Life After Lunch

by Sarah Harrison

  ‘She asked me,’ said Patrick. ‘ But I declined. I have my standards.’

  Glyn laughed – they both did – at this, and I could feel Patrick looking at me.

  ‘I’ve called her up a few times since,’ he went on chattily, ‘ to try and persuade her to take part in one of our Info-fairs at the college, but without success.’ I realized he was not going to say anything really dangerous, simply to play with the situation like a cat with a baby bird. I breathed a little easier, but my fear was beginning to be superseded by anger. How dare he?

  ‘What’s an Info-fair when it’s at home?’ Glyn was asking, though he couldn’t have known it, for both of us.

  ‘It’s an evening we have each term, not confined to the students and academic staff, but for anyone who wants to drop in. Began as a kind of exercise in bridging the town – gown gap. It’s a completely different kettle of fish to this farrago.’ He nodded round disparagingly at the assembled company. ‘People who come have the opportunity to set up stands, do presentations, give out literature—’

  ‘Patrick’s problem,’ I said to Glyn, ‘is that he thinks I’m a serious, sensible person.’

  ‘Bad mistake,’ agreed Glyn, happy to play along. ‘You’re barking up the wrong tree, Prof.’

  ‘What about you?’ asked Patrick, whose expression told me he was the tiniest bit rattled. ‘Aren’t you in showbusiness?’

  ‘Did Laura tell you that? No, not really. Those who can, do. Those who can’t take their ten per cent.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re too modest,’ said Patrick condescendingly.

  ‘He is,’ I said. ‘ Much too modest.’

  It ended there, thank God. At that moment a handsome, deep-voiced woman with a scarf round her head put her arm through Patrick’s and said, ‘Mind if I steal him?’

  ‘Do, we’ve finished with him,’ said Glyn, adding as they disappeared, ‘Great chap. Good value.’

  We completed our separate circuits of the room. The meeting with Patrick had left me so limp that I was unable to make any effort and simply had to wait for people to come up to me. I met two senior traffic wardens, the coach of the local football club, a flock of librarians and the deputy head of a primary school. At one point I was standing back to back with Patrick as he talked to the Lady Mayoress, so close that I could feel his heat and the vibration of his voice as he spoke.

  When Glyn and I eventually caught up with one another again I said, ‘I’ve had enough, let’s go.’

  ‘Suits me.’

  It was a quarter to eight, the evening blurring into dusk. The air in the market square was fresh after the heat and noise of the party. Never mind that there were a couple of winos sharing a flagon of cider on the steps of the drinking fountain, nor that an arrow-faced mongrel was defecating amongst the scattered litter of the empty stalls. A clattering handful of pigeons burst from the church tower to our left and wheeled away over Marks and Spencer and the central library. A group of young teenagers in baggy shirts horsed around and smoked death-defyingly on the corner by Barclays Bank.

  ‘Shall we find something to eat?’ asked Glyn.

  ‘I’m not hungry.’

  ‘Walk?’

  I didn’t answer, but we began to walk anyway. Glyn strolled hands in pockets, I paced more purposefully. Still, we both knew that it was he who led and I who followed.

  We went round the edge of the square. On the far side by the Rivoli Italian restaurant I glanced back at the town hall and saw that someone had opened the bottom of the long windows and in one of them Patrick sat, sideways on, glass in hand, watching our progress – or so I thought. Seeing me, he appeared to raise the glass slightly.

  On the far side of the square Glyn turned down a paved, pedestrianized lane that led into Bartholomew Street. We were going to cross Bartholomew Street and walk round the Peace. We’d come back through St Michael and All Angels, past Isobel’s white stone, and we’d slow down but not stop. And then back to the car, and home, as the soft glove of early autumn darkness slipped over the town. It was nice to be taken, not to have to decide. That’s how it would be.

  Halfway along the lane was Pizza Parade, where Susan and I sometimes had lunch. The chefs made the pizzas, Italian-style, in full view of customers and passers-by. It was pure street theatre. We stopped for a moment to watch them slapping and pummelling and sliding and sprinkling, and juggling the great soft clocks of pizza dough from hand to hand.

