CHAPTER NINETEEN
‘Clarky, I know she’s with you,’ Finn says on the answer machine. He pauses. ‘Ask her to come home. Please, Josie. I’m sorry.’
The phone rings again. It clicks into answer-machine mode. ‘Hi, Justin, it’s Kelly.’
‘What’s she like?’ I ask when she’s finished leaving a longwinded message about meeting up.
‘OK.’
‘What does she do?’
‘Er, marketing or something.’
‘You were clearly paying attention. Is she pretty?’
‘She’s all right.’
‘Clarky, make the most of this time. How I’d love to be single again. Want to swap roles?’
‘And be Finn’s wife? No, thanks.’
I kiss him on the cheek. ‘I should go. Why are you always so together, Clarky?’
‘Hardly,’ he mutters.
I look around the kitchen which is painted a pale blue. Nothing out of place, the latest gadget on every surface. This time it’s a very high-tech wine-bottle opener although Clarky doesn’t drink wine. I put on my coat. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen you blue. I mean,
really blue
.’
‘I’ve had my moments.’ He looks at me. ‘Maybe it’s plain sailing because there’s nothing in my boat that I care enough about to make it rock? You and Finn, you’re living, even if it is stormy at times. I’m just drifting, not sure what matters to me.’
I take his hand firmly and kiss it. ‘You are my rock, Justin Clarke.’ He shifts awkwardly from one foot to the other. ‘Thanks for tonight. I wish Finn understood me as well as you do.’
‘Let me walk you.’
‘No, it’s not far.’
Clarky hands me an umbrella. ‘Here, take this.’
I am about to leave when he says, ‘Can I ask you a simple question, Josie?’
I nod. ‘As long as it is.’
‘Do you still love Finn?’
*
I run down the floodlit street as fast as I can, avoiding the puddles. There are plenty of people still out, newsagents still open, restaurants lit by candlelight. Do you still love Finn? I had laughed out loud. ‘You call that simple!’
‘Yes. If you love someone there shouldn’t be any hesitation, should there?’
*
‘Why did you have to run to Clarky?’ Finn asks me when I return. I found George asleep in his school uniform; he hadn’t let his father undress him.
‘You made me so angry, I can’t speak to you when you’re like that.’
‘But don’t you understand that running to Clarky every time we have a problem doesn’t make it go away?’
I let out a strangled cry. ‘Well, don’t you get it that I wouldn’t need to if you weren’t so pig-headed all the time? You haven’t asked me about my meeting, about George’s headmaster. All you do is shout and criticise the moment you come home. You don’t listen to me!’
‘And, let me guess,’ Finn says in defeated tones, ‘Clarky does?’
We both sit down on the edge of the bed. ‘I’m sorry,’ he mumbles. ‘I know I fly off the handle sometimes.’
‘I hate us fighting.’
‘How was the meeting?’
‘Do you love me, Finn?’
‘What?’ He looks as if I’ve asked him something impossible.
‘
If you love someone there shouldn’t be any hesitation, should there?
’
‘We say it to George all the time, without even thinking,’ I go on. ‘Do you love me?’
‘Of course I do,’ he finally says.
CHAPTER TWENTY
‘Can we go to the Science Museum?’
‘No! Stand still, George.’ I am trying to put on the fifth tie I’ve bought him in a year.
‘
Emma, does Nat lose ties? They’re either chewed to death or they disappear into the vortex. How does this happen? How?
’
‘
Ha! The chewing tie syndrome. Nat used to chew and suck his like a stick of rock. Only buy the cheap ones now
.’
The doorbell rings. Mrs B bustles inside, wearing her parka coat with the fur lining. I hug her tightly. ‘I’m glad you’re back.’
‘It’s good to be home. I missed my bed, the fireplace, and my home-made celery soup. Funny the things you miss, isn’t it?’
‘Mum’s having a baby, Mrs B. When’s it ready? It’s taking ages.’ George picks up his cold fruit drink. ‘Ugh!’ He starts hitting his forehead. ‘Brain freeze.’
‘You’re pregnant?’ She looks at George to see if he’s joking.
