The Things You Do for Love

by Rachel Crowther

  ‘I can see it’s a question I should be able to answer,’ Flora said at last. ‘Admitting to regret, or defending Henry. Giving a final judgement one way or the other. I’ve thought about it a lot, this summer. But you know, I can’t. It’s like being asked to weigh up forty years of solid history against a – a film script no one’s even written. You can’t know in advance what the effect of your choices will be, of course, but I did think there might be an answer at the end. A thumbs up or down. But there isn’t. Not about Henry, anyway.’ She smiled; a slightly cautious, characteristically Flora kind of smile.

  They both waited for her to go on, but she seemed to have run out of words, for the moment.

  ‘But if you hadn’t married Henry,’ Kitty asked, mustering her courage again, ‘would you have married Landon instead?’

  ‘Landon never asked me,’ Flora said.

  ‘He was so sad, those last few days,’ said Lou. ‘I think he wishes he could now.’

  ‘Do you really?’ Flora looked astonished; she frowned, apparently considering this. ‘He’s stuck to what he chose,’ she said. ‘Through thick and thin.’

  ‘Is that always the right thing to do?’ Lou asked. Her expression tugged at Kitty; the way she hung on Flora’s answer.

  ‘I honestly don’t know,’ said Flora. ‘I can’t tell you how to choose, or when to stick or twist. All I can say is that you can’t avoid choosing. Not if you want to make anything of life. I almost think – perhaps the choosing itself matters as much as the choice you make. Picking a path and seeing where it takes you.’

  ‘But you chose surgery, too,’ Kitty said. ‘You didn’t just choose Henry.’

  ‘I did,’ said Flora. ‘And I certainly don’t regret that, even if it made me a second rate mother. No, don’t answer that. The last thing I can expect from either of you is absolution.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ said Lou. ‘The last thing you need is absolution. The last thing any of us need is blame, when we . . .’

  Kitty looked carefully at her mother. ‘They’ll certainly remember your name, Mum,’ she said. ‘All those prizes. All those lives you saved.’

  Flora shook her head. ‘It’s Henry they’re having the memorial concert for,’ she said, ‘but that’s not really the point.’

  ‘What is, then?’ Kitty asked.

  Flora hesitated again. ‘Do you remember me saying something, once,’ she said, ‘about not selling yourself short? About the heart and the mind?’

  ‘No,’ said Kitty, although she wished very badly that she could say yes. It seemed vitally important, just now, to follow every turn Flora took. ‘I don’t think I do.’

  ‘It was me,’ said Lou. ‘Kitty was away skiing.’

  ‘Of course. Of course she was.’

  ‘Tell me now,’ said Kitty.

  ‘It was one of my moments of wisdom,’ Flora said. ‘Not that I’ve had many, as far as maternal guidance is concerned. It was – well, one of the times Henry was misbehaving. That Christmas, do you remember? When he was in New York?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Kitty. Her mother looked very young, suddenly: just like those photographs of her honeymoon.

  ‘The gist of it,’ Flora went on, ‘was that if you had to decide, it was better to sacrifice your heart, not your mind. Rather surprising advice, perhaps, given what that philosophy had cost me, but I meant it. I meant that if you have a brain and you use it, you can achieve something, but the things you do for love . . .’

  ‘Are they the things you’re gonna treasure?’ said Kitty.

  Lou and Flora both looked at her.

  ‘It’s a song,’ she said. ‘By Mia van Arlen. “The things you do for love – are they the things you’re gonna treasure?” ’

  ‘Hmm,’ said Flora. She leaned back in her chair, and the look she settled on Kitty made the hairs stand up on her arms. ‘It seems obvious to me now,’ she said, ‘that they are. I wasn’t convinced, back then. That Christmas. I had a pretty firm conviction in the opposite direction. I feel rather embarrassed about that, now.’

  Only her mother, Kitty thought, could talk about love using words like ‘opposite’ and ‘conviction’, but it was clear, in the silence that followed this speech, that it amounted to a declaration of love. She felt her eyes filling with tears as she floundered in search of a response, but before she could find one Lou spoke instead.

  ‘I almost envy you, Ma, having got to where you are. I’m sure that’s a terrible thing to say, but I wish sometimes that I could fast-forward through the next . . .’

