The Confirmation

by L G Dickson

‘I wont be too long, promise.’ He held her close one final time before she jumped from the sofa, grabbed her coat and bag and headed out the door.

  The afternoon had dulled as Annie made her way up the hill to the café. It was a popular haunt with the slightly more bohemian Stockbridge residents, of which Virginia was one. Annie saw her sitting at a corner table through the back of the café, head buried in a Doris Lessing paperback.

  ‘Hi, Gin.’

  Virginia looked startled. ‘Gosh, didn’t see you there. Completely absorbed. Have you read any Lessing? Amazing woman.’

  Virginia put the book down and broke into a wide smile. She stood up and wrapped her arms around Annie.

  ‘Goodness, there I am prattling on about a silly book when I haven’t seen you for ages.’

  ‘Oh I know, I’m really sorry, Gin. I’ll tell you all about it when Kirsty gets here. You look fab though.’

  Virginia was as Virginia always was. She wore a pale blue blouse tucked into a purple velvet elasticated skirt topped off by a pair of shabby knee-high black boots. Her hair was resolutely scored down the middle, frizzy grey hair emerging from either side of the parting. She wore her premature greying with pride, embracing the natural production of what looked suspiciously like a length of fine wire wool.

  Annie felt as though she had just emerged from a period of self-imposed isolation. It had been a very pleasant, comfortable confinement, but confinement nonetheless. Virginia was subjected to a quick-fire round of questions, with Annie leaning over and listening intently to her every reply. She was not accustomed to anyone being that interested in her everyday life and after giving Annie the lowdown on the first meeting of the Stockbridge Arts and Crafts Group, Virginia placed her hand atop Annie’s before the next phase of interrogation commenced.

  ‘Okay, darling. I know none of this is of any real interest to you. What on earth’s been going on?’

  ‘I’m just so pleased to see you. Honestly, I feel as though I haven’t seen you for such a long time and it just struck me, as we were sitting here, how much I miss you. I don’t know, Gin, maybe we just take each other for granted. You are such a good friend and yet I don’t really know half of what goes on in your life.’

  ‘Well, I do try to tell you and the others for that matter. No one ever seems that interested but that’s absolutely fine.’ Virginia smiled and tightened her grip on Annie’s hand. ‘The rest of you have such interesting lives, I’m more than happy to hear all about the latest big “case” you’re all working on or how the skiing holiday went. You’re all far more adventurous than me, or Gordon for that matter.’

  There wasn’t a hint of bitterness or resentment in her voice, Annie thought. It was more than she could bear. She got up, walked round to the other side of the table and hugged her friend from on high. Virginia stayed resolutely in her seat; Annie noticed how utterly perplexed she looked.

  ‘Oh, Gin, I’m sorry. I think we’re just all so wrapped up in our own wee worlds. If nothing else, the last couple of months have shown me that we really need to slow down and appreciate each other more. It’s not whether Lothian Regional Council prosecutes some poor clerical worker at the Sports Centre for falsifying invoices that’s important. I mean, obviously it’s wrong, even if the poor woman was struggling to pay off her husband’s gambling debts, but what’s important, I mean really important – well, it’s the people in our lives, the relationships we have. Don’t you think? I mean, it takes time and effort to build and keep friendships, love even…’

  The rambling monologue tailed off and Virginia looked desperately at the door of the café.

  Right on cue, the door opened and in rushed Kirsty in a pink neon top and black spandex leggings tucked into woolly slouch socks.

  ‘Sorry, girls, yoga started late today. Our instructor had been out on a bit of bender last night. Don’t really think that’s the sort of thing yoga instructors should be doing, mind you!’ She dropped her Adidas holdall loudly onto the floor and collapsed into the vacant chair next to Virginia.

  Kirsty had abandoned her Cindy Crawford body workout video some weeks previously, protesting that exercising in the Californian sunshine just didn’t transfer to the confines of a Georgian drawing room. Yoga was the ‘in thing’ now and Kirsty had thrown herself into the new phenomenon with her usual enthusiasm, acquiring all the requisite clothing and signing up to twice-weekly classes. She radiated a kind of post-exercise high.

