by Jo Verity
‘Gil’s promised to see me home,’ Vivian said.
‘Good. Perhaps you two could share a cab with—’
‘It’s all sorted,’ Vivian said. ‘Goodnight everyone. Have a lovely Christmas, Cara.’
‘Yes. And thanks for a great party,’ Gil said.
She grabbed his arm and they started back the way they came.
‘Was that okay?’ she said.
‘It was fun. They’re a nice crowd.’
They walked on, their breath condensing in the sub-zero air.
‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ he said.
Her stomach flipped. ‘Oh.’
‘I may be – in fact I’m sure I am – claustrophobic.’
She stopped and, laughing, kissed him on his lips. ‘Is that all?’
‘You don’t understand,’ he said. ‘It means I don’t go by Tube and—’
‘The last Tube’s gone anyway. We’ll get the bus to Finchley Road.’
She took out her phone, opened the London Transport site and checked the timetable. ‘There’s one due in six minutes.’
On the bus they discussed the party. Gil had chatted to most of her colleagues but, from the way he glossed over his conversation with ‘Friel’, she guessed that the two men hadn’t hit it off. Maybe Gil was envious of their longstanding friendship and daily association. She wondered, too, whether Howard had sensed that there was more to her friendship with Gil than she’d suggested. He could sometimes be over-protective.
They got off the bus at Swiss Cottage and walked up the hill towards her flat. Lights still blazed in the big houses in Buckland Crescent and Belsize Park, party music seeping from open windows.
‘You’ll stay?’ she said when they reached the front door.
‘If that’s okay with you.’
‘I wouldn’t have asked if it weren’t,’ she said.
She watched him hang his coat in the hall. He’d been to her flat several times now but she wasn’t yet accustomed to seeing him there. He looked out of place – like a pencil in a cutlery drawer. They fitted together best on neutral ground. Walking down the street or sitting on a bus. Even in her father’s house because she, too, was pretty much a stranger there.
‘That’s a nice coat,’ she said.
‘It is. Pity it’s not mine.’
He explained how he’d requisitioned it for the evening, making her laugh at his dithering over what to wear. He was good at telling stories, of spinning the ordinary into something amusing and she was sorry that she’d worried him with all that nonsense about grey.
Howard had told them all to have a lie-in and that he wouldn’t expect them until mid-morning but tomorrow would be a normal working day for Gil.
‘What time d’you have to be in?’ she said.
‘Eight-thirty.’
‘We should go to bed.’
The last time he was here she’d seduced him (that’s what it boiled down to) and she wondered whether he was waiting for her to take the lead again.
‘I’m staying because I’ve had to share you all evening and I want you to myself for a little while,’ he said. ‘We don’t have to make love. In fact I’m not sure I’d be up to it.’ He grinned. ‘No pun intended.’
She nodded. ‘D’you need anything?’
He produced a toothbrush from his pocket. ‘A squeeze of toothpaste, if you can spare it.’
Whilst he was in the bathroom, she undressed, put on a nightshirt and slid into bed. Nick hadn’t collected his things yet and she wondered whether to offer Gil his pyjamas but when he came into the bedroom he had stripped off to a white T-shirt and boxer shorts. He climbed in beside her and switched off the lamp. They weren’t touching but they were close enough for her to feel the warmth of his body.
‘Irene rang this morning.’ She had been on the point of getting into the shower. Calls at seven in the morning tended to be important and without checking she’d accepted it.
‘Vivian? It’s Irene. I’m so glad I caught you.’
She knew – or thought she knew – what was coming.
‘Actually, Irene, I’m behind schedule. Could you possibly—’
‘It won’t take long. And it’s vital you hear this before it’s too late.’
‘Look Irene, I really don’t have time—’
‘I don’t want to alarm you, dear,’ Irene said, ‘but you must steer well clear of Gil Thomas.’
‘Gil?’
‘Yes,’ Irene said. ‘We thought he was a good Samaritan, didn’t we? Prince Charming. Well he fooled us. He’s evil. Worse still, he’s devious.’ Irene raised her voice. ‘First he suggested we meet after work for a little pre-Christmas celebration, as he put it. He pretended he was interested in the missionary work our church does. He even made a donation. Nice as pie. Grooming. Isn’t that what they call it?’ Now she was gabbling. ‘Then, the other day, he invited me to his flat. I had no qualms about going. It wasn’t as if he were a stranger. I was too trusting. I should have left the minute I saw the bed.’
