The Decision

by Penny Vincenzi

  ‘So you described me to him? Funny way of keeping him away—’

  ‘Heather, please! All I said was you were a young mum, and you were pregnant.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry, Eliza, I don’t want even to discuss it any more. Alan is so angry, he won’t even speak to me, Coral’s having a horrible time at school, they’re calling her slummy, and we’re definitely going to have to go and live with Alan’s mum now.’

  ‘No, Heather, you’re not, look, try these, a couple of much better places that actually Matt found for you, phone them, please.’

  ‘I don’t think so. I don’t think anything to do with Matt would be a good idea at the moment. We had actually found somewhere quite promising, but the landlord told Alan this morning it was off the market. I wonder why. And now I’m terrified of the landlord turning up here and just putting us out on the pavement—’

  ‘Heather, he can’t do that. Believe me.’

  ‘I’m a bit sick of believing you, Eliza. Anyway, we’re moving up there next week. I can’t even have my baby at the hospital I know and trust. And it’s all your fault. Oh, just go away, Eliza, please, and leave me alone. There’s one law for people like you in this country and another for people like me, and I should have known better than to trust you.’

  ‘Well – will you at least give me your new address, so I can keep in touch?’

  ‘No. Now excuse me please I’m very busy.’

  And she shut the door in Eliza’s face.

  Eliza went home and wept; and then wrote to Heather and told her if she ever changed her mind, she would always be pleased to hear from her. Heather didn’t reply.

  The atmosphere in the house was horrible. They hardly spoke, Matt went to work, came home very late, refused food, refused anything, just went to his study and then to bed. She lay awake half the night, every night; several times she had knocked on the door of his room. ‘Please go away,’ he said, his voice polite but very final. Or sometimes, ‘Please leave me alone.’

  Only with Emmie was he himself, greeting her with hugs and kisses, talking to her, playing with her, taking her out to the park. At first Eliza though this was his way of returning to normality, an overture via Emmie, but he continued to ignore his wife, to behave as if she wasn’t there.

  If Eliza spoke, he ignored her, if she tried to follow them upstairs he said, ‘would you prefer to take her?’ and the same thing on proposed outings, to the swings, the river, even, most dreadfully, to Summercourt for the weekend.

  ‘I’d like to take Emmie down to Summercourt,’ he said, the first time. ‘I presume that’s all right.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ she said, and it was still at the stage when she was hoping he would relent, that things would be normal again. ‘When shall we go?’

  ‘I don’t want you there,’ he said, ‘I’ll take her on my own.’

  That was terrible, that he should put this awful impenetrable barrier round Summercourt too. Even for one weekend.

  ‘But I want to go,’ she said, ‘please.’

  ‘Of course,’ he said and she looked up, sharply hopeful, but, ‘you can go next time,’ he added, and he walked out of the room.

  She had to explain then to her mother; Sarah, while upset, didn’t understand, thought it was just a row.

  ‘Don’t worry, darling,’ she said, ‘he’ll get over it. Just humour him, that’s what I always did with your father. And don’t worry about Emmie, I’ll see she has a nice weekend. And – who knows, I might be able to talk him round. What was the row about? Not that silly article surely, that was nothing to do with you …’

  Eliza said she didn’t want to talk about it.

  The weekend while they were there was endless. She stayed in the house alone, didn’t want to see anyone. It meant explaining too much.

  Her mother phoned after the weekend, interestingly cheerful: ‘Honestly, darling, you must be exaggerating. He was very much himself, I thought, very sweet and polite to me, and so wonderful with Emmie. He does adore that child, Eliza, I’ve never seen quite such a besotted father. I’m not sure it’s good for her. I didn’t mention anything about a row, of course; but when I asked him how you were he said you were fine. He seemed very relaxed altogether. Oh, and he insists on my having the room next to mine turned into an en-suite bathroom; doesn’t that sound wonderful?’

  ‘Very – wonderful.’

  ‘Of course he dressed it up, as he always does, said it was only to improve the overall value of the house, but I know it was still largely for my benefit. I mean, he’s not going to sell it, is he?’