  In one of the window tables, also watching, were Becca, Griggs, Amos and Sinead. Sinead was standing on her seat, with Becca’s arm round her waist to steady her. Amos was slewed round in his, with his chin resting on the back. Griggs, who wore a baseball cap, was also turned away from us, watching. If the cap was meant as a disguise it didn’t work, for one of the waitresses detached herself from the group in the corner and came over with a menu to ask for his autograph. He obliged, and then turned back and gazed at Becca. Her hair was in a plait and she wore a white T-shirt and droopy old cardigan. Sinead laughed and pointed at the chefs. Amos stood on his seat. Becca tweaked the seat of his jeans to make him sit down. Griggs gazed.

  We walked on, to say goodnight to Isobel.

  Chapter Seventeen

  There was nothing, on the morning of Steph’s wedding, to presage ill fortune. No shattered mirror, no change in the weather, no bad news in the post. In the end, Josh didn’t even come home the night before. He left a message with Verity that he was going to stay over with Mad Max (the car collector) because of the early start, and he hoped we’d all have a good day. I chose to interpret this behaviour as conciliatory – a sign that Josh felt at least a little shamefaced about not attending the wedding.

  ‘Look at it this way,’ said Glyn, ‘he’ll be able to pay me back the twenty quid he’s owed me since March.’

  Verity was generous. ‘He underestimates himself – I think Steph will be sorry he’s not there.’

  Becca – whom, with the children, we picked up en route – was predictably scathing. ‘The little toe-rag – why do you let him get away with it?’

  ‘What could I do?’ I protested. ‘He’s well past the age or the size when I make him do anything he doesn’t want to.’

  ‘You’d never have let us get away with it,’ pointed out Becca.

  ‘You’d never have tried it on, Bex,’ said Glyn teasingly. ‘You were always far too work-shy.’ I held my breath but Becca wore her I-shan’t-stoop-to-answer-that expression.

  ‘Do you think I’ll feel sick?’ enquired Amos.

  ‘No,’ said Becca. ‘ you’ve taken a pill.’

  ‘I will,’ said Sinead emphatically.

  ‘Bridesmaids are never sick,’ said Glyn, glancing at his granddaughter in the rear-view mirror. ‘ Didn’t you know?’

  Sinead nodded. ‘Yes, I did.’

  It was a squeeze in the Shogun, particularly with all our glad-rags festooned in the rear windows and in the boot, but this arrangement permitted Becca to have a drink, and relieved us of the anxiety attendant on her hurtling down to Ferniehurst in the Mini with the kids on the back seat.

  We’d been invited to shepherd’s pie and bubbly at the Ponderosa beforehand. The guest annexe was to be handed over to the bridesmaids and their mothers for prenuptial titivation, and the rest of us would get changed and head for the church in advance of the bridal party.

  The day, as I say, was fine, and Josh’s backsliding had a pleasantly bonding effect on the rest of us. Or most of the rest of us.

  ‘Where’s Josh?’ asked Amos.

  ‘Working,’ replied his mother curtly.

  ‘Cleaning cars?’

  ‘So he tells us.’

  ‘Your Uncle Josh,’ said Glyn, ‘would rather work than have fun like the rest of us—’ here Becca snorted – ‘ he’ll go far.’

  Amos gazed out of the window with a furrowed brow, considering this latest example of adult doubletalk, and how to pull it apart. Verity put her arm round Sinead.

  ‘Are you looking forward to being
a bridesmaid?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You know you’ll have some beautiful flowers to carry.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Just so long as they’re not one of those pom-poms on a string,’ said Becca. ‘ That I couldn’t stand.’ She spoke like a woman who had put up with everything a capricious middle-aged bride could throw at her but had reached her limit.

  ‘I can’t think Steph’s a pom-pom kind of person,’ I said soothingly.

  ‘I want a pom-pom,’ said Sinead.

  ‘No you don’t,’ said Becca.

  Amos had a thought. ‘Do I have to come?’

  ‘Yes you do.’

