‘What is your wish, Daddy?’ demands Tessa. ‘What is your wish?’ She’s sitting at the kitchen table, pencil poised over her sheet.
‘I wish that … I could …’ Dan speaks slowly, distractedly, as though his mind is grappling with some other, far-off problem.
‘How do you spell “could”?’ asks Tessa promptly, and I spell it out, because it’s obvious Dan isn’t paying attention. The morning sun is catching the fine lines etched around his eyes. His gaze is distant and he looks almost bleak.
‘Could what?’ Tessa is banging her pencil on her sheet. ‘Could what?’
‘Escape,’ Dan says, so absently that I wonder if he’s even aware he said it. My stomach clenches in dismay. Escape?
‘Escape?’ Tessa surveys him as though suspecting a grown-up joke. ‘You’re not in a cage, Daddy! People who escape are in a cage!’
‘Escape.’ Dan comes to and sees me staring at him. ‘Escape!’ he repeats in a more upbeat tone. ‘Escape to the jungle and see the lions. I have to go.’
‘That’s a stupid wish!’ Tessa calls after him as he disappears towards the front door.
‘Just write see some lions,’ I tell Tessa, trying to stay calm. But my voice is shaky. My whole being is shaky. Dan wants to escape? Well, thanks for the heads-up.
It’s my turn to do the school run this morning, and I’m so distracted, I drive the wrong way, twice.
‘Why are we going this way, Mummy?’ says Tessa beadily from the back seat.
‘It’s nice to try different things,’ I say defensively. ‘Otherwise life gets boring.’
The minute the words are out of my mouth, I realize their ghastly significance. Is Dan ‘trying different things’? Is Mary a ‘different thing’?
I don’t quite know what’s happened to me. I feel like a pinball machine. Suspicions and worries and theories are careering around my brain in a way they never have before. I trusted Dan. I knew Dan. We were us. Solid. So what’s changed?
Or am I inventing problems for myself? The idea hits me as I head into a snarl of traffic, all heading to school. It’s entirely possible. Maybe I’m Othello, obsessing over a handkerchief. Dan is totally innocent, yet my irrational jealousy is an unstoppable force and I’ll only realize it, in anguish, once I’ve killed him. (Divorced him and got the children and the house. It’s the Wandsworth equivalent.)
My head is spinning more than ever. What would Tilda say? She’d say, ‘Focus on what you actually know.’ So. OK. Here goes. I know that I encouraged Dan to be adventurous. (Huge mistake; what was I thinking?) I know that something ‘woke up inside him’. I know that he’s cooking Mary his flashest lamb recipe and suggested that I be out of the house for the evening. I know he googled Mary Holland husband. And, of course, now I know he ‘wants to escape’.
It’s more than a handkerchief.
Isn’t it?
Is it?
I pause at a set of traffic lights, my heart thumping and my brows knotted. My hands are clenched around the wheel; my entire body is engaged in this mental process.
OK, here’s the thing, I’m not saying I think he’s having an affair. Yet. What I’m saying is, he’s in that zone. He’s primed. He’s vulnerable. He may not even realize it himself, but he is.
‘Mummy! Mummeee! The cars are hooting!’ Suddenly I’m aware I’m being beeped. Shit. (And trust Tessa to notice, not me.)
I hastily move on, then start looking for a parking space, all thoughts of marriage temporarily swept from my head. Bloody London. It’s impossible to park. It’s impossible to do anything. Why are there so many people on the roads? What are they all doing?
At last I find a spot, three streets away from the school, and hustle the girls along, trailing book bags, recorders and gym kit. As I head through the playground, I wave and smile to various mums I know, all clustered in gossiping groups. They basically fall into three categories, the mums at school. There are the working mums. There are the at-home mums. And there are the exercise-is-their-work mums, who never wear anything except leggings and trainers.
What are their marriages like? I find myself wondering as I survey all the jolly, chatting faces. How many of them are hiding worries under their smiles?
‘Oh, Sylvie!’ calls Jane Moffat, our class rep, as I pass by. ‘Can I put you down for a quiche for the year-group picnic?’
