by Sarah Long
‘Tessa, look how Harriet’s become shabby chic without even trying! I’m tempted to go for it myself next time, I’m sick of clean lines. Maybe I’ll try it out on a client first, if I manage to get another one after Megan, see how it turns out.’
‘I’ve always felt comfortable at Harriet’s house,’ said Tessa, ‘but the whole point is it doesn’t have the faintest whiff of interior design. I don’t see you getting to grips with shabby chic, you’d be dropping in oligarch-style statement pieces all over the place.’
‘Wrong,’ said Sandra. ‘The secret of the best designed homes is that they don’t look designed at all.’
Tessa settled into a chair with a cushion that had been embroidered with a stout piece of advice; plain white letters on a navy background urging the reader to Keep Calm and Carry On.
‘How’s Sam?’ she asked. ‘Is he keeping calm and carrying on?’
‘He’s in New York,’ said Harriet. ‘It’s very exciting about your business, Sandra, but, more importantly, how is poor old Nigel getting on?’
Sandra discreetly kicked the pug that was dribbling over her suede shoe. She didn’t like talking about Nigel’s depression. It was bad enough putting up with it at home, she didn’t see why it should seep into her convivial hours.
‘Too many “shoulds” apparently. That’s what the shrink is telling him now.’
Harriet gently pushed down the plunger of the cafetière, taking care not to make it spurt out hot water. It was a common middle-class injury, according to the A & E doctor who had once treated her scalded forearm.
‘That will be his critical voice,’ she said, ‘he has to push aside those negative thoughts.’
‘Yes, that’s what Nigel told me,’ said Sandra. ‘Then he gave me this really depressing book called Living with the Black Dog, so I can share his pain. But honestly, what am I supposed to do about it? If anything, I’m the injured party here. If he claims his life is such a disappointment, what does that say about me?’
Tessa leaned forward to take a cup of coffee, chunky green and gold in the old French bistro style, a throwback to the confident Conran years when everyone awoke to the idea that they could be bohemian and cook a chicken in a brick.
‘You’ve just got to be patient,’ she said, ‘he’ll get better.’
Harriet was less tolerant.
‘It’s not about you, Sandra, it’s about him,’ she said. ‘We all know our husbands can be grumpy old men, but Nigel is genuinely unwell. I do think you could be a little more understanding.’
Sandra pushed aside the other pug which had jumped up beside her on the Chesterfield. It was funny how dogs always made a beeline for her even though she disliked them.
‘Trust me, I’ve tried,’ she said. ‘But it’s so draining being around someone who fails to embrace the glory of being alive. Anyway, I’m doing my best to keep cheerful, for Poppy’s sake. She doesn’t need both parents going around with a face like a smacked arse. Which is why I’ve started seeing Mariusz again. Yes I know, inappropriate. Condemn me now.’
She looked up at her two oldest friends, a glint of triumph in her eye. She’d still got it, could still pull a hot young man while they remained shipwrecked on the long, dull sandbank of middle age.
‘When you say “seeing?” . . .’ Harriet frowned.
‘We had sex this morning. On the chaise, if you must know. Very satisfactory.’
‘You never!’ said Tessa, ‘I thought you said it was all over, what made you change your mind?’
‘Possibly Nigel’s SAD box. But don’t worry, this is purely therapeutic, we’re both singing from the same song sheet.’
‘How do you say that in Polish?’ Tessa asked.
‘Please can I have small money? Don’t judge me, we’re grown-ups, it’s not hurting anyone. And it’s helping me get through Nigel’s depression.’
Harriet wasn’t having it.
‘I’m sorry to play the prude here, but hasn’t he got a family back home in his own country?’
‘Yes, that’s what I mean about us both being on the same page, It’s extra-curricular, nobody’s falling in love or anything. Now, that’s enough about me. What about you, Tessa? Have you heard about this, Harriet?’