  We laughed about the Ponderosa, but it was pretty damn smooth. Glyn and I told ourselves we couldn’t possibly have lived in a place like it, but of course we could have done, and very easily. It looked like a cross between a ranch and a golf club. Built in the thirties by a millionaire shoe manufacturer, it was pleasingly proportioned and many-windowed, with a verandah running round two sides. Extending from the back, northerly wall, was what had been the staff quarters and was now the guest annexe. What was now the stables had been garages for the mogul’s fleet of expensive cars – a reversal of the usual situation – and a large part of the park where he had grandiosely kept a herd of rare deer was divided into grazing and paddocks with immaculately maintained post-and-rail fencing, five-bar gates and jumps. The roof of the house was a whimsical melange of angles and gables and chimneys, and crenellations and a weathercock. It was as though up there the mogul’s imagination had burst forth in a riot of romanticism that could be seen for miles around.

  David had organized signs – ‘ Parking’, ‘ Exit’, ‘Reception’-all of which Glyn ignored and pulled up the Shogun by the front door. Jasper was the first person we encountered, corning out to greet us carrying a box of lightbulbs and a plastic bag full of toilet rolls.

  ‘Welcome to the house of fun,’ he said with a rueful smile.

  ‘All will be well,’ said Glyn, taking an armful of clothes from the back. ‘ Isn’t that right, Ver?’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  Jasper kissed us in his nice, unaffected way, took Verity’s hand and led the party into the house.

  ‘What are you doing with those?’ asked Amos.

  ‘Checking lightbulbs,’ replied Jasper. ‘And loo paper. Mum’s reached the compulsive-obsessive stage,’ he explained over his shoulder. ‘Come on in and have a coffee.’

  ‘Who’s here?’ asked Becca, lifting and carrying the suddenly shy Sinead. I knew she needed to prepare a persona for the asembled company. She was more sensitive about her marital status – or lack of it – than she let on.

  ‘Everybody. More relatives than you ever knew you had.’

  ‘Great,’ said Glyn. ‘I do love a knees-up.’

  Amos skipped backwards in front of Jasper. ‘Can I help?’

  ‘Let me show everyone where to go first and you can. You can be in charge of bog rolls.’

  The hall of the house ran from front to back. It was darker than usual, in spite of the weather, because an awning had been set up leading from the drawing-room to the marquee, which sat like a stranded UFO on the croquet lawn.

  ‘Everyone’s out at the back,’ explained Jasper, ‘because the caterers are taking over the world.’

  We went through the dining-room, with its equine portraits and cabinets full of trophies, and into the kitchen which was, as Jasper had predicted, a requisitioned zone, full of piles of gold-rimmed plates and sealed caskets of food. Anthea had centred her domestic catering operation on the secondary kitchen, once the scullery, which was nowadays the preserve of the stable staff. It had a second cooker and fridge, a stone sink, a set of Homeworld formica units, and a folding table and chairs which this morning had been moved out to join a loose scrum of garden furniture on the – also secondary – patio, where the family were taking their ease, but watchfully, like any troop of primates alert to the possibility of disturbance. On the table was a tray with mugs, spoons, a large cafetiere and a milk bottle, and another with plastic tumblers, a two-litre bottle of Coke and a slab of Heinekens, already breached. More mugs and beakers were scattered about, along with two sideplates being used as ashtrays, and what remained of a jumbo bag of crisps and a packet of Kit-Kats. I thought, as we emerged into the sunshine to a chorus of greeting, that this was what money bought you: fall-back positions. Cash meant never having to say sorry about the mess.

  David rose up from a deckchair, cigar in hand, my father and Brian (the Canadian geologist) following suit. ‘Hallo, hallo! Welcome! Make yourselves at home!’

  This injunction, though warmly spoken and sincerely meant, and accompanied by much shoulder-squeezing and cheek-pressing, was not that easy to comply with. Or not for me – Glyn dived in like a kid at a funfair. I reflected how much easier it was to handle relatives other than one’s own.

  ‘What a gathering!’ exclaimed my mother, ensconced in the only upholstered chair. Isn’t this the greatest fun? Glyn, darling, come and sit by me, how are you?’

  I sat down on a kitchen chair, appreciating the small height advantage that it gave me. Jasper, accompanied by Amos, retreated back into the house with his box of lightbulbs. Verity went to help Anthea with fresh supplies of coffee. Becca stood to one side with Sinead clinging bashfully to one leg.

  My father leaned towards his great-grand-daughter, patting his knee. ‘Want to sit with me?’

  ‘I doubt it,’ said Becca, ‘she’s being clingy.’

