The Missing Letters of Mrs Bright (ARC)

by Beth Miller

  My God, Piet was a strange chap and no mistake. I sat back, and realised that Martine had already spoken to the last couple of people, and I’d failed to register their names. She shuffled some papers on her lap, cleared her throat, and said, ‘ACODs stands for Adult Children of Divorce, and we are a much-overlooked group. Mostly, researchers who study the impact of divorce consider only young children, and of course they do suffer greatly. But so do those of us who were adults at the time. What are some of the things people have said to you when you told them that your parents were splitting up?’

  Everyone but me chipped in immediately, talking over each other in their eagerness to share.

  ‘It’s not as bad as if you were a kid.’

  ‘Good of them to wait till you were an adult so it has less impact.’

  ‘How nice for them, starting again before it’s too late.’

  Martine nodded vigorously after each comment. ‘Yes, exactly!’ she said.

  ‘I have one,’ Piet said, leaning forward towards Martine. ‘People said that at least I knew it wasn’t my fault, because I was no longer living at home.’

  ‘People said that to you?’ I said, looking at Piet. He nodded solemnly.

  ‘A friend of mine asked if I’d be having a bedroom in both parents’ houses,’ Phone Boy said, ‘and started laughing, like it was a joke.’

  ‘Yes,’ Martine said, ‘people do sometimes seem to find it quite funny. Why do we think that is?’

  ‘It’s a bit comical, I suppose,’ an older man on Piet’s other side said. ‘Like instead of settling down to a pipe and slippers, the man is deluded that he’s going to start again with a young girlfriend and a red sports car.’

  ‘It’s not only men who leave,’ Martine said, ‘but yes, thank you Adrian, that’s part of it, isn’t it? Our expectations of what an older marriage looks like.’

  ‘And also,’ said Carol, who was about Mum’s age, ‘everyone knows that divorce is awful for young kids, but if it happens to your parents when you’re an adult, no one knows what to say. So they make a joke about it.’

  ‘That is so true,’ Martine said, nodding vigorously.

  ‘You’re expected to be able to cope, because you’re not a child anymore,’ Adrian said, ‘but actually you’re always your parents’ child, aren’t you?’

  Others in the group muttered their agreement, and began sharing more horrific details of their experiences, but none of it seemed very relevant to me. Certainly none of them had stepped in to the family business and consequently discovered their boyfriend was unfaithful. I sat back in my chair, and discreetly examined Phone Boy aka New Man. Dark hair, cut short but not too short, nice brown eyes. T-shirt and good jeans, the right blue and the right tightness around the, er, pelvic area. I drifted off into a pleasant little reverie about how Phone Boy would never be unfaithful, and how handsome he would look sitting up in my bed without his shirt on, smiling at me, making that ‘call me’ gesture…

  I dragged my eyes upwards, back to his nice face, to discover, oh God, that he was looking straight at me, a faint smile on his lips. Had he witnessed my long slow laser-sweep down his body? I twanged my eyes away. Where had I seen him before?

  ‘… but you know, it can be just as devastating for your parents to split when you’re an adult as when you are a child.’ Martine’s voice broke into my thoughts. I looked round, and realised that everyone was nodding. Carol was crying quietly, tears rolling down her face.

  ‘For some people,’ Martine went on, ‘the awareness that their parent might have waited for them to grow up and leave home before they themselves felt able to leave can be almost impossible to get over.’

  I felt as if Martine had thrown a bucket of cold water over me. It had not occurred to me, until this moment, that Mum might have left earlier had I not come back home after university.

  Piet nudged me, and handed me a pile of papers.

  ‘Take one and pass it on,’ Martine said.

  I looked at the handout. It was reminiscent of a GCSE worksheet, with little squared-off sections and naff clipart decorations. Everyone else was already filling theirs in, and I didn’t even have a pen. I turned hopefully to Piet, but he had his head down and was working diligently on the first question. Then someone was pressing a pen into my hand. I looked up into the kind brown eyes of Phone Boy.

  ‘Thank you,’ I whispered, for the room was silent as an exam room now, with everyone scratching away at their worksheets. I breathed in a wave of his scent – lemony and clean – and he grinned and sat back in his seat. The pen was a blue uniball, medium nib. Once a stationer’s daughter, always a stationer’s daughter. A good choice of pen: classic, dependable, nice flow.

