An Ocean Apart

by Robin Pilcher

  “I’m going down to Glasgow next week for the Whisky Association meeting, and, well, Duncan is heading off to Europe at the same time, so”—he began pulling at his ear-lobe with the thumb and forefinger of his right hand—“it’s really just a question of who is going to be able to go over to the States.” He quickly picked up his whisky glass and took a mouthful as a way of giving himself the excuse to be silent while his son came to terms with what was being said.

  David leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. “What about Robert McLeod?” he said softly. “What’s he doing at the minute?”

  His father let out a short laugh. “Well, you know Robert better than any. He may be financial director, but he’s hardly ever been out of this country, let alone to the States! He’d end up in Alabama or somewhere, and we’d have to send out a search party!” He smiled, but became serious once more when he realized David had not reacted to the light-hearted remark. “Anyway, like everyone else on the board of Glendurnich, Robert’s getting a bit long in the tooth to be able to cope with something like this.”

  David shut his eyes and nodded slowly. “So, what you’re actually saying is that Duncan wants me to go.”

  Alicia, who had been sitting quietly listening to her husband explain the situation, cut in. “Darling, the last thing we want in the world is for you to go out there, especially when we know that you don’t feel up to it. We, of all people, understand this, David, but you also have to realize the predicament your father is in.”

  David rubbed at his forehead with the fingers of his right hand. “It’s not only that I don’t feel particularly up to it. It’s just that I don’t want to be too far away from the children at this precise time.”

  George paused for a moment, then reached out and placed his hand on his son’s arm. “Listen, David, I do realize this, and I actually mentioned this very point to Duncan. However, he did say that he would make it fairly painless. Really, all you will have to do is to go over there for a couple of days to make the appointment. It will be a very simple operation and you’ll be back almost immediately.” He paused and looked once more at his wife for her silent support before continuing in a calm and reasoning voice. “Your mother and I also think that it might be a good opportunity for you to get away from here for a bit. I know that at the moment you might not think this is right, but I have a feeling that once you’ve made the break, it could be of benefit.”

  David picked up his napkin from his lap and threw it on the table and, pushing his chair away, he began to get to his feet. “Right—well, I’ll give it some thought.”

  Alicia put up her hand, stopping him half-way out of his chair. “David, please … just sit down for a moment.” She gathered her thoughts while he settled down once more. “David, your father and I are trying our best to do everything to help you at the minute … and it’s very difficult … because we know how much you are bottling up inside yourself. We watch you every day becoming more and more introverted, and … well, it really is becoming too much of a strain on us old things.” She looked at her husband, who sat silently in his chair, his face grey with fear of overstepping David’s gossamer-thin tolerance level. “You see, life has to go on—not only for us, but for you—and, most important of all, for the children. We have to try to get back to some sort of normality, and everyone in the household is making the hugest effort to achieve this, even though the immediate past has been so damaging.” She stopped and cleared her throat, her voice beginning to quiver with emotion. “I don’t mean to be hard, David, but you have to come some way to helping us—and to start talking to us, otherwise I don’t think that your father and I will really be able to cope with the situation much longer.”

  David glanced across at his parents, noticing the look of sheer sadness on his mother’s face, while his father, issuing a gruff cough to cover for his emotions, took a handkerchief from his top pocket and loudly blew his nose. Somewhere deep in the turmoil of his brain, the sight of them showing their despair so openly pinpricked at a sense in David which had been hitherto anaesthetized. He chewed slowly on his bottom lip before eventually speaking.

  “For eighteen years of my life … I shared it…” He stopped, wrestling with his brain to get the word out, like someone who had suffered a massive stroke and was going through the agony of learning how to talk again. “… with Rachel.”

  He looked around the room and therefore didn’t catch the slight movement that his mother made as she reached over to hold the hand of her husband under the table. David continued, his voice coming out in spasmodic phrases.