I cannot miss the flash of horror on her face, as if a sharp pebble has just hit her, but she manages to compose herself quickly, forcing her features into a smile. ‘Congratulations. How many weeks?’ she asks.
‘Sixteen. I’ll tell you all about it later. Right, George, where’s your homework?’
‘I don’t want to go to school.’
‘Why not?’ Mrs B asks. ‘I strayed off once, must have been about four at the time, and the police found me at the local infants’ school. All I wanted to do was learn like my sister.’
George’s eyes are not focusing on Mrs B any more, his mind moving on to something else as he turns away from her. I call it the ticking clock; his face starts turning away from somebody in a clockwise, or anticlockwise direction, depending on what it is distracting him. This time it’s Rocky pattering into the kitchen. Yet Mrs B boldly carries on. ‘I didn’t like it that she was learning all these new and exciting things and leaving me behind. I hated staying at home.’
‘I haven’t got any friends.’
‘You’ve got Eliot,’ I say.
‘He doesn’t count.’
‘Why not?’
‘He’s in a wheelchair, Mrs B,’ George explains, ‘he doesn’t play football or anything. We play together but that’s because he hasn’t got any real friends either. He doesn’t have proper legs.’
‘That doesn’t mean he can’t be your friend, George,’ she argues firmly.
‘He’s called “Ginger” at school. His hair is the colour of a carrot!’ He starts to snort with laughter.
‘You need to respect Eliot for who he is, now don’t you? Red hair can be very attractive.’
‘Paul’s having a party at McDonald’s with Ronald the Clown and everything but I’m not invited,’ George goes on matter-of-factly. ‘Eliot isn’t invited either.’
‘Well, that’s because we’re doing something else,’ I improvise.
‘Can I have a party, Mum? It’s my birthday soon.’ He starts to hum again. This is absurd. George says he has no friends and in the next breath he wants a party. Finn and I had planned to take him to the cinema but if he wants a party …
‘Your shoes aren’t on properly.’ I watch Mrs B take them off effortlessly. The battered leather is squashed down like a flat tyre around the heels because he can never be bothered to untie the laces first. ‘Now, let’s do this right,’ she mutters as he lifts his foot obediently towards her. She slots one back onto his foot and pulls the laces tightly towards her. ‘There we go, don’t want you falling over now and knocking that pretty head.’ She ruffles his hair like a favourite pet and he looks at her with fascination, his brown eyes opened wide. ‘You see, the slipper fits Cinderella.’ I notice we all smile at that. ‘And Cinderella can have a party if she goes to school.’
*
‘I had a call from Neil,’ Ruby says the moment I walk into the office carrying a hot cup of tea. My heartbeat quickens.
‘Why did you take your son to the goddamn meeting?’
Is that the flicker of a smile on Natalie’s face? ‘I’m sorry but I had no choice, there was an emergency at school.’
Already her eyes have glazed over. Children aren’t real to Ruby. They are mere inconveniences. ‘I’m running a business. I am a professional. I thought you were ready for the responsibility?’
‘I am.’
‘Can you promise to give me one hundred and ten per cent over the next year? That’s all I need to know. Natalie’s on board, aren’t you, Natalie?’
‘Yes, definitely. One hundred and ten per cent.’
‘I promise I’ll do my absolute best.’ How am I going to tell her I’m pregnant now? I know she can’t sack me but she’ll start giving me the mundane jobs just because. She’ll think baby-free Natalie is a safer bet.
‘I’m sorry I lost the client, Ruby.’
Natalie’s by the window cutting some card with a scalpel. I can tell from her expression she is enjoying this. She thinks she’s going to take over my job. No way. ‘But I won’t let you down again, Ruby.’
‘Well,’ she spins round in her chair, ‘the funny thing is, I spoke to Neil – and Gem Communications won the pitch!’
‘We have! I don’t believe it!’
‘Shit,’ Natalie says, holding up a cut finger. She finds the first-aid box which we keep at the top of the cupboard, above the filing system.
‘I had to do a lot of sweet-talking, mind. This can’t happen again, Josie. There’s only so much I can do to save your pretty arse. I said I employed only the most talented designers, and … well, he has rather a soft spot for me.’
