Coming of Age

by Valerie Mendes

  “Jules told me about her.”

  “Yeah . . . And Aunt Charlotte . . . and neighbours, people from the village . . .”

  Chris edges his chair closer to Amy’s. “I thought you might have a boyfriend.”

  Amy thinks of Pete Franklin. “No. The boys at school are, well, boys!” She bites her lip. “Nothing special. Nothing romantic . . . But what about you? You must be spoilt for choice. All those glamorous students, the girls you act with?”

  He grins. “I haven’t been short of offers. But nobody’s really taken my fancy. There’s no one I –”

  Julian returns to the terrace. “Just somebody for Dad.”

  Chris straightens his back. “I was sorry you couldn’t come to see me in Cyrano de Bergerac,” he says more loudly than necessary.

  “So was I.” Amy collects the teacups. “My exams got in the way of everything.”

  “But they went well, yeah?”

  Amy catches the half-smile in Chris’s eyes. It implies: I’m merely making idle chat. There are other things I’d much rather say to you.

  She says hurriedly, “The exams were fine. No problem.”

  Julian says, “Chris was brilliant as Cyrano. Did I tell you? An agent from London came to see him. Met him backstage and signed him on the spot. We may yet see his name in lights.”

  In my head, Christopher’s name has always been in lights.

  “He’s gorgeous,” Ruth said.

  She’d met Chris in the hall as she flew upstairs to Amy’s room.

  Amy laughed. “See? What did I tell you?”

  “When did he arrive?”

  “Yesterday. It’s been fantastic. We had supper with Dad and Hannah. I hardly noticed her!”

  Ruth laughed. “Poor Hannah!”

  “And then we took Tyler for a walk, and this morning Aunt Charlotte arrived and we left her and Dad together, and Julian took us for a drive to show Chris the countryside and we had lunch at the Bishop’s Table in Farnham . . .” Amy paused for breath. “It’s been the best.”

  Ruth sat down on the bed. “I can’t believe it.”

  “He makes me laugh. He’s got the most beautiful speaking voice.”

  “You’re well and truly smitten!”

  “Yes.” Amy flopped down next to Ruth. “I’m crazy about him.”

  “I’d begun to wonder.”

  “Whether I’d ever feel like this? Well, I do.” Amy blushed. “I want to be with him all the time, listening to him, looking at him. I could hardly get to sleep last night, knowing he was upstairs.”

  Ruth said quietly, “That’s great, Amy. And happy birthday. You look beautiful.”

  “Are you sure the dress is OK?”

  “It’s stunning.” Ruth rustled in her bag. “Here. These are from Mum and me.”

  “Ruth! You shouldn’t have.”

  Amy unwrapped a pair of earrings in softly glinting pearl. She caught her breath. “I don’t know what to say . . . Thank you!” She clipped them on. “What d’you think?”

  “The perfect finishing touch. Are you ready, birthday girl?”

  “I’m ready . . . Here I come!”

  Ruth rushed down to join Eddie, who’d begun to organise the music.

  Amy stood for a moment on the landing, listening to the buzz of happy voices. And suddenly two others, dark, bitter, coming from Dad’s bedroom. Her heart leapt. Perhaps Dad was arguing with Hannah, telling her to get out of his life?

  “But you promised me.”

  Amy froze. Aunt Charlotte was in Dad’s bedroom. Her voice sounded thick and smeary, as if she’d been crying.

  “I’m sorry, Lottie,” Dad said, low, urgent, as if he were trying to get rid of her. “I’m grateful to you for all your help, all your –”

  “Grateful!” Amy heard a slap. “You’re a lying pig, William Grant. Why d’you think I’ve bothered to love you all these years?”

  “I’ve no idea.”

  “You promised you’d marry me, after a decent time had passed, after Lauren . . .”

  “My dear Lottie, I did nothing of the kind.”

  “You mean, after all these years of being so discreet and hiding my real feelings from the children, making sure they never found us together . . .”

  Amy walked past the door and stiffly down the stairs, her heart thudding against the silk of her dress.

