A Very Big House in the Country

by Claire Sandy

  ‘But you don’t know.’ Mike was agitated, his whole body a frown. ‘You can’t.’

  ‘I can and I do.’ Evie sat on her hands to stop herself ravishing the Battenberg. Taking a deep breath, she spoke rapidly, getting it over with, ‘Mike, darling dearest Mike, here is what I know. When I was ill and we were at sixes and sevens and we were scared and you were trying to look all manly, but underneath you were Bambi, you went to a staff leaving do because back then you could afford staff, and you drank too much and suddenly you weren’t worried any more because you were as high as a kite and could barely pronounce your own name.’ Evie broke off to take a sip of tea. ‘Am I on the right track?’

  Dumbly, Mike nodded.

  ‘Excellent. So, there you were, plastered and emotionally unstable, and suddenly Haley – who’s the one leaving – appeared. Haley with the foofy hair and the tendency to cry in the loos. You can’t really remember what happened next, but you think it went like this: you were randy and you suddenly fancied her and you kissed her when you both went outside for a smoke and you led her on and you took advantage and you made her believe there was a future for you as a couple. So, when she began calling and texting and emailing and generally scaring the bejaysus out of you, you felt you owed her something and you tried to let her down gently, by listening to her crying and carrying on. Haley upped the ante by threatening to tell your wife – i.e. moi – even though I was sick. You begged her not to. Finally she met a guy and, hallelujah, the silly cow got engaged and told you fiercely she was deleting your number and you were a pig, et cetera, et cetera.’ Evie took another sip. Her tea was getting cold, so she sped up. ‘Fast-forward to this summer. Haley’s divorced – surprise, surprise – and she’s texting you again. You’re baffled, because she behaves as if you have this great love that she can’t leave behind. She’s insisting you dump your wife – me again – and you’re worried she’ll talk to me and I’ll believe her, because she’s so convincing that sometimes you think you’ve had an affair instead of one drunken kiss you’ll regret until you die.’ Evie sat back, spent. ‘Am I right?’

  Mike nodded again. ‘How?’ he began slowly.

  With one eye on the scones, Evie said, ‘How do I know? When you’re bonding with your bros, Mike, you should keep your voice down, and double-check that the ladies haven’t come home and crept upstairs. I lay in bed last night and listened to you telling Clive and Jon.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘I wanted you to tell me yourself.’

  ‘You believe me?’

  Evie laced her fingers together and wondered how to put it. ‘Listen, I had no idea this Haley creature is bugging you. But I did know about the other time – the first time.’

  Mike looked as confused as Evie had when she slept through the middle of Homeland and woke up for the climax.

  ‘Because Haley came good on her threat. She came to see me.’ She added ‘in hospital’, just for the fun of seeing Mike’s eyes widen. ‘I told her to bugger off. I know her type. Drama-queens who churn up the water and watch everyone drown.’

  Evie recalled the faux-tears at the end of her bed, the knowing face gauging her reactions, the I’m sorry, I know you’re ill, but you should know the kind of man you married. Evie had retorted that she knew exactly the kind of man she’d married – that is, not the kind of man who would look twice at a schemer who’d pull a sick stunt like this. ‘Mike, your assistant told me all about the kiss, the morning after.’

  ‘Barb did? You’re kidding.’ Mike’s past rearranged itself.

  ‘She couldn’t stop laughing. She’d watched the whole thing unfold and gave me a heads-up, in case there were repercussions. She’d seen Haley’s type before. You were easy prey, running on empty. Clever old Barb tailed you when you went out for a smoke – and this is another reason why you were right to give up the fags, by the way – so she saw the lunge and the clinch and the taking advantage. Haley took advantage of you, love. Barb was tickled because you were too drunk to notice that Haley sat beside you all night, trying to hold your hand. It was a narcissistic fantasy, Mike.’

  ‘Good old Barb.’ Mike looked as if he’d been though the spin cycle in a washing machine.

  ‘She’s a diamond. But even if she hadn’t told me, I would’ve said the same thing to that bunny-boiler.’ She moved the milk jug and took his hand. ‘I would’ve told her I trust my husband.’

  ‘Christ!’ said Mike. ‘I’m so relieved. I want to shout.’

  ‘Don’t shout,’ said Evie. ‘Eat.’