  ‘He can’t,’ said Eliza. ‘It’s in our joint names.’ But anxiety suddenly flickered through her. There were only two ways Matt could really hurt her: through Emmie – and through Summercourt. That would be – but no. No, he couldn’t. However angry he was. He wouldn’t.

  And then it happened; after two more weeks of the absolute hostility and disdain, as she struggled to remain calm and outwardly cheerful in the face of it all, she received a formal offer of a job with KPD.

  ‘Sorry to have been so long getting back to you,’ Rob Brigstocke said when he called, a wonderful bright warmth breaking into yet another bleak morning. ‘Had to get a few things rubber-stamped. Hope that’s OK.’

  ‘Oh – yes. Yes, of course. Marvellous.’

  ‘Good. So when do you think you might start? Is the nanny you found still available? I know that was an important part of the mix.’

  ‘I’m – yes, yes, I think so.’

  She felt her mind racing; why not? Why bloody not? If Matt was never going to speak to her again, she had to do something to help herself. And this was just about the perfect something. But – what would he say? What might he do?

  ‘You do what you want,’ he said that night. ‘You always do. What are you going to do about Emmie, have her adopted?’

  ‘Matt! Don’t.’

  ‘Don’t what?’

  ‘Don’t say such awful things. Please.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ she said, ‘except for the school holidays, she’ll be at school most of the time. After school, I could do exactly what I do now, if I have to, and ask your mum to look after her. I’d pay her, I wouldn’t expect her to do it as a favour – and Emmie loves her so much. What would you feel about that?’

  ‘I don’t want anyone else looking after her,’ he said. ‘You’re her mother, that’s your job.’

  She felt a flare of anger.

  ‘Matt – don’t be so bloody unreasonable. You don’t mind your mother looking after her if I’m at the dentist or have to sort out something to do with the house. What’s the difference?’

  He was silent.

  ‘And then in the holidays, maybe she could go down to Mummy at Summercourt. For two days a week. Surely that would be all right. She’s stayed there with Mummy lots.’

  ‘Your mother’s not up to it,’ he said, ‘I was watching her when I went down there, she can’t even pick her up.’

  This was undeniable.

  ‘OK. Well, maybe your mum could have her in the holidays as well. Just for two days a week. Why don’t I ask her? See if she likes the idea.’

  ‘I’ve told you,’ he said, ‘I don’t want Emmie left with anyone. She’s your responsibility, not my mum’s.’

  ‘Matt, you’re being so unreasonable. So absolutely unreasonable.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, yes, YES.’ She was screaming at him. ‘No one, no one in their right minds would refuse to agree to this.’

  He stood there, staring at her across the room, with the same, awful blank anger; she felt quite frightened, as if he was going to hit her again. Then quite suddenly he said, ‘You do what you like, Eliza. Like I said, you always do. Just don’t expect me to agree to it.’

  ‘And – what does that mean?’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Work it out for yourself. But I don’t want Mum involved.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said,
taken totally aback. ‘Why?’

  ‘I just don’t,’ he said.

  Maybe he was afraid she would confide in Sandra, Eliza thought, maybe he had talked to her himself; unlikely though, he was terrified of confronting his parents with any kind of emotion.

  Eliza switched her mind to her current problem: something had to be done about caring for Emmie. She started calling agencies. And that led her to Margaret.

  Margaret was actually working for one of the other mothers at school, who was looking to share her with someone. She was a sturdy girl from Birmingham who had taught in a nursery school for five years and seemed the absolute opposite of the sort of nanny who Matt would have objected to. Emmie liked her, and she clearly liked Emmie, although Eliza could see she would be firm, would be able to deal with her tantrums and her manipulative ways. Eliza offered her the job.

  Matt said he didn’t want to interview Margaret, but then at six o’clock on the evening before Eliza was due to start work, he demanded to see her, and said he wasn’t prepared to allow Emmie to be left in her care until he had.

  Eliza felt there was too much at stake to argue, and managed to get hold of Margaret, who was just sitting down to supper; she was clearly surprised, but agreed to come over, if Eliza could collect her.

