by Patrick Gale
‘Something rather special I’ve been saving up,’ he said as he passed them, stroking the label.
‘Smashing,’ Sam said, adding in an undertone, when Alison caught his eye, ‘Right-wing twat.’ For a moment his face was too close. She was too aware of his chin. The fullness of his lower lip. His eye seemed to linger on her longer than was necessary.
Stop it, she thought. Stop it at once, and she slipped aside into the kitchen to see if she could help.
During dinner it was Miriam’s turn to be charmed, sitting between Sam and Jamie while Alison sat by Francis.
‘What do you really think about having these two share a bed under your roof?’ she wanted to ask him. ‘What would you be saying if Jamie was your only son and not hers?’ For once, however, she found it hard to be angry with him. Sam’s attempts, however cynical, had nonetheless humanised him in a way that Miriam’s efforts had never succeeded in doing. Either from sensitivity or self-absorption, Francis managed to pass the whole meal without so much as a passing reference to her still being single even though Jamie, for better or worse, was hitched.
As glasses were raised and eyes sparkled, enlivened by candlelight, she kept thinking of her brother’s secret, biding its time in the shadows, just out of sight. By the standards of their generation, Miriam and Francis probably thought they had passed the evening’s stiff test of social attitudes with flying colours – a minor awkwardness here and there, a few tears shed in the kitchen, perhaps a few hot words exchanged out of sight between courses – and yet, compared to the test Jamie still had in store for them, being civil to a son’s boyfriend was elementary as finger painting. This thought, too, softened Alison’s heart towards them and, when the time came for opening presents over coffee and yet more alcohol, made it easier to accept their entirely unsuitable gift of a three-speed hairdryer with ‘professional’ diffuser, ‘bodifying’ attachments and hot curling set.
Sam had given her a bottle of Italian scent, which was probably far more than he could afford, given that he had been nowhere near a duty-free shop. Delighted, she squirted some on her wrists and was wreathed at once in a warm, jasmine cloud. Jamie was always cool and uninvolved about present buying so she guessed that Sam had chosen it on his own, and was doubly touched. By comparison, the book she had given him seemed a lordly, lazy choice. She crossed the room to kiss him, but he seemed flustered at the abruptness of the gesture and she realised it was the first time she had done more than touch him diffidently on the shoulder. Jamie had given her a new recording of Gurrelieder she had been hankering after. She turned to thank him but found he had suddenly fallen asleep, his head lolling towards Sam’s shoulder on the sofa-back. Sam made as though to wake him but she shook her head. Francis chortled, tickled by the evident tenderness between the two men.
‘Tired himself out selling symphonies to the undeserving rich,’ he said, glancing at his watch as he stood. ‘Ah well. Midnight beckons.’ Miriam wandered off to fetch scarves and coats. Alison had been going to chicken out of church, thinking one could take duty too far, but she realised that the Boys might appreciate an hour alone on the sofa by the fire. She looked at Jamie dozing. Yet again he had won the fatted calf without even trying.
‘See you at breakfast,’ she told Sam as envy lent a twist to their parting.
They were no sooner in the back of Francis’s Jaguar than her mother began voicing worries.
‘I still don’t understand why he threw in a perfectly good job at Lloyd’s to become a sales assistant,’ she said.
‘Quality of life,’ Alison improvised. ‘He works with nicer people now. He can be himself. And the money’s not so bad. After all he’s already paid his mortgage off.’
‘Yes but …’
‘I don’t think he’ll do it forever, if that’s what you’re worried about. It’s just a stop gap.’
‘But I can’t bear it if he becomes one of those pathetic thirty-something drop-outs.’
‘Well you should know all about those!’ Francis jeered from the front, ignored by Miriam.
‘Not much danger of that,’ Alison told her, crossing her fingers. There was a pause. Miriam glanced forward at Francis and saw that, despite the interjection, he was entirely focused on the business of driving in a straight line and watching out for policemen.
‘We’re talking about him again,’ Miriam said ruefully. ‘We never seem to talk about you, Angel.’
‘No,’ Alison agreed. ‘Funny that.’
‘How are things?’
‘Things are fine.’
‘Good. I’m so glad,’ Miriam said, unable to suppress her true concern. ‘And he looks terribly thin,’ she went on. ‘Has he been ill?’
