by Penny Jordan
‘It’s a habit mothers fall into,’ she said gently. ‘You see, when they’re little they’re so dependent on us that we automatically have to put them first. It doesn’t necessarily mean…’
She stopped and Joel looked at her.
‘What? That they do come first? No, when I was growing up it certainly didn’t then but Sally keeps on telling me it’s different now.’
‘We all want to give our children the things we feel we didn’t have ourselves.’
‘Mmm… well, all my two seem to want is the latest piece of electronic rubbish… a new computer is what Paul is after now… I offered to take him fishing the other day but he said fishing bored him…’
He stopped as he saw the small betraying expression flicker across Philippa’s face. ‘What is it?’ he asked her.
‘Nothing,’ she denied and then added quickly, ‘Your children are very lucky to have a father who wants to spend time with them.’
She didn’t say any more, and Joel didn’t press her to explain.
So she thought his children were lucky to have him as a father? He doubted whether Sally would agree.
As they reached the front gate to her house Philippa stopped. Joel gave a small start of surprise. He hadn’t realised they were there. They only seemed to have been walking for a few seconds.
He didn’t want to end their conversation, to let her go, he recognised; there was something about her that had a soothing, warming effect upon him, that somehow made him feel good about himself. He couldn’t explain exactly what it was, he only knew that during those few seconds while he had held her and felt her body tremble slightly against his he had been intensely aware of her vulnerability.
‘It was kind of you to walk me home,’ Philippa told him now.
‘I enjoyed it,’ Joel told her truthfully. ‘It was… good to have someone to talk to.’
‘Yes,’ Philippa agreed, acknowledging all that he had left unspoken.
‘I could come round tomorrow and take a look at your car for you if you like,’ Joel offered.
Philippa felt her heart give a small betraying flurry of half-beats.
‘Oh, I couldn’t put you to so much trouble,’ she protested.
‘It’s no trouble,’ Joel assured her. ‘It will give me something to do…’
‘Well, if you’re sure you don’t mind…’
She shouldn’t be doing this, Philippa acknowledged on a small burst of panic.
‘I… I can’t afford to pay you,’ she told him awkwardly. ‘I’ll…’
‘There’s no need… As I said, it will give me something to do. Come on,’ he added, glancing up the drive. ‘I’d better see you inside…’
She ought to have invited him in for a cup of coffee, Philippa acknowledged guiltily when Joel had gone, but she had already nearly consumed her small stock of coffee this morning with Susie’s visit, and according to the Social Services, unless she had misunderstood the woman, it might be some time before she actually received any money.
It hadn’t helped discovering that, while the owner of the second-hand shop was more than delighted to sell her clothes, she wouldn’t actually receive any money for them until a customer came into the shop and bought them.
‘I work on a flat commission basis,’ the woman had told Philippa briskly, ‘and I’ll account to you at the end of every month.’
So much for hoping that she could use the money for the boys’ school trip… which meant that she now had no option other than to go to her parents… It made no difference knowing that her father could easily afford the relatively modest amount involved; she was a grown woman of thirty-four and, even if her relationship with her parents had been a good one built on mutual love, she still wouldn’t have wanted to approach them for money. She was not, despite what others seemed to think, a woman who enjoyed being financially dependent on others; she never had been. Even as a teenager, she would have preferred to be allowed to earn her own pocket money, but there had been no question of her father allowing her to do that.
She remembered how scathing Blake had been about her financial dependence on her parents.
‘Can’t you see what you’re doing? They’re buying you, Philippa, and you’re letting them. If you really wanted to go to university, to be independent, you’d find a way of financing yourself.’
‘How?’ she had demanded tearfully.
She had loved him so much… worshipped him in dumb, heart-aching silence. He had filled all her teenage dreams with fantasies of how it would feel to have Blake’s mouth touching hers, kissing her the way she had seen lovers kissing in films, open mouth pressed to open mouth in hungry, fierce need. Her body had grown hot and achy just thinking about how it would feel to have Blake kiss her like that.
In the privacy of her bedroom she had studied her naked body, shivering as she’d watched her nipples grow into hard, urgent points when she’d imagined Blake touching her, but a fantasy was all it had been, and after that final quarrel between them, when he had made it clear to her what he thought of her, she had been almost feverishly grateful that they had not been lovers, that she had been spared the final humiliation of being used sexually by him in the way that she herself had pitifully and stupidly invited.
But she had no illusions left. That restraint had been for his sake and not for hers.
The pain of loving him and of forcing herself to destroy that love had left her very weak, with no energy to spare for any further battles with her father.
Andrew’s intense and determined courtship of her had been a panacea, a means of distracting herself from a pain she could neither suppress nor deny. Her father had approved of him, and at least marriage to Andrew would be some form of escape.
Only by convincing herself that she had found someone else to love would she be able to banish the humiliation of Blake’s rejection of her, by convincing herself that she was worthy of being loved.
Sometimes, just occasionally, when she was feeling particularly reckless, she allowed herself to wonder what her life might have been like if she had not visited Blake that evening.