  Good God. Dad and Aunt Charlotte. So that’s why she kept on coming here, year after year . . . All that comforting she did when Mum died . . . I remember now . . . Always the first to say, “Don’t cry, dear William, don’t cry.”

  Chris met her at the bottom of the stairs. “Hey!” he said. “Just look at Jules’s little sister now!”

  The downstairs rooms thronged with guests. Tyler, banished to the kitchen, chewed miserably on a bone. Eddie’s music filled the house, floated to the starry summer sky. Plates of food scented the terrace table.

  The fairy lights had triumphantly survived the deluge. Now they swung and glittered from the trees, painting the garden magical rainbow colours.

  Aunt Charlotte handed out drinks from a tray, her eyes dark with rage whenever she glanced at Dad and Hannah laughing together. Later, Dad said Aunt Charlotte wasn’t feeling well and had driven back to London.

  Amy stared at him with hardened eyes.

  Dad insisted on making a speech.

  In the moment of silence before he spoke, Amy remembered Mum’s funeral, how they had toasted “Lauren”, her own wretched muteness – and Aunt Charlotte’s comforting presence.

  The room darkened at the memory.

  “I wanted to say thank you, to everyone, for being here. And happy birthday to my best and darling daughter, who looks so beautiful tonight. We wish you the happiest year of your life.” He raised his glass. “Amy. Happy birthday.”

  “Amy! Happy birthday!”

  Amy’s eyes filled with tears. “Thanks, Dad.”

  Christopher says, “I’ve got a present for you.” He grips Amy’s hand.

  His touch charges through her body. “I didn’t expect . . .”

  “Come into the garden, away from all these people. I want to give it to you before your birthday’s several days old!”

  He slides an arm around her waist. They cross the terrace and the lawn, wander through the sweet dampness of the rose garden to the edge of the Common. A curved sliver of moon hangs like a midnight jewel, parting the clouds around it.

  “Here.” He gives her a small flat parcel.

  Amy tears at the wrapping. It’s a book, slim in its leather binding. “Chris! But I can’t see what it is!”

  He chuckles. “It’s an edition of Shakespeare’s Sonnets. I love them. I wanted you to have a copy.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Hold it carefully. I’ve put something inside to mark my favourite.”

  “Which one is it?”

  “Aha! You’ll have to open it and see in the quiet of your room.”

  Amy runs her fingers over the smooth leather.

  “Amy?”

  “Yes.” She looks into his face, half hidden in the shadows.

  “I think you know how I feel about you.” Chris moves a step closer. His eyes glitter in the moonlight. “Ever since the cricket match.” The tips of his fingers touch her bare shoulders, stroke them like the wings of a butterfly. Her skin sparkles. “Ever since last year. Do you remember?” Closer still. “That afternoon on the river?”

  Amy feels the warmth of Chris’s body against her, the crispness of his shirt beneath her hands. “Of course I remember.”

  “I’ve thought about you such a lot.” His lips brush her hair. “I wondered –”

  Amy stiffens. Suddenly the only thing she can hear is the murmur of two other voices. One of them laughs. It’s Hannah. Hannah and Dad.

  Nausea rises up Amy’s throat and into her mouth. She pulls out of Chris’s arms. “I’m sorry,” she says abruptly. “I have to go in.”

  Amy runs back across the garden.

  She pu
shes through the guests, races up to her room. She stands with her back to the door, her legs trembling, her hair tumbling around her shoulders. Her heart beats like pounding rain.

  Chris will think I don’t want him. I want him so much I can hardly stand up. But the thought of Dad and Hannah kissing makes me feel sick. It’s supposed to be Chris and me under those fairy lights, not Dad and Hannah.

  It’s my garden. Mum’s and mine.

  Amy sinks on to the bed, looks down at the book in her hand. Under the light, the leather binding gleams a luxuriant crimson. Slowly she opens it, reads the inscription:

  For Amy, now you are sixteen. With my love, Christopher

  In the centre of the book lies a carefully crushed, pale yellow rose, its stem stripped of thorns. Chris must have chosen it from the ones she’d put on his bedside table. Underneath the rose lies Sonnet 116. The words blur into each other as she reads:

  Let me not to the marriage of true minds

  Admit impediments, love is not love

  Which alters when it alteration finds,

  Nor bends with the remover to remove.