  This shaft ensured that Sinead (ever her mother’s daughter) went to sit with my father, and Becca lit a cigarette. ‘Who do I have to sleep with to get a beer?’

  ‘Help yourself for goodness sake, child,’ said Anthea with her usual brusque, horsey tolerance, ‘and see who else wants one.’

  Ros said, ‘I can’t believe these are your grandchildren, Laura! And you look exactly the same. Do you remember Brian?’

  ‘Yes, hallo,’ I said. Brian was tall and hefty with a low forehead and a beard. The rest of his features, clustered together between two bushy growths of hair, were like those of a shy wild creature peering from its lair.

  ‘Hi there.’ His huge paw enveloped my hand but gave it a dismayingly limp, damp shake.

  ‘Those are ours,’ said Ros, indicating two well-scrubbed teenagers sitting on the grass with Anthea’s basset hound, Percy. They do adore that dog!’

  She had picked up a slight transatlantic inflection. Of the two of them, she was the twin who was more like Caro – the wildness of her hair, though obviously recently subjected to a ‘ do’, was beginning to reassert itself, and her large, slightly watery eyes had a surprised look.

  ‘We must introduce the two bridesmaids,’ she said. ‘How old is Sinead?’

  ‘Three and a half.’

  ‘Nadine is twelve. She’s the youngest, so I tend to think of her as my baby, but she’ll be a teenager in November – hey-ho.’

  ‘Where’s Steph?’ I asked, looking round. ‘And Aunt Caro?’

  ‘Upstairs putting slices of cucumber on their eyelids.’ She made it sound as though mother and daughter were enjoying an exchange of girlish confidences. Tell me, does your little one like the dress?’

  ‘She’s not mine – she’s Becca’s.’ I glanced brightly across at my daughter, who didn’t return my smile. Undeterred, Ros got up and went over to her.

  ‘Brian,’ I said, ‘will you excuse me? I’m going to pop up and say hallo to the bride.’

  ‘Sure, you go right ahead,’ said Brian, helping himself to another beer.

  I went into the house and across the hall. Caro was corning down the stairs. She was wearing a royal blue tracksuit with horizontal white stripes on the top half. She fell on my neck.

  ‘Laura! Were you going up to see Steph? I wish you would, I’ve been thrown out.’

  ‘Is she okay?’’

  ‘She’s in a filthy temper. Nothing I do is right. And you ought to see her dress, it’s the most beauti
ful thing you’ve ever seen. Do go, it’ll do her so much good to see you.’

  I couldn’t imagine why this should be so, but anyway I went on up and followed directions to the guest bedroom. A cistern flushed and Emma emerged into the corridor.

  ‘Emma!’

  ‘Aunt Laura!’

  The effect of not seeing a relative for a while is always to profess, on meeting them again, more affection than is really the case. We embraced warmly and then stood back to drink each other in. Emma had only half her brother’s looks, but twice his confidence. She was wrapped in a towelling robe, but wore a red and black hat like a flattened toadstool fastened to a frighteningly disciplined coiffure. Her tan was darker than was fashionable, almost weatherbeaten, but her nails were red and her teeth had been expensively capped since I’d last seen her. She was still rather chubby and chinless but she had put on the armour of fight, and I found myself admiring her. Like Anthea, she pushed relentlessly on without wasting valuable energy on what her mother would have called navel-contemplation.

  ‘Going to see the condemned woman?’

  ‘Is that what she is?’

  ‘Let’s put it this way, I wouldn’t want to be in her shoes. Ugh!’ She shuddered.

  ‘Why on earth would a successful, attractive, independent, middle-aged woman like Steph want to get married?’

  I tried to address the question, and not be sidetracked by its implications.

  ‘She’s in love with him, I suppose …’

  ‘What’s love got to do with it?’ asked Emma rhetorically. ‘ I adore Bud, but I don’t want his hairs in my bath. Have you met this guy?’

  ‘She brought him to a party in the summer. He seems pleasant enough.’

  ‘Oh well, that’s all right then!’ She honked with laughter. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I wish her well, I really do. Better go and be sociable.’ From this I inferred, correctly, that she was going to go down to the garden exactly as she was. ‘By the way,’ she added, ‘there’s enough bog paper in there to wipe the backsides of the entire Home Counties!’