by David Belbin
Sarah was an only child. Felicity didn’t have strong maternal instincts, but she did have a strong sense of pride. She liked going out with a successful (or so it seemed, for a while) Cambridge graduate with a rich, famous father. She was seven months pregnant when they married. It pleased Kevin to have a daughter, and he was a good father, at first. He was less good as a provider, but there was always Grandad to fall back on.
Mum went back to work at the council before Sarah was one. Dad had sometimes stayed at home to look after her. He had a job with his father in the early days of the marriage, as some kind of parliamentary adviser. He wasn’t in Chesterfield much. Sarah remembered being impressed by parliament the one time Dad had taken her to visit. Being in London suited Dad, for he had a whole other life there. In the late sixties and early seventies, he worked as a book reviewer, a travel journalist, the editor of a trade journal. But work never took up much of his time.
When homosexuality was legalized, in 1967, Dad had little reason to hide the most important aspect of his London life. He left for good in 1970, when Sarah was eight. Her dad never paid maintenance but occasionally bought her extravagant presents. His dad, Sir Hugh, regularly sent money to Felicity and, doubtless, to Kevin too. When Grandad died, Dad got most of his money. After that, he stopped any pretence of work.
Grandad had been a shrewd investor, so there was plenty of money. Sarah’s share had paid for her small flat in London. Her dad inherited enough for a three-bedroom place in Spain, with a pool. Sarah visited twice. Dad, in his fifties, toned down his behaviour while she was around, but there was still enough going on for her to see the kind of life he led. He had a bottle open and a joint on the go from lunchtime onwards. Both were shared with handsome young men nearer Sarah’s age than his own. Sarah, having joined the police, had become – to Dad’s eyes – uncomfortably straight. Her second visit was nearly five years later. By then, she was taking her first steps in a political career while Dad, unknown to him, had contracted HIV.
‘I had a great time,’ he’d told her the last time they met, in hospital. ‘I don’t regret any of it, except spending so little time with you. I’m sorry I couldn’t live with your mother and see more of you. I thought we had for ever to figure things out between us. But there’s no such thing as for ever. There’s just time.’
She’d meant to visit again before he died, but he’d declined rapidly. When she went back, three weeks later, it was to bury him. At the time, she thought that the wrong parent had died. She and Mum had fallen out when Sarah left the police and moved into politics. Mum realized what her ex-husband had died of, said that he had it coming, that if anyone was going to catch the gay plague, it was Kevin Bone.
Lost in memories, Sarah had driven the last part of the journey on autopilot. She turned off the Chatsworth Road and parked outside Mum’s terraced house, with its tidy, narrow front yard. Her mobile rang. Sarah answered at once, relieved to delay the inevitable.
‘Andrew! How are you?’ It was a voice from the more recent past, Nick’s oldest friend.
‘Very well indeed. I wanted to wish you a happy new year and remind you that I owe you a meal, restaurant of your choice. Be great to catch up.’
‘Restaurant of my choice?’
‘In Nottingham or London. Entirely up to you. I have a little business to do in Nottingham. In fact, I’ll be there later.’
‘I’m in Chesterfield just now, I’m afraid. But how about Alastair Little’s?’
‘Consider it booked. When?’
‘You’ll have to talk to Hugh, my diary secretary, about that. You don’t mind eating late, do you?’
‘Not at all. I’m still a night owl.’
‘Great. How are you getting on with Gill Temperley?’
‘Swimmingly. She takes my money. I use her name. Not a lot else for her to do.’
‘Really? You offered me a full-time job doing whatever it is she does for you.’
‘I’d have invented more work for you, if only for the pleasure of your company.’
The net curtains in Felicity’s front bay windows parted. Sarah saw her mother’s hawk-like profile, filled with the mean expression that – in her mind’s eye – Mum always wore.
