by Carol Mason
When Toby hears his name he says, ‘I don’t want to go to the hair salon I want to go for tea to eat a car cake!’
‘It’ll only be an hour,’ she says. ‘It’s right there.’ She points across the street, sounding petulant.
Since our fight in the kitchen and my text apology – which feels like a long time ago now – she has been unusually low-key, almost a little flat, but oddly cooperative with me. Like she feels bad on some level. I don’t want to take one step forward and five back. Plus I’m reminded that Toby does seem to garner the bulk of everyone’s attention and she must get sick of that at times. ‘Okay,’ I say. ‘But do you think they’re likely to take you as a walk-in?’
‘I’ve already called them. I’ve got an appointment.’ She glances at her phone. ‘But I’ve got to go, like . . . now!’
She starts walking off towards the zebra crossing and I can’t help but feel a tiny bit manipulated.
‘Okay!’ I say, not much choice in the matter now, and we hurry after her. Toby can’t keep pace, so I end up picking him up and carrying him.
She strides ahead like a supermodel, through a dark walkway that emerges into filtered sun and a courtyard of beautiful, high-end shops.
‘Where’s the salon?’ I ask.
‘There.’ She points a finger.
I gaze at the awning, at the name. ‘But that’s where all the celebrities go!’
‘Yup.’
‘But . . . Won’t it cost a small fortune?’
She flashes me a look that borders on distaste. ‘So? It’s not like I’m paying for it.’
Last time she said that she nicked a waistcoat. But she can hardly lift a haircut, so I try to tell myself at least I can relax on that front.
‘Mummy lets me come here,’ she says.
I vividly remember when I first moved down to uni from the north. How I used to go back home every six weeks to get my hair cut simply because it was cheaper.
Mummy bloody would, I think.
I tell her I don’t feel like sitting inside with Toby so we’ll go walkabout and come back in an hour. She breezes off inside.
Sensing the idea of tea and cake has just gone sideways, I take Toby to a Middle Eastern place on King’s Road that does a nice assortment of tasty but healthy snacks. I try to spin out an order of hummus and flatbread and a yogurt drink, followed by a wander around Duke of York Square and a short anecdotal history lesson on the Chelsea Pensioners, which Toby has no interest in, until 5.30, when Grace said she’d be done.
Talking to him about war veterans takes me back to something I don’t much care to remember: an outing with Joe’s kids soon after we’d become engaged. Remembrance Sunday 2018 – long something I had honoured by attending the Cenotaph, a day that was of the utmost importance to me.
‘It might be a nice thing for us to do together!’ I said to Joe, who had originally intended for us to go to a hotel for a fancy brunch. ‘One hundred years since the end of the First World War.’
‘That’s all well and good,’ he said, ‘but I’m not sure there’s anything there to interest the kids.’
I knew that Grace was studying the two world wars in history. And that Toby loved his ‘Coldstream Guards’ – a set of heirloom toy soldiers his grandfather had given him. I suspected Joe might be pleasantly surprised.
I went early and got us a good spot. We found each other after much texting and waving of hands.
‘This is boring,’ Grace said, straight off the bat.
We waited around some more. The service began – and so did Toby’s crying.
After a while, at the end of his patience, Joe said, ‘This is bullshit. Come on, let’s get out of here and go for brunch.’
‘I’d like to stay,’ I said, and added that I could just meet them afterwards at the hotel.
‘Afterwards?’ He frowned. ‘By the time this thing’s done, we’ll have moved on to dinner!’
We went back and forth on it, until he finally said, ‘I don’t understand. I thought this was supposed to be an outing with the kids? I thought it was about you trying to get to know them better?’ He searched my face, as though he wasn’t so keen on what he was seeing. He didn’t say another word, but the message was clear. By staying, I was showing I was not committed to our relationship; I was being self-centred.
And so we cut a path through the solemn crowd and made our way to a Park Lane hotel where we ordered expensive omelettes and talked about nothing in particular. Just like we could have done on any old Sunday. I was furious. He knew how much this day meant to me and yet he’d completely disregarded my feelings. A little voice was saying, If he’s selfish and inflexible in little ways, imagine what he’ll be like in the big . . .