  ‘Don’t wish the future away.’ Flora’s voice was gentle, but it was full of her old certainty too. ‘No one should do that.’

  ‘Even you,’ said Kitty.

  ‘Even me,’ Flora said. ‘Away with the past, and on with the future. Pastures new.’

  Kitty felt a sudden stab of apprehension. ‘But you’re not . . .’ she began. ‘You’re not thinking of selling Orchards, are you? I mean, of course –’

  ‘Not Orchards,’ said Flora. ‘No, not Orchards. But I think – Dad’s paintings. Nicholas Comyn’s paintings. I’d like to sell those. I’m not sure whether I can explain it to you, but . . .’

  ‘Away with the past?’ said Lou.

  ‘Not exactly,’ said Flora. ‘They’re just not quite how I remember the past. How I want to remember the past. We get to choose that, too.’

  The sun had been hidden for the last few minutes, and Kitty had had a strange sense that they were all waiting for it to come out – for some sort of vindication. But when, just then, sunlight spilled suddenly through a gap in the clouds, she felt not relief nor reassurance but an inexplicable sadness. She wanted something more for her mother, she understood. Not a conventional happy ending, perhaps, but – the things you do for love, she thought. The things that turn out to be more important than you think.

  ‘What about Martin?’ she asked. ‘Couldn’t you – I know you don’t need a man to do your cooking, or for anything else, but even so, it might be nice to . . .’

  And then she felt foolish. Flora hardly knew Martin, she told herself. And Flora, of all people, knew how troublesome and perplexing love could be. She could just as well say the same thing to Kitty – in fact, perhaps that was exactly the point Flora had been making, she realised now, however hedged about it was. Perhaps she meant to encourage Kitty to be single-minded, but also . . .

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘What do I know about anything?’

  But Flora smiled at her, and glanced down at the tray which still sat, untouched, in the middle of the table.

  ‘Dear Kitty,’ she said. ‘Don’t be sorry. Look at all this delicious food you’ve found. Let’s eat.’

  New Year’s Eve, 1977–8

  This is not, Flora thinks, a party her mother would approve of. That much was clear from the moment they arrived – she and Landon, an escort her mother can hardly object to, whatever her suspicions about the evening’s entertainment. Looking around her now with a sort of awe, Flora tries out the words that might be applied to this gathering and finds them deliciously evocative: louche, debauched, sybaritic. Even the sound of them speaks of things she hasn’t encountered before.

  The party is in a glittering basement club, decked out with silk hangings and fairy lights. The invitation specified fancy dress, and Flora is wearing an old ball gown of her mother’s (a cunning idea on several counts) in which, with a few additions and alterations, she passes muster as Marie Antoinette – not entirely right for the occasion, but Flora is used to the idea of not quite fitting in. Landon is a highwayman, somehow more respectable than reprobate, but closer to the mark. There are several Tarzans, a few bunny girls, a selection of priests and nurses and the odd pirate.

  Henry, whom Flora hasn’t seen for a week, is ravishing in drag. His unruly hair is hidden beneath a black page-boy wig, the angles of his body all too clearly outlined by a grey silk flapper’s dress. Framed by sleek wings of hair and lent emphasis by red lipstic
k and mascara, his face is barely recognisable but his allure is unmistakable. Seeing him across the room, Flora feels a tug of impatience and exhilaration and fear that threatens to overturn all semblance of decorum. This, too, is something new, something greater even than the broil of longing she has lived with for the past few weeks.

  ‘Not a man for modest understatement,’ says Landon, following Flora’s gaze. ‘Shall I get you a drink before we battle our way over?’

  ‘Gin and tonic,’ says Flora, not taking her eyes off Henry. ‘Thank you. Who are those people?’

  ‘With Henry? Nick Comyn is the tall chap. The flying ace, if that’s what he’s meant to be in those goggles. We were at Oxford together, Nick and Henry and I.’

  ‘And the others?’ The others are girls. Flora is more interested in them than the men; in their claims on Henry.

  ‘No idea. That might be Nick’s cousin Pru in the pink. Let’s grab that drink.’

