It Had to Be You (13 page)

‘So sorry, sir.’

As he walked towards the door, a thought struck him, and he turned.

‘Excuse me.’

The manager, who was about to disappear to safer pastures, stopped, turned, forced a smile.

‘Yes, sir?’

‘Did you get my address from the residents’ book?’

‘Yes, Mr Rivers. You had filled in your address, even though of course you later cancelled when the lady didn’t turn up.’

‘So my wedding ring, with a considerable financial value, and a far greater emotional value, especially now that …’ Now that Deborah was dead. Now that it was the most treasured relic of the only other great passion in his life. Now that he felt ashamed of having taken it off in the first place. How could he possibly have forgotten it. He needed it back. He needed to repair this betrayal. ‘… especially now that my … um … my wife is dead, has been sent by post, and not presumably by Special Delivery, to Poole in Dorset?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I see. Thank you.’

He stormed through the revolving doors, had a thought, stormed back in.

The manager had already disappeared. Stefan was back.

‘Mr Rivers,’ he said. ‘How I help?’

God knows.

‘The address I gave, in your book, was not my address.’

‘Book? You lost book? I not find book.’

‘Could I speak to the manager again, please?’

‘Yes, sir. I go. I am fetching.’

Not very, to be honest. He almost made the stupid joke out loud. Anything to take out a little of his frustration.

The manager returned. His smile was getting tired.

‘Yes, Mr Rivers?’

‘The address I gave, and to which the ring is going, it’s a long story …’

Their eyes met. It was not a happy meeting.

‘… is not actually my address.’

Why can I not just tell the truth? Because of those eyes.

‘It’s the address of a holiday cottage I was booked to go to after leaving here, and I thought, if any problems did arise, that would be the best place to contact me.’

‘Very sensible, sir.’

He doesn’t believe a word of it.

‘But I cancelled due to … well, it turns out the lady … my wife … was killed in a car crash.’

‘Oh, no, sir. I read about that. I’m so sorry.’

‘Thank you. So, I cancelled the booking.’

‘Not surprisingly.’

‘No. But I can’t remember the exact address. To contact them. To get my ring back.’

‘I understand completely, sir.’

I know you do. That’s what makes this all so pathetic.

The manager opened the residents’ book. Oh, God, he could have just done that himself.

‘Easy to find, sir. We’re very quiet at the moment.’

I’m not surprised.

‘I’ll write it out for you, sir. Lake View, 69 …’

Their eyes met again. It was an even unhappier meeting.

‘… Pond Street, Poole. No postcode, sir.’

‘Oh, dear.’

‘You should always put the postcode, if I may make so bold as to advise you, Mr Rivers. I do hope the ring arrives safely, but without the postcode there is no guarantee.’

Fuck off.

He parked the Subaru neatly in the little visitors’ parking area. It was neatly roped off by privet hedges, so that the residents’ view over the manicured grounds remained unsullied. These flats were perfect. It irritated his mother that there was nothing to complain about. It was one of the many things that she complained about.

It had been another slow, tedious drive through the crowded, melting streets of North London. He was tired, so tired this day. He let his head drop down onto the steering wheel, so that he could rest a moment. He hadn’t switched the ignition off completely, and the horn blared loudly. He sat up rapidly, but the damage had been done. Faces appeared at windows all over the low, bland, unblemished complex. He twisted his neck to see if his mother had come to her window. It didn’t look as if she had. He would risk it. He would sit in the car for ten minutes, gathering his strength.

He shouldn’t have had that fifth drink. Holly had said that he should drink less. He’d known that this was good advice, and he’d decided to put it into practice straight away. Where better to drink less than in a pub? There was a pub in Hampstead called the Holly Bush. Where better to go to put Holly’s advice into practice? And now he was bushed. He smiled at the word play and wondered if he was going feeble. His mother would suggest he was if he tried the word play on her. Once, when he said he found Jack Dee funny, she had said, ‘Jokes are all right, I suppose, if you like laughter.’ She’d been a cheery woman once, while his father was alive. ‘Somebody has to be cheery,’ she’d once said, ‘while that man’s around.’ And then, when he’d died, and she could have really led a cheery life, she’d seemed to find no use for cheeriness, nothing to set it against. Tragic, almost.

