by Adele Parks
‘You think so?’
‘Yes.’
Actually, only minutes ago Mia had stopped thinking that Scaley Jase was an irresponsible forever-juvenile. She’d started to think of him as a rather sophisticated lover and soul mate. But no, he was reverting to type. God, how stupid could she be? He blows on her knickers and blows out her mind. After all these years, you’d think she’d know better.
‘So, you think I’m permanently adolescent, but fit to be a father? Isn’t your argument somewhat flawed?’
‘Biologically fit to be a father. I told you I wouldn’t want you to be really involved. I’d do it all on my own. I want a baby.’
‘Babies aren’t like Gucci bags. You don’t just fancy owning one and go and pick it up. They are not this season’s must-have accessories,’ yelled Jason.
‘I never said they were. Don’t be insulting.’ Hot tears sprang into Mia’s eyes.
The bastard. He had no idea. Gucci bags, indeed. She’d never coveted a single fashion accessory in her life. Didn’t he know anything about her? He clearly wouldn’t ever be able to understand her aching for a baby. He had no idea that she wandered around Mothercare on her Saturday mornings. Mothercare, not even Baby Gap. It wasn’t as though she indulged by just looking at frivolous things such as cute baby-gros and socks. She did serious research on the unglamorous stuff, too. She’d already picked out the exact pram she wanted (one with an attachable car seat) and the changing mat and the baby bath. And what she didn’t know about breast pumps really wasn’t worth knowing. This wasn’t a passing phase.
‘Babies are magical,’ shouted Jason.
‘I know that,’ counterargued Mia. ‘That’s why I didn’t want to go to a sperm bank –’
‘Any child I sire will be a sum of everything that’s gone before me. Some Neanderthal had to rub a couple of sticks together before he could get his end away so that my ancestry could begin.’
‘What are you talking about?’ demanded Mia, confused. ‘Your ancestry isn’t particularly impressive. I didn’t even consider your ancestry. You are entirely new money, but besides that I’m not asking for your money.’ Mia was baffled. Why couldn’t he give her this one little thing? It was just a shag. That’s all he had to do. It wasn’t so much to ask, was it? Jason shagged all sorts. Only five minutes ago he’d wanted to shag her.
‘You are insane.’
Jason started to move around the room collecting his clothes. He pushed his foot into a sock and threaded his leg through his trousers in a couple of double-fast moves. ‘Have my bloody money. You are welcome to every last penny of it. You are welcome to everything I own. Well, except for my porn collection, perhaps. Some of the tapes I have are irreplaceable, and I can’t imagine you having much use for them, anyway.’ Jason shook his head as if to clear it – he didn’t want to be sidetracked. ‘But what you are asking for is far more precious. Far more valuable. You’re asking for a bit of me. Possibly the best bit. My future.’
‘And is that so bad?’ Mia yelled back because she wanted to match Jason, and he was shouting very loudly.
‘Have you any idea what you are suggesting? What you’d be taking on?’
‘There are plenty of single mums out there.’
‘Not many of them opt to be so. You are so arrogant, Mia. Even this, you think you can do on your own, better than with help.’ Jason stopped yelling and tried to breathe deeply. He needed her to understand, and he wasn’t sure he was making a good job of explaining. He was dressed and had his hand on the door knob. He wanted to get out of the bedroom which was, in reality, comfortable and spacious, but in his mind was claustrophobic, threatening.
‘Let’s just play out this ludicrous scenario. Imagine if I did do, do –’ For the first time in his life, Jason was without the ability to find a word to describe sex. He pointed at the bed. ‘Imagine if I do what you want me to do. What would you teach this baby that I surrender up into your hands? How to have a good time? How to enjoy life? How to love? I don’t think so. All you are capable of teaching is how to be hard and calculating and mind-blowingly selfish.’
‘I know how to love, Jason. I know how to love,’ she yelled. But Jason didn’t hear her, as he’d slammed the door behind him and stormed down the corridor.
Mia grabbed a pillow and folded her body into it. She was used to pillows providing night-time company and all-time consolation. She fell asleep quietly sobbing.
61. Drunk and Sentimental
‘It’s me.’