‘I’ve got to go, Andy.’ She used the old name affectionately. It was funny how you could feel affectionate about some people from the past, when you had no particular reason to like or trust them still, just because they knew you when you were young and yet to be fully formed. But with other people – particularly, perhaps, family, although Sarah had never had enough family to make a firm study of this – the past kept looming up like a shipwreck, one that had been long since abandoned and which only a fool would return to. For the wreck was bound to have deteriorated further over the years. To swim back into it was stupid and dangerous.
He shouldn’t be in Nottingham this weekend, he tells you. He’s skiving off a conference for you. You weren’t expecting him. You were hanging out down the Broadmarsh when the moby rang. You told him where you were. Fifteen minutes later, he’s parked on a side road near Meadow Lane. He takes a good look at your pupils.
‘You been smoking?’
‘I was with Shaz. She had some weed.’
‘Don’t smoke in the daytime. You can lose weeks that way. Months. You could be reading, doing something useful.’
He sounds like a dad, but you’ve never had a dad, and you quite like that. It’s cool he cares enough to tell you off. Still, you have to fight back.
‘I work hard Monday to Friday. I have an extra class on Sunday and do my homework then, too. But I take Saturdays off and the day’s so long, you know? If I’d known that you were going to call …’ You realize that you sound like a fifteen-year-old, which is what you are. ‘Anyway,’ you whisper in his ear, ‘smoking makes me really, really horny. How long have we got?’
‘Long enough.’
This afternoon, he moves the car to the back of the antique markets, which are all closed by mid-afternoon. The road’s full of cars parked for the football, but the game is still going on. He likes the risk that someone will come along. The two of you move into the back of the four-by-four, fold down the long seat, and spread out the blanket he keeps beneath. You go down on him, giving head just the way he taught you to. Then he goes down on you, until you let him know you’re ready. Then you fuck each other for a long, long time, until you come again and again.
‘You’re a god,’ you tell him. ‘I love you, God. Oh, God!’
‘I love you too,’ he says, coming at last. ‘I’ll always love you. We’re always going to be together.’
Afterwards, driving you back to the hostel, he isn’t so soppy.
‘How are the lessons going?’ he asks.
‘Fine. I’m just doing English now. At school, they say I’m bound to get a good maths grade, but I need help with English. The teacher’s good.’
‘I’ll give you some more money to pay him, but don’t go spending it all on weed.’
‘I never pay for weed.’ You risk a question. ‘Do you still smoke?’
‘Still?’
‘Don’t tell me you didn’t smoke weed when you were young.’
‘When I was a teenager, everybody smoked. But after that, only now and then, to be polite. I like to keep a straight head.’
‘It’s great when you’re straight, yeah?’ you say.
‘What is that, a song title?’
He gets it. ‘You’re pretty cool for an old guy,’ you tell him.
He pulls up at the end of the road that backs onto the hostel. You look around to make sure there’s nobody who will spot you.
‘When will I see you again?’
‘Soon as I can make it, babe, but I’ve got a lot on my plate.’
You kiss him tenderly on the lips. ‘Make it really soon. I love you.’
He doesn’t say it back again, but he smiles and you know he’s yours. You can’t believe you ever doubted him, offered your body to somebody else. Dunt matter. Didn’t h
appen. This is for always. Now and for ever.
14
‘You didn’t go home last night, did you?’ Nick’s sister-in-law said, making gravy to go with the pork tenderloin. ‘I phoned you this morning and you weren’t there.’
‘Maybe I’d gone out to buy a paper.’
‘I phoned three times to ask you to ask you to pick up some mustard powder when you were cycling over here. In the end, I had to send Joe out for it.’
‘Okay,’ Nick said. ‘You got me. I stayed the night at a friend’s.’
‘It would have been fine for you to bring her over. We can always stretch to one extra at the table.’
‘Thanks, but it’s early days.’
‘Someone you met at work?’
‘No, she’s a teacher.’
‘Primary or secondary?’
‘Secondary. English.’ That seemed to please Caroline, a teacher herself. He told her how Nancy had written to him in prison, but he had only started seeing her recently, when she split up with her boyfriend.
