As the Clock Struck Ten

by Gill Mather

  “What the fuck do you think you’re getting up to with my daughter?” He hardly ever swore but he thought that this would be a language that Luke would recognise and respond to. And he felt like it.

  “Sorry,” said Luke still not turning. “You’ll have to make yourself clearer. Emma has other roles than merely being your daughter. She’s an individual in her own right. And what do you mean by ‘getting up to’?” Luke had assumed his public school accent as he knew it intimidated some people. It drove his dad mad in certain circumstances.

  Don wasn't going to be fazed by this cool young man. “You know perfectly well what I mean. You’re having sex with her. She’s only eighteen. I think you are taking advantage of the fact that you are able to live here by entering into a physical relationship with a young girl who has little experience and is living in close proximity to you. She may appear to want to be doing the things you do together but girls of her age have a lot of pressures on them, pressures to conform to what they think they should be doing. And also I freely admit, I haven't been the best role model for her just lately. She wasn't prepared to find your mother and I having anything more than a companionship in our latter years. I think that’s what she was expecting. But that doesn't mean that some young man should waltz in here and take advantage of the situation.”

  This somewhat took the wind out of Luke’s sails. What was it Emma had said when she’d met him at the Duck and Lizard. “Of course I’d been told he was living with someone but I’d just thought it would be a sort of granny type person. But instead….the way they are together….”

  Luke himself had been furious at the thought of his mother and a man being intimate. And he still was. It sickened him. Like Emma, he felt that only young people had the right to have fun in bed. Old people ought to give in gracefully before they became objects of pity and derision. These thoughts however couldn't very well be politely expressed and it did slightly worry him now that Don had reminded him about the nauseating fact that Don and his mother enjoyed having sex together that Emma was just trying to keep up with them.

  But he knew really that it wasn't that. He knew that she had been inexperienced but that he had, through patience and uncritical passion, enabled her to reach a potential she hadn't known before. He knew this more or less for certain. And that now, she really loved to have sex with him.

  However he couldn't say these things to Don. He couldn't say that she hadn't been a virgin, that she wanted to have sex with him, that it was she not he who dictated the pace and largely decided if he could enter her room and her bed. It would be improper and unfair to Emma. In another era he might have declared his honourable intentions, his undying love for Emma and his wish to marry her. Perhaps that would satisfy a father. In an historical drama it might. In today’s world however it would be laughable. So instead he said:

  “You put me in an impossible position. I can't give you any assurances or in decency tell you the things that might make you feel that the relationship is entirely consensual and is in no way one-sided. I can't help you I’m afraid, except that I don't think you need to worry that you’re to blame for it.”

  Don was flabbergasted. He felt he had been verbally out-ranked and out-manoeuvred. The little speech put him in mind of a Jane Austen novel. You just didn't expect to hear this sort of talk from a twenty year old male. Where had he acquired such flowery language? Not from his father definitely. That public school presumably. Though his father might have had something to do with the confidence with which the speech was delivered.

  Don shook his head. He wasn't pleased, not at all and he saw no reason to give this union his blessing, but he realised the weakness if his position. He wondered in fact if his having brought the thing into the open would now mean that Luke would be downstairs every night sleeping with his daughter. He shuddered at the thought and decided that probably he’d been foolish to take issue with Luke at all. Grace had implied that there wouldn't be much he could do about it if Emma and Luke were consorting but at that time he hadn't known that they were so it was possible to think then that he might have some input and influence. Clearly he didn't. He knew that if he opened his mouth again, he would just make things worse. Therefore he got up and was about to walk out when Luke turned around.

  Don had to admit that Luke was a magnificent specimen, standing there in his cut off jeans and not much else. He could have graced the pages of any fashion catalogue. Don resented the fact that, though he struggled not to acknowledge it, if he had had a son himself, he would have wanted him to be like Luke. Really who wouldn't. But that didn't make it any better. Don waited. He could guess what was coming.

  “You took my mother away from my father,” said Luke, looking cold and angry. “You split our home up.” Don winced. “If it hadn't been for you, I know she wouldn't have left. If she hadn't started to go to that church, she would never have met you.”

  “It wasn't like that.”

  “Oh really, what was it like then?”

  “I’m not going to say anything against your father Luke, but your mother had already left him before I made contact with her. I know you were away at the time. She had good reason to leave him. But she didn't come to me. I had to track her down and offer her a refuge.”

  Luke was uncertain. His father he knew was a bastard, but for that matter, he didn't know Don well. Don might be a slippery sod underneath all that surface calm and urbane manner. He might be making this up. Or he might have subtly influenced his mother to leave. He didn't like what Don was implying. The use of the word “refuge” had an ominous ring to it. He didn't want to think about his father being violent towards his mother.

  “Why should I believe you?” he said. “My parents had been married for nearly thirty years. Why do you expect me to believe that she meets you and then suddenly she’s upped and left my father with no input from you at all and that within no time the two of you are living together?”