*
Tessa made sure she was home by six, although she wasn’t sure that John was serious about the Skype appointment. She was already regretting their exchange last night, begging him to show himself like that and sounding much too keen, silly of her to message at the end of an indulgent evening. Don’t drunk text, she’d heard the children say it plenty of times, pity she didn’t follow their advice. She shut herself in the office, cleared the desk and placed her laptop centre stage. It was like a gypsy’s crystal ball, gaze inside and all will be revealed, past, present and future. Except it was flat and black, not round and sparkling. She opened the Skype app and waited.
Three minutes ahead of schedule, she heard the sound of the incoming call, a weird and extra-terrestrial wail, like being in a space ship. She clicked to answer.
‘Hey, Tessa!’
She could see his profile picture in the corner of the black screen, no surprises there, the same baseball-capped portrait he used on Facebook. But his voice. Hearing those two words, she was back with him in his single bed, under the hot tent of the duvet, murmuring into the night about the things they were going to do together.
She leaned forward, unsure where the microphone was situated on the computer.
‘This is spacey, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘Ground Control to Major Tom!’
They grew up with dear departed David Bowie and she could still recite every single line, from ‘Space Oddity’ through ‘Life on Mars’ and ‘Ziggy Stardust’.
‘I should be taking my protein pills and putting my helmet on,’ said John, in his warm, confident voice. He sounded familiar yet different, the estuary English she remembered overlaid with American ellipses. She could hear his emotion in the pause before he spoke again.
‘It’s so great to hear your voice,’ he said eventually. ‘You sound exactly the same.’
I am exactly the same, she thought. I’m seventeen, I’m all over the place and I don’t know what I’m doing. She pulled herself together.
‘And you sound fairly American,’ she said.
‘Over here they think I sound British, I’m a hybrid!’
‘Like a Toyota.’
‘Ha! Sure you don’t want to switch the camera on?’
‘I’m sure. It’s enough to get used to hearing you, don’t want to go into shock overload.’
‘You’re right, let’s ease in gently. So, how’ve you been? Where do we start with this, Tessa?’
‘I don’t know. How about where we left off. The morning after your party, maybe.’
He said he couldn’t bring himself to tell her he was leaving that morning. ‘I’d finally made you see that we belonged together, we had just one night together, I couldn’t bear to spoil the moment, you must understand.’ Then when he arrived in Australia he had panicked, he wasn’t going to spend the year pining for her, he was young, it was too soon. And when he returned to take his place at university, he hadn’t dared to contact her, he was afraid she would be so angry. ‘I was a coward,’ he said, ‘it was the biggest mistake of my life, I know that now.’
‘I’m just so sorry I hurt you, Tessa. If I could have my time again, I’d do it all differently.’
Tessa couldn’t speak for a moment, as she contemplated the other life she might have had. The path not taken, the unborn children they could have created. Wiping the slate clean to make way for another story, it made her head spin. They moved on to safer territory; John’s subsequent move to the US and the misdemeanours of his ex-wife, who had made him wary of relationships, especially with American women. He liked British women because they were more relaxed, he said, they drank and swore, and he found that attractive. They’d talked for nearly two hours when Tessa suddenly noticed the time. Matt would be home any moment.
‘I’ve got to go, do you realise how long we’ve been on this?’
‘Not long enough! Let’s do it again real soon. I love talking to you, it feels like you’re sitting right here beside me.’
‘Yes.’
‘Tomorrow, same time?’
‘I’m not sure, send me a message first.’
‘Will do, you’re the boss.’
‘Bye then.’
‘You go first.’
‘No, you.’
‘Let’s go for simultaneous log-out.’
‘Alright then, on the count of three.’
‘Starting now! Goodbye, Tessa, take care.’
She wasn’t so keen on the ‘take care’ platitude, but as she switched off her computer, Tessa admitted she was probably just looking for something to criticise, in an attempt to pour cold water on the unsettling feelings their conversation had provoked. She was already impatient for the next time.
