The Family Holiday

by Elizabeth Noble

  ‘Oh, Dad.’

  He laid his hand across hers on the table. A smiley waitress approached with her pad and pencil. He raised a hand, surreptitiously, and she backed away, nodding understanding.

  ‘Darling. What is it?’

  He never needed Daphne more than at moments like this. Laura needed her mum. As she had for every scraped knee and wounded heart of her childhood and adolescence. And he needed her to tell him what to do.

  For a few minutes, Laura patently couldn’t speak. She was trying to control sobs. Charlie went to the counter, and ordered two English Breakfast teas and a large slice of carrot cake with two forks. Cake seemed a good idea, in the absence of any better ones. Daphne always fed sad people. Or happy ones. Or worried ones. He grabbed a fistful of paper napkins from the stack by the till, and when he got back to the table, he pressed them into Laura’s hand. Then he sat, and waited for her to calm down, blow her nose and be able to speak. While Laura got herself together, the smiley waitress, no longer quite as smiley but empathetic and kind, came with their order, leaving it silently and swiftly, studiously avoiding eye contact with Laura. He would tip her well.

  ‘Alex has left me. Left us.’

  Charlie inhaled sharply, then exhaled slowly through blown-out cheeks. Experienced a sheer rush of relief that she wasn’t ill. That Ethan wasn’t ill. Because nothing could be as bad as that. He realized that, after all, he wasn’t surprised. Buying time. He could hear Daphne, knew exactly what she’d say. Not to Laura, of course – but afterwards, to him.

  To Laura, he was infinitely gentle. ‘Oh, my poor love. When?’

  ‘Christmas.’

  A stab. Months ago. She hadn’t said. Maybe he hadn’t given her the opportunity. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘I haven’t really told anybody.’

  ‘But why not?’

  ‘Humiliation, pride, hurt … and anger. I’m so bloody angry, Dad.’

  ‘Is there …?’ Charlie didn’t know how to phrase the obvious question. Thankfully, Laura didn’t need him to.

  Her tone was bitter. ‘Someone else? Of course there sodding is. Isn’t there always? He’s such a fucking cliché.’

  He always fucking was, Charlie wanted to say, but he didn’t. He didn’t swear like that, although if any situation might make him this would be it. He poured tea from the pot into the two mugs, then refilled the pot with the hot water the waitress had brought. And stirred sugar into both mugs, even though neither of them took it normally.

  ‘A younger woman, who works with him. I mean, for God’s sake. Genevieve.’ She said the name slowly and deliberately.

  ‘Has he moved out?’

  She nodded. ‘To some swanky new flat he’s renting, for now.’

  ‘But you and Ethan are still – I mean you’ll still be able –’

  ‘To stay in the house? No. He’s way ahead of the game. Been to see solicitors. Got it all sorted. Wants to be divorced as soon as possible. Sell the house.’

  ‘Can he do that?’

  ‘Course he can. Fifty/fifty, everything we have. The house is a huge share of that.’

  ‘Plus maintenance for Ethan, surely?’

  ‘Yeah. He’ll have to pay maintenance until Ethan’s eighteen, then education, all of that. But he wants a completely clean break from me.’

  ‘So you’ll have to put the house on the market?’

  ‘He wants that done in time for the spring market. That’s now, more or less.’

  ‘Can he make you do that?’

  She nodded despondently. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Bastard.’ Charlie spoke under his breath, but he wanted her to hear him.

  ‘Bastard is right.’

  ‘Have you been to a solicitor?’

  ‘Solicitor, accountant … I’ve had to. I think that’s why I’m so angry. It’s only because I’m furious that I can get through a single conversation, let alone a meeting, without doing’ – she gestured with her hands at the pile of napkins now in front of her – ‘this.’

  ‘I wish you’d told me.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Dad.’

  ‘Don’t be. You’ve nothing to be sorry for. I just wish I could have helped you.’

  ‘I don’t think you can, Dad. It’s not your job.’

  ‘It will always be my job.’

  She smiled.

  ‘Won’t it always be yours, to help Ethan?’

  Tears welled again.

  ‘How is Ethan?’

