‘And another thing you might try is getting in touch with the freeholder. Geezer starts chucking tiles around, that’s gotta be against the lease, hasn’t it?’ He smiled at me, opening the door. ‘Just a thought.’
Gilbert had the paintbrush out, minutes later, when I drove up Napier Road to feed the cat. The sight of him stooped in the porch made me pull the car to a halt several houses short of the end of the cul-de-sac. I’d felt sick all day on and off, and the nausea suddenly gusted upwards, making me swallow hard. I didn’t want to confront him. It was difficult just getting out of the car.
I was at the front gate before he turned round. He was wearing an old denim smock, scabbed with paint. His eyes were shadowed with the kind of deep exhaustion my father had before the stroke took his life.
I gestured at the brush. There were big splashes of paint all over the doorstep.
‘Why mauve?’ I said.
‘I happen to like it.’
‘But why didn’t you mention it? I live here too.’
‘Do you?’
He stared down at me. On some days, like today, I’d noticed an air of defeat about him, or perhaps bewilderment. Here was a man, I thought, who’d set out on a journey but kept losing the map.
I fingered the catch on the gate, flicking it back and forth, giving away my nervousness.
‘What about the tiles?’ I said, changing the subject.
‘What tiles?’
‘All those grey slate tiles you’ve been knocking off the roof.’ I looked down at the pavement. There was no sign of any tiles so I stepped back into the road, studying the roof. As far as I could see it was intact. By the time I got back to the porch, Gilbert was painting again. The conversation was becoming surreal. Nothing new, I thought bitterly, as far as Gilbert was concerned.
‘You killed my cat,’ I said heatedly. ‘You’ll deny it but I know it was you. That was a terrible thing to do. Terrible. I thought you liked cats.’
‘I love cats.’
He didn’t stop painting. Big mauve stripes, up and down. ‘So why kill it?’
‘I didn’t kill it.’
He broke off and looked round. The paint was dripping onto his jeans. I didn’t bother to point it out. Instead I told him about Gaynor. Gaynor was a policewoman, a detective. One phone call from me and she’d be round. If she didn’t get an answer at his door, she’d be summoning help. One way or another, she’d get inside the flat. There’d be traces in the freezer. Bound to be.
‘Traces of what?’
‘Pinot. The cat.’
‘Of course.’
‘You’re admitting it?’
‘Yes, absolutely, of course I am.’
I frowned, not knowing quite where to go next. Insanity, I thought, is a tricky thing to argue with.
‘You killed my cat,’ I said slowly. ‘And then you put him in your freezer.’
Gilbert was looking down the road. The sight of the Mercedes seemed to send a physical shiver down his thin frame.
‘He was in the road,’ he muttered. ‘I found him in the road.’
‘Dead?’
‘Yes. I brought him back. I put him in the freezer. I wanted you to have him.’
I tried to remember the state of the cat. To be honest, I hadn’t taken a proper look before I’d buried him. There was just a chance, I supposed, that Gilbert was telling the truth but I rather doubted it. A passing car, at the end of a cul-de-sac, sounded like yet another of his fantasies.
‘How can I be sure?’ I asked.
‘Sure of what?’
‘Sure about what you’re telling me. Anything could have happened.’
‘Of course,’ Gilbert recharged his brush. ‘But then you wouldn’t know, would you?’
‘Why not?’
He paused a moment, turning his back to me, then he jabbed viciously at the door, a heavy mauve daub that began to run at once.
‘Why not?’ he echoed softly. ‘Because you’re never here.’
I went to the doctor two days later. I hadn’t bothered to sign on at a practice and in the end I took Brendan’s advice and went along to the local health centre. A harassed middle-aged lady GP listened to my symptoms and mused aloud about stomach upsets. There was always a bug of some description around and this week’s gave you diarrhoea and vomiting. She typed a message into her computer and the printer alongside produced a prescription. As an afterthought, as I was leaving the consulting room, she asked me if I’d missed any periods. As it happened, I had. Twice.
‘Is that unusual? With you?’
‘Not especially. It’s happened before.’
‘Might you be pregnant? Have you thought of that?’
I hadn’t. Apart from that first time, I’d taken careful precautions. The doctor nodded, tapping her pencil on her teeth, listening. The practice nurse occupied a room down the corridor. I had the test result within an hour. It was positive.
I spent most of that evening with a friend in a pub off Upper Street around the corner from the office. I hadn’t seen Michelle for nearly a year which, oddly enough, made her the perfect confidante. We’d been very good friends on the course down in Bournemouth and she’d been one of the few third-years to share my passion for documentary. One of the reasons she’d phoned was to tap me for contacts. Where could she write to that she hadn’t tried already? Did I have any particular names? How was I getting on?
Against my instincts, I spared her the news about Home Run, partly because it seemed unnecessarily tactless - compounding her frustration - and partly because I didn’t altogether believe the thing would ever fly. Television is full of false starts, and though I knew Brendan was totally sincere in handing me my big, big challenge, there was still a zillion miles to go before we could start spending serious money. Big money is the acid test in television. Once you’re past your first £25,000, it’s stick back, wheels up, and away. To date, though, thanks to some extremely creative accounting and a judicious dip or two into other Doubleact budgets, we were barely into four figures.