‘What?’
‘Well, dear, I don’t want to distress you but he tried to touch my…private places.’ She paused, obviously waiting for the full horror of it to sink in. ‘But don’t worry. I was able to get away.’ She paused again. ‘Our Lord taught us to turn the other cheek but I’m sure He doesn’t mean where perverts are concerned.’
Vivian wanted to laugh and tell her not to be ridiculous but something stopped her.
‘Sorry, Irene, my cab’s here,’ she said. ‘I’ve got to go.
Vivian related the conversation.
‘Wow,’ he said. ‘She’s certainly got it in for me.’
‘The scary thing is, I’m sure she believed what she was saying.’ Vivian found his hand and squeezed it. ‘I should have told her she was lying.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘You did the right thing. I don’t want her starting in on you. The woman’s toxic.’
‘She can’t be allowed to go around making that sort of accusation. What if she—’
‘Shhh. Let’s worry about that when it happens,’ he said. He folded her in his arms. ‘I’ve been thinking. I know you’ll be at your dad’s place for Christmas. How about I keep you company? You’ll want to spend time at the hospital but you have to eat and I’m happy to act as catering manager. I’d like to pop in and see him too, if that suits.’
‘You can’t, Gil. It’ll be miserable.’
‘Cheerier than a bedsit in Kentish Town.’
‘I wouldn’t bet on it. I haven’t even thought about food or—’
‘Easy. We shut up shop around midday on Christmas Eve. Just give me a list.’
The explosion had been, as Cara said, a terrible thing. Had she arrived at the crossing a few seconds earlier, she might have been one of those bodies on the traffic island. A few minutes later and she would have run in the opposite direction. But she’d arrived at exactly the right time to meet Gil Thomas.
She kissed him. ‘I shouldn’t accept, but I will. And thank you, thank you, thank you. You’re a lovely man.’
‘Not a sex-crazed pervert, as Irene would have you believe?’
‘In my experience, sex-crazed perverts don’t wear boxers to bed.’
It wasn’t long before a slight snoring indicated that he was asleep. She lay in the darkness, taking pleasure in his being at her side, realising how isolated she’d come to feel since her father’s accident.
Her father. She should have checked with the hospital but, after the conversation with Richard, she was furious with him for his evasiveness. Let his beloved son take responsibility for a couple of days since they were such great buddies.
27
Gil, who knew about such things, had explained how, whenever possible, patients were ‘allowed out’ over Christmas. ‘Good for morale. And it takes pressure off the staff.’ ‘They wouldn’t send Dad home, would they?’ she’d asked. ‘Unlikely. His wound’s not healed. And he’s not mobile. They wouldn’t risk it.’ She was relieved, hap
py to trade off time in the ward against responsibility for her father’s safety, and the physical intimacy that went with tending to the sick.
At two o’clock, after champagne and mince pies, Howard wished his staff a happy holiday and closed the office until the New Year. Vivian had taken her holdall to work and she went straight from the Elephant House to Farleigh Road. Gil was coming via Sainsbury’s and while he was busy with food shopping, she would get the house ready.
There were a few pieces of mail on the mat, and a note from Teresa – Vivian had forgotten the cleaner – saying that she’d turned up twice and been unable to get in. (Naturally her father wouldn’t trust a cleaner – albeit his cleaner – with his house keys.) She phoned to apologise and let her know what had happened. Although sympathetic, Teresa was understandably unhappy at losing two weeks’ pay and they agreed that Vivian would pay her half her usual wage until she was needed again.
The only evidence that Richard had been to the house was a pile of junk mail left in the centre of the kitchen table. She’d not heard from him since their lunch, which didn’t surprise her as they’d not parted on the best of terms. Until her name had appeared in that ‘next of kin’ box, wherever possible she’d avoided involvement in her father’s affairs. And that had suited her fine. But the situation was different now. No one could be sure how quickly, or how well, he would recover. He’d had plenty of opportunity to tell her about this power of attorney business. To explain why he’d chosen Richard. Oversight was one thing but secrecy was another. As soon as Christmas was out of the way, she would tackle him on the subject.
