The Misplaced Affections of Charlotte Fforbes

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The Misplaced Affections of Charlotte Fforbes Page 5

by Catherine Robertson


  Patrick laid his head against the back of the sofa, closed his eyes and breathed in the room. Ignoring his own beer-and-pizza-gas odours, he could smell orange-scented cleaning fluid, notes of vanilla, baked sugar and coffee, a hint of play-dough, and above all, in this, his son’s favourite place, Tom’s own scent, which Patrick did not have words to describe but which filled him with emotions that surged from aching, heart-ripping love to gasping terror.

  Patrick’s father had walked out when he was two, and he knew that his mother had struggled with her only son from birth. They’d continued to battle right through until he’d left home at sixteen. We fought at first because I was little and didn’t know better, thought Patrick, but later on because I chose to be a shit.

  Even now that he and she had been back on speaking terms for over twenty-five years, even now that he’d become everything she’d ever wished for — rich, settled down with a wife and son — Patrick’s mother still beat her hand against her heart. The pain, she’d tell him. Still, I hold here such pain!

  Will Tom be causing us pain for that many years? Patrick wondered. Will he ever intend to, or will it always be out of his control?

  He realised he could hear breathing. Was it his own? He held his breath and listened. He could still hear it. The breathing, he worked out, was coming from the floor in the corner, between the edge of the shelves and the wall, as if something were curled up there, asleep. For one horrible moment, Patrick thought it might be Tom — that, unbeknownst to Clare, he’d sneaked down there in the night. He got to his feet with more haste than was wise, lurched into the shelves and knocked Clare’s box set of Child of Our Time (The First Ten Years) onto the floor.

  From the corner there came a whine and a panting noise, and suddenly Patrick found himself besieged by a licking, crooning, leaping Labrador puppy.

  ‘You’re fucking kidding me.’ Patrick sank back down onto the sofa and fended off the puppy as best he could.

  ‘What in the name of fuck almighty are you doing here?’ he said to it.

  ‘Aishe dropped him off.’

  Clare, wearing one of Patrick’s T-shirts, which on her hung down to mid-thigh, was standing behind the fireguard. She stepped over it, with considerably more ease and grace than he had, Patrick noted, and came across to lean against the shelves. The puppy bounced over and quickly sniffed her feet, then bounced back to Patrick.

  ‘Aishe’s son’s band won the inter-school contest,’ said Clare. ‘And now they’ve been invited to perform in that well-known jazz capital, Düsseldorf.’

  ‘She’s got a fucking nerve,’ said Patrick. The puppy tried to gnaw on his hand, and he cuffed it lightly on its nose. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll take this pest back to her tomorrow. And give her what for.’

  ‘No …’ Clare expelled a weary breath, and came and plumped herself onto the sofa next to him. ‘No, I offered. She rang to tell us they were all going away, and I offered.’

  Patrick frowned. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I was pissed off at myself for not coping the last time.’ Clare reached down and fondled the puppy’s ears. ‘It’s only a baby. I should have had better strategies for handling it.’

  ‘Fuck’s sake, Clare,’ said Patrick. ‘Strategies are for Barack Obama figuring out how to keep the free world safe from armed lunatics. A puppy is a hairball of energy without a brain. No “strategy” is going to make it easier to handle.’

  His wife did not look up, but continued to caress the dog, which had now flopped onto its side, and was lying at their feet, tongue lolling.

  Patrick said, more gently, ‘I’ll find somewhere for him. You’ve got enough on your plate.’

  And, wondering if he was doing the right thing, he laid a hand on her hair and lightly stroked it.

  She did not respond, and Patrick was about to remove his hand, when she said, ‘How smashed are you?’

  ‘Quite,’ he said. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Were you at The Star?’

  ‘Uh, no. The Danbury. With Anselo.’

  Clare sat up and gave him a look. ‘Anselo? I thought he was a paragon of a husband.’

  Her move had dislodged Patrick’s hand. He now used it to scratch behind his ear, a reflex action whenever he was embarrassed.

  ‘He didn’t stay the whole time.’