* * *
All through the winter and then the spring she had been looking forward to the summer holidays, to what she feared would be Blake’s last visit to her home, since Michael would soon have completed his course. She was eighteen now, not a child any longer but a woman, a woman who was determined to put to the test what all her feminine senses were telling her. It wasn’t enough any more to watch Blake smile, to listen to him talk and to dream her dreams of him alone in bed at night. The kisses she wanted from him now were no longer merely the fantasy ones she conjured up for herself.
All her burgeoning femininity told her that Blake was aware of her, that when he smiled at her and watched her he was well aware of the effect he was having on her and that the burning look she sometimes saw in his eyes meant that he too wanted more…
Frustratingly, though, once he had arrived, she never seemed to get the chance to be alone with him; someone else, normally her father or Robert, would appear and the opportunity to show him how she felt, to encourage him to recognise that she was no longer a child, would be lost.
Once or twice they had been alone, but on both occasions she had been stricken by such a paralysing shyness that she hadn’t been able to say what was in her heart.
The first time had been when she had seen him emerging from the guest bathroom one evening, his legs bare beneath his robe, bare and soft-furred. Her stomach had contracted on a sudden surge of shocked excitement, hot shivers burning her skin like fine needles. She had taken a step towards him but he had stepped back, leaving her feeling self-conscious and confused.
The second occasion had been when she had gone in search of Michael to fasten her pearls and had found Blake in her brother’s room waiting for him.
‘Perhaps you could fasten them for me,’ she had suggested shyly, her throat so constricted with her awareness of him that her voice had sounded unfamiliarly husky. She had
turned her back to him as she spoke, lifting the weight of her hair off her shoulders, her body trembling even before she’d felt the heart-stopping cool touch of his fingertips against her hot skin.
She had been standing in front of the bedroom mirror and had watched as Blake fastened her pearls, greedily drinking in the sight of his dark head bent over her fair one, achingly aware of the proximity of their bodies, of the heat she could feel coming off his, of its strength and maleness. All she had to do was to close her eyes and lean back against him…
But, even as the thought had formed, Blake was placing his hands on her shoulders and turning her round, his eyes sombre as he’d begun, ‘Philippa, I…’
She never learned what he had been about to say because Michael had walked in, apologising to Blake for keeping him waiting, teasing Philippa and grimacing as he saw the pearls she was wearing.
‘Daddy likes me wearing these,’ she had told him, not wanting to explain just why it was so important to her to keep her father in a good mood. She sensed instinctively that her father did not particularly like Blake, but she had no idea why. It was true that Blake’s family did not have money or position but Blake was very clever, much more so than either Robert or Michael.
One day he would be rich and successful. Blake himself had laughed when she’d told him so a couple of summers before, plainly amused by her childish defence of him. She had been only sixteen then… a girl still…
As she had left her brother’s bedroom she’d reminded herself that Blake’s visit had barely begun and that there was still plenty of time…
Only there hadn’t been… one afternoon she had come in from a game of tennis to find Robert and Blake deep in conversation.
Blake had looked oddly bleak… angry almost, and Robert’s face had been unpleasantly flushed. At first Philippa had thought they must be arguing about something but it turned out that she had been wrong and that Robert had simply been giving Blake a telephone message.
When Philippa had learned that Blake was leaving she had barely been able to conceal her disappointment, tears all too ready to fill her eyes. She hadn’t even been able to say goodbye to him because her parents had insisted on her accompanying them to a dinner they were attending. When she’d returned, Blake had left. All Michael could tell her was that he had said something had come up that Blake needed to attend to immediately.
Philippa had worried that Blake’s mother, who she knew suffered from some incapacitating disease, had taken a turn for the worse.
She knew a lot about Blake’s background, information she had gleaned and cherished over the years from both her brother and from Blake himself.
She knew that his father had been killed in an accident when Blake was fifteen and that his mother’s illness had developed shortly afterwards. She knew that Blake had had to work to finance his education; and that he had returned to university after a year away working to finish his degree course.
She also knew, but because her brother had told her, that in addition to financing his own education Blake also helped to support his mother.
Tears had closed her throat when Michael had told her this.
Blake had shared a small flat close to the university with her brother; his mother lived several miles away in purpose-built sheltered council-provided accommodation. Philippa had never met her but she’d yearned to do so; she could imagine what she would be like, how much she must love her son and the bond there would be between them.
Philippa had been wretchedly miserable after Blake had gone, her misery compounded by the arrival of her A level results and her father’s irritated refusal to even so much as discuss her desire to go on to university.
‘Daddy is quite right,’ her mother had told her. ‘If you had won a place at Oxford, at one of the good women’s colleges, Somerville, for instance, things might be different, but those new modern universities… Daddy is only doing what’s best for you, Philippa,’ she had added. ‘And I think you might try to appreciate that fact, to appreciate just how lucky you are instead of being so difficult.’