  ‘I probably don’t need the added stimulation but let’s have coffee and cake!’

  Coffees were ordered but Annie was ravenous, having missed out on the promised lunch at Cramond, and so went for the hot quiche option with salad and thick-cut bread.

  ‘Gosh, did you miss lunch?’ Kirsty enquired. Annie nodded but said nothing. She couldn’t think how to begin the conversation she needed to have.

  Annie sensed Virginia staring at her, waiting for the big reveal, but she wasn’t yet ready to tell all. Kirsty jumped in to fill the void. Fuelled by a mixture of caffeine and endorphins, she dominated the next thirty minutes. She recounted her search for good quality winter curtains, Duncan’s all-nighter following his first century for Dunedin Cricket Club, students in the attic flat who were not pulling their weight on the communal stair-cleaning front and finally, the apparent and most welcome disappearance of the nightmare neighbour, Mr JFK himself.

  Annie had allowed herself to relax into the company, enjoying Kirsty’s stories and the familiar feeling of not having to make an effort with good friends. Kirsty’s final proclamation, however, jolted Annie from her composed state. Muscles tensed in her neck and she could feel the blood pulsate up to her cheeks. She couldn’t bring herself to look up and remained focused on the warm broccoli and stilton quiche.

  ‘Anyway, enough from me. What have you been up to, Miss Annie?’

  Annie decided this was the moment to tell all even if it wasn’t quite how she had envisaged breaking the news. She had thought to frame the announcement by describing a new relationship that had started slowly and was building into something very special. As she rehearsed it over in her head she couldn’t help but think Kirsty and Duncan’s opinion of James, which appeared to have remained resolutely negative, could only diminish all the warm, positive feelings she had been living with over the last few weeks. It would have been so easy to say nothing and return to her state of blissful exile.

  ‘Actually, I’ve been seeing someone.’ She said it quietly, not sure how to move to the next sentence.

  ‘Well, there’s a turn up for the books. What brought that on? I thought you were happy as you were?’ Kirsty exclaimed. Virginia just looked anxious, her eyes darting back and forth between her two friends.

  ‘Well, it’s not always brilliant, Kirst. You know I love being with you lot but then I go home by myself and, well – it’s fine most of the time but sometimes I think it would be nice to have someone around to talk to other than the cat. Anyway, it’s early days but we’ve been having a really lovely time. I wouldn’t say he’s the easiest man to get to know but once you do you can see what a good and caring soul he really is. I don’t know what it is but I can just be myself with him. He doesn’t need me to be anything else – he just makes me feel safe and loved and to be honest I can’t really remember what that feels like. Don’t know if I ever did.’

  Annie finally looked up and smiled at them both, tears inexplicably filling her eyes.

  Virginia looked across sympathetically, her facial muscles visibly relaxing.

  ‘Well, that’s just wonderful, darling.’

  It appeared to Annie that Virginia really required no further details. She had again placed her hand on Annie’s and looked both genuinely happy for her dear friend and completely relieved that nothing bad had happened.

  Kirsty simply looked aghast.

  ‘I did wonder, even though I thought that noti
on had left you long ago when you reacted so badly to young Alex going off to Mozambique or wherever it was. I said to Duncan the other day, “I think she’s landed herself a man”. Of, course he was completely dismissive, you know what men are like. “Don’t be daft”, he said. “She’s probably snowed under at work and then of course there’s her mother…”.’ Kirsty stopped in her tracks. ‘Anyway enough of all that, tell us all about him.’

  Kirsty too reached across and briefly held Annie’s hand. However, it was more of an encouraging squeeze to spill the beans in contrast to Virginia’s comforting touch.

  Annie drew her hand away, wiped her mouth with her napkin, gathered herself and looked straight across at Kirsty.

  ‘Actually, it’s your neighbour, James Kerr.’

