Three’s a Crowd (7 page)

Catherine maintained that Rachel had wasted too many years travelling, and that's why she was where she was today. Which was nowhere, in Catherine's estimation. But travelling had suited Rachel; the incredible freedom of drifting from place to place without a plan, finding somewhere to stay for a night, then staying for a month. Or six. And moving on when she felt like it. She had never been happier, except for that brief period at Rainbow Street, and that was a big part of the reason she left. She knew it couldn't last, so she didn't want to get too used to it, too attached, only to watch it inevitably dissolve around her.

By the time she returned from overseas there was no more share house. Everyone had moved on, graduated from uni and into adult life. Catherine was forging ahead with her career and had already managed to fit in a brief marriage and divorce. She had insisted that Rachel be back in time for her second wedding. And Tom was thoroughly settled with a wife and two kids. Rachel suddenly had the urge to catch up to her friends, to settle too, whatever that meant. Perhaps it was time to make a home for herself. That was right about when Sean came along, so she settled for him.

‘So, shall we drink to Annie?' said Tom, raising his glass.

‘Of course,' said Rachel.

He clinked his glass against hers and they drank, though as the Scotch hit the back of her throat she gasped a little, just managing to swallow it down before she had to cough.

‘Are you right there?' Tom asked.

‘Just not so used to spirits,' she croaked, clearing her throat again.

‘Me either. But this is pretty smooth stuff.' He turned the bottle to check the label. ‘Clients give it to me. I keep it for special occasions,' he added, shaking his head ruefully.

Rachel looked at him. ‘Well, you got through today,' she said. ‘That was no mean feat. And Catherine certainly didn't help.'

He frowned. ‘Yes, she did, of course she did.'

Rachel winced. ‘I know that, I just . . .' God, she sounded like a bitch. ‘I only meant, well, I know what Catherine's like, better than anyone, and I should have reined her in –'

‘Hey,' he interrupted her, ‘she's not your responsibility. Besides, I'm grateful to her. I realise today wasn't very “Annie”, but I wasn't up to organising it,' he went on. ‘Let's face it, the only person who'd be able to pull off an Annie-style funeral would be Annie herself.'

He had a point. ‘Surely the girls would have liked to have some input?' said Rachel.

‘I think they're still in shock, Rach. Perhaps after a while . . .'

She thought about it. ‘So maybe you can plan your own memorial, say, in a year's time, just the three of you.'

He was staring out into the garden. ‘How are we ever going to get through a year?' he said quietly.

‘One day at a time, isn't that what they say?' said Rachel, before wincing again. ‘Sorry, I should be able to do better than that cliché.'

‘No, all the clichés work,' he assured her. ‘It really is like a bad dream, and I do keep thinking she's going to walk through the door any minute. Or that I'll come home and she'll be sitting at the piano with one of her students . . . and everything'll be back to normal. But nothing's going to be normal ever again.'

Rachel watched him staring into space, his eyes glassy. ‘You didn't have any warning, nothing to prepare you for this. If you'd known about the condition, or she'd been sick for longer, you'd have had time to get used to the idea.'

‘How could I wish Annie had suffered so we could get used to losing her? That doesn't seem right.' Tom shook his head. ‘No, I've been thinking about this a lot, and I'm pretty sure this is the way Annie would have wanted it.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘You know what she was like, she believed in destiny, fate, all that new-agey crap.'

‘I take it you didn't share those beliefs?' Rachel said wryly.

He smiled then. ‘Not really, but whatever, if this had happened to someone else, she'd have had a whole lot to say about how it was “meant to be”, that the person was never destined for long
on this planet. All that. The worst part for her would have been leaving the girls without a mother. But worse than that even would have been the idea of putting them through years and years with a sick or dying mother. It would have broken her heart to do that to them.'

Rachel thought about it. He was right. Annie was totally devoted to those girls, they were her life.

‘So you see,' Tom went on, ‘if she was meant to die young, this is how she would have wanted it – no dramatic build-up, no lingering. Get it over with, and then get on with it,' he said plainly. ‘Except she's not here to show us how to do that.'

‘You'll figure it out.'

He was shaking his head. ‘I just don't know if I'm up to it. It's so hard, Rach, too hard. It's crushing.'

Rachel's stomach began to churn, what was he suggesting? That life wasn't worth living now?

‘Can I tell you something I haven't told anyone?' he said.

She swallowed. She didn't really want him to, but she could hardly say no under the circumstances. ‘Sure,' she said, before taking another gulp of Scotch.

‘What I'd really like to do is just go away,' Tom said plainly, ‘somewhere no one knows us, and start all over. Not have to explain, no one would have to know about Annie. Then I wouldn't have to be the dutiful widower.'

Was this all about finding another woman?

