‘She was just feeling a bit off-colour,’ he murmurs.
‘Um … yeah. I heard about the Brie.’
Rob sighs, knowing that whatever he says is unlikely to get past his brother’s razor-sharp bullshit detector. And so it all spills out, not only about the suspected Tambini plot to poison her unborn child, but the way he’s stumbled into her life of girlie get-togethers and abominable cooking, as if he’s in a first-night performance of some terrible play, and no one thought to give him a script beforehand.
‘Fuck, Rob,’ Dom mutters, raking back his abundant dark hair. ‘I was shocked, you know, when it happened. I’d never realised you and Kerry had problems …’
‘Well, we didn’t. That’s the whole point.’
Dom frowns at him. ‘So why …?’
‘I’d rather not go into the ins and outs,’ he blusters, choosing to ignore his brother’s flamboyant eyebrow wiggles. ‘I fucked up, okay?’
‘Er … just a bit, Rob.’
‘Yeah. Well, it’s happened and I’m not going to walk away from Nadine and the baby. I’m … you might find this really hard to believe, but I’m trying to do the decent thing here.’
‘I know you are.’ Dom’s voice softens.
‘Anyway,’ Rob says with forced jollity, ‘here I am. One minute, happily married, about to move into a pretty little cottage by the sea. Next thing, living in a flat strewn with fairy lights like Santa’s fucking grotto.’
‘So you’re living together now?’
Rob pauses to extract a carton of orange juice from the fridge and takes a big swig from it, a small gesture that both brothers know drives their mother insane. ‘Kind of half-and-half at the moment, but we’re about to complete on the sale of the house. It seems crazy to rent a flat of my own when she’ll need me there.’ He senses his kid brother studying him, as if he’s an interviewer, not entirely sure that Rob is cut out for the job.
‘What’s it like at work, the two of you being in the same office?’
‘We sort of … orbit each other.’
‘Like planets.’
‘Yeah, with the feeling that a meteor’s going to smash right into us.’
Dom laughs dryly, adding, ‘You’ll have to give up this porn shit when there’s an innocent little baby toddling around.’
Rob sniggers, slightly regretting having told Dom about his Miss Jones column. ‘Can’t afford to at the moment, not with things so iffy at work.’
‘Hmmm.’ Dom smirks. ‘Have to say, it’s quite … believable actually. You as a woman, I mean.’
‘You actually
read
it?’
‘Well, I don’t pore over it but, y’know – they usually have a copy lying around at the barber’s. And I might have a quick look, if it happens to fall open at the right page.’
He grins, and Rob is overwhelmed by a feeling of gratitude that his brother made the journey today, despite the fact that he’s still emitting an air of slight disapproval and bewilderment.
All four children, plus Rob’s parents and sister-in-law, are playing a rowdy game of Pictionary in the living room. The tense atmosphere of lunchtime has made way for a comforting sense of bonhomie, and the rest of the evening passes pleasantly amidst a steady flow of wine and chatter.
‘I’m
fine
,’ is all Nadine will divulge when Rob calls her before heading upstairs to bed.
‘Are you sure? I still worry, you know, after that scare you had …’
‘I’m just tired, Rob. I am in my second trimester, you know.’ Hmmm. As far as Rob recalls, the first few weeks are the exhausting part. Come her second trimesters, Kerry was full of energy, glowing and gorgeous with hair all glossy and … no, he
mustn’t
think about that.
It’ll all be okay when I’m back in London
,
he reassures himself as he climbs into bed. Yet, despite trying to think soothing thoughts, he realises there is no possibility of being able to drop off to sleep tonight. What had possessed him to call Kerry today, just for a chat? He must stop doing this. She was obviously in bed with someone, or at the very least in a state of undress – he can picture the scene right now, which triggers a wave of queasiness. It’s not good for his digestion, imagining his wife in the throes of passion with someone else, especially after two slices of his mum’s toffee tart and a whacking great slab of that Brie.
Rob is starting to sweat now beneath the thick, hairy blanket – Mary remains suspicious of duvets, they’re far too modern and convenient – and burps loudly. His stomach is in turmoil and he feels as if he’s gained half a stone since arriving here. He sits up, wishing his parents didn’t keep the house so hot, but realising it’s far too chilly on this bitter December night to open the window.