  I stared at the sheet. The opening question was: ‘How did you first hear that your parents were separating?’ I’d deliberately not thought too much about that awful phone call. But now, the question stark in black and white, it all came flooding back. I felt again the anxiety as I pushed coins into the phone box, the suspension of breath before Dad picked up, going over all the worst things that might have happened, the sheer frozen shock to the stomach on hearing him cry that his life was over, ranting and shouting, out of control, chaotic, about all he had done for Mum, all he had done for his family, and for what, what was it all for, it was all so pointless, there was no sense in going on with anything. And finally, my own regrettable words, telling him that Mum had clearly lost her mind, that I would tell her to come back, insist on it, I remembered promising. I hadn’t managed this, had I? Instead I had bitched at Mum, told her off, accused her of taking a gap year, called her selfish, alienated her. My eyes blurred with tears and I could scarcely see my own writing.

  When Piet started wailing it seemed at first a manifestation of my own inner state. Seconds later I realised that he was doubled-up as though in the most awful pain, his head against his knees, his whole body jackknifed in his chair, a horrible noise coming from his mouth. Like an air-raid siren, I thought dimly, remembering that sound from war films I’d watched with Dad. Everyone was staring at Piet, their own problems temporarily forgotten.

  ‘Wah-wah-wah-wah-wah!’ Piet cried, his face hidden in his hands. He began rocking backwards and forwards.

  I put my hand on Piet’s shoulder to comfort him, but it didn’t seem to help. Martine came over and put her arms round him, not an easy task as he was rocking like a crazy person, but after a minute or so he started to calm down. Martine held him until he pulled away and sat up. His face was streaked with tears.

  ‘It is so – so – painful,’ he said.

  ‘I know, Piet. I know,’ Martine said. She had tears in her own eyes. ‘We all understand. I do, and so do all your friends here.’

  I wasn’t sure that I did understand, really, but when he looked at me, I nodded vigorously.

  ‘Thank you,’ Piet whispered. ‘I feel much better, and ready to continue.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Martine got to her feet.

  ‘I am quite sure, Martine, thank you so much!’ He gave one of his beaming smiles, and if you hadn’t seen him a few minutes earlier, you would never have known that he was in the slightest bit of turmoil.

  Everyone turned their attention back to their worksheets, but I felt thoroughly shaken. If Piet, who took everything in his stride, had been so floored by his parents’ separation, was I too going to have some kind of breakdown months or years down the line?

  I went back to the form. ‘How did you first hear that your parents were separating?’ I wrote: ‘Dad rang me but my phone had no battery left,’ and noticed, almost as if watching it happen to someone else, that tears were dripping onto the paper.

  Piet whispered, ‘Are you OK?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, giggling as I was clearly a teary mess and not OK.

  I let the tears fall as I continued writing in shaky letters. I wrote about the panic, trying to find a phone box… then I realised all at once where I knew Phone Boy from, and my tears dried up like a tap being turned off. H
e was the nice librarian, the one who had directed me to the payphone on that awful day. That was why he’d made the phone gesture – he was trying to remind me of our connection. Silly to have done a mobile-phone gesture; I’d have got it much more quickly if he’d acted out a payphone. He’d be a lousy charades partner. I blew my nose and moved on to the next question, which was: ‘Do you wish your parents were still together?’ I hesitated. A few days ago I’d have ticked ‘yes’ so hard I’d have ripped the page, but now… I thought of Mum’s face as she tried to think of things she missed about Dad, of her saying she’d been unhappy. After a moment, I ticked ‘not sure’.

  The next question seemed to have been written specifically for me: ‘Strange things often happen to us as adults in the wake of a parental divorce. Did anything strange or unexpected happen to you?’ I was still compiling what turned out to be a rather long list when Martine suggested that anyone who hadn’t finished – looking round, I could see that category only included me – might like to complete the form at home.

