‘You can see great lumps and bumps in the wall, Livvy,’ he stormed as he dragged me upstairs one evening to see. ‘Look, even you can see that’s hopeless, surely!’
I ignored the implicit insult. ‘But we’re going to tile it,’ I soothed. ‘They’ll plaster it over and then the tiles will cover it. You won’t even see it.’
‘But I’ll know it’s there,’ he hissed. ‘And I want it all off!’
My builders were subdued. Johnny’s return had been greeted with polite congratulations and a searching look from Lance which I’d ignored, followed by studied concentration, heads down, and a deep desire to finish the job and get the hell out as soon as possible. Any hopes of finishing that imminently, though, were dispelled by Johnny, who made it quite clear – politely or forcibly, depending on which way the wind took him – that much of the work done in his absence had been second rate. Clearly, he seethed, they’d hoped to get away with it, but now that he was back and was once more ‘the guv’nor’, they wouldn’t. Spiro whimpered and twisted his hat in his hands, Alf cowered, Lance looked angry and defiant and Mac was mutinous but tight-lipped, because he’d been a builder long enough to know that keeping shtumm was the only way to get paid.
As Claudia and I sat in the kitchen at breakfast one morning, listening to him berating them upstairs, I felt sad. On the whole I believed their work to be good and professional, but aside from this, I’d been close to these people. They were my friends. They’d helped me when Johnny hadn’t been there and seen me through some very dark days. I clenched my hands under the table and felt a sense of betrayal as Johnny’s irate voice resounded through the rafters.
‘It’s just incompetent!’ he was saying. ‘Just downright incompetent!’
Claudia was wide-eyed over her Coco Pops. ‘Why is Daddy so cross?’ she breathed.
‘I don’t know,’ I replied. I pushed my chair back and got up. ‘But I intend to find out.’
I may have sounded determined as I snatched my car keys from the dresser and grabbed my bag, but as I went into the sitting room to find the A to Z, it was with a thudding heart. I knew Nina Harrison’s address off by heart, but as I flipped through the pages to find the route, my hands were shaking. You see, for the first time since Johnny’s return, it occurred to me to wonder if the object of his affections had rejected him.
Clarendon Road wasn’t hard to find. Plenty of my friends had lived in the Finchley, Highgate area, premarriage, and as I drove around the quaint little back streets, I thought what happy times I’d had here in my single days, tipsy and shrieking with laughter in a girlfriend’s basement kitchen, a crowd of us cooking spaghetti bolognese and talking long into the night. In fact, if I remembered rightly, Imogen used to have a flat right – here. I went past her old flat, peering into the familiar windows, then turned down another familiar side street, and left into a mews. I purred along, and drew up slowly, right opposite number 32. I checked my scrap of paper. Yes, 32, next door to a garage Johnny had said. I gazed out of the window. And yes, there it was. Not a tacky, filling-station-type of garage, though, more of a discreet workshop affair, with double barn doors painted bottle green, and opening on to a small forecourt with a couple of classy vintage cars parked outside.
A silver-haired, narrow-faced man with glasses looked up from polishing a hubcap as I got out of my car. He straightened up and wiped his hands on a rag. It was a quiet, dead-end street so I imagined any visitor was something of a diversion. As I locked my door I felt his eyes on me and I wondered if he was just a mechanic or indeed Bob, the father. Either way I ignored him as I walked confidently across the street, glancing up at a rather dear little mews house, painted pink with a green door to match the garage beside it, with window boxes and pots spilling over with bright red geraniums. I reached the door and stared nervously at the bell. 32A or 32B. Oh help, which one was she? I couldn’t remember. Suddenly I realised the silver-haired man was behind me.
‘Can I help?’ in a friendly voice.
I turned. I knew at once it was her father. I managed a smile. ‘Oh, well, I was looking for Nina actually.’
‘Ah, you want the top flat then. We’re down below in the servants quarters where we belong.’ He chuckled. ‘Hang about, I’ll see if she’s around. Sheila!’ He rapped his oily knuckles on a downstairs window.