  ‘I don’t know. Quiet. Shell-shocked. Or not bothered. It’s hard to tell. Uncommunicative. There’s a girl. It all seems to be very intense, you know. He spends most of his time with her at the moment.’

  ‘Is he still seeing his dad?’

  Laura nodded. ‘He has keys to the bachelor pad. Welcome anytime, Alex says.’ Her voice was sarcastic.

  ‘And he goes?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t he? No rules there, I’m pretty sure. And I’m probably the worst company in the world.’

  ‘I’m sure he doesn’t think that.’

  Laura laughed bitterly. ‘I’m pretty sure he does, Dad. I can’t even stand to be around myself.’

  ‘That’s nonsense. You’re still you.’

  ‘I don’t even know who that is any more.’

  They sat quietly for a moment. Charlie picked up a cake fork and slipped it into Laura’s hand. She stared at it and gave a very small laugh. ‘Cake’s the answer, is it?’

  ‘If the question is, what shall I eat right now, then, yes, cake is the answer.’

  The laugh got a little bit louder, but was still, he knew, perilously close to a sob.

  Laura broke off a piece of the carrot cake, and ate it.

  ‘I don’t know the answers, my love. But I do know that you’re not alone. You mustn’t try to do this on your own. I’m here for you. I want to help.’

  ‘Thank you, Dad. I appreciate that.’

  ‘Don’t just appreciate it. Believe it.’

  She smiled gratefully.

  ‘You’ll come on holiday, will you?’

  She nodded. ‘That’d be lovely. Of course. And thank you for fixing it all, for organizing, for making me come. It’ll just be me and Ethan. No Alex, obviously.’

  Charlie wondered if he dared risk it. Decided he would. ‘Thank fuck for that.’

  Which was exactly what Daphne would have said.

  And Nick, last as ever, sent an email. Brief, not unfriendly: Thanks, Dad. That sounds great. Count us in. He had done a lot by email since Carrie. He was busy, Charlie knew. Time poor. But it wasn’t just that. He liked the remoteness and the one-sidedness of it. No need for conversation. No questions. No break in his voice to try to disguise.

  But he had said yes. Charlie felt relieved. Everyone had said yes. Daphne would be bloody delighted. They were all coming. Dysfunctional, disjointed, distant. All with the baggage of their own messy lives. And all coming except her. God help him.

  6

  Heather’s was the first face Scott saw once he’d cleared Customs. She was leaning over the rail at Heathrow Terminal 5, jewel-like among the drab, dour drivers with their A4 name signs and their bored expressions. And she was smiling her broad, dazzlingly white smile. And it was for him. It was before eight a.m., and she must have been up and out of the house well before seven to get here, park, and order the two Costa coffees she was now holding, but she had full makeup on. No last-minute Lycra for her – she wore gym gear only to the gym, and was more than slightly judgemental about women who called their gym gear athleisure wear and wore it everywhere, particularly if they looked like they never went anywhere near a gym. She was wearing dark skinny jeans and a vivid fuchsia silk blouse. And heeled sandals. At home he knew the emperor bed would be neatly made, and there’d be no toast crumbs on the marble kitchen island. Not that she ate toast, of course. This woman, his wife, had her act together, which was, he acknowledged, wonderful to come home to.

  He felt the frisson of pride he’d eventually grown used to feeling
when he saw her. With a delightful after-shudder of lust. The surprise that accompanied both sensations was gradually wearing off, and he was grateful for that. He’d stopped pinching himself.

  She couldn’t put her arm around him, because of the coffee cups. He took her face in both hands, and kissed her deeply, drinking in the clean, sweet smell and the familiar taste of her. A man on her right stared. Scott didn’t care.

  ‘Hello, darling.’

  ‘Hey, babe. How was the flight?’

  ‘It was fine. Uneventful. Fast.’

  ‘D’you eat?’

  ‘In the terminal, before I boarded. Slept through breakfast.’

  ‘I grabbed you a croissant.’

  ‘Mmm. Sounds good.’ They were walking towards the lift. He took a coffee with one hand, and put the other on her waist, feeling the delightful wiggle of her bum just beneath. ‘I missed you.’

  She winked at him. ‘Damn straight you did, Scottie.’

  Inside the car, unencumbered by coffee cups and briefcases, he took her in his arms and kissed her again, more hungrily now that they were alone.