  Kirsty’s mouth fell open and stayed like that for what seemed an interminable period of time. Virginia’s eyes widened and she proceeded to suck in her entire bottom lip. Annie looked at each of them in turn.

  ‘Okay. Is anyone going to actually say something?’

  ‘But he was such an arse,’ Kirsty finally erupted.

  ‘I think that’s a bit of an exaggeration, Kirst,’ Virginia retorted.

  Annie felt that Virginia would have been more suited to a career in family mediation rather than pursuing a path which involved becoming inordinately passionate about sources of fuel.

  ‘Anyway, as I said earlier, he’s really nice once you get to know him. He’s interesting, he makes me laugh and even though it’s early days I really think he cares for me. You just caught him on a bad day, that’s all.’

  ‘Well, that’s all that matters.’ Virginia smiled and then with a hint of annoyance in her expression turned to look at Kirsty.

  ‘Well, of course it is,’ Kirsty chimed in. ‘It’s just, well, I thought we’d all agreed he was a bit of a rude dinner guest and I think he and Duncan have had a few frosty exchanges since then.’

  ‘Yes, well, it isn’t all that matters. Not really. I want us all to start again. If he’s going to be part of my life then I really want him to be part of your lives too.’

  ‘Of course we can all start again.’ Virginia appeared to adopt the role of spokesperson for the group. ‘Why don’t we all meet up for a drink? A pub’s kind of neutral territory, isn’t it?’

  ‘That sounds great.’ Annie was thankful for her friend’s suggestion.

  Kirsty nodded and smiled. Annie knew she was dying to break the news to Duncan.

  ‘But, sorry, can we just rewind a bit. I mean, where did this all happen and how?’

  Kirsty needed to know far more than Virginia did.

  Annie described their meeting at the Queen’s Hall and lunch date at Hendersons without going into any of the more dramatic details. Kirsty finally looked satisfied but Annie knew she was struggling to make sense of it all.

  Well, that makes two of us, Annie thought to herself.

  They moved the conversation on but Annie could sense an undercurrent of tension. It was left to Virginia to organise the unlikely get-together and they left to get on with the rest of their Saturday. Virginia would follow her normal weekend routine of scouring the vintage shops in St Stephen Street and Kirsty announced she was making a beeline for Bower’s the butchers to see what sort of game they had left.

  ‘Found a leg of hare in the freezer. If I can get hold of some pheasant I’ve got the makings of a rather tasty terrine!’

  Annie just wanted to get back to the sanctuary of her flat. She knew Gordon and Virginia would go out their way to make James feel welcome but she just had no idea how Kirsty and Duncan, particularly Duncan, would behave. Then again she had no real idea how James would behave either.

  As she turned the key to her front door, Annie heard Ludovic meowing in the hall. He arched his back and rubbed up against her leg as she stepped inside. He liked to make sure his scent overwhelmed any rivals that she might have encountered on her foray into the world beyond the railings; beyond his territory. Satisfied that he had reclaimed her, the cream cat slunk back towards the lounge, long tail quivering.

  Annie entered the lounge to find James in pretty much the same position she had left him. This time, however, he was fast asleep, chin down into his chest and glasses balanced unevenly on the tip of his nose.

  How completely adorable he looks, she thought. Almost like a little boy; not that she knew what he had looked like as a little boy. After that initial conversation in Hendersons when James seemed to be at ease talking about his father, he had rarely mentioned his parents since. He seemed reluctant to speak about his upbringing and despite Annie asking to see photographs from childhood, none had been forthcoming. Very little had been forthcoming, she reflected.

  She sat beside him on the couch and Ludovic jumped up, settling back into James’s lap – the comfortable lair he had been forced to abandon to greet his mistress. Annie noticed that a rather battered-looking library book, identified by its coded spine label, had replaced the glossy periodical. The large hardback entitled Gardens of Northern Italy lay open across his chest, the plastic cover slipping ever downwards towards Ludovic’s head.

  James woke, looking startled, unsure for a moment where he was. As he turned and saw Annie’s face he smiled.

