Ah. So that was all right then. I swallowed.
She shrugged miserably. “And I suppose we’ll just share their holidays. A week with Mummy and a week with Daddy. After all, other couples manage it, don’t they? I mean, look at Alex.”
Yes, look at Alex. Who hadn’t seen his daughters for six months, who invited them in the school holidays, but found, increasingly, that boyfriends and parties took precedence, and that even though their mother, Tilly, came to London quite regularly to see family—was over here at the moment, in fact—the girls stayed at home. Was he sad about that? About the fact that they seemed to call him slightly less these days? Unbelievably, I didn’t know, because—oh God, my chest tightened with guilt—I didn’t ask him. Didn’t go there, because in my paranoiac state I’d been afraid that if it didn’t upset him too much, then my goodness, it could be me and Rufus next, couldn’t it? After all, he’d left one wife and family, why not another? So I hadn’t brought it up: hadn’t been supportive, said, how d’you feel, my love? Do you miss them, the girls? Oh, there was so much I had to make up for, I thought, ashamed. I glanced at Eleanor. Yes, she was right, divorced couples did juggle their children, but she must know it wasn’t ideal. Must know too that Piers may be dull, but to Poppy, Sam, Natasha and Theo, he was Daddy. Beloved Daddy. He wasn’t a cheat, like Mummy, an adulterer, and neither was he having a child with someone else. Eleanor was in for a very bumpy ride, particularly from her teenagers. I wondered if they’d ever forgive her. It seemed to me she was gaining one child and in danger of losing four others.
“I know,” she said quickly, reading my mind, “it’s going to be unutterably bloody, and I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve lain awake at night thinking about it, knowing a time bomb is growing inside me. And yet, if anyone said to me, what if you miscarried tomorrow?—d’you know, Imo, I’d be devastated. Just devastated. I want this baby so badly. I’ve never wanted something so badly in my life. I got pregnant with the others to cement my marriage, but this baby was conceived through love and I’m having it.” There was something desperate yet fierce about her eyes and I knew she meant it.
“How many months are you?”
“Three. So please God I’m over the dodgy stage and it sticks. And if it doesn’t, I’ll still leave Piers. This has made up my mind. I can’t live a lie any more. Not even for the children.”
That was quite a decision to come to as a mother, and she knew it. We fell silent for a moment, lost in thought.
“You’ll have to tell them soon,” I said breaking the silence. “I mean, that you’re leaving. Or else you’ll start to show.”
She gave a twisted smile. “Except that they’ll still do the maths when it appears, won’t they? Think—right, so six months ago when she said she was leaving Daddy because he didn’t understand her, and that marriages weren’t always made in heaven, in fact she was three months pregnant with another man’s child and it was all a load of crap. No. There are no hiding places here, Imo. I’ve got to tell them the truth. And actually,” she looked at me squarely, “you’d be surprised how much straight talking children can take. They’re very resilient, you know.”
Were they now? I caught my breath at her pragmatism. It seemed to me she had the weight of the world on her shoulders and didn’t seem to feel it. She was about to shatter so many lives, just as, I realised with a jolt, she’d once shattered Tilly and the girls’. Only this time it was her own family, her own children who’d end up in pieces. I wondered if it could be right to cause so much pain just to achieve personal fulfilment. Did we really have such a divine right to be happy? Did it rank above duty and compassion and loyalty? I wasn’t convinced. I wondered too if she ever would truly be happy. If her “in-loveness” would last. Would Daniel—without the added frisson that an affair gave a relationship—eventually become dull and stupid like Piers? And would the headmaster’s semi that she would undoubtedly have to swap Stockley Hall for, become, not an exciting love nest, but a miserable, poky little place? Time would tell. In Eleanor’s eyes, she’d made one simple mistake: she’d married the wrong man, and now she was rectifying it. But an awful lot of people were going to have to be sacrificed on the altar of Eleanor’s happiness.
“Will you stay around here?” I asked, swimming to the surface of my reverie. “I mean, presumably with Daniel’s school being up the road…”
“We’ll have to, yes, to begin with. But Daniel’s already applying for a post elsewhere. The head of a primary’s coming up in Shropshire. He’s going to go for that.”
