The Way We Were (30 page)

‘I think you could be right,' she admitted, and felt his arm relax fractionally. ‘But you know what my family call me: Mrs Manic.'

He gave an almost unwilling snort of laughter. ‘I'm not arguing.'

She laughed too, snuggling against him. ‘Anyway, it's much too hot tonight.' His relief was so palpable she wondered if she should be offended but she was determined to stay cool. Since the telephone conversation with her sister she'd decided on a whole different approach.

‘You won't conceive,' she'd told Val, ‘while you're all worked up. And you'll make Chris tense, which is the last thing you need. He'll smoke and drink more and that's fatal. I mean, come on! You've only been trying for a few weeks. It took us three years. I was like you, though. Once I'd decided to go for it I wanted it to happen first go. It was crazy, really, to expect it. I was working, stressed out, and when it didn't happen I just freaked. I wanted a baby so much I'd have stolen one. It just didn't pan out until we adopted a much calmer approach, but after all that time and so many disappointments it wasn't easy. You're just beginning so, for once, take my advice and chill.'

It was good advice: Val rolled away to her own side of the bed and picked up her book.

Lying beside her, Chris felt ill at ease. He was tired but not relaxed and he craved a smoke.

‘I'm just going downstairs for a minute,' he muttered, pulling on his dressing gown. ‘Something I've forgotten.'

He didn't look at her, not wanting to encounter the disapproval that showed that Val knew exactly what he was going to do. He slipped out and down the stairs, picked up his cigarettes from the kitchen table and went into the small garden. He hoped there would be no visitors about, taking a late stroll, and he remained close to the house behind the screening of fuchsia bushes and the escallonia hedge.

The soft air embraced him, overhead a dazzle of stars, and he inhaled deeply, struggling against a desperate need to go next door to find Liv. He could see the light from her kitchen window laying a square of gold upon the cobbles and he wondered if she were sitting at her table sending an email to Andy. Supposing he were to just knock on the window; go in and have a chat and a cup of coffee? Instinct warned him that tonight it would lead to much more than that. He knew that Liv was finding it difficult too; the atmosphere between them sang and trembled with their neediness.

His hands were shaking. He threw the stub down, trod on it, then bent and picked it up and flung it into the hedge because he knew how Val hated cigarette butts lying around. Damn Val, with her rules and regs and demands and requirements. Why on earth hadn't he stuck with Liv when she invited him to go travelling with her after uni instead of accepting the prestigious pharmaceutical company job?

He sat down on the small bench by the front door and had it out with himself at last. He hadn't gone to Australia with Liv because he'd wanted security; a good job that brought fulfilment and rewards. The prospect of backpacking, picking up work here and there, simply didn't appeal to him. He'd wanted responsibility, advancement, and Val, being of like mind, had been there just when he'd needed someone to share his future. Without Val there would be no Penharrow; they would never have managed to buy the London house without her hard work and substantial salary. When Val was made redundant they'd decided to start a new life – and that included a family whether he felt he was ready for it or not.

Liv represented freedom, fun; he wanted her not just because of her warmth and generosity but because responsibility and family ties were threatening him. Chris stood up and walked to the edge of the garden. Liv's door was open; light spilled invitingly out into the yard. He stood for several seconds fighting his instinct to go in to her; at last he turned back into the shadowy garden, closed the front door behind him and went upstairs to Val.

Liv waited. She knew he was there, his cigarette scenting the mild night air. She knew too that if he came to her tonight she would be unable to resist him; she simply had no strength left, she wanted him too much. Oh, she'd told herself she'd be no better than Angela and that she'd be betraying them all but – just now, just tonight – she didn't care. She simply wanted his arms round her.

Why, all those years ago, hadn't she simply gone with him to London; settled down and made a life together? Well, she knew the answer: even now the prospect of the rat race, the concrete jungle, the nine-to-five, filled her with absolute horror. No way – not even for Chris – could she have settled to the drudgery of the daily commute and the knowledge that this was it for the next however many years simply for the sake of bricks and mortar and a pension.

She shivered at the thought of it. Perhaps when she was old she'd regret it, but she refused to be a prisoner in order to provide for an old age that might not happen. She stood, leaning against the door jamb, wineglass in hand, listening intently; still waiting. Supposing he were to appear, standing before her, wearing that expression she'd seen several times in the last few days: what then? Could they simply turn back the clock and pick up where they'd left off ten years ago? Would a relationship that had foundered once because of their very different needs be able now to survive the break-up of his marriage and the crumbling of all their dreams?

What would have happened to her and Andy, to Charlie and Zack, if their father had succumbed to Angela's persistence? What would have happened to their mother? Of course, there were no children to worry about here … or might there be? Supposing Val were pregnant?

Silently, reluctantly, Liv turned her back on the soft dark night and closed the door very gently behind her. She picked up her mobile and scrolled down to Matt's number.

1977

Much to the children's disappointment the snow lasts less than forty-eight hours. For a few days the high tors retain a fairy-tale icing, pure and sparkling in the bright sunshine, but the lower slopes of the moor remain obstinately dun-coloured, squelching muddily beneath their gumboots and the dogs' feet. The wind continues to blow from the northeast, increasing in strength, pinching and nipping at cheeks and fingers, but these cold, dazzlingly sunny days raise Julia's spirits and give her new courage. Ever since her outburst, the unburdening of her pent-up grief for Tiggy and for her own unborn child, she's felt a sense of release that is enabling her to be more confident in herself and in the future.