‘Sure,’ I say, absently, before cursing myself. Quiches are vile. Why does anyone want quiche at a picnic anyway? It’s impossible to eat. I’ll email her later and suggest sushi instead, which has the advantage that no one expects you to make sushi.
Tessa and Anna are already at the door of their classroom, which is on the ground floor and opens straight on to the playground. I head over and help them put gym kit bags on to pegs, book bags into the basket and recorders on to the special recorder shelf.
‘Oh, Mrs Winter,’ says Mrs Pickford, their teacher. She’s a gentle, kindly woman with greying hair cut in layers, and a lot of waterfall cardigans in different colours. ‘The girls have been telling us that you have a new snake in the family! How exciting!’
Here’s the thing about five-year-old children: they tell their teachers everything.
‘That’s right!’ I try to look positive. ‘We do indeed have a snake in the family.’
‘We were wondering if you might bring it in for Show and Tell? I’m sure the children would love to see … her, is it?’
‘Maybe,’ I say, after a pause. ‘She’s really more my husband’s thing. He feeds her and everything.’
‘I see.’ Mrs Pickford nods. ‘Well, perhaps you could ask him?’ She hesitates. ‘I mean, it would be safe? It is a safe snake?’
I resist the temptation to answer, ‘No, it’s a ten-foot lethal boa constrictor, that’s why we have it in our family home.’
‘Quite safe,’ I nod reassuringly.
‘Apparently it was a complete surprise?’ Mrs Pickford adds chattily. ‘Tessa told us all that you were quite shocked! I don’t know how I’d react if my husband brought home a snake, out of the blue!’
She gives a little laugh, and I know she’s only making conversation, but I feel flicked on the raw.
‘Well, we have a very strong marriage,’ I say before I can stop myself. ‘Very strong and happy. Very stable. We’re in a really good place, actually. We don’t get rocked by stuff like snakes, or other …’ I clear my throat. ‘So.’
As I stop talking I can see a slightly odd look on Mrs Pickford’s face.
Oh God. I am actually losing it.
‘Right,’ she says, her voice a little too bright. ‘Well, let me know about the Show and Tell. Girls, say goodbye to Mummy.’
I hug each of the girls in turn, then walk away, my mind churning. I smile and wave goodbye to the other mums, and I probably look relaxed and jolly, just like them, but inside, the tension is ratcheting up. What I really need, right now, is a distraction.
OK, Toby is definitely a distraction. When I arrive at work, he’s already there, wandering round the hall, peering up the staircase, looking totally incongruous in his shabby black T-shirt.
Thank God he’s here. He’s already cancelled on me twice. Always with a good excuse, but still.
‘Hi, Toby!’ I say, greeting him with a handshake – and just for a moment there’s a weird little frisson between us. The last time I saw Toby, I was half-naked, and I can tell he’s remembering that too, from the way his eyeballs are darting up and down. Then I see him gather himself, and the next instant he’s making a valiant effort at saying, ‘Hello, Sylvie.’
‘Thank you so much for coming by. I usually take the stairs, is that OK?’
‘No problem,’ he says, following me up the staircase two steps at a time. ‘This place is mad! All those suits of armour!’
I nod. ‘They’re great, aren’t they? You should see the basement.’
‘You know, I never knew about this place,’ Toby continues blithely. ‘Never even heard of it. I’ve probably walked past a million times
, but I’ve never noticed it, my friends have never noticed it … Like, literally, I didn’t know it existed. If you said “Willoughby House” to me, I’d be, like, “What’s that?”’
Does he have to sound quite so emphatic? Thank God neither Robert nor Mrs Kendrick is in earshot. And also thank God we’ve already commissioned a big ‘Willoughby House Museum’ sign for the exterior of the house. It’s going to be grey painted wood and very tasteful, and it only took us a week of solid discussion to nail Mrs Kendrick on the style and font.
How are we ever going to agree on a whole website redesign?
No. Don’t think like that. Be positive.
‘I’m sure your mum must have mentioned this place to you a few times?’ I suggest. Tilda’s been to loads of events here; she’s very loyal.
‘Yeah, maybe she has,’ he says agreeably. ‘But it never stuck in my mind. It’s not famous, is it? It’s not like the V & A.’
‘Right.’ I try to find a smile. ‘Well, that’s the trouble. That’s the problem we’re trying to solve.’