  “Well that’s what did happen in a nutshell. Your mother and I had only ever met at the church. I think we liked each other.” Don looked down at the ground. The withdrawal of eye contact wasn't lost on Luke. Don went on, “Mostly we’d only spoken about superficial things.” He was going to say that he hadn't spoken to her about leaving her husband, but of course he had said it in a roundabout way after the Christmas night service. “I hadn't been much to the church after Christmas because of Carol my wife’s illness and death. I was going to start to go again regularly. And I did. But after a few weeks Grace wasn't there one Sunday or the next. I thought,” he hesitated, “I thought she might need help and made an effort to find her. It turned out she’d left your father and I offered that she could come and stay here if she needed to, and she did need somewhere to stay so she came here.”

  “So,” said Luke with a lift of his head, “if in your eyes the male is always predatory, why shouldn't I think that you took advantage of the situation, took advantage of my mother’s position and her vulnerability?”

  This was a question. Don sighed. He’d been well and truly outflanked. He wondered if Luke played chess. Accordingly he parried. “Luke, your mother and I are older. Emma on the other hand is only eighteen.”

  “And I’m only twenty. I can't see what that has to do with anything.”

  “Well I think it has. In the States you know eighteen is the age of consent. Under that age it’s a crime. It’s thought that under that age people are not ready for a physical relationship. And by extension that once people reach eighteen they are not suddenly going to be ready either.”

  “Thanks for that but we’re in England. And here the age is sixteen. If the Yanks are buttoned up about it, that’s their problem. There’s no reason for us to be. But if I’ve taken advantage of Emma, then you’ve done the same to my mother.”

  “The two situations are very different.”

  “I don't think so. You don't want Emma to sleep with me. I and my father don't want my mother to sleep with you.”

  “This is
getting silly,” said Don. It was starting to lean towards the assumption that women were there to be picked off at will or not according to a male’s inclination.

  “I don't think so.”

  “Yes it is,” said Don. “It’s becoming sexist. All that concerns me is Emma’s age and inexperience. I don't think it’s appropriate that you and she should be….consorting. And that’s my view. Clearly I can't do anything about it. But I’m not going to say to you or anyone else that I’m happy about it.”

  Luke considered saying that a lot of father’s would be glad to know their daughter was having a good time in a safe environment with someone he knew. But he didn't. He started to wonder in fact why Don didn't feel like that. He began to have doubts about Don and why he might be possessive of his daughter. He didn't know that Don was not a man’s man, that having spent most of his life surrounded by only females, Don was automatically suspicious of and to some extent uncomfortable with other men. He didn't know that Don had largely brought Emma up single-handedly right from practically the moment of her birth and still partly saw her as a baby.

  With that, Don walked out, and went back to the house without saying any more.

  Luke watched him go, by no means feeling that he had won or scored any points. He just thought he had reacted in the only way he could in the circumstances and that his arguments were entirely reasonable. It was the father who was being pig-headed, albeit that his manner was cold and quiet without the ranting and fuming Luke’s own father would have gone in for.

  But he knew Emma was already uncomfortable with the secrecy. If she now felt the harsh cold wind of her father’s disapproval, she may want to end the relationship. He didn't love her. Certainly not, and he knew they would both want to move on in due course. But for this time, their shared intimacy and the depth of their passion was almost akin to love. It wasn't far off and to sever it just at this point would hurt him a lot. Tear him apart in fact. For a time.

  This was a young man’s take on closeness and physical love. It was nearly like romantic love but not quite. He didn't want permanence, or children or commitment. He just wanted her soft warm loving body curled around him as often as possible and to spend a great deal of his time with her. He didn't want any hassle and Emma herself didn't give him any. He was sure she felt exactly the same as he did. Nearly in love, but not quite.

  He had an idea what he could try to do to cool things down and bring about a temporary halt to hostilities, or at least distance themselves from them.

  013 The Escape

  THE QUEUE TO DRIVE onto the ferry had seemed endless. But eventually the little Citroën had been directed into a stream of traffic that led directly into the bowels of the ship on the starboard side where a uniformed employee had beckoned and waved it into position. They had emerged stiff and achy from the car and had taken the open door on the same side to the upper decks where they made straight for the bar.

  The ferry was packed. Excited children were everywhere, screaming and running about in an uncontrolled way, bawling at things they saw on display and couldn't have, siblings breaking into fights, manically playing computer games, seemingly thousands of them, giving out loud, insistent, discordant electronic noises. The parents looked fagged out. Some of them had probably just driven hundreds of miles to get there. Luke took Emma’s hand and guided her through the frenzy, at some point losing his mate Ant and Ant’s girlfriend Natasha. Luke made for the upper decks and the quieter bars, hoping that Ant and Natasha would find the same bar by some route or other or else he’d have to text Ant.

  There were kids running around up here too but not so many and not quite so hyper. You had to wonder why, during a heatwave in England, so many people were making for the Continent. Luke and Emma had a good reason to be putting distance between themselves and the green green grass of home. Or so Luke thought. Why most of the rest of them would bother to leave Blighty he couldn't imagine especially with the hassle of bringing screaming kids with them. No doubt though, like Ant, they had booked up months ago thinking that summer in England would be a washout as it normally was. Of course, it would be even hotter by the time they got down to Bordeaux which was the ultimate destination they hoped to reach the following day.

