Green Grass

by Raffaella Barker

  ‘Where are Dolly and Fred? I think we need to talk to them,’ says Laura.

  ‘Aah yes,’ says Inigo. ‘Well, if it’s all right with you I suggest that—’

  ‘No.’ Laura raises her hand, speaking fast to get her point in first. ‘It’s not all right with me. I will say what I am doing now. I’ve made my decisions and I don’t want to be steam-rollered by you any more.’

  Tears pour down her cheeks; she presses her fingers into her eyes to try and stop them flowing but they swell hot from her eyes and drip down her hands instead. She sniffs and wipes her sleeve across her nose. ‘I don’t want to hear what you think any more. I have decided what I am doing. I shall stay in London in the week until the end of this term and then I am coming to live here with Dolly and Fred. I know Dolly won’t like it, but at least she’s got Tamsin, and I don’t think it will ruin her life as she doesn’t like anything much anyway. You must do what you must do, but I have to do this.’

  Panting slightly, Laura buries her hot face in Grass’s pungent neck. The goatiness is too much to stay like that for long. Laura rises, pats Grass and begins hanging buckets on hooks, anything to occupy her hands and the direction of her gaze.

  ‘Very well, Laura.’ Inigo has retreated behind a wall of icy disappointment. ‘You do as you please, and I’ll go to New York and earn some goddamn money to pay for everything.’

  ‘Please don’t pretend you’re being hard done by,’ Laura flashes back at him. ‘It’s what you want. You hate it here. You said so.’

  Inigo’s ice wall melts for a moment. He flushes and puts out a hand to Laura but she doesn’t see because she’s folding paper sacks in the corner. Grass’s shed has never been so tidy. Unremarked, Grass placidly chews at the jacket Inigo hung on her door.

  ‘I didn’t mean it when I said that, Laura, you know I didn’t. It’s just – it’s just –’ He waves imploringly. ‘Well, you know. I’m a town type. This is a culture shock for me. All this business with animals and mud and picking fruit just gets in the way of life.’

  Laura’s voice is small and sad, and makes Inigo want to weep when she replies, ‘But to me it is the way of life, or it could be. You just haven’t given it a chance.’

  Inigo reaches for his jacket. ‘I can’t now – JESUS H CHRIST! Where’s my sodding sleeve? Look! Look, Laura! This hell fiend has eaten the whole sleeve. I tell you, goats are Satan’s children and if I have to, I’ll—’

  ‘Oh, for goodness sake shut up, it’s only a stupid jacket,’ snaps Laura. ‘You liked the goat fine when you were using her for art.’

  ‘That was the only thing she will ever do that is worthwhile in her whole life,’ snarls Inigo, hurling the jacket at Grass’s feet and marching out of the shed with his slides and his projector.

  Laura and Grass look at one another. Grass takes another bite out of the jacket. ‘Since when are goats supposed to be worthwhile?’ asks Laura crossly.

  Inigo vents his temper by shutting himself in the kitchen for the rest of the morning with an earsplitting Eastern European opera at full volume and all the lids and doors of the Rayburn open to create a satisfactory fug in which to cook. The evisceration and jointing of the hare provides the outlet his battered pride needs, and by the time he clamps the lid on for the meat to braise, much of his usual aplomb is restored. Humming, he turns the music up, trilling along to Janáĉek, and one of Janufa’s mother’s blood-chilling arias. Laying the table with a red checked cloth, plonking yellowed half-melted candles on it and a vase of golden leaves and rose hips picked by Dolly, Inigo sings a burst of opera and thinks how nice it would be to have a parallel existence as a bistro owner in a small town in France or Italy where food is appreciated and even talked about.

  He puts the food on the table and calls his family to sit down, pouring himself a large glass of red wine and gulping it down in one, as they appear in the kitchen and arrange themselves around the table. Laura tries to smile at him across the table, but is met with an impenetrable stare, so turns to Dolly, who has scraped all the meat sauce off her pasta and is fastidiously picking out the tomatoes from the salad.

  ‘This is horrendous, I’m a vegetarian,’ she wails. ‘And I had to have meat last night with that stew Mum cooked and now this. You’re trying to starve me. Can’t I just go and get a Pot Noodle?’

  Laura winces, expecting Inigo to erupt at the mention of Pot Noodle, but he ignores Dolly’s rudeness and simply says, ‘If that’s what you want,’ before leaning back to put the kettle on for her.