  In the event neither Pru in pink (determinedly attached to her fiancé, a semi-clad pirate whose eyes wander more and more freely as his blood alcohol level rises) nor any of the rest cause Flora more than a flutter of anxiety in the course of the evening. Henry seems intent on asserting his claim on her, which Flora finds more agreeable than she could have believed. She’s introduced to several of his friends (the majority dismissed by Henry in an amusing whisper as soon as they turn away) but doesn’t retain their names. Nick Comyn lodges in her mind, however – gangling, drawling, awkward, he strikes a chord in her. She can tell that his unsmiling countenance is not a sign of hostility, or even unfriendliness, but even so she doesn’t warm to him. He is, it seems, a painter, gaining a modest reputation in certain circles, as he puts it. He’s also, Landon tells her, an aristocrat – a fact Flora registers as counting in Henry’s favour with her parents, although the painting might not.

  The music is loud, much of it familiar – Abba, Status Quo, Showaddywaddy – and alternates tantalisingly between catchy rhythms and beseeching tunes that resonate deep in Flora’s belly.

  ‘Shall we dance?’ Henry asks, sliding up to her ear as she exchanges a stilted sentence or two with Nick. Flora smiles, makes the little self-conscious curtsey that seems required by her costume, and takes his hand. Nick watches them move away; Flora is aware of his scrutiny, of being with Henry in the public eye. She lifts her head, feels her feet moving like a swan’s beneath the wide hem of her dress. As they make their way to the dance floor, the room melts in a blur of colour and sound, a cocktail of sensations so rich and delicious that she wants never to forget them. Her mother’s warnings about being left on the shelf echo in her head, roundly trounced. Here, Flora thinks, is the payoff for all those exams, all those hours in theatre: the opportunity to be her own woman, and make her own choices. Here is the glory of having it all; the prize she was waiting for.

  And now, as she tries to move her body in time to the music, she realises that she is drunk, slipping willingly towards an irrevocable change. She can feel Henry’s body against her, the slippery silk surface of him and the press of bone and muscle beneath. She dares herself to look up at his face, and finds his eyes, deliciously underlined with kohl, already fixed on hers. The music changes from the jigging beat of ‘Tiger Feet’ to the croon of ‘I don’t want to talk about it’, and Henry draws her in close.

  ‘You’ve seen the worst of me now,’ he murmurs in her ear. ‘Do you think you could marry me?’

  Flora freezes, hanging in his arms. For several moments she says nothing, waiting for the white noise in her head to quieten, for Henry to say those words again. Her face is buried in his neck, and his hands are on her back, resting on the tight bodice of her dress.

  ‘No?’ he says, his tone gentle, amused. ‘Sensible girl. Not a good prospect.’

  ‘Yes,’ she says, with a surge of laughing panic. Surely the offer can’t be withdrawn so soon? Surely he can read the rapture in her silence? ‘Of course yes. Absolutely.’

  His hands move up to her head, and he lifts it gently away from him. ‘Are you sure?’ he says, looking into her eyes again. ‘Do you love me enough?’

  ‘Do you?’ she asks.

  ‘Oh yes,’ he says. ‘Oh yes, I do. And I love the idea of being married to a surgeon. I love the idea of you operating all day and coming home to me at night. We’ll be such a couple.’

  *

  ‘Engaged?’ says Landon.

  He looks astonished; aghast even. Below the great wash of happiness, Flora feels a prick of petulance. He’s supposed to be thrilled for her, and for Henry too.

  ‘Yes,’ she says. ‘We’re getting married. People do, you know. Even me.’

  ‘To Henry.’

  It’s more a statement than a question, but even so there’s a strain of disbelief in his voice which causes her, now, a flicker of disquiet.

  ‘Yes,’ she says again. ‘Why not to Henry?’

  And then she understands. She should have realised, should have seen the signs, she thinks, however discreetly they have been veiled all this time. She reaches out her hand and takes his, the words of an apology hovering on her lips. She can’t quite speak them, though; can’t quite bring what hangs between them into the open. For his sake, she thinks. For all their sakes.

  Landon frowns. His face doesn’t do what she expects: there’s no softening, no lightening. Surely he wants her to be happy, Flora thinks.

