by Jo Verity
‘Obviously, as her friend, I’ll have to warn her you’re not the nice man we thought you were.’ She pulled on her mittens. ‘I shall pray for your salvation, of course. It’s never too late—’
‘I think it is.’ He held the door open. ‘Would you leave now, please?’
He listened as she clomped down the stairs, waiting until he heard the front door shut. Then he went to the window and looked down into the street, watching her disappear around the corner.
Gil texted Feray several times without response, finally making contact with her on Sunday morning. After three days rehearsing his exit strategy, the whole thing had become huge in his mind. It might be best if they met on neutral ground, somewhere where there were people around to limit histrionics and minimise the possibility of physical contact. He’d made one mistake and he didn’t trust himself if she started crying.
‘Why are we meeting here?’ she said when she joined him in the coffee shop.
The lighting was unflattering, accentuating the lines around her eyes and at the corners of her mouth. A few millimetres of grey were visible at the roots of her dark hair and her index and middle fingers showed traces of nicotine staining. She looked weary.
‘You’ve started smoking again?’ he said.
‘Just one, now and then.’ She pushed her hair back, looping it behind her ears. Usually she wore earrings but today only purplish pinpoints showed where her ears had been pierced. ‘I’ll pack it in when I get another job.’ She looked him full in the face, daring him to criticise.
The girl came and Gil ordered a small black coffee – cheap and quick to drink. He was eager to get this done but Feray said she was famished. Her panini took forever to come, and forever to eat. At last she pushed her plate away and he could say his piece.
‘There’s no right way to say this…The timing’s bloody awful…’ He floundered, willing her to put two and two together and do his dirty work for him, but she wasn’t going to make it easy. ‘I’ve met someone,’ he said.
‘Someone?’ she said. ‘You’ve met “someone”. Aren’t I “someone”?’
‘Of course you are. You’re a wonderful woman. But we both knew that it wasn’t a forever thing, didn’t we?’ It was dialogue from a second-rate movie. ‘Didn’t we?’
The seconds ticked away until he could bear her silence no longer. ‘Say something, Feray.’
‘It’s been three years, Gil. It was starting to feel like a forever thing. To me anyway.’ Her voice was getting louder. ‘Who is this “someone”? Is she young? Yes? And rich? I expect so. Does she have kids? I don’t think so.’
‘I didn’t go looking for this, Feray. I was happy with things as they were.’
‘So why didn’t you walk away from her? Does she have you by the balls? Where was Miss Someone on Friday night, when you and I were fucking?’
Before he could reply she kicked him hard beneath the table, catching his shin with the toe of her boot.’
‘Jeez, Feray.’
‘Fuck you, Gil,’ she screamed. ‘Don’t come near me or I’ll call the police.’
The proprietor of the café had left his coffee machine and was coming towards them, wiping his hands on his apron. ‘Everything okay here, folks?’
Customers caught up in the drama, stared into their coffee cups.
‘A misunderstanding,’ Gil said. He took a ten pound note from his pocket, standing up and offering it to the man. ‘This should cover it.’
He hurried out of the café. Picking his way over the banks of filthy snow, he crossed the road and jumped on the first bus heading south. His shin was throbbing and when he eased up the leg of his jeans he saw that Feray’s kick had caught him squarely on the shinbone, half way between knee and ankle, breaking the skin. Although the wound wasn’t deep, it was weeping watery blood and he dabbed it with his hanky hoping to prevent the denim from sticking to it. He should be grateful that she hadn’t picked up the fork that was lying on the table.
The bus was going to Trafalgar Square and, needing to take his mind off the scene with Feray, he made for the National Portrait Gallery. He’d been there not so long ago but he never tired of studying faces. After revisiting his favourites – Jane Bown’s Jagger, the pencil sketch of T. E. Lawrence, Hilliard’s exquisite miniatures – he checked out the photography exhibition that was causing such a stir in the Sundays. The photographers were at least twenty years younger than he and memories of his own abandoned aspirations weighing heavy, more than a little demoralised, he came away after half an hour.
