by Hilary Boyd
Such a momentous summer, she thought, as she settled to sleep that night. She felt like a different person to the one who’d arrived at Eve’s door all those weeks earlier, hot and frazzled by her journey, stifled emotions boring a hole in her peace of mind. She would be eternally grateful to Jack for forcing her to lay her son to rest. He had comforted her, supported her and understood her as nobody else could have done. But the new lightness in her soul had had a knock-on effect. Her previously shut-down heart was feeling way more than was good for her these days.
‘I’ve sold the flat!’ Iain was barely through the garden doors, waving a bottle of champagne in one hand, taking off his sandals with the other – a habit learned in the East – before the words were out.
‘What?’ Stella was in her kitchen, making a spaghetti sauce of beaten eggs, ricotta, spinach and peas; stewing up some gooseberries she would serve with Greek yoghurt for pudding. She pulled the pan containing the bubbling fruit off the stove and stared at him. ‘I didn’t even know you’d put it on the market.’
Iain grinned and slapped the bottle triumphantly on the work surface between them. He looked scrubbed from a recent shower, his heavy hair damp around his tanned face, dressed in his usual jeans and a light-blue T-shirt. It wasn’t warm outside, despite being the second week in August, but he wore no jacket or jumper. Stella didn’t remember him ever complaining of being cold.
‘I didn’t.’ He pulled himself up on one of the stools by the counter. ‘You know my neighbour, Babak? Iranian guy in Flat 17? We sometimes bump into him on the stairs.’
Stella nodded, vaguely aware of a handsome, bearded man in his thirties in smart, tailored suits and a whiff of musky aftershave. He always smiled politely when they met.
‘Well, he pushed a flyer through the letterbox, saying he was looking for another apartment in the building, and I went and had a chat with him. Apparently he wants it for his mother, who’s currently living with him and driving him nuts.’
‘Good solution, if he’s lucky enough to be able to afford two,’ Stella said, knowing Iain’s flat, although barely two bedrooms, one little more than a box room, was worth a lot of money. Iain’s father had lived there for thirty years before he died, leaving it to his son in his will. Which was lucky, as Iain came back from his spiritual wanderings without a bean in his pocket. ‘The universe provides,’ Iain always said of his good fortune.
He laughed and nodded. ‘He’s made a fair offer, probably not what I’d get if I put it with an estate agent, but then there’d be all the hassle, commission, etc.’ He put his head on one side, a slight frown on his face. ‘Are you pleased?’
Stella was more nervous than pleased, but she squeezed his hand tight. ‘It’s brilliant. What’s the timescale?’
Iain got off the stool, wandered over to stand by the windows on to the garden, hands clasped behind his back. The light was fading, the clouds obscuring the setting sun. ‘Babak didn’t say. He’s got to check the place out first, obviously. Sooner rather than later, I imagine, if his mum’s getting on his nerves.’
Stella thought about what this would mean. She wouldn’t have time to do anything with her flat until after the baby.
Iain spun round. ‘As soon as the summer’s over and the work eases off, I can start looking for somewhere. You’ll be down with the family in September, anyway. So you can easily pop over and see places I think might work.’
Stella felt her head spinning. They had barely discussed their plans to buy a house in Kent, beyond the idea of it. If Iain sells his flat, he’ll have to move in here, was all she could think about, a knot of anxiety forming in her gut. Things were moving too fast.
‘You probably don’t even need to sell this place,’ he was saying, ‘unless you want to. You could rent it out for a fortune. The money from Dad’s flat will be enough for the sort of house we want.’
She stared at him. ‘What sort of house do we want?’
‘Let’s talk about it.’ Iain gave her an enthusiastic grin and picked up a tea towel, wrapping it round the top of the champagne bottle and carefully loosening the cork. She reached for two flutes from the back of the cupboard over the dishwasher and placed them on the work surface as the cork popped discreetly from the bottle, letting out a little puff of mist.
Later, as they sat at the table eating supper, Stella found Iain looking at her with that quiet gaze of his as he tried to fathom her mood.
‘I don’t have to move in, if it’s a problem,’ he said, as if he could read her like a book.