Clarissa’s out this morning and Robert hasn’t shown up either, so we have the office to ourselves. I show Toby our home page saying Apply in writing and he bursts into laughter.
‘I love that,’ he says, about fifty times. ‘I love that. That is so cool.’ He takes a photo of the home page and shares it with all his techie friends and reads me out all the comments which instantly stream in. And I’m torn between feeling pride that we have something so distinctive and embarrassment that a whole group of tech whizzes are laughing at us.
‘Anyway,’ I say at last. ‘As you see, we’re behind the times. We can’t carry on like this. So … what can we do? What are the possibilities?’
‘Well,’ says Toby vaguely, still laughing at some comment on his phone. ‘There are loads. Depends what you want to achieve. Like, manage a database, an interactive experience, an e-shop, what?’
‘I don’t know!’ I say, my appetite whetted. ‘Show me!’
‘I looked at a few museum websites,’ he says, getting out his laptop. ‘Like, globally. It was pretty interesting.’
He starts loading up websites, one after another. I thought I’d done my research pretty well, but some of these I missed. And they’re amazing. There are photos that spring to life, 360-degree videos, interactive apps, spectacular graphics, celebrity audio tours …
‘Like I say,’ Toby concludes, ‘the sky’s the limit. You can have anything you want. Depends on what you want. What your priorities are. Oh, and budget,’ he adds as an afterthought.
Budget. I should have started with budget.
‘Right.’ I wrench my gaze away from the website of an American museum which has extraordinary 3-D photos of exhibits spinning slowly round on the screen. They’re so vivid that you really feel you’re there in the room with them. Imagine if we could do that! ‘So, like … how much would that one have cost?’
‘Actually, I read about that one in a tech magazine,’ Toby says, nodding. ‘It was half a million. Oh, don’t worry,’ he adds at my expression. ‘Not pounds, dollars.’
‘Half a million?’ I feel like he’s punched me in the chest.
‘But that was, like, with a whole big rebrand and everything,’ he adds hastily. ‘Like I say, it depends what you want.’
I feel betrayed. All I’ve seen online is adverts saying how cheap and easy it is to make websites. ‘I thought these days you could make websites in your bedroom for half nothing,’ I say, almost accusingly. ‘I thought that was the whole point.’
‘You can!’ Toby nods earnestly. ‘Totally. But they won’t work like that one does. You don’t need to spend half a million, though.’ He’s obviously trying to sound reassuring. ‘You could spend a hundred grand, fifty grand, ten grand, one grand …’ His eyes drift back to our home page again. ‘I mean, this is cool,’ he says. ‘Just a drawing. It’s subversive.’
Mrs Kendrick, subversive? I’d laugh if I weren’t still poleaxed by half a million.
‘Maybe it is.’ I sigh. ‘But it doesn’t bring in any customers. It doesn’t make any money.’
‘So how do you get customers?’
‘Lots of ways. Little adverts here and there. Or word of mouth.’
‘Oh, word of mouth.’ Toby perks up. ‘That’s the Holy Grail. That’s what you want.’
‘Yes, but there aren’t enough words. Or mouths.’ I look at the American website longingly for a few more moments. ‘So, basically we need money in order to afford the website which we need to make money.’
Toby nods sagely. ‘Golden goose. No, I mean, chicken and egg. So, did you think about a platform yet?’
I rub my face, feeling my energy ebbing away. Why is it that everything in life is just a bit harder than you think it’ll be? Icing cakes, having children, keeping marriages together, saving museums, building websites. All hard. The only thing that’s ever turned out easier than I expected was my Italian GCSE. (Oh, and lasering my legs, that was a doddle.)
‘I think I’d better put a budget together,’ I say at last. ‘Then we can talk about platforms or whatever.’
‘Put a budget together.’ It’s such a euphemism. It sounds as if I just need to collect the bits together from where they’ve been scattered and assemble them. But I don’t have any bits. I have nothing.
We could sell off some pieces of art, it crosses my mind. But would Mrs Kendrick ever agree to that?
‘Sure thing, Sylvie, whenever you’re ready,’ says Toby, and a wave of sympathy passes over his face. ‘It’s tough, isn’t it?’ he adds, suddenly sounding more serious, as if he gets it.
