I sat for a moment trying to organise my thoughts. I was oddly unfamiliar with death. My parents were abroad most of the time but still hale and hearty and my grandparents had died before I was born. I still had my sister, my few relations, my friends. No one close to me had died that I could remember. How would it feel to be Ivy, growing up with no mother, just photographs and people’s memories of her? Had Clare been funny, kind, sexy, loving?
Had there been other, pathetic women like me who had thrown themselves at Joe and into his bed hoping for more than one or two nights of passion? Had he felt anything for them other than the relief of occasional sex? Was I just the latest in a long line?
It’s a long time since I’ve done this.
Perhaps that wasn’t true at all. Maybe the county was littered with women he had lured into bed and then rejected?
I’d even told Jassy I loved him. Sally knew what I’d been up to. Damn, blast, and bugger.
I was in love with him. He made me feel something I’d never felt before. I’d thought there was something special between us. What possible grounds had there been for that? I thought back and tried to remember. Had there been a special lingering glance? A declaration of something? Not that I could recall. Was there a moment when he had touched me and made me feel as though I was different or exceptional?
Well there had been that time when he had turned the bedside light on and watched me. I shivered at the memory.
‘Look at me. I want to see you.’
I put my face in my hands. Oh God, could I be more embarrassed?
Perhaps he had just needed to remind himself which one I was?
*
I think I’d had some stupid idea I would go into the pub, have a meal. That I would find a sanctuary there away from Benedict and his idiocy. Marry him? Ridiculous, why would I marry him? I didn’t love him. I knew now that I didn’t. But I’d thought I loved him once, when our relationship was new and he had made a bit more of an effort. But then I’d thought I loved Joe.
Oh God.
There was no way now I was going to risk seeing Joe, or letting Ellie make me feel worse about myself than I did already. I needed to face up to this and sort it out. I wound my window up, started the car and drove back to Barracane House.
Sally was sitting on the sofa next to Enid and they were both watching Frozen. Enid was transfixed, her skinny knees drawn up to her chest, sucking the end of her hair, her lips moving in time to the soundtrack. I watched her for a few minutes and she was word perfect.
Sally looked up. ‘You’re back then. Any thoughts about what we can have for dinner. Enid’s a bit hungry. I suppose we could go to the pub to eat?’
‘No!’ I said a bit too quickly. ‘There’s plenty of stuff here. I’ll make something. Where’s Benedict?’
‘He came downstairs, took a glass of wine and said he was going to have a bath. I’m guessing you two are going to spend the rest of the weekend arguing? So pleasant for me and Enid.’
‘Sorry but I didn’t invite him. I didn’t tell him I was here.’
I picked up my discarded wine glass and refilled it. I had no idea what I was going to make for dinner; I certainly didn’t know what I was going to find that Enid would think acceptable.
‘Enid likes fish finger sandwiches,’ Sally said helpfully. ‘There are dozens in the freezer. Actually so do I.’
‘Me too,’ I said with some relief.
I put a tray full into the hot oven of the Aga and made them into sandwiches. There was some brisk discussion about ketchup or mayonnaise as we all settled down in front of the TV to watch Frozen yet again, and then Benedict appeared. He had obviously been asleep; his hair was sticking up and his cheek was creased from the pillow.
‘What are you eating?’ he said. ‘Fish finger sandwiches? Are you serious? I can’t eat that! I’ve driven for hours to get here. I need some proper food.’
‘No one asked you to come,’ I said under my breath.
He stood rubbing sleep out of his eyes for a few minutes, waiting for me to offer him something else. I didn’t.
‘Right then,’ he said crossly. ‘Anyone coming with me to find something decent to eat?’
We turned back to the TV and ignored him. He jangled his car keys for a moment and then with an exasperated noise he went out, slamming the door behind him. Then he came back in and kissed the top of my head.
‘Don’t lock me out will you, darling?’