*
Harriet was finding it hard to sleep. Sam had told her not to wait up, his flight was delayed, but she was listening out for him, wanting to hear about Alex and Nadia. They had been to the Polo Bar, it was the place apparently, where the waiters referred to themselves as Captains which sounded rather silly but she was glad her son was enjoying his glamorous life. And she wanted a full debrief on Nadia, who looked fabulous and a little bit terrifying in the photos.
There was no point stressing about insomnia. She had already done her breathing exercises and made a cup of Moroccan verbena tea, with no effect, but at least she could use these hours as an educational opportunity. She turned on the light and picked up The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire to negotiate the Conquest of Trajan in the East.
When she heard Sam’s key in the door downstairs, she changed her mind, it was too late to talk, better turn the light off and pretend to be asleep. Playing dead to avoid confrontation was a familiar old trick, which seemed to work for both of them. She heard him hanging up his coat, then filling a glass with water, the usual routine, before making his way up the stairs. In the bedroom, he undressed in the darkness, and put on the stripy pyjamas she always arranged, neatly folded, under his pillow.
‘Harriet?’
She decided to answer.
‘Hello.’
‘Ah, you’re awake. I was thinking of reading for a bit if you were already asleep, but it doesn’t matter.’
‘Read if you like, I’ve only just turned the light off.’
‘Alright, if you’re sure you don’t mind.’
He leaned over and turned on the brass lamp. Beneath the velour brocaded shade, the ceramic base was decorated with fox-hunting scenes, though neither of them had ever been on a horse.
‘Might as well join you,’ said Harriet, pulling herself back against the pillows and picking up her book.
‘Still on the Romans then,’ said Sam, glancing at the cover.
‘Ita vero.’
He nodded. They were both keen on Latin, it was one of their shared interests.
‘I’m on Chapter One and there are six volumes. I might finish it before I’m sixty.’
‘Herculean task,’ said Sam. ‘Labor onerosum.’
‘So how was Alex, did you have a nice time?’
‘He was great.’
Sam opened his book.
‘And Nadia?’
‘Great. You’d like her.’
‘Oh good. What did you talk about?’
Sam sighed.
‘If you don’t mind, I’d rather just read for a bit, it’s been a long journey.’
Harriet tried unsuccessfully to bring her concentration back to the travails of Roman heroes conquering the world in their sensible leather sandals, defeating the barbarians at every turn. Instead, she thought about marital middle-aged beds like theirs, scattered across the globe. Husbands and wives lost in their respective reading matter, taking comfort in imaginary and bygone worlds when once, in the first flush of passion, they used to make their own.
Her sons were far away, it was just her and Sam now, and the dogs, and his ailing mother, two floors down. No wonder you needed the stimulus and release of literature.
*
Matt had dozed off in front of Newsnight so Tessa opened the laptop slumbering beside her on the sofa. There was a message.
Tessa, my gorgeous astronaut space person, I loved our walky-talky talk earlier. Listen, this is very last-minute I know, but something’s come up urgently with a client and I’m coming to London next week. Any chance we could meet up?
Meeting up? Just like that? Tessa stared at his words and tried to control her emotions. She pictured them running towards each other in slow motion like in a film, then reined herself in. They were old chums, it was perfectly natural for them to get together. You saw it all the time on Facebook, groups of middle-aged red-faced men and straight-from-the-hairdresser women holding in their stomachs as they smiled for the camera at the school reunion. She typed her reply.
Yeah, sounds good. You must come to dinner.
The speed of his response was alarming, did he really have so little else to do?
And meet your HUSBAND :-S ?
Not such an outrageous idea, was it?
Why not?
Not what I had in mind. Can we meet somewhere for lunch? I’m staying at The Ritz, let’s have lunch there on Monday. Just the two of us, don’t want to bore your husband with our talk of the good old days!!
The Ritz, he must be doing alright! She mentally flicked through her empty diary.
Puttin’ on the Ritz! Sure thing, what time?
Fantastic! 1 p.m.