Well, of course he gets it. He’s trying to launch a start-up. He’s got enough struggles and obstacles of his own.
I give him a wry smile in return and shut his laptop. ‘Yes. Yes it is. It’s all pretty tough.’
TWELVE
It’s all pretty tough. And it hasn’t got any easier.
It’s the following Tuesday and the most positive development in my life right now is the ‘Willoughby House Museum’ sign, which arrived yesterday, and is gorgeous. Far better than we expected. We all keep going outside to gaze adoringly at it, and the volunteers are convinced it’s bringing in more visitors already, and even Robert gave a kind-of-impressed grunt when he saw it.
But at home, forget it. I’m not sure who’s most stressed out right now, me or Dan. He’s permanently taut, stroppy, tentery and generally hard to live with. When his phone rings, he grabs for it so fast it makes me wince. I’ve got home twice to find him striding around the kitchen having intense phone conversations which he immediately breaks off from. And when I ask, ‘What was that?’ he replies, ‘Nothing,’ in discouraging tones, as though I’m somehow trespassing on his privacy. Whereupon I feel such a surge of frusture that I want to hit something.
I feel as if I don’t know anything any more. I don’t know what Dan’s thinking; I don’t know what he wants; I still don’t know what this ‘million pounds, maybe two’ is. I don’t know why he’s been huddling with my mother. If it was to arrange a surprise, then where is that surprise?
I used to think our marriage was a solid entity. Firm and dense, with maybe just the odd little fault line. But are those fault lines bigger than I thought? Are they chasms? And if so, why can’t I see them?
Sometimes, honestly and truly, I feel like a colour-blind person. It’s as if everyone else can see something I can’t. Even Mummy. Sometimes she takes a breath to speak, then stops herself and says, ‘Oh, I’ve lost my train of thought,’ in an unconvincing way, and her eyes slide away from mine and I think, What? What?
On the other hand, I may be being paranoid. It’s possible.
I could really do with a sensible friend to talk to, but the only person who knows all the ins and outs is Tilda, and she’s still commuting to Andover. Yesterday I felt so desperate, I found myself googling How to keep your husband, and the answer that came back was essentially: You can’t. If he wants to leave you, he will.
(I hate the internet.)
The infamous dinner party is tonight, and Dan is totally obsessed – about the food, the wine, even the coffee cups. (When has he ever taken any notice of coffee cups?)
Meanwhile, I’m ratty and snappy and dying for the whole thing to be over. I keep telling myself: It can’t be that bad. Then: Yes it can. And then: Actually it can be worse. (I’m not sure what worse might consist of, but it won’t be good, surely?)
Dan’s picked up on my tension; how could he not? Although – silver lining – I’ve blamed it on my problems at work, which are still massive, despite the sign. My non-existent website budget is still non-existent. I’ve made approaches to every single supporter, patron and philanthropist I can think of. But so far we’ve received nothing except a hundred pounds in cash pushed anonymously through the letter box in an envelope (I totally suspect Mrs Kendrick) and a big crate of Fortnum’s biscuits. One of our volunteers apparently ‘pulled some strings’. (Robert’s face when he saw them was quite funny; in fact it’s the only thing I’ve laughed at for ages.)
And now I’ve got to get ready to confront my nemesis over Ottolenghi slow-cooked lamb.
No. I don’t have any proof she’s my nemesis. I have to remember this.
As I enter the kitchen, I’m wearing my most casually elegant outfit – slim white trousers and a print top with a flash of cleavage – and wafting perfume. I’m hoping Dan will turn from the stove and his eyes will light up and maybe we’ll sink into each other’s arms in a bonding, imprinting way which will inoculate him against Mary.
But he’s not by the stove. I can see him through the window, out in the garden, picking some mint from our straggly bush which grows by one of the Wendy houses. (I do know mint. Mint and rosemary. Any other herbs, forget it: I’d need to see them in a Tesco packet to identify them.)
I head through the back door and make my way over our crappy grass, picking my brains for something to say. As I reach him, I blurt out, ‘Mint is lovely, isn’t it?’
Surprise Me Page 22
