Pug Actually

by Matt Dunn

“What? Oh, I...” Luke is standing there, obviously nonplussed at the sight of a man he doesn’t know answering Julie’s door. He takes a half step back and looks up at the house, as if to check he’s at the right place, then he frowns. “Is Julie here?”

  “Who’s asking?” says Julie’s dad, in a friendly tone, so Luke—perhaps assuming that means “yes,” smiles at him.

  “I’m Luke,” he says.

  Julie’s dad seems a little confused, then he looks down to see me still growling, and evidently puts two and two together. “Luke.”

  “That’s right. She might have mentioned me?” Luke grins again. “And you are?”

  “Trying to think of a good reason not to slam the door in your face.”

  “Ah.” Luke takes another half step backward. “She has mentioned me, then?”

  “She has,” says Julie’s dad, impassively.

  Luke is looking a little nervous. Julie’s dad is hardly the biggest person in the world, and certainly isn’t the most menacing, but Luke’s proved himself to be a coward. Between the two of us I think we could take him, and I also suspect Luke knows this.

  “So, is she? Here?”

  “No.”

  “Right.” Luke hesitates, then peers over Julie’s dad’s shoulder and along the hall, as if expecting to spy Julie hiding behind the coatrack. “Only, I saw her car, so I thought...” He nods at Julie’s Fiat, as if he thinks proving he knows what car she drives might help his case.

  “What did you think, exactly? That you could call in for a bit of hanky-panky before heading back home to your wife?”

  Luke lets out a brief laugh, perhaps at Julie’s dad’s old-fashioned description, before realizing perhaps he shouldn’t have, and the grin leaves his face so quickly it’s as if a switch has been flicked.

  “I’m sorry. Who are you again?”

  “I’m Julie’s father,” says Julie’s dad. “And it’s not me you should be apologizing to.”

  Luke appears a little confused, as if he’s expecting Julie’s dad to enlighten him, and when he doesn’t, he starts to back away down the garden path, clearly realizing he’s made a mistake.

  “Oh-kay,” he says. “Well, if you could tell her I... Actually, no, don’t bother, I’ll...”

  “Not so fast.” Julie’s dad takes a step after him, shoots out a hand so quickly I don’t see it, and grabs Luke’s wrist in an iron grip. “I think you and I should have a little talk. Don’t you?”

  By the looks of him, Luke clearly doesn’t agree. “Actually, I have to...” He tries to peer at his watch, but the grip Julie’s dad has on his wrist means he can’t quite see the dial. Or get away.

  “That’s right. You have to,” says Julie’s dad. Then he stands to one side and, maintaining his grip on Luke’s wrist, ushers him in through the door.

  * * *

  Somehow the evening has taken rather a surreal turn. Julie’s dad’s made tea, and right now, he’s sitting on the sofa, while Luke is perched on the front edge of the armchair, looking like he’d rather be anywhere but here. I’ve taken a strategic position underneath his outstretched legs, where I’m currently growling softly, though not loud enough that I can’t follow the conversation, although up until now, it’s mostly been polite chitchat about how Luke takes his tea.

  Once they’ve both got a mug in front of them, Julie’s dad looks down at me and puts a finger to his lips. Then he sits back in his seat, blows across the top of his mug, and clears his throat.

  “So I understand you’re expecting?”

  Luke nods, even though he looks like he’s not sure what he’s expecting at all. “Yeah. Well, not me, obviously. My w...” He stops talking abruptly, obviously deciding that reminding Julie’s dad of his marital status might not be the smartest of moves.

  “So you do admit you’re married?”

  “Technically,” says Luke, nervously.

  “And yet you and Julie were...?” Julie’s dad seems to be trying to find the right word. Unsuccessfully, as it turns out. Though Luke’s possibly keen he doesn’t either.

  “Um, yeah,” he says, quickly. “But at the time, I was—my wife and I, I mean—were separated.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Well, we were thinking about it. At least, I was. Because we’d been having some problems.”

  Julie’s dad eyes him suspiciously. “And they’re all sorted now? Those ‘problems’?”

