Thicker Than Water

by Anthea Fraser

  He frowned in bewilderment. ‘What about your own people? You must—’

  She straightened, moving away from him. ‘Both my parents are dead. I suppose that’s why I assumed yours were.’

  ‘You must have someone, though?’

  ‘No one who counts.’

  ‘But – they’ll come to the wedding, surely?’

  ‘I shouldn’t think so; I’ve not seen them for years.’

  He said gently, ‘That sounds a very lonely existence.’

  ‘I’ve had my work, and my friends.’

  ‘Well, I’ll make sure my lot don’t crowd us, at least in the early days, though I hope you’ll soon think of Tina and Ben as friends, too.’

  ‘But you told me – Sylvie, is it? – is your sister’s friend. She’s not likely to welcome me, is she?’

  ‘Nonsense; Tina’s never one to hold a grudge. Still, it’s a pity you can’t meet them all tomorrow, and – get it over with.’

  He remembered his mother’s cool reply when he’d suggested just that: ‘I don’t think so, do you?’

  ‘In a week or two,’ he added resolutely, ‘we’ll be wondering what all the fuss was about. In the meantime, we mustn’t let this cast a blight over your visit. I’ve booked a table at a super little restaurant, and since it’s within walking distance, we needn’t worry about drinking. OK?’ He looked anxiously into her face.

  She nodded, summoning up a smile. ‘OK. Sorry if I overreacted. Of course it was a shock for your mother, especially when she’d no forewarning.’

  ‘They’ll soon come round, just you see.’

  He reached for her hand and drew her to him. The length of her was still a novelty, thighs, breast and mouth almost on a level with his own, in marked contrast to petite Sylvie, kissing whom had frequently resulted in a crick in the neck.

  But this was no time to think of Sylvie. Abigail’s caresses were becoming more insistent, and dinner was a while off. Still clinging to each other, they moved towards the bedroom.

  Monday morning, and James’s mobile sounded as he was running up the stairs to his office.

  ‘James Markham.’

  ‘Good morning, James.’ A voice he didn’t immediately recognize. ‘Robert Warren here.’

  Sylvie’s father! James came to a sudden halt, moving to one side as people continued to clatter past him up the stairs. ‘Good morning, Robert.’

  ‘I’m wondering if you’d be good enough to meet me for a drink after work?’

  James groaned inwardly. Shotguns to the fore! ‘Well, I—’

  ‘The bar at the Queen’s Hotel, about six?’

  His mind fumbled for excuses – previous engagements, dental appointments – but could come up with none that sounded plausible. ‘I’ll be there,’ he said.

  The prospect of the meeting clouded his entire day, even diluting memories of his weekend with Abigail. After she left, late yesterday afternoon, he’d succumbed to a welter of conflicting emotions, miserable and elated in turn, and quite unable to settle. Meeting his friends was not an option, since he couldn’t face telling them his news; and Tina and Ben, his usual port in a storm, were for the moment barred to him. He was persona non grata at his parents’, and now, to cap it all, he’d have to account for himself to the father of his ex-fiancée.

  While he was not looking forward to the prospect, it was only as he was eating a snatched lunch in a sandwich bar that a truly awful possibility occurred to him: suppose Sylvie was pregnant? Vague memories of breach of promise suits blundered round his head. Were they still in effect? He thought not but couldn’t be sure, and the uncertainty added to his apprehension. He wished, passionately and uselessly, that he and Abigail could fly away to some tropic isle, and let the rest of them go hang.

  Robert Warren was there before him, seated at a table against the wall. Mentally crossing his fingers, James walked across to join him. Warren rose to shake his hand. Good sign, or bad?

  ‘What are you drinking?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, let me—’

  ‘Not at all; you’re here at my request.’

  ‘Then a pint of best, please.’

  He watched his host go up to the bar. Warren was of medium height, broad-shouldered and balding. James had always considered him fairly laid-back, but then, he’d never jilted his daughter before.

  He returned with two brimming glasses, set them down on the table, and seated himself. Each of his actions seemed to James unduly protracted. Get on with it! his nerves were screaming.