  Fred drops his fork in melodramatic mock amazement, and whispers to Laura, ‘Can I have one too? I liked that hare, but it wasn’t enough, and I don’t want seconds of it, I want something else.’

  Wondering whether any conversation about their family will penetrate the skin of self-absorption each child displays, Laura nods, then coughs, and closes her eyes as she speaks.

  ‘You two need to know our plans, I think.’

  Dolly groans, ‘Oh God, you’re getting divorced. I might have known it. This is what happened to Becca and she got really bad acne the next day just before the school disco and it ruined all her chances with Luke Johnson.’

  ‘I thought Luke Johnson was your boyfriend,’ says Laura.

  Dolly throws her a withering look. ‘He is now,’ she says patiently, ‘but he used to be Becca’s.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’

  Fred passes Dolly her Pot Noodle, and Laura blinks and inhales the plastic sweet smell of monosodium glutamate.

  They can’t get divorced because they aren’t married,’ Fred points out.

  Inigo stands up and begins circling the table, a knife twirling on the back of his hand. He pauses and arranges three oranges so they sit on top of one another on the windowsill. He tries for a fourth but the stack collapses, oranges squidging onto the floor. He bends to find them and tries again. He does not speak or look at the children.

  ‘We’re not getting divorced or whatever the non-married version is,’ Laura says. ‘But—’

  ‘Oh, I know what “But” means.’ Dolly pushes her Pot Noodle away and sits, arms folded, hair pinched back from her face, strumming her fingers on her arms, her gaze darting between her parents. ‘Come on then, tell us what’s wrong.’

  ‘Nothing is wrong, nothing will really change now,’ Laura soothes, ‘but next holidays we might come and try living here for a bit while Dad’s in New York.’

  Dolly’s skin turns chalk white; her mouth wobbles. Laura gabbles to try and protect her from her shock. ‘It should be great fun and Zeus will love it,’ she finds herself saying.

  Without a word, Dolly pushes her chair back and leaves the room.

  ‘Cool,’ says Fred, reaching for Dolly’s Pot Noodle now his own is finished. ‘Can I have another ferret then?’

  Laura looks helplessly at Inigo. His mouth is set in a grim line as he pours himself more wine. Laura starts clearing the table, reflecting wryly as she washes the pasta saucepan that she will miss his culinary expertise. A tear plops into the washing up, but she blinks others away, reminding herself that she is becoming a domestic success herself.

  ‘I’m going to make blackberry jam this afternoon,’ she announces with this in mind. No one pays any attention. Fred is bombarding Inigo with questions he cannot answer. ‘Will I leave my school?’

  ‘I don’t know, I suppose so.’

  ‘Where will I go instead? The same one as Tamsin?’

  ‘Er, I don’t know, I suppose so.’

  ‘Will you come and live here when you get back from New York?’

  ‘Umm. Mmm. I don’t know.’

  ‘But you suppose so.’ Fred nudges him, grinning. Inigo gets up from his chair and moves over to the sink next to Laura. She gives him a clipped little smile.

  ‘Come on, let’s all go and pick some blackberries,’ she says brightly. ‘We need fresh air. I’ll go and call Dolly.’

  Coaxing Dolly out of her room is slow work. Inigo and Fred set off across the stubble field behind th
e house, and are out of earshot by the time Dolly is ready, wrapped as if for the tundra in three fleeces, two hats (one a hood, the other a stripy egg-cosy type knitted by Laura when the children were tiny) and two pairs of socks inside her pink trainers, but with several inches of midriff exposed between the bottom of her fleeces and the top of her studded jeans. The long shadows of the afternoon are shot with bright sunbeams and Dolly winces when she steps out of the door, but recovers and sets off leaning on Laura’s arm. Laura decides that this invalidish behaviour is entirely acceptable, and hugs her close as they march in pursuit of the others up the cropped golden field.

  The soothing quality of being out of doors is palpable, and Dolly is able to greet Inigo with a genuine smile when they catch up with him and Fred skimming stones on a pond in a derelict farmyard. She clamours for a go. Laura moves away to watch the sun as it spills liquid flame across the soft grey of a distant wood; a pheasant screeches and flies up, rewarding Zeus’s scrabbling at the bottom of a hedge; a damp scent of leaves hangs in the air. It is impossible not to feel happy in this moment.

