The Consequences of Love

by Gavanndra Hodge

  ‘Certainly, Senhor ’Odge,’ she replied.

  Dad pushed a two-thousand-escudo note across the desk.

  ‘What work things?’ I asked as we followed a porter dragging our bags along the patchwork stone pathway.

  ‘None of your beeswax,’ said Dad.

  The minute we were in our room we opened our suitcases and found our swimming costumes. We didn’t pull up the blinds or decide who was sleeping in which bed, any of that, all we wanted was to jump into a swimming pool. We ran all the way there. We were bare-footed and the pathway stones were hot enough to cook a pizza on; but that was not why we ran. Once we got to the pool, I kept running around to the deep end. I held my nose and jumped, falling deep into the cool blue.

  When we finally got out of the pool again we found that Dad had established himself on a lounger in full sunlight. He had a beer and a packet of fags. I asked him for money so we could have beer and cigarettes too, as well as ice-cream.

  ‘Where’s Mum?’

  ‘She’s gone to the supermarket. You know what she’s like.’

  We found two loungers with a good view of the pool so we could eat our ice-creams and look for handsome boys from behind our sunglasses.

  Mum already had the washing machine going when we got back to the villa. I had no idea what she was washing, seeing as we had only just arrived.

  ‘I’m having a shower,’ I shouted.

  ‘Good girl,’ she shouted back.

  I lay on my bed in my wet towel, making my clean white sheets damp, smoking a cigarette, tapping ash into a water glass. The patio doors were open and there were already three flies circling. Anya was asleep.

  Later, we shared the small rectangular mirror to put on make-up before we went out. My face was pink from the sun and glowed with grease so I had to use a lot of bronzer to create a matte effect, which made my face a different shade to the rest of my body. But still, I thought I looked OK, bright blonde hair and dark eyebrows, nothing really matching.

  The sky was the colour of a peach and we followed a sandy path to a seafront restaurant. We sat outside, a low bamboo fence separating us from the beach. There was sand on the concrete floor and I could hear the fizzing sound the sea made each time it receded. Dad put on a Spanish accent to speak to the waiter, even though we were in Portugal.

  ‘Vino bianco, per favor, uno bottilio.’

  I drank quickly. The cold, green wine quenched my thirst. Dad got drunk quickly too. We were the same like that. I ordered clams, and he had mussels. He did this thing with them, inserting his tongue between the little coral-coloured flaps and making sexy noises; he did it each time, with each mussel; he wouldn’t stop and I laughed because I thought it was funny.

  ‘Gavin, don’t,’ said Mum, and there was an edge to her voice, but he didn’t stop, and telling him to stop was the worst thing to do, because it only made him do it more. Even I knew that.

  Anya and I were in our separate beds. The lights were off; the sound of Dad’s snoring rumbled through the villa like a train.

  ‘God, that thing your dad did with the mussels was disgusting,’ said Anya.

  I didn’t speak. There was a cold feeling under my skin. It was the feeling I got when I suddenly realized I had missed something, got something wrong, not understood. I knew that there was something fucked up about me and it was not even my fault, but I would never be able to put it right.

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘Gross.’

  We lay on bathroom towels on the weird bouncy foreign grass in the patch of garden outside our room. We had everything we needed: Walkmen, tapes, magazines, books, a hairbrush, bottles of water, snacks, nail varnish, tweezers. I was using oil and lemon juice instead of suntan lotion because that was what Dad was using. I wanted to get really brown. I wanted to get more brown than Anya, who was freckly and pink. I wanted to be brown when we got back to school in two weeks, so that everyone would know I had been away and that I was the sort of person who got really brown. My skin was tight but that was good because it meant it was happening.

  Mum was also at the villa, in her bit of garden.

  ‘Gavanndra!’

  She called for me, and at first when I stood up I felt I might faint because I was so hot. I drank some warm water from a plastic bottle that felt soft, as if it was melting.

  ‘Gavanndra!’

  ‘I’m coming.’

  ‘Do my back, will you?’

  I rubbed my mum’s wide back with factor 15 suntan cream. There were moles and tiny pink blobs on her skin.