  “We … were … one. We thought the same things … we laughed at the same things … we lived the same … we were the same … and…” He paused and took in a choking breath. “… now that she’s no longer here … I feel lost … and empty … and I don’t have any feelings any more. I find it difficult to show gratitude, because … my powers of being able to notice even the smallest kindness … seem to have been purged from my body.” He wiped roughly at each eye with the back of his hand. “There is now … this huge void in my life … I have no senses … my emotions are gone … my self-confidence is gone … everything is gone.” He glanced briefly at his parents. “But even if I can’t feel anything, I do know … that you two have both been wonderful over the past six months … and I also know that I haven’t shown my full appreciation for what you have done … but I do … appreciate it, that is.”

  “Darling, you don’t need to—” his mother started.

  “No, please,” David interrupted, “let me finish.” He got up from his chair, stuck his hands in the pockets of his jeans, and again gathered his thoughts before continuing slowly and methodically. “I guess I’ve shut out everything in the world … because my own world no longer matches with it. For most of the time, I walk around existing as if nothing has happened to change my life … ever … then suddenly it’s there, reality, right bloody there in front of me.” His voice crescendoed as he angrily spat out the words through clenched teeth. “And just as I think, right, now you stupid bugger, this is where you can stand up and face it”—he paused and sat back down on his chair again before continuing almost inaudibly—“the shut-off valve cuts in again.”

  His mother looked across at him tenderly. “Darling, I know it might sound a bit of a cliché, but I really do think that this has to be nature’s way. I would imagine it’s a bit like losing an arm or a leg. To begin with, the mind numbs the senses, but eventually the reality, the pain, does catch up with you. It will catch up with you, David, and you will be able to face it … and you will come through it all right and begin to build your life again … I know so.”

  George and Alicia watched as their son stood up from his chair and walked up to the far end of the dining-room. He turned to face them. “You’re probably right. Maybe I should go away, because I don’t really want to be around here when it all does catch up with me.” He stopped and began tracing a line down the pattern of one of the heavy damask curtains with his finger. “Because no matter how hard I try, I cannot … physically … move one step around here without thinking of Rachel. Everything and everybody reminds me of her … and I resent that … so I end up feeling … sad, depressed … even embittered towards those who are closest to me … like you two … and Effie … and, God forbid, even Jock sometimes!” He breathed out a shallow laugh and stuck his hands back in his pockets. “You know, I really thought that by staying out of our own house, it would make it easier. But it doesn’t work. Rachel is everywhere.”

  He turned and walked back down the room towards his parents, giving them a forced smile of reassurance. He breathed out heavily. “Pretty hopeless, huh? Pretty bloody hopeless!”

  Reaching across the table for David’s empty whisky glass, George rose slowly to his feet, took his stick from the back of the chair, and picking up both his and David’s glass with the fingers of his free hand, made his way to the sideboard. “I think that we could both do with another one, don’t you, my
boy?” he said with false cheerfulness in his voice. He poured two large whiskies, added a splash of water to each, placed one on the table, and slowly pushed it across to David with his stick. “One good thing, I suppose—there’s plenty more where that came from!”

  David looked at him and smiled and took the glass off the table. His father plumped himself heavily back down on the chair. “David,” he said slowly. “There’s never going to be a good time for you to make this trip, but I’m afraid that it really does look as if you will have to go. If you could bear to, I think that it would be a good idea if you came into work with me tomorrow, just to have a quick word with Duncan. Then, as soon as he’s briefed you, you can bring the car back afterwards, and I’ll get a ride back.” He lifted the tone of his voice in an attempt to inject a tinge of lightheartedness into the overriding oppression of the conversation. “I was just telling your mother that I met a charming young boy in the distillery today by the name of Archie McLachlan. Turns out he’s the grandson of Gregor McLachlan.”

  David smiled and nodded. “Yeah, I know Archie. I took him on for work experience just before I left.”

