Prime Time

by Jane Wenham-Jones

  ‘One thing at a time,’ he’d have said. ‘Start with one small task.’ I could almost hear his voice. Soothing, yet brisk. Amusement laced with sympathy. ‘Take a deep breath, lovey. Get that work done – that’s what’s earning you the money. Do the stuff that keeps a roof over your head … You’ll feel better when you get going.’

  It’s all a mess, Dad. My home’s a mess, I’m a mess, I’ve messed up with Charlotte.

  ‘It’ll work out. It’s never as bad as you think it is.’ He shook his head, a small reproving smile. ‘Not worth getting in a state about.’

  Hormones, I told myself. Only hormones.

  But as I put the shopping on the kitchen table, there was Charlotte’s parcel for Stanley. You never saw him, Dad. I so want you to see him.

  I looked at my friend’s familiar, large, looping handwriting; the beautifully tied ribbon. Happy birthday, Stanley darling …

  And I cried all over again.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Stanley was touchingly thrilled with his iPhone and didn’t appear to notice that Charlotte and her family hadn’t put in an appearance. I heard him thanking her on the phone for his sweatshirt and PSP game – “really cool” – and also saying “yes, she’s fine”, so I assumed Charlotte was checking I was still alive while obviously not wanting to actually speak to me.

  Instead, I had the joy of my mother, who had barely drawn breath since she’d arrived. She was here for the duration both to celebrate Stanley’s birthday today and keep him in her tender care when I went off to do the filming tomorrow. She watched disapprovingly as he and Connor ate delivered pizzas the size of dustbin lids with various weird and wonderful “extras” and some lurid-looking ice cream with enough E numbers to run the national grid.

  She brought her own brand of joie de vivre to the proceedings by engaging in her most favoured leisure pursuit: reminiscing about my dead father’s shortcomings and highlighting my ineptitude in allowing my own husband to slip through my fingers.

  ‘Boys need fathers,’ she announced, when we’d completed the birthday cake ritual and Stanley and Connor had finally retired to watch a DVD. I went to the fridge and poured a very large glass of white wine while deep breathing. My PMT was still ferocious – so much for Sally-Ann and her funny-smelling creams – and I needed to keep a lid on the tide of emotion that was already fermenting inside me nicely.

  I held the bottle up to my mother and bent my mouth into a smile. ‘Would you like one?’

  ‘All right, then,’ she said, as though helping me out.

  I don’t think it was entirely my fault. I did try. I twittered on about how Stanley seemed to be getting on better at school and the beauty of the Thanet coastline I had so appreciated on my bracing walks with Benson. I shared with her the difficulty of producing a full Sunday roast in Charlotte’s Aga and offered the opening speech in a debate entitled But Does It Make Nicer-Tasting Chicken? Thus giving her the cue to launch into one of her own favourite diatribes: Why Things Don’t Taste Like They Used To.

  I asked after her friend Betty’s gastric reflux problem and even, in desperation, enquired whether she had spoken to my hallowed brother lately, not flinching when she mentioned the dreaded C word. (I had been studiously ignoring the fact that Christmas was looming – not only had I been dreading it since July but now things were the way they were with Charlotte, the thought of not going to her house but remaining here, staring at my mother’s sour features, was a vision too horrendous to contemplate.)

  But apart from a brief respite while she gazed lovingly into the middle distance and ran through Anthony’s sterling qualities, gifts, and achievements, she was not to be deterred.

  ‘In our day we stayed,’ she said, putting down her empty wine glass and waiting for me to refill it. ‘We didn’t run at the first sign of trouble. You got married for life and it meant life, no matter how much of a dance they led you.’

  ‘I stayed,’ I said. ‘Daniel was the one who left.’

  My mother’s eyes narrowed. ‘You know what I mean. You made him. You threw him out.’

  ‘He was having an affair,’ I said, realising too late the sort of ground I was stepping onto.

  ‘Lots of men have affairs,’ said my mother, drinking her wine with uncharacteristic speed. ‘It’s what they’re like.’

  ‘Well, I couldn’t cope with it,’ I said tightly, hoping we weren’t going where I feared we might be.