  O, no, it is an ever-fixed mark

  That looks on tempest and is never shaken

  It is the star to every wand’ring bark,

  Whose worth’s unknown although his height be taken,

  Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

  Within his bending sickle’s compass come,

  Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

  But bears it out even to the edge of doom:

  If this be error and upon me proved

  I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

  With infinite care, Amy closes the flower into its page. Hot tears burn behind her eyes.

  She lies awake, staring into the dark, filled with a confusion of feelings. Wanting to talk to Aunt Charlotte, to confide in her – to hear her story. Anger at Dad. Resentment of Hannah. Longing for Christopher, for the stroke of his fingers, the touch of his lips. Bitter remorse that she ran away.

  She hears Chris and Julian come up the stairs, hears them mutter, “Good night,” on the landing. She wills Chris to tap at her door, whisper, “Amy? Are you awake?”

  Instead, silence throbs into the darkness. An owl hoots, mournful, complaining. In the garden, cats spit fresh animosities. On the Common, the foxes scream for food.

  Nobody taps at the door.

  Her bedside clock shows two, three, four. She hears something creak on the landing. Perhaps it’s Chris, not sure which door to tap on?

  She slips out of bed and opens her door a fraction.

  Hannah stands in the doorway of Dad’s room, blows him a kiss, whispers, “See you tonight, darling. Love you.” She vanishes down the stairs, trailing lily-of-the-valley.

  Tyler growls from his basket.

  Hannah murmurs, “Good dog, Tyler. It’s only me.”

  The front door opens and closes. Hannah revs her car and drives away.

  Amy slumps back on to her damp, tangled sheets. She falls instantly into the pit of sleep.

  When she wakes, sunlight splashes fiercely on her pillow. The clock says half-past eleven. Amy stares at it. Memories of yesterday flood back.

  She sits up with a start.

  A piece of paper has been pushed under her door.

  She leaps out of bed, scrabbles at it.

  Dear Amy

  Jules and I have left for Perugia. We didn’t want to wake you. Thank you for a lovely party. If anything I said last night offended you, I can only say I must have misread all the signs. I’m desperately sorry.

  Take care of yourself.

  Love Christopher

  “You’ve been crying.”

  Ruth stood in the doorway. She pulled Amy into the house.

  “Cup of tea? Come into the kitchen. Everybody’s gone for a Sunday afternoon walk but I’m knackered after last night. What’s wrong?”

  Amy told her. First about Dad and Aunt Charlotte. Then Dad and Hannah. Then Chris. She pulled Chris’s note out of her pocket. “Look. That’s the last I’ll probably ever hear from him.”

  Ruth glanced at it. “Don’t be so melodramatic. Why don’t you write to him and explain? I’m sure he’ll understand.”

  “Where do I write? I haven’t got an address in Perugia, and even if I had, by the time it arrives he’ll probably have moved on.”

  “Hasn’t Julian left you an address? You must have some idea where they’ve gone . . . Here, drink this.”

  Amy clutched the mug of tea. “Maybe Dad knows. I feel such a fool. What was I thinking of, running off like that?”

  “You’d had a shock.”

  “Too right. It’s the last thing I expected, Dad and Hannah snogging like teenagers!”

  Ruth giggled.

  “It’s not funny.”

  “Sorry. Though it is romantic, isn’t it? Your dad finding true love again.”

  Amy said venomously, “True love? True nothing!” She gulped the burning tea. “They went to bed together. I saw her leaving Dad’s room at four o’clock.”

  “I think you should give him a break.”

  “Why should I?”

  “Because Hannah’s better than Aunt Charlotte! He’s got a girlfriend and he’s obviously head over heels. So they’re sleeping together. Wouldn’t it be odd if they weren’t?”

