We never talked. We never had time. We had no mobile phones, we had no opportunity, we had no privacy, but nothing deterred us from being together as often as we could.
Afterwards, everyone assumed we had been plotting and planning, but that simply wasn’t true. I never considered the future. I was just greedy for the present because I thought that was all I was ever going to have.
December, of course, was Wasbrook’s busiest month. My supervisor kept asking me to stay on and work overtime and I always agreed because I needed the money for my escape fund and it took my mind off Luca’s wedding. Also, working meant I didn’t have to go home. Working was fun at Christmas, although the shoppers left the store in a dreadful state and the shoplifting that went on was unbelievable. Racks of merchandise disappeared into the shopping bags of the predominantly middle-class women who frequented the store. I grew sick of the piped Christmas music, the pa-rum-pum-pum-pum and the have-yourself-a-merry, but I enjoyed the bustle and the busyness as red-nosed shoppers, stressed and short of time and money, struggled to find the perfect presents. I liked coming out of the shop into the winter dark, the city garlanded with lights every way you looked. Sometimes the Salvation Army band would be playing carols on the podium in the centre of the shopping area, and once I saw Father Christmas on a motorized sleigh throwing sweets to the shoppers and waving a mittened hand like he was the Queen. His pixie told me they were collecting for the Firefighters’ Benevolent Fund.
I was on a permanent adrenalin high. I saw Luca’s face everywhere. I saw the slope of his shoulders, or the swing of his hair, or the way he stood with his feet apart and his thumbs in the pocket of his jeans, and I would cross the department floor time and time again to find it wasn’t Luca but somebody who bore a tiny physical resemblance.
This permanent state of sexual anxiety made my eyes bright and my cheeks pink and never in the whole of my life did I receive so much attention. Young men would come up to me in the store. Some of them were polite and courtly. They asked if they could take me for a coffee in my break. Others – the ones I preferred – were full of smiles and bravado. They flattered and teased and worked round to what they were trying to say which was usually did I fancy a drink after work. Older men tried to give me presents. The boys at work showered me with small acts of kindness. I told them all thank you but I had a boyfriend. Then, when it came to the staff Christmas party, I was stuck, because of course I didn’t. Not one who belonged to me, anyway.
The party was due to take place on 17 December, which was the Friday before Christmas Eve and Luca and Nathalie’s wedding day. It occurred to me that Luca might be prepared to drop me off at the party and then make an excuse for not staying. That would keep everyone happy and my position as spoken-for would not be compromised. I could see no harm in this plan. There was no risk to Luca.
When I stepped out of the dark winter evening and into the bright, welcoming warmth of Marinella’s to make the necessary arrangements, it was clear that the wedding preparations were well under way. Cardboard boxes of glasses and champagne were piled up behind the counter. A little stage had been erected at one end of the restaurant, perhaps for a band, and somebody had installed small spotlights on a runner on the ceiling. Big, high-standing vases were lined up at the other end of the room and the Christmas decorations, which were, as always, beautiful, were all green and purple and twined with the tiniest, prettiest fairy lights I’d ever seen. At the counter, Fabio was laboriously making tiny mauve roses out of icing paste. There was a smell of celebration in the air.
Angela, as usual, didn’t have a hair out of place, but she was so fraught that she forgot to even pretend to be polite to me as I stood at the counter.
‘What is it, Olivia?’ she asked without any preamble.
‘I’d like a coffee, please,’ I said.
‘You can’t just have coffee,’ said Angela. ‘We’re too busy. You have to have a meal too.’
Four American tourists were sitting at the table right beside me, drinking coffee. My eyes flickered to them, and then back to Angela, but she wasn’t even looking at me any more; she had turned to speak to one of the staff who was standing behind her drying her hands on a dishcloth.
Normally I would have turned and left at this point, but this was important.
I coughed. Angela turned her head. ‘Yes?’
‘Could I just have a quick word with Luca, please?’
‘No. He’s at the church having a dress rehearsal with Nathalie.’
‘Can I help?’
Marc had come into the restaurant behind his mother, his arms full of Christmas linen. He had a friendly smile on his face, and I had an idea.
‘Yes, sure.’
‘Do you want a coffee?’
Angela shot me a look of pure spite, but didn’t intervene, so I nodded and Marc fetched us both an espresso and we sat down at a table by the window. It was wet with condensation. There was no snow yet, but the feel of snow was in the air, like the promise of Christmas.
‘So how are you?’ asked Marc, sipping his coffee from a teaspoon.
‘I’m OK,’ I said. ‘Actually I was wondering if you were doing anything tomorrow evening?’
‘At a guess I would say I’ll be talking weddings.’ He grinned up at me, blowing steam off his spoon. ‘God, it’s boring, Liv.’
‘Well, would you like to come to a party with me instead?’
Marc sat back and opened and closed his mouth.
‘Oh look, don’t worry,’ I said, busying myself with a twist of sugar. ‘I’m sure you’ve got far too much to do and …’
‘No, it’s not that, I’d love to.’ Marc smiled widely. ‘I just never thought you’d, you know …’
‘What?’