But I didn’t listen to it.
Back at the salon, Grace sits in reception on a dark-coloured velvet sofa – looking like a cross between a mushroom and a middle-aged newscaster from the ’80s.
‘It stinks,’ she says, when she sees us come in the door.
I pat some of the poof down with my hand. ‘I have admittedly seen better . . . But the cut looks good. That’s the main thing, isn’t it?’
She rolls her eyes. ‘It should do for a hundred quid.’
My jaw gapes. ‘What?’
‘Cough it up, then.’
I do a double-take. ‘Cough what up?’
‘Duh! It’s not like I carry that sort of change around.’ She glares at me as though I’m some sort of sad moron. ‘You have a credit card, don’t you?’
Hang on . . . I’m paying for this? Does she know I can’t even afford to get my own hair cut at a place like this – not on a junior doctor’s salary?
Never mind. Dutifully, I hand over my card.
Once we get outside into the sunshine, she snaps a selfie, making sure to get the name of the salon in the shot, and uploads it to Snapchat. ‘Oh my God, I can’t wait to tell everyone you stiffed them on the tip!’ she chuckles.
Lovely.
We leave. None of us seems all that bothered about going for cake now. We hop on the bus instead of calling another Uber.
Given that’s all I can now afford.
On our way home, I tell her I want to whizz round Marks & Spencer’s food hall. She says she’ll go upstairs and look at lingerie, then come find us. I disappear down the escalator. She goes up.
‘Can we buy some cake to take home?’ Toby asks. ‘Because we didn’t get any today.’
‘We most certainly can if we can find where they are,’ I say. I pick up a basket, hanging on to Toby’s little hand as we wander around and I get my bearings in an unfamiliar layout.
Then Joe texts, How’s tea?
Without taking my eye off Toby, I put the basket down, text back, We didn’t go. Grace wanted a haircut. In M&S and then heading home with food. How was meeting?
Bummer, he replies. (Meeting went ok) I was expecting some pictures of delicious cakes!
‘Here they are!’ Toby says, and hurries off down the aisle. I quickly trot after him.
‘What do you fancy?’ I say to him. ‘I think I know your dad’s favourite!’ I scan the shelves then find the Victoria sandwich box and take a photo of it. How’s this? I text the picture to Joe.
He writes back, Now you’re talking! Bring one for me!
I laugh. I pop the cake into my basket. Then I say, ‘Okay, little guy! I think we’ve got dessert covered . . .’
But when I turn around, Toby’s not there.
‘Toby?’ I quickly scan up and down the aisle. ‘Toby, where are you?’
He was there literally thirty seconds ago. Where the hell has he gone?
Suddenly my phone vibrates. I ignore it, abandon the basket, and hurry to the end of the aisle to see if he’s whizzed around to the other side.
Nothing. Toby is not there either.
‘Toby?’ My voice is a little louder, panic etched into it.
I do a quick dash around the wine section, my heart kicking up like a tornado. ‘Toby?’ I dash to the oth
er end of the shop, nearly colliding with an older couple. But it’s like he’s vaporised.
Oh my God! Where is he? Nerves are shuttling through my body and I feel like I’m going to puke.
‘Toby!’ My voice cracks.
There is a second where everyone stands still and looks at me.
Then I hear a voice saying, ‘What?’ with a certain childlike consternation.
When I look down the cake aisle again, Toby is standing there, like he’d never been anywhere else. As though I imagined the whole thing. ‘Why are you shouting?’ he says. ‘I’m right here!’
‘Toby!’ I fall on my knees and hug him.
While he’s trapped in my embrace, my eyes go to the far end of the aisle.
Grace is standing there watching all this.
She smirks.
‘Oh my God! It was like a scene from Broadchurch!’
Grace embarks on the ‘Lauren lost Toby’ story to her dad the instant we are through the door.
‘I’m, like, I’m coming down the stairs, and it’s like all anyone can hear. “Toby!!!!!!!!”’ She screeches out a terrified, blood-curdling cry. ‘It was like, literally, everyone just stopped what they were doing. Just stopped dead in their tracks. There was just this deadly . . . SILENCE . . . Then everybody was like tearing the place apart looking for him!’