  Warren raised his glass and James responded, though no toast was given. Then he wiped a hand across his face and said, ‘This is a bit of a turn-up, isn’t it?’

  ‘I know. I’m – sorry.’

  ‘What happened, exactly?’

  ‘I was on a course in London, and I met this girl.’ How lame it sounded.

  ‘It does happen,’ Warren said drily. ‘However, you happened to be engaged to my daughter.’

  ‘I know. I’ve no excuse, and I can’t explain it. All I can say is I’d be no use to Sylvie, having met Abigail. The kindest thing seemed to be to end it straight away.’

  ‘Kindest for whom?’ Sylvie’s father took a long draught of beer. ‘I might as well admit that meeting you was my wife’s idea. She wanted me to see you immediately, before, as she put it, things had gone too far. By which I think she meant before too many people heard about it, and while the situation might still be salvaged.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ James said quietly.

  ‘There’s no chance of that?’

  ‘No.’

  The two men were silent for a while. Then Warren sighed. ‘It’s not easy, you know, seeing your daughter breaking her heart. And that’s no exaggeration; she really loves you, James. Always has done, though she’d kill me if she knew I was meeting you like this.’

  ‘I’m very fond of her,’ James said wretchedly. ‘The last thing I’d have wanted was to hurt her.’

  ‘Yet you didn’t think twice about doing so. Look, I know how these things happen. You can be strongly attracted to someone; but there’s always a point at which you can pull back, put a stop to it. You must seize it at once, though, because the longer you leave it, the harder it’ll become. You admit the truth of that?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ If he hadn’t walked down the length of the bar to speak to Abigail, hadn’t then suggested dinner, would he have been able to put her out of his mind? He doubted it. He’d not been granted even that split-second in which to pull back. And why hadn’t he? The answer was clear: because he’d not loved Sylvie enough.

  He looked up to find Warren’s eyes searchingly on him.

  ‘I’m so very sorry,’ he said.

  At least there’d been no mention of pregnancy, he thought, as he made his miserable way to his car. But his relief was short-lived; incredible as it now seemed, it was less than ten days since he and Sylvie had last made love, on the eve of his trip to London. There was still time.

  They were in an Italian restaurant in Soho, where they’d been meeting one Tuesday a month for at least two years; even sitting at their usual table. Everything was as it had always been, and yet was totally different.

  Abigail looked about her as though seeing her surroundings for the first time – the counter dividing the kitchen from the diners, behind which a group of dark men in white coats performed miracles with tuna, veal and pasta; the waiters in their tight black trousers and short jackets; the saucer of olive oil on the table between them, in which Sarah was dipping her ciabatta. She even reached out to touch the straw-covered Chianti bottle, in a kind of caress. Because, for her at least, this was the last of their monthly Tuesdays.

  ‘I’ve something to tell you,’ she said, breaking into the general chatter. The three of them turned questioning faces towards her, and she studied them with the same sense of distance: Sarah, who worked in television and looked like a soap star herself, with her springing chestnut hair; Eleanor, grey eyes huge behind outsize glasses, an up and coming lawyer;
and Millie, a platinum blonde who appeared not to have a thought in her head, but ran her own catering business.

  Abigail drew a deep breath. ‘I’m getting married,’ she said.

  Her friends stared at her blankly. Then Sarah, the first to find her voice, said, ‘You’re joking, right?’

  Abigail smiled. ‘No joke. I’m really getting married.’

  They all started to speak at once: ‘But you swore you never would!’ ‘Not Theo, surely?’ ‘Why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘To answer you each in turn: I know that’s what I said, but I’ve changed my mind; it’s a woman’s prerogative, isn’t it? No, it’s not Theo, and the reason I didn’t tell you before is because I only met him last week.’

  This time their reactions were identical, and voiced as one. ‘Last week?’

  Abigail smiled. ‘Love at first sight,’ she said.

  ‘Now I really don’t believe you!’ Millie. ‘There must be some other reason. Is he a millionaire, or something?’

  Abigail laughed and shook her head.

  ‘So the Ice Maiden melts at last.’ That was Eleanor. ‘Who’d have thought it?’ she added rhetorically.