  She sat stolidly relaxed, good-naturedly answering Matt’s increasingly absurd questions: ‘What would you do if there was a fire, do you prefer looking after girls to boys, have you got a boyfriend?’ Her rosy, pleasant face showed no irritation or surprise, even when he suddenly said did she know that he didn’t approve of working mothers and that Eliza was returning to work very much against his will.

  ‘I think children are best with happy mothers,’ she said, ‘and happy mothers are best for children. And some mothers are happier working.’

  Matt nodded and said she must excuse him now; he had a lot of work to do and disappeared into the study.

  Eliza drove Margaret home; when she got back, she went into the study and said, very nervously, would it be all right for Margaret to look after Emmie; he said he supposed so, but he would like to remind Eliza again that what she was doing was in direct opposition to his wishes and that he was going out.

  And in the morning, Eliza got up an hour earlier than usual to wash and blow-dry her hair, got dressed in one of her new maxi dresses and her new pink suede Biba boots, made up her face with her new Mary Quant paint box, delivered Emmie to school and told her to be good for Margaret and that she would see her at six o’clock, and then turned her new, souped-up Mini Cooper in the direction of Carlos Place and, more nervous than she would ever have believed, returned to the world of work.

  She had expected to spend the first few days at least in a state of trauma, at once unable to cope with the job and fretting over Emmie; in the event, she found herself so instantly happy and absorbed, so soothed by being appreciated and valued and even talked to, for God’s sake, and so delighted once the first day was over at finding Emmie contentedly playing Ludo in the kitchen with the estimable Margaret that she was even able to bury the nightmare events of the past few weeks and turn her face determinedly, for part of the time at least, towards what seemed like a new beginning.

  Or at least what she hoped was a new beginning.

  ‘Matt, hello. Look, I’d like to see you. It’s been so long.’

  ‘Scarlett, I’m terribly busy.’

  ‘I daresay you are, and so am I, but I’d still like to see you.’

  ‘Have you been talking to Eliza?’

  ‘No. No, of course not. Haven’t heard from her for ages. How is she?’

  ‘Fine.’

  His voice was dismissive; not one to pursue then.

  ‘Right. Well, can I buy you a drink?’

  ‘OK. But I’m not very good company at the moment.’

  Scarlett said she didn’t want good company, she just wanted to see him.

  ‘Mum says you’re avoiding them, you’re certainly avoiding me, I just want to make sure you’re OK.’

  ‘Scarlett, I’m OK. Believe me.’

  ‘I want to see for myself. Tomorrow OK?’

  ‘Yes, all right,’ he said wearily.

  ‘My pub, seven thirty. Don’t be late. And – will you be bringing Eliza?’

  ‘I won’t be bringing Eliza, no.’

  There was that same odd note in his voice.

  He walked into the pub in the Old Brompton Road looking terrible: white, drawn, and he had obviously lost weight.

  ‘Hi, Matt. You do look very – tired.’

  ‘Well, I am tired. Probably the reason.’

  ‘Everything OK business-wise?’

  ‘Yes, perfectly OK, thanks.’

  ‘And how’s Emmie?’

  ‘She’s fine.’

  ‘Good. Well – can I get you a drink?’

  ‘Yes, thanks. Large whisky.’

  He downed it in one; she watched, half-shocked.

  ‘Matt, are you sure you’re OK?’

  ‘Yes, I’m quite sure. What is it you want to talk about?’

  ‘Oh – nothing much. I’m a bit low. Strikes me you are too. Want to talk about it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, I’ll talk about mine. I need to, really. And there’s no one else who’d listen, Mum and Dad would have a fit. Several fits.’

  Silence.

  ‘OK. Here goes. I’ve made a complete hash of my life,’ she said quickly, as if it would make it all easier. Complete.’

  Matt listened, horrified. She didn’t spare herself. There’d even been a child – or rather a termination. Which she’d never told this bloke, this absolute wanker, about. And she’d had to cope with it all on her own. Had never told anyone.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Scarlett,’ he said, and then again, ‘so sorry. I wish you’d felt you could tell me.’