Strangely, I felt something like relief at this: to know that they’d be moving away, and yet…she was my friend, wasn’t she? But a friend, I thought uncomfortably, who’d never sought me out in London, never come to tea with me and Rufus, only my husband, for lunch in the city. And a friend who’d wanted me to come down here because she’d needed my moral support, had wanted somewhere to run to. I wondered if I’d ever trust her entirely, her and her relentless quest for happiness. Where might she look to find it next?
“And anyway, I’ll have to say something to the family soon, otherwise Piers’s mother will do it for me,” Eleanor said darkly.
“She knows?” I said sharply, coming back to her.
“Suspects. I’m pretty sure she has no idea who it is, but she cornered me a few weeks ago, upstairs in my bedroom. Said she had a shrewd idea I was up to something and she didn’t trust me.”
I gazed at her. “Oh! Was that when we first arrived?” I said, suddenly remembering when we’d come to Stockley a day early, and Eleanor had run down the stairs into Alex’s arms, crying.
“Yes, she was absolutely foul. As only she can be. And now she’s suddenly decided she needs the flat in London too.”
Yes, she had, hadn’t she? She was protecting her son. Fighting for his interests. As, I’m sure I would protect Rufus’s. Go to any lengths. Was that so wrong?
I shifted in my seat; a regrouping gesture. Not uncomfortable, exactly, but—
“I’ll get the bill,” said Eleanor, quickly, noticing. She raised her hand and Molly appeared from behind the bar in her long apron.
“Oh!” I looked up in surprise. “I thought you weren’t here this afternoon. I looked for you when I came in.”
“I was upstairs sorting out my flat. I’ve got the decorators in so it’s pretty chaotic, but at least the kitchen’s ready now. You must come and see it some time, come and have supper one night.”
“I’d love to,” I glowed. The true hand of friendship. “Oh, d’you know Eleanor Latimer? This is Molly, the owner.”
Eleanor smiled. “I’ve seen you around but I don’t think we’ve met.”
“We haven’t, but nice to meet you.” Molly smiled and took away the ten-pound note Eleanor had put on the saucer.
Eleanor leaned across the table. “I’ve seen her around, because she’s one of Pat Flaherty’s visitors,” she hissed.
“Really?” My heart, inexplicably, thudded at this.
“Constantly in and out of his cottage. I’ve often spotted her creeping in last thing at night and then leaving early in the morning.” She grinned.
“Oh. Right. Well, good luck to them.” I reached for my drink and drained it too quickly. Some missed my mouth. I wiped my wet chin as I stood up, gathering my coat hurriedly from the back of my chair. “I must say, he seems to lead a complicated life,” I said lightly.
“Just a bit,” Eleanor rolled her eyes, as Molly came back with the change. “Thanks.”
So. Pat and Molly were an item. Right. I shoved my arms into my coat sleeves. Well, why not? She was a very pretty girl. I shot her a quick smile as she went to the door and held it open for us. Tall and slim, and with that shining bob of hair and creamy complexion, she knocked Pink Jeans into a cocked hat. I wondered if they knew about each other. Or did he run them in tandem? How did it work, exactly? For some reason, I was disappointed. In h
er, I think.
“I’ve got someone else interested in your pictures incidentally,” she was saying as we went out under her arm. “A family came in for lunch earlier and liked the one of the church. They’re local, so I reckon I can work on them!”
“Great!” I grinned, but my heart wasn’t in it. It was elsewhere. Why, I wondered? Why did my balloon feel so pricked, when it had recently been so buoyant?
Confused, I drove Eleanor back to her car. We travelled the short distance in silence. When we’d bumped down the stony track and drawn up outside the cottages, she got out. I turned to look at her as she was about to slam the door.
“Good-bye, Eleanor.” Even as I said it, I felt it had a note of finality to it.
She smiled but her eyes were already somewhere else, darting up to the bedroom window. Daniel was up there, by the curtains, waiting.
“Bye,” she said distractedly, before shutting the door and nipping away. No, correction, before striding away, up the path, golden-brown curls blowing in the breeze, head held high, not caring now who saw her.