  “Well, that’s what I’m here to talk to Julie about,” says Luke, a little less confidently. “What with, you know, me about to be a dad, and all that. Because obviously I want to do the right thing. By everyone.”

  “The right thing.” Julie’s dad nods slowly. “In that case, may I give you some advice?”

  He’s said it in a way to suggest he’s not really asking for permission, and Luke swallows hard. “Sure.”

  “Because it can be hard when you’re expecting a child. Puts a strain on any relationship, I can tell you. Then eventually this tiny, helpless thing arrives and all of a sudden, you fall head over heels in love. And then you realize you’ll do anything to protect them. And that’s a feeling that stays with you forever.” Julie’s dad leans forward, so his face is close to Luke’s. “If you get my drift.”

  Luke swallows even harder. “Sure.”

  “Good. So. One question.”

  “Then can I go?”

  Julie’s dad smiles noncommittally. “Do you love her?”

  “Who?” says Luke, though it’s a stupid question.

  “Julie, obviously. Since it’s also obviously not your wife.”

  Luke opens his mouth to protest, then evidently thinks better of it, and shuts it again. “It’s...”

  “If you say ‘complicated,’ you’ll end up wearing that,” says Julie’s dad, pointing at Luke’s mug.

  “But it is,” protests Luke, as I move out of the splash zone, just in case. “You’re a man of the world. You must know what it’s like?”

  “What what’s like?”

  “Marriage. I mean, it’s not our natural state, is it, if you think about it. We’re men. We’re born to procreate.”

  “Which, correct me if I’m wrong, you’re doing with your wife?”

  “Well, yeah, but...” Luke gives a shrug, but it’s hard to know what he means by it. “You married, are you?” he says, perhaps in an attempt to switch the focus away from himself.

  “I was,” says Julie’s dad, curtly.

  “Left you, did she?”

  “In a way.”

  “Right, but you were together, for, what...?”

  “Not nearly long enough.”

  “So you understand the...ups and downs a marriage can go through?”

  “I understand there are ups and downs. And they cancel each other out. The downs certainly don’t mean you go running off with someone else. Particularly if you’re just leading that someone else on. And especially if that someone else is my daughter.”

  “I wasn’t leading her on.”

  “You told her you’d leave your wife for her.”

  “Well...”

  “And have you?”

  Luke shifts uncomfortably in his chair. “Well, that’s kind of why I’m here.”

  “That doesn’t answer my question.”

  “To see if I...need to.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Yes, well, like I said, it’s...” Luke sets his mug down on the coffee table, careful to place it out of Julie’s dad’s reach. “Complicated.”

  “So you keep saying. Though in any case, you’re too late.”

  “Am I, though?” says Luke, and I spot a vein in Julie’s dad’s neck start to throb.

  “You are. So I’d suggest you go back home to your wife, forget all about my daughter, and do your best to live up to those vows you made a few y
ears ago.”

  Luke makes a face. “Till death do us part, and all that?”

  “That’s right,” says Julie’s dad, though there’s a tremor in his voice I haven’t heard before. “Let me tell you, if you have one bit of the thirty years I had with Julie’s mother, you’ll think yourself lucky. And you’ll thank me for putting you straight.”

  “Thirty years.” Luke winces. “You could have killed her, and you’d have been out five years earlier.”

  He’s obviously meant it as a joke, but the look that appears on Julie’s dad’s face suggests he hasn’t found it funny at all. Luke looks at him like that’s a failing, and Julie’s dad picks up on that, because he’s up off the sofa and looming angrily over him.

  “You’d do well not to joke about that kind of thing, son.”

  “Jeez! Lighten up, old man.”

  “I’m just trying to give you a little advice. For your own good.”

  “Yeah?” Luke stands up, so I do too. “Well if you’re such an expert, where’s your wife now?”

  “I...” Julie’s dad hesitates. “Lost her,” he says, and Luke leers at him.

  “That sounds a bit careless, if you ask me!”