Sophie yawned, and stretched to reach her bedside clock. She squinted at it. The big hand was pointing to the twelve and the little hand was pointing to the two. She shook her head. She really did have to get out more. All her conversations, even those she had in her head, were conducted as though she was having them with a two-year-old.
‘Lloyd, what on earth are you doing ringing me at this time of night?’
‘It’s not so late for you as it is for me,’ Lloyd reasoned. ‘Besides, it’s a special occasion.’
‘Is that why you are drunk?’
It worried Sophie that Lloyd drank so much, and it annoyed her that she still worried about him. She sighed, confused and exhausted at her own, sundry emotions. She knew she should just hang up. It was lucky that he hadn’t woken Joanna, yet she found herself asking, ‘So what’s the occasion?’
‘Tonight, tonight is…’ Lloyd paused. Sophie knew he was checking his watch, she knew him very well, sometimes, she thought, too well. ‘Or today, as it is in fact already tomorrow,’ Lloyd’s explanation was drunken, but Sophie managed to just about follow it. ‘Today is the first day of the rest of my life!’ said Lloyd grandly. Quite pleased with himself for making it to the end of his sentence.
Sophie remembered the first time that she heard that expression, ‘Today is the first day of the rest of my life.’ She, too, had been struck by its hopefulness and elation. She’d thought it was profound, but then she had been about fourteen. Now she was almost thirty-four, the saying sounded tired, even clichéd.
‘Lloyd you’re drunk and making a nuisance of yourself. I’m going back to sleep.’
‘Don’t! Don’t hang up,’ cried Lloyd.
God, the Belgians could drink. He could barely walk, but he’d left them at the pool table still challenging one another to another game and another beer. They’d been a fun group, though, very pleasant company. But for all their chatter, Lloyd had not been able to give the foundling friendship his full attention.
‘Ted and Kate have already left. In fact, that was the main reason I called.’
‘What, the guests are thinning out and the numbers need a boost?’ asked Sophie with disbelief and the fragile ego of a woman who has been rejected.
‘No, no, nothing like that.’
Lloyd gave a brief synopsis of the events as relating to Kate and Ted. Sophie managed to understand despite the drunken tangents Lloyd veered off on, over and through.
‘I’m very sorry for them,’ said Sophie with genuine sympathy. ‘I’ll call Kate and see if there is anything I can do to help.’
‘Like what?’ asked Lloyd.
Sophie seethed, resenting the implication that she could never be of any genuine use to anyone.
‘Like, offer her a job. She knows everything there is to know about party organizing, and she’s incredibly well connected. Maybe she could manage the Highgate branch for me, rather than my selling it.’ Sophie was being rash and thinking aloud, but the idea wasn’t absolutely out of the question, it wasn’t ludicrous.
‘Brilliant. My God, Sophie, that’s a brilliant idea. I wish I’d thought of it.’
‘It’s just a thought. I’ll put it to her.’ Sophie wished she still didn’t sparkle in light of his praise. The ex-couple fell silent.
‘Look, Sophie, I need to talk to you.’
‘We’ve talked before. I’m all talked out.’
Sophie was now sitting up in bed. Her eyes had become accustomed to the dark. She rested them on the familiar objects
that filled her house and made it a home. Next to her bed were two photographs of Joanna and one of her parents. The frames were ornate and feminine. When Lloyd had left, the first room Sophie had redecorated was their bedroom. She’d thrown out the green duvet cover and the practical but rather ugly wicker wash basket. She’d sold the pine chest of drawers and both wardrobes. Empty, the room revealed itself to be surprisingly large. She bought an antique sofa, bookcase and dressing table to fill it. The sofa was permanently covered with feather boas, silky shift petticoats and shoe boxes; the things she bought for their beauty and frivolity that never quite made it into her wardrobe. The dressing table was laden with tiny jewelled boxes and bottles. Strings of beads and fake pearls hung around the mirror. The bookcase swayed under the weight of embroidered cardigans and beaded jumpers. The carpets were plush, the lampshades Art Deco– inspired. The room screamed ‘boudoir’.
‘Kate and Ted were inspirational. I think they are going to pull through it, I think they’ll stay together,’ said Ted.
‘I’m sure they will. They love each other very much,’ agreed Sophie.