  ‘It’s all very well for you, what about him?’ she said, jerking her head in the direction of the sitting room from where we could hear the muffled sounds of gunfire. ‘What about Stanley?’

  ‘Daniel didn’t want to be with me. It would have been different,’ I added meaningfully, ‘if he had.’

  My mother gave one of her more dramatic snorts.

  ‘I know what your father got up to,’ she said, nastily. ‘But I still put you and Anthony first.’

  ‘You never let anyone hear the end of it, though, did you?’ I bit my lip. Too late, it was said. I’d had enough wine to say it but was still, unfortunately, sober enough to know I’d pay.

  She glowered. ‘I made sacrifices. I kept the family together. Put up with him being weak and swanning about with his fancy woman, so that you and your brother would have a stable home.’

  I looked at her with disbelief. ‘Anthony was at university, Mum, and I’d already left.’

  ‘But you had somewhere to come back to, if you wanted to.’

  But we didn’t want to, Mother. Because you filled every room with resentment and your bitterness soured the air. Because you interrogated our father every time he left the house, because you totally refused to let him go and because, he, good man that he was, keeping his marriage vows, stayed to look after you, even though he was quietly dying, weighed down by his guilt and your relentless contempt …

  I pulled a large piece of black and green icing from Stanley’s football cake. ‘You could have gone if it was that bad.’

  ‘Huh! And let that strumpet have him!’

  ‘You didn’t want him, Mum. You hadn’t shown him any love or affection for years.’ Not since Anthony was born …

  ‘Is that what he told you?’

  ‘He didn’t need to tell me. I was there, I saw it.’ And I felt it. You went off me too …

  My mother stood up, filled the kettle and sat down again. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about. We had a perfectly normal marriage until that floozy came along and got her claws into him.’

  I took another mouthful of wine. ‘Jenny wasn’t a floozy. She was an ordinary, decent woman. She was devastated when Dad died.’

  There was a sharp intake of breath. ‘You saw her?’

  I felt myself recoil. My mother was looking at me with something close to hatred. But, recklessly, I was on a mission now. I wanted it all said, all out in the open and done with.

  ‘Yes, I went to see her. I’d met her before. She was nice. Just a straightforward, middle-aged woman – not glamorous or scheming. No claws. Not a strumpet or a tart or a floozy – just warm and kind and interested.’ As I said it, I had a sudden pang about Roger. I pushed it away.

  ‘Jenny really loved Dad. And he loved her. But he loved you too – enough to stay and look after you because he knew that’s what you wanted.’

  I’d seen her flinch when I’d used Jenny’s name but she spoke with venom.

  ‘He wanted,’ my mother said, with quiet fury, ‘what they all want. A bit of extra jam on his bread.’

  ‘No .’ I tried to speak calmly. ‘He wanted someone to cherish him. To appreciate and value him, not constantly criticise and put him down. He just wanted a wife who would treat him like the nice, decent human being he was – who would be his friend. Who would listen …’

  For a moment my mother was quite still, her features rigid with rage. Then she gave a peculiar little smile. She leant across the table and brought her face close up to mine.

  ‘Perhaps,’ she sneered, ‘that’s how Daniel felt too
.’

  I held it together while I shepherded Stanley and Connor to bed, reminding them gaily that it was – birthday or no birthday – school tomorrow and that they must get some sleep.

  And while I watched my mother weave her way, somewhat unsteadily, up the stairs.

  It was when I got back to the kitchen and sat alone, shaken by her cold anger and the memories we’d raked up, that I stared at the cyclamen on my window sill and cried all over again.

  I’ve had it for years, that cyclamen. I only water it when I remember; it hasn’t been fed or ever re-potted. Yet despite me, it valiantly flowers on. Sends up endless curling buds, opening into creamy white flowers. The more I neglect it, the more it blooms again.

  I would have done anything to keep my father alive just a little bit longer – just long enough. He had nurses there, he was wired up to drips and tubes; he had every possible care and he was trying his best, but he just couldn’t hang on any more. Why are some things robust while others die so easily? I’ve had other cyclamens that have expired within days; that have rotted away or shrivelled up. This one just keeps on going.