  ‘How’s traffic?’

  ‘It was fine on the way up. It’s rush-hour now, though. It’s probably crappy.’

  ‘Damn.’

  ‘Have you got to work?’ It wasn’t unusual for him to get back from a red eye, shower, dress, and spend five or six hours at the desk at home. Such was the nature of the beast that paid for the Audi Q7 they were sitting in, and the five-en-suite-bedroom house with a tennis court they were heading back to. And the shimmering trio of long diamond and platinum necklaces that were glinting at her neck and into the amazing cleavage just below the fuchsia silk.

  ‘Nope. Schedule says “at leisure in Haslemere”.’ This he whispered lasciviously in her ear, and she giggled. ‘Girls at school?’

  She nodded. ‘And they have sport after. It’s Wednesday.’ Raised an eyebrow coquettishly.

  ‘What are you waiting for? Let’s do battle with the A3.’

  All the sex. All the lovely, married, daylight, any-room-in-the-house-you-like sex. Thank you, God and Goldman Sachs.

  Heather drove onto the M25, where, predictably enough, they slowed almost immediately to a frustrating 20 m.p.h. Scott drank his coffee and ate the pastry she’d bought him.

  ‘How has it been here?’

  ‘Busy.’

  ‘Good busy?’

  ‘Great busy. I’ve gotten lots done.’ He didn’t doubt it for a second. She sounded buzzy and he was pleased. He wasn’t entirely convinced that Heather wouldn’t get bored buried in the country. Which was really only an extension of the worry that she would get bored with him at some point and bolt.

  He’d been gone almost a week, which was a little longer than normal. He tried not to be away now for more than two or three nights, but this trip had been extended to five nights, and he’d missed her. Really missed her.

  The house was still a novelty – bought after they’d married. Home before that (and home was stretching it a bit) had been a smart, cool one-bed flat in a converted warehouse in Shoreditch. All bare brick and 50-inch plasma screen. He’d paid a designer to make it look like he was stylish and modern. He’d never turned the oven on. Now it was an Arts and Crafts country house in three-quarters of an acre in a quiet Surrey town. He didn’t know Haslemere at all. He’d never even been there until the Saturday Heather had produced a plastic wallet with the details of seven potential houses and brought him down. He’d asked for a maximum hour’s commute, and a relatively straightforward airport run, then left the decision to her. She’d been delighted by the look of the place – ‘This is what Americans dream England looks like’ – with its quaint high street, and easy access to rolling hills. It also had a good school for the girls, which was key, he knew, to Heather’s decision.

  He kept the Shoreditch place, grateful that he could afford both. The mortgage he’d started with in London had been paid off with bonuses long since, and he could pay cash for Haslemere too. He wanted to be ready with exciting romantic mini breaks when and if the time came to dazzle her. The girls’ school offered flexi-boarding so they could stay a night or two.

  So far, she hadn’t seemed to miss the bright lights. There’d been an extensive refurbishment to micromanage, though, so her life had been a whirl of fabric swatches and paint charts and what she called ‘antiquing’. Walls had been knocked down, so the Lutyens-style exterior now gave way to a very American aesthetic inside, all light and airy and spacious. He thought it worked. It shouldn’t but it did. A bit like him and Heather. The kitchen now rejoiced in a four-oven Aga she adored for its Englishness but never cooked on, along with a wall of Wolf appliances and a six-ring gas hob that boasted a pot boiler – a tap that came out from above the hob, with the exclusive purpose of filling pots, as the name suggested – embedded in the herring-boned tiles behind. To Heather it was the ultimate status symbol. She’d babysat for an affluent family in Montclair one summer before college and they’d had one, and she’d dreamt of owning one ever since, apparently. The Haslemere plumber was mildly baffled at the request, but happy to oblige. She was easy on the eye, was Mrs Chamberlain, and grateful, and she gave him real coffee, not instant.

  Scott knew nothing about antiques or pot boilers or fabric-covered walls, and if he occasionally balked at an invoice that crossed his desk, and wondered what his mother and father, who had told tales of furniture bought on the never-never, might have had to say about it, he honestly loved the end results. The house, which had previously been in one family, untouched, for thirty years, had been transformed into a stylish, calming, seriously good-looking home where the everyday ovens were turned on most days. It was a ridiculous notion, and one he would never share, but, owning this now, it was almost as if he felt like a grown-up for the first time.