There’s a knock on the door. It’s Diana who controls the switchboard and generally looks after the entire office block. ‘Ms Gold?’
‘Yes? What is it? I’m busy. I’m about to get my nails done.’
‘Sorry. Does anyone in here have a black Audi, registration number CR8 TV?’
‘That would be me,’ Ruby answers proudly, clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth. ‘Brand new that baby. CR8 TV, get it, girls?’ She’s nodding vigorously, waiting for our explosive reaction.
I look blank. Natalie says nothing.
‘Um … anyway,’ Diana tries to go on.
‘CR8 TV. Come on, Josie.’ Ruby hits her hand against the desk. ‘You must get it?’
‘Oh,’ I force myself to laugh. ‘Creative … CR8 TV … yes, wow, you personalised it. Clever.’
She chuckles. ‘Well, I thought so.’
‘I’m afraid it’s just been clamped,’ Diana finishes, trying hard not to show a hint of satisfaction.
Ruby tries to rush out of the door but she can’t run in her tight skirt. ‘Oh, my God!’ she cries down the corridor. ‘Someone, stop the bastards! Stop them!’
We all remain poised, trying hard not to make a squeak until it is safe to do so. One … two … three … Then Diana and I burst into laughter.
But only seconds later Ruby bolts back into the office. ‘Sort it out, will you? I don’t have time to dig Josie out of a grave and my car too.’ She slams the parking ticket down in front of Natalie who still looks aggrieved that I won the pitch.
Now who’s smiling?
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
It’s my son’s birthday tomorrow and here I am, the perfect mother, walking down a busy London street, my skirt swishing in the breeze and carrying a dozen Bob the Builder helium balloons. How very Sarah Jessica Parker, I tell myself.
‘Wait, don’t cross the road!’ I pull George back and six of the balloons hit me in the forehead and obscure my vision. As I lean towards the ‘wait’ button, another gust of wind catches the entire cluster and they proceed to hit me under the chin and then pelt me in the forehead. An old lady wearing a raspberry-coloured beret presses the button instead with a frail wobbling finger.
‘I wanted to do it!’ George stamps his foot on the pavement. The green man starts flashing.
‘Next time you can do it, OK?’
‘No.’ He starts to cry.
‘We’ve got to go.’ I pull at his arm. ‘Come on.’
‘No!’ he screams. The light goes back to red and the tears stop. George stands, poised and ready to press the button, back in control.
*
We walk back to the car. I struggle to find the keys as I clutch the balloons tightly.
‘Come on, Mum. Snail.’
I am getting redder and hotter as we pull over at the cake shop. Can I leave George in the car and quickly pay for the cake? I touch the handle and am about to go without him … but the handbrake would be off, George and the car would hurtle down the road … chaos and disaster. ‘Don’t bring them,’ I tell him as I unlock the side door.
‘But they’re
my
balloons.’
‘Keep them in the car.’ I am going to hyperventilate any minute. Oh, no, I need the loo, I think with despair.
‘I want them,’ he insists, struggling to get out with all twelve of them in tow.
I have to weigh up the time it will take to argue with him against the time it will take simply to allow him to bring the balloons. ‘You can take just these ones, OK?’ We cross the road, a trio of balloons bobbing furiously in the air behind us, ready to strike like cobras.
The shop smells of chocolate and icing sugar. There’s a long queue. I tap my foot restlessly against the floor, trying to control my bladder at the same time. I keep an eye on the car, its hazard lights flashing. ‘Greenwood,’ I say in a breathless voice when it’s finally my turn, ‘I’ve ordered a chocolate castle.’
She nods and calls out my name to someone in the kitchen. ‘Ah, is that your son?’ She gestures to George who is standing in the corner of the shop next to a plate of flapjacks and brownies.
I nod back impatiently.
Finally the cake arrives in a nice clean white box. When I thrust a twenty-pound note into her hand she tells me they’ve run out of change. Can I wait a minute?