What kind of father are you to do this to your children?
The question has lodged itself firmly in his brain, and he wipes a lick of perspiration from his brow.
You’ve messed up your entire family. What sort of man
do you think you are, shacking up with a twenty-
year-old?
Tears spring into Rob’s eyes, and he dabs them away with a corner of the blanket. God, he has to snap out of this. No point in going over and over it, torturing himself in the middle of the night. What good will that do Mia and Freddie?
Rob slides out of bed and clicks on the bedside lamp. He needs to distract himself from these terrible thoughts, and the only thing he can think of is to turn on his laptop and try to focus on work. If he can just finish his column, it’ll be out of his hair and he won’t need to think about it when he gets back to London tomorrow night. Nothing makes him feel more phoney and ridiculous than writing his latest Miss Jones despatch in Nadine’s flat, especially when she keeps peering over his shoulder, giggling and suggesting teasing little touches for him to add. ‘Well, I am a woman,’ she’s reminded him on numerous occasions.
Only just
, replied the voice in his head.
Pillows propped up behind him, Rob is now back in bed with fingers poised over his keyboard. This month’s column is addressing all those men out there who are under the illusion that nipples should be twiddled like old-fashioned radio knobs.
My breasts
, he types,
are what I think of as fun pillows, so take your time and enjoy
… What did that cab driver call him again? Big shot journalist?
My nipples
, he continues,
are the super-charged epicentres of a zillion tingly nerve endings
… Yeah, Eddy will love that. Plus, miraculously, spilling out such ridiculous prose is helping to chase away those gloomy thoughts …
‘Daddy!’
Rob’s heart lurches.
‘
Daaaad!
’
Shit. Freddie’s awake. Something must be really wrong. He never wakes in the night here, he loves his cosy bed in the huge spare bedroom … Hurtling out of bed and across the landing, Rob manages to locate Freddie’s bed in the semi-darkness.
‘What’s wrong?’ he whispers, instinctively reaching out to touch his son’s clammy forehead.
‘I had a dream, Daddy.’
‘Shhh. It’s okay, darling. We’re at Nanny and Nonno’s, remember? Everyone else is asleep, we mustn’t wake them …’
Across the shadowy room, Marcus shifts beneath his covers on the bottom bunk, while Mia mutters quietly in the bed above. Ollie, who’s on a camp bed at the far end of the room, doesn’t even stir.
‘I can’t sleep.’ Freddie sniffs into the sleeve of his PJ top.
‘I’ll lie with you for a little while,’ Rob whispers. ‘Move up a bit. But we’ve got to be very quiet, okay?’
‘Yeah. I had a really scary nightmare, Dad.’
‘What about?’ Rob is now in bed with his son, stroking his hair. It’s been so long since he’s lain close to one of his children, it causes an ache in his heart.
‘Bad cheese,’ Freddie mutters.
‘What?’
‘Cheese with germs in.’
‘Oh, love.’ Curling an arm around Freddie, Rob pulls him close. ‘That was just Nadine. There are certain things you shouldn’t eat when you’re having a baby but you needn’t worry about that.’
‘Yeah, only ladies have babies.’
‘That’s right. Now hush, try to go to sleep.’
‘It comes out their vagina, Mummy said.’
‘Um, yes.’
Christ, how about we wake everyone up and have a little where-babies-come-from talk right now?
‘Can you see germs?’ Freddie whispers.
‘What germs?’
‘The cheese ones.’
‘No, not just by looking with your normal eyes. You’d need a microscope …’
‘It is germy then!’ Freddie exclaims.
‘Shhhh!
’ Rob sighs, feeling suddenly, achingly tired, as if his bones could crumble like the thin, salty crackers his father likes. ‘Well, there are good and bad germs.’
‘I wanna see the germs in Nanny’s cheese.’
‘Freddie,
please
go to sleep …’
‘Can I have a microscope?’
‘Shush!’ It’s gone 2 a.m., and Mary will be rousing everyone at eight thirty for her customary Sunday breakfast: eggs, salamis, a great mound of pastries and amazing coffee he’s never managed to replicate at home, despite investing
in various hideously expensive gadgets. Picturing his mum’s
breakfasts, coupled with the steady rhythm of Freddie’s
breathing, gives Rob a warm feeling inside. As
he finally drifts off, the day’s worries start to float away and he’s a proper dad again, before the split – before Shorling, even – when they all lived together in Bethnal Green in a rather gloomy little house, but happy as anything.