  ‘Ah, you’re back. How was it? Did you tell all? Come close, I need to feel you close to me.’

  As she snuggled in, the book finally lost its precarious grip on James’s chest, gently sliding down the front of his shirt till it came to rest squarely on the cat’s head. Ludovic could take no more encroachment onto his sleeping platform and with a short sharp meow, jumped down and sloped off towards the kitchen.

  ‘Yes, well, they were obviously a bit surprised given how things had gone at the dinner. Once I told them what a nice time we’d been having, they seemed absolutely fine and really looking forward to meeting you again.’ Annie was aware she was painting a far rosier scene than the one she’d just left but desperately wanted him to approach the next encounter in a positive frame of mind.

  ‘In fact Virginia is going to organise a night out at the pub.’

  ‘What pub?’

  ‘I don’t know. Probably in Stockbridge – the Baillie, the St Vincent, somewhere like that.’

  ‘I like the St Vincent. Not that keen on the Baillie.’

  ‘Well, I don’t know, let’s wait and see.’

  ‘Will he be there?’

  ‘Will who be there?’

  ‘Mr Drummond.’

  ‘Well, of course he will. He’s Kirsty’s husband and they are both my friends. And please stop calling him Mr Drummond. His name is Duncan.’

  ‘Duncan Drummond.’

  ‘Yes, Duncan Drummond. Good grief, James, stop being so deliberately obtuse. Can we now please change the subject? What is that you are reading?’

  ‘Have you ever been to Italy?’

  ‘Yes.’ She hesitated. ‘The year after my father died I took Mother to Florence. It was just lovely. I think I could go back there time and time again and never get bored. I’ve never been anywhere like it. Quite overwhelming really; so much culture and history in one place. I think it also really suited the two of us. There was just so much to see and do, no space or time for us to stop and revisit…’

  ‘Revisit what?’

  ‘Oh, just a lot had happened with my father the previous twelve months.’

  ‘Tell me.’ His voice, his look were all so reassuring she knew that for the first time ever she was about to disclose the full unabridged story. Not just edited highlights and no reimagined versions of the truth.

  CHAPTER 3

  She sat up, keeping her hand on the security blanket that was his soft textured shirt and found herself journeying back to her childhood.

  Annie’s early memories all seemed to centre around her father. His made-up stories, building th
ings, making furniture for dolls’ houses. It seemed to her that he had been the one who helped shape her little world. Yet most time was spent with her mother. He worked hard – evenings, weekends too while her mother stayed at home. Looking back it seemed odd that such a firm bond should form so early on between father and daughter but it did and, despite some testing times, it had endured right up to his death.

  Hugh Anderson had been a lawyer working for one of the big banks initially. If you worked for the bank, you stayed with the bank and of course that was where their social lives centred. The same people moving round the same drinks parties. The men in sports jackets and brown suede shoes; the women wafting around in their Laura Ashley skirts, sipping at their Bacardi and Cokes or Scotch and water.

  The more she described it to James, the more she realised how stifling it must have been. If they weren’t doing the rounds of colleagues’ cocktail parties, Saturday nights were devoted to badminton at the Church Hall, just with all the same people. The inane conversations, the mind-numbing gossip and petty suburban jealousies. It all seemed so normal then but it must have been absolute torture for her father. It just wasn’t him.

  Annie spoke of his interest in travel, other countries, other cultures, none of which interested her mother, unfortunately. Then one day, just after Annie’s fourteenth birthday, both parents sat her down and made the monumental announcement. Daddy had been offered a position with a pharmaceutical company based in Geneva. They had a small research facility just outside Edinburgh but most of his time would be spent on the continent. The plan was that Mummy and her would stay put and Daddy would visit whenever he could. It was a great opportunity for Daddy but really far too much upheaval to drag her out of school. She had found herself staring at them both, trying to take in the enormity of what they were telling her. He was leaving. That’s what she heard. That’s what she knew. And even now, looking back, it seemed so at odds with their behaviour in the years that followed, to present the proposal with such confidence, certainty and unity.