That night Tessa went to sleep dreaming of Fred Astaire in top hat and tails, leaping in the air and flashing his spats as he danced with a chorus of Fred Astaire lookalikes behind him, all of them looking exactly like Johnny Ormonde. She couldn’t wait to see him again, and couldn’t remember the last time she had felt so excited.
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘Don’t be jealous of your girl when she grows up because you are afraid you will have to take a back seat.’
Blanche Ebbutt, Don’ts for Wives, 1913
The upside of an empty nest is the joy you feel when they come home. Lola had turned up on the doorstep last night, her petite frame swamped by an unflattering maroon university sweatshirt and Tessa had gathered her up in her arms, familiarising herself with the small curve of her waist, the smell of her hair. Then later, after dinner, cuddled up together on the sofa watching some nonsense on television, Tessa knew that this was happiness. If she could just keep her little girl safely here beside her, there would never be anything to worry about.
And now they were driving through the streets lined with busy Saturday shoppers, on their way to have lunch with Tessa’s parents. The familiar foursome, parents in front, children behind, except the children were now adults, their lives played out at a distance, their secrets safe from their parents’ prying eyes. Tessa had engaged in a bit of digging about Lola’s new boyfriend, but so far had only ascertained that he was ‘well hench’ and the owner of her oversized sweatshirt. Hench as in henchman, Tessa wanted to know, is he somebody’s sidekick? Lola had put her right, it meant ‘very built’, apparently, which was in itself a peculiar distortion of grammar.
‘You alright in the back?’
She turned round to look at Max and Lola, squeezed into the shallow seat of their father’s mid-life Maserati. How absurd of him to buy a smaller car when the children grew bigger, where was the logic in that? Both of them were plugged into their respective machines and staring vacantly out of opposing windows, heads nodding idiotically.
Lola turned and caught her mother’s gaze. She pulled out her tiny earplugs and smiled benevolently, throwing a lock of silky brown hair back behind one ear. She was wearing a lace camisole with thin straps which offset her delicate beauty.
‘Sorry?’ she said, still only semi-engaged.
‘Nothing,’ said Tessa, blowing her a kiss, ‘what you listening to?’
‘Kings of Leon, reliving my school days.’
‘Aah, I know them. Is your sex on fire?’
‘Butters, Mum.’ Lola pulled a face.
‘What are you two talking about?’ asked Matt.
‘I wish I knew.’
He looked with satisfaction in the rear-view mirror at his daughter’s fine nose and heart-shaped face. Lucky girl, she’d got his looks. She pulled a face at him in the mirror.
‘Hey, girlfriend!’ he said.
‘Hey, Dad!’
She blew him a kiss and he beamed back at her, what a beauty she’d turned out to be, now she’d grown out of her awkward teenage phase.
‘I don’t want to sound too wholesome and Christian,’ said Tessa, ‘but when we were kids we used to sing along with our parents to the car radio, it was good fun. Whereas you two just stay locked in your little worlds, it’s such a shame.’
‘Bleak,’ said Lola, making a gagging gesture. ‘Where are we going for lunch again?’
‘That Italian, where we went last time.’
‘Good shout.’ Lola put her earphones back in.
‘We’re having drinks at their flat first,’ said Tessa, ‘they want to show us their photos of Mexico on the computer.’
‘Another bloody holiday,’ said Matt. ‘Alright for some.’
‘You’d do the same in their position,’ said Tessa, ‘in fact, I hope we will.’
‘Right. You’ll be paying for it, will you?’
Tessa turned on the radio and sang along by herself until they reached their destination. Her parents had moved a few years ago into a retirement flat too small to accommodate any of their furniture. To adjust to their downsizing, they had ditched the three-piece suite and invested in two reclining chairs for themselves and a couple of hard stools for visitors, which had the desired effect of discouraging anyone from outstaying their welcome. It wasn’t that they were inhospitable, but they realised their remaining time was too limited to waste stuck indoors at the mercy of people dropping in to make small-talk.