  Chapter 22

  By Tuesday, however, Laura fears that it is unlikely that she can ever be happy again. London is damp and fog-ridden, Inigo is leaving for New York in two days, and Jack Smack is in the house from before breakfast, chivvying him and missing no opportunity to gloat. For no good reason as far as Laura can see, he elects to travel with them to the studio today, and announces that he will spend the morning there helping them.

  ‘We’ve got a lot to get through,’ he says with relish, when they reach the building. Flinging his telephone on the red Formica table he draws up a chair and reaches into his pocket for a pen and notebook. ‘We won’t put the house on the market yet,’ he mutters almost to himself. ‘We’ll see what you find in New York before we burn our boats here.’

  Laura, going through the post on the desk next to him, slams her fist on the surface before Inigo has a chance to reply.

  ‘Jack, this is between me and Inigo, not you. Our house is not going on the market. This whole thing is nothing to do with you. Do you understand?’

  Jack rolls his eyes and says, ‘Don’t you think it’s time you faced facts, Laura? You and Inigo are history. You want different things in different places and neither of you is prepared to compromise. My job is to make this whole situation easier for you both.’

  ‘Oh come on Jack,’ says Inigo. ‘That is total crap. You are bloody nosy, that’s why you’re here and I wish you’d sod off and do something useful.’

  Crestfallen for a moment or two, Jack takes out a large handkerchief and wipes his face. Refreshed, he delivers a cheesy grin and tips back on his chair, one hand in the pocket of his tight black jeans, silently watching Laura. So as not to slap him, she has to clasp her hands tightly behind her back. She stands up and walks over to the door, holding it open. ‘No. You’re out, Jack. I’d like you to leave now, please.’

  Raising his eyebrows, Jack looks over to Inigo for support; he does not look up from his computer screen. Jack stands up and gives Laura a squeeze on the arm. His brittle hand softly dents the fabric of her jacket and she shudders, disgusted.

  Jack mistakes this for hysteria.’ I can see you’re taking it hard,’ he says, his eyes treacle dark, glooping fake sympathy. ‘I’ll take a rain check. Inigo, I’ll call you.’

  Laura watches from the window as Jack appears on the street below, weaves across the traffic and sets off on the opposite side of the road at a brisk pace.

  ‘Why did I never do that before?’ she marvels.

  Inigo, who keeps expecting her to capitulate, and who is looking on the internet for large houses to rent in New York for his family to follow him out to, gives her an uneasy look. ‘I don’t know. You seem to have become very assertive. Maybe you’re having a mid-life crisis. I deal with Jack, you don’t.’

  ‘Well, I’m sick of his shadow in our lives, and I don’t have to put up with it any more,’ replies Laura. ‘I’ve never liked him, and he’s never liked me much either. He’ll be glad to see the back of me.’

  The telephone rings. It is Hedley, his voice strained and high-pitched with anxiety. ‘I don’t know what to do. Tamsin’s run away from home. She went this morning. She’s left a note saying she’s not coming back and she’s not alone. I just don’t know what to do.’

  Shock thuds at the back of Laura’s throat; she strains to keep her voice steady. ‘Oh Hedley, stay calm. I’m sure she’s fine, she’s probably gone to stay with a friend.’

  He groans. ‘I don’t think so. She isn’t at school – I went there first thing, and none of her friends have seen her. Do you think Dolly might know something?’

  ‘I’ll ask her when she comes home. I’m sure she hadn’t heard from her this morning, but they did spend the whole of Sunday lying on the bed in Dolly’s room talking, so she might have some idea of what’s going on. Did you try calling her?’

  ‘Yes, but her phone’s switched off or she’s screening calls from me because it just rings and then I get her answering message. Shall I call the police, Laura? Gina says to wait but what do you think?’

  The anguish in her brother’s voice surprises Laura; Hedley is not a man to show any emotion, unless it’s irritation.

  She tries to calm him down. ‘No, I don’t think so. She’s left a note, so she hasn’t been abducted. I’m sure she’s fine and she’ll be back soon. Try not to worry too much.’

  Laura puts the phone down, then, thinking out loud, says, ‘Actually, I’ll go to the school now and ask Dolly. It’s never a good idea to hang around with this sort of thing,’

  Inigo does not look up from his computer. ‘Bye,’ he says absently. ‘Hope she turns up,’

  As if she’s a missing letter, Laura thinks savagely, flouncing out of the studio. She finds Dolly sitting on a radiator eating crisps in the school front hall. Her response is reassuringly Dollyish.

