by Freya North
A text message beeped into Matt’s phone. It was from Jake.
‘HAD SEX LAST NITE.’
Matt laughed and replied.
‘ME 2.’
‘1ST PINTS ON ME,’ Jake responded, much to Matt’s approval.
‘You hussy!’ Gemma gawped admiringly at Abi. ‘I can’t believe you did that!’
‘Did what?’ Fen, coming through the front door, asked.
‘Yay! McCabe returns!’ Abi sang.
‘Stop changing the subject, strumpet,’ Gemma said with an emphatic crossing of her arms, her raven curls swishing about her face like angry serpents.
‘What subject?’ Fen enquired. ‘What’s she done now?’ She plonked her bag on the settee and joined Gemma’s side, crossing her own arms over her far less substantial bust and, therefore, to a lesser effect.
Abi giggled coquettishly. ‘Fen?’ she said gingerly, tweaking tufts of her blonde crop.
‘Yes, Miss Baker?’ Fen replied, arms still folded in a teacher-like fashion.
‘You know Mr Matthew?’ Abi said with theatrical shyness and an uncharacteristically coy lowering of the eyes.
Fen looked puzzled. Their landlord was called Mr Michaels. ‘Who?’
‘For God’s sake,’ said Gemma, more exasperated with Abi than Fen, ‘Matthew. Matt. Lover-boy In The Offing.’
‘Oh,’ said Fen, ‘him.’
‘Well,’ said Abi, all sparkly, ‘you know him?’
‘Er, yes,’ said Fen, having no clue where the conversation was going.
‘Well,’ Abi continued, looking utterly triumphant, ‘you know his flatmate, horny Jake?’
‘Yes,’ Fen said, with a slight frown, ‘he of the goatee and flirtatious manner.’
‘Hmm,’ Abi hummed appreciatively.
‘He is good-looking,’ Fen agreed artlessly.
‘For God’s sake,’ Gemma exclaimed, ‘the girl and boy played doctors and nurses all last night.’
‘What?’ Fen looked amazed.
‘And no, I do not mean that they were in Casualty at the Royal Free,’ Gemma added.
Abi raised one eyebrow most lasciviously. ‘He was good,’ she slurred in an impressive southern drawl.
‘Blimey!’ Fen marvelled, the penny dropping visibly as her eyes widened and her jaw gaped. ‘Did you? Do it? With Jake?’
‘Yup!’ Abi confirmed nonchalantly.
‘Matt’s flatmate?’ Fen double-checked.
‘Yup!’ Abi shrugged.
‘Good God!’ Fen exclaimed. ‘Where? When? How?’ She paused. ‘Quick! White wine!’
There was no white wine, and as Gemma and Fen’s thirst for details could not be quenched by a time-consuming trip to the off licence, the housemates made do instead with the bottle of port kept for emergencies. They toasted Abi, while Abi toasted Jake’s dexterity of digit and tongue and ‘stonking great hard-on’. Fen, who had craved a luxuriate in a bubble bath to mull over James and think of Matt, was now pleased for the distraction away from such introversion.
And the fact that I’m saved, by the enormity of Abi’s conquest, from divulging my dilemma and having them laid bare for dissection.
‘I can’t believe you did that!’ Gemma, impressed, said as more of the previous night’s antics were revealed.
‘I can’t believe he did that!’ Fen exclaimed, wrinkling her nose at a particularly lurid detail concerning Jake’s tongue.
‘You get a taste for it,’ Abi shrugged with a sly grin. Fen pretended she was going to throw up.
‘So,’ Gemma concluded, draining the dregs of the bottle between the three glasses, ‘we just need young Fenella to set the wheels turning with Mr Matthew, then you lot can be quite the cosy foursome.’
‘Wait up,’ Abi said, sounding a little concerned and looking rather horrified, ‘it was one night of unbridled passion. It’s not leading on to anything twosomey, let alone foursomey.’
‘God,’ Fen said, quite indignant, ‘you imply that’s far more distasteful than half those things you let that he-man do to you last night!’
‘I’m going to have a bath,’ Abi yawned, ‘anyone want my water? It’ll be Clarins bath tonic.’
‘It’ll be contaminated,’ Fen goaded, ‘I’d catch something! I’ll wait, dear. You go and have a good scrub.’
Abi, though, licked the tip of her index finger and scored an imaginary tick in the air.