Lloyd was surprised. None of the others had had the same confidence in Kate and Ted’s relationship. How did Sophie know so much about love? ‘It made me think, Soph. Maybe we gave up too easily.’
‘You bastard.’ Sophie was grateful there was a channel separating them. Anything less and she’d have happily throttled him. She smoothed the patchwork duvet cover with the back of her hand – the sensation was somewhat calming.
‘Would you have forgiven me if I’d got us into debt?’
‘Yes, if you’d wanted my forgiveness.’
‘But you can’t forgive my actual mistake?’
‘You never wanted my forgiveness for your infidelity, which I assume is the mistake you are alluding to.’
Sophie was Scottish and, although she’d lived in London for over a decade now, she would never get into those namby-pamby ways of calling a spade a digging device. To her it was a shovel. It would always be a shovel.
‘And what if I said I wanted your forgiveness now?’
There was a moment of silence. Lloyd did not dare breathe, Sophie could not.
‘I’d say you were drunk and sentimental, which is a lethal and insincere combination.’
For a fraction of a second, Sophie wished she didn’t know him so well. She wished that she could believe that he wanted her forgiveness. He certainly believed it, and he’d go on believing it at least until his hangover wore off.
‘Maybe you just didn’t love me enough,’ said Lloyd sulkily.
‘I wish you’d died rather than left me, that’s how much I love you,’ assured Sophie with a sigh.
‘That is a terrible thing to say,’ said Lloyd, aghast.
‘Is it? I think it’s the biggest compliment I’ve ever paid you. If I hadn’t loved you so much, I could have let you go more easily. As it is, I am stuck in a state of perpetual grief. Logically, true love would mean that I just wanted you to be happy somewhere, even if it wasn’t with me. This isn’t the case. I don’t want you to be unhappy, but I just don’t want you to be. There’s no going back for us, Lloyd. We went too far.’
And then she hung up.
It had taken over a year, but Sophie slept well that night. She slept sound in the knowledge that he hurt, too. Not in the way she did. He didn’t ache that the world was so hellish and disappointing. It was unlikely that he doubted everything and everyone. He managed to hold together a relationship because he didn’t recoil from intimacy, as though it was a stinging jellyfish. But he hurt, too. Maybe only when he was drunk and sentimental. Maybe only when he couldn’t get hold of Greta. But somewhere it had finally registered in the deepest recesses of his brain that he’d lost out. Losing Sophie and Joanna was a loss. Thank God. She’d begun to think that she and her baby were a product of her imagination. She knew that after tonight’s good night of rest she’d wake up feeling a whole lot better.
Thursday
62. The Hideaway
Tash rolled over. The duvet slipped slightly, allowing a cheeky draught to ripple up her bare legs, buttocks and back. She shuffled towards Rich and snuggled into his warm body. He was still asleep, which pleased and surprised Tash. She’d noticed that Rich hadn’t slept too well since they’d come away. Despite des Dromonts’ firm and comfortable mattresses, despite hours of exertion on the slopes each day and in bed most nights, he’d been waking up several times a night and always getting up before her in the morning. It was good to see him resting and peaceful.
Tash chewed on her thumbnail. She felt very guilty. It was obvious that her not seeing eye to eye with Mia had caused him a lot of distress. It must be that, as Rich was not the sort of man to get nervous or stressy over wedding preparations, and yet he had not been his relaxed self of late. Now she’d vowed to see the best in Mia, he seemed so much more chilled. Tash felt a weight of responsibility not exactly resting on her shoulders, more hovering above her head. She was responsible for Rich’s happiness. Not all of it, obviously, he was a grown man and had to take responsibility for his own life, but suddenly she realized that she held an enormous power. The power to make Rich happy or unhappy. It seemed obvious, part of her brain had always known this, but suddenly she understood exactly what that meant. They were a team. Soon they would be married and they would always have to think of each other. Not just on the little things, such as what do you fancy for lunch? Or whether they should see a Merchant Ivory or a Tarantino at the cinema, but big things, too.
Tash could have made this holiday a better one for Rich. She could have spent more energy on getting to know Rich’s friends. She should have trusted his judgement or at least respected his history. Rich had tried so hard to make this holiday fabulous for her, travelling club class, visiting a five-star hotel, taking her on sleigh rides, they’d almost swum in champagne. Tash felt ashamed.