I went to bed at about ten and Benedict still wasn’t back. I moved his suitcase off my bed and into the spare room and I locked my bedroom door behind me. Then I wedged a chair against the handle for good measure.
The pillows on my bed were creased from where he had laid his head on them so I turned them over.
He came back at around midnight, stamping up the stairs with all the disregard of the inconsiderate drunk, rattling on my door handle and mumbling through the keyhole at me.
Worried in case he woke Enid I got out of bed and unlocked the door.
‘For heaven’s sake keep the noise down! Go into the room over there,’ I hissed.
‘But I love you,’ he said, leaning up against the doorjamb.
‘Stop making such a racket,’ I said. ‘You’ll wake everyone up.’
‘I don’t care,’ he said, suddenly belligerent. ‘I love you, I want to marry you. I told them all. I know you will say yes because you love me, don’t you?’
I pushed him out and across the landing into the spare room where he collapsed onto the bed.
‘You’re an irresponsible fool to be driving,’ I said angrily as I pulled his shoes off.
‘Not,’ he said. ‘I told them. I explained. You’re going to marry me and we’ll live happily ever after in a house on Primrose Hill with a garden and a pergola and a child in a pram and a nanny.’
‘No. You’re drunk,’ I said. ‘Stay there and don’t throw up on the floor or you’ll be clearing it up in the morning.’
‘You do love me, don’t you?’ he said. ‘Lulabelle?’
I turned in the doorway and looked at him, my mind suddenly clear. ‘No.’
He laughed rather wildly and slapped his hand down on the bed. ‘Yes you do.’
Chapter Twenty-Three
The following morning – Sunday – I was up, showered, dressed and writing by quarter to seven. Something had happened to spark me up. I typed like a woman possessed and before I knew it I had written a particularly saucy scene where my heroine and the Muscular Builder had enjoyed an intimate encounter on a recently delivered mattress. I’d changed his sphere of activity with the wooden flooring to her bedroom as the sitting room seemed too pedestrian. Much refreshed, I set the kitchen table for breakfast and waited until there were signs of life from the others.
Sally was down first; still in her pyjamas and looking a bit the worse for wear.
‘Benedict snores like a warthog. I could hear him through the wall. I woke up and thought there was a train going through the house.’
‘He was always like that when he got drunk. I’d forgotten,’ I said. ‘Anyway, I used to wear earplugs. Coffee?’
Sally waved a mug at me. ‘Of course. And then at half past three Enid came in and insisted there was a mouse in her room.’
‘Was there?’ I said, rather alarmed.
‘Of course not. What self-respecting mouse would live here when they could be living in Stokeley?’
She took her coffee away and added milk and two sugars and then she opened the kitchen door and went to have a cigarette.
‘I’ll have to give these up soon,’ she said. ‘Enid the Moral Conscience is on my case. I swear when she’s older she will be researching the evils of cigarette smoking on the internet so she can tell me all about the grisly death I am heading towards.’
‘Benedict proposed,’ I said.
‘Proposed what?’
‘Marriage.’
Sally started laughing and then she realised I was serious.
‘What did you say?
’
‘No. I said no of course. He came stamping back at midnight, drunk and convinced I’d said yes.’
‘You didn’t did you?’ Sally said, alarmed.
‘No I didn’t.’
‘What an idiot he is. I’ve got to go back to London after breakfast by the way,’ Sally said, attempting to blow smoke rings in the still air. ‘Apparently there is some sodding birthday party she’s been invited to that I didn’t know anything about until I found the invitation screwed up on the bottom of her school bag. Some kid called Crispin or Caligula or something. I’ll have to call into a service station en route to find a present, which means a neck pillow shaped like a dachshund or a SpongeBob SquarePants backpack. Neither of those things will be acceptable so Enid will be struck off their list too. By the time she leaves that school only the teachers will be talking to us.’
‘Please make Benedict go too,’ I said plaintively.
‘I meant to ask, where’s his car?’
‘What?’