‘No,’ Alison insisted and forced a sisterly smile. ‘I think he’s just been so happy, he’s stopped eating for comfort. Unlike me.’
‘You don’t have to, you know. It’s quite simple, Angel. I was reading about it the other day at the hairdresser’s. You just have to ask yourself before you eat anything, “Now am I eating this from body hunger or soul hunger?” and if it’s soul hunger, you drink a glass of water instead.’
For the rest of the short drive, Miriam was successfully diverted into diet chat before the Christmas ritual took over. On the drive home, she was overcome by exhaustion and wine and fell fast asleep on Alison’s shoulder. Alison recognised that the time she had read of in self-help manuals had arrived – she had started mothering her mother.
Christmas Day dawned sunny and unchristmassy with not even a threat of frost, much less of snow. The effect was not helped by Alison’s first glimpse of the morning being Miriam and Francis jogging across the garden in coordinating tracksuits, pursued by the dogs, Francis vociferously in the lead. She would not have minded so much if her mother’s transformation had been successful. But her effort to keep up, in every sense, was too pathetically palpable and Alison turned aside from the window in revulsion. As always, having been made to open their presents the night before, the day felt as heavy and directionless as any bank holiday Monday. She had packed a bag full of little presents – some useful, some funny-and a pair of old rugger socks, so as to retaliate if Jamie and Sam had thought to surprise her with a stocking. But they hadn’t, so she left the things tucked away in her case. She tried to snatch a quick coffee and orange juice in peace with the jumbo crossword, but soon had Miriam and Francis making a noisy and complicated breakfast around her, Francis steaming slightly despite the towel about his glistening neck.
‘Happy Christmas, Angel,’ Miriam said.
‘Happy Christmas, Angel,’ he echoed her, pleased at his tease. Miriam giggled and Alison somehow knew they had made love last night, or perhaps this morning. Francis did his best to irritate her into a good humour by leaning sweatily over her shoulder to supply unhelpful suggestions for the crossword. Then they were joined by the Boys.
All unwitting of the effect it might have, Sam was wearing an old speckled jersey of Jamie’s, the only one that had survived from Miriam’s knitting era.
‘Suits you,’ Miriam told him as she kissed both of them on the cheek, clasping her pain before it had time to sting, as a gardener might a nettle. Stirring sugar into his coffee – a new habit-Jamie looked drained, as though he had barely slept, and Sam had grey stains below pinched eyes.
‘How did you sleep?’ Alison murmured to him while Francis demonstrated a new electric slicing machine to Jamie.
‘Not much,’ he mumbled, picking sleep from an eye. ‘Does it show?’
‘Naa,’ she assured him, unconvincingly. ‘Not much. Maybe they’ll go for a walk and you can collapse later. The party isn’t till tomorrow so we’ve a day off.’
‘Francis has had a great idea,’ Miriam announced. ‘It’s so sunny, almost warm, so we thought we could take the bikes and ride out along the tow path and have lunch at the Old Swan.’
‘Have you got enough bikes?’ Alison asked, clutching at straws.
‘Of course. Now that we’ve got the tandem.’
<
br /> ‘You’ve bought a tandem?’
‘We couldn’t resist it,’ Miriam confessed as though admitting a weakness for Sèvres.
‘Well, I –’ Sam began to demur, with a glance at Jamie, ‘I don’t know how.’
‘Great idea,’ Jamie cut in with a rebellious air. ‘Let’s.’
Alison caught Sam’s eye. He shrugged. Breakfast trailed on. Francis and Miriam went upstairs to shower and change and Jamie insisted on watching the special Christmas episode of Mulroney Park he had taped the previous evening, even though he knew Miriam might be thrown into a bad mood at the sight of the soap’s star, Myra Toye.
Alison had not ridden a bicycle in years and was slightly wobbly as they set out, Miriam and Francis resplendent on their new tandem in front, the Boys bringing up the rear and talking quietly, the two dogs bounding along beside them. She was on a nasty, small-wheeled thing designed for undemanding shopping and felt that her feet were having to churn the pedals faster than anyone else’s. It was a beautiful day, however, the colours intense after recent rain. The towpath had been widened and carefully gravelled by a young offenders programme to provide a more convenient cycle track. The canal waters seemed devoid of life, poisoned by rainbow seepages from weekend pleasure boats. There was a charm in the sunlight glancing off the murky water, however, and in pursing an activity for all the world as any other happy family, past camel-coated and wax-jacketed dog-walkers offering self-conscious season’s greetings, Alison began to find the whole thing funny.