Despite the continuing cold, the snow was melting. Outcrops of clumpy shrubs and islands of flattened grass had appeared spoiling the unblemished whiteness of the back garden. The snowman was shrinking and leaning precariously. Another old man on the brink of falling. She hadn’t caught the weather forecast but the sky was gunmetal grey. If it snowed again, they would be able to restore him and maybe fix him up with a companion.
Gil texted. At S’burys. Long q s. May be some time x
Her decision to take Gil to the party had been the right one. They could have allowed things to continue as they were, but a covert friendship could never be quite healthy. Her colleagues had said nice things about him the following day, and they’d accepted the explanation of their friendship – no bawdy remarks, no eye rolling.
Humming to herself, she went upstairs to her father’s bedroom. Net curtains obscured the windows, cutting out what little daylight remained. A fringed lampshade dangled from the central light fitting. Mismatched furniture – a wardrobe, a couple of upright chairs, a tallboy with flimsy metal handles – was placed randomly around the room. Cough sweets, indigestion tablets, a magnifying glass, a torch and a copy of Whittaker’s Almanac were piled on the bedside table.
Her father spent night after night alone here. His days were spent alone too but she knew how darkness crystallised hazy apprehensions into full-blown fears. What did he think about, lying in this bed in the dark? The future? Not a great prospect – and that was before his accident. The past? She couldn’t imagine whether that brought comfort or distress. She’d been determined not to feel sorry for him but now he’d ambushed her with a packet of indigestion tablets.
She stripped the double bed of its winceyette sheets, substituting white percale from her holdall. Long before they became the default in Britain, the Carey family had slept beneath duvets – proper ones, filled with feathers, not synthetic substitutes. After her mother died, her father had abandoned his duvet for sheets and grey blankets – suspiciously ex-army-looking. She’d never bothered to ask why.
She gathered up his bits and pieces, clearing the surfaces that he used as a dumping ground, finding a place for everything in the bottom drawer of the tallboy. Then she used a pillowslip from the laundry basket to dust the room. There.
She’d spent yesterday lunchtime looking for a gift for her father. What would a bed-bound octogenarian – and a bolshie one at that – appreciate? She’d seen a dozen things that Gil might like – a down-filled jacket, a chromatic harmonica, a grey tweed cap with a button on top, a natty little rucksack – but she’d resisted because they’d made a pact. Each would give the other one of their possessions. The suggestion had been his and she’d agreed, assuming that he was short of funds. On reflection, she saw that it had little to do with money. This hand-me-down thing should embody the essence of themselves, or at the very least be meaningful. It was a test, almost Arthurian in ambition, and it had taken her some time to decide on the appropriate item.
But what to buy her father?
In the end, she’d dashed into Boots and grabbed an Imperial Leather gift set, three flannels and a tube of hand-cream. Surely he couldn’t find fault with such a practical present. As an afterthought, to offset this utilitarian selection, she’d spent over the odds on a red cashmere scarf in a trendy shop on Haverstock Hill. ‘What’s this? I already have a scarf.’ She could hear him now.
She lit the fire, sitting cross-legged on the hearth rug, listening to the crackle and spit as the kindling caught light. After a few minutes, yellow-grey smoke was twirling up from the coal, giving off the sulphurous smell particular to a freshly lit fire. At last a single flame licked up, and then another, and another, until a flickering halo capped the mound of coal.
She went around the house gathering table lamps which she set on the floor, their mellow glow camouflaging the drab surroundings. Something was missing. Green. There should be foliage. Bracing herself against the cold, she cut swags of shiny-leaved laurel from the back hedge and laid them along the mantelpiece. After she’d added clusters of tea lights, it looked as festive as any Christmas tree.
Gil crossed the items off his list. Small chicken (that had been a tricky one). Fish (for this evening). Vegetables, salad things and fruit. Butter. Milk. Bread. Wine – one red, one white. Christmas pudding. Mince pies. Cheese? Did she forget cheese? Or maybe she didn’t like cheese. How little he knew about her. And what about cooking oil? The old man must keep a few essentials in his cupboards. He decided to stick to the list. They wouldn’t starve and there was always a Spar open somewhere.