  “It’s all right for you.” Amy’s hand shook. A dollop of tea flopped on her jeans, spreading a dark puddle, stinging her thigh. “You can look at it from the outside. He’s my dad. Or should I say, he was my dad? It’s like I’ve lost him to a stranger.”

  “He’ll always be your dad.”

  “And now, in the space of one glorious weekend, I’ve lost Christopher too.”

  Nine

  “Well, sweetheart,” Dad says cheerfully.

  He’d slicked his hair back from his forehead after his shower. Amy notices with alarm it makes him look ten years younger. He also looks thinner. All that stupid cycling, that cavorting on the trampoline, are obviously paying off.

  “Just you and me together again for Monday morning breakfast . . . How nice.”

  “You could say that.” Amy stuffs a forkful of scrambled eggs into her mouth. It tastes disgusting. I must’ve sploshed half a sea of salt into this by mistake.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Only that I’m sure you’d like there to be three of us.”

  “You mean you miss Jules?” Dad sounds relieved. “So do I. And Christopher – charming lad.”

  Amy tries to ignore the way her heart leaps into her mouth at the mention of Chris. “I mean you wish your darling Hannah was right here beside you.”

  “I beg your pardon!” Dad splutters into his juice.

  “Seeing as how you’re practically joined at the hip,” Amy continues in a deadpan voice, “I’m amazed you haven’t already asked her to move in.”

  Dad gulps. His face, Amy sees with delight, has flushed a dark red. “There’s no need to be offensive.”

  She glares at him. “I think there’s every need.”

  “My friendship with Hannah –”

  “It’s a bit more than friendship, Dad.”

  “That’s nothing to do with you!”

  “Isn’t it?” Amy’s heart thuds with indignation. “Snogging in the garden at my birthday party? Sleeping with Hannah when Jules and Chris and me were upstairs, across the landing? Just friends, are we, Dad?”

  He flings down his serviette. “Look here, Amy. I will not have you talking to me like that. Understand?”

  “No, I don’t.” She clenches her fists. “You’ve started behaving like a besotted teenager!”

  “A what?”

  “After all those brilliant years with Mum . . . How dare you betray her?”

  Dad stares at her. Thin lines etch the corners of his eyes. “You’ve no idea what you’re talking about.” His face darkens. “I was never, for one single solitary moment, disloyal or unfaithful to your mother. It was she
who . . .” He turns his head away.

  “Who what?”

  “Never mind. I’ve already said too much.”

  “You’ve told me nothing.”

  “That’s how it’s going to stay.” Dad runs a hand through his hair. It flops into its usual untidy zigzag. “I’m not saying any more, not one word.” He stands up. “If you’ll excuse me, my patients are waiting.”

  “Sure, your patients. Don’t let me keep you from them. Talk to them, do you, Dad?”

  “You know I do.”

  “Then why don’t you talk to me?”

  Dad turns from the door. “I’ll say this to you, and then the subject is closed.” The sprightly vigour has drained from his body. “Mum was a wonderful woman, a good wife and a great mother.” He hesitates. “But she wasn’t perfect, Amy. Don’t make out she was some kind of saint.”

  Amy shivers. Once again, Ruth’s words ring in her head:

  “You put your mum on a bit of a pedestal.”

  “I loved her.” Amy’s voice sounds thin and feeble, her palms feel clammy with sweat.

  “So did I. With all my heart.” Dad chokes over the words. “But if you think that’s going to stop me loving Hannah, you’re very much mistaken.”

  Amy walked up and down the hill of Guildford High Street. She took a deep breath and dashed into the bank. She used her cashcard for the first time, reciting her pin number to herself, staring anxiously at the screen’s instructions, prodding nervously at the buttons.

  The notes smelt stale. She stuffed them into her bag, glanced guiltily over her shoulder, whizzed out to the street as if the bank were on fire.

  I don’t know what I’m making such a fuss about. It’s my money, my allowance. I’ll spend it how I want.

  She headed straight for the travel agent’s, pushed at the door, surprised and relieved that she was the only customer. A pale-faced young man with spots and greasy hair gave her a weary grin.