A Question of Us

by Mary Jayne Baker

  Through a combination of elimination, guesswork and fluke they managed pretty well with the monarchs round, even without Si and his history knowledge. After that, the rest of the quiz was a gift. With Les Quiz smarting from the loss of their star player and Gemma back on their side, everything seemed to go their way. Dave aced the round on sci-fi films, Jeff was in his element for once with an eighties music round, and current affairs seemed to be mainly celebrity questions, which Gemma blitzed.

  They would’ve been riding high, if it hadn’t been for the empty seat. Where the hell was Si?

  ‘Well, it’s the first win for this team in a long while,’ Tim said when they’d finished marking, glancing at the sheet in his hand. ‘The Murgatroyds in second place, and in first… the Mighty Morphin’ Flower Arrangers with an impressive sixty-eight out of seventy.’ He came over to hand them their prize. ‘That puts you in a very healthy second place, five points behind Les Quiz. Well done.’

  ‘Fuck me,’ Clarrie said, looking down at the crisp twenty pound note in her hands. ‘We won.’

  The rest of the team were also staring at the note.

  ‘I don’t know whether we ought to spend it or frame it,’ Dave said.

  ‘Spend it,’ Jeff said firmly. ‘Come on, someone, get a round in. I’m parched here.’

  Clarrie jumped, nearly dropping their winnings, when her phone buzzed in her pocket. She fumbled it out, her desperation to get at it making her clumsy.

  ‘Is it Si?’ Gem asked.

  ‘No,’ Clarrie said, disappointed. ‘Just my mum.’ She swiped the screen to answer. ‘Hiya. What’s up?’

  ‘Clarrie, have you spoken to Simon today?’

  ‘No. I haven’t been able to get hold of him.’ Clarrie’s stomach knotted as she registered her mum’s worried tone. ‘Oh God, Mum, why do you sound like that? Si’s okay, isn’t he? He didn’t show up to the quiz.’

  ‘Well… I just got off the phone with Yvonne.’

  ‘Yvonne? Her and Pete are away in the caravan, aren’t they?’

  ‘That’s right. It’s… it’s not good news, love.’

  ‘How do you mean, not good news? Mum, come on, tell me.’

  Clarrie listened to the rest of what her mum had to say, the blood draining from her face. The rest of the team watched her anxiously.

  ‘Right,’ she said at last. ‘I’ll get there as soon as I can. Text Yvonne and tell her I’m on my way to him.’ She hung up.

  ‘What is it, Clar?’ Dave said. ‘What’s happened, is Si okay?’

  ‘I don’t think he’ll be too good, no,’ she said in a choked voice. ‘The family’s had some bad news.’ She turned to Sonny. ‘Can you give me a lift to his, soon as possible? It’s his mum, she was diagnosed with breast cancer today.’

  20

  It was just under half an hour later when Clarrie rocked up at Si’s one-bedroom terrace bearing a large pizza box and a six-pack of lager. She put it down on the doorstep and knocked at the door.

  ‘Thought it’d be you,’ Simon said when he answered.

  He looked pale, his eyes red and swollen. There were still a few tears swimming about in them too, behind those long, wet eyelashes. Clarrie winced to see the pain drawn over his features.

  ‘Come here, love.’ She flung her arms round him and felt his body convulse with a sob.

  ‘Thanks, Clarrie. Thanks for coming round,’ he said when she released him.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me, Si? I could’ve come sooner. I’ve been ringing you all evening.’

  ‘I was on the landline to Mum for most of the night. Who told you?’

  ‘My mum. She promised your mum we wouldn’t leave you alone. She was worried about you – your mum, I mean.’

  ‘I wish she wouldn’t. She’s got enough to worry about without me.’

  ‘Are they still in Filey?’

  ‘Yeah. They were supposed to be there another week but Dad’s driving them back tomorrow. Kim’s coming home from uni for a few days too.’ He glanced down at the step. ‘You brought pizza?’

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t know what else to do for you. I just… thought I’d bring you pizza.’

  ‘How did you get here?’

  ‘Sonny drove me over after the quiz. I came as soon as I heard.’

  ‘The quiz.’ He groaned. ‘Oh God, I forgot about the quiz. I was supposed to pick you up, wasn’t I? How’d we do?’