But as far as Michelle was concerned, Members Only was fame enough, and I spent a good part of the evening sharing some of the raunchier gossip. Nearly all of it featured politicians, some of them extremely prominent. Her father, whom I happened to know, took the Telegraph daily and lived in the never-never world of squeaky- clean Tory politicians. Once Michelle got home and rang him with the news, he was clearly in for a shock.
Later, past ten o’clock, we got into the personal bits. How was I doing? Had I found anyone interesting? Was I making out? I’d braced myself for these questions all evening, not because I wasn’t happy - I most certainly was - but because my session with the practice nurse had affected me so deeply. Already, in the most fundamental way, I felt there were two of us. I was no expert on pre- natal development, but I was absolutely positive that the read-out from the test she’d given me represented a face, and a body, and a pair of the most exquisite little hands. I was no longer alone. For as long as I could possibly imagine I’d always have someone who’d need to rely on me, someone who’d be my friend.
Given that Brendan was the father, and that I’d fallen in love with him, all this probably sounds daft, even insulting. With Brendan to love me, why would I feel alone? To that question, I had no answer. Neither, as it turned out, did Michelle.
‘What’s he like? This Brendan?’
Good question. I told her as much as I knew. I told her that he was older than me, and very bright, and a bit manic. I told her that he’d been dotty about me from the start, and had courted me like mad, but had never really been a pain about it. Since I’d moved in, we’d got to know each other well, really well, and the more of him I saw, the more I knew he was for me. I went easy on the bit about Brendan’s special talents but Michelle and I had been pretty frank with each other in our Bournemouth days and I think she guessed th
at the sex was wonderful. I also admitted, when she asked, that he was married.
‘Do you trust him?’
Better question still. I said I did.
‘Why?’.
‘Because he’s never let me down. Not once. Because he’s kind, really kind. Because he says we’re important, the most important thing of all, and I believe him.’
‘Does he make you laugh?’
‘Yes,’
‘On purpose?’
‘Yes, and in other ways, too. He can be funny because he tries so hard, and funny because he thinks he’s fooled you, but you can see through him, right through him. He could come back as double glazing. He’s completely transparent. I tell him that sometimes.’ I grinned. ‘He keeps the warmth in, too. Do you know what I mean?’
Michelle looked briefly troubled and I knew I’d touched a nerve. Living with Brendan had taught me just how rare it is to find a relationship like ours and telling other people about it sometimes isn’t kind. Maybe I should have stuck to Home Run after all, I thought. Who wants to hear about other people falling love?
I got us both another drink. Michelle was still looking gloomy.
‘It’s not all roses,’ I told her. ‘Don’t think that.’
She brightened up at once.
‘It’s not?’
‘No,’ I sat down. ‘I’m pregnant.’
She stared at me and I could tell at once that it was the last thing she’d expected to hear. Canny, street-wise Julie Emerson? The Viking goddess of the windsurf set? Pregnant?
‘How come?’
I told her how I thought it must have happened. Blaming drink was the oldest excuse in the book but I genuinely couldn’t think of another. Since that first night, and the morning after, I’d been back on the pill so Brendan’s malt whisky had a great deal to answer for.
‘How has he taken it?’
‘He doesn’t know.’
I explained about my visit to the GP. We were talking hot news, I said, and I’d yet to decide whether or not to share it with Brendan.
‘What’s stopping you ?’
‘I don’t know.’ I stared at my glass of Pils. ‘I’m a bit confused.’
‘You think it might change things?’
‘I doubt it but…’ I pulled a face,’… I suppose it might.’
‘And you don’t want that to happen?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘So why don’t you…’ Michelle made a loose, circular motion with her hand.
‘Get rid of it?’
‘Yes.’
‘I couldn’t.’
‘You couldn’t? Why not?’
‘Because…’ I frowned, concentrating hard,’… it’s not mine to get rid of.’
‘Of course it is.’
‘No, it’s not.’
‘Whose is it then? Brendan’s?’
‘No.’
‘Not Brendan’s?’
‘No, it’s his, of course it is. But it’s not, if you see what I mean.’
Michelle was looking bewildered. Surprise had given way to disbelief. Then blank incomprehension.
‘It’s a baby,’ I said at last. ‘It’s alive. It exists. I can’t just get rid of it…’ I touched my glass to hers, ‘… can I?’
As it happens, I couldn’t tell Brendan my little bit of news, not at once, because he chose the whole of the next fortnight to go away. Co-production deals had taken him off to Australia and the postcards began arriving within days, dozens of variations on a theme of mile-long beaches, curling waves, and hunky surfers daubed in pink sunblock. In a way, this absence of his was a blessing. Not only did it give me a breathing space to get stuff sorted out in my head but it also offered a chance to nail down some dates. So far I only had the confirmation that I was pregnant. Now I wanted the entire script.
I returned to the GP. She was still waiting for my notes to come up from Petersfield but in the meantime I gave her a summary of my health to date. No major diseases. No broken bones. And a level of fitness that was, by media standards, pretty impressive. The GP concluded her examination with some wary questions about what she termed my ‘situation’. In this, she covered pretty much the same ground as Michelle, with one exception.