  ‘Do it properly, rub it in, I can still feel the cream on me,’ she said when I stopped too soon. I didn’t like that her back was sweaty and there was a deep pit where a mole had been removed a couple of years before.

  ‘Do you want me to do you? You’re looking quite red.’

  ‘No, thanks.’

  My father had a theory that in order to get a really deep and long-lasting tan it was important to burn away the top layers of skin on the first couple of days of a holiday, and then you could start tanning the fresh new skin beneath. So at the end of the day we helped him by tugging the peeling skin from his back. It came off in satisfying sheets, like clingfilm, which we scrunched into small grey rags. Normally I would have found this fun, but I was in too much pain; my back and my chest were the worst, the skin felt tender and hot, as if it was still cooking.

  ‘I’ll get the bath going,’ said Mum.

  ‘Have a beer while you are getting in, it will make it easier,’ said Dad.

  My father had another theory, or perhaps this theory was my mother’s, that the best way to treat sunburn was to get into a bath, the hotter the better, as hot as was bearable, and this would take the sting out of the burn.

  I lowered myself into the bath slowly, thighs, bottom, tummy, and then my back, chest and upper arms. I did not breathe while I did this, it hurt too much, my skin sizzling on contact with the water. I drank the beer in short, breathless gulps. I had to remain in the bath until the water cooled to body temperature because this was the method. I had recently learnt that this was also a method used to cook white fish. I shouted for someone to bring me another bottle of beer but no one came.

  I felt triumphant when I emerged from the bathroom, slick with aftersun, a towel coiled around my head, but Dad had gone and there was no one to congratulate me.

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked.

  My first ever sentence was ‘Where’s Daddy?’

  Mum was sitting on the green leather sofa; she was alone in the living room, which smelt of Dad’s cigarettes and aftershave. She was dressed up to go out, fresh make-up and nail varnish, and for some reason it made me sad that she was just waiting by herself, not doing anything, smoking a cigarette or having a drink or even reading a magazine.

  ‘He’s gone to make a call, a work thing.’

  ‘What work thing?’ I asked.

  ‘I don’t know, darling, I didn’t ask. Go and get dressed, will you, or we’ll be late.’

  After dinner at the same place, where we all ate the same food we’d had the night before, except Anya, who had pizza, we walked to the shore to look at the sea. There was a full moon, bright and heavy. It made a rippling stripe of silver on the black sea.

  ‘Isn’t that beautiful, man, look at that,’ said Dad. He was excited, bouncing in his espadrilles. ‘There was this one time, in Marbella with Kerstin. I took some acid and it was a full moon, just like this one, and I realized that if I could just walk along the silver path I would actually get to the moon. So I started walking, right into the sea. When I got nearly up to my neck Kerstin started shouting. She didn’t really speak English, so I couldn’t understand a word. She followed me out into the sea, dragged me back to the beach, really messed with my trip …’

  We didn’t say anything.

  ‘So I never did get to walk on the fucking moon,’ he said, laughing, flicking his cigarette into the water.

  On the next day we kept out of the sun for the morning. Instead I walk
ed to the office on my own. It was mid-morning and Anya was having one of her naps. I wanted to make sure everything was organized for me to make the call the next day. My old babysitter Elaine was getting to the flat at 3 p.m. her time to open the envelope with my GCSE results. I remembered my Latin exam, how I’d felt when I turned over that paper. Why does shock always feel cold, never hot? I thought as I entered the cold air-conditioned office with the desk, the chair, the little pamphlets about water slides, donkey parks and museums devoted to the local fortified wine, the sorts of thing we never did on holiday because it might interfere with the tanning schedule.

  I heard his voice first, murmuring and intimate. I let the door close quietly behind me and then I looked. He was on the telephone, one elbow on the desk, shuffling his hips just a little, tapping his foot, always fidgeting.