  As Evie sliced, diced and filleted, Fang’s caterwauling grew louder, then diminished, only to grow loud again as her parents walked her desperately from room to room. The child, understandably, missed her nanny.

  ‘Thanks to you,’ said Evie to Mike, who was ‘helping’ prepare dinner, ‘we’ve got poor Fang’s howls as a backing track.’

  ‘Thanks to me?’ Mike was aggrieved.

  ‘You taunted Clive, and he took the bait.’

  ‘I had a point. We managed without childcare.’

  ‘I managed, you mean. You were at work.’

  ‘Don’t say it like I was in a strip-joint, tucking tenners down strippers’ bras.’ Mike assumed the face he used for doing his tax return. ‘I mucked in, didn’t I?’ He considered himself to be a New Man. He distinctly remembered hoovering with Dan strapped to his front. Once.

  Hands deep in a bowl of crumble mix, Evie paused, looking over at Mike and back into the past. ‘Remember when we took Scarlett out in the car to lull her to sleep? Driving around like zombies at 3 a.m.?’

  Mike’s shoulders softened, recalling those drives through slumbering streets. ‘Dan always dropped off on top of the tumble-dryer.’

  ‘Happy days,’ said Evie, attacking the crumble again. ‘Exhausting days.’

  ‘If we can do it, so can Shen and Clive.’

  ‘Well, they’re not us,’ said Evie.

  ‘Is that a compliment to us?’

  ‘Sort of. Why didn’t you offer to help?’

  ‘Because it’s Clive,’ said Mike, as if that explained everything.

  ‘Now you’re being childish.’

  ‘Ouch!’ said Mike.

  ‘I might need you to be grown-up quite soon.’ Evie’s face was hot, and not just because of the steam from the dancing pots and pans.

  ‘But I am grown-up.’ Mike sounded sulky and not particularly grown-up. ‘I have a job. I wear long trousers. I can open safety caps on tablets.’

  ‘True.’ She was grateful for his lightness of tone. ‘But . . .’ She had to be more realistic. ‘Life changes, Mike. You may not always be able to rely on me so much.’

  ‘What’re you trying to say?’ Like Patch sniffing under the kitchen door when sausages hit sizzling fat, Mike knew something was in the air.

  ‘I’m trying to say . . .’ Evie quailed, ‘never approach a woman making crumble. That’s when we’re at our most dangerous.’ She sensed him wondering whether to press her, and exploited his hesitation to say, ‘Make me a Martini. Dry. With an olive.’

  Mike started for the den and the comprehensively stocked cocktail cabinet that secretly intimidated them both, with its polished shakers and strainers and row of gleaming glasses. ‘How do I make a—’

  ‘Google it!’ roared Evie, sick of being her family’s personal encyclopaedia.

  A phone buzzed and she jumped, before realizing the noise came from Mike’s mobile, lying on the worktop. As she read the message, her eyebrows disappeared into the undergrowth of her fringe: I think of you and I bite my lip I’m on heat mike come and fill me up DUMP HER NOW xxx

  Evie typed a reply: Hi Haley! Evie here. Nice to hear from you again. You sound hot, you poor thing! Why not open a window instead of bombarding my husband with poorly punctuated smut? If I were your friend, I’d urge you to talk to a professional about why you’re pursuing Mike. But as I’m Mike’s wife, I’ll simply delete your number and leave you with the knowledge that you have
no power over him, because I know all about this correspondence and your threats. Goodbye.

  When you nurture – when that’s what you do, day in and day out – it’s hard to be brusque with somebody so damaged. After some hesitation, Evie pressed ‘Send’; Hayley must reach out for the help she needed.

  ‘One dry Martini.’ Mike was back, proffering a triangular glass.

  Evie slung the crumble into the oven. It was majestic, made with pears from the orchard she’d discovered in a far corner of the garden; another gift from Wellcome Manor. Taking the glass from her husband, she thanked him and left the room, with an autocratic ‘Keep an eye on the potatoes.’

  ‘I thought it was for you . . .’ Mike watched her cross the terrace to Clive and trade his painstakingly mixed drink for Fang.

  ‘Here. A medicinal Martini.’ It was a relief to talk to somebody that Evie was neither married to nor keeping secrets from. ‘I heard you grumbling about dinner being late.’

  Taking the Martini like a bear stealing a taco, Clive said, ‘You’re an angel.’

  Fang fidgeted grouchily in Evie’s arms. Clive gazed at her. ‘So small and yet so powerful. And so very, very full of shit.’