  And then Henry looms out of the crowd, larger than life, eyeshadow streaking his cheekbones. He looks like a Harlequin, Flora thinks, or a tart. Her chest fills with elation and pride, an extraordinary pressure of happiness.

  ‘Here he is,’ she says. ‘My fiancé.’

  September 2014

  The autumn had set in gently. In the garden at Orchards the apple trees that had given the house its name stooped a little closer to the ground every day, and nearer the house the delphiniums she and Henry had planted the year before made a startling display – the sort of miracle, Flora knew, that other people took for granted. Looking out of the kitchen window this morning, her eye was drawn irresistibly to the wide swathe of cerulean blue, which seemed to resolve, as she gazed, into the complex architecture the flowers revealed at close hand: the tiered rosettes making up those spikes of colour, and the overlapping layers of petals that formed each bloom. Many more layers than were needed: proof, surely, of the extravagant overabundance of nature. Beyond the flowerbed, the lawn stretched away towards sheep-strewn fields and the ring of low hills that rose to meet the cool lightness of the English sky.

  Flora turned away from the window when she heard the sound of a car rounding the corner, and by the time she reached the front door it had pulled into the drive. She waited a second or two before she turned the handle, so Landon was there on the threshold when the door opened.

  ‘Good morning,’ she said. He was dressed – as he had always been, it seemed to Flora – more elaborately than the occasion demanded, in a blazer that was showing its age but would have been made for him, once upon a time, and cavalry twill trousers the colour of paper left out too long in the sun.

  ‘Hello,’ he said. ‘I do have the right day, then.’

  An old joke, offered as a token of something. A password.

  Flora stood back to let him in. It was only a few weeks since she’d seen him, since he’d left St Rémy, but it felt much longer. It felt as though they had been catapulted backward, skipping over that whole episode.

  ‘It looks bare without them,’ Landon said, stopping for a moment in the hall.

  ‘I don’t notice,’ said Flora.

  Landon said nothing, and Flora regretted overstating her case so early. She’d hoped this morning wouldn’t be entirely about the pictures.

  ‘Coffee?’ she offered, as he followed her into the kitchen.

  ‘Goodness,’ he said.

  ‘Haven’t you seen it since we changed things round?’ she asked. ‘Yes, of course you have.’

  Landon had visited just before Henry died – a briefer visit
than Henry would have liked, awkward for reasons Flora had found hard to fathom. Some people can’t bear death, Henry had said afterwards, and she’d held his hand and said, you’re not dead yet, and poured him a glass of Scotch, although she’d known he’d only take a sip.

  ‘It’s an improvement,’ Landon said. ‘I never knew how you lived with that squalid kitchen.’

  ‘It wasn’t squalid,’ Flora said. ‘We liked it.’

  She’d left the coffee pot ready on the stove, and she spent the time while it was brewing wondering where they should drink it. In the end, Landon solved the dilemma for her.

  ‘Shall we go outside?’ he asked. ‘That little terrace was made for days like this.’

  He smiled, the perfectly amiable guest, perfectly familiar old friend.

  So Flora put the cups on a tray and Landon held the door open for her – the new French window she and Henry had put in so that they could get outside easily from the new kitchen. It was true that this sheltered corner was balmy even on colder autumn days than this one. A suntrap, Henry had called it. Before the French window had been installed it had been out of sight of anyone inside the house, and people used to hide there. Flora hadn’t realised that before, but she could see now that that was precisely what it had been used for. Finding the girls playing here, Lou curled in a deckchair with a book and Kitty arranging stones and flowers at her feet, she must have known it was no accident that they were out here while she and Henry were arguing inside – nor that Henry should be discovered nonchalantly absorbed by the newspaper when, in Flora’s mind, he had some case to answer. Perhaps the new door had had more significance than she’d realised, opening up one of the corners that had harboured their secrets and divisions.

  ‘Lovely,’ said Landon. The table and chairs were new too, positioned to catch the sun and give a view of the apple trees. The delphiniums were in plain sight, but Landon gave them no more than a glance. ‘How are you finding it?’ he asked. ‘Being back here, after . . .’

  ‘It’s fine,’ Flora said; and then, because her tone sounded a little defensive, ‘Les Violettes was delightful, of course, but not for ever.’