A Family Man

by Amanda Brookfield

  ‘No —’

  ‘Well, what the hell is all this about?’

  ‘It’s about Joshua,’ said Matt simply. ‘I’ve made a mess of everything else …’

  ‘But you’ve got that splendid girl …’

  ‘Yes, for the time being. But Josie is not going to be around for ever. There’ll be a string of replacements, most of them not nearly so splendid. And meanwhile, more and more of the time Joshua is at home will be when I’m out at work. It has at last dawned on me, Oliver, that I’m not going to just bump into somebody else, that some sort of long-term female substitute for Kath is not waiting round the corner, and that it is up to me to reorganise my life to accommodate —’

  ‘But you have reorganised your life, for God’s sake, you couldn’t have done more.’

  ‘Oliver, I appreciate your support, but …’

  ‘If this is about that half-baked idea of writing about Andrea Beauchamp for a living, then you can forget it. Not only because the whole project is highly unlikely to materialise, but also because biographers – ghost writers – even of famous people, get paid peanuts. Take it from me—’

  ‘It’s not that,’ Matt cut in, all the more fiercely for the fact that Oliver had touched a nerve.

  Secretly, he had pinned a few hopes on the actress and was disappointed she had done nothing to get in touch. ‘There are other jobs … I was thinking of going to see one of those consultants who help you change career.’

  ‘And get charged thousands to be told what you know already.

  Matthew, you are so good at what you do.’

  ‘That’s not a good enough reason to do it, Oliver, not now I’m a single father. I’ve got to stop thinking of myself, of my own happiness. Being out four nights a week, charging all over the country, it just won’t do. Joshua needs me. And I need him,’ he added quietly. ‘It’s a two-way thing. I thought working from home would be the answer, but it’s not. Obviously I’ll work out my contract if necessary, but ideally I would like to stop in two months. That way I’ll be free for Joshua’s summer holidays. He’s due to start full-time school in September, that is if I ever sort out where the hell he’s going – I’ve got the name of another place I’m going to try this week. Whatever happens he’s going to need all the support he can get.’

  ‘Well, that’s admirable, Matthew, I take my hat off to you.’ Oliver sounded weary. ‘May I ask what you will do for money?’

  ‘We’ll be fine for a while. If necessary I’ll sell the house – prices keep going up. Oliver, I’m sorry to let you down and so on – if I thought there was any other way I —’

  ‘Don’t apologise to me, dear boy.’

  ‘And I’ll talk to Phillip tomorrow. Obviously he’s going to be pissed off and I don’t see why you should take the flak.’

  After Matt had put the phone down he went and stood at the window. He thought about calling his father but decided to save it for later, knowing he might need some of his no-frills wisdom to see him through the week.

  He was due to come and stay at the end of the month anyway; partly by way of a celebration for his seventieth birthday and partly to fulfil his own suggestion of taking Joshua back up to Yorkshire for half-term.

  Remembering Dennis’s barely concealed excitement at the prospect, Matt smiled, for the first time raising his gaze from the chipped paint of the windowsill. With early summer in full swing, the uglier urban elements of his view were less visible, shrouded from sight by the bursting green of trees in their prime. Three gardens away laundry hung from a line, bobbing on the light breeze; pillowcases, seven socks, three T-shirts, five pairs of pants, two handkerchiefs. Thinking with tiresome predictability of Sophie, wondering glumly what she would make of his obsession with her underclothes, Matt blinked and looked away. In the midst of all his other woes the way she had ignored him that morning still rankled. Cutting him dead like that, looking through him as if he didn’t exist. When all he had wanted, all along, was to be friends.

  Opening the window wider, he leaned his elbows on the sill and took a deep calming breath. In the distance the dome of the War Museum roof glinted like a jewel on a cushion of green. The worst was known, he reminded himself, turning in towards the room and silently vowing that whatever muddles followed would be of his own making.