  Clarrie smiled. ‘Well we won.’

  ‘We won? Are you sure?’

  ‘Yep. Even aced the history round.’ She handed him the pizza and picked up the beers she’d brought. ‘Come on. I bet you haven’t eaten tonight, have you?’

  ‘Not had anything since breakfast. I’m starving actually.’ Si managed a weak smile. ‘Glad you’re here, Clar.’

  Clarrie followed him through to his modern fitted kitchen. He put the pizza down on the worktop and opened the box.

  ‘It’s pepperoni,’ Clarrie said. ‘Stuffed crust. I know it’s your favourite.’

  Si stared at her blankly. Then he burst into tears.

  ‘Oh, Si,’ she said gently, coming forward to envelop him in a hug. ‘Let’s go sit down, eh? You can have a good cry and tell me all about it.’

  Clarrie took his hand and led him to the living room, then guided him down with her onto the settee.

  She stroked his hair while he buried his face in her neck and sobbed out his grief. Her top was damp with tears by the time he’d finally cried himself dry.

  She pressed her lips to his hair, eyes prickling in sympathy. ‘Can I do anything for you? Get you anything?’

  ‘Just stay with me, that’s all,’ Si said quietly. ‘It’s better when you’re with me.’

  ‘As long as you need me.’

  He squeezed her gratefully. ‘Knew I could count on you.’

  ‘You want to talk about it?’

  Si gulped back another sob. ‘If I can.’

  ‘When did she tell you?’

  ‘Dad rang first to break the news, late this afternoon. God, he sounded so… I don’t know, broken. Those two are like soulmates or something. If he lost her…’

  ‘He won’t,’ Clarrie said firmly, taking his hand in both hers. ‘He won’t, Simon. Does she know what happens next?’

  ‘They caught it early, which is good, they said. They’ve booked her in for an op to remove as much of it as they can, then she starts treatment.’

  ‘Radio, or…?’

  ‘Radio and chemo.’

  Clarrie kept her features fixed, hoping he wouldn’t read worry written there. Chemo – that wasn’t good, was it? Poor Yvonne, she was going to have a tough year ahead.

  ‘What if she doesn’t come through, Clarrie?’ he asked, looking up at her.

  ‘She will. Your mum’s a fighter, Si.’

  He shook his head. ‘You don’t know that. None of us do.’

  ‘Yvonne Dewhirst never let anything beat her in her life. This won’t be any different.’ Clarrie tilted his face up to look into the eyes misty with tears. ‘You just wait, you’ll see I’m right.’

  He let out a shuddering sigh. ‘Clar?’

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘You remember when you’re a kid, and you first get your head round what it means to die?’

  ‘Yeah. I think for me it was when our cat Bustopher got run over. It’s scary, when you work out it’s forever.’

  ‘I used to have nightmares about my parents dying. Selfish kid sort of nightmares, that there’d be no one to make my tea, make Christmas happen or whatever, you know?’

  ‘We all did, Si. All little kids go through that.’

  ‘I know. But after a bit I just stopped having them, all of a sudden. My mum seemed like… like a force of nature, somehow. Singing drunk karaoke with your mum down the pub, making Dad join that whitewater rafting club. She had all this life in her, like she was unstoppable. It never seemed possible she couldn’t be there, just, being my mum…’ His voice trailed off into a sob.

  ‘That’s how I k
now she can fight it.’ Clarrie dipped her chin so he could see her smile. ‘Hey, remember her Stevie Nicks phase? The beads and the big hair?’

  Si gave a wet-sounding snort. ‘Don’t forget the floppy hat.’

  ‘Ouch, yeah. Her fashion sense was always something else.’

  ‘Jesus, Clar… she’ll look so strange when she loses her hair, won’t she? I mean, she’ll hate it, won’t look like… Mum…’ He burst into a fresh round of tears, struggling to speak through his sobs. ‘How’ll I cope if we lose her? She’s only fifty.’

  ‘Try not to think about it,’ Clarrie said softly, stroking his damp cheek. ‘The odds are on her side. There’s nothing to do now but support her while she fights it.’

  ‘I have to think about it. It’ll be worse if I don’t. Dad and Kim’ll need me to be strong if… if…’

  She tried to blink back the tears in her own eyes. ‘You know you wouldn’t have to do it alone, Simon. You know you’ve always got me. My mum too, and Gem and the lads. We all love you to pieces.’