By four-thirty it was dark, the temperature plummeting, and his stomach was grumbling. There were plenty of eating places in the vicinity but, even if he went for the most basic, by the time he’d finished he would end up shelling out another ten quid and he had to watch the pennies. He kept a supply of tins in the cupboard and he’d stocked up on vegetables only yesterday. He’d go straight home and make corned beef hash – enough for two days.
Thoughts of food made him hungrier and he made his way up Charing Cross Road towards his bus stop. It was hard going. The pavements were mobbed with Christmas shoppers dawdling, walking three abreast, half of them talking into mobiles. Seeing all those bulging bags it was difficult to believe that money was tight.
When his bus reached Warren Street, the lights were red. Within hours of the explosion, this had become a place of pilgrimage. Dozens of bunches of flowers were lashed to lamp-posts and heaped around traffic bollards. He’d watched the offerings mount. They’d taken a hammering from weather and passing traffic, and, after six weeks, nothing much remained but cellophane and synthetic ribbon. This flower obsession had taken off big time when Diana died and the whole world had been shown what to do. Flowers – always left in the wrapper. Mawkish messages. Teddy bears and balloons. Reverence for the dead? Sympathy for the survivors? No. It was a superstitious urge to offer up thanks that Death had, on this occasion, passed the donors by.
There had been little information released on the investigation. The whisper was that the bomber was ‘white Caucasian’. It was likely that the explosives strapped to his torso had been detonated by a malfunction of a mobile phone. Gil wondered why this hadn’t been leaked to the media but maybe it suited the powers-that-be to let the public assume the bomber to be of Middle Eastern origin.
25
Vivian wondered whether she would recognise Richard. It was five years since they’d met at her mother’s funeral. It had been all she could do to get through that awful day and she had scant memory of it.
She needn’t have been concerned because as soon as she entered the restaurant a man stood up, hand raised in greeting.
‘Vivian. Hello,’ he said. ‘I hope this place is all right. I haven’t eaten here before.’
An odd statement coming from a man who lived in Edinburgh.
‘Are you in London often?’ she said.
He looked sheepish. ‘Every couple of months. Usually here and back in a day. I don’t get to see Dad as often as I should.’
She wondered if her father knew that his son regularly came within a few miles of his house. ‘As often as I should’ implied that Richard did, now and again, get to Farleigh Road although her father had never mentioned these visits.
She studied the man sitting opposite her. His hair was white now but she recalled the sandy-haired young men who had occasionally come to the house when she was a child. In her mind’s eye they were remarkably tall – but then everyone’s tall when you’re five years old. In middle age, Richard bore a strong resemblance to their father. They shared the same prominent nose and rudiments of a cleft chin, the same tapering fingers and flat fingernails.
‘Was he pleased to see you?’ she said.
‘Hard to say. He kept telling me I shouldn’t have bothered “fagging all the way down”.’
‘He loves playing the martyr. How was he?’
‘Tired. Old. A wee bit confused.’
‘Confused?’
‘A few non-sequit
urs. Repetitions. I collared a doctor. She assured me he’s going on well. When I mentioned the confusion thing, she said old people often become disorientated when they’re removed from familiar surroundings.’ He shrugged. ‘It sounded reasonable, but it all came out a bit pat.’
They ordered food and he asked how she was coping. She explained that she would only be able to get to St. George’s at weekends. ‘I’m afraid he won’t get many visits in the week.’
‘Don’t beat yourself up,’ he said. ‘By the way, I called in at the house. Everything looked to be in order. Your snowman – I’m assuming it’s yours – gave me quite a start.’
He laughed, as if he were indulging a juvenile prank.
‘You have Dad’s keys?’ she said.
‘Yes. He gave me a set when he moved in.’
Her father hadn’t told her this – but there was no reason why he should. In the normal run of events, Richard would have no more use for keys than she did. And when things went awry, as they had done now, it was as well that they could both access the house.