A family enter the shop, the bell tinkling as the door swings open. One of the children starts to sing, ‘Bob the Builder, Can You Fix It?’ An impressed George gives him a balloon, explaining it’s his birthday, but then the other child wants one too so they start to fight over it and Bob flies out of the door and high into the sky. George knocks over the flapjacks and treads on a brownie. I have to pay for that too.
Finally I am handed the correct change and George and I return to the car, only to see a man in uniform writing out a ticket and smacking it onto my windscreen. Oh, fuck.
*
‘Not
another
ticket, Josie?’
I had forgotten I’d hidden it in the cutlery drawer. ‘Did you put money in the meter?’
‘I was picking up the cake, Finn. Don’t start.’
‘OK, sorry.’ But he’s still thinking about it, I can tell. ‘We need a secretary to pay all our traffic fines. All you had to do was stick money into the meter …’
‘Well, I failed! You should be congratulating me for managing to get the cake and balloons back in one piece. I’m amazed the only casualty was a parking ticket.’ I storm out of the room and plonk myself on the sofa.
Finn pours himself a glass of red wine and follows. He sits down next to me and starts to rub my back. Every inch of my body stiffens. ‘I’ll deal with it,’ he says.
‘I can, don’t worry.’
‘No, I will.’
‘So now we’re arguing about who is going to pay for it?’
‘I hope people turn up for this party after all the trouble you’ve gone to.’
‘They will.’
He’s not convinced which irritates me even more. ‘Anyway, Clarky’s coming …’
‘Of course he is.’
I ignore his tone. ‘And Tiana, Mrs B, Mum and Eliot.’
‘The one in the wheelchair?’ Finn flicks absent-mindedly through the television guide.
‘Yep. No reply from your mum or Dicky, though. Probably too busy.’
‘I did ask her. I’ll call again.’
‘Don’t bother. You need to write in George’s card. I bought him a funny space card. He loves his planets at the moment,’ I inform him.
‘I know he loves planets,’ Finn says back, equally acid.
‘I’ve wrapped up the bicycle. I bought him a course of piano lessons too.’
‘Piano?’
‘Maybe we’re going down the wrong track with sport. George might be musical. Clarky says …’
‘Clarky this, Clarky that …’
I put my hands over my ears. ‘How about you suggesting something then?’ I walk away.
‘I’m happy to give the piano a go. My grandfather was good. Oh, look, there’s a good thriller on tonight. Hey, where are you going?’
‘Upstairs. I need to lie down.’
*
I sit down on my bed with my old portfolio which I keep on the top shelf in my studio. I wipe off the dust and unzip the edge. There’s an abstract oil painting of a silver jug next to a bowl of apples and grapes, painted in shades of grey, blue and pink. It was one of the ‘A’-level pieces on my still life course. I smile, remembering when a tall father in a tweed coat offered to pay my teacher Mr Dowsky two hundred pounds for it at the end of term exhibition. I was dreaming of all the things I could have bought with the money but … ‘It’s not for sale,’ Mr Dowsky said firmly.
There’s a picture of my mother in the garden, a green and gold scarf around her hair and wearing a thick cream jumper and jeans with a mud stain on them. That was for a ‘work in progress’ piece. Lots of students did factory workers or men drilling holes in roads. I look at the next one. It’s a pencil sketch of Finn when we were just married and still living in my multi-coloured apartment with the orange-painted kitchen. I pick up the photograph from my bedside table of Finn and me on our wedding day. We married quickly. We didn’t want a big fuss and all the trimmings, just a small church wedding with our closest friends and family. Supper had been honey-roasted sausages and mash followed by sticky toffee pudding. We’d danced into the early hours of the morning.
Soon after, when I still had dreams of having my own exhibition, I’d signed up for an art course in London. It was on a Thursday and if it was sunny the teacher took us out across London. We’d sketch parks, rivers, bridges, markets, interesting buildings or landmarks like the Houses of Parliament.
One of the terms was spent on life drawing.
‘I’m not posing nude for you,’ Finn had said when I’d begged him to come into the college and be a model.
‘Darling, you’d knock ’em dead.’
‘You can have a private view, take it or leave it.’
‘Spoilsport … but I like the idea of having you all to myself.’