  36

  The days that followed felt different, easier, as if he had stopped pushing against an invisible weight. Philip Legge, while not attempting to disguise his impatience, promised to release Matt just as soon as he could find someone suitable to take his place. Since Erica Chastillon’s performance on the subbing desk had proved somewhat less spectacular than anticipated, it was generally acknowledged that a solution would have to be sought in other quarters. The mere fact of having laid his cards on the table made Matt feel better. He set off on his evening assignments with a lighter heart and rediscovered some of his old fluidity in writing about them afterwards.

  With the approach of her exams, Josie took to turning up for her baby-sitting duties with a sackful of books under her arm. Knowing Joshua’s capacity for disruption, and fearing for her grades, Matt tentatively suggested he should seek alternative help. Mr Patel, back behind his till with a strapped ribcage and shadows where the bruises had been, had volunteered his son, Rajeet, for evening childminding. He was saving up to buy a computer, he explained, and needed to supplement his pocket money. Josie, looking hurt, had asked whether her friend Mick could come with her instead, free of charge. Unsure of how to respond, Matt consulted Joshua, whose eyes had at once widened with pleasure.

  ‘Mick teaches me football. He can do thirty-four kick-ups without stopping.’

  ‘He’s got lots of little brothers,’ explained Josie. ‘And he’d be able to test me on stuff when Josh is in bed. We’re saving too,’ she added, a little defensively, ‘for a car. Mick’s got his test.’

  Matt had relented, agreeing to a compromise whereby Rajeet Patel came on Fridays and Josie, with Mick if she chose, could continue to manage everything else.

  ‘But Josie, I just want to say that your priority, even when Mick is here, must be Joshua. I don’t want to find …’

  ‘Him and me snogging on the sofa?’ she finished cheekily. ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Don’t worry … I mean, you don’t want to do it in someone else’s house, do you?’

  Feeling like an old-age pensioner, aware that it would be a long time before he did anything in his own or anybody else’s house, Matt had accepted these assurances with a wry smile. A new domestic pattern emerged as a result; one that worked very well. Of particular satisfaction to Matt was how the altered arrangements were encouraging Joshua to spread his affections more freely, to cling with less desperation either to Josie or himself. Even after a couple of weeks the difference was noticeable. His new minders complemented each other beautifully, with Rajeet particularly strong on the indoor books and board games department, while Mick, a lanky teenager with a fierce-some haircut and a gentle smile, showed endless patience in the garden, diving after Joshua’s little kicks with all the panache of a goalie having a bad Wembley final. So worn out was Joshua by these new attentions that sometimes he was in his pajamas before Matt left for the theatre, waving sleepily from the bottom stair, soft toy under one arm and a book under the other, so like the perfect, textbook version of the happy child that it gave Matt a lump in the throat just to look at him.

  With this new, simpler version of his life, the only immediate hurdle remained the question of Joshua’s new school. Even though Matt had seized upon the information in Sophie’s note and contacted Mrs Cherry as soon as he could, she had sounded sufficiently preoccupied to leave him with lingering doubts as to whether The Garden would in fact provide the solution after all. To add to his anxieties, the only appointment she could offer him had been the distant date of the first Friday in June, the day Joshua broke up for half-term. All the other parents he knew had sorted out their infants’ futures weeks before, some opting for St Leonard’s, som
e for Broadlands, a few for schools in ridiculously distant places like Dulwich and Blackheath. No one was going to The Garden. No one even seemed to have heard of it. A brand-new school was a dreadful risk, Maria Schofield had warned him, wagging her finger in a way which had made Matt glad that Joshua had slipped from the mainstream tea circuit into occasional play dates with quieter children of whom Maria and her gang had probably never heard. A mild temptation to consult Louise on the matter was easily quelled. She had not been in touch since their showdown in the beer garden, and Matt could see the sense of in leaving things that way.

  On the morning of his appointment with Mrs Cherry he awoke early with a stomachful of nerves, aware that, in terms of Joshua’s personal happiness at least, this was the next vital link in the chain. As he was leaving the house the postman, arriving at the bottom of the steps, pushed a single envelope into his hands, of bright yellow, handsomely addressed in sloping black ink. Matt, thinking with a surge of quite illogical hope of Andrea Beauchamp, tore at the flap, only to find that Louise had mustered the courage to make contact after all.