  ‘I know you do.’ He looked up, a strange, hungry expression kindling in his eyes. ‘I love you too, Clarissa.’

  Before she could stop him, he’d brought his face to hers and he was kissing her with a grim, determined sort of passion; a needy kiss, wet with tears and hard with desperation, his fingers pressing the back of her head uncomfortably.

  She put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him away.

  ‘Mm… no, Si, don’t. Not now.’

  ‘Come on, Clar. Please. I need you.’ He tried to press his lips to hers again but she held him back.

  ‘I said no, Simon.’

  ‘Don’t you like it? You did before.’

  ‘It’s not the time, okay? Not when you’re like this.’

  ‘It is the time. It’s exactly the time.’ He latched wet, appealing eyes onto hers. ‘Come upstairs with me, Clarrie. Let me make love to you.’

  ‘What? No!’

  ‘Please, Clar, do this one thing for me. I need to be close to someone – to you, it has to be you. Need to.’

  ‘Oh God, Simon…’ She guided his head to her shoulder and folded him back into her arms. ‘You daft, adorable little bugger. You can’t cure mortality with sex, you know.’

  ‘Don’t you want to? You said you loved me, just now, you said it…’

  ‘You know I do. But that isn’t the way to heal yourself.’

  He snuggled his head into her and closed his eyes. ‘I just want to feel you, that’s all,’ he mumbled brokenly. ‘There with me, all of you – part of me.’

  ‘It wouldn’t fix anything, Si. Your mum’ll still be ill and you’ll still have to deal with all those feelings. It’ll make things worse.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I just do.’ She leant down to press a kiss to his forehead. ‘I can be pretty insightful, you know. Well, I have my moments.’

  ‘You do, don’t you?’ He sighed. ‘God, I’m sorry, Clar. Sorry. Shouldn’t have kissed you like that. Shouldn’t have asked you to bed. Brain’s not working tonight.’

  ‘You’re just upset.’ She let a tear fall into his hair. ‘Wish I could fix things for you, Simon.’

  ‘You’ll stay for a bit though, won’t you?’

  ‘I’m not going anywhere. Just tell me what you need from me.’ She smiled. ‘Other than a bloody good seeing-to, obviously.’

  He managed a weak laugh. ‘Want to stick the telly on and eat pizza with me under a blanket then?’

  ‘That’s more like it.’

  ‘Love you, Clar. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Love you too.’ She planted a kiss on top of the head nestled into her neck, letting her lips linger there a moment. ‘Come on then. I’ll fetch the duvet off your bed, you reheat the pizza.’

  While Si was in the kitchen, Clarrie jogged upstairs for his duvet. She found it on his large double bed – the one that in the desperate isolation of fresh grief he’d just tried to get her into, she remembered, cringing.

  She glanced around the room, suddenly realising that in all the years she’d known him as an adult, all the times she’d been to his house, she’d never been in Si’s bedroom. It was like everything that belonged to him: tidy, clean, nice. Simon Dewhirst, with his neat little house and his car and his grown-up job and his proper wine glasses not made of pink plastic – why wasn’t her life like that?

  Back in the living room, she glanced at the duvet she was dragging, an idea bouncing into her head.

  When Si came in with a plate of steaming pizza slices, he found his feather duvet stretched across a couple of armchairs Clarrie had pushed into the middle of the room, the front uncovered to make an opening. She’d scattered the floor with cushions and was sitting inside waiting for him.

  ‘Made you a den.’ She patted the cushion next to her. ‘Come on. It’s a pizza-eating den.’

  Si crawled inside and put the pizza down on the floor.

  ‘Why’ve you made me a pizza-eating den, Clar?’

  ‘I tried to think what I’d want if I was upset and somehow the answer came back “den”,’ she said. ‘Here, come lie down on me while the pizza cools off a bit. Otherwise we’ll get molten cheese burns from the stuffed crust.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Si lay down so his head was cradled in her lap. She draped one arm over his shoulder and started running her fingers through his hair.

  ‘So? Do you like your den?’ she asked softly.

  ‘Yeah. You know, eating pizza with you in a den feels like just what I need right now.’