‘Ask me on a date. God, you know how I feel about you, Liv. I’ve been dreaming of this for years.’
I could think of no way to ameliorate the situation. Any use of the words ‘just’ or ‘friends’ would have been too wounding. So instead I ignored him and said breezily, ‘OK! Will you come and call for me about six?’
‘I’ll be there, don’t worry.’
‘There’ll be lots of free drink and food and stuff and they’ve got a comedian for the cabaret. Probably be really boring but …’
‘No, no, it sounds great. Better than being stuck here listening to Mama trying to get Luca to show a bit of interest in the colour of the napkins. By the way, what was it you wanted him for?’
I shrugged. ‘Oh, it was nothing. Just a message from Mum about something to do with the ushers at the church.’
‘Shall I get him to call you?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes, please.’
forty-five
Watersford in the summer was beautiful, a city of trees and gardens. The May blossom lasted well into June, scenting the warm evening air with the fragrance of honey. The late-evening light turned the buildings apricot and pink and people sat outside pubs with their jumpers round their waists and their shirtsleeves rolled up and drank cold beer and smiled.
After the trip to Ireland, I was glad to be back in my flat, on my own. I was sleeping better because I was getting up earlier and my appetite had returned. I felt healthier. I realized there were parts of my daily ritual that I actually quite enjoyed. I didn’t call Marc and he didn’t call me, and I dared to hope that we had survived both the bereavement and the affair without anybody being hurt. I missed him, but it was nothing compared to the missing of Luca and even that wasn’t so bad now, not so weighty.
I’d taken to stopping in the café every morning for coffee and toast. The bodybuilder chef and I were friends now. He was called Chris. I looked forward to our conversations. Chris was always very well informed due to starting work so early. He listened to Radio Four while he fried up the first eggs for the early commuters and the council workers coming off night shift. Because I was always in the café at the same time of day, I began to recognize the regular clientele, and they recognized me. We enquired after each other�
�s health and well-being. I learned the names of wives, husbands and children. I knew whose nephew played bass in a rock band called Mumm-Ra, whose mother had won £100 on a scratchcard, who was studying Spanish at evening class and whose four-year-old had been diagnosed with autism. Accidentally, I had become part of a close-knit and diverse little community.
After the café, I would walk to work. Jenny always got there before me, even on her hangover days and sore-feet days after a long shift at the noodle bar. Sometimes the professor came, sometimes he didn’t. Either way I would switch on my computer, organize my notes while it buzzed into life and then type in more carefully researched information about Marian Rutherford. It was a story unfolding in no particular order in front of my eyes, and I had begun to look forward to the next piece of information.
I would tuck my feet under my chair, and put my mug of coffee on one side of the keyboard and the sheaf of notes on the other, together with a huge old dictionary, its pages soft and yellow, and a coloured pencil for marking any part of the manuscript that was illegible, undecipherable and unguessable.
Meanwhile the professor was his usual quiet, shadowy self. He paid me small kindnesses and compliments, but always in a manner that suggested he was going through the motions. He didn’t try to persuade me to talk about myself and he didn’t mention his own experience again, for which I was grateful. I had never met anybody before who moved so effortlessly amongst people, but who gave away so little of himself. It was as if he shed no skin, exhaled no carbon dioxide and left no fingerprints. One day, I thought, maybe there would be a time when it would be right to talk. In the meantime, he didn’t pry beneath any of my rocks. At work there was no anxiety. The big, light, untidy office was a haven to me and to the professor too.
Then, three weeks after our return from Ireland, I heard from Marc. I switched on my phone after a particularly pleasant day at work and there were several missed calls from Marc, and a message saying not to call him under any circumstances.
My knees went weak.
‘Is everything all right, Olivia?’ asked the professor, who had come out of the history department behind me in order to lock the door.
‘Yes, fine,’ I said.
He didn’t look convinced.
‘You’ve gone a very funny colour.’
‘Just a bit of bad news.’
‘Is there anything I can do?’
‘No, no, thank you, it’s nothing serious.’
I said, ‘Goodbye, have a nice weekend,’ and set off at a fast walk in the direction of Fore Street.
Mrs McGuire was back and had said something to Angela. She must have done. I was oblivious to the beauty of the city as I tried to compose an alibi to explain my presence at one of southern Ireland’s most famous beauty spots at the same time as Marc. Just because we were together didn’t necessarily mean anything, as Marc had pointed out. Incredible coincidences take place all the time. People bump into one another in the strangest places, I thought, and then I thought, Yes, in books and films they do.
Back at the flat, I drank two glasses of wine one after the other and then changed into my jeans and one of Luca’s old, unwashed Tshirts, and went out again.
I hadn’t meant to become involved in an affair, I really hadn’t, and I was sure Marc hadn’t either. It had been an unconscious thing, our coming together, a reaction to the pain of losing Luca and a way of alleviating the grief. It had been selfish and dangerous, but sort of inevitable, and now we had come to our senses we had done the right thing. We had decided to stop seeing one another in any way except as brother and sister-in-law. We had agreed that the death that had brought us together was the reason we now had to part. Hadn’t we?