  ‘Not in front of the baby, Clive. Elizabetta never used such language.’

  ‘Elizabetta knew where Fang’s off-switch is. It’s beyond me.’ He regarded Evie over the rim of his glass, smiling slyly. ‘Done any writing today?’

  ‘Haven’t had time.’ She was riveted by Fang. The damp curl on her forehead. The bulge of her putty nose.

  ‘Waiting for inspiration to strike?’

  ‘This place inspires me.’

  ‘And . . . me?’

  She laughed. ‘Everybody inspires me.’ She drew back a little; his gaze was very intense. ‘Are you all right, Clive?’ She moved closer, murmuring, ‘Fancy a lie-down?’

  He looked startled. And pleased. ‘Darling, come on – it’s the middle of the day and Shen’s about, you naughty girl.’

  ‘Shen won’t mind. She’ll understand.’

  He was taken aback. ‘Are you mad?’

  ‘Please yourself.’ Evie held out Fang and took the glass, wondering at Clive’s clumsiness, not letting go until their fingers touched.

  ‘Just imagine,’ he said in an undertone, ‘if we’d gone to the Maldives, this would never—’ He straightened up as Mike approached and carried on, more heartily, ‘Can’t believe I shelled out Maldives-style money to stay in the English countryside with baby-sick in my ear. Literally,’ he said, with something like awe, ‘in my ear.’

  The slinky motion of Mike’s arm sliding around Evie’s waist made her shudder happily as he said, ‘The Maldives would cost twice what we paid for this place.’

  ‘This place is no bargain,’ said Clive. Evie, sensing what was coming, willed his lips to close, but no, he kept going. ‘I paid twice what you paid, mate.’

  Mike withdrew his arm. ‘Evie, is that true?’

  ‘Well . . .’

  Taking that as confirmation, Mike said, ‘Thanks, love’ as he walked away. ‘There’s nothing I enjoy more than being made to look stupid.’

  ‘Oops.’ Clive looked penitent. Or as penitent as he could look. ‘I should stop rubbing your husband up the wrong way, shouldn’t I? For both our sakes.’

  ‘Clive,’ sighed Evie. ‘I should put you over my knee and spank you.’

  ‘Now you’re talking!’ said Clive.

  The Eights didn’t notice the atmosphere at the dinner table; they were too busy interrogating Evie about their food: ‘So this pig definitely had a happy life and then just dropped dead of old age?’

  Similarly the teenagers were too absorbed in their own psycho-drama to police the oldies: Scarlett watching Zane; Zane pretending not to watch Scarlett; Scarlett watching Tillie watching Zane. The permutations were endless.

  Evie saw it all. She noticed Mike’s seething indignation. She noticed Shen struggling to stay calm, as Fang writhed on her lap and put her hands in the food. She noticed that Paula was on Planet Paula, that unreachable distant sphere. She saw Jon pick at his meal. And as for Clive – she reminded herself to find the Optrex. The poor man was suffering from some form of pollen allergy. Either that or he was winking at her every time she looked his way, and obviously he wouldn’t do that.

  ‘Let me take Fang,’ she said to Shen, ‘so that you can eat.’ Having cooked and served the meal, Evie didn’t really want to hold the baby, but clearly nobody else was going to offer.

  ‘It’s fine.’ Shen’s eyeliner was smudged; a detail as discordant as the Queen sporting a Hitler moustache.

  ‘Just hand her over and—’

  ‘Leave it, Evie.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘Are you saying I can’t cope?’

  ‘Darling,’ said Clive warningly, ‘Evie said nothing of the sort.’

  ‘Don’t you start.’ Shen trembled with manic energy as she shifted Fang to her other knee, giving the child easier access to the pearls around her neck. ‘Oh no, Fang, why?’ she groaned as a small fist closed around the necklace and pearls scattered all over the dinner table.

  ‘Pearls before swine!’ shouted Dan. ‘I don’t know what that means!’

  Mabel stuck one up her nose, without further ado, as if she’d been waiting for a pearl to roll past so that she could do just that.

  ‘They’re real!’ said Shen, despairingly.

  ‘Mabes!’ Evie jumped up. ‘That’s a hundred quid you’ve stuffed up your hooter!’

  ‘If your mother says it’s worth a hundred pounds,’ said Mike, lifting a pearl out of his mash, ‘It’s probably worth two hundred.’