  ‘Had to rush off home, did he? No surprise.’ Clare folded her arms. ‘He can hear one of Darrell’s snivels a mile away, like a faithful hound tuned to his master’s voice.’

  Patrick’s instinct was to defend Anselo, until his mental logic pointed out that the actions of his younger cousin highlighted a conjugal dedication that was conspicuously absent from his own.

  But, unusually, Clare seemed unconcerned that her husband had come home late and plastered. Patrick began to wonder what was distracting her. His mind circulated a number of possibilities, some of them frankly terrifying. He tried his best to remain optimistic.

  ‘Italy,’ said Clare.

  Patrick felt that subject could go either way, so he kept quiet.

  ‘Remember that trip we took there?’ his wife went on.

  ‘Yes?’ seemed a safe answer.

  Clare lay back on the sofa. ‘That little house on the clifftop. Mario and Vincente told us to go.’

  Mario and Vincente were the Italian brothers who owned the café where Patrick and Clare had first met. Thrilled that their humble surroundings had ignited the flames of amore in two of their regulars, the brothers urged the pair to take two weeks on the Ligurian coast, in a house owned by another brother, or a cousin, or a cousin’s brother — Patrick had lost track in the voluble outpouring of generosity. Suspecting the guarantees of delight might be akin to those made by boys in the souk about their Uncle Abdul’s carpet shop, Patrick’s expectations had not been high. But it had been glorious. At least, he’d thought so, and he was pretty sure Clare had too.

  ‘All we did,’ she added, ‘was swim, eat, drink and fuck.’

  Her sigh sounded contented, but Patrick felt compelled to make a final check.

  ‘That was good, wasn’t it?’ he said.

  Clare raised an eyebrow at him. ‘I had eight orgasms in one day,’ she said. ‘I think you could safely say that was good.’

  ‘Eight?’ said Patrick. ‘Jesus, really? We did it eight times in one day?’

  ‘Don’t you remember?’

  Patrick made an apologetic face. ‘Men’s brains shut down when they have sex. It’s a well-known fact.’

  ‘Hmm.’

  Smiling, Clare pulled her feet out from under the once more soundly sleeping puppy, and hooked over one knee to sit straddled across Patrick’s lap, facing him.

  ‘How smashed did you say you were again?’ she said, placing her hands on his hips. ‘Because I can always go back up to bed …’

  Patrick couldn’t entirely blame his feeling of disconnection on the drink. This was the first time Clare had willingly offered to have sex with him in more months than Patrick could remember. To test whether or not he was dreaming, he tentatively slipped his hand up under her — his — T-shirt. And found that it was all she had on.

  ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Jesus.’

  Clare began to unbuckle his belt. ‘He’s not with us right now,’ she said. ‘But give me a decent fifteen minutes, and you can call on him all you like.’

  5

  Darrell adjusted the shoulder straps on the front-facing baby-carrier and looked down on the dark fuzz of Cosmo’s hair as he slept, his head cradled by the padded support. The baby-carrier, Darrell remembered well, had been chosen because the marketing blurb promised that you could carry your baby high enough up to check their breathing. There was something else about ‘essential closeness’, but Darrell had latched onto the sentence about breathing, mainly because it had never occurred to her that her baby’s might need checking when he was sleeping against her chest. At night, yes — Darrell knew all about cot death, and was vigilant about changing the batteries in the baby monitor. But she’d assumed during the
night was the only time a baby might stop breathing. Until she’d read the baby carrier brochure.

  Ninety per cent of sudden deaths, Darrell knew, happened to babies under six months old. Cosmo was less than half that now, and Darrell found herself, much like a prisoner in solitary, chalking off the days to that magical six-month mark. Six months was also when Darrell intended to stop breastfeeding. Darrell found breastfeeding exhausting and claustrophobic, and she was frustratingly ineffective at expressing. But bottle-feeding, according to the authority on all things baby — Clare — posed manifold threats to Cosmo’s health, both physical and psychological. Darrell was not keen to risk it, though she wasn’t entirely sure what she was more afraid of: compromising Cosmo’s immune system and emotional development, or facing the disapproval of Clare.

  ‘Do you want me to carry him?’