  Martine taught us some meditation exercises for when we felt overwhelmed, and then announced the date of the next meeting, in a month’s time. Everyone thanked her and stood up. I started across the room towards Phone Library New Man Boy – if nothing else, I needed to find a more manageable name for him – but I was blocked by Carol, in full head-tilt mode. I smiled at her vaguely, hoping to be able to keep walking, but she reached out and clasped my hands.

  ‘Are you all right?’ she said, glancing between me and Piet. ‘It’s all still so raw for you. I saw you crying. You and your husband were really connecting with your feelings there, weren’t you?’

  ‘Oh, he’s not my, uh…’

  ‘It doesn’t get any easier,’ Carol said. ‘My parents split in 1995, and I’ve never been the same. I was devastated.’

  ‘Oh dear…’ I could see that Lib-Pho-Boy-New-Man was putting on his leather jacket, which was so cute, very librarian-tries-to-be-edgy. I attempted to extricate myself, but Carol held on firmly.

  ‘Devastated,’ she confirmed, meaningfully, as though devastation was something we shared.

  ‘I don’t think I’m quite… well, you have to manage one day at a time, don’t you?’ I said, praying that a mundane platitude would get me out of being Carol’s new best friend.

  Damn it, LPB was heading for the door. I turned my head to him, my hands still held fast, and he caught my eye just as Carol said, in an unnecessarily loud voice, ‘Still, you’re lucky to have such a handsome and supportive hubby,’ nodding at Piet, who was wrapping his long red scarf round his neck with a flamboyance even Liberace would have considered over the top. LPB made a brief smile of regret, and left the room.

  CAROL! I wanted to shout. You have alienated the hottest man in Essex, and after the ego-bashing I’ve had from Theo, I really need to know I can attract the hottest man in Essex. I’m not asking for him to be my new boyfriend, or anything. I only want a bit of a flirt, is that too much to ask?

  I pulled my hands away, and they slid out of Carol’s damp ones with a slippery squelch. I said, ‘Piet is not my husband.’

  ‘Boyfriend then, sorry!’ Carol trilled. ‘I’m so old-fashioned!’

  ‘He’s not my boyfriend!’

  But it was too late, LPB had gone, and Piet was looming over me saying, ‘Ah, alas, Stella, if only I were,’ and Carol was simpering and stroking the end of his scarf, and now Adrian was coming over to join in the fun, and I wanted to scream.

  I tugged at Piet’s sleeve. ‘Come on,’ I said, ‘I want to go to bed.’

  ‘Is this the invitation I have been waiting for?’ Piet said gallantly. Carol laughed.

  ‘No, Piet. My sights are set elsewhere,’ I said. I linked my arm through his, and we clattered down the rickety stairs and out into the street. Perhaps there was a God, because LPB was standing outside, leaning against the pub wall, looking at his phone. He glanced up as we came out, and I saw him clock my arm in Piet’s. He put his phone in his pocket and began to walk away. I extricated myself from Piet and called, ‘Excuse me!’

  The boy turned, and Piet stepped towards him. Not now, Piet, I thought. I really need you to be somewhere else, any-bloody-where else, please just go away!

  But as the handsome boy looked quizzically at us, Piet said, ‘Please, mate, my friend wants to talk to you.’

  Piet sounded so funny saying ‘mate’ that I couldn’t help laughing. The boy started laughing too.

  ‘She does, does she?’ he said.

  ‘Yes, I do,’ I said. We stood and stared at each other. His eyes were exactly the same colour as a tiger’s eye pendant I owned, dark brown flecked with gold.

  ‘I am surplus to requirements, I believe,’ Piet said.

  Carol tapped him on the shoulder. ‘I’ll keep you company,’ she said.

  ‘That is very kind,’ Piet said, and he allowed himself to be led away. Good old Piet, taking one for the team like that! I thought of him earlier, saying, ‘I will make it up to you, one way or another.’

  ‘He’s not your husband then,’ the boy said.

  ‘He’s my housemate. I don’t have a husband.’ I decided I might as well clear it all up now. ‘Or a boyfriend. I’m completely single.’

  ‘This is useful information,’ the boy said, grinning. ‘I know you’re Stella. I’m Newland.’

  ‘Ah yes, I heard it in the group.’ New Man. ‘Unusual name.’