‘You still have a flat of your own?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you’ll be keeping it?’
I gave the question some thought. Given half a chance, I’d sell the place tomorrow but Gilbert had just added two enormous eyes, in white gloss, to the front door and his message to would-be buyers had become all too effective. Mark was still telling me to hassle the freeholder, something I hadn’t had time to do, but even if I got some kind of result I knew that Mark was close to giving up on the place. His last prospect, plus half the street, had been given the full Mozart treatment on CD, some concerto or other, at something close to a million decibels.
‘For a while,’ I said carefully, ‘I’ll probably hang on to it.’
‘That might be wise. Could you cope alone there? You and the baby?’
The question made me blink a bit. Most GPs take extraordinary care to keep their, distance from patients’ private lives, but this one sounded just like my mother.
‘Of course we’d cope,’ I said brightly. ‘But I’m sure it won’t come to that.’
Even now, nearly a year later, I can see that doctor’s face. I was on my feet, the consultation over, her questions answered, and as I backed towards the door I remember her glancing up from her desk, pen in hand. She looked weary, like they all do, but there was something else in her expression as well, an odd mixture of pity and sympathy. She sat in this room every day. She probably talked to hundreds of young women like me. And there was a part of her, way down, that felt sorry for us.
I worked harder than ever during the next couple of weeks, mainly trying to nurse my other baby, Home Run. The dates that came through on the pregnancy ringed the week of 17 December, 1997, a deadline that gave me barely any leeway at all for post-production after the November shoot. There’d be pictures to edit, sound tracks to lay, and a fine cut to agree before we’d be ready for the final dub. This process was complex enough but the fact that we were dealing with a pilot made it doubly so. This first programme would be a template for everything that followed, and if we got anything wrong then the fault would be magnified over subsequent shows. We’d therefore be in for weeks of anguished debate over the off-line, wrangles over what was to come out, what should survive. Would I really be able to fight my corner, the way a real producer should, when any day I might become a mother?
The prospects for both babies were, to be frank, worrying and I knew there was no point pretending otherwise. But arguing for a change in the production schedule would inevitably risk declaring my hand. Was Brendan really ready to confront life as a threesome? When he’d only just made room for me?
Until Brendan came back I couldn’t begin to resolve this issue so I got on with the nuts and bolts business of actually producing the thing. First call, of course, was for the kids themselves and I spent an infinitely depressing week in the company of various Inner London social workers, touring the dodgier council estates. Each of them was testament to different kinds of failure and the more kids I met, the more sullen and wary they seemed to become.
Before he’d plunged into the arms of Qantas, Brendan had stressed how important it was to end up with the right ethnic mix, and Gary and I argued for hours on the telephone about exactly how many blacks, browns, yellows and greens we should be adding to the pool of contenders. Put this way, the process sounds a bit like cooking and it was only after Gary came up to town for a session in the pub that we found a recipe that satisfied us both. In all, the team would number twelve. Half should be white. Of the rest, at least four should be West Indian, Bengali, Chinese or Malay. The other two places were up for grabs, depen
ding on the talent available.
It was after we’d met in the pub, incidentally, that Gary announced he’d missed the last train. He lived in the outskirts of Ross-on-Wye, a house he’d bought when he was still with the SAS at Hereford, and the chances of making it back after half past nine were zilch. We’d had a nice time at the pub, marvelling at all the stuff we were up to, and I was delighted to offer him the key to Napier Road when he inquired about a bed for the night. I wrote the address on a scrap of paper and gave it to him before he ducked into the taxi.
‘Make yourself at home,’ I told him. ‘Use whatever you want.’
That night I lay awake waiting for Brendan to phone from Australia, wondering whether Gilbert might confuse Gary with me. The thought of my crazy neighbour appearing at Gary’s bedside in the small hours was too yummy to resist, and despite the absence of a call from Sydney, I drifted off to sleep with a smile on my face. Gary would probably throttle him. That would make Mark’s day.
Gary appeared at the office next morning. When I asked him whether he’d slept OK, he looked surprised.
‘Yeah,’ he said.’ Any reason why not?’
It was at this point that Sandra, of all people, disappeared. We’d had a couple of preliminary meetings about Home Run, trying to block out cash flow on the basis of the pledges Brendan had wrung from the sponsor. Both meetings, to my relief, had been businesslike, even civilised, and Sandra had listened to my critique of the original idea with something close to sympathy.
Like me, she was wary of underestimating the challenge of trying to motivate the kids, and she also agreed that Brendan was short- changing us over location facilities for the shoot itself. Leaving the pictures to the kids was the kind of after-lunch decision that simply wouldn’t survive contact with reality. The principle was sound enough (whole programmes had been built around it) but in this case the pressures were far too heavy to expect the kids to produce half- decent pictures as well. Wouldn’t they have enough on their plates simply trying to survive? My despairing question drew an understanding nod from Sandra, and when I took her back to Brendan’s original decision, the word ‘macho’ brought a smile to her lips.
Nocturne Page 14