  It’s him who’s changed, not you . That’s what Andrew said about my husband. Daniel was good back then when Dad died. He stroked my shoulder as I sobbed and sobbed. I sometimes wonder if that is why Stanley has the weight of the world on his shoulders because he was born when I had such a burden of misery on mine.

  I tried to imagine what my father would say to me if I told him about this now. But I couldn’t even conjure up his voice any more. Dad, can you hear me?

  I looked at the kitchen walls, the flower on the window sill, the teacup on the table, imprinted with lipstick from my mother’s acid mouth.

  Dad?

  Only silence bounced from the empty walls.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  I woke up puffy and piggy-eyed, with a headache and a feeling of doom. For the first time I wasn’t looking forward to the filming at all. I just wanted to put my head back under the covers and stay there. If it hadn’t been for the thought of seeing Cal, I’d have phoned in sick.

  I went down to the kitchen where my mother was already wielding the oven cleaner. ‘Oh dear, look at you,’ she said with satisfaction. ‘You look terrible .’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, going back to the hall mirror to confirm this truth for myself.

  ‘Well if you will get yourself in such a state.’ My mother gave one of her sniffs and then a few more for good measure. ‘I’ve made Stanley’s rolls – he likes the way I do them with cheese and ham – and when I’ve got this oven into a decent condition, I’m going to do him a nice casserole with proper vegetables. Not much goodness in all that rubbish they put away last night. I offered that other boy rolls too, but he says he has school dinners.’ Her tone suggested she didn’t believe him.

  ‘His name’s Connor,’ I said. ‘Have they had breakfast?’

  ‘Yes. You look like you could do with some too.’

  Food was the last thing I wanted. I felt tired and miserable as I drove the boys to school.

  ‘Thanks for having me,’ said Connor, as I pulled up on the zigzag lines.

  ‘Mum – you’re not supposed to stop here,’ said Stanley anxiously. ‘Look, Mr Longmead is coming – he’s seen you!’

  ‘Jump out then and I’ll go,’ I said, as a rotund figure in a raincoat came waddling toward us at surprising speed. ‘Have a nice time with Grandma tonight and I’ll see you tomorrow. I’ll be back in the afternoon.’

  ‘OK.’ Stanley got hastily out of the car before I could attempt to kiss him. Connor was already on the pavement. Keeping my eyes on the rear-view mirror, I watched them both scuttle into school, the backs of their blazers disappearing just as Mr Longmead bore down on me, wagging his finger.

  Unable to cope with anything more of that ilk from my mother, I went straight upstairs when I got back and embarked on a serious repair job on my face, involving industrial amounts of concealer and big dollops of camomile and peppermint eye rescue mask that promised to dispel bags but just made me smell like a polo mint.

  Hopefully, by the time I’d sat on the train for an hour and a half and then in a cab for a bit longer (the car and driver seemed to be a thing of the past but at least they weren’t making me get the tube) my puffy bits would have settled down. And at least the filming was in the evening, where the lights might be dim.

  Cal had been vague about what I was actually going to do, simply saying he wanted some last odds and ends and that as we were staying overnight in the hotel where we were shooting, we could use some of the facilities when it was quiet. ‘And we’ll have a few drinks to celebrate it being finished,’ he’d added. ‘You’ve been really great.’

  He was the only person left standing who seemed to think so, I reflected, as the train pulled into Victoria. I felt the tears at the back of my throat whenever I thought about Charlotte. My mother had simply looked me up and down and sniffed again when I said goodbye and even Andrew had seen what an old bag I could be after the supermarket scene.

  Which was perhaps just as well – he was married, after all, and what with everything Roger had been through, I certainly didn’t want to be too much on the receiving end of his sympathy. It was highly unlikely we’d have a third supermarket encounter but I shuddered at the thought of his wife popping up one day behind the baked beans and thinking I was Hannah Mark Two.