He had only drunk halves, just to prove that he could drink less. But it’s tiring drinking slowly, as any true drinker knows. Sip sip sip. Drip drip drip. Wearisome. And the slow tick tick tick of the clock clock clock as he sipped sipped sipped in that long hot Hampstead afternoon, thinking in circles, thinking fondly of Deborah, thinking longingly of Helen, a fortunate man suspended between great events, a lonely man with a host of friends, but it didn’t do him any good to have lots of friends if none of them were in the pub with him on that long, slow afternoon, and he felt as unhappy as his right kidney. He cursed himself for having arranged to see Mike. He cursed himself for not having arranged to see Helen. He should have eaten something, but he had to leave room for the walnut sponge. He shouldn’t have had that fifth half. Two and a half pints were nothing, usually, but James this Saturday was not a strong man.

He could still ring Helen, see if she was free this evening, have a quick drink with Mike, spin him some yarn about funeral arrangements. But James this Saturday was a man riven by indecision, a weak man.

He should have gone home, as he usually did after his acupuncture, for a nice little lunch with Deborah. But there was no Deborah, there was no lunch, he was a man who couldn’t face shopping, he was a man this Saturday who couldn’t face himself, couldn’t face the truth, would be very unwise to face Helen, no, leave things as they were. James this sunny Saturday was a man without a home, a nomad, a wanderer in the desert, a man caught betwixt and between.

He felt slightly better now that he’d made up his mind not to ring Helen.

Suddenly, without his being conscious that he’d decided to, he was getting out of the car, he was walking away from the car, he was locking the car, he was walking towards his mother’s flat, he had nothing in his hands, nothing to give her, no flowers, no sweet little book of notepads, no thoughtful little gift of any kind. If he’d brought her flowers, she’d have said, ‘How much did they set you back? Florists? Daylight robbery.’ If he’d brought a sweet little book of notepads, she’d have said, ‘You think I’m losing my memory, do you?’ If he’d brought scent, she’d have said, ‘Do I smell? You would tell me if I did, wouldn’t you? Because sometimes old people do start to smell.’

But he should have brought something.

‘Hello, Mum.’

Kiss. One cheek. Brief. Not the tactile generation. Sad.

‘Why did you wait in your car?’

To give me strength to face you. No!

‘What?’

‘You set the horn off and I looked out because I was sure it would be you. A mother recognises her son’s horn. Right in the middle of Mrs Pardoe’s nap, I shouldn’t wonder. That nap of hers. You’d think it was the Trooping of the Colour. Quarter of an hour you’ve been.’

I was wondering whether to ring the woman I love and have loved for five years and whom tomorrow I will be f— No.

‘Ten minutes I’d have thought, top whack. I … there was a programme on the radio I wanted to hear the end of.’

‘I see.’

Much more important. Your poor old mum has nothing as interesting to say as the BBC. It was in her voice, but she didn’t actually say it, and for that he was grateful.

‘Anyway, thank you for coming, and this is all so sad. So very sad, dear. And if I may criticise, but what’s a mother for if she can’t, don’t you think that pink shirt’s just a bit cheerful a bit soon? Oh, poor Deborah. Though of course it was sudden, and at least we know she won’t end up in a home. There is that.’

‘She was forty-six, Mum.’

‘Oh, I know. Much too young. Tragic. I’ll make the tea.’

He watched her as she made the tea, and he was very relieved. She was as brisk and efficient as ever. But she looked so small. She was shrinking slowly over the years. The dress she was wearing, the red one too thick for the weather, the one that looked as if it had been made from part of a carpet, still fitted perfectly. He wondered if the Kwality Cleaners, round the corner, were serendipitously shrinking it at exactly the same rate as she was shrinking.

‘And some walnut sponge?’

‘Please.’

He went to the window and looked out at the pleasant, anodyne prospect.

‘There are no birds,’ he said.

‘We’re not allowed to put food out. It’s against the rules.’

‘What? Why?’

‘Probably the noise would disturb Mrs Pardoe’s nap.’

The bitterness in his mother’s voice was a physical shock to him. So small, but capable of such ferocity.

‘If we ever get another bad winter I’ll take no notice. I won’t let my birds starve.’

‘Quite right, Mum. You do that.’