We were in our bedroom on a Sunday morning and he was sitting by the window, the sun streaming in against one side of his face. I watched him as he stared out into the outside world. ‘Be quick, you know I can’t be still for long,’ he’d said.
Finn is beautiful in a kind of damaged way. One moment he looks as if he is in a room filled with adoring fans; the next he is alone and vulnerable, as if someone has told him his life will amount to nothing.
I’d picked up my pad and flipped it to a clean page, starting to draw the outline of his face. ‘Keep still! And no covering up.’
‘Who else is on this course?’ he’d asked. ‘Can’t one of the men model for you?’
‘They’re all women.’
‘What’s the standard like?’
‘Good. One of them is a graphic designer. Then there’s Sally who paints nothing but angels.’ He’d laughed at that. ‘Each painting is exactly the same, these funny mountains and skies with little angels dotted about in clashing colours. I don’t think our teacher knows what to say. Hold it right there.’
There was a little crease at the corner of his mouth as he tried hard not to smile.
Finn is easy to draw, with his strong jaw line, wide mouth, the small scar at the corner of one eye that gives character to his face, and the hair that flicks across his forehead. I don’t need to look at him. I can draw him from memory.
‘You are beautiful,’ I told him again, sketching the long sweep of one arm which was draped across a knee.
‘What’s your dream, J?’
‘My dream?’ I tilted my head sideways, giving the impression that I had never thought about it before. ‘I’d love to move out of this cramped apartment, live in a large Victorian house with a studio on the top floor where I would paint all day. And make a very good living out of it, of course.’
‘Of course.’
‘I’d have my own exhibitions. A Josie Greenwood painting would go for thousands at Sotheby’s.’
‘Millions, you mean.’
‘Exactly. I’d be the hottest property in London. I’d have a wonderful husband …’
‘You have that already.’
‘And we’d have a son called George and fly kites on Sunday afternoons.’
‘I didn’t know you’d thought of names already?’
‘Haven’t you?’
‘What if it’s a girl?’
‘It’s a boy.’ I tapped my stomach as if to tell the baby not to let me down. ‘And I’ll do a bit of acting on the side when I’m needed for the odd Robert Redford film and no one else will do. How about you? What’s your dream?’ I asked in a fake American accent.
‘To be a great doctor, and to be happy.’ He must have felt my surprise because he’d turned to me.
‘Finn!’
‘I might pretend to be all complicated, but that’s all I want. To be happy.’
‘It’s not finished,’ I protested when he looked at the picture and then pushed it away. I felt the heat of the sun on my face, his mouth grazed my cheek and I closed my eyes as we kissed.
‘Josie?’
‘Um?’
‘Josie?’ I feel a tug on my arm and open my eyes. Finn is standing over me. ‘What are you doing? Oh, that’s the picture you drew of me.’ He picks it up. ‘It’s not bad.’
I gather the papers back into their portfolio. ‘I thought you were watching the film.’
‘It’s boring. I was just wondering …’
‘Yes?’
‘What’s for supper?’
I sink back against the bed.
When Finn and I were first married we used to have a ‘date’ night. Every Tuesday we’d take it in turns to arrange something and keep it a surprise. I used to love those evenings. It made the day at work pass quickly. Finn once took me to the Ritz. I’ll never forget the smart-suited man at the reception desk saying he couldn’t go inside looking like that. He had forgotten to do up the zip on his trousers and his Union Jack boxers were on display. I’d never laughed so much. We sometimes went to a show and would hop onto a rickshaw and be scared stiff that we were about to hit a bus as we were driven across the West End by a furiously fast-peddling driver. On one of my nights I’d taken him to Wembley to see Prince, which he’d loved. Sometimes we’d get hopelessly drunk and then decide it was a great idea to do a bit of karaoke at the nearest bar. But most of the time we’d go to the local Thai restaurant where we’d met again after five years.
We don’t do that anymore. Why don’t we make an effort? Too tired? Do we use George as an excuse? Or work’s a good one. Or have we let ourselves become bored with one another?
‘Josie?’ Finn says again. ‘Supper?’
I feel resentful that everything becomes so mundane. ‘Have a look in the fridge,’ is all I can say, ‘and let me know.’