The thought of Luca was enough to turn my feet in the direction of the cemetery, but although it was still light the gates were already locked.
Some of the old loneliness and the frustration at being separated from Luca returned. I couldn’t bear the thought of wandering around Watersford on a Friday evening on my own, so I turned back the way I had come and was just going into the off-licence when Marc called.
He was trying to sound calm, but it was clear from the furtive tone of voice that this was a panic call.
‘Where are you?’
‘At home. In the flat.’
‘But that noise … ?’
‘I’m in the bathroom. I’ve put the shower on so Nathalie can’t hear. She’s watching me.’
I stepped back out of the shop and walked a little way down the street, moving back against the wall to make way for a gang of cheerful teenagers.
‘What’s happened? Does she know?’
‘She thinks I’m seeing you.’
My heart gave a little jump. I could feel the muscle squeezing itself in fright.
‘Oh God.’
‘Don’t worry, she doesn’t know anything for sure, but …’
‘Mrs McGuire! She told Angela?’
‘No, no, it’s nothing to do with Mrs McGuire.’
I bent over in relief, rubbing my forehead with my hand and feeling nauseous.
‘Oh, thank goodness. It’s just a suspicion then. And it’s OK because we aren’t seeing each other any more. Apart from Mrs McGuire there’s nothing to ever put us together.’
I heard Marc sigh. Over the storm of the shower water I heard him sigh like a man who fears all is lost.
‘What? Marc, what is it?’
‘It’s not just a suspicion. She found the photo.’
‘What photo?’
‘The photo of you on my phone.’
I was genuinely confused.
‘You’ve got a photo of me on your phone?’
‘You know, the one I took of you on the beach.’
‘But you said you’d deleted it …’
‘I couldn’t. It was all I had of you.’
This time I sank right down on my heels. My breath was coming in short little gasps. My fingertips were tingling, my mouth was dry.
‘I’m so sorry …’
‘Oh Marc, oh God! I was practically naked. What are we going to do?’
‘Are you all right, love?’ A powder-faced old lady was leaning down over me.
I looked up and nodded, but I wasn’t all right.
‘Has somebody attacked you?’
‘No, really, I’m all right, thank you.’
The old lady probably thought I was a drug addict. She looked at me suspiciously, but she wandered away. She had a tiny little dirty-white dog on the end of a lead. The dog looked on its last legs.
‘Marc? Are you still there?’
‘Yes.’
‘What did you tell her?’
‘I told her Luca sent me the picture last summer.’
‘But why would he do that?’
‘Well, he might have done. You looked so sexy. I told her I’d just forgotten it was there.’
‘Did she believe you?’
‘I don’t know, Liv. You know how she feels about you. Even if she does believe me, she’s pretty upset.’
‘Poor Nathalie,’ I whispered.
I stood up again, breathing coming a little easier, and shook my head.
‘I can’t believe you kept the picture. I can’t believe it.’
‘Well, it’s gone now.’
‘And she has nothing to fear because what we had is over.’
‘You believe that?’
‘We agreed it was over on the plane.’
‘I’m finding it hard without you,’ said Marc. ‘I can’t just switch off grief or love or whatever this is. That picture, it felt like it was all I had left of you.’
‘Enough, Marc.’
‘If she calls you …’
‘I know what the story is now.’
‘I’m sorry, Liv, I …’
But I had had enough. I was tired of Marc, tired of feeling anxious, tired of the whole business.
‘I’ve got to go,’ I said. ‘Have your shower. Leave me alone.’
forty-six
&
nbsp; Luca came round to my house. It was late-ish. I’d had a bath and was sitting cross-legged on my bed, in my pyjamas, listening to Bob Marley. My hair was wet and I was twisting it into tiny plaits so that when I combed it out in the morning it would all be wavy and would look nice for the party. I heard a gentle knocking at the door and knew it was for me. It was past ten and Mum was already in bed.
I ran down the stairs and opened the door to find Luca there. The first snow was falling; it was stuck to his fringe and his eyelashes, and his nose and cheeks were red.
‘What’s the matter?’ I asked in an urgent whisper, but Mum was already on the landing, leaning over.
‘What’s going on, Olivia?’
‘Nothing,’ I called back over my shoulder. I beckoned Luca inside so that I could shut the door and stop the rest of the heat escaping.
‘Who is it?’
‘Just a friend.’
‘Tell them to go away.’
‘I’m just lending a book.’
I did a little pantomime of opening and closing the door again and shouting, ‘Bye, see you soon!’
Then, stifling the urge to giggle, I put my finger to my lips and Luca tiptoed after me into the kitchen. It was directly below Mum’s room. If she came out, we would hear her and Luca could escape through the back door.
I didn’t put on the kitchen light, but the room wasn’t dark thanks to the luminescence of the snow, which had covered the garden and was mirroring light from the sky and from the windows of the houses in the street and the streetlamps beyond. My feet were cold on the lino. Luca, huge in his coat, pulled me to him and held me tight. I tried to pull away so that I could look into his face, but he wouldn’t let go.
The Love of My Life Page 19