Matt and Jake were sitting on plush red velvet in a booth encrusted with Aztec designs in reclaimed mosaic. In Soho. Strange noises, which could have been tribal, or workmen, or terribly avant-garde music, or not music at all, filtered through the private members’ bar from speakers hidden behind wafts of chiffon. They were sipping a rather peculiar vodka and hadn’t ventured into the complimentary nibbles because it was difficult to tell if they were animal, vegetable or mineral. Despite the cutting-edge trendiness of the surroundings and post-modern vodka, the other people looked decidedly normal. Matt wondered whether this was a source of disappointment for the club’s owners.
‘I thought vodka was meant to be odourless and tasteless,’ Matt remarked, ‘which is why it is so easy to drink.’
‘This has a scent and a taste to it,’ Jake agreed, sniffing and sipping.
‘Not that I’m complaining,’ said Matt, sniffing and sipping.
‘No,’ Jake hurried, ‘nor I. Another? Shall we move on to lager?’
The meticulously attired and coiffured bar staff studiously ignored increasingly obvious attempts from Matt and Jake to catch their attention so Matt went to the bar. He returned with vodka.
‘The lager is Latvian,’ he explained to Jake, ‘I didn’t think we should risk it.’
They chinked glasses and Jake lit a cigarette, drawing on it in a leisurely fashion and blowing the smoke through his nose, eyes half closed and fixed contemplatively on a bit of broken glass that was the centrepiece of the mosaic on the far wall.
‘I shagged your intended’s flatmate,’ Jake said, tapping ash into the ashtray and suddenly hoping it was an ashtray and not art or some receptacle for the pips or stalks or inners or outers of the unidentifiable nibbles.
‘Who?’ Matt said, not thinking of Fen and wondering if Jake referred to his ex, Julia.
‘Abi,’ Jake drawled.
‘Who?’ Matt responded, because he thought his ex’s flatmate was called Josie.
‘The bleach-blonde pixie who lives with your Vanilla MeCrave,’ Jake explained, slightly baffled and wondering whether the vodka was having a more potent effect on Matt or himself.
‘Fen!’ Matt exclaimed, half to Jake and half to himself.
Why should he have been thinking of Fen? Judith was the last person he went to bed with. His ex before that. Fen – never.
‘She was rather good,’ Jake nodded, as if with great discernment.
Matt smirked in that charmingly puerile way that remains the prerogative of all men, whatever their age. ‘How? When? More vod!’
‘Great bod!’ Jake smirked back.
‘Will you see her again?’ Matt asked.
Jake swished the ice-cubes around his glass and tipped his head from side to side. ‘Probably,’ he said, ‘I’d quite like to check out Gemma too.’ Matt shook his head in mock exasperation. ‘A glass of white wine,’ Jake shrugged, ‘a glass of red – sometimes you feel like blonde, sometimes brunette. Milk chocolate, plain chocolate. The one, or sometimes the other. Something sparkly and light, or something dusky and more sultry.’
‘I cannot,’ Matt enunciated, ‘believe you are contemplating it.’
‘Anyway, what’s your story?’ Jake moved on, at ease with his personal proclivities when it came to sex. ‘Your sweetheart was not home last night. I peeked in her bedroom though. Very spic and span. And with chains and manacles strategically placed above the bed.’
‘Sod off,’ Matt laughed.
‘Anyway, what about you – last night,’ Jake encouraged.
‘Judith. At work. Deputy director.’
‘Matthew!�
�� Jake exclaimed, ‘Not Judith! Not at work?’
‘Yes – Judith,’ Matt confirmed, ‘no – Bermondsey.’
‘Bermondsey?’ Jake exclaimed as if the place were commensurate with some very depraved act. And then he totally took Matt off his guard. ‘Nice mess, mate,’ Jake proclaimed, with slight disapproval. ‘You fancy the English Rose who hides away in the Archive and yet you go and shag the Mad Woman who wants to oust the director and take over the art world. I know all about Judith – and from the way you’ve spoken about her, I presumed you didn’t much like her.’
Matt considered this. Then he shrugged. ‘I don’t really. We simply had sex.’
Jake considered this. Then he shrugged. ‘Believe me, it’s rarely simple.’
Matt considered this. Then he shrugged. ‘She made a pass at me. I was drunk. Simple.’