She persuades herself that she should try Aunt Em's advice and give Pete the benefit of the doubt: play the waiting game. Sometimes she feels capable of it; at others she can only believe the worst. She tells herself that other people besides Pete might have been at Angela's that night, or that perhaps it hadn't been Pete getting into the taxi, but all the while the worm of distrust continues to gnaw at her new self-confidence. She remembers how, after Pete's letter, that brief moment of happiness had been smashed by Celia's telephone call, and she reminds herself of what Aunt Em said about fear being disabling. She sees now how much she has allowed Angela to manipulate her in the past – and how she is still allowing it – and she tries to take a firmer grip on her emotions.

She takes the twins with her to collect Pete from the dockyard, knowing that their presence will help to keep their meeting on a light note. Aunt Em looks after Charlie and Zack and is in the middle of their bath-time routine when they all arrive back at Trescairn so it isn't until the evening that Julia finds herself alone with Pete. He is in high spirits, pouring wine for them both, drinking to his good news.

‘Of course, it means being away for a bit,' he says. ‘In
Dolphin
in the Attack Teacher to begin with, and then north to do it for real. Let's just hope that if I pass I get a submarine down here in Devonport.'

‘I hope so too.' Julia speaks feelingly; the thought of moving to Faslane or Gosport with four children is a daunting one. ‘Especially now that the twins have settled in so well at school.'

Pete grins. ‘I gather Rough Tor is growing apace.'

Julia laughs. ‘No thanks to Liv. Learning to knit is a long, slow process.'

He refills her glass, and kisses her. ‘God, I'm just out of my mind, darling. I was really sure I wouldn't be recommended.'

Julia keeps smiling, though all the while she longs to question him about the night in Faslane. ‘I bet Martin was pleased,' she says lightly. ‘You must have had quite a celebration.'

He stares at her, the smile fading from his face, and her heart beat speeds anxiously.

‘I didn't go,' he says. ‘I changed my mind.'

She raises her eyebrows. ‘Did you?'

‘Martin was at sea,' he says abruptly. ‘I thought under the circumstances that it would be … well, foolish. Angela said that if I was that sensitive about it I could take her out to dinner instead but I thought, after your letter, that it would be disloyal.'

He slightly stresses the word she used in her letter to him and she is silent, eyes on her wineglass. He puts his own glass on the table.

‘I think it was the right decision,' he says. ‘I'm going to have a bath. Shan't be long.'

He goes out, through the sitting-room and up the stairs, and she remains sitting at the table, feeling desolate. He sounds so sincere and she longs to believe him, yet how can she now confront him with the fact that he was seen leaving Angela's that particular morning? Presently she goes into the sitting-room to make up the fire and sees his grip, half open with a shirt trailing from it. She opens it wider, so as to take out the clothes to be put in the washing machine, wrinkling her nose against the smell of diesel. A heavy parcel is wedged down in the corner and she pulls it out, puzzled: half a dozen paperbacks. Pete comes down as she is looking at them.

‘That's my C. S. Foresters,' he says. ‘I lent them to Martin last leave just before they moved. I couldn't believe he'd never read him, but he's an ignorant bastard.'

She looks up at him, still kneeling. ‘But how … ?'

‘Oh.' He grimaces irritably. ‘I was a bit miffed, actually Angela phoned the base the morning we were sailing to say that Martin had left this parcel for me and that she'd be in real trouble if I didn't take it. She made such a song and dance about. I felt a bit guilty about standing her up the night before so I just had time to grab a taxi out to pick it up. Only books, for God's sake. I think she was annoyed that I'd refused to take her out for dinner and was trying to make a point.'

Julia bends her head so as to hide her expression of relief. ‘That explains it,' she says.

‘Explains what?'

She stands up and, perching on the edge of the sofa, tells him about Celia's telephone call. He watches her with disbelief.

‘But why?' he asks. ‘The bitch. Why should she want to make trouble?'

‘She's Angela's best friend,' says Julia.

‘Honestly, love.' Pete shakes his head disbelievingly ‘That's a bit strong, isn't it? It's a poisonous thing to do.'

Julia shrugs. ‘Angela
is
poisonous,' she says. ‘I've told you that lots of times but you haven't wanted to hear it. She resents the fact that you dropped her for me and she tries to make me as miserable as she can. You know it really Why do you go along with it?'

He sits down on the arm of the chair opposite, his face serious in the firelight. ‘I suppose part of it is vanity' he admits. ‘You feel a fool not responding to her, and the other chaps egg you on a bit. That kind of thing. Part of it is guilt. I didn't treat her very well. We were pretty nearly engaged when I met you and I just dropped her like a brick. None of it meant anything, you know that.'

‘It did to me,' Julia tells him angrily ‘This last time, when she came here, and then when I had that phone call, I very nearly decided that I'd had enough and that if she was so important to you that you could keep ignoring how I felt about it then you could have her.'

He stares at her, shocked. ‘You're not serious?'

‘Yes, I am.' She stands up, fists clenched. ‘You don't know what it's like, Pete, to have that kind of poison dropped in your ear at regular intervals, and you encouraging her publicly and doing nothing to support me. I've felt utterly humiliated.'

He gets up too and holds out his hands to her, his face contrite. ‘I'm sorry, love. Really, I am. I never believed you could ever take anything she said that seriously. Honestly, Julia.'

Julia ignores his outstretched hands. ‘Do you know that she told Tiggy that there was a story going round that her child was yours and that's why she was here with us “all so cosy together”, as she put it?'

This time he is angry. ‘She actually said that to Tiggy?'

Julia nods. ‘She just wanted to add to her humiliation, I suppose.'

‘But
why?
'

Julia shrugs. ‘Tiggy assumed that it was because Angela hated me and her hatred extended to Tiggy as my friend.' She remembers what Aunt Em said. ‘I let her get away with it all for too long. I was afraid, I suppose, that her sly little hints and allusions might have some basis of truth in them. You always behaved as if she had rights over you. She implied once that Cat might be your child.'

‘You couldn't believe such rubbish. For God's sake, Julia.'