‘Wine?’ he said, raising the carafe.
She held her hand over her glass. ‘Not at lunchtime.’
‘Very wise.’ He smiled and poured himself a liberal measure. ‘From what I read, the building industry’s taking a battering. Your firm’s okay?’
‘We’ve been lucky so far.’
She told him about the competition win and how she was scheduled to run the Cologne office after Christmas. ‘Someone else will have to do it.’
‘You mustn’t jeopardise your career for Dad,’ he said. ‘I don’t intend doing that so why should you?’
He wiped a piece of bread around his plate. ‘We should start thinking about a care home. He won’t be able to look after himself much longer and, let’s be honest, we don’t want him living with us, do we? John feels the same.’
The thought had been at the back of her mind. Nevertheless it was a shock to hear it expressed in such bald terms, and to know that her half-brothers had been hatching plans even before they’d been told the prognosis.
‘Dad wouldn’t like it,’ she said.
‘Maybe not. But he just might have to lump it.’
‘Doesn’t he get a say?’
‘Of course. But let’s not forget he’s eighty-seven. And we have no idea how this is going to pan out. He may be thankful to have an excuse not to struggle on alone. He can’t be getting a lot out of things as they are.’
Richard was clearly unaccustomed to having his pronouncements questioned. He seemed altogether too ready to make judgements on a life with which he’d chosen not to engage. Her own involvement had been reluctant but she had made the effort to visit every few weeks. It seemed wrong – underhand – for the two of them to be sitting here consigning their father to a geriatric home.
He folded his napkin into a neat square and set it alongside his plate. ‘I don’t know if you’re aware of this, Vivian, but after your mother died Dad assigned me enduring power of attorney.’
‘What?’
‘Ahhh. He didn’t tell you.’
‘Obviously not.’
He gave a nervous smile. ‘Look, Vivian. This doesn’t change anything.’
She had only a sketchy idea of what ‘enduring power of attorney’ entailed – but enough to know that, if their father became incapacitated, Richard would have the authority to handle his finances.
‘I think it does,’ she said, ‘especially if you’re suggesting he’s becoming incapable.’
‘I’m not suggesting anything. And I certainly wouldn’t take action without consulting you first.’
His disclosure had wrong-footed her. She’d been too eager to see him as an ally but how could she trust him now?
She glanced at her watch. ‘I must get back.’
Opening her purse, she took out thirty pounds and placed it on the table. ‘I hope that covers it.’
‘Don’t be silly,’ he said, pushing it towards her.
‘You think I’m silly?’
‘Of course not. Vivian—’
‘Tell Dad I’ll be in to see him on Christmas Day,’ she said.
She’d begun to hope Richard might share this with her. Now it seemed that his motive for coming to London was to check on their father’s state of mind.
When she phoned Gil, he didn’t ask about Nick and she didn’t asked about Feray, but he seemed his old self again and she assumed that he had, as promised, ‘sorted things out’. They talked about her father’s progress and Richard’s visit. Gil told her how he’d finally lost it with Irene, warning her to expect a phone call. And he said that he would love to accompany her to the party tomorrow.
Now she was having doubts about the wisdom of her invitation. Her ‘he’s just a friend’ approach hadn’t convinced Ottilie. The presumption would be that Gil was Nick’s replacement. The assembled company (the women anyway) would measure him against Nick and almost certainly find him wanting.
They arranged to meet after work. Although they’d spoken, she hadn’t seen him since their night together and she was feeling apprehensive. Even a little shy.
Vivian was wearing the green coat, the one that would set off those jade earrings. She looked tired. And edgy. No matter what she’d said about their failing relationship, finishing with the Nick bloke couldn’t have been fun. On top of that, she was bearing the brunt of this business with her father – a double bind if she felt nothing for him. He thought Philip Carey was a game old codger, but it was easy to like other people’s parents.
‘So, your brother turned up,’ he said.
‘Half-brother. Yes.’
‘That should make things easier for you.’