A net curtain parted and a middle-aged woman appeared between the Fairy Liquid bottle and a spider plant. She was attractive in a faded blonde sort of way, with good bones and pale hair coiled neatly round her scalp, secured with gold hairpins.
‘What?’
‘Is Nina about?’ he yelled.
She shook her head and smiled, indicating by a wave of dithering hands in the air that she couldn’t hear a thing. ‘Hang on,’ she called. ‘I’ll come out.’
‘Deaf as a post,’ he grinned. ‘Although I always maintain it’s selective. She can hear the postman arriving with her new Freemans catalogue halfway down the street!’
I groaned inwardly. Oh God, did we have to get the whole family involved here? Why on earth had I come? In fact, why didn’t I just slip away now and forget all about it?
The green door opened and the woman peered around. She was wearing a housecoat and Dr Scholl sandals, and I spotted a wheelchair behind her in the hall.
‘This lass has come to see Nina,’ explained Bob with a sideways nod at me.
‘Oooh, has she now?’ she said with evident interest, coming more squarely into the doorway. ‘Well, she should be up there, luv. Is she expecting you?’
‘Um, well not exactly.’ I hesitated. They gazed expectantly at me. ‘I’m – I’m a parent, from school. From – her school.’
She beamed. ‘Oh well, she’ll be pleased to see you, I know she will. She’s always keen to get involved with the kiddies, isn’t she, Bob? Have you tried the bell?’
‘No, I –’ haven’t had a chance, I wanted to say through gritted teeth, but stopped short of saying anything at all as I heard a clattering down the stairs behind her. Pink, fluffy slippers appeared, then nylon-encased legs, a floral skirt, and then Nina was beside her mother in the communal hall. She looked tired, dishevelled and unmade up. Her face was very pale. As she stared at me, her right hand slowly reached out and gripped the banister rail tight.
‘What d’you want?’
Her parents caught the tone of her voice and turned quickly. They glanced at her, then back at me. As they did, I could see the penny making its slippery way down and, as it dropped, so did their smiles. Her mother’s face sagged.
‘Well, I – I wanted to talk to you,’ I faltered nervously. I flushed, from nerves, sure, but actually, from anger too. Jesus, who was the wronged party around here? Why should I be feeling guilty? Surely the aggressive, defensive tone should be mine, not hers? Who exactly was the floozie here, hmm? Nina’s eyes dropped to the lino floor, almost, I thought, in recognition of this. She nodded.
‘You’d better come up.’
‘Nina, d’you want me to –’ her mother shot out an anxious hand. Nina shook it off her arm.
‘No, Mum, I’ll be fine.’
Her parents watched silently as I followed their daughter upstairs, and as I turned at the top, I saw the man put an arm around his wife’s shoulders.
A separate front door opened on to a tiny hallway with a night storage heater and not much else, which in turn issued on to a light, airy sitting room. I followed Nina through and realised it stretched the length of the flat – which wasn’t large – with two sash windows on to the street. Coir matting covered the floor and a pair of identical white sofas with rather worn, washable damask covers stood either side of a wooden fireplace. Oatmeal hessian curtains hung at the windows from black, wrought-iron poles and on the white walls or on shelves, driftwood collages, twiggy sculptures and large church candles perched. All was cream, all was neutral, all was very safe and very Habitat. And how unlike my own eclectic, cluttered chintzy home, I thought, glancing around, full of clashing colours and mistak
es, but at least they were my mistakes and not Terence Conran’s. I tried to imagine Johnny here, full length on one of those creamy sofas, reading the Sunday papers, picking his nose, swigging a beer. Suddenly, I realised I could. Yes, why not? Totally at home, no doubt, his feet on that ethnic wooden coffee table. Fury rose and it strengthened my resolve.
‘So this is it,’ I sneered. ‘The love nest.’
‘Would you like a cup of coffee?’ she asked, wrong-footing me.
I stared. ‘Um, yes, all right,’ I muttered. I’d rather expected a defiant stare back.
I followed her into a little white galley kitchen, the paint peeling slightly on the walls, and watched as she fiddled about making real percolated coffee, something we never bothered with at home. I didn’t think Johnny liked it. I glanced at the efficient, stainless-steel kitchen. Clearly his tastes had changed. Then I studied her in the silence. Her hair was mussed and flat on one side and there were pillow marks on her cheek. I realised she’d probably been lying on the bed. I used to do a lot of that, too.