I look from Grace to Joe.
‘Grace . . .’ I say, disbelieving my ears. ‘That’s not how it happened at all. No one was tearing the place apart looking for him.’ I gawk at her as though to say, Why are you doing this?
She holds my eyes for a second, then she glances at her dad, throws up her hands. ‘Er . . . Okay. Whatever you say . . . I mean . . . I was there!’
‘So was I!’ I say.
Joe looks at me, bemused. ‘What’s going on here, Lauren?’
‘What’s going on?’ I hold steady even though I’m pulsating with annoyance. ‘Nothing is going on, Joe.’ Except your daughter is making up bullshit again! I’m on the brink of just coming out with it – and saying, Oh, and, in case you didn’t know, she’s a thief as well as a liar! Want me to tell you a tale about a shopping trip to Topshop? But instead I say, calmly, ‘Toby wandered off. There was a moment where I panicked – but then he was right there.’
There is an empty pause, a spell of dead air, where my contradiction of Grace’s version of events is out there and underscored. Toby fills it by saying, ‘I was choosing us a cake! They had so many choices!’ But Joe doesn’t seem to see or hear him. He is too busy staring daggers at me.
Then his gaze slides to his daughter. ‘Is this right? What Lauren just said?’
‘What?’ I practically spit. Did he really just ask a child to validate my explanation? This can’t be happening.
Grace drops her eyes, and for a second I think she’s going to own up. Then she says, ‘I already told you, didn’t I?’ She flings her hands in the air, says, ‘Not sure why no one ever believes me!’ then storms out of the room.
‘We need to talk,’ I say to him, hours later. We have come to bed. We’ve barely spoken since dinner. Grace refused to join us and he carried a tray to her room and ate in there with her while I sat at the dining table with Toby. Every time I ventured beyond the kitchen I could hear them talking. The hushed tones. Joe’s firm voice. Her wounded, slightly dramatic one.
‘Talk, then,’ he says, curtly.
I try to keep my composure. ‘I can’t go on like this,’ I say. ‘I can’t have it always be Grace’s word against mine, and you never believing me.’
‘Look, Lauren,’ he begins, after a moment. ‘I know you don’t react well to criticism – none of us do. And I know you’re trying hard . . . But you can’t lie. And you certainly can’t call Grace a liar like that, right to her face.’
I almost leap into the air. ‘Me call Grace a liar?’ My heart hammers. ‘I’m calling her a liar because she is a liar!’
There is another moment where he just looks at me, like he’s trying to make sense of my words. And then he says, ‘I think you need some time. And I think you need to sort yourself out.’
I digest this, frown. ‘Time? What’s that supposed to mean? Sort myself out?’
‘I don’t know,’ he says. ‘I really don’t, to be honest. But I can’t have you always at war with my daughter in her own home.’
‘At war?’ My voice cracks. ‘Her home?’
‘She can’t seem to say or do anything right! She’s tired of it.’
‘Because she’s lying, Joe.’
He flings up a hand. ‘There you go again. See what I mean? You. Her. Her. You . . . She’s not your adversary, she’s not your rival, she’s not your competition. She’s a kid, for Christ’s sake!’
I cannot believe this . . . Adversary! Rival! Competition! It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell him about the stealing. Open his eyes. Get the blinders off. But the sad thing is, I have a feeling that if I do, there’s not even a chance he’ll believe me.
‘I’m done!’ I say. ‘Done with this! I’m leaving.’
I charge towards the door.
And as I do, I’m one hundred per cent certain I’m never coming back.
TWENTY-ONE
‘Sorry, I was trying to be quiet.’ Charlie misses his footing and slides down the last few stairs.
‘Don’t worry, I’m not asleep.’ I raise my head from my pillow to peer at him. He is dressed for his early shift. I didn’t mean to end up here but once I stormed out of the flat I realised I didn’t really have anywhere else to go.
‘Are you sure about that? This is not you asleep? Because I’m used to people telling me they’re not asleep when they’re asleep. Sophie does it all the time.’