‘What are you going to do?’ Jake asked, ‘about Good Girl in the Archive? And Wicked Witch in the Big Office?’
‘I’ll pursue the former and be mature about the latter,’ said Matt. ‘I guess I’ve done the rebound thing now. I’m cleansed and purged and have a clean slate to see what might happen with Fen.’
‘Let’s hope Judas will be “mature” about it,’ Jake said, a little glumly because thrusting career women intimidated him slightly (probably because he had been cuckolded by one once). ‘Ideally, a zipless fuck should happen with a woman you won’t see again, not one you work with on a daily basis.’
‘Zips aside, it was definitely no-strings sex,’ Matt said, ‘after all, she made all the moves.’
‘Sure,’ said Jake, who actually wasn’t sure at all.
There are always strings, Jake thought as he ventured into the black marble cavern he presumed was the Gents. There’ll even be strings with Abi – if I’m lucky, she’ll just want to tie me up with them or, better still, allow me to strap her to the bed with them.
James sat up late watching television. He wondered, fleetingly, if Fen had arrived home safely. And what she was doing. Asleep? Awake? Eating? Boyfriend? Barry had diarrhoea. Beryl was trying to fuss over him.
SEVENTEEN
Fen adored both her sisters. Being the middle girl, it was as if she constantly looked from this way to that, from left to right, much as she did the palms of her hands. On the one hand, if she looked up, a year older than her, she’d find Philippa. Pip – unusual and outgoing from an early age. Fen had always been in awe of Pip’s ability to entertain, to hold court in such an amenable way. Pip was an accomplished acrobat and an adorable clown, a master of both spontaneous flikflaks and polished slapstick. Fen marvelled at Pip’s strongest personality trait – to be bright and carefree but never self-centred. By comparison, Fen felt herself to be dull, unable to do even a cartwheel or to recount the shortest of jokes. Pip, though, wished she could have that serenity that was so effortless for Fen. For Pip to be quiet, controlled, thoughtful, necessitated yogic breathing and a slow countdown for at least five minutes.
On the other hand, if Fen looked down, a year her junior, she’d find Catriona. Cat. Fen admired Cat’s single-mindedness and her passion for all things athletic. When in Derbyshire, while Fen day-dreamed in the heather or under the shelter of a drystone wall, she’d marvel at Cat charging around the moors on her mountain bike; whether staying on in the most precarious of situations or falling off dramatically. Similarly, whilst Fen might stroll along the lane, eyes low so she could spy plants and flowers, Cat would belt past, perhaps two miles into a five-mile hill run, her eyes fixed ahead, always forward, always making strides. It was Cat’s blueprint for life, Fen decided. And now that her younger sister had chucked out the despicable boyfriend, and though she was suffering so, she was still managing to stride ahead, planning to leave Britain to report on the Tour de France and further her career as a sports journalist.
Philippa, Fenella, Catriona. From the earliest age, they had rarely been referred to by their full names. Unless they were being scolded. Or were lost in the woods. Or had emitted a sonorous belch at an inopportune moment (Django assured them that there were times when it was acceptable to do so). Or had sworn with one of the forbidden expletives (bugger and bollocks and bloody were allowed). Or had rejected Django’s cuisine. Or had scored an anomalously high grade in any science subject at school.
The day that Fen returned from Derbyshire was the day that Cat finally split from her long-term but poor excuse for a boyfriend. Currently, Cat is desperately low. She fears she will never feel anything but the leaden sickness weighing heavy in her stomach; the feeling of panic lurking at the base of her throat; the notion filling her mind that she might never love or be loved again; the searing pain of her heart cracking – surely moments away from breaking altogether. And yet, lucky Cat McCabe. Her eldest sister Pip keeps her distracted and entertained during the day and her older sister Fen is with her each evening, staying the night; listening, soothing, advising. It is these three qualities, held in abundance by Fen, which Cat and Pip have always depended on; drawn upon; coveted.
Matt, however, didn’t know of Fen’s younger sister’s crisis. All he knew was that, since her return from Derbyshire, Fen had seemed somewhat remote. She’d been keeping to herself, mostly taking her lunch at her desk, or cross-legged on the floor whilst sorting through 1964. He was a little disappointed. She’d hardly been in to Publications. She’d come out for lunch only the once. She was in early and left early; mostly he didn’t realize she had gone until he tried her extension or actually visited the Archive. Bobbie asked him if Fen was on a diet, ‘’cos she ain’t been down for her Jammy Dodgers, I save ’em for her and look how many’s stackin’ up’. Otter wondered whether Fen had somehow found out about Judith and Matt, and he spent another afternoon gurning and grimacing and throwing himself into his work to prevent himself from divulging this theory to Matt, or merely asking, ‘Why the fuck did you have sex with the Tyrant?’