She quickly shook her head in denial. ‘Of course you can. Don’t be ridiculous.’
He laughed, his blue eyes knowing. ‘Taking things too fast, am I? I just wasn’t going to pass up such a perfect opportunity.’ He was silent as he finished the remains of his salad, taking big forkfuls of leaves and cramming them into his mouth. Then he put down his fork. ‘Listen, Stella. You know I’m not going to force you into anything. If you’ve had second thoughts about living with me, just say.’ He hesitated. ‘I know you’ve been through it recently. And there’s Eve to think about … But is there something else?’
Stella cursed as a telltale heat crept over her cheeks. How does he know?
She got up and began to gather the blue-and-white spaghetti bowls and stack the salad plates, breathing slowly to manage the flush – a technique she’d learned during the menopause, although it never worked quickly enough – until she was able to meet his gaze again.
‘I’ll admit’, she started, as she carried the dishes over to the sink, ‘that I’ve been feeling all over the place lately.’
Iain nodded his understanding.
‘But that doesn’t change our plans. I just need more time.’ She knew her words were hardly brimming with enthusiasm, but it was all she could manage.
‘OK,’ he said after a minute, but she could tell he was waiting for something more. He’d told her once that his guru – one of them, she couldn’t remember which – had taught him how to be very still and listen to his instincts if he wanted to know the truth. And those instincts, he said, were seldom wrong.
But she couldn’t begin to explain how much this summer had changed her. She knew she should, he would probably have helped her make sense of it. But the words wouldn’t come and she hated herself for being so cowardly in the face of this man who loved her in such an honest, straightforward way.
Iain didn’t push it, but he was quiet the rest of the evening, and decided not to stay, as would usually have been the case. When she asked him why not, he merely told her he had to be up very early in the morning, and gave her a gentle kiss goodnight.
43
Eric had picked Eve up from the hospital on Monday and she’d cried with relief that he was back and they were all together again. It was blissful to feel Eric’s warm body against hers in bed after all the months of being alone, to watch his sleeping face on the pillow beside her and witness Arthur’s arms around his father’s neck. Both of them had spent every waking moment babbling on about all the tiny minutiae of their lives apart – things that had seemed too humdrum to explain during the precious phone calls across the globe, but which were the stuff of a shared life. Each day she woke with surprise that he was there; neither of them could stop smiling.
Arthur, however, was still shy with his father and confused by his sudden presence in their lives. He turned to Eve to do every single thing for him, as if he hadn’t yet realized Eric would be perfectly capable of pouring his cereal in the morning, or getting him dressed. Eve could see how much this was distressing Eric.
It was nearly seven thirty on Thursday evening and the child was still not ready for bed. Eve and Eric had been so absorbed in conversation as they sat with cups of tea at the kitchen table that they hadn’t noticed the time.
‘We should get him up,’ Eve said, indicating their son as he sat on the tiled floor surrounded by his farm animals. ‘He’s exhausted.’
‘I’d take him, but he probably won’t let me,’ Eric
said. ‘I don’t want to upset him.’
Eve took his hand. ‘Give him time. You just have to keep trying.’
Eric sighed and dropped his voice. ‘It’s weird, Evie. When I left, it was just you and Arthur, and he was still a toddler. Then I get home and you’re about to give birth to another baby, and our son has changed beyond all recognition. He doesn’t seem to relate to me at all …’ He paused and shook his head in apparent bewilderment. ‘I feel a bit useless, to be honest.’
‘You’re being brilliant,’ she replied, watching him shrug off her reassurance. ‘You haven’t been back a week yet. He’ll get used to you.’
‘I hope he’ll do more than that!’
She laughed. ‘You know what I mean.’ There was silence for a moment. ‘Have I changed “beyond recognition” too?’ she asked tentatively.
Eric gave her an appraising glance. ‘Apart from becoming two people, you mean?’
‘Yeah, apart from that small consideration.’
‘I’d say …’ Eve waited, realizing she was oddly nervous of her partner’s reply. So much time apart – with such different agendas – could have changed the whole nature of what they meant to each other. But then Eric said softly, his brown eyes suddenly bright with uncharacteristic tears: ‘I’d say you’re still the most beautiful woman I have ever set eyes on.’ She heard him clear his throat. ‘And you’re still the woman I love most in all the world.’