  ‘Literary parents. They named me for Newland Archer from…’

  ‘The Age of Innocence.’ I had never in my life been more grateful for my school’s English curriculum.

  ‘Ahhhh!’ Newland looked delighted. ‘You’re the first person who ever knew that.’

  ‘I did it for A Level.’ Shut the fuck up, Stella!

  ‘It’s a good book. A bit of a liability, though, for a name. Most of my friends call me Lan, which is shorter, at least. Do you remember me from the library?’

  ‘Yes, you were really kind and let me use the payphone.’

  It was obvious to both of us, I think, that we were talking in code. ‘Do you remember me?’ clearly meant ‘do you like me?’, and ‘you were really kind’ meant ‘you were hot as hell’. It occurred to me with a flash of inspiration that if I stayed out late with Newland – if I, for instance, went back to his place – I could avoid the scheduled confrontation back at the house with Theo.

  ‘Where are you going now?’ I asked.

  ‘Nowhere. What about you?’

  ‘Same.’

  ‘Then, Stella’ – and he held out his hand – ‘shall we go nowhere together?’

  Sixteen

  Kay

  ‘Stunning.’

  ‘More than stunning. Exceptional.’

  ‘Superlative.’

  ‘Astonishing.’

  ‘Exquisite.’

  ‘Beyond compare.’

  I sipped my cappuccino, closed my eyes briefly, then was rocked all over again by the view when I opened them. ‘Bloody gorgeous!’

  Bear laughed. ‘So poetical.’

  It was our third day in Venice, but it was the first time we had done the thing I’d dreamed of – sitting together in a café by the edge of the Grand Canal.

  ‘I still can’t believe we’re really here,’ I said.

  ‘Me neither,’ Bear said. ‘Turns out all you need to achieve a lifelong dream is a bossy friend and a shitload of money.’

  ‘Who knew?’

  We went back to our new favourite pastime, which was gazing at the Grand Canal and failing to find the right adjective to sum up its appeal.

  ‘It’s like a film set,’ I said.

  ‘Except better, cos we’re in it,’ Bear said.

  ‘It’s like a painting.’

  ‘Except better, cos we’re in it.’

  ‘Do you really feel that we add something extra to the timeless beauty of the scene, Ursula?’

  ‘Yes, I do. We are, ourselves, timeless beauties.’

  The water glittered in the lo
w bright sun, and metres from where we were sitting there were gondolas tied up at the shore, bobbing gently up and down. Across from us, on the little island in the canal that housed the tower of San Giorgio Maggiore, someone was getting married. We were too far away to see their faces, but the bride posed for photos alone by the edge of the water, her long train spread out on the ground behind her. I missed my camera; my fingers itched to take her picture as well.

  ‘You see all the films set in Venice,’ Bear said.

  ‘Like Don’t Look Now.’

  ‘That was a good one. But you don’t really believe it’s a real place, not till you’re here.’

  ‘And not even then.’ I finished my coffee and sat back in my seat.

  Bear put her hand on mine, startling me. ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘Thank you for making me come here.’

  ‘I didn’t make you, did I?’

  ‘Well, you didn’t coerce me. You just made me want to come. This is such a beautiful way to spend time. With you. Here.’

  I hadn’t yet dared ask Bear what made her change her mind. I didn’t want to wreck the mood, which was friendly as always, but which I felt depended on me treading carefully. There was an agreement between us – unspoken but as loud and clear as if it had been yelled through a megaphone – to keep things light.

  * * *

  I was the one who’d booked this last-minute, off-the-clock-exorbitant trip. Bear had enough on her plate with organising a week’s study leave from school at short notice. Rose would be proud when she heard how I’d managed all the complicated logistics. It had already cost an arm and a leg – hell, several arms and legs – for me to change my return flight with no notice. And as soon as Bear had said she wanted to come, she showed me the website of an unbelievably beautiful, unbelievably expensive palazzo. I said that a basic Airbnb apartment would be more my speed, but Bear insisted and offered to pay for the whole thing. I couldn’t agree to that, of course, but reasoned that it was only five nights, and when would we ever do such a trip again? I also told myself to think of the fortune I’d saved on all the other holidays I hadn’t had over the last twenty-nine years.