Sainsbury’s was crammed with frazzled shoppers. The checkouts were backed up causing gridlocked frustration in the aisles. It was too hot in here. And his rucksack wasn’t helping. He was tempted to abandon his trolley and head for the exit. But he’d promised her he would do this. He closed his eyes, breathed deeply and shuffled forward. His turn came and he loaded his shopping onto the belt. The checkout girl – ‘Kasha’ – processed his goods faster than he could pack them, her torso twisting as she passed each item from right hand to left. Without looking, she presented each barcode towards the scanner. Did checkout staff acquire a sixth sense? Butter. Bleep. Tangerines. Bleep. Milk. Bleep.
‘Fifty-eight pounds sixty-three,’ she said, indicating the card-reader. ‘Nectar?’
He shook his head, entered his PIN and confirmed the total – more than twice his weekly food allowance.
Having fulfilled his mission, he wanted to be with her right away. The carrier bags were heavy, the handles stretching and cutting into his hands – a good enough reason to lash out on a mini-cab. When he reached the house he dumped the bags on the doorstep, allowing himself a few moments to anticipate the starting-over moment before knocking the door.
‘Hello,’ he said. ‘I bring gold, frankincense and milk.’
He thought she was going to kiss him but instead she picked up a couple of bags. ‘Was it horrible?’
‘Grim.’
They unpacked the shopping, checking the cupboards to see what was there and what they might be short of, the commonplace task giving them time to adjust to being together. And, as he watched her emptying oranges into a bowl, it came to him that he was in love with her. He loved her. The realisation thrilled and terrified him. He didn’t want or need this. This wasn’t in his plan. But it had happened and it was somehow wonderful, and anyway there was
nothing he could do to change it.
They made tea and toast and took it into the living room to eat in front of the fire. Dusk was fading into darkness and they drew the curtains. Four-thirty on Christmas Eve.
He pictured his children, on the far side of the world, sleeping their way into the heat of Christmas Day, immediately editing the image as he remembered the child in Polly’s womb. North of Coffs, in Grafton, his sister Rachel was almost certainly awake, worrying about the catering, fretting about table napkins and timings. Louise – sweet, conciliatory Louise – would soon have to rouse her family and convince them that Christmas at Rachel’s was going to be much more fun than a lazy day at home. Once she’d got them sorted, she’d collect their mother then drive the fifty-odd miles to Rachel’s place. What a palaver.
‘It’s already Christmas in Australia,’ he said, ‘and it’ll be hot.’
‘Do you – did you – spend it on the beach?’
‘Not until I left home. When I was a kid we had a proper English Christmas. Turkey, mince pies, Christmas pud, the works. All sweltering around the dining table. Mum and Dad were replicating their own Christmases, I suppose. It’s hard to break the chain.’
‘We always opened our presents on Christmas Eve,’ she said. ‘I’ve never spent Christmas with anyone but my parents. It’s too…personal to share with strangers. Being with another family, seeing all their rites and rituals, would seem like voyeurism.’
Thirty-six Christmases with her parents – that was hard to comprehend. ‘You never went to your mother’s family? Christmas in Germany would have been quite something I should think.’
‘No.’ She frowned. ‘We never had much to do with them. I’m not sure why.’
She stood up and fiddled with the candles on the mantelpiece. ‘Have you seen the matches?’
He washed their plates and mugs then went upstairs to the bathroom. The house was by no means large but, compared with his bedsit, it was palatial. It struck him how rarely he went into a house that was a home. Kevin’s a few times – the Friel’s place – and here.
Above the sink, a shaving mirror – a magnifier on a swinging bracket – was fixed to the wall. He adjusted its angle so that his features filled the reflecting disc. There was no escaping its brutal honesty. Thickets of nose hair, wrinkles like trenches, blood vessels snaking across his eyeballs, that warty eruption on the slack skin beneath his left eye – everything rendered several times life-size but no doubt visible to the naked eye of a young woman with twenty-twenty vision.