by Tony Salter
'Now, I've monopolised you long enough.' Henrietta snapped seamlessly back into her 'conversation at cocktail parties' mode. 'You should go and save your son from his grandmother. He looks like he's had quite enough.'
As I walked over to rescue Sam from Virginia, I thought back to my comforting vision of generations of Carlantinos crowding the church and stretching out into the churchyard and beyond. There was something which jarred uncomfortably with my memories but refused to take shape, it was sand sifting in a sieve, slipping soft and silent through the mesh.
The strangest thing happened later that night. I picked up an email at about six in the morning when I was up with Sam. The message was unusual and upset me but, later on, when I went to read it again, it wasn't there; it wasn't in my trash, nor in any of the other email folders. It had vanished completely.
Rupert was in the kitchen, making coffee, when I came out of the shower.
'Morning sweetie, did you get any sleep at all?' he said, handing me a cup.
'Not so much, he was restless most of the night and then there was an email which really got under my skin.'
'That's the last thing you need, I keep telling you to stop checking your phone during the night. You're online way too much these days. Who was it from?'
'Well, that's the weirdest thing. It wasn't from anybody. It just had a row of asterisks where the sender's address normally is.'
Rupert was much better than me with computers and anything technical and I recognised the familiar look which implied I had probably pressed something by mistake, or selected the wrong option somewhere. Nothing was more guaranteed to wind me up.
'OK, that is strange. Let's have a look then. Maybe I can find out something from the header info.'
'That's what's even crazier,' I said. 'It's gone.'
'What do you mean, gone?' By then, he had the phone and was fiddling away, but the frustration in his voice and his energetic tapping and scrolling told me that the 'stupid thing I must have done because I was a woman' wasn't as easy to find as he'd expected.
'Gone, as in I can't find it. It's not in any of my folders, not in my trash, not in my sent items, not in my spam, nowhere. I checked on the iPad too. Nothing.'
'That doesn't make any sense, Fabi. Emails don't just disappear. You must have done something. What did you do after you read it?'
Well, that question was predictable, and so was my furious reaction. 'I didn't bloody do anything. Why does it always have to be something I did? I read the mail – several times actually – then went to check on Sam and to make a cup of tea. When I went to look for it again, it wasn't there.'
Rupert was smart enough to realise his mistake. 'OK, OK, I'm sorry, I was only trying to help. I wasn't accusing you of anything.' He was still looking at the phone but there was no eureka moment. 'It doesn't make any sense. You've still got messages in your trash so it hasn't been emptied. It must be somewhere. Any chance you were dreaming?'
'No, for fuck's sake. Of course I wasn't dreaming. Do you think I've gone pazzo just because I gave birth? That's such a typical bloody bloke thing to say.' I took a few seconds to calm down and sip my coffee. 'The mail wasn't about anything as such and there was only one sentence. 'You should have listened!' That was it.'
'Beats me. I can't find any trace of it,' Rupert said, handing me back the phone with a sheepish smile. 'The only thing which might have happened is that it was some sort of spam which slipped through and then the mail software identified it and removed it afterwards. I wouldn't worry about it.'
I finished my coffee and sat at the small kitchen table while Rupert went to get Sam ready to go out. We'd added an extension at the back of the house which made the kitchen much bigger and we'd put a hexagonal skylight in the roof at the same time. A narrow beam of cold morning sunshine spotlit the dust which spiralled upwards as I plumped down onto the cushion. We needed a cleaner, and soon. Would it be too decadent and bourgeois to get an au pair?
God, how my attitudes had changed in just a couple of years. What would Daz or Linda have thought about that? Thinking about them was enough to make me give myself a good ticking off, a mental slap on the back of the hand because of the conversation I should probably have with Rupert about the political side of my life in the years before we met. The conversation I kept putting off.
It had been bad enough when he'd learned about my relationship with Jax. I'd avoided telling the whole truth for over six months. I hadn't exactly lied to him at any time, but I'd always known that he'd assumed Jax was a man and I'd never said anything to disabuse him of the notion.
The fact I had a long-term relationship with another woman wasn't a big deal for me. I've always preferred men and it had no impact on my relationship with Rupert. I didn't think of myself as gay in any way. The thing with Jax was simply something which happened; there was something about her ... something unique and exciting.
I hadn't been sure how well Rupert would take it though. He was such a straight-laced public school boy, full of thoughtless pseudo-homophobic jibes about people being 'bloody benders', 'nancy-boys' or puerile innuendos about 'back passages' and 'bending down to pick up the soap in the showers'.
His ridiculous old-school approach to sexuality was the main reason why I'd been wary of telling him that Jax was a girl in the first place and, once I'd missed the opportunity to say it upfront, it became easier and easier to avoid as time went by. I'd never had any intention of letting the two of them meet after all.
Rupert and I met fairly randomly when I was out for drinks after work. A group of us were standing on the pavement outside the Lamb and Flag in Covent Garden and Rupert came up to me with an outrageously cheesy chat-up line. It was ridiculous, but he had a gorgeous smile and, although he had no idea, brilliant timing. Things with Jax were becoming difficult and I was probably looking for an excuse to make my escape.