I drove thoughtfully to Sheila’s and picked up Rufus, who bounced out of the trailer with round eyes and vertical hair; full of E numbers and artificial colouring, no doubt. I thanked Sheila who was busy hosing down the Alsatian and drove away with him pinging off the seat beside me.
“Can we go and see the baby now? You said we could, and I’m the only one who hasn’t seen him!”
“Oh Rufus…” I raked a hand through my hair, “I think we might do that another day. I’m shattered, actually.” I was. Although I felt about two stone lighter for knowing that Alex wasn’t part of the Latimer family drama, I still felt emotionally drained by all that I’d heard just now and my head was aching. What I really wanted was to lay it on a crisp white pillow in a darkened room, preferably in the Swiss Alps, prior to sipping beef tea on the veranda. I certainly wanted to be alone.
“Oh come on, we practically go past their house!”
“Yes, but I don’t know if Hannah’s back from hospital yet,” I lied.
“She is! I heard you talking to Eddie on the mobile earlier!”
I sighed and swung the car into their road. Sharp lad, this. Too sharp for me. But actually, maybe this was a good idea, I thought as we drew up and saw Eddie, pushing a brand-new pram around the front garden. Maybe a dash of old-fashioned family values was just what I needed right now, after Eleanor’s sledge-hammering of them so very recently.
“Well, how lovely!” Eddie hailed us, leaving the pram and coming to meet us as we picked our way across the wet grass and soggy remains of daffodils, through low shafts of evening sunshine. He scooped Rufus up and swung him round in an arc in the air. Rufus squealed with delight.
“Just practising,” Eddie wheezed as he set him down, “for when the babe’s a bit bigger. Older father, you know, got to keep young. Ooh, me back.” He hobbled off to the pram, rubbing the base of his spine. “Shouldn’t have done that.”
“Still ‘the babe’ then, is it? No name yet?” I followed and peered in the pram.
“Tobias,” said Eddie, straightening up proudly. “Means gift of God. Tobias Martin Sidebottom, after his grandfather.”
“Oh! Dad will love that.”
“He does,” Eddie assured me. “Ask him. He’s round the back putting the finishing touches to his work of art. Have you seen it yet?”
“No, but I’ve heard about it, Hannah told me on the phone.” Dad was a bit of a whiz at carpentry and was apparently making a cradle for the baby.
“Can we wake him up?” asked Rufus, peering at the little orange face in the pram.
Eddie looked shocked. “Good Lord, no. It’s taken me twenty minutes to get him off!”
“Maybe he’ll wake up later,” I said, seeing Rufus’s disappointed face. “And if he doesn’t, we’ll come again tomorrow, but Rufus, it’ll be a while before he’s playing conkers with you.” I could see that Rufus had envisaged something a little more entertaining than this blob of pond life.
“At least he’s a boy,” he said at length. “At least he’ll want to do the same things as me.”
“Course he will!” agreed Eddie. “Golly, before you know it the pair of you will be running round the garden kicking a football together!”
“Really?” Rufus brightened, Pond Life already morphing, in his suggestible mind, into a little tyke in Man U strip.
“Yes, well, let him get out of nappies first,” I advised. “Is Hannah around?”
“In the house. Tell you what, Rufus. You can push, and we’ll take him to the corner shop for an ice cream. It’ll still be open if we hurry.”
“Cool! How fast can I push?”
“Fast as you like, as long as you don’t actually catapult him out of it. Hannah’s inside, by the way,” he directed this at me as he shadowed Rufus, who was already off with the pram, anxiously across the grass, out of the gate and on up the road.
I watched as they went, shading my eyes with my hand into the evening sun. For all his big talk, Rufus was actually pushing very carefully, taking this new responsibility very seriously, handling his cousin with care. His cousin. Lovely. Another member of the family, making Rufus not such an only, cherished child. And if only there were more. If only I could have more. For a moment I felt a pang of jealousy for Eleanor. Why wasn’t I like that, pregnant at the drop of a pair of trousers?
I sighed and went in to find Hannah. She was on the top of a stepladder, cleaning the windows. “Should you be doing that?” I asked in alarm.
