Country Lovers

by Fiona Walker

  ‘You gonna try for King of the Gypsies one day, Ash?’ one asked. It was the biggest organised fight of all, tribe alpha against alpha.

  ‘Not he’s not!’ Carly flared, earning a dirty look from the lad and her husband.

  The bare fist bouts had stopped before they’d met, replaced by army boxing and strict discipline. Carly had made him promise not to return to it now his army days were over, which she knew he resented – especially since his old rival Jed still claimed the family fighting crown – but they needed boundaries for the sake of their kids, all under six. She could forgive the occasional marathon Mortal Kombat session or lashed all-nighter with his shark pack of single mates so long as he didn’t come home with both brows split up and his teeth knocked into his sinuses.

  Despite the dance-floor flights and much throwing up of toffee vodka in the ladies loos, the party was barely getting going, having kicked off at six for the younger kids. Carly tried not to yawn, secretly longing to be at home watching soaps on catch-up. It was so early, she’d see the latest episodes as they were broadcast.

  ‘Nothing’s going on here for hours,’ Ash announced after his second bottled beer. ‘Let’s head over to Flynn’s for a bit.’

  Carly gritted her teeth. The shark pit beckoned.

  Music thumping, dogs barking and dope smoke rising, nineties rock-star throwback Flynn greeted them at the door of his tiny terraced cottage wearing nothing but a skull and crossbones flag wrapped around his snake-like hips, tattoos and neck chains on show.

  ‘It’s an ABC party,’ he reminded them.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Anything but clothes. Amelia’s idea.’

  Flynn’s latest girlfriend was a teenage university student, the riding-mad daughter of two local doctors, all swishy hair and wide-eyed ‘totes!’. Ash and Carly endured her with toothache smiles, uncomfortable in the knowledge that Flynn was sleeping with at least three other clients. Tonight, Amelia had brought a lot of pretty friends, also with swishy hair, excited exclamations and tiny skirts made from sticky tape and bin bags. Carly cast around for any women she knew, but saw none, not in itself unusual. Ash’s old gang was a bachelor pack who, like divorced dad of two Flynn, saw sex as recreational sport, their relationships counting down from first chat-up line to pillow-biting revenge porn.

  All Ash’s usual crew were already there, friends he’d known since schooldays – or bunking-off-school days – none of them embracing the ABC theme, although Ink, the tattooed assassin of the quiet chat-up, was already wearing a pretty blonde on his knee. Meanwhile Roadie, the hulking fridge of music trivia and gross party tricks, was wearing a retro T-shirt featuring a picture of a man with hair like Cameron Diaz.

  ‘Martin Fry – lead singer of ABC, gettit? A… B… C!’ He raised a can from his lair by the stereo.

  ‘You both got a hall pass then, yeah?’ Flynn gave them beer bottles. He was even talking like a student, Carly realised.

  The Turners’ three children were sleeping over with their grandmother, a quiet little woman abandoned long ago by Ash’s father, her fear of going outside compensated by the sixty-inch television constantly beaming CBeebies, soaps and crime after lights out.

  ‘I’m trying to get Mazur-arty next door to join us.’ Flynn picked up his phone to check messages. ‘You know, that sweet piece of arse married to the Polish man mountain.’

  ‘You’re brave. He’s one big bastard.’

  ‘Still in Poland with ze luvink family,’ Flynn said, winking. ‘Little Mrs M came home early, looking for work. Shame for her to sit alone all night. You go round there and invite her over, Carl. She thinks this party is beneath her.’

  ‘It bloody is.’ She eyed the slipping bin bags. One girl had tit-taped CDs to her nipples and thong. ‘And don’t you dare call a woman a sweet piece of arse again in my presence, Flynn Rix. Not unless you want your plain ordinary man-arse embossed with my trainer treads.’ She had no intention of asking the next-door neighbour around, a woman she had no doubt was way too sophisticated for one of Flynn’s seedy sessions, where half the room was usually under age or on probation.