  ‘I can’t stop thinking about you,’ he said. He was stroking the desk with his index finger, just as I’d seen him stroke the soft underside of Julia’s forearm on one of the evenings we’d all spent together. She’d become a regular fixture in the last month, never invited by me; she and Polly would just turn up. Dad had been more manic than ever, showing off, spending money he didn’t have, taking us all to the posh bar at the end of Beauchamp Place for honey-glazed sausages and champagne that came in buckets filled with ice, sitting in a velvet upholstered corner with young girls squeezed in on either side, not being discreet about taking cocaine, three of us going up to the loo together. It was fun and decadent and crazy and I would make myself feel sick by eating too much and drinking too much, so would try to sober up with the coke, and then when I began to feel flat and strange I would tell Dad I wanted to go home, and he would say, ‘You mustn’t go, that would be boring,’ and we all knew that boring was the worst thing anyone could be. So I drank more, snorted more, and pretended that it was fun and brilliant, pretended that I was having the best time in the world.

  I felt the area between my ribs go numb. I knew that this was not where my heart was but it felt like my heart. I stood behind him. I made my blood slow and still, my breath imperceptible, so he wouldn’t know I was behind him. The receptionist looked at me, and I returned her gaze.

  ‘Just get the flight. I’ll sort everything out. It’s so beautiful here, you’ll love it. You need a break. I need to see you.’

  The receptionist coughed and rolled her eyes so Dad would realize that someone was behind him.

  ‘I’ve got to go … Yes, yes … OK, me too.’

  He put down the phone and turned around. He was holding himself like a boxer, muscles tense, one foot in front of the other, ready for anything, for anyone, ready for a fight. Perhaps he thought it was Mum.

  ‘Oh, it’s only you,’ he said when he saw me.

  Fuck you, I thought.

  I didn’t say that, though.

  ‘Who were you talking to?’ I said.

  I knew the answer, of course. It had been obvious all along. What an idiot I’d been. How they must have laughed at me.

  ‘Julia. Come on, I’ll buy you an ice-cream.’ He laid a couple of escudo notes on the desk. ‘Thank you, my darling.’

  ‘OK, Senhor ’Odge.’

  He walked past me, pushing open the doors to the office, letting in the hot air, sauntering into the sun as if nothing had happened, as if he hadn’t even noticed the jagged crack in the universe that had just opened between us.

  At first I couldn’t move. I felt as though I hadn’t moved for such a long time. But he was leaving without even checking to see that I was following so I shook myself free.

  ‘I don’t want an ice-cream,’ I said when I caught up with him.

  ‘What! Are you going on a diet?’

  ‘No, I’m not going on a diet.’

  ‘But you have put on a bit.’

  ‘I’m not as fat as you.’

  Dad didn’t answer. We walked along the path between the hedges, heading for the pool. He lit a cigarette and handed it to me; then he lit one for himself. I dragged the hot smoke into my lungs. I still couldn’t feel anything.

  We got to the pool bar and Dad pulled up a stool for me and one for himself. He ordered two beers and two whiskies.

  ‘Have you ever had a chaser?’ he asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘You do it like this,’ he said.

  And even though I hated him, I copied him. A shot of whisky to sting the throat, followed by a cool beer to soothe it.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

  ‘Duo mas, Pedro,’ Dad shouted, putting two fingers up, in case the handsome waiter, who was not called Pedro or Pablo but Alex, and who spoke very good English with an American accent, had not understood. Alex nodded and smiled.

  ‘Listen, G, remember what I asked you before? The favour. I really want you to think about doing this for me. Tell Mum that you have invited Julia out here, that you want her to come for the second week. There’s that spare room. It’s no skin off your nose. Don’t be a meanie.’

  It had been one night in the pub back in June, after Mum had booked the holiday, just me and him sitting at the bar.

  ‘Why don’t you invite Julia to Portugal? It will be fun to have more people,’ he’d said.

  ‘But she’s not even my friend.’

  ‘What are you talking about? She’s great. And she’s having a shitty time at home. It would be a nice thing for you to do to invite her out.’

  ‘I am not inviting Julia to Portugal. There are a million people I would invite on holiday before I would invite her.’

  ‘Fair enough. I’ve got to go, I’ve got a client,’ he’d said and he slid off his stool and left me at the bar, with his half-drunk beer and his half-smoked cigarette.