He was glad to see that she poured the tea with a steady hand, and cut the cake very professionally. She was only seventy-six, which was no age these days, but still, it was best to keep a close watch. She still had her bone structure, too, though she was heavily lined, having been a sun worshipper in those Malta and Majorca days. But her grey hair was getting humiliatingly sparse.

‘James, there’s a fork for the cake.’

‘Oh, Mum.’

‘We have standards in our family, James. The Harcourts think they’re posh, Fliss with all those double-barrelled friends, but we have standards too. I hope the funeral tea will be a classy affair. You can judge a family by their funerals just as much as by their weddings.’

‘Mum! I just want it to be a good send-off for Deborah.’

‘Of course. I hope the vicar’s all right. The decline in vicars in this country is shocking. Is he all right?’

‘I’ve no idea. I’ve never met him. We just have to hope.’

‘Oh, dear. Is Stanley coming?’

‘Yes.’

‘Oh, dear.’

‘I can’t not invite him, Mum.’

‘No. I know. I was hoping he might be the next to go. That’s the only solution, really, for people like that. More tea?’

‘Thanks. Nobody makes a cup of tea like you, Mum.’

She tried so hard not to show that she was pleased. Why?

‘Another slice?’

‘Please. It’s lovely, and I’m really hungry.’

He expected that to please her, but she said, ‘Now that’s bad. You should make sure to eat. I bet you can’t boil an egg.’

‘I can cook, Mum. I have a limited range, but … not bad.’

‘Things with rice,’ she said scornfully.

‘Partly. We like rice.’

‘Well, that’s lucky. I wouldn’t thank you for it. It’s fine if you’re Chinese, but I’m not. And nor are you, may I remind you?’

There was silence for a moment. He could see that his mother was brooding about something, and he was happy to concentrate on not dropping crumbs.

‘She doesn’t sleep at night,’ said his mother. ‘Of course she doesn’t. It’s because of her precious nap. The whole block has to be quiet. It’s Remembrance Day every afternoon.’

Her eyes had sunk into her face, but they would still be able to spot a speck of dust in a stately home at two hundred yards.

‘Have you seen Philip?’ he asked.

‘Coming tomorrow. He’s not a bad boy.’

‘I come whenever I can, Mum.’

‘I didn’t say you didn’t. You shouldn’t be so touchy. Touchiness is not an attractive trait in a person. More tea?’

‘I’ve had two.’

‘You always used to be a three-cup person. In the old days.’

Ah, those tea-swilling days of yore.

‘All right, then. Thanks. Seen Charles?’

Her face broke into a smile at last.

‘Ah, Charles,’ she said. ‘He’s doing so well.’

‘Have you seen him?’

‘Not since March. He’s so busy with his concerts.’

So typical. Place the one who doesn’t come on a pedestal. Make him your favourite. You were an individual once, Mum, strong, holding the family together, saving them from Dad. When he died the purpose went out of your life and now, now you’re in danger of becoming a cliché. When all this is over, Helen and I are going to take you in hand, make sure you become the sort of old woman you ought to be. You won’t like Helen at first, but she’ll grow on you.

‘He’s away now, isn’t he, giving his concerts? Ecuador or Iceland or somewhere like that.’

This vagueness is a new thing. I think it’s put on. You’re an educated woman.

‘I see him on the telly, of course. I saw Philip on the telly too, on that programme about global warming. It’s a pity
you’re
never on the telly.’

I’ll make some suggestions to the BBC.
Strictly Come Packaging
.
I’m in a Parcel, Get Me Out of Here. Britain’s Got Cardboard
.

‘I’m sorry, Mum,’ he said at last. ‘I’m going to have to take my leave.’

‘Well, thank you for coming. I do appreciate it.’

He tried to hide his astonishment.

They walked slowly towards the door. It would be a while before they reached it. Saying goodbye to his mother was never a swift affair.

‘You’ve been a good husband, James. Take comfort from that,’ said his mother. ‘Do you remember Mrs Tomlinson from number forty-four, when we were in Carberry Crescent before we went up in the world?’

‘No, Mum. I think I was two when we left Carberry Crescent.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t say Carberry Crescent was a fount of wisdom. You didn’t meet your Jean-Paul Sartre slipping off to Londis. Your father used to be very scornful of the people in Carberry Crescent. But you learn in this life that wisdom sometimes comes from unexpected places.’