that’s why Ollie now weighed in.
‘Until you leave home you’re our responsibility and we don’t want you wandering round alone in the middle of the night.’
‘Or in the middle of nowhere,’ Daisy added. ‘Why didn’t someone give you a lift?’
‘Dunno. Too busy.’
‘You could have got lost. You could have been wandering round till morning. You could have …’
Archie’s face was so wet and blotchy it took a while for me to realise he was crying. It was impossible for Daisy to cradle him while standing up, so they dropped to the sofa, where she held his face to her breasts as he sobbed about a fight at the house and having to leave and being given directions to Badingley but missing a turning and floods and strange sounds from the fields and a car crawling by with a staring man in it and how he had phoned and had texted but there was no fucking reception was there so what was the fucking point. While he sobbed into the V of her dressing gown she gave Ollie a look that said Don’t you dare say a word — let him cry all he likes. I doubt Ollie would have spoken anyway. Archie might be overdoing it, as he had when the tennis ball hit him, but even Ollie seemed touched, and plonked himself the other side of Archie, stroking his hair and rubbing his back. I too was moved — by Archie’s head shamelessly nuzzling his mother’s breasts, as I’d done, on the same sofa. He was her son. He’d every right. But I felt usurped.
Mouthing goodnight, though it was morning, I left them to it, slipping back along the tiled corridor and up to bed.
Some minutes later I heard footsteps on the stairs, then two doors closing, one after the other. Archie, exhausted, would be asleep at once. Not so Ollie and Daisy, who had outstanding business from last night. Though their voices didn’t carry, it was easy for me to imagine the row. Arms folded, her hair swirling angrily around her, Daisy would be giving Ollie hell.
How dare you treat a guest like that! How dare you imply that something’s going on between me and Milo!
Ollie, unfazed, indeed annoyed with himself for not speaking more plainly at dinner, would have his answer ready.
Why do I think there’s something going on? Because you dragged him up here when we’re on holiday. Because you’ve been all over each other all weekend. And because of the tissues.
She would shake her head at that point, bewildered.
Which tissues?
The tissues in the waste bin.
What about them?
You know what I’m talking about.
I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.
I’m talking about you and Milo having sex.
Hearing which, outraged, Daisy says: If you believe that of me, you can forget about the wedding.
Fine, Ollie replies, since I can’t trust you any more, I don’t want to marry you anyway.
Then I’ll marry someone who does want me.
Who, Milo?
Not Milo, Daisy says, someone else.
I listened as they argued in my inner ear, knowing Daisy would be too discreet to mention what had happened between us. That could come later, when she confessed (to herself as well as to him) that she was in love with me. For now all that mattered was to get through the weekend.
Someone else? Who?
None of your business.
Slipping from bed, I crept to the bathroom in the hope their voices might breach the lath-and-plaster partition. I put my ear to the wall tiles as I pissed: nothing. But as I pulled the chain, the sound of Daisy laughing carried through. Laughter wasn’t in the script. Perhaps I’d imagined it. But as I crossed back to the bedroom, a second laugh, Ollie’s, floated along the landing, and then Daisy’s voice saying: We should never have invited him. Or if not those words exactly, something very like them.
They’re talking about Milo, I thought, climbing back into bed. But why would they laugh about it, after the tensions over dinner last night? Then an ugly thought struck: that it was me they were talking about; that Ollie had used me to justify his suspicions; that Daisy had mocked me when he did. The dialogue was easily reconstructed.
It was Ian who put the idea in my head.
/> Ian! Why would anyone listen to Ian, you know how jealous he is.
Jealous of who?
You, me, Milo, everyone. I know he’s your friend —
Your friend too.
He’s not my friend, not after this weekend.
Why? What’s he done?
You don’t want to know.
Tell me.
Put it this way: we should never have invited them. Em’s all right. But he’s a nightmare.
Laughter from Ollie: I know what you mean.
Incidentally, do you know what Em told me about him? Well …
So that was why they were laughing at me. I lay on the sheet, sweatily reviewing the finale of the night before. While I’d been there to listen, Em had described our fertility problem as a mutual one. But then the two of them had gone off in the car. In my absence, there was nothing to stop her telling Daisy the truth. The full works. Every shameful detail. Now Daisy, in turn, was telling Ollie. Hence the laughter, as he delighted — they both delighted — in my humiliation.
I didn’t expect them to understand. No one does. If you say you’re infertile, people assume you can’t get it up. Daisy knew that was untrue. But she could hardly tell Ollie how she knew. All she would have told him was what Em had told her. That I’m deficient. A sub-prime sperm producer. That I shoot blanks.
It didn’t seem that way when we first visited the clinic. The doctor spoke of ‘non-specific infertility’ and it was Em — less physically fit than I am — who did the initial tests. They showed she was ovulating normally. More from pride than fear, I stalled on my tests, allowing her to think I’d done them when I hadn’t and, then, worse, when I was tested, lying to her about the results. I now knew it was one in ten million she’d get pregnant through ‘unassisted intercourse'. But I’d had outside bets come home before and I kept on plugging away. Eventually the clinic had us in together and the truth came out. Em felt too sorry for me to be angry for long but she bemoaned the delay: if I’d been honest, we could have begun saving for IVF six months earlier. In penance, I agreed to start saving up – from now on we’d put a hefty sum aside each month. But as I’ve confessed already (by now you know every sad truth about me), the savings are no longer there.
The Last Weekend Page 22