We went out for drinks a few times and then one night I ended up staying over at his place. I was never a one-night-stand sort of girl but with Rupert it was right. I'd not felt that way about anyone for a long time, if ever.
We'd been lying in bed afterwards, chatting and got into one of those idiotic conversations which seem to spring up in the confused first-time moments when a whole tombola full of emotions is spinning and rattling around – satisfaction, pride, embarrassment, guilt, hope, fear – all mixed up together. We ended up on the subject of 'favourite sexual fantasy' which, as it turned out, was not the best idea.
Rupert's favourite was a classic, or at least a classic for a middle-class English male in his mid twenties. He imagined surprising a lesbian couple, in action as it were, and being asked to join them. It didn't take much imagination to see what would happen next as, of course, they found him so attractive that they stopped being interested in each other and devoted themselves to giving him pleasure. Way, way too close to home and there was no way I was going to bring up the topic of Jax's gender immediately after that.
I didn't mind so much, he didn't mean anything by it. He was at ease with the few gay couples in our London social group and would blithely use the same language in front of them. I suspected, however, that he would see me having been in a same-sex relationship for five years in a somewhat different light, which was why I avoided the issue for so long.
I'd told him eventually although there were still other things which I'd never mentioned and needed to. It would have to wait as that morning wasn't a good time to talk about anything serious. I hadn't slept well and was tired after the christening.
The email was also still niggling away at the back of my mind, but it must have been some weird webmail thing as Rupert had said; it wasn't worth worrying about on such a lovely day. We'd been looking forward to strolling down to the town centre and simply wandering about, looking at some of the colleges, grabbing a coffee and enjoying a peaceful Sunday.
'We're ready,' came the shout from the hall. 'See you outside.'
'OK, just coming.' As I got up and reached for my coat,
I remembered the other thing which had been worrying away at the edge of my mind like a puppy with an old blanket. The vicar had been about to do the water-splashing thing with Sam and I'd been looking at everyone gathered in the church and the rows of imaginary Carlantinos. Right at that moment, a dark figure had stood up and slipped out through the open doors. I hadn't seen who it was but, for some reason, it gave me the shivers.
Timing is Everything
Once password access to email accounts has been acquired, it is possible to upload a Calendar Jogger. This will adjust the displayed time of a calendar appointment and is often used in the case of full identity theft to allow the hacker, or an accomplice, to attend a meeting in place of the victim. Calendar Joggers can automatically reset themselves leaving no trace of the 'jog'. The original appointment remains unaffected.
"How much is your Life Worth? Protecting your Identity in a Digital World." JJ Martin, Insight Business Press 2015
I couldn't believe the weather. It had been gloriously sunny for two weeks, but then it started tanking it down, blustery gusts conspiring with overflowing gutters to spread bucket-sized sheets of extra wetness as a random bonus.
It was a couple of weeks after the christening and I had an appointment to take Sam for the third, and last, of his baby injections.
Our doctor's surgery was on Beaumont Street which was only fifteen minutes walk away and, as it was almost impossible to find a parking space anywhere nearby, driving wasn't an option.
Not only did I need to time my excursion to fit in with sleeps, feeds and nappy changes, I also needed to allow for the time spent configuring the rain cover for the ridiculously-expensive, high-tech pram, finding the waterproof bags for all of the stuff I needed to take with me, and finally dressing myself for wet weather.
Normally it would have been a pleasant stroll, but the weather made it a nightmare. The appointment was at ten o'clock and, despite allowing twenty minutes extra to organise myself, we were still ten minutes late by the time we arrived and I was sweaty, stressed and soaked to the skin.
'Good morning. Sam Blackwell for his five-month injection. I'm sorry I'm late,' I panted out. 'I thought I'd allowed enough time for all of the wet weather hassle, but clearly not.' I peeled off my raincoat, managed to open the pram cover and released Sam.
'Good morning, Mrs Blackwell. Let's have a look.' The receptionist turned to her computer and then looked down at her watch, shaking her head slightly. 'You're a bit early, I'm afraid. I have you down for twelve o'clock, not ten.'
'Are you sure?' I said, taking out my phone. 'I only checked this morning. Look I have it here.' I opened the calendar and passed her the phone.
'That's right. Twelve o'clock,' she replied, handing back the phone. 'The same as I have in the system.'
'But that doesn't make any sense ...' I took back my phone and looked at the evidence in full retina-screen technicolor. 'I only checked an hour and a half ago and I'm certain it said ten o'clock. I must have a much worse case of baby brain than I thought. I'm so sorry. Any chance of an earlier appointment?'
'I'm sorry, Mrs Blackwell, we're very busy. It'll have to be at twelve. Sorry about that.'
It shouldn't have mattered as there were lots of lovely coffee shops only a short walk from the surgery but, when you take into account the hassle of managing a baby, and the fact that we were completely soaked, the whole morning was turning into a complete disaster.
I'd fed him right before we left and he wouldn't need a sleep for a couple of hours. Now everything was out of synch and, to make it worse, I was furious with myself for being such an idiot.
I called Rupert; I needed to talk to somebody and to vent a few of my frustrations.