  Dear Matt

  You are probably wondering why you have not heard from me. The truth is I have longed to get in touch many times, but have managed to resist. Anthony is trying very hard. He guessed there was someone else, though I haven’t – and never will – tell him who. More importantly, he has realised that part of why it happened was because he had been neglecting me. We have decided to move to the country, Dorset probably, though Gloucestershire is lovely too. Looking at houses is helping to keep me busy, and happy, as I have always been a country girl at heart. I know you do not want to admit to what there was between us, Matt, but that makes it no less real for me. The number of times I thought of you, the dreams I had of how things could be between us, so real it was sometimes like they had actually happened. But enough. Looking back won’t help us to move on. In case you’re wondering, I won’t be in touch with Kath either. I could never be her friend after what she has done to you. I hope you have forgiven me for telling you about Graham. No one loves the bearer of bad news, do they?

  Hugs to Joshua. Take care of yourself. You are very special and deserve to be happy.

  Louise.

  Everyone had their own version of their life, mused Matt, shaking his head in wonder as he screwed up the letter and dropped it into his wheelie bin. Everyone was at the centre of their own drama, casting acquaintances and lovers in subsidiary roles, the extent of which was often beyond the participants’ wildest imaginings. He thought of Kath and what her story of their marriage would have been, how vastly different to his; being trapped with a hateful husband, an intoxicating illicit romance, the tragedy of leaving her son. To an impartial listener it would seem like a rich narrative indeed, with Kath glittering in the role of heroine, the wronged wife, sacrificing motherhood on the altar of her new love. Everyone read from their own scripts, he realised, encouraged rather than depressed by the thought, contemplating how good he was at judging such things from a theatre seat and how hopeless in real life.

  After checking the A–Z, he locked up the car and set off down the street, whistling softly. It was going to be another hot day, but he was ready for it, having at the last minute traded his sensible grey suit for a pair of clean shorts and a smartish T-shirt. He wanted to present himself to Mrs Cherry as he was, to be frank about his situation, what he wanted from a primary school, what Joshua wanted.

  The Garden turned out to be a twelve-minute walk away, in a handsome Victorian house at one end of a maze of streets Matt wouldn’t have known existed unless he had consulted the map. A man in dirty white overalls was up a ladder painting the G of Garden as Matt approached, reminding him, though he barely needed it, that this was a brand-new establishment with no track record and no recommendation beyond that of a woman who seemed to hold him in the lowest regard.

  ‘I thought we’d sit in the garden,’ said Mrs Cherry, slipping her fingers free of his hand almost before he had got hold of it and turning to lead the way down a long central hallway to a glass door. ‘The place is still swarming with workmen, but they break for lunch any minute and I’ll show you round then. I’ve made a pot of tea, or would you prefer something cold? All I’ve got is orange juice, I’m afraid.’

  Matt followed her through to the back of the house, their footsteps echoing on the bare boards. She was tall and slim, with gingery brown hair swept into a loose French bun and startled blue eyes that looked both alert and perpetually amused. Although she was probably in her mid-forties, her demeanour was of a woman much younger, an impression heightened by the simple blue cotton dress she was wearing and her girlish flat-heeled sandals.

  ‘I can see where you got the name for the school from,’ said Matt, admiring the huge space stretching before them, most of it laid to lawn, apart from the nearest third which was taken up by new, soft-looking tarmac and several sets of climbing frames. At the far end of the grassed area were two small, robust-looking goals, still covered in polythene.

  ‘The curriculum will include all sorts of sports,’ said Mrs Cherry with a laugh, noting the direction of his gaze.

  ‘Good,’ said Matt, smiling. ‘Football is Joshua’s new passion – Peter Pan doesn’t get a look in these days.’

  ‘Ah, Joshua, yes, he sounds a lovely child. I’ve heard all about him,’ Mrs Cherry explained, seeing his look of puzzlement, ‘from Sophie Contini.’