  To prove her point, with a blast of cold air from an open door, her nemesis arrived, his hooded eyes trailing around the exposed flesh with a piratical smile. Older than the others, battle scarred and aloof, Skully was Ink’s big brother, an intermittent member of the group, and the one Carly trusted least. So-called because of the bodysuit of skull tattoos going up to his chin – and because he was rumoured to have broken more skulls than Genghis Khan – he’d been in and out of prison all his adult life, some of it as cellmates with Ash’s long-errant dad, Nat. Skully and Ash’s close friendship worried Carly. There’d been recent rumours that they were fencing stolen goods, although Ash angrily denied it. Whatever secrets they shared, Sully had a hold over her husband she didn’t like.

  ‘Ohmygod! He so looks dangerous,’ Amelia gushed to a friend nearby, then let out a little squeak as Skully sauntered up to Carly and Ash.

  An imperceptible nod passed between the men along with a muttered, ‘Brother.’ Then Skully bowed to Carly, flashing his gold teeth like a threat. ‘Dressed to kill, I see, Carlita.’

  ‘We can test that if you don’t call me Carly.’

  He forced a laugh. ‘You’re lucky I like funny women.’

  ‘And you’re lucky I like boneheads.’ Carly reached across to grab a bin bag before he could reply. ‘Skully, love, have you met Flynn’s girlfriend, Amelia?’

  Grinning, Ash went to fetch more beers while Amelia preened coyly and made introductions to a Sophie, a Chloe and a Figs. Skully looked delighted, especially when Flynn muscled up territorially. If there was one thing the tattooed maverick enjoyed more than winding up his mates’ wives, it was chatting up his mates’ girlfriends.

  ‘Go next door and ask her over,’ Flynn entreated Carly.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because, sweetlips, I think you’d really like her. You need a little friend of your own to stop you winding up Ash’s.’ He dropped his voice. ‘It doesn’t do to mess with Skully. He’ll mess right back atcha.’

  Reluctantly shrugging on her coat, Carly found Ash returning from the kitchen, dipping his head beneath the ceiling beam, bottle necks threaded between his fingers.

  ‘Just running next door, okay?’

  ‘No shit.’ He glanced unenthusiastically at Skully who was now hypnotising Amelia and her giggly friends with his devil eyes and dirty talk. Ash diverted to join Hardcase who was holed up by the stereo choosing music.

  Carly sometimes missed the wild energy of the soldier she’d married, but she was grateful he never sharked, however drunk he got. Ash was no flirt and hated small talk, although Carly still kept a jealous count of the tanned bench-press queens at his gym whose flat abs her husband watched with professional interest. A confirmed Jack the Lad before they’d married – and a little bit after that, if she was honest – his interest in other women rarely flicked beyond Tomb Raider and hardcore these days. At home, he could still be a randy sod, but war and fatherhood had changed him, and he lived too deep in his shell to share his mates’ brio.

  Heading for the door, she felt Skully’s eyes on her and turned. He winked nastily. She winked straight back at him, cold-eyed, not caring what Flynn said. He didn’t frighten her.

  *

  ‘To auld acquaintances!’

  Pax held her glass against Lester’s, her gaze focussed tightly on the three fingers of malt whisky refracted behind the carved crystal, a fiery golden hit she’d been looking forward to all day. The past last hour had crawled by, feeding the tack room wood burner half a cider apple tree’s worth of logs while helping Lester meticulously clean leatherwork for hunting tomorrow. The sun had been over the yardarm for ages, Happy Hours would be coming to an end, New Year’s Eve parties already well underway, and at last she had a drink in her hand.

  To her frustration, before they could knock back the toast, Lester started reciting a list of family absen
tees, Laphroaig still aloft. ‘The Captain and Mrs Percy, and Major Percy before them – may got rest their souls.’ He went on to reel off a register of distant dead relatives, recently departed friends, a couple of favourite horses and a labrador. Mistaking her wide-eyed frustration for alarm, he explained, ‘Your grandparents liked to remember those we’ve lost this time of year.’

  Pax thought Lester far too obsessed with death, like many of his age. ‘Maybe that tradition can be laid to rest.’

  ‘To Johnny!’ he toasted stubbornly.

  Pax stared longingly at her glass. ‘Yes, to Daddy.’

  ‘Your father was a good man.’

  ‘I know he was.’

  ‘Soul of a poet, heart of a cavalryman.’