'Roop, you won't believe it. I've messed up Sam's appointment at the doctor's and arrived an hour and half early. I'm unbelievably pissed off. You're not around for a coffee, are you?'
'Oh, what a pain,' he said. 'That's not like you and you must've got soaked. I can't get away, I'm afraid. I'm in Summertown now, and meeting a client in twenty minutes.'
My surging irritation and disappointment at his inability to drop everything and come running immediately were, of course, wholly unreasonable and I managed to maintain an approximation of a cheery voice. 'OK caro mio, not a problem. It's just a bit of a pain what with feeding and sleeping times. His routine is going to be royally messed up, and I feel like such an idiot for getting the time wrong.'
'Don't beat yourself up about it,' he said. 'You're still up two or three times in the night. It's no surprise you're tired. Look, I have to run. I won't be late tonight. Love you.'
'Love you too.' I put the phone in my bag and started preparing to go out in the rain again. For some reason, my irritation slipped seamlessly into sadness and I felt tears threatening the edge of my eyes without warning or permission. I turned away from the other people in the reception and busied myself settling Sam back into his pram while I told myself to get a grip. It was only a messed up appointment and I wasn't even late. Really not something to get upset about.
As it turned out, Sam and I ended up having a pleasant enough time at the Ashmolean coffee shop; he was well behaved, and afterwards he didn't even complain about the injection. The rain had stopped by the time we set off for home, the wind had blown itself out and, walking up Walton Street, I remembered how much I liked living in Oxford.
I grew up in Bedford which was one of the most boring towns in England; there was absolutely no point in comparing it with Oxford, or anywhere else I've lived for that matter.
My granddad, Roberto – we always called him Nonno – was in the last wave of Italians who came over in the late fifties to work at the Marston Valley Brick Company. There was a huge shortage of labour after the war, I guess a huge shortage of able-bodied men was more the case, and a lot of building going on. Marston and a couple of other firms brought over workers from southern Italy, where there was no work or money.
Nonno was a hard worker and soon got a real job as a shift supervisor. He managed to make a deposit on a small terraced house a year later and sent for his family, which included my dad, also called Roberto, who was seven at the time. Nonno made sure his children, the boys at least, had a good education and, by the time I went to secondary school, the two Robertos, father and son, owned a chain of three coffee shops.
It was a strange life growing up in the Embankment, Bedford's Little Italy. We were, in many ways, normal English kids, but our home culture was still Italian. We spoke Italian in the house, ate Italian food, never missed mass on Sundays and there was absolutely no question about who to support when international football was on.
The more I thought back to those years growing up, the more I realised that they had been wonderful times. I wasn't planning on conceding that Bedford was anything other than boring, but, leaving that aside, we lived in a great community and my family had been kind, loving and usually very entertaining. I was never a religious fanatic but I was a good Catholic and I had my faith.
Every Sunday, when I was a child, we would have a big lunch at the largest coffee shop. It was closed on Sundays and we would be anywhere from ten to twenty people, all lined up on pushed-together tables, just like the traditional family lunch under a vine terrace which is an obligatory part of every Italian film I've ever seen.
My favourite was the polpette di melanzane, fried aubergine balls, which were always deliciously crunchy and we would always have ice cream afterwards, big balls of hazelnut and pistachio, covered with flaked nuts and smothered with shiny chocolate sauce.
The women would clear up while the men moved over to a corner table to smoke cigarettes and drink their coffee and grappa. They would pretend to be discussing important matters but everyone knew the conversation was about football and, even if politics did come up, it was much more likely to involve a ranking of politicians' wives than anything serious.
Having a child, or even thinking about having a child, had changed me in so many ways. Growing up, I'd never se
en or appreciated that Nonno, and my parents to a lesser extent, had made huge sacrifices to make sure their children would have the basic opportunities in life which hadn't been possible for them.
What an ungrateful little bitch I must have been, pompously regurgitating my Marxist dogma; my adolescent passion and deep, deep certainty blithely brushing over the fact that I'd never had a moment's real hardship in my life. Too blind to imagine what they must have needed to overcome simply to survive, not to mention the inner strength and faith it must have taken for them to not become bitter and resentful. To keep on smiling and laughing despite everything.
I looked around me as I walked through the comfortable, middle class streets towards my lovely house – owned, not rented – with my expensively-dressed baby in his seven hundred and fifty quid pram, and realised how much I'd changed over the past year. I no longer thought about making the world a fairer place. I thought, somewhat subconsciously, about how I could help my children succeed.
I was no different from my parents, grandparents, and almost all other parents, and had no intention of trying to be. When it came to any of the important decisions relating to my children – schooling, friendships, travel, sports, whatever – I would do whatever I could to give them an unfair advantage.
The world wasn't fair but I no longer had time to change anything. My instincts screamed at me to focus on making sure my kids were part of the winning team and I would follow those instincts. Family had to come first.
By the time we reached home, Sam was happily asleep in his pushchair and I decided to walk around for a while to enjoy another ten minutes of peace in the sunshine. I was struggling to remember what had compelled me to be such a nasty, selfish piece of work back then and I wanted to understand what exactly had triggered my change of heart now.