She looked down. “Why not?”
“Well, you’ve just had a baby and—good God, look at this place! You’ve had a tidy up, and—blimey, the flowers!”
I gazed round in wonder. The piles of dusty books, bundles of newspapers, chairs with broken legs stacked in a pagoda awaiting mending had all gone, and instead, space prevailed: glorious, glorious space, with freshly hoovered blue carpet, gleaming skirting boards revealed for the first time in years, and all around the room, vases and vases of flowers. She came down her ladder, looking slightly sheepish. “I know, aren’t they lovely?”
“Who are they from?”
“Oh, all sorts. Locals in the village, teachers, kids at school.” She fingered some delicate wild flowers in a bowl.
“Oh, how sweet—sweet of everyone! You see?” I rounded on her accusingly.
“I know,” she agreed ruefully. “Everyone’s been so kind. And of course I had to have a tidy-up. I can’t have a baby in all this clutter and dust, and anyway, most of the so-called projects I had on the go were never going to be finished.”
I eyed her beadily. Ah, so she knew that too, did she?
“Yes, all right,” she muttered, folding her arms. “Too much talk and not enough action, and too much running round being bossy. Too many committees. I’m staying on at Sea Scouts, but I’ve resigned from the Brownies.”
“Have you?” Hannah had battled her way furiously to the top of that particular little empire. “Who’s going to be Brown Owl, then?”
“Tawny Owl, no doubt. She’s frightfully ambitious, been snapping at my heels for years. Or pecking at them, should I say.” She grinned.
“Well, quite,” I blinked, stunned that she’d made a pecking order joke. The rest of the family had for years, but secretly of course, never in front of her. Quite a lot of giggling about ruffled feathers. “But you’re still going to teach?”
“Oh, yes, but part time,” she said happily, balling her J cloth and aiming it at the bucket. “The school’s agreed to me doing four mornings a week, and I get all my maternity leave too, since I obviously didn’t take any while I was pregnant!” She grinned and I marvelled at how well she looked. Shiny hair, rosy cheeks and slimmer. Well, obviously slimmer, since Tobias had come out, but still, she was in better shape than I’d expected. She saw me looking her up and down.
&nb
sp; “Breast-feeding,” she said proudly. “Tobias sucks for England, and after every feed I reckon I lose a couple of pounds. I promise you, it’s the best diet ever.”
“But you’re eating?” I said, concerned. “You’ve got to eat properly, to feed.”
She laughed. “You sound like Eddie. Yes, I’m eating, but instead of a couple of rounds of sandwiches and a whole chocolate cake, it’s one round of sandwiches and a piece of chocolate cake. I don’t need all that food any more.”
“Because you’re happy.”
Tears filled her eyes. “Because I’m happy. You’re right, I was misery eating before. Pretending everything was fine, but feeling hollow inside. I know it’s unfashionable to admit it, Imo, but all I ever wanted was to get married and have children. To have the roses round the door, the baking, the babies. I never wanted to be a success.”
“Who says that’s not a success?” I said softly. “And now you are. Now you’ve got it.”
“Now I’ve got it!” she echoed, and a big beam spread across her face as she opened her arms to me.
I walked into them, my eyes like saucers. Hannah and I never hugged, never. Tears sprang to my eyes too. For her, for her hard-won, unexpected happiness, but, I suspect, for myself also. For my peace at last, my own family’s sanity and security, free from the tyranny of Eleanor. Never again would my heart flip with fear when she rang and asked to speak to Alex; never again would I hold my breath when he mentioned he’d had lunch with her. I wished I could tell Hannah, but I’d promised to stay silent until Eleanor had broken it to Piers, and I would.
“You look well too,” she commented, linking my arm—linking my arm!—as she led me towards the back door and the garden.
“I am well,” I agreed, trying not to wonder who’d unlink first. As it happened it was me. My hands shot to my mouth in surprise as I stepped out on to the back steps. “Oh golly—look at this!”
“I know,” Hannah agreed, leaning against the door frame, folding her arms. “Didn’t know your father was a master craftsman, did you? He was up all night making that.”
A Crowded Marriage Page 35