  By the time the taxi stopped outside the hotel in Clerkenwell, I was feeling thoroughly sorry for myself and a quick look at my face just before I paid the driver, showed that still looked in a pretty sad way too. When Cal saw me he’d be thinking twice about the “fab” bit. Fed up at 40 was nearer the mark.

  But he beamed at me as brightly as ever when he bounded into reception minutes later.

  ‘You all right, babe?’ He wrapped both arms around me in a big, jubilant hug. ‘Final session tonight. Let’s get you checked in and we’ll have a drink and go through it all.’

  He picked up my overnight bag and swung it easily over his shoulder. Did you remember to bring something sexy? No? No problem – the girls at the office have borrowed some fab dresses for you. They’ve all been dying to try them on themselves …’

  He chatted on gaily and I began to feel better. My room was lovely. Someone had put fruit and mineral water and half a bottle of dry white on a tray next to the flat-screen TV, and the bathroom had a massive shower and huge fluffy white towels.

  ‘Come back down and have a glass of wine first,’ Cal had said. ‘And then you can get yourself glammed up.’

  ‘Am I doing my own make-up, then?’ I asked, when I joined him in the bar. I forced a laugh. ‘I was rather hoping for some expert help – I know I’m looking a bit rough.’

  ‘I thought how stunning you looked when you walked in,’ said Cal smiling. ‘You’ve lost loads more weight. I think you’re looking really good. You’ve really thrown yourself into this – it’s going to make terrific TV.’

  He gave our order to the waiter and turned back to me. ‘We’ve gone over budget a bit so I didn’t bring make-up in today – but I really don’t think you need it. Just put a bit on yourself – dark sultry, eyes perhaps, plenty of lipstick … You know the sort of thing – you always look great anyway.’

  I smiled at him gratefully, beginning to relax a little. He was so lovely the way he always tried to make me feel a million dollars. The very opposite of how Daniel had set out to portray me in the last six months we’d lived together. Which was flabby at 40 and barking mad.

  The moment I started drinking wine I realised I was really hungry. I hadn’t had anything to eat yet today. The waiter bought a small dish of nuts and cheesy biscuits but I didn’t like to eat too many of them since I was supposed to be behaving in a slim and sophisticated manner, not cramming food down my throat the first chance I got.

  I thought fondly of Charlotte, who would have emptied the bowl in one hit and sent the waiter for a refill without turning a hair. Cal didn’t touch the
nibbles at all and neither, of course, did Tanya, who had now joined us and was drinking her usual Diet Coke.

  I looked at her, leaning back on one of the long leather seats, texting, and wondered afresh what she actually did as “producer” of this film. I’d still only ever seen her make endless calls on her mobile and sit around looking murderous. She’d given Cal a desultory kiss when she came in and nodded at me. Since then she hadn’t said a word.

  ‘Have you brought the clothes for Laura?’ Cal asked now.

  She gave him a bored look. ‘The office should have sent them over earlier – they’re probably out there.’ She nodded her head toward reception.

  Cal smiled at her but I detected a bit of tension between them. ‘Do you think you could go and check?’ he asked with exaggerated patience.

  She sighed and got up, pausing to address me with a sardonic smile. ‘I’ve got you some fuck-me shoes too – just in case you get lucky with one of the saddos tonight.’ As she sauntered out, Cal looked annoyed.

  ‘What’s she talking about?’ I asked him, noticing two women on the next table gazing at Cal appreciatively, clearly glad that Tanya had gone and hoping I’d follow soon.

  ‘Don’t take any notice of her.’ Cal shook his head. ‘She’s a strange girl sometimes. The thing is,’ he said, shining his smile back on me and then hesitating, looking for a moment like a little boy, ‘the thing is – I’ve had a bit of a last minute idea. Turns out they’ve got this do on here tonight – one of these speed dating parties? And I thought maybe you …’

  Any good feelings I’d begun to build up, evaporated.

  ‘Speed dating? You’re joking.’

  He looked at me appealingly. ‘It would just be for laughs. I think it would really work – you all confident and looking fab. You don’t have to take it seriously. Just chat to a few of the guys – see if there’s anyone worth flirting with.’ He laughed, showing his white teeth. ‘We’ll have you in a really great dress –’