‘We look like people in an ad for yoghurt,’ she shouted to Jamie.
‘Tampons, more like,’ he gasped back.
‘No,’ said Sam. ‘Press-on towels with wings and a uniquely formulated stay-dry lining.’
‘Children, really!’ Miriam shouted playfully, and Alison thought it sad that her mother had become the kind of woman for whom the very mention of feminine hygiene constituted daring.
The unwonted exercise gave her a kind of euphoria and when Sam flew past and began to race Francis, despite Miriam’s protests from the rear of the tandem that they would exhaust the dogs, never mind her, Alison was surprised to find she was enjoying herself. They passed, whooping, under a red brick bridge and she turned back to share with Jamie her happy realisation that they might be about to get through a whole family Christmas without having to eat Brussels sprouts.
Jamie had stopped, though. He was breathless, the colour drained from his face.
‘Jamie!’ she shouted and swung clumsily back to him. ‘What’s wrong?’
He wiped his temples and forehead with a spotted handkerchief. They were beaded with sweat and his voice sounded high and strained.
‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘I should never have stopped going to the gym. I’m so unfit.’
‘But I thought you’d been biking to work each day.’ Sam had ridden back to them. Miriam and Francis waited some twenty yards ahead, chatting, assuming a chain had come off.
‘Only as far as the tube and I stopped that when it started getting too wet,’ Jamie told her.
‘What’s up?’ Sam asked, then saw Jamie’s face and turned to Alison.
‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘He’s just worn out. I reckon it’s ‘flu coming on or something. There’s a lot about. We’ll go back so he can lie down. You go on with the others.’
‘Are you sure?’ she asked, feeling excluded.
‘Honestly,’ Jamie managed. ‘Please. Take them on while we –’ He paused for breath. ‘It’ll be easier without her fussing. Honestly.’
He turned back without waiting for her reply, as if faintly ashamed. He stood on his pedal, painfully forcing the wheels to turn again, and started back for the house. Sam threw her a look she could not read and set off alongside him. She clunked her bike around again and rode back to Francis and Miriam.
‘Jamie doesn’t feel too good,’ she said. ‘It looks like a nasty ‘flu. They’ll meet us back at the house later.’
‘Probably overdid the cognac last night, more like,’ Francis said. ‘Remember how he passed out.’
‘Oh shut up,’ Miriam snapped and made the tandem lunge forward so that he barked a shin on a pedal.
They rode on to the pub and ordered lunch, but the brief illusion of family harmony had evaporated. Alison picked at her food, appetite dwindling in the over-rich steam rising off gravy and roast parsnips. Try as she might, she could not rid herself of her feeling of dread at the sight of Jamie’s ill-concealed weakness. The memory of the Boys riding slowly back to the house haunted her-Sam’s hand pushing with tender force at the small of Jamie’s drooping back. Nobody ordered pudding and they left before finishing their coffees.
Francis strode off to his study as soon as they arrived home, muttering about a late report. Alison and Miriam walked upstairs, each trying to pretend to the other that they weren’t hurrying. Miriam even went through the motions of slipping into her room on the way to hang up her jacket. Jamie was still dressed, flat out on the bed, staring at the ceiling. His breathing was laboured and his eyes shone with fever. Sam came through from the bathroom with a damp flannel to wipe his face.
‘He’s definitely going down with something,’ he said.
‘Poor Angel,’ said Miriam, sitting on the edge of the bed. ‘And at Christmas too.’
Alison reached through them to touch Jamie’s forehead.
‘Shit,’ she exclaimed. ‘You’re on fire!’
‘I’ll get the thermometer,’ Miriam said. ‘Get into bed properly, Jamie. I’ll bring up a tray. You’ll need lots of cold fluids. I’ll whizz up some nice lemonade in the blender.’
Alison gave up any pretence.
‘Sam, you’ll have to drive him to hospital.’
‘What?’ Miriam was incredulous. ‘For ‘flu?’