  ‘Oh yeah. I knew she was doing that. She’s gone with Dan, her boyfriend. Hedley doesn’t know him. I think she wants to go and find her mum.’

  Resisting the desire to scream, ‘OhforGodsake-teenagersareanightmare,’ Laura arranges her face into an expression of polite but non-pressuring interest, as if she were asking Dolly about her favourite nail polish.

  ‘So do you know where she is at all?’

  Dolly looks shifty. ‘No, I don’t think I do,’ she says cautiously. Deciding it’s best not to push her, Laura returns home to speak to Hedley. As she dials his number she reflects briefly how utterly this new crisis has eclipsed her own, and is trying to unravel her thoughts about Inigo when the telephone is answered by a male voice.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hedley?’

  ‘No, this is Guy, you’ve got the wrong number. Is that you, Laura?’

  His voice is warm, and, Laura finds herself thinking, very sexy. Absently she runs her fingers through her hair. ‘Oh sorry, yes it is. It’s me. I meant to ring Hedley, you see. I’d better get on with it. How was your trip?’

  ‘Oh, it was great. I’ll tell you all about it next time I see you. But what’s the matter, Laura, you sound upset?’

  No one ever notices when Laura’s upset, or if they do, they don’t say so. Grateful tears spill onto her cheeks, and she sighs shakily. ‘Oh, it’s a long story. I’ll explain another time. But I’m OK, honestly.’

  ‘Are you sure? Is there anything I can do?’

  ‘I’ll let you know if there is. Thanks, Guy.’ Laura puts the phone down; her cheeks are flushed, and she smiles, staring out the window for an instant before dialling Hedley’s number.

  By evening, Tamsin and her boyfriend have been found. Or rather, the bell rings at Laura’s house and she opens the door to find two pale, bedraggled individuals, both carrying backpacks, their trousers dark with wet from the knees down. Their faces are shrouded by their hooded tops; one is tall with a hacking cough, the other jogs about impatiently on the doorstep, long empty-ended sleeves flapping at its sides. In their gr
ey hoods in the street-lit evening they look sinister and other-worldly. The sight of them gives Laura a nasty shock.

  ‘Ugh!’ she shrieks involuntarily.

  The smaller one hastily pulls down its hood. ‘Aunt Laura, it’s me, Tamsin. Look!’ it shouts. ‘And this is Dan. We’re back. We didn’t know where to go because Dan’s friend wasn’t there, so we thought we’d come here. Is that all right?’

  Laura gapes at them for a moment before nodding, words rushing as she ushers Tamsin and Dan into the house.

  ‘Of course it is. How sensible of you to come here. Oh Tamsin, thank God you’re all right, Hedley has been so worried. I must call him right now. Or maybe you should.’

  She herds them into the hall and yells up the stairs, ‘Dolly, Tamsin’s here! She needs some dry clothes.’

  Dan unzips his sweatshirt and peels it off and, like a frog prince, suddenly a boy with floppy hair and gentle brown eyes appears in place of the creepy alien he was a minute ago. He edges to the door of the sitting room where Inigo and Fred are immersed in football on the television and peers in.

  ‘Hi,’ says Fred, sensing rather than seeing him, as he is unable to look away from the television. ‘Come and watch this. It’s a brilliant match.’

  ‘What’s the score?’ mumbles Dan, glancing at Laura as if for permission.

  Laura, wondering if she should be cross, but dismissing the thought as it really isn’t her concern, and anyway, she isn’t cross, she’s glad they’re here, simply says, ‘Have you called your mother?’

  Dan nods sheepishly. ‘Yup. I said we were coming here. She’s going to call you, I think.’ He slides on to the sofa next to Fred. ‘What’s the score?’ he whispers again, removing the next damp layer of his clothing and dropping it on the floor in front of him.

  ‘Three-one,’ says Inigo, leaning to pick up the sweatshirt. ‘Shall we dry this for you?’

  ‘Yes please,’ says Dan, settling back in the sofa with a speaking sigh. Tamsin, almost prone in Dolly’s arms, drags herself up the stairs. Laura longs to know what prompted the flight and the somewhat precipitate return, but no confidences are coming her way, so she has to content herself with draping fugitive clothes along radiators.