Rob is properly asleep now, back with Kerry at home, and his old mate Simon in the editor’s chair. In his dreams, Rob is carefully crafting a lengthy feature about vineyard tours in Umbria, and all is right with the world.
Mary Tambini loves nothing better than having her boys here, her beautiful Roberto and Domenico and all the children, who bring this big old house to life. She’s worried, though, which is probably why, at 2.47 a.m., she decides there’s no point in tossing and turning in bed, and pads lightly downstairs to the kitchen instead. Here, waiting for the kettle to boil, she mulls over the day’s events. Rob’s bedroom light was on, she noticed as she passed his door on the landing, resisting the urge to check he was okay.
He’s a forty-year-old man
, she reminded herself,
not a little boy anymore. He can stay up as late as he wants.
Now, as she sits at the kitchen table, her hands cupped around her mug of tea, what happened today seems even stranger and more impossible to figure out. Yes, she’s had a few months to get over the shock of Roberto leaving Kerry and taking up with that girl – that
Nay
-dine – yet it still seems … ridiculous. There’d been no warning whatsoever. He’d just blurted it all out on the phone, leaving her and Eugene shocked to the core. When Mary had called Kerry she, too,
had sounded stunned, but also strong and determined, and
had tactfully avoiding saying anything bad about Roberto. Not that Mary would have blamed her. God, she could wring his neck sometimes, the silly, silly boy …
She’s not angry now, though – more concerned, because she has never seen him looking so stressed, not even when that new editor arrived and all his old friends were thrown off the magazine.
And
he’s started smoking again. He might be able to fool the children with his minty gum and mouthwash but she detected it straight away.
Is he still awake, she wonders? Would it be completely wrong of her to go up and try to talk to him? She doesn’t see why she shouldn’t. After all, the family will still be here tomorrow so she’s unlikely to have the chance of a private chat. The central heating pipes judder ominously as Mary gets up from her chair and treads softly upstairs.
His light is still on, and she taps the door gently. ‘Roberto?’ she whispers. No reply. Another tap. ‘Roberto? Are you awake?’ Still nothing. She hesitates before pushing the door open, then reassures herself that he must have fallen sleep – while reading, probably – with the light on. But when she steps into the room, Roberto’s not there. The covers have been thrown back, as if in haste, and his laptop is sitting open on his bed.
Mary is a modern woman; she shops online and is on Facebook, mainly to keep in touch with Eugene’s side of the family in Verona. Roberto has been working on a document, she notices, and his laptop is running on battery power. Should she save the document and shut it down for him, or is he planning to come back and work on it? It’ll probably save automatically if it runs out of power, but she wouldn’t want to risk him losing anything important. Mary gets up and checks the bathroom – no one there – then peeps around the door of the biggest bedroom where all four of her grandchildren are sleeping soundly. Ah, there’s Roberto, fast asleep with Freddie in his arms. The image of the two of them snuggled together causes a lump to form in her throat. This is what it’s about, she thinks, her vision blurring. This is
family
. Mary wishes Nadine could see this. Maybe then she’d be less keen to dump her baby with a stranger and have an almighty strop about cheese …
Mary pads quietly back to Rob’s room and perches on the edge of his bed, turning the laptop towards her. She’s about to press save, but can’t resist a little peek at what he’s been working on. Such a talented writer, Roberto – although he’s recently stopped sending his father copies of
Mr Jones
, she’s noticed. ‘It’s taken a different direction,’ he explained. ‘Not sure it’d be your kind of thing anymore.’
Mary’s eyes flick across the screen.
So many men give my breasts a cursory tweak before moving onto the main event.
She squints at the text, as if she might have misread it.
My super-sensitive nipples
, she reads on,
are not radio knobs … kiss and lick my lovely sumptuous
… At that, Mary stops. Why is he writing as if he were a woman – the kind of woman who refers to her breasts as ‘pleasure centres’? The phrase ‘fun pillows’ leaps out at her. Mary shivers in her apricot Marks & Spencer’s nightie. Is this what he’s lowered himself to now – writing pornography? Is he desperate for money these days?