  It was still early evening and they were spending the night at a campsite just south of Calais which Ant had booked. If they weren’t allowed to put the two tents on the same pitch, they’d all have to squeeze into the same tent.

  Luke sat observing Emma sipping her ginger beer and peering around her. She still looked bemused by the turn of events. Incredibly she’d only been abroad once in her life so far which, she had told him, was in Year 10 at senior school being a long weekend to Holland with the school. Therefore at least she had a passport. Her parents had never taken her abroad. It was starting to sink in for Luke how restrictive it would have been to have a chronically ill grossly disabled parent and not much money. Little chinks were opening up in his mind about Don’s attitude to his daughter. He began to appreciate why Don might be protective.

  As soon as Don had left Luke yesterday after taking him to task about Emma, Luke had texted and emailed all of his friends. He knew some of them would be going camping in France. Someone always did. It was just a case of whether any would be going in the next few days. He scored a direct hit with Ant who was leaving the following day and was happy to have two others along to share the cost and help with the driving. Luke had no money of course but he’d had a few paintings on the wall of a local restaurant for months. The price tags were high but no more than he thought the paintings were actually worth given the effort and degree of expertise that had gone into them. Not to mention the materials and the cost of mounting and the fact that artists actually had to live and buy food etc.

  One of his paintings had attracted a lot of attention and offers but none of them anywhere near the two thousand pounds price tag he’d put on it. The highest offer was five hundred pounds and after his confrontation with Don, Luke had contacted the prospective purchaser and had said he would take eight hundred pounds for the work if the money could be paid that day. The collector had agreed and paid the money into Luke’s account later. It was too late to order any euros and anyway he had no way of getting to a bank. He decided to use an ATM on the ferry and in France to draw cash out.

  Emma had been surprised to receive a call from Luke while she was at work. Actually it was a missed call. He had always previously texted her. When she called him back during her afternoon break, he had been brief. After finding out that her father hadn't talked to her yet, he’d explained what had happened and said he thought it would be a good idea if they got way for a week or two. He asked her if she could get the time off from the restaurant for a camping trip to France with another couple. Emma was nervous about that. If she lost her place as a waitress or kitchen worker, she might never get it back. She really needed the cash for the next year. Luke urged her to at least try. He thought apparently that the atmosphere in the house would be frosty and hostile at least from her father. And, he said, she deserved a holiday. He would pay for everything.

  Emma spent the rest of the afternoon worrying. So her father knew which wasn't great. But further, she was very tired and the thought of a holiday was so tantalising. Lazing on a beach somewhere for several days to wind down having to do no more than stagger in the evening to an old beamed restaurant dripping with character and study a menu replete with local cuisine; supping far too much of the regional wine; falling into the festival tent Luke had previously referred to as being under-utilised and spending the nights cuddling together; sleeping in in the morning; in due course exploring local tourist attractions and sights. It was such an attractive prospect. Like a dream really. An impossible dream.

  With almost no hope whatsoever, she had asked Ginger when she came on at six if it might be possible to have ten to fourteen days off from tomorrow to go away on holiday without losing her job. She’d been amazed to be told that it was no problem at all, that
most of the summer help had some time off. Usually it was at the beginning or end of the season so now in the middle was actually a good time for the restaurant. Ginger assured her she wouldn't lose her job. No way and she’d put it in writing. Emma had pinched herself and texted Luke back that yes she’d be able to go with him.

  EMMA WASN’T TROUBLED by her father’s attitude after due consideration. Her father was obviously sulking when she got home and the following morning as he seemed to be positively avoiding her but if he couldn't hack it, well that was too bad for him. He hadn't exactly been understanding when she had come upon him and Grace in the kitchen and she hadn't immediately reacted favourably.

  She hadn't liked the secrecy, but if there was now no secrecy, then largely problem solved. If her dad for some reason couldn't cope with her having a boyfriend, that was his problem. Whatever he might have heard through her bedroom door, it couldn't be even half as bad as unexpectedly coming across an elderly couple practically at it in a kitchen. She would continue to sleep with Luke when she wanted to and that was that.

  So far as she was concerned, after the holiday she would only be there at home for a few more weeks and then back to Northampton with her accumulated earnings and her usual grant and loan and bursary. Her father hadn't yet mentioned to her that Grace living with him would have an effect on her eligibility for student finance. Luke had told her that the change of circumstances would affect his ability to obtain student finance but she knew his father had been obstructive and didn't relate any of that to her own situation.

  Accordingly, that night when she got home, knowing that she could go on this holiday, she hurriedly sorted through her clothes and possessions and dug out her battered holdall, packing it with anything suitable. As a precaution she hid the packed bag in her wardrobe in case her father came in before she left and saw it and confiscated it for whatever reason, preventing her from going on her deserved break. And she now wanted to go very much regardless of the loss of income.