  ‘Quite.’ Pax drew the glass towards her lips with an ecstatic shudder of anticipation, then realised he was off again, toasting the living as well as the dead now.

  ‘To your brother in Africa and to your sister and her family here. May they have good fortune and good health.’

  She felt a beat thud in her temples as Lester took a reedy breath to add more. ‘To your mother, who we must help as best we can. To all the little ones who will benefit from the Percy stud breeding champions again…’ He seemed to take pride in pedantically naming all her nieces and nephews. ‘And of course, to poor little Oliver, who you miss so much.’

  She looked away, the pain instant. ‘We call him Kes.’

  Lester lowered his glass, voice quiet, ‘To Kester too.’ The crystal rim touched hers again.

  Pax’s gaze went sharply across to his face, but his wise eyes had disappeared into their creases as he took a long, appreciative draft of the fine malt.

  She knocked hers back in one, temples pounding now. ‘As you know, Lester, there’s a lot of things we don’t talk about in this family. Best left that way.’

  With a brisk nod, he admired the whisky left in his glass. ‘Attic flat ready for the newcomer, is it?’

  Already craving a second measure, Pax let the heat of the malt diffuse through her, grateful for the change of subject at least. ‘It’ll do.’

  Thick with dust and mouse droppings, crammed full of old furniture and reeking of damp, it was a part of the house largely untouched for years. Cleaning it had taken her all the rest of the day.

  ‘Used to have house staff up there when I first worked here.’ He set his glass down and went to close the stove flues, stepping carefully over Stubbs and the sleeping puppy. ‘Place had status.’

  ‘Another drink?’ She grasped the opportunity if Lester was going to wax lyrical.

  But he shook his head. ‘Roads are going to be foggy later. You’ll need your wits.’

  Pax watched enviously as he polished off his remaining Laphroaig, gathering the keys and his empty hunting flask from the table.

  ‘Almost forgot.’ Reaching in his pocket, he handed her a mobile phone. ‘Mrs Ledwell left this behind. Happy New Year.’

  ‘And to you, Lester. May it bring everything you wish for,’ she added over-effusively.

  He fixed her with a scope-lamp stare she’d almost forgotten. ‘I want you back on a horse.’

  ‘We’ll see,’ she humoured, having no intention of getting back in the saddle.

  ‘Don’t let your parents’ talent go to waste. Your father rode the Wolf Moon Lap for you, you know that.’

  ‘I’d need all seven planets and Clair de Lune to get round again,’ she joked.

  ‘And I would give every star in the sky to see it.’ Lester’s voice crackled. ‘Good night to you.’ He limped off, poker-backed.

  Retreating to the main house, Pax paced the kitchen, which was the only warm room, the Aga gurgling throatily, its rail festooned in her mother’s silk thermals. It was still hours until New Year, the airport run looming between her and one last night in her cups. She was dying for another drink, the almost-full whisky bottle like a golden trophy on the table as she marched around it, fiddle-footed. If she stood still, she thought about Mack threatening to stay in Scotland with Kes and emotion overwhelmed her. She had no desire to dwell on past lives while her son was being taken away from her.

  Waking that morning, Pax had looked forward to being here on her own while the year she’d rather forget, and the week she couldn’t, slipped away. It would be the first time she’d spent a night in the house where she grew up since her late teens, and the first time she’d ever done so alone. She’d been planning to drink the whisky, listen to loud music and run from room to room, singing at the top of her voice, swan wings flapping and hissing, grateful for her own company, and to be granted a night away from the Mack Shack, from Mack, from marriage, from modern digital communication. But instead she must soberly chauffeur Stud Man or whatever he called himself, probably courteously see New Year in with him too, and she resented him like mad.

  Without a drink, Pax was burning up with restless, heart-thumping loneliness.

  She knew better than to impinge upon Lester’s routine. A creature of deeply entrenched habit, he would remain shut in his cosy cottage watching television after his evening meal of a Fray Bentos pie, then bathing before bed.

  Her mother’s forgotten phone lay as dormant as her own on the table beside the whisky bottle, the only sounds coming from the shuddering fridge, bubbling flue and the still-nameless puppy, curled up in front of the Aga, having a whisker-twitching dream. She thought jealously of Ronnie partying with friends, merry on half a glass of white, as quick to reel in admirers as she was to cut ties.