‘His car isn’t outside,’ Sally said, pulling back the curtain to check. ‘No, it’s definitely not there.’
I rubbed my hands over my face. ‘He came back late and definitely pissed. I expect he’s crashed it into a ditch somewhere.’
‘Let’s hope no one else was involved.’
*
Benedict appeared an hour later, grey, rumpled and asking for coffee and paracetamol in a feeble tone that was supposed to arouse my pity. I pointed at the cafetière on the table and he trudged over to fill a mug.
‘How can you bear to stay in this place when you could be back in London with me?’ he said. ‘Back with cafés and shops and the Gang. Everyone is asking where you are and what’s the matter with you.’
‘There’s nothing the matter with me. I love it here. I’m down here for peace and quiet and no distractions so I can write, not for the shopping experience. I’ll be glad when you clear off and I can get on with it. Though how you are going to get back to London is anyone’s guess.’
He looked puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Where’s your car?’
Benedict sat and sipped his coffee and thought. I could almost hear the neurones in his brain firing.
‘Car,’ he said.
‘Car.’
He thought a bit more.
‘You went out in your car and came back at midnight pissed,’ I prompted.
Realisation dawned. ‘Ah yes.’
‘And?’ I said, irritated.
‘I got a lift back. A fat bloke behind the bar took my car keys off me and someone else drove me here.’
‘How did he know where to bring you?’
‘I told him I was staying with the author.’ His face brightened a little. ‘My fiancée. I think I may have invited him to the wedding. Still, I don’t suppose he will come, surly bastard.’
‘Benedict, we are not engaged.’
‘And that’s another reason why you need to come back to London, to organise the wedding.’
‘We are not engaged, you fuckwit. Thank you for the offer but I am not going to marry you, Benedict, and that’s final.’
‘But where am I going to live?’ he said sadly.
‘Oh I see! I thought so. That’s why you proposed? So you could move back in to my flat? You are the pits, do you know that?’
He slumped across the table his head resting on his folded arms. ‘Stop shouting, Lu, there’s a love. My head is splitting.’
‘Get that coffee down you. Get packed. As soon as you are sober we’ll go and get your car.’
I went into the sitting room and found Enid there, glassy-eyed, watching Frozen again. From the thumping noises upstairs I guessed Sally was packing their bags. I went into the dining room and pretended to do a bit of editing.
With the promise of an early lunch at Enid’s favourite fast food place, Sally got out of the house by eleven thirty and I waved them off with a sigh of relief. Just Benedict to get moving now.
I found him asleep on my bed.
‘Benedict, get up, get dressed and get your stuff together.’
He looked at me and reached out an arm.
‘Come and give me a cuddle? For old time’s sake.’
‘Get up, I’m taking you to get your car so you can go home.’
He sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed, running a hand through his hair so it stuck up at all angles.
‘I don’t know what’s the matter with you, Lulu; you never used to be like this. You used to be nice to me. Be nice to me?’
‘I am being nice. I’m offering to take you to the pub so you can get your car and go home. Anyone else would make you walk there.’
I started putting his stuff back into the holdall and he watched me. Half an hour later we set off towards the Cat and Convict. Then we had to go back because Benedict had forgotten his phone charger.
A few minutes into our trip I saw a familiar Land Rover coming towards me. It was Joe. I could feel myself blushing and I prayed Benedict wouldn’t notice. The width of the lane being what it was I pulled into a gateway to let Joe pass. Would he stop and talk to me? I wound my window down and tried to look casual. Just for a second he caught my eye and then he was gone, the Land Rover sweeping past me in a spray of mud.
‘Bloody yokels,’ Benedict shouted after him, ‘no manners.’
I thought about it and was suddenly excited. Perhaps he was on his way to my house? Maybe when I got back he would be waiting for me? But where was Ivy? I hadn’t seen her in the car.
We got to the pub car park and Benedict started patting his pockets. ‘Have you got my keys?’ he said.