  Sarah moved impatiently. ‘Enough surmising. Start at the beginning, and tell us exactly how it happened.’

  So Abigail related her meeting with James, their immediate attraction, and his almost immediate proposal. She skated over the fact that he was engaged – because it was no longer relevant – and made light of her meeting with his mother.

  ‘The thing is, though,’ she finished, ‘he lives in a small town in the Cotswolds.’

  ‘You’re never going to bury yourself in the country?’ Eleanor demanded incredulously. ‘Not you, Abigail?’

  ‘I can work there just as easily as in Pimlico,’ she said.

  ‘But work’s only part of it!’ Millie put in. ‘What about restaurants and theatres and concerts and shopping? Not to mention us! What about us?’ she repeated on a rising note.

  ‘I’ll miss you all, of course, but we can email and text, and I’ll have to come to London every so often anyway. It’s not the other side of the world.’

  ‘Does Theo know?’ Sarah asked suddenly.

  Theo Hardy had been – probably thought he still was – Abigail’s latest partner, presently away on a business trip to China.

  ‘I’ve not had the chance to tell him. It didn’t seem fair to email.’

  ‘So where is this James now?’ asked Millie. ‘When are we going to meet him?’

  ‘After a week away from the office, he can’t take time off at the moment. I’m driving up again at the weekend.’

  ‘So when will this Wedding of the Year take place?’

  ‘It won’t be that, Sarah,’ Abigail said seriously. ‘In fact, it’ll be a very quiet affair in a register office, but of course you’re all invited. As to when, probably one day next month.’

  Again, they all stared at her in astonishment. Abigail, who had been the most resolutely anti-marriage of them all; who swore she’d never been, and would never allow herself to be, in love; who weighed all possibilities before reaching a decision – this same Abigail, marrying a man she’d have known less than four weeks – and for love, at that!

  Who said the age of miracles was past?

  The family’s meeting with Abigail couldn’t, of course, be postponed indefinitely, and his parents’ first move was to invite James to supper, when a long and searching discussion took place. No punches were pulled, and he was left in no doubt that they considered he’d behaved shabbily. But once they’d seen he was adamant, they’d no option but to make the best of it and extend some sort of welcome, however restrained, to their proposed daughter-in-law. It was either that, or risk estrangement from their son.

  So an invitation was extended, via James, that she join them and the rest of the family for lunch the following Saturday. The change of day was significant; Sunday lunch was a family institution. Saturday would be less formal, and as it happened, suited himself and Abigail better, since the prospect would not be hanging over them all weekend. Also, she wouldn’t have to set off for London again immediately afterwards.

  James delivered the invitation when he phoned on the Wednesday evening.

  ‘Tina, Ben and the kids will be there, too. Can you face it?’

  ‘Better to jump in the deep end,’ Abigail answered philosophically. ‘As you said last week, there’s a lot to be said for getting everything over at once.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, sweetheart; I’m the one they’re annoyed with, not you. I’m sure it will all be very civilized.’ He paused. ‘We’ve not really discussed this, but it might help if we can give them a definite date. Have you thought about it?’

  ‘Sometime next month?’

  ‘Perfect. I’ll just about last that long! A Saturday?’

  ‘It would be easier for my friends; they’re all working girls.’

  James waited, and when she didn’t enlarge on that, prompted, ‘And your family?’

  Her tone of voice changed. ‘I told you, there’s no one I want to be there. We’re completely out of touch.’

  He was aware of disappointment and a vague feeling of unease. He’d have liked their families to meet; it would have somehow rooted her more securely, made it a more normal affair.

  Relinquishing the prospect, he asked, ‘So who would you like to be there?’

  ‘Just my three closest friends, your parents, and Ben and Tina, if they’ll come.’ She paused. ‘Is that all right from your angle?’

  ‘Well, I’d have liked to show you off to the world, but there’ll be time for that later. We can all have lunch afterwards – I’ll book a private room somewhere. So – name the day, my darling.’

  ‘How about Saturday the eighteenth, in three weeks’ time? Will that give you long enough to sort things out?’

  ‘All I have to do is fix a loft ladder!’