Eve swallowed. Eric found it so hard to voice his emotions, and his words caused her heart to swell with relief. For a moment their attention was caught by their next-door neighbour’s cat, Possum, wandering into the kitchen. Eric got up and gently shooed it out. Then he came up behind her where she sat and rested his hands lightly on her shoulders. Lifting his right hand, she felt his finger softly trace the length of her tattoo. She shivered with pleasure. ‘I meant what I said, Evie.’
She smiled at his words and let out a contented sigh.
‘You’re not still angry with me, are you? For not coming home sooner?’ he asked softly. ‘I think your mum thinks I’m well out of order.’
Eve looked up. ‘Why? What did she say?’
‘She didn’t say anything. I just had the feeling …’
‘I don’t care what anyone thinks. You’re home now.’ As she spoke she felt the tension about the baby’s birth – which had hovered like a huge black bird on her shoulder for weeks now – slowly slip away. She and Eric were in this together; everything would be all right.
44
Jack hadn’t spoken to Stella for a week. He knew she was no longer at Eve’s, but he was dying to get news of her as he and Lisa drove over to the house for Sunday lunch, which Eric had promised to cook. The week had crawled at a snail’s pace. Lisa had been working, leaving Jack undisturbed to write, supposedly. But in fact he had spent the time watching cricket and bringing Stella’s number up on his mobile. He knew he was being pathetic.
‘I hope it’s not lamb,’ Lisa was saying.
‘I thought you loved lamb.’
‘I do. But I don’t fancy it today.’
Jack didn’t reply.
‘So is Stella still here?’ Lisa asked.
‘No, she’s gone back to London.’
Neither spoke as the car picked its way cautiously along the narrow, winding lanes. Jack wanted to avoid the subject of Stella.
‘Eve said she and Iain are buying a place down here soon.’ Lisa broke the silence.
‘Together?’ The word shot from his mouth like a greyhound out of a trap, making his wife’s eyebrows rise.
‘Well, yes. Didn’t you know? Eve says they’re finally taking the plunge. I must say, I’ve always thought it a bit strange, living in separate flats all this time when they seem to get on so well.’
Trying to calm his voice, he asked, ‘When did Eve tell you this?’
Lisa shrugged. ‘Not sure. Last time we were down?’ She turned to look at him. ‘You sound surprised.’
Why didn’t Stella say anything to me? he thought, agitatedly.
‘No, not really,’ he said out loud. He hadn’t been jealous of Iain till this very second. Theirs seemed such a detached affair, something of a convenience more than a relationship. But buying a place together? As they turned into Eve and Eric’s gate, he tried to control his jealousy, painfully aware that he had no right to any such sentiment as he sat cosily beside his wife.
‘So why didn’t they move in together before?’ Lisa was asking.
‘No idea. I hadn’t seen Stella for years, don’t forget. I imagine it was something to do with Eve.’
Lisa considered this as she slowly undid her seat belt. ‘No, that can’t be right. Iain and Stella weren’t an item until Eve was in her twenties.’
‘You’ll have to ask her,’ Jack said, realizing his tone was unnecessarily brusque. He didn’t understand why she was taking such an interest. But Lisa didn’t seem to notice.
‘I hope they do.’
He turned the engine off and opened his door. ‘What?’
‘Move in together,’ she said, but Jack wasn’t listening. He was trying to work out how he felt about what Lisa had just told him.
As they walked round the side of the house, a small bundle erupted from the kitchen door.
‘Grandad, Grandad, Daddy’s home!’ Arthur barrelled into Jack’s legs.
Jack swung him up and hugged his small body, kissing his curls and whirling him round.
‘That’s great news, little man,’ he said, as he carried his grandson into the house.
Arthur was grinning. ‘He’s been in the ’Tartic, and he saw penguins and whales and snakes.’
‘Wow! Snakes?’ He caught Eve’s eye as they stepped into the kitchen and smiled. ‘I didn’t know there were snakes in the Antarctic.’