Maybe Tash should ask Mia to do a reading or sign the register. Would she like that? wondered Tash, who momentarily felt like a six-year-old in a playground wanting to ask the most popular girl to be her best friend. Tash shifted uncomfortably. It felt a little forced, and friendships ought to be organic, not genetically modified. Still, she sighed, it clearly meant a lot to Rich; it meant enough to afford him a good night’s sleep.
Tash propped herself up on her elbow and looked around the B & B room. They had checked in late last night. They’d boarded over to Champéry, got pleasantly drunk in a small tavern and soon it was too late to find a way back to Avoriaz. She mentally hugged herself. What a magical day yesterday had been. She already knew it was one that she’d remember for ever in Technicolor. The skies had been bluer than she’d ever seen before, the snow cleaner, the hot chocolates creamier. They’d pushed themselves physically, covering more ground than any other day, and it was a fantastic feeling. Away from des Dromonts, Rich had transformed. He’d suddenly relaxed back into his articulate, loving, challenging, amusing self. And for her part, she’d cast off the role of nag or worrier, and re-emerged as her happy-go-lucky, warm, humorous and doting self. When they’d checked in to the not-too-pretty B & B, they had not minded the ripped lino floor in the reception or even the smell of stale smoke that lingered in the bedroom. They’d slowly undressed, movements impaired by beer consumption and sore, over-exercised limbs. They’d collapsed on to the bed and fallen into sound sleeps. No talk about weddings, or friendships, or feuds, or anything remotely ‘big’. No talk at all, and it was lovely.
In the cold light of day, Tash could see that, to be totally frank, the B & B was not up to scratch and was pretty dismal in comparison to Hôtel des Dromonts. The mattress was too soft and covered in stains that Tash didn’t even want to contemplate the origin of. She’d nipped to the loo (which was down the corridor and communal) as soon as she’d woken, and discovered not only was there only one bathroom to share amongst five rooms, but also the B & B didn’t provide towels – she would have to dry herself with a sheet. Tash decided she’d skip
a shower; she already knew it would be nearer to a trickle anyway. She’d enjoyed their get-away adventure. They had found privacy and intimacy, the perfect pre-wedding retreat, but Tash missed the power shower and sachets of bubble bath and body lotion. It surprised her how easy it was to get used to the good life. No wonder Mia was such a snob about accommodation and travel, after living in the lap of luxury for so long.
Tash kissed Rich’s shoulder, and he trembled, almost imperceptibly.
‘Morning, gorgeous,’ he muttered.
Tash delved down under the duvet and felt for his erection, which she knew would be there. Not disappointed, she muttered, ‘Morning, glorious.’ It was their usual morning pattern, neglected of late. Rich rolled on to his back and lifted up his arm so that Tash could crawl under it and rest her head on his chest. She snuggled into his pit and marvelled that love made even the slightly spicy smell of his sweat-soused skin attractive. They lay together, her lightly trailing her fingernail over his chest, him running the palm of his hand up and down her arm in an attempt to keep her warm. Tash felt so relaxed she almost dozed in their comfortable silence.
Rich was rigid with fear.
Oh, my God. Oh, my God. What now? What could he possibly do to avoid Tash meeting Jayne? They were OK here. Safe. Secure. But the moment they went back to Avoriaz she’d be there, waiting. Oh shit, what to do? What to do? He could tell Tash. Now, now when she had nowhere to run to, no way of hiding. She’d have to listen to his entire explanation. And it would be better coming from him. That way at least Jayne couldn’t put her poisonous and inaccurate spin on things. He could start by telling Tash about the kiss. It was only a kiss, for fuck’s sake. He didn’t have to tell her about the tit feeling. Well, he probably would have to tell her because her first question was bound to be ‘Just a kiss? Are you sure?’ By the very nature of confession he’d have to tell her that his hands had run up and down Jayne’s firm, provocative little body. Would Tash think it was a greater or lesser crime if he told her that it wasn’t the first time and in fact Jayne was an ex-lover? Would she think it was a big deal at all? Maybe not. Tash was cool with this stuff. She wasn’t irrational or jealous of any of his exs, so why hadn’t he told her about Jayne? He’d tell her now. This minute. Now.