‘I don’t know why I’m surprised,’ she said suddenly, snipping the top off a gold foil coffee bag. ‘I half expected you to come every day.’
I startled. ‘Really? Why?’
She shrugged. ‘To fit the jigsaw together, I suppose. Find out about the other side of the story. After all, I came to see you.’
‘You did,’ I said, remembering how Mac had described her sitting on my terrace. ‘And I never found out why.’
She shrugged again. ‘An impulse, which I didn’t have the nerve to repeat. I wanted to present my case, I think.’
‘Which is?’
She turned and handed me a mug. Her eyes were very blue, but pale, like a duck’s egg, fringed with blonde lashes. ‘Look, why don’t you tell me why you’ve come here, first? Something clearly brought you, and then we can take it from there, eh?’
It was said gently, but I found the ‘eh?’ patronising. None the less I nodded and followed her back into the sitting room, thinking that even if I looked compliant, I wasn’t bloody feeling it. Oh no, I was thinking fast. In the first place I wasn’t going to tell her what a mess Johnny was and how worried I was about him, and I wasn’t going to enquire as to whether she knew what was driving his erratic behaviour either, and whether it stemmed from her. No no, I could box a bit cleverer than that. I perched on the edge of a sofa as she bustled about getting mats for the mugs. She still had her ghastly fluffy slippers on and I just knew I’d have kicked those off the moment I’d heard the door. Well, actually I wouldn’t have bought them in the first place; how could Johnny bear to look at them? Did she slop around in them all day? They closed neatly together on the coir matting as she perched opposite me. Her face was expectant. I took a deep breath.
‘Johnny says – well, he says he left you because he missed me too much. He says he made a mistake and that he should never have gone in the first place, that it was a madness that should never have happened. He’s adamant he loves me more than ever now, but I need to know that for sure. I need to know you’re out of our lives for good.’
The pain this gave her made her catch her breath, but I didn’t care. I’d caught my breath a few times recently too. She gripped her cup, glanced down at the carpet. Presently she nodded.
‘Yes, he left me because he missed you.’ She raised her eyes. ‘And I dare say he loves you above me. There now.’ She smiled. ‘Is that what you wanted to hear?’
She gazed at me with her steady baby blues, and it seemed to me she was mocking me. I hesitated. Somehow I’d expected her to deny it, say that he’d only returned to me through feelings of guilt, of marital duty.
‘Well, obviously I came to get the truth.’
‘The truth.’ She smiled again, eyes still on mine. She shook her head slowly. ‘Well, I’ll answer any questions you care to ask truthfully, but what about the ones you don’t know how to ask? What about them?’
I stared. ‘I … don’t know what you mean.’
‘No. You don’t. How could you? And actually, it doesn’t matter. You’re right, all that matters is that he left me to go back to you.’ She picked up a glass ashtray from the table beside her, turned it around in her hands thoughtfully. ‘Nothing else matters now.’
I licked my lips, confused. Tried a different tack. ‘OK – so, if that’s all that matters, why did you come and see me that night?’
She sighed and put the ashtray down. ‘Because I could feel him going. I could feel him slipping away. I wanted to explain to you – to appeal to you, really – try to make you understand why I needed him so much. It was a last, desperate attempt to hold on, I suppose.’
‘To appeal to me? But why me, for Christ’s sake. God, I – I probably would have socked you in the teeth!’
Not for the first time her eyes flitted back to the little table where she’d replaced the ashtray, darting, involuntarily almost, to a large black and white portrait photograph in a silver frame. I realised with a start that it was a picture of Johnny as a baby, dressed in a sailor suit. It was very similar to one that Angie had given me. Had Angie given it to her? Was it some sort of warped, setting-up-home present? I reached across.
‘Where on earth did you …?’ I studied it. ‘It’s Johnny, isn’t it?’
‘No, it’s not Johnny. Everyone says that, but it’s not.’