‘There are,’ Arthur insisted earnestly. ‘Lots. Daddy saw them.’ He wriggled to be free of his grandfather’s arms and rushed off to the corner where his toys were to pick up a large green rubber snake. ‘Like this.’ He made a hissing noise and waggled the snake threateningly at Jack.
Eric chuckled, his normally chalky face flushed from the open oven, his rimless glasses all steamed up. He was extracting a large, battered roasting tin, containing chicken pieces, lemon quarters, garlic cloves and halved new potatoes dotted with sprigs of rosemary and olive oil, which he set on the side for basting. The smell was mouthwatering.
‘It’s way too cold for snakes, Arthur. I told you, they’d all freeze up,’ Eric said.
But his son remained adamant, holding the snake to his ear as if he were listening to something. ‘Snaky likes the cold; he just told me.’
‘How’s it been going?’ It wasn’t till after lunch that Jack had a chance to talk to his daughter alone. Lisa had taken Arthur outside, over to the dilapidated wooden shed in the corner of the garden, where his father was fixing stabilizers to a small, second-hand bike he’d bought the previous day. It looked almost new to Jack, with a sky-blue frame, orange seat and grips and multicoloured streamers trailing from the handlebars. He could see his grandson jumping up and down, barely containing his impatience as Eric worked.
Eve sat at the table while Jack stacked the dishwasher, scrubbed the roasting tin and washed up the wine glasses they’d used for the Californian red opened at lunch, which neither Eric nor Eve had tasted.
‘Yeah, OK, I suppose,’ she said, yawning. ‘Although I’m sick of sitting around like a beached whale, doing bugger all.’
‘How’s Eric coping with family life?’
‘Umm, there’s been a few ups and downs with Arthur.’ She gave him a tired grin. ‘Eric’s desperate to get him riding a bike,’ she added, ‘although he seems a bit young to me.’
‘Not my favourite parenting experience,’ Jack said, remembering running behind his daughter, bent double, holding the back of the bike seat as she wobbled up and down the Holland Park boardwalk. ‘It was bloody freezing, my hand went blue holding the seat, my back was in spasm, but every time I sugges
ted we call it a day, you point-blank refused. You just wouldn’t give up till you’d cracked it.’ He smiled at the memory of his little daughter in her pink helmet, red hair streaming behind her, face set with concentration.
‘And did I?’
‘Oh yes. It was almost dark, sub-zero by then, but you finally got the hang of it in a crazy, headlong rush. I thought you were going to kill yourself, you rode so fast.’
Eve laughed. ‘I think I’ll leave it to Eric, then.’
‘So, how’s your mum?’ Jack said, as he dried the glasses. It was the question he’d been desperate to ask, the bike conversation just a stop-gap, his eye constantly on Lisa, leaning back against the shed as she chatted to Eric, in case she came back before he’d had a chance to ask his daughter about Stella.
‘Fine, I think. We’re all on hold till we know what’s happening with this little madam.’ She stroked her bulging belly lovingly. ‘I’m sure it’s a girl, by the way. But we don’t mind, as long as everything’s OK.’
Jack didn’t want to talk about the baby. ‘I hear she’s moving down here.’
Eve’s face lightened. ‘Isn’t it brilliant? She says Iain’s already sold his flat.’
Jack nodded. ‘Umm, so this moving-in-together thing …’
His daughter shrugged. ‘Mum says she’s good with it. Says it feels right. About time, I say.’
‘As long as he’s not pressurizing her,’ Jack said, which made Eve chuckle.
‘If anyone’s being coerced, I’d say it was Iain.’
‘Really? You think your mum’s the one driving the move?’
‘Dunno. Maybe not. She hasn’t told me much. But Iain used to be a Sannyasin, don’t forget, which means he doesn’t believe in owning people or material things, wants to be free from meaningless conformity – all that spiritual malarkey.’ She paused. ‘Although he’s such a decent guy, I shouldn’t sneer.’
Jack couldn’t make out the significance of Iain’s hippy beliefs when it came to Stella. ‘But you think Stella wants to live with him?’ he persisted.