‘She sounds nice,’ Caroline said. ‘You must bring her round.’
‘I’ll see how it goes.’
After dinner, Nick and Joe shared a spliff in Joe’s snug. Since Phoebe was born, this was the one room in the house where he was allowed to smoke. He’d sorted the room out recently, put a few photos and other football memorabilia from his County days on the walls and added a CD ghetto-blaster. There was enough space for two old armchairs.
‘This is sweet,’ Nick said, referring to the room.
‘Won’t last for long. Caroline wants this to be the baby’s room when she moves out of our bedroom in a few months.’
‘I thought she was going to have the room I used to have,’ Nick said, referring to the few weeks that he’d stayed here when he got out of prison.
‘Eventually, but this room’s nearer ours and by the time she moves …’
‘You’re not trying again already, are you?’
Joe gave a bashful grin. ‘Not yet, but we don’t want too big a gap between kids. Better if …’ He let the sentence drain away.
‘You’re probably right,’ Nick said. There were six years between him and Joe, too many for them to have been friends growing up. He took another toke of the African grass and added, ‘This is good stuff.’
‘I’ll bet you’re making some connections where you’re working.’ He put on a stoner voice. ‘When are you going to hook us up with some really high-quality weed?’
Nick shook his head. ‘People don’t get problems with stuff like this. I had a parent come round the other day. Her kid’s getting through nearly a hundred quid’s worth of killer skunk every week. Can you believe that?’
‘How old is he?’
‘Seventeen, just dropped out of college. All he wants to do is stay in his room and smoke. Him and his mates listen to sounds, watch videos. They’re too stoned to get off with girls. Only other thing they do is play computer games.’
‘I can’t imagine wanting to get that high all the time.’
‘Lots of ’em do, though. They don’t know any different.’
‘What do you tell him?’
‘Nothing. He won’t come in, doesn’t see it as a problem.’
‘Well skunk’s not like smack … you know, addictive.’
‘I dunno about that. High, the world’s an easier place.’
The grass was stronger than the Moroccan hash Nick usually had. Both men fell into silence. Perhaps Joe, like Nick, was thinking about what they had just been saying. Dope always helped Nick to think. There was a time when he thought it made him more perceptive, more intelligent in a way. In certain tribes, he’d read, cannabis was revered and used only on special, religious occasions. Stoned, Nick could hear his thoughts, follow a trail to the end and, sometimes, locate solutions to complex problems, such as how far and how fast to take his relationship with Nancy.
Next day, however, he could rarely remember where his thoughts had taken him. He usually drank too much when he smoked. Nothing cerebral about his reasoning processes then.
‘Do you really think that?’ Joe asked, replying to something that Nick had said a short while ago, but had no recollection of.
‘Sure,’ Nick told him. ‘I always say what I think. What else is there?’
Joe nodded, as though Nick had said something profound, and stubbed out the joint. Then, without needing to discuss their next move, the two men went downstairs to watch the Sunday game on Sky Sports. At half-time, Caroline came down from her post-dinner nap.
‘How’s work?’ Nick asked. His sister-in-law had just gone back to school after maternity leave.
‘A slog. I wish I’d negotiated to go back part-time. Next year I’m going to see about a job share. Actually,’ she went on, ‘there was something I meant to mention. I’ve got a year eleven tutor group and I overheard something the other day, might interest you. One of the girls was talking about her boyfriend, said he worked for a guy called the King.’
‘Worked as what?’
‘I’m not sure. I thought I heard them use the word “power” but when I went over in her direction, she clammed up, which made me suspicious. Isn’t your place called the Power …?’
‘Project, yes.’
‘What’s the philosophy behind the name? Let me guess: Just saying no gives you the power?’
‘Something like that. What did you hear?’
‘The gist of it was that he had the best drugs in town. But perhaps I misheard the power bit.’