She shrugged. ‘Let’s not talk about it.’
They drank coffee and again shared cakes, and he didn’t care that his shin was throbbing or that he was spending way, way over his daily allowance. Every time they met he had that delicious sense of starting something from scratch. Of not knowing where it was going – or whether he would ever see her again. Maybe this should bother him but he was happy simply to go with it.
‘Tell me what happened with Irene,’ Vivian said.
He gave her a full rundown on Irene’s phone call and visit.
‘I can’t believe she turned up after what you’d said to her,’ she said.
‘Irene Tovey and God – not to mention the pastor, or whatever she calls him – make a relentless team. They don’t give up easily.’
‘Surely she’ll leave you alone now,’ she said.
‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you?’ He scooped up the last crumbs of cake. ‘D’you know I actually wanted to hit her? Sitting on my bed. Simpering away like…like Mrs Doubtfire.’
Vivian laughed. ‘Don’t.’
‘Apparently I’m a son of Satan. I’m surprised she hasn’t been on to you already.’
‘She will, I’m sure.’ She popped a sugar lump into her mouth. ‘About tomorrow. The party. You don’t have to come.’
He was prepared for this. He didn’t blame her for having second thoughts. An office party was about as public an arena as you could get – the mother lode of gossip for the year to come.
‘I’m flattered that you invited me but I can see it might be tricky for you,’ he said. ‘It’s not easy when two parts of your world collide.’
‘I really do want you to come,’ she said, ‘but…’
‘But?’
‘When I told Ottilie – she’s our office manager – that I was bringing a friend, she did that eye rolling thing.’
‘Eye rolling, eh? Not good.’
She laughed and seemed to relax a little.
‘Why not tell them how we met?’ he said. ‘It would explain why you’ve invited me. Besides, one look at me and Ottilie will know there can’t be anything between us.’
‘You’ll come then?’ she said.
‘I’d love to. Where? When?’
‘Queens Park. Seven-thirty.’
‘Dress code?’
‘Oh. Informal.’
‘I guess we’re not talking sweat pants.’
She frowned. ‘Architects love grey. No logos. No patterns. Nothing shiny.’
‘Sure you’re not confusing them with fog?’
They exchanged the café’s fragrant fug for the chill of the street. Looping her scarf around her neck, she shivered. ‘I’m going back to work now.’
He didn’t like the idea of her alone in what wasn’t the most salubrious area and he thought about offering to walk her back to her office. But he didn’t want her thinking he was angling to spend the night with her.
‘You’ll be all right?’ he said.
‘Of course.’
She took a step towards him and kissed him on the lips – a lingering, unambiguous kiss and he watched her stride away, waiting long enough to know that she wasn’t going to look back.
What had they talked about for the past hour? Nothing much. As ever, their conversation had been sparse – more like verbal impressionism. Take that weekend at her father’s house. They’d spent a lot of the time in silence. In his experience silence was not the default female state. Polly would accuse him of gender stereotyping but he felt qualified to defend himself. A recent study in a well-respected journal reported that, in any one day, the average man says seven thousand words – the average woman, twenty-one thousand. Vivian bucked that trend. But she’d grown up without siblings and with a father who apparently had nothing to say to her. This might explain a lot.
Gil stepped down from the bus and cautiously picked his way home. The country was, it appeared, still in the grip of a rock salt shortage. Camden was being frugal with its supplies, gritting only the main routes, leaving side streets crusty with ice. In the past couple of weeks, he’d seen enough plastered limbs to know that it wasn’t only OAPs who were coming a cropper.
Hands deep in pockets, shoulders tensed against the cold, he stood on the pavement looking up at the house. The tired old building looked almost grand under the inky sky, its flaking paint and stained brickwork restored by soft street lighting. Oskar’s curtains were open, his room illuminated by the glow of a TV set. In the room below, Christmas lights, poor imitations of icicles, dangled across the head of the window frames. And at the very top of the house, his dormers were dark and lifeless.