  He’s got a point, though as he stands there, grinning inanely, Julie’s dad lowers his voice. “She died,” he says, in little more of a whisper, causing both Luke and me to stare at him.

  As Luke perhaps contemplates how he can possibly come back from that one, my head is spinning. Julie’s mum isn’t simply “lost,” like Santa next door. She’s dead. No matter how many posters he might put up on lampposts around town, she’s never coming back. And now I understand everything.

  “I’ll tell you something,” he continues. “There’s not a day, not one hour where I don’t beat myself up wondering whether I could have prevented it. Done something differently. Every time I look at Julie, I’m reminded of her mother, and it’s simultaneously the best and the worst feeling ever. So to think about someone like you messing her about...”

  “Okay, okay. Keep your hair on,” says Luke, and it’s about now that the evening really takes a turn for the worse. The argument escalates, until Julie’s dad is shouting at Luke, who’s giving as good as he’s getting, even prodding Julie’s dad in the chest as he tries to make a series of points that don’t seem to be relevant.

  I’m on the floor in between the two of them, barking frantically, until suddenly, Julie’s dad stops talking, turns shockingly pale, and clutches his chest right where Luke has been prodding him.

  Luke starts to protest that he wasn’t even prodding him that hard, then Julie’s dad tries to say something, but no sound comes out. He takes a couple of steps backward, collapses down onto the sofa, and his eyes sort of do this funny “rolling” thing until they match how white the rest of his face is. Then everything goes quiet.

  I jump up onto his lap, snort inquisitively, then give his hand a tentative lick, but Julie’s dad doesn’t so much as acknowledge me. Then from behind me Luke says, “Fuck!” softly, then once more, then once more still, although a little louder each time.

  He hurries over to where Julie’s dad is lying, leans in cautiously, and says, “Mister Newman?” softly, as if scared he might wake him. With another “Fuck!” he reaches down, takes him by the shoulder, and gives him a gentle shake, then a slightly harder one, accompanied by a loud “Mister Newman!” leaving me in no doubt he’s definitely trying to wake him up now.

  Luke looks desperately down at me and then back at Julie’s dad. Then he scrabbles for his phone in his pocket and starts to dial a number, but slips it away again just as quickly. He runs both hands frantically through his hair, then says, “Don’t judge me, Doug,” as he picks up his mug, empties it into the sink, wipes the handle on a tea towel, and hurriedly stuffs it into the dishwasher. Then he turns and sprints for the front door.

  I’ve sat through enough medical dramas on television to know that this isn’t a good development, and that now would be an excellent time to summon help. I leap off Julie’s dad’s lap and—at top speed—chase Luke along the hall, out through the front door and along the garden path, eventually managing to get between him and the gate.

  “Out of the way, Doug!” he says, as I block his exit, hackles raised.

  Luke reaches down, as if he’s thinking of trying to manhandle me out of the way, but I bare my teeth just enough to deter him, then begin barking furiously, the very definition of pugnacity.

  “What?” he says, as I let out a fusillade of accusatory yaps. “I can’t. I...”

  I bark some more, then out of the corner of my eye, spot Miss Harris’s curtains twitching next door, and her miserable face appears at the window, so I decide to try a different tactic, just like Julie does whenever Miss Harris is going “off on one.” Who knows, maybe I can appeal to Luke’s better nature. Assuming he has one.

  I stop barking, widen my eyes to their maximum, angle my head so far round that it’s almost painful, then let out the most pitiful whine I can produce, and...it seems to work! Luke glares at me, then he says, “Jesus” under his breath, and—as if doing me some huge favor—retrieves his phone from his inside pocket and presses the screen three times.

  “Ambulance, please,” he says, as I tail him back inside the house.

  Julie’s dad hasn’t moved, and in fact, looks like he’s sleeping, though the noises he’s making aren’t sounding particularly restful.

  “What?” Luke says into his phone, followed by “My, um, friend’s father. I think he’s had a heart attack.”

  He gives our address to the operator, then leans in as if he’s about to give Julie’s dad a kiss, says, “Yes, he is,” and then, miserably, “Right.”