  “Well, he seems to be a very willing young man. I’m sure that he won’t mind giving me a lift.” He paused and looked across at his son. “Rest assured, David, that while you’re away, your mother and I will give every support that you might need—with the children and everything. You’ll only be away for a short period, and then, when you return, we can take it from there. If you feel you need a bit more time, then you can certainly have a look at that bit of the garden down by the loch.” He looked across at David. “How does that suit?”

  David didn’t reply immediately, but bent forward and picked up the glass of whisky off the table. “Well, whatever plans Duncan comes up with, I don’t want to leave without seeing the children.”

  “No, of course. I quite understand that.”

  David nodded slowly. “Right.” He held up his glass to his parents. “Well, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll just take this up to my room.”

  He began making his way across the room, then, as an afterthought, turned back and walked over to his mother. He put his arm around her neck and gave her a kiss on either cheek. “’Night.”

  “Good night, darling/my boy,” his parents said in unison, and watched him walk to the end of the dining-room, open the door and leave. For a moment they sat there wordlessly, their eyes fixed on the door, both lost in their own private thoughts, before the movement of one broke the trance of the other.

  “Well done, old girl,” George said quietly, smiling across at his wife. “At least you started to get him talking.”

  Alicia did not reply immediately, but sat fiddling with an unused spoon on the table. “He’s on a knife-edge at the minute, Geordie. He could go either way.”

  George leaned across and squeezed his wife’s hand. “I know he is. I also know what he’s talking about, this thing of being devoid of all feeling. I remember being like that during the war, seeing friends and comrades killed in battle, and just having to carry on.” He took another drink of whisky. “I’d really forgotten until he started to speak about it.”

  “He will be all right, won’t he?”

  “Yes, I’m sure he will”—he slowly nodded—“but I’m afraid he’s yet to suffer that cold hard shock to his system.”

  “You didn’t say it all, did you?” Alicia said quietly.

  “What? About Duncan’s ultimatum?” He shook his head. “No, I couldn’t. I think it’s best to leave it as it is, and see how it works out.” Pushing himself laboriously to his feet, he picked up his stick and walked round to his wife’s side, placing his hand on her shoulder. “Come on, old girl, I think we’re both pretty well emotionally drained. Let’s turn in as well.”

  Alicia got up and linked her arm through her husband’s. They walked together to the door, and as he opened it, she pressed the bell to signal to Effie that the dining-room was clear.

  Chapter SIX

  For a moment, David stood motionless in his bedroom, his eyes closed, allowing its soothing quiet to envelop him slowly and gently ease the clamour in his mind. Putting his whisky glass on the dressing-table, he walked over to his bed and sat down heavily, leaning his elbows on his knees and rubbing at his face with both hands.

  “Oh, bugger!” he said softly.

  He fell back on the bed and lay looking up at the ceiling, wishing that there were an easy way to refuse his father’s request. But there wasn’t. Too much had been said over dinner, too many things had to be considered. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat up again. His parents were right. He did have to start getting some sort of perspective into his life, and even though the prospect of flying over to the States and having to conduct business once more with people that he had never met filled him with trepidation, he realized now that ending his closeted and protected existence at Inchelvie was inevitable—and that forcing himself into contact with others would, in the long-term, be healing.

  Yet it really did terrify him. He got to his feet and walked over to the dressing-table and took a gulp from his whisky glass. In pouring it, his father had been overgenerous with the whisky and less so with the water, and he coughed involuntarily as he felt it burn its way down deep into his stomach. He was about to turn back to the bed when he stopped, his eye caught by the photograph that stood propped up against the wall at the back of his dressing-table. He reached forward and picked it up. It was one that he had taken himself about two years previously—of Sophie, Charlie and Harriet in a boat on the loch, the soft evening light gently bouncing off the mirror-calm surface of the water and accentuating the glowing smiles on the children’s faces. Sophie was pulling hard on the oars, her giggling face tipped up towards the sky as she tried her hardest to get the heavy craft on the move, while Harriet sat in the stern, looking open-mouthed over the side of the boat in the belief that she would soon pull out a fish with the help of her bamboo cane with string attached. Charlie meanwhile balanced precariously on one foot on the seat in the bows, his outstretched arms tipped to one side like the wings of a banking jet, as he halfheartedly fought his compulsive desire to fall overboard.