  She laughed. ‘I’ll have to consider what to do with the flat. Since there’s no room at your place, I think I’ll let it furnished, and just bring personal things with me. Which, of course, includes my easel and work materials.’

  ‘But there must be some things of sentimental value? I’m sure we could find room.’

  ‘I don’t do sentiment, James.’

  ‘You mean, you didn’t!’

  He heard the smile in her voice. ‘Even now, only in very prescribed circumstances. No, really. I bought the furniture when I moved into the flat; now I’m moving out, I’ve no further use for it.’

  ‘OK, you know best. Admittedly we’d be rather strapped for space. I must go, sweetie; I’m off to make my peace with Tina and Ben. I’ll phone tomorrow, and you’ll be here on Friday, won’t you?’

  ‘Yes, as soon as I can get away.’

  ‘I’ll have an extra key cut, then you won’t be dependent on my getting home before you. Speak to you tomorrow, then. Love you.’

  ‘Love you, too. Good luck with Tina and Ben.’

  After a cool and cloudy week, Friday ushered in an Indian summer. The forecast was for continuing high temperatures, and Abigail was thankful to leave the humid, air-starved city and head west for the country. She drove with the windows open, relishing the wind of passage that lifted her hair and, though warm, provided the illusion of freshness.

  On this occasion, she drove straight to the alleyway and parked, as before, next to James’s black Peugeot. Rounding the corner into the square, she found the front door of the flat standing open, and a bouquet of roses on the bottom stair.

  ‘James?’ she called, and he came running down to greet her.

  ‘I’ve never known such a long week,’ he declared, pulling her close. ‘But only another three to go, and we’ll be together all the time.’

  ‘I see I have an admirer,’ Abigail commented, eyeing the bouquet.

  ‘A very devoted one.’

  ‘It’s gorgeous. Thank you.’ She stooped to retrieve it, and they went together up the stairs. Already, the
sunny room with its pale walls and colourful rugs felt like home. Abigail drew a long, tremulous breath.

  ‘It’s lovely to be back,’ she said.

  Three

  By the Saturday, it would be hard to say which of the three couples meeting for lunch was the most apprehensive. Though James had been told twelve thirty, Rosemary asked her daughter to arrive at twelve, ‘to provide moral support’.

  Tina’s family had not been cooperative. ‘But we went there last weekend,’ Charlie grumbled. ‘Archie’s parents have invited me to go swimming.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry, but this is a special occasion. Aren’t you interested in meeting Uncle James’s new fiancée?’

  ‘No!’ he said flatly.

  ‘Surely you are, Lily?’

  Her daughter shrugged. ‘How long will this one last? He was going to marry Sylvie till last week.’

  ‘That’s enough!’ Ben said sharply.

  ‘Anyway, Saturday isn’t grandparents’ day, and Debs and I are booked to go riding.’

  ‘You can’t always do as you want,’ Tina retorted, her patience wearing thin. She wasn’t looking forward to the day herself, and could do without aggravation from her family.

  As the children sulkily left the breakfast table, Ben put an arm round her. ‘It’ll be all right,’ he said.

  ‘I thought we’d eat in the garden,’ Rosemary announced. ‘It’s less formal, and it seems a shame to waste the good weather. It’ll be autumn soon enough.’

  ‘Won’t it be too hot?’

  ‘Not under the chestnut; there’ll be plenty of shade. Be a love, and move the table and chairs, would you? There’ll be eight of us.’

  Andrew surveyed the selection of food laid out under protective netting – curried eggs, bite-sized home-made pizza, savoury tartlets. There were several salads in the fridge, together with a bowl of couscous and a selection of cheeses and desserts. This meal, he reflected, ranked as what Tina had dubbed Ma’s Harvest Home – a scaled-down version of the fare she presided over on the church catering committee.

  ‘You’re doing her proud, love,’ he said.

  Abigail was dismayed to find James’s parents lived a mere fifteen-minute drive away, in one of the hamlets that fringed the town. The house was approached along one side of a village green, where a group of boys were kicking a ball about. Across its expanse she could see several other houses, a church, and an old-fashioned pub, whose customers were sitting or standing outside in the sunshine. A gale of laughter reached them on the still air.