  ‘Oh yes, Sophie, of course.’

  ‘We met on a course about eighteen months ago and have kept in touch,’ she explained. ‘The idea of starting the school was only just beginning to take off – I was still waiting to hear if I’d got the grant. I don’t know how much Sophie has told you,’ she continued, ‘but I’ve run a small nursery for many years now, just a couple of roads away – started it when my own lot were small and I couldn’t find anywhere I liked. Anyway, for years parents have been begging me to extend on up to primary level. Not having the space there I kept putting it off, and of course finding the right site was hard …’ She clapped her hands. ‘But you haven’t come here for a history of the bureaucratic and logistical nightmare of getting a new school off the ground. Would you like to look round now? Still ladders and paint pots, I’m afraid, but we’re nearly there. Half the ground floor has been converted for the hall and kitchens, which leaves room for two small classrooms and one cloakroom, and of course the staffroom and my study – a cubby-hole, but I’m sure I’ll manage. On the first floor we’ve got two further classrooms, each with cloakrooms, which leaves the top floor for art and craft – one huge room full of light. Oh yes, and there’s the library, which is in the basement. Sounds dreary but I think the conversion has worked particularly well down there – it’s spacious but really snug and with lines of ceiling lights everywhere to make up for the —’

  ‘Mrs Cherry, I … it all sounds wonderful. But presumably Joshua isn’t the only one wanting to be considered … and I can’t help being surprised you’ve got any spaces left. Most schools seem to have closed their lists months ago.’

  They had got as far as the doorway into what was obviously the main hall. In the far corner, across a considerable yardage of freshly varnished floorboards, a young man in splattered jeans was leaning on an upright piano sipping from a mug and smoking a cigarette.

  She laughed. ‘Yes, well, in an ideal world my lists would have closed months ago as well – I shall be more organised next year. And yes, Joshua is among several children hoping to be accepted. I shall meet all of them for a short interview – quite different from the grilling he got at St Leonard’s, I assure you …’ She hesitated. ‘Obviously, Mr Webster, it would be unprofessional of me to make any guarantees, but I cannot envisage any enormous problems. I’ll give you the forms before you leave. We need a small deposit, I’m afraid, of fifty pounds, but happily the fees themselves are well below your usual private institutions – for the time being anyway,’ she added, making a face. ‘In fact,’ she confided, lowering her voice, �
��I had been hoping to lure Sophie herself over here, but then who can blame her for choosing Italy instead. She’s been talking of making such a move ever since I met her …’

  ‘Italy?’

  ‘Her sister and brother-in-law run a language school there. Near Orvieto. Sophie’s going to join them. She’s bilingual … I assumed you knew …’ She broke off, looking momentarily puzzled, before pushing open another door, revealing a room with windows fronting on to the garden at one end and a huge white board at the other. ‘Not very big, but then that’s what I believe in – small classes, individual attention. We’re going to have no more than ten in each room, with a maximum of twenty in each of the three years. The reception class is the one that’s now almost full. The other two will obviously take a little more time …’

  For the remainder of the tour Matt said very little, distracted not by the obvious and happy fact that he had found a place and a person to whom he could entrust the next three years of his son’s education, but by the notion of Sophie going to Italy. Deserting the sunny grime of south-east London for olive groves. Deserting him.

  Joshua broke up for half-term. All the other parents he knew had sorted out their infants’ futures weeks before, some opting for St Leonard’s, some for Broadlands, a few for schools in ridiculously distant places like Dulwich and Blackheath. No one was going to The Garden. No one even seemed to have heard of it. A brand-new school was a dreadful risk, Maria Schofield had warned him, wagging her finger in a way which had made Matt glad that Joshua had slipped from the mainstream tea circuit into occasional play dates with quieter children of whom Maria and her gang had probably never heard. A mild temptation to consult Louise on the matter was easily quelled. She had not been in touch since their showdown in the beer garden, and Matt could see the sense of in leaving things that way.