  Looking at her watch, she was shocked to see barely a few minutes had passed since her toast with Lester.

  The hiatus was unsettling, making her mind breed negative thoughts, like bacteria on Petri dishes: a custody battle, her teenage mistakes brought out, her unsuitability as a mother, her family’s tragic track record.

  At seven thirty on the dot, Pax called Mack’s mobile from the house landline to wish Kes artificially bright night-nights, ignoring her husband’s hissed, ‘Have you got my messages?’ before he handed the phone across to their sleepy son. She kept Kes talking too long because her heart hurt, quickly hanging up before his father came back on the line, ignoring Mack’s three callbacks, then taking the phone off the hook, pacing all the while. She knew it was childish to avoid talking to the husband she’d lain awake beside just hours earlier, but she was afraid of more one-upmanship and manipulation, of his anger, or, even worse, that stiff-jawed Happy New Year politeness the Forsyths did. She didn’t want Mack to have a Happy New Year; she wanted him to get food poisoning.

  The clock hands had barely moved.

  She lapped her way around the table again, eyeing the bottle, wondering how far down it she’d need to go to kill the grief throbbing in her chest, to still the ever-moving legs. The reception of the old radio on the windowsill was too crackly to endure – how her grandmother had managed four decades of The Archers Omnibus with it was beyond belief. It was too cold to settle anywhere else in the house, and she didn’t trust the chimneys enough to light a fire. The freezing fog that forecasters had been warning about was already cloaking the Comptons up on their high ridge.

  She looked up Luca O’Brien’s number on her mother’s phone contacts, using the landline to dial it. An automated female voice invited her to speak after the tone.

  She matched its robotic, stern depth. ‘This is Patricia Forsyth, Ronnie Ledwell’s daughter. I shall be collecting you from the airport.’ She reeled off her own mobile number. ‘I’ll hold your name up at Arrivals, but if you miss me for any reason, please call me. Don’t call the house – nobody’s here.’

  Older sister Alice, who had Googled O’Brien extensively, insisted he was a charlatan, unable to hold down a job for long, his departure from the legendary German stud Gestüt Fuchs veiled in secrecy. Their brother Tim knew a wine grower in South Africa whose besotted showjumping wife had spent a fortune on horses at the Irishman’s recommendation when he was based there. There was also a strong suspicion that he’d once been Ronnie�
�s lover. None of the three children trusted their mother’s judgement.

  The old wall clock still insisted it was still far too early to set off for the airport, even allowing for fog. She remembered she had yet to take a set of towels and spare sheets through to the attic flat. The more self-contained Luca was there, the better, she felt.

  Contrary to its name, the attic flat ran across three floors, utilizing the maze of old servants’ rooms that led off the back staircase beyond the service doors, along with the entire top storey. It had its own small kitchen, sitting room and study, several bedrooms, a vast bathroom that was supposed to be haunted by a giggling housemaid, and lots of little rooms that had once stored laundry and silverware. It was ridiculously big for just one person – her parents and all three siblings had lived there, along with a nanny, before her mother left. It even had its own little courtyard garden, and a roof terrace at the back on which a newly married Ronnie had scandalised her husband by sunbathing naked.

  Nowadays, there was little evidence left of her parents’ time there together; Pax had been so young when her mother left them that she had no memory of living there before she and her siblings had all moved across to the old nursery in the main house. Her father had stayed on in the flat, drinking himself to oblivion each night, but most traces of Johnny Ledwell had gone. Pax wished her memories of him were sharper. She’d been just eleven when he’d died. Before that day she’d thought he would live forever, not leave her with a decade of fading snapshots.

  She’d made Luca O’Brien up the sleigh bed in Johnny’s old room, which was at least tidy and had a lavatory next door. Unapologetically masculine, it had been a dressing room once, with a wall of heavy-fronted cupboards still crammed with hunting coats and dinner suits reeking of mothballs, an old-fashioned washstand in one corner, and a big, speckled full-length mirror which she glanced in as she placed the towels on the chest of drawers. Eyes pinched, neck poking scrawnily from her thick jumper, skin pale and dry as a bleach stain, she looked like a tortoise – and at least a decade older than her thirty-one years.