  ‘Thought it would be.’

  ‘You’re a strange girl,’ he said, flashing her a smile. ‘Wouldn’t swap you for anyone.’

  ‘That’s lucky, since I’m pretty fond of you.’

  ‘I know.’ He rolled over and pressed his face into her tummy. ‘Just wish I could keep you.’

  ‘Si…’

  ‘Sorry. Sorry. Not the time,’ he said. ‘Thanks for this, Clarrie. Thanks for looking after me.’

  ‘Like I’d be anywhere else when you’re upset.’ She leaned down to kiss his cheek. ‘You know I’d do anything for you. I want you to be happy, Simon.’

  ‘You make me happy,’ he mumbled into her tummy.

  ‘I’m… glad. Anything else I can do for you?’

  He glanced up at her. ‘You been crying too, Clar?’

  ‘Yeah, I had my cry on the way over. Wanted to get it out of my system so I could be strong for you.’

  ‘You don’t need to be strong.’ He eased himself back into a sitting position. ‘Let me see.’

  She brought her face close to his so he could see the swollen lids, the redness around her irises. He ran a gentle finger under one eye.

  ‘Will you cry with me?’ he asked quietly.

  ‘Will that make you feel better?’

  ‘Yes, I think it will. I don’t know why but it will. Just… come here.’

  He engulfed her in a tight hug. Burying her face against his cheek, Clarrie gave way to the tears she’d been fighting back, mingling with Simon’s as they comforted each other in the safety of their little duvet den.

  21

  14th Annual Denworth Quiz League: Leaderboard

  The Woolly Lamb, Match 5 of 8

  1st place – Les Quizerables (267)

  2nd place – The Mighty Morphin’ Flower Arrangers (262)

  3rd place – The Murgatroyd Family (259)

  As pubs went, the Woolly Lamb was nothing special. But it did have one thing to recommend it in the summer months: a massive canal-side beer garden.

  At some point the landlady had had the bright idea of installing an aviary too, and regulars seemed to enjoy watching the little finches and budgies hopping about while they enjoyed a sun-drenched pint. The regulars, that is, not the budgies. They were strictly teetotal.

  It was a tradition that when it was the Lamb’s turn to host, usually on a Saturday in mid-August for the fifth match of the League, they made the most of this asset by holding a family
barbecue in the afternoon. There was always a bouncy castle for the kiddies and live music – they’d got a ukulele band this year, strumming out ironic Nirvana by the barbecue.

  Clarrie arrived alone just after 3 p.m. and claimed a table on the decking outside the pub. She plonked herself down, turned her face up to the yellow ball of sun and let herself bask in its warmth for a moment while she waited for her friends.

  When she opened her eyes again, she spotted Sonny walking towards her.

  ‘What’s with you?’ she asked, looking him up and down. He was buttoned up to the neck in a black suit, white shirt and tie. The words ‘dog’s dinner’ sprang to mind.

  ‘How do I look, Clar? Smart?’

  ‘Yeah, smart like an undertaker. Where the hell are you going dressed like that?’

  ‘Nowhere. Here. I mean…’ Sonny was visibly shaking, sweat standing out on his brow. ‘Gem’s on her way.’

  ‘I know she is. And you’re what, trying to impress her with your sweaty creature of the night routine?’

  ‘Her dad and Lou are coming too.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So I want to make a good impression, don’t I?’

  ‘Why? You’ve met them before.’

  ‘Not since we got back together. It’s different now.’

  ‘Why is it different?’

  ‘I don’t know, it just is,’ Sonny said, running one finger around the inside of his too-tight shirt collar. ‘Feels more serious.’

  Taking pity on the nervous wreck that used to be Sonny Bandal, Clarrie stood up.

  ‘Here.’ She unknotted the tie and stuffed it in his pocket, opened his top shirt button, then unfastened the suit jacket so it hung loose. She ruffled the gelled hair a little to de-slick it too.

  ‘That’s better,’ she said. ‘Smart without the corpse at a wake feel.’

  ‘Really, no tie?’

  ‘Absolutely no tie, you’re at a barbecue. In fact, you should think about losing the jacket too.’

  Sonny summoned a smile and struggled out of his jacket. ‘I’ll take your word for it. Thanks, Clarrie.’