‘Are you OK?’ Matt had ventured in what he hoped was a sensitive and not prying tone of voice.
‘Fine, fine,’ Fen said briskly and with a quick smile, ‘I want to wrap up 1959 and then have a preliminary peep at 1963 before I go.’
Fen hasn’t heard from James. She’d dropped him a line to thank him and to assure him she would be in touch as soon as there was any information. But as yet there hasn’t been. So, though she has been tempted to call to say nothing in particular, she hasn’t. And there’s been no point for him to have contacted her. So he hasn’t.
Matt arrived at work early. Jake hadn’t been around for most of the week so Matt had indulged in early nights and a relative de-tox from alcohol. (The bottles of Budvar in the fridge didn’t really count, he decided. ‘If they’re an accompaniment to Crimewatch or The Bill or the News,’ he reasoned, taking a bottle before watching one of the above, ‘then it’s merely the same as a humble cup of coffee.’) This morning, Matt ordered a caffeinated cappuccino, one sugar please, and a pain au chocolat. Just a double espresso for himself. This’ll work, he assured himself as he walked down John Islip Street, it may not be the most direct route to a woman’s heart, but certainly it is a step in the right direction and should elicit some response. I’ve arrived, well armed, good and early. I don’t think a chat over breakfast would be decadent or even unreasonable.
But Fen wasn’t in the Archive. She wasn’t in the building. And, by ten o’clock, Matt hadn’t a clue where she was.
Fen was worried about Cat. Her sister had been the protagonist in finishing the already decaying relationship and, though initially Cat had felt brave, she had quickly sunk and was now pretty inconsolable. Her voice was different, tinged with pure sadness and underlined by a frightening flatness. ‘This desolation, Fen,’ she had croaked, waking Fen at four in the morning, ‘how will I get over it? Oh God, how? When? I won’t! I won’t! I will always feel this way.’ Fen had cradled her to sleep, kissing the top of her head, whispering, ‘I promise you, I promise you – you will so be OK.’ Just before Cat had drifted into a numb sleep she had told Fe
n, quite emphatically, ‘I don’t believe you.’ And Fen, then, could not sleep. An hour later, Cat awoke crying. She sat up in bed and switched the light on. ‘I want him back!’ she sobbed, her eyes racing from right to left. ‘I can’t! I can’t! I’d rather be unhappy with him than face an unknown future without him.’ Fen knew that if she reasoned with Cat just then, if she pointed out the man’s vices, let alone his inadequacies (and he had many of each), if she emphasized how miserable Cat had been in that relationship, she would only hurt her sister more. So she cuddled Cat and felt extremely perplexed.
Not just perplexed. Impotent. There is nothing I can say or do. I just hope I can soothe her.
Being there for Cat, physically, meant just that. Today, Fen would not countenance leaving her until Pip was there for her too. Pip arrived, as scheduled, on the dot of ten. And Fen, handing over the care of Cat, imparted all that was needed with just one look. Like nurses checking each other’s charts as one shift ends and the next begins.
‘I’d have been happy to have taken the whole day off work,’ Fen said to herself as she walked to Camden Town tube station, ‘happier, actually, than turning up late. Hopefully I’ll just slip in unseen and unannounced.’ She wasn’t to know that Matt had arrived early, and had gone to the Archive armed with cappuccino and cake for her. She wasn’t to know that Judith had announced to Rodney Beaumont that Fen wasn’t just leaving early in the evenings, it now appeared she was arriving late in the mornings too. She wasn’t to know that, by the time she arrived, Matt had removed the stone-cold cappuccino and eaten the pain au chocolat himself.
So, Fen arrived at Trust Art and walked lightly, ever so slightly on tiptoes, up the stairs to her corridor. Fortuitously, Matt was just coming out of the toilet.
‘Fen!’
‘Hi,’ Fen said in a friendly but hasty manner. She kept walking, which required Matt to about-turn so that he could at least keep the conversation going. ‘I’m a bit late today.’