  Fang kicked over Shen’s glass.

  ‘Clive,’ she said, in a metallic undertone, ‘I could do with some help here.’

  ‘Sorry, darling. What?’ Clive stopped studying Evie and slapped his forehead. ‘Sorry, Angel. I’ll get you another glass.’

  ‘I mean, help with your daughter.’

  ‘One of your many daughters,’ said Zane.

  ‘But I’m eating, my love.’

  ‘I’ll take her,’ said Evie.

  ‘No, thanks.’

  ‘Dan . . .’ Miles ate greedily, unaware of the pearl amongst his peas, ‘why’d you sleep with the light on?’

  ‘I don’t,’ said Dan hastily.

  ‘You do,’ insisted Miles. He had the table’s attention; without Evie and Shen conducting the conversation, the adults were quiet. ‘Mabes said, and everything.’

  ‘I didn’t!’ Mabel burst into tears. Amber, this being her area of expertise, joined in. ‘That’s not true, and it’s a secret!’

  Fang burst into empathetic, even louder tears, as her mother crammed her own mouth with food like a famine victim.

  ‘It’s Dan’s business.’ Mike eyed The Eights sternly, as Clive finally accepted Fang from Shen’s grasp like the prize in a grim game of pass-the-parcel.

  Dan’s bottom lip was jelly.

  ‘Whoa, Dan.’ Zane slouched over the table towards him. ‘Never had you down as a cissy, man.’

  ‘Zane . . .’ Scarlett, looking hurt, put down her fork.

  ‘You afraid of ghosties? Even girls sleep with the lights off.’

  ‘Even girls?’ said Tillie. ‘Even girls,’ she repeated, leaning over to Fang, who stopped crying and plonked two mash-smeared hands on her cheeks.

  ‘It’s a bit gay, Dan.’ Zane was bubbling, as if ill will had fermented within him and pushed out the words.

  ‘I want him to be gay.’ Mabel’s tears were magically dry. ‘But he won’t be.’

  ‘You’re gay,’ said Dan to Zane.

  ‘No, you’re gay,’ said Zane.

  ‘Nobody’s gay,’ said Evie. ‘Well, statistically somebody probably is. It doesn’t matter. But Dan isn’t,’ she added, as her son’s face filled again. ‘For God’s sake, Zane.’ Goading a ten-year-old with homophobic crap was beyond her patience. ‘Stop it.’

  ‘He never picks on somebody his own size,’ s
aid Clive languidly.

  ‘Nor do you,’ said Zane. ‘But then, there isn’t anybody your size. Except a gorilla, maybe.’

  The Eights laughed uproariously. Having recovered, Dan did a creditable gorilla impression.

  Shen foamed with anger – only some of it, in Evie’s opinion, rooted in her stepson’s rudeness. ‘Zane! Get out!’

  ‘No, leave him.’ Clive grunted with frustration as Zane jumped up, threw down his napkin and stalked out. ‘Let him insult me, darling.’

  ‘At least,’ Tillie poked her food around, mouth pursed, ‘he says it to your face.’

  ‘Tillie,’ cajoled Paula, ‘dear, we don’t talk to grown-ups like that.’

  ‘Grown-ups, Mum?’ Tillie stood too. She didn’t have Zane’s knack for posturing and caught her trailing skirt in her chair as she made her exit. ‘Like Santa, I don’t believe in them any more.’

  In her bijou home (bijou being estate-agent speak for ‘too bleedin’ small’), Evie always knew where her personnel were, give or take an inch or so. Wellcome Manor absorbed and hid people. She could have been alone in the house as she crept downstairs.

  There were distant sounds. A chuckle. A bang. Footsteps. Presumably The Eights were in bed, but they’d become so feral and self-reliant they might well be sacrificing peasants by the pool.

  ‘Sh-en!’ she called, moping through the rooms. Shen wasn’t in the quiet, on-standby kitchen, or in the womb-like cinema room, or in the hoity-toity drawing room with its ankle-deep carpet. In this posh commune Evie was accustomed to constant access to Shen and high-quality gal-pal chatter.

  Gauzy curtains fluttered at the French doors. Evie saw the teens canter past, holding in their laughter, up to no good. Zane, who seemed to have something under his shirt, reached for Scarlett’s hand with an insouciance that suggested they were an established item.