  ‘No,’ I said.

  There was silence between us. I could hear the sounds of people splashing in the pool, the music from the bar stereo, the whirring of a coffee machine, the low hum of the fridge, two people close by having a conversation about football.

  Dad sucked his cigarette.

  ‘Are you fucking her?’ I asked.

  He didn’t answer straightaway which meant that he had slept with her, he was sleeping with her.

  ‘What are you talking about? We’re in love.’

  I put my hands against the bar to steady myself. I got down off the stool. I walked away from him, back to the villa. I did not cry.

  Anya was inside, on her bed, reading a magazine, holding one of those small plastic battery-operated fans to her face.

  ‘Hi,’ I said, trying to sound normal.

  ‘Hi,’ she replied.

  Later that afternoon Mum opened the door to our room. I’d been half asleep.

  ‘Don’t wear your jeans tonight, we are going somewhere different, a nice restaurant in Vale do Lobo,’ she said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘We want to do something special for you both, to celebrate your GCSE results.’

  ‘But we don’t get them until tomorrow.’

  ‘Don’t be pedantic.’

  I wore my jeans, a grey T-shirt and my espadrilles. I didn’t brush my hair. I was getting dreadlocks in the back. Anya wore a flappy floral dress and redid her liquid eyeliner twice because she couldn’t make both sides match.

  Mum didn’t say anything when she saw me; she just pursed her lips and looked away.

  ‘Is that what you are wearing, Chubbs?’ said Dad.

  ‘Yes.’

  He looked at Anya. ‘You look gorgeous,’ he said.

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Mum.

  ‘Make sure you’ve got your Gold Card, Jan, this one is going to be expensive,’ said Dad.

  It was a beautiful evening, I couldn’t help but notice that, even though I was so full of rage. We sat outside on a stone terrace. Men in red waistcoats flapped large napkins on to our laps. Pergolas were draped with blooming jasmine and fat candles burned with still flames because there was no breeze. The warm air hung heavy about our shoulders and made us glow.

  ‘Order whatever you want, girls, you only live
once,’ said Dad.

  I scanned the menu, looking for the most expensive thing.

  ‘Chateaubriand,’ I said. I didn’t know what this was, but it cost more than anything else.

  ‘Brill, we’ll share,’ said Dad.

  And even though I hated him, I was finding it hard to keep my hate stoked in this pretty place with the nice wine and tasty food, and I knew that I was shallow, but that was not my fault.

  The bill came and Dad didn’t even look at it; he just blew luxurious smoke rings and finished off the last of the wine while Mum examined it and, with a small sigh, put down her credit card.

  That night I could not sleep. I took Anya’s fan from her bedside table and stood outside looking up at the moon and holding the fan to my face until the battery ran out.

  The next day was the hottest yet. There was no breeze. The fat green leaves on the bushes had lost their juicy lustre; the gravel on the pathway was molten with heat. We walked to the pool for waffles and a swim, Anya smoking a cigarette, the paper burning down quicker than usual.

  We sat under the awning by the bar, although I made sure my chair was in the sun. Dad was sprawled on a sun lounger nearby; his skin a glossy walnut brown, the yellow of his Walkman bright against his belly.

  I realized I had forgotten my suntan oil. Hawaiian Tropic, factor 5. There was no way I was going to use Anya’s factor 30.

  ‘I am just going back, order a waffle for me,’ I said.

  The air around the villa seemed to shimmer and warp. It was so hot that the birds had stopped singing.

  I went in through the door to the kitchen. The dishes were only half finished. The washing machine was not on. It was weirdly quiet. Then I heard a gulping, sniffing noise. Mum was crying.

  I went into the sitting room.

  Mum was on the sofa in her huge blue kaftan, her bare feet on the floor, wide apart, toenails painted pink, elbows on her knees. She was holding a piece of paper. The paper was lined, torn out of a schoolbook. I recognized the handwriting: it was round and childish, done in purple felt-tip pen, fat hearts instead of dots over each ‘i’.