The second half of the match started. Nick didn’t waste time reflecting on what Caroline had just told him. He used to teach teenagers. They liked to bullshit. Also, he had something else on his mind. Last night, he’d gone to Nancy’s, used his key to let himself into her maisonette. They didn’t have a date. She’d mentioned something about a drink with people from work, meeting him after. He’d figured on catching her when she got home, but she hadn’t been there. And she hadn’t come back, either. He didn’t have her mobile number. It was written down in his flat and it hadn’t occurred to him that he might need it.
He’d waited until one, then slept – badly – in her double bed. He’d expected to be woken by her, but she hadn’t appeared, although he’d stayed there until midday. This was when he’d decided to walk over to his brother’s for Sunday dinner. He’d not left a note. It was early in their relationship and he didn’t want to screw things up by making her feel guilty. But he’d like to know where she’d been, whether she’d deserted him deliberately or had a screw loose and forgotten she’d given him a key along with an open invitation for a late-night visit.
*
‘I’ve been thinking about Grandad a lot lately,’ Sarah told Mum. ‘I wish he’d lived to see me in the Commons.’
‘I don’t. Your grandad would never have voted to cut money for single mothers.’
Sarah was surprised that her mum had been following the news, and knew how she had voted. She went on.
‘I’m not for scroungers. I was a single parent, but I always worked. Not everyone has the choice.’
Sarah had never thought of Mum as a single parent when she was growing up. Only recently had she begun to imagine what it must have felt like from her side, with a husband who was only ever half there, relying on her father-in-law for financial support.
‘Have you seen any more of that Nick fellow?’ Mum said, changing the subject. She never liked talking about Dad or Grandad, whereas she had always liked Nick. Last year, Sarah had made the mistake of telling her that he had been back in touch.
‘Only briefly. I’ve talked to him about work a couple of times.’
‘Work? I thought he was a teacher.’
‘No, he’s a drugs worker these days, trying to get young people off crack cocaine. I’m on the board of the place where he’s based.’
‘That can’t pay as well as teaching.’
‘No.’
‘Does he have much experience in that field, drugs?’
<
br /> Fuck it, Sarah thought. I am a grown woman and a government minister, there is no need for me to lie to my mother about men any more.
‘Yes, he just served five years in prison for growing cannabis on a large scale and for possession of four hundred pounds’ worth of cocaine.’
‘I see.’ That shut Mum up. She went to get the Lancashire hotpot out of the oven. It was worth the drive for the meal, if not the company. Proper hotpot, with mutton and lambs’ kidneys and red cabbage baked with apple on the side – a meal that took Sarah back to childhood. She poured another glass of the very good Côtes du Rhône she’d brought with her, giving Mum a larger glass. Sarah needed to be able to drive home later. She had not stayed the night here since the eighties.
‘Your father was fond of that stuff,’ Mum said, putting a steaming plate in front of Sarah. ‘Oh, I don’t know about the cocaine, but I expect so. He tried everything else, or so he told me.’
‘He smoked dope when I visited him in Spain in the eighties,’ Sarah said. ‘It made him – well, mellow, I suppose. More content.’
‘Did he offer it to you?’
‘No,’ Sarah lied, then tasted a bit of crumbling potato. It was still too hot. ‘And if he had, I would have refused. I did that stuff at university, a bit, but I’d long since stopped by then. I was in the police, for Christ’s sake. When I first saw him with it, I thought he was trying to shock me.’
‘He’d have had stronger ways than that to shock you.’
Sarah wasn’t sure what Mum meant. She wasn’t sure that she wanted to know.
‘Anyway,’ Mum went on. ‘There’s something I’ve put off telling you. Now, I don’t want you to worry about this …’
‘So this is where you live.’ Nancy was waiting outside Nick’s flat when he cycled home after watching the game at his brother’s. He hadn’t given her his address.
‘How did you find me?’
‘Directory enquiries. Why didn’t you ring me last night?’
The truth was usually the best option. ‘I didn’t have your mobile number with me. But I went to yours. Where were you?’