Unwisely Philippa had continued to argue, even being rash enough to say, ‘Blake says that everyone should make use of their intelligence; he says that the only real independence comes from being self-sufficient; he says that everyone, man or woman, should be able to…’
‘Philippa, I’m afraid I’m not really interested in what that young man has to say. In fact I believe he has had rather too much to say. That type always do.’ She had given Philippa a thin smile.
‘This is exactly the sort of thing your father means when he says that university is not the place for you, that it will expose you to the wrong kind of influences… to people… men like Blake…’
‘Michael likes Blake,’ she had protested. ‘They’re friends.’
‘The acquaintanceships a man may make are entirely different from those suitable for a young girl,’ her mother had informed her. ‘Your father and I might have tolerated Blake Hamilton’s presence here in our home for Michael’s sake, but it was obvious right from the start the kind of person he was.’
Philippa had wanted to protest, to object, but she could hear her father’s voice in the hall and knew from bitter experience that she would have no chance of winning any argument with the two of them ranged against her.
After all her high hopes, this was turning out to be the worst summer of her life. Misery filled her as she remembered how she had pictured talking to Blake, being with him… discussing her future with him, seeing the pleasure and approval in his eyes, watching the realisation dawn in them that she was now grown-up. She had even visualised exactly where ‘it’ would happen… in the garden, not the formal, carefully cultivated part, but the tangled wild area beyond the tall yew hedge where field poppies grew in the untidy grass and the stumps of the stricken elms which had been cut down three summers ago provided seats that were close enough together and tilted at such an angle that she would have had to lean very close to Blake when she was talking to him. So close that she might just possibly have slipped off her seat, necessitating Blake’s reaching out to catch hold of her…
Her stomach muscles had clenched when she had visualised this particular moment, the way he would look at her, the way his expression would change, the way he would hesitate for a moment, looking deeply into her eyes before brushing her hair off her face and then, as though completely unable to hold back any longer, bend his head to kiss her, gently at first, and then later…
A delicious frisson of fear and excitement had run through her at the thought of being kissed by Blake. But now Blake was gone and sometimes, when she tried to conjure up his image, to re-create the intensity and magic of that anticipation, all she could actually feel was a sense of loss and panic. On the morning of her birthday she searched the post, hoping that there might be a card from him, because after all he had sent her one when she had sat her exams, wishing her good luck; but there wasn’t one.
Her parents had planned a small dinner party to celebrate the event, inviting those of their friends who had suitably aged children of their own.
Philippa hated every second of it, but most especially when her father stood up and made a brief speech and then handed her the keys to the car he had bought her as a birthday present. She had been taking lessons for the last ten months and had surprised and shamed Robert, who had taken his test three times, by getting her full licence on her first attempt.
Only Philippa knew that the tears filling her eyes at her father’s generous present were tears of misery and resentment.
She didn’t want a car. She wanted… she wanted her freedom, the right to make her own choices… her own decisions.
As she listened to the envious comments of her peers she was bleakly aware that the money spent on her birthday present could have quite easily put her through university, and just for a second she fantasised about running away, selling the car… defying her parents. But she simply wasn’t that kind of person, the habit of obedienc
e too deeply ingrained.
Michael was due home in four weeks; perhaps, she decided, she could arrange to visit him at the flat once he was back at university. Then she could see Blake and…
And then, totally unexpectedly, her parents were invited away for the weekend, by an influential acquaintance of her father’s who, like him, was a keen golfer. No invitation had been extended to Philippa; Robert was away visiting Lydia’s family and, despite her mother’s reservations, Philippa was to be left at home alone.
The decision to visit Blake wasn’t made overnight; at first it was nothing more than a tentative, daring but impossible wish, but it grew stronger. Her imagination even subtly provided her with the ideal excuse for such a visit… an excuse that, once it took root, like the original desire, swiftly became a necessity.
Blake, she was sure, would be able to think of some way for her to get around her father… Blake would convince her parents that she should continue her education, she decided, conveniently ignoring the fact that Blake was the last person her father was likely to listen to.
While her mother fussed about what clothes to pack, Philippa mentally planned. Studying maps, making surreptitious notes, firmly ignoring the small, frightened voice that warned her that no good could come of such deception. Her need to see Blake was paramount, totally overriding everything else.
At night, once she was in bed, she closed her eyes and visualised the look in his eyes when he opened his door and saw her standing there, and her body shivered in anticipatory excitement. He would know, of course, exactly how she felt, just as she would be able to see from his face how much he had missed her… how much he wanted her.
And once she had gone to him, given herself to him, once they had acknowledged their feelings for one another, there would be no going back… Blake would not allow her to go back. She would be his then, and nothing her parents could do would change that.
Her imagination ran on busily; she saw herself rushing home to the flat from her tutorials to get Blake’s supper, the plain gold band of her wedding-ring adding a new maturity to her status. She saw herself buying flowers for the flat, while Blake looked on admiringly at the small feminine changes she had made to it. She saw him pleased and proud of her the day she got her degree, sweeping her up into his arms and telling her how much he loved her; she saw him… In the darkness she blushed furiously at the intense intimacy of her thoughts.