I struggle to sit up, bring a hand to the back of my head. ‘Ow!’
‘You drank almost a bottle of wine.’ He studies the mess of me. ‘No judgement – given I might have had two.’
We did stay up for hours talking. I had no intention of divulging so much, but at the same time, I had to get it out. I have managed to accept that our friendship is being redefined. To tell one is to tell both of them. Sophie and Charlie are enmeshed, we have entered a new era and there’s no sense in me mourning what once was, or what may never be again. Still, I gave them an edited version, trying not to focus too heavily on Joe’s inability to fight clean. As with everything, there’s a chasm between how things are and how they look. I can’t quite fully serve up my disillusionment on a platter just yet.
Sophie peeks her head around the wall from the kitchen. ‘Fancy a fry-up?’
‘Urgh!’ I feel green just hearing the word. ‘A cup of tea, maybe . . .’
‘Get yourself up and have a shower,’ Charlie says. ‘You’ll feel like a new person. We’ve put fresh towels out and cleaned the bath.’
‘Have you?’
‘No. But we will next time if you give us a bit of advance warning that you’re coming over.’
‘Next time?’ I pull a face. ‘I’m really hoping there won’t be a next time.’
‘Come on,’ Charlie says. ‘We can all but bet on it.’ He sends Sophie a slightly conspiratorial glance.
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence,’ I say, too numb to even take offence. I just keep seeing Joe pitting me against his daughter, hearing him essentially call me a liar, feeling this profound sense of loss – of trust, of faith, almost of love.
‘For the duration of your marriage, our sofa is your sofa.’ He flourishes a hand at the said piece of furniture. ‘I’ve slept on it many a night, when my wife took umbrage and wouldn’t allow me in the marital bed. She had the nerve to try to persuade me to spend three grand on a brand new one saying it’ll ultimately be for my own comfort, but I’ve got a sentimental attachment to an eight-year-old sofa from Ikea that countless people have sat on, slept on, shagged on.’
‘Thank you for that image,’ I say.
Sophie presents me with a china mug that reads Tea Time. The best time of your life but Charlie intercepts it before it re
aches my hand and takes a drink.
‘So what are you going to do for the rest of the day then?’ he asks brightly, like I’m on some lovely weekend getaway at a fancy B&B.
I shrug. ‘A stroll along the shore. A nap in the afternoon. Fish and chips for dinner.’
He smirks.
‘I’m going to go home. Change my clothes. Get into work for 4 p.m.’ I don’t say, Hope Joe’s out. I truly can’t bear the thought of facing him – could throw up at the idea.
‘And what are you going to do about Grace?’ he asks.
Charlie’s theory was that Grace is gaslighting me – trying to paint a different reality to convince others – her parents – to doubt mine. His solution was that I must always remain confident in my version of events, and, where possible, record all conversations.
‘I don’t know,’ I say. ‘Not sure I’ll heed your advice, but I do appreciate it.’
‘And what about the man you married?’
I look down, briefly. ‘Today is a new day,’ I say.
‘You might make light of it now,’ Charlie says. ‘But you were very upset last night when you got here and it wasn’t all to do with Grace . . .’ He sends me a rather caring, concerned look – something I’ve not seen too often. ‘You had a pretty low opinion of Joe. In fact, I don’t think Sophie was that down on me when I said I couldn’t marry her.’
He glances at his wife, who turns red, like someone finding herself acknowledging an embarrassing truth.
Perhaps I hadn’t been as subtle as I’d thought.
‘Anyway,’ he says, ‘I’m sure you’ll work it out, but for now I have to go.’ He pops the mug on the coffee table, kisses his wife, salutes me, and then we hear the clash of the front door.
He’s sure I’ll work it out?
I wish I had his confidence.
‘Why did Charlie cancel the wedding?’ I ask her when we are on to our second cup of tea, both of us curled up at polar ends of the sofa. My private life has been under the spotlight plenty; I don’t see why hers should stay in the dark. ‘You never really said, just that he’s terrified of commitment because not a single marriage in his family has ever worked.’