  ‘Well – wouldn’t have helped.’

  ‘Might. I could have given you some good advice. Like sending him round to me, so I could beat him up.’

  ‘Oh, Matt. That wouldn’t have helped. It’s all right. I went into it with my eyes open. I should have known better. And advice, who takes advice? Especially the sort you don’t want to hear.’

  ‘As long as you’re rid of him now. And yes, you’re right. Advice is pretty useless. It’s so bloody easy to live other people’s lives for them. I should know.’ He sighed, felt the tears at the back of his eyes, the treacherous tears he shed every night, shocked at himself for his weakness, unable to staunch them, biting the pillow lest a sound might escape. ‘I – I’m just going to get another drink. You?’

  ‘Yes, please. Vodka and tonic again. Lots of ice. I learnt to love ice in America. It’s such a lovely country. Matt – sorry, but are you really all right?’

  ‘Not really,’ he said, ‘but best not to talk about it. Like you, I want to deal with it on my own for now at least. No one can help.’

  ‘OK. I won’t press you. But when you’re ready—’

  ‘Yes, thanks.’ He managed to smile at her, went to get the drinks; when he came back he sat down in silence again, staring into his glass.

  ‘Sorry, I’m not very good company at the moment.’

  ‘Oh, Matt,’ she said, putting her hand on his arm, ‘what a pair we are. We used to be able to help each other; it’s gone a bit past that now. But for what it’s worth, I’m so fond of you, you know. And glad you’re around.’

  He felt the tears rising again. Shit, what was the matter with him? He was acting like a bloody girl.

  He rummaged in his pocket for his handkerchief, blew his nose hard.

  ‘Sorry. Getting a cold.’

  ‘Matt, God, you’re crying. Matt, what is it, whatever is it, is it Eliza?’

  ‘I am not bloody crying,’ he half-shouted. ‘I’ve got a bloody cold. Now look, I really must go. And please – please – any serious problems, in future, please come to me. I know I’m only your kid brother, but I can still look after you, OK?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, very soberly
, ‘yes, Matt, I know. I should have done. But I thought you’d be shocked and I couldn’t face that. And you – well, you know, I’m always here. We must look out for each other, Matt, you and me. And at least you’ve still got Eliza—’

  Only he hadn’t, he thought, walking swiftly out of the pub, after kissing her goodbye. He hadn’t got Eliza. It was over. The sweet, sweeping, heady love and love affair were over. And he had to make the most of what he had left.

  And make sure he kept it.

  Chapter 51

  The job was – well, it was wonderful. Eliza couldn’t remember when she had last had such fun.

  The lines of command were very clear initially, but Rob increasingly referred to her on models, rather than to the fearsome Babs Brown who ran the bookings department at the agency, and there had been quite sharp words exchanged between them. And although Rob chose the photographers, he began to discuss the choice with Eliza beforehand. If she felt he was making a serious mistake – such as when he wanted to use the dreamily romantic Sarah Moon to shoot some dazzlingly sexy poolside images and she would have chosen Helmut Newton – she would say so in no uncertain terms.

  Her relationship with Rob was at once combative and relaxed.

  They found each other amusing, professionally admirable and sexually attractive. He was unmarried, ‘for the third time’ as he put it cheerfully, but ran a string of affairs with one devastatingly beautiful girl after another. Eliza, as she told him with a heavy sigh over one too many glasses of wine one night, was married, and wasn’t running anything, least of all a sex life. He leaned over and kissed her on the mouth in a rather disturbing way when she said this and told her if she ever felt like extending their relationship, he would be delighted.

  She laughed, as she was not really supposed to do, but stored it away for future reference. It all soothed her insecurity, eased her self-distaste; she felt she was waking up and coming not so much back to life as discovering a new one.

  It was very odd: to be so happy and so unhappy at the same time. While she was working, absorbed, confident, excited, surrounded by the kind of people she most admired, she was happier than she had been for years. And while she was at home, with a husband who appeared to dislike her, who certainly didn’t trust her, she felt an abject failure and was very very unhappy indeed.