As I stared I felt the blood drain from my face. Suddenly I dropped it. It clattered down on to the carpet, still face up. I gazed down. No, it wasn’t Johnny. It was too modern a pose. It was very like him, but – it was his son. I put my hand to my eyes. Covered them so as not to see.
‘Oh God.’
‘That’s what I came to tell you,’ she said quietly, reaching forward and picking it up. ‘Johnny wouldn’t, couldn’t, but I felt you should know.’
I had a moment of complete light-headed nausea. For a second, I thought I was going to pass out. They had a son. Johnny had a son.
‘I wanted you to know I wasn’t just some two-bit tart he’d picked up, that I was the mother of his child too.’
Doesn’t stop you being a tart, I thought fiercely. Plenty of mistresses have illegitimate children. But my head was spinning now, full of unanswered questions. The mother of his child. Jesus.
‘How – how old is he?’ I whispered, staring blankly at the photo again that she’d set back on the table. God, so like Johnny – that nose, those eyes. The smile. The smile destroyed me.
‘Nine months.’
‘Nine –’ My eyes shot back to her. ‘But he’s only been with you for –’
‘Six years.’
My mouth dried. ‘Six years!’
She nodded. ‘But I’ve known him a lot longer than that.’
‘But how? How can you have?’ I blurted out, clenching my fists and realising my voice was shrill and uncontrolled and not at all as I’d intended, but I was shaken to the core.
‘Because every Saturday for years, he used to come here with his father, tinkering with cars with Dad. I’ve known him since I was about twelve, when Oliver gave him his first car, in fact. He must have been – ooh, about seventeen.’
‘Seventeen!’ I gasped. ‘You knew him – shit!’ I got up and walked quickly over to the window, gripping the sill hard.
‘My parents knew Oliver very well. He brought all his cars here to be serviced, you see, took Dad’s advice whenever he bought a new one too. They used to travel all over the country together, to view them.’
‘But – but Johnny told me –’ I swung round – ‘he told me he met you at an open day. At the school, he said –’
‘Yes, well, he would, wouldn’t he?’ she interrupted without a hint of irony. ‘Of course he would. He didn’t want you to know, did he? Didn’t want you to discover he’d been living a secret life for years, had a mistress. What husband would? You might have been a mite upset had you known he came here most Wednesdays, had a chat with Dad and a cup of tea with Mum, before nipping up here and making love to me. I dare
say he also didn’t mention the fact that last year I gave birth to a son. Of course he didn’t!’
My heart was hammering; I couldn’t think straight. My God, where did this leave me? And Claudia too, with a brother? I felt sick.
‘Where is he?’ I whispered, glancing nervously about, half expecting a small blond head to pop up behind a sofa. I didn’t want to see him. Ever.
‘Peter? He’s downstairs with Mum. She has him every morning. Usually I’m teaching, but she still has him for me in the holidays. It gives me a bit of a break.’
‘Convenient,’ I muttered drily.
‘Well, yes, I suppose so, but it’s also fairly essential. We all need a break from him now and again. Peter’s got cerebral palsy.’
I stared, shocked. ‘Oh! God, isn’t that – serious?’
‘Very. Although some kids are not too badly affected. But Peter’s very ill. Very – severe.’ She swallowed and her eyes filled.
I gazed. ‘I’m … sorry.’ I was. Confused and angry and shocked as I was, I could still feel sorrow for a handicapped child.
‘My God – Johnny!’ My hand clutched my mouth. ‘How did he –’
She nodded. ‘Devastated. Totally devastated. We only found out when Peter was six months old. It wasn’t diagnosed until then. That’s when he moved in with me.’
I gazed at her incredulously. ‘You mean – that’s when he decided to leave me? When he heard the child was sick?’
‘Yes, he said he couldn’t leave me alone with him then. We’d never intended to live together, you see. I’d always known he loved you much more, and I’d always known I was just a harmless diversion, a mistress, and for a while, it suited me. I wasn’t unhappy with that. He was great fun and we always had a lark, a good roll in the sack, but I’d always known he was beyond me, totally out of my reach. I thought I was lucky to have him as a lover, but I never thought long term. I’d always assumed that in time I’d marry someone else, someone from my own sort of background. But then Peter came along.’
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