‘It’ll pass if we wait,’ Sam said. ‘He was as hot as this last night and this morning he was fine again. It comes and goes.’
‘Sam, he needs to be in hospital. Look at him. Don’t kid yourself.’
‘I’ll be fine,’ Jamie murmured. ‘Honestly.’ His face was awash with sweat again, darkening his hair where it ran off his brow. He began to wheeze, then couldn’t stop as he tried to sit up.
‘Do you know where to go?’ Alison asked.
Sam nodded.
‘Same place as we’ve been for the tests,’ he said.
‘Yes, but you’ll need to go straight to the fifth floor. Say he’s been coming to the clinic for check-ups, then they can bring up his notes from downstairs.’
‘I’m sure this isn’t necessary,’ Miriam said as Sam half-rolled, half-tugged Jamie back onto his feet. Jamie’s knees buckled like a drunkard’s.
‘Listen,’ Alison told her. ‘He’s really sick. He needs oxygen. He needs drugs. They can put him on a Septrin drip. I think that’s what they do. Sam, I’ll call the ward for you and let them know you’re on your way. They can have everything ready for him.’
Sam mumbled assent over his shoulder as he helped Jamie downstairs.
‘Since when did you know so much about medicine?’ Miriam asked, following them.
‘Since I started telling adults the revised facts of life over the fucking phone,’ Alison hissed, snatching up the landing telephone. ‘Shit. Damn!’ She slammed it down as she realised she had forgotten the all-important number. She tugged out her wallet and, hands shaking, fumbled a mess of notes, cards and receipts onto the highly polished table top and started scrabbling through them. Jamie’s car revved up and pulled swiftly away, spitting gravel. She found the switchboard card of emergency numbers and punched out the one for the ward’s direct line. After an intolerable wait, she got through. She could hear Motown carols in the background, Santa Claus is Coming to Town. The nurse was laughing as she picked up the receiver. The ward was evidently mid-way through a late Christmas lunch.
Miriam had slumped to the top step, a hand on the banisters, by the time Alison hung up.
‘How long have you known?’ she asked, quietly now.
> ‘There’s nothing to know. We don’t know anything.’
‘How long have you known he was sick?’
‘He isn’t. I mean. He wasn’t. Not till now.’ Her mother turned to look at her, her old-young face lined with new care, full of wet-eyed reproach.
‘We didn’t tell you because Jamie didn’t want you to worry,’ Alison explained.
‘Ha!’
‘Not before you needed to. Oh God.’ Alison felt herself beginning to cry. ‘He’s got sick so fast, Mum! He should have had six years. More even. Some people don’t have any symptoms for fifteen. Of course, we don’t know when he got infected.’
‘What are you talking about? I don’t understand.’
‘It doesn’t matter.’ She sniffed heavily, controlled her breathing, blew her nose. ‘I couldn’t tell you. It was up to him. He’ll probably be pissed off as hell that you found out. Oh Mum. I’m so sorry.’ Why was she apologising?
Miriam lurched suddenly on to her feet before Alison could hug her. She hurried downstairs, snatching up a coat in the hall. Her tone was brusque, as though she were late for a meeting and would brook no distractions from her purpose. The dogs bounded about her, expecting another walk and she had to shout over their barking.
‘Frank, Jamie’s had to go to hospital,’ she called out. ‘Francis!’
‘What? Why?’ Francis emerged bewildered from the study. It had been insensitivity, Alison realised, not tact, that sent him in there. The entire crisis had brewed up and broken around him, she realised now, without his even sensing it. Scornful, Miriam made no attempt to explain.
‘I’m taking the Jag. The Merc needs petrol and we don’t have time to faff about.’
‘Wait. I’ll come too. I’ll drive you in.’
‘No, you stay here,’ she said. ‘Dad was going to ring from Marrakech. For fuck’s sake don’t say a thing.’
‘Well I have to say something.’
‘Wish him merry Christmas and tell him we’re having a lovely time,’ she said, impatiently. ‘But that we’re all out on a long walk and I’ll call him when we get back. Take his number at the villa. I’ve lost it. I’ll call you from the hospital when we know something. Keys.’ She held out her hand. He passed her the precious bundle with infuriating hesitancy and she snatched them. ‘Come on, Angel.’