  Smiling to himself, David opened up the top drawer of the chest and took out a pair of socks and gave the dusty glass of the photograph a wipe before placing it carefully back in its position. He took a pace back and stood looking at it for a moment, then his eyes dropped to another picture that had been concealed in the drawer. He hesitated, then took it out and, without viewing it, carried it to his bed. Falling back on the faded yellow eiderdown, he lay there looking up at the ceiling, the picture face-down on his chest. After a moment’s meditation, he held it up.

  It was a photograph of a wedding group—its colour almost faded out from having stood too long in direct sunlight—of himself and Rachel, flanked by an undisciplined gaggle of little bridesmaids and pages who strained at the leash, wanting to be anywhere else at that time but in the picture. To David’s left, dressed in a black morning suit and looking somewhat out of place amidst the profusion of kilts, stood his best man, Toby, who leaned forward looking along the line at Rachel, a beam of sheer delight on his face. The photograph was one that had not been initially selected by the mimsey little wedding photographer, who had stated categorically that he didn’t want to use the photograph as “it does not meet with my general high standards of portraiture.” However, David had clandestinely saved it from the outtakes, as it was the only one that he really liked of the wedding, the reason being that as he looked towards Toby in admonishing seriousness, Rachel was looking directly at the camera, her face overflowing with laughter, having just secretly undone the buckle of his sporran, the shutter of the lens only managing to catch the image as a streaked blur as it fell to the ground.

  David dropped the photograph back down to his chest and closed his eyes, suddenly cradled in the enveloping warmth of humorous nostalgia. He remembered now that he had chosen the photograph because
at that time he had realized that it encapsulated every facet of Rachel’s character. Direct, funny, incredibly beautiful. He felt his face break into a smile and he crossed his arms over the picture, hugging it to his chest, his pain gradually fading out of focus.

  * * *

  “Tell me again why Frank was called Frankie Push-Push?”

  “What?”

  “Frankie Push-Push. You remember—your friend at Oxford. Why was he called that?”

  “God, what made you think of that?”

  “I always think of things like that. They’re all very precious memories—things like that.”

  David looked across at his wife on the bench beside him and reached over and tucked the tartan rug around her neck. Even though they were in the relative warmth of the old summer-house, he knew that she really shouldn’t be out of her bedroom—not when it was this bloody cold.

  “This is mad. You should be in bed.”

  “Come on, don’t fuss. I’m all right. I just looked out of the window and saw you working, and I wanted to be with you.”

  Giving a shrug of resignation, David got up and walked over to the corner of the dark-pined room. He picked up an old paraffin stove and gave it a shake to check if there was any fuel in it.

  “Should be enough,” he said, removing the funnel and delving in his pocket for a box of matches. He lit the wick and watched as the thin yellow flame worked its way around each side to meet, then, replacing the funnel, he adjusted the flame until it glowed blue through the little window. Instantly, the summer-house was filled with its heady, comforting smell.

  As he sat down again, Rachel unravelled her hands from the rug and pulled her woolly hat farther over her ears. “Well?”

  David frowned at her for a moment before remembering her question. “Ah, yeah, Frankie Push-Push.” He put his arm around his wife’s shoulders and eased her gently towards him, ever conscious of her now constant pain. “Well, it was all a bit naughty really. He just happened to turn up at the flat one evening with a girl who turned out to be, well, somewhat loud when it came to love-making, and we all just happened to hear her yell out. ‘Push! Frankie, Push!’ probably at rather an important moment. Anyway, the next morning, I happened to call him Frankie Push-Push, really just as a passing remark, and he was so taken aback that he sort of blew out his mouthful of cereal across the table. After that, the name just stuck; actually, as it turned out, to his own egotistical pride and joy!”