‘Of course I haven’t. I thought you said someone had put them behind the bar?’
‘Oh yes. Can you go and ask for me?’
‘Why should I go? I’m not your mother, you go and ask!’
‘Please, Lulu, and ask about my new jacket too. The blue one with the tartan lining. I can’t find it. I’ll never ask you to do anything else I promise. It’s just that last night I might have … you know?’
He pulled a pained expression.
‘What, insulted someone? Thrown a punch?’
He shrugged and gave a tight smile.
‘Oh God; you didn’t?’
I went in. There were a few drinkers propping up the bar and Pete the barman was tipping spilled beer off the rubber mats into the sink. He looked up and saw me.
‘Oh, you,’ he said, rather grimly, ‘come for your boyfriend’s keys have you?’
‘Sorry. And he’s not my boyfriend.’
Pete ignored me and reached behind a giant bottle filled with small change for some charity or other and handed them over.
‘Whoever he is we can’t have that sort of thing in here,’ he said, still not looking at me. His normally jolly and welcoming face was stern, the disapproval settling into the creases of his chin. ‘Tell him he’s banned. I’m as easy-going as the next man, anyone will tell you, but not that. I was surprised, I don’t mind telling you. Not heard language like that since 1998.’
It was on the tip of my tongue to ask what had happened but I suddenly didn’t have the energy; I didn’t want to know.
‘Sorry,’ I said again, ‘thanks.’
I took the keys and ran back to where Benedict was looking over his car for scratch marks or random damage.
‘What did you do in there last night?’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘Nothing. Just put a few people straight.’
‘Heaven knows what that means. Here are your keys, I’ll get your stuff from my car.’
*
I was back at Barracane House soon afterwards but there was no sign of Joe.
I felt a deep plunge of disappointment. Embarrassment or not, random sex or not, I wanted to see him. Perhaps all the cars parked outside the house over the weekend had put him off. Perhaps now everyone had gone he would pop by to see me? He liked popping by. He was well known for it.
I straightened up the house,
collected the wet towels, stripped the beds and changed the sheets. Then I put a load of laundry on and hoovered up the crumbs from the kitchen floor. The sink was filled with soggy biscuits that Enid had optimistically thrown into what she thought was a waste disposal unit. It wasn’t.
By the time I sat down with a cup of tea and a KitKat (the only snack left in the tin because Enid didn’t like them) it was getting dark. I went upstairs and put my bedroom light on, like a beacon stretching out across the fields that Joe might see, might recognise as a signal.
What was I, fifteen?
I searched for something to watch on television and found a dreary documentary about one of our monarchs. Far from being a cheery old cove with an eye for the ladies, he would nowadays rightly be described as a sexual predator. I had a glass of wine and watched a natural history programme about some rare beetle in the Fenlands; riveting stuff.
Then I fell asleep, waking up at one thirty in the morning with a crick in my neck and half a glass of white wine seeping into the sofa cushions. It had not been what one might call a good day. And things were about to get worse.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I’m not a person who suffers from migraines but the following morning I thought that might be about to change. My head was fuzzy and heavy with a nasty little pain behind my eyes. Coffee seemed like a very bad idea so instead I had a glass of water and two aspirin. I made toast but couldn’t eat it, it seemed too noisy for one thing and my jaws were tired, as though I had been clenching my teeth all night. Instead I sat at the kitchen table and put my head down on my arms. For a moment I considered going back to bed. I could almost imagine the relief as I sank down onto the pillows and pulled the duvet over myself. Then I heard someone driving up the lane. My eyes flew open and I waited.
Seconds later I heard a car door slam.
Then someone knocked on the front door.
Hardly daring to hope or breathe, I went to answer it.
Joe stood there, tall and broad and even more attractive than ever. I sighed with relief. It was as though the sun had come out and everything dark and tiresome that had happened in the last few days didn’t matter any more.
The Mini-Break Page 21