  Anselo was at her side, baby bag on his shoulder. Darrell saw his eyes travel to her hands, which were still fiddling with the carrier’s shoulder straps.

  ‘He must be getting heavy now,’ he said. ‘Or we could get a pram? They don’t all cost as much as a house in Peckham.’

  The mention of a pram filled Darrell with the usual ambivalence. Part of her longed for a pram, yearned to be free of the stifling feeling of still being umbilically connected to her baby. But if something went wrong because she wasn’t close enough to notice it, she would never forgive herself. Darrell battled with these counterpoints every day. She was secretly glad that the risk of smothering meant she and Anselo did not have to share their bed with Cosmo. But she agonised over the fact that, because their bedroom was simply too tiny to fit even a bassinet, Cosmo had to sleep in the other room. A little distance was a relief, thought Darrell. But too much felt like you were tempting fate.

  ‘No, I’m fine,’ Darrell said. ‘You can take him at the café, though. If you want.’

  Anselo opened the front door and waited for her to go through. ‘Sure,’ he said.

  ‘Why do we do this every Saturday?’ Darrell said to him, as they walked up the road to the café. ‘I mean, Patrick’s fine. I adore Patrick. But … well, you know.’

  ‘We don’t have to,’ said Anselo. ‘I can explain to Patrick.’

  ‘That’s all very well,’ said Darrell. ‘But how will he explain it to her? If he concocts some tale about us taking up Saturday morning water babies or infant t’ai chi classes, or anything like that, I’ll be grilled mercilessly about how we’re finding it. And if I try to fob her off with some blather along the lines of “Oh, it’s great,” I’ll then be subjected to a litany of research that confirms any benefit I may have observed has been a product of my own ignorant delusion.’

  ‘You shouldn’t let Clare intimidate you,’ said Anselo. ‘Doesn’t matter what she thinks.’

  Darrell tried very hard not to hate her husband at that moment. But it was a bit rich, she felt, for him to accuse her of being at the mercy of other people’s opinions when he’d spent his whole life being acutely sensitive to what others thought of him. Patrick in particular, although the brew of admiration and resentment towards his older cousin that had been on full hubble-bubble when she’d met Anselo had reduced markedly since Patrick asked Anselo to join him in business.

  Darrell had initially had misgivings about this, feeling it might be better for Anselo if he continued being self-employed. His building business had been growing, and Darrell had noted a corresponding increase in Anselo’s levels of confidence and ease with himself. She’d worried that taking up Patrick’s offer would put her husband in the shadow of the man he considered the epitome of success, and that Anselo would once more begin to fixate on the gap he imagined lay between them.

  But so far, Darrell hadn’t seen that happen. If anything, it was Patrick who had seemed to step back and let Anselo take more of the lead. Darrell knew, as all the family did, that the situation with little Tom had become increasingly difficult, so she supposed that was the reason. To her annoyance, she found this was yet another situation about which she had mixed feelings. On the upside, Anselo had risen to the challenge and was looking and sounding more confident than he’d ever done. Which made him a great deal easier to be around, Darrell had to rather guiltily admit. On the downside, the opportunities to experience this benefit were increasingly limited due to the fact Anselo was spending a lot of time at work. More than Darrell had bargained on. More than Anselo had promised …

  Darrell had been five months’ pregnant when Patrick had offered the job to Anselo.

  ‘I can’t take it,’ Anselo had said to Darrell. ‘It’ll put too much pressure on you.’

  Darrell had agreed with him wholeheartedly. But a dead person could have sensed how much he wanted this, so she kept her thoughts to herself. ‘You must take it.’ She’d made sure she sounded convincing. ‘It’ll be a terrific opportunity, and probably great fun to boot.’

  ‘But how will you find time to write?’

  His relief had been palpable when Darrell had replied, ‘With luck, the little blighter will be a good sleeper. And if he isn’t, I’m sure one of your younger cousins will be happy to earn a few extra quid taking him for long walks in the park.’

  ‘I’ll keep my hours down. Patrick will understand.’

  And he had kept them down, at first. But in the last few weeks, Darrell had noticed a gradual but inexorable extension — leaving earlier in the morning and coming home later at night. Darrell knew that Patrick was not asking this of him; Anselo’s choice of hours was entirely his own. If his choice was being driven by a dedication to the job, it would be easier to cope with.