  Then he calls Julie’s mobile, leaves her a brief message, and with a hardly-reassuring, “It’s going to be okay, Doug,” sits heavily down on the armchair.

  And as I run back into the garden to wait for the ambulance, I can only hope he’s right.

  36

  After all of yesterday’s excitement, Julie’s dad’s heart attack seems to have only been of the mild variety. While they kept him in hospital overnight as a precaution, the good news is there’s no permanent damage, and as long as he keeps taking his medication (and keeps off the beer) the doctors say he’s going to be fine. As is Dot, who looked like she was going to have a heart attack when Julie told her what had happened.

  The less than good news, however, is that even though Luke doesn’t unfortunately smell anything like roses, that’s apparently how he has come out of all of this. I’ve even heard the word hero mentioned by Julie herself, along with how he saved Julie’s dad, even though Julie’s dad wouldn’t have had the heart attack if Luke hadn’t been there in the first place.

  “Not all heroes wear capes,” Luke had reminded Julie, half-jokingly, and he’s right. Some of them wear collars.

  What’s even more worrying than Julie’s dad’s mild heart attack is that as a result of all this, Julie seems to have forgiven Luke for most of his past indiscretions. Even worse, when an emotional Julie told him, “I don’t know how I’ll ever thank you,” the glint in Luke’s eye suggested he had an idea or two. All I can hope is that the Tom factor is strong enough to prevent this from happening, along with the fact that nothing else has changed: Luke is still married, and Sarah’s still pregnant with twins.

  “Hey, Doug,” Julie’s dad says, when we pick him up the following morning. “Did you miss me?”

  I jump up on him repeatedly in response, which gets me a bit of a rebuke from Julie.

  “Go easy on him, Doug. He’s still a bit fragile.”

  “Get away with you,” he says, bending over to pick me up, then he straightens up suddenly and leans against the car.

  Julie rushes to his side. “You okay, Dad?” she says, anxiously.

  “I’m fine,” he says, gently removing the supportive hand she’s pu
t on his arm. “Just a rush of blood to the head. Probably from one of the hundreds of pills they gave me. I’m bound to feel a little unsteady.”

  “Right,” says Julie. She opens his door, leans the seat forward so I can jump in the back, then helps her dad into the car. “In?” she says.

  Julie’s dad rolls his eyes. “Yes, thank you,” he says, making a show of shutting the door properly.

  Julie gives me a look, which I do my best to return, then she hurries round to the driver’s side, jumps in, and jabs a finger toward the gym bag next to me on the back seat. “I’ve picked up some clothes from your house, and made up the bed in the spare room, so...”

  “We’re not going home to mine?” says Julie’s dad, as we make our way out of the car park.

  “Nope.” Julie lowers the window and feeds her ticket into the machine, accelerating before the barrier comes back down. “We thought it would be better if...”

  “We?” Julie’s dad swivels round to fix me with an accusing stare, and Julie laughs.

  “Not Doug—although he’s pleased you’re staying with us. Dot and me.”

  “What’s Dot got to do with...?”

  “The price of fish?” Julie keeps her eyes fixed on the road. “You’ve had a heart attack, Dad. Like it or not, you need to be some place where someone can keep an eye on you. I’ve taken a couple of days off work. And between me and Doug...”

  “But...”

  “It’s not forever. The doctor said you just need to take it easy for a few days. Let someone else look after you for a change. Get a bit of light exercise in,” she adds. “Eat properly. Which means if you see Dot, no...”

  “I think what two consenting adults get up to is none of your...”

  “Muffins,” says Julie, dryly.

  “Julie, love...”

  Julie shuts him down with a look. “I’ve already lost one parent,” she says. “I’m not keen on losing another just yet, if it’s all the same to you?”

  Julie’s dad opens his mouth to protest, then shuts it again. Secretly, I think he’s quite pleased with the arrangement, and so am I. After all, with Julie’s dad staying with us for now, Luke surely won’t be darkening our front door anytime soon.