  The goal at work had always been to succeed, to make money, to win, to climb the ladder, all the clichés. Since Heather, that had shifted. He still had the hunger – you couldn’t be there if you didn’t have it – but the end game had changed. There was a reason for all of it that there hadn’t been before. It felt infinitely healthier.

  ‘The girls? How are they doing?’

  ‘Hayley is all about the studying. They’ve got them so wired about the exams. The GCSEs. Thank God she’s only doing five. Did you know they mostly do, like, ten? Eleven, some of them! Crazy. And Mere made it from the Cs to the Bs in netball, which she was wildly happy about.’

  ‘Good for her. All that practice paid off.’ He had spent hours with Meredith the weekend before this last trip, throwing the ball, passing, googling the rules. Meredith had been the easier nut to crack. She’d been younger, when he’d come into her life. They’d bonded over The Simpsons, a love of burgers, and his willingness to spend hours throwing balls in the garden – baseballs, at first. She’d seemed happy he was there, almost from the start. They’d been walking to get doughnuts one weekend morning, before he’d started ‘sleeping over’, when he’d spend the evening with Heather, drive her home, go back to work, then to his hotel alone, and drive back for breakfast, and Meredith had slipped her hand into his. He hadn’t made a big deal of it, but he’d found it so moving he’d almost cried.

  Hayley had been harder. That bit older, nearer to adolescence. Already testing her mother a bit, she’d viewed him with something like suspicion, something like fascination. Her frank, appraising gaze made him anxious. Maybe he’d pushed a bit too hard at first, trying to establish his credentials, pretending to know more than he actually did about Jay-Z and Beyoncé.

  Heather stroked the back of his hand. ‘You star. When you’re twelve, in an English school, that’s apparently like winning the lottery.’

  ‘And work? How’s work?’ he asked. She threw him a sly glance to see if he was making fun. He sort of was, although in the gentlest, fondest way. It didn’t really seem much like work to him.

  This latest project was only a month or so old. The house was finished. The last tradesman
– the landscape gardener and his team – had left a few weeks ago. Heather had been looking for her next challenge. Her words. He was pretty sure that, at some point, he’d constituted one. He didn’t mind. More than didn’t mind. Was profoundly grateful to have been a challenge Heather had taken on. But she needed a new one. And then she’d hit on it. She would be, she announced to him, in all seriousness, an Insta-influencer and lifestyle blogger. This, she informed him, was a huge sphere. A brave new world. And right up her alley. If he suspected that it was a new spin on why excessive shopping was justifiable he was smart enough to keep that thought to himself.

  Once, at work, when he’d hardly known her except to form the somewhat inappropriate opinion that she was the best-looking woman in the place, he’d expressed surprise and delight that an admin task he’d thought would fill days had taken her just one. She’d smiled at him, her head on one side, and said, ‘I find that the best way to get something done is to just get on with it.’ Never had a phrase so succinctly captured a personality. The laser beam of her diligent attention had moved now from his filing system to him, to relocation, refurbishment and now to the latest project. She was all about the hashtags, the flatlays, the Insta-stories and the artful shots of everything from flowers to food to sunlit corners of their home. Not him. He’d ruled himself out. He had no doubt that she’d grow her modest couple of hundred followers to many thousands of disciples before too long. Whatever that meant.

  She spoke for two junctions of the M25 about it. About some new post series she was planning, and a great contact she’d made online. He didn’t so much listen as let her voice wash over him. He was tired. He’d slept as badly as a six-foot-four man usually did on an overnight flight, even in business class. He murmured approval when it seemed appropriate. She didn’t mind.

  Then, when they’d turned onto the A3, she asked, ‘Did you speak to your dad? About the birthday thing? Tell him yes?’

  ‘I did.’ He looked at her but she had her eyes firmly on the road. ‘Is that okay?’

  ‘I said so, didn’t I?’ But she sounded benevolent, not irritated. ‘I can absolutely roll with it. Was he happy to hear it?’