  But it isn’t, is it? Darrell thought. Anselo’s spending more time at work because he’s less happy spending time with me. I know that’s my fault, she told herself. Since Cosmo was born, I’ve been so wrapped up with him that it’s no wonder Anselo feels on the outer. I don’t want to be so focused on the baby, but I can’t help it. Even when Cosmo’s asleep — and by golly, is he a champion sleeper — I can’t switch off completely. It’s like an incredibly important upcoming event you’re so terrified you’ll forget that it keeps leaping into your consciousness, creating a little electric jolt of fear every time. It makes it so difficult to be present for anyone else, including Anselo. So I suppose I have no one else to blame now he’s choosing to be not so present for me.

  I wish I knew what to do about it, Darrell thought. I miss so much what we had BC: Before Cosmo. We’d barely been together a year before I got knocked up, and I loved feeling that it was just we two. I loved being able to phone Anselo whenever I was tired, bored or fed up, and have him chat to me, or even drop what he was doing and come back home. ‘I’ll say I’m out getting supplies,’ he’d say. ‘Do you want a custard tart from the café?’

  I miss those custard tarts, thought Darrell. I even miss his old voicemail, with the gruff ‘Anselo Herne. Leave a message.’ Now, I get that message recorded for him by that posh bird from his office, Charlotte or Scarlett or whatever her name is, with the hint of dominatrix or dog trainer about her vowels.

  It occurred to Darrell that Charlotte-or-Scarlett was exactly the type that the innocent but gutsy heroines in her romance novels had to do battle with to win their billionaire hero. Said billionaire always had a mistress ensconced in some Manhattan or Parisian apartment, with whom he was exchanging an accommodation of his sexual demands for, most usually, a large amount of emerald jewellery. The transactional nature of this relationship would become unsatisfactory to the mistress the instant the gutsy innocent entered the scene, and she’d begin a merciless campaign to reduce the heroine to dust with a swift grind of her Louboutin heels. It never worked. The scales invariably fell from the billionaire’s eyes, and the shards of ice melted within his heart. He’d declare that he no longer desired to protect himself emotionally with a shield of clinical perfection, and what he really wanted was a full-figured young girl with simple charms, who would tell him right out when he was being a prick. And then he’d marry her and take her off to
his private beach in the Maldives.

  It then occurred to Darrell that she’d spent the last five minutes in her head, and that they were now actually at the café, where Patrick and Clare, with Tom, were already waiting at an outside table, under a green sun umbrella. Darrell regretted the mental excursion because now she had no time to plan what her tactics might be if Clare launched into her about something to do with Cosmo. She also regretted not taking up Anselo’s offer to strap on the baby carrier. It was mid-July, already seventeen degrees at ten in the morning, and Cosmo felt like a hot-water bottle filled against safety advice with boiling water. A little pool of sweat was starting to gather in Darrell’s cleavage where Cosmo’s head lay, but as he was still asleep, she was reluctant to move him. She sank down into a spare chair, grateful for the umbrella’s shade, and glanced towards Anselo for reassurance and potential aid. But he’d already slung the baby bag down and gone inside to order. He didn’t have to ask what she wanted — he had it off by heart. Darrell knew she should be pleased that he had bothered to memorise her preferences. But she wasn’t. She was resentful. He’d gone off and left her unprotected, and now all she could do was sit and wait for Clare to begin her inevitable assault.

  The realisation that she absolutely did not want to be here raced through Darrell. But where did she want to be, and with who? Right at this very moment, those were questions she wasn’t at all sure she could answer.

  Clare opened her mouth to speak. Darrell braced herself.

  ‘So we’re all going to Italy,’ said Clare, ‘to share a villa with your friend Michelle. What’s she like?’

  Darrell couldn’t help a glance at Patrick. Surely, thought Darrell, Patrick had given Clare his opinion on Michelle? He’d met her last year when he’d travelled to the States to look at buying a winery (although rumour around the Herne family was that he had needed to escape the pressure cooker that had become his home life before he became the one who exploded).

 

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