‘No one expects you to be a monk, Tom,' Rachel said awkwardly.

‘No, that's not what I'm talking about,' he shook his head. ‘Sorry, I'm not explaining myself very well. The thing is, I'm suddenly a widower. I didn't ask for the role, I wasn't prepared for it, I'd never even considered it, but now I don't have a choice. I've been sentenced to some arbitrary period of misery, of people feeling sorry for me, feeling uncomfortable around me, not knowing what to say. And I don't know either. My life has changed forever and I don't know how to live it any more.'

‘It's still your life, Tom,' said Rachel. ‘Go away if that's what you need to do.'

‘But it's not just my life, that's the thing, it's the girls' as well,'
Tom reminded her. ‘And I can't do that to them. They've lost their mother, they're going to need security, and continuity, so everything else is going to have to stay the same.' He glanced at her. ‘I'm worried about Soph.'

Rachel nodded. She could see why, if the conversation upstairs was anything to go by. ‘Does she have any contact with her father?' she asked tentatively.

Tom looked wounded. ‘I'm her father, Rach.'

‘Of course, I'm sorry, I didn't mean –'

‘I know, but that's the very reason I'm worried about her.' He drained his glass, setting it down on the table. ‘She's going to feel like the odd one out now, she doesn't even have the same surname as me and Hannah. That's just the kind of thing Sophie will obsess about.'

Annie hadn't changed her surname when they married, so she had certainly seen no reason to change Sophie's, who was nearly two when she and Tom met. When Hannah was born, it had seemed only fair to give her Tom's surname, and though they had decided it was the perfect time for Tom to formally adopt Sophie, she and Annie remained Veitches, while Tom and Hannah were Macklins. They could never have anticipated a reason to do otherwise.

‘She knows where she belongs, Tom,' said Rachel.

‘I hope so, she can be hard to read.'

‘She's a sixteen-year-old girl, doesn't that make her illegible?' Rachel suggested.

Tom smiled faintly, shaking his head. ‘It's such a bad age to lose her mum.' He looked at Rachel. ‘You'd know all about that.'

‘It's a little different, Tom, my mother's alive, she just doesn't seem to know I am.' She gave him a lame smile. ‘Annie has given those girls the most amazing foundation, she was ten times the mother my mother could dream of being.'

‘Yeah, she was,' he said wistfully. ‘I was in awe of her when we first met, the way she was with Sophie. I think that's why I fell in love with her. She was so patient, and loving, and she was all on her own. Her parents wouldn't have anything to do with her.'

‘Did they show up today?' Rachel asked.

He shook his head. ‘Didn't even respond to my messages. They believe she's going to hell, you know.'

‘Tom –'

‘It's true, Rach,' he insisted. ‘Fucking fundamentalist freaks. It used to make me so angry, but Annie was never resentful. She said it'd be bad for the girls. So in her heart she forgave them, even if she couldn't understand them, even if it still hurt her so much . . .'

His voice broke then, and he pressed his fingers to his eyes, dropping his head. Rachel didn't know what to say, though perhaps it was better not to say anything, just give him a moment.

Eventually he sat up straight again, clearing his throat and reaching for the bottle. He tilted it towards Rachel, but she shook her head. ‘I thought you were going to get drunk with me?'

‘I'm still on this one,' she protested, picking up her glass and taking another sip. That went down a little easier. She looked at him. ‘You know, Tom, time will heal.' She groaned, slapping her forehead. ‘There I go again, where are all these clichés coming from?'

‘You do seem to have a certain flair for them,' he observed.

‘What can I say? Lack of originality has always been one of my strengths,' she said.

He grinned then. ‘Okay, what else have you got? Give me your best.'

Rachel drummed on the tabletop with her fingers. ‘Hmm . . . let me think. Well, you've already covered “It was meant to be.” What about “Things always happen for a reason”?'

‘Got that today,' he nodded, ‘a few times. Along with “Something good will come of this.”'

‘I hope someone told you “You have to keep busy”?' she asked.

‘Oh, they did, repeatedly.'

‘You're still young –'

‘I have my whole life ahead of me,' said Tom, raising his glass and taking a drink.

‘Think of all you have to be thankful for,' Rachel added.

‘At least she didn't suffer.'

‘She was too good for this world.'

‘Life goes on.'

‘Life is short.'

‘Ah, best one I heard,' said Tom, sitting forwards, ‘was from this woman, I'd never met her before, I think she said she worked in
a health-food shop, or an organic co-op, some place. You know how Annie made friends with everyone, the further off beam the better.' He gave a wry smile. ‘Anyway, what was her name? Skye . . . or Summer, something like that. Do you know her?'

Rachel shrugged. ‘I don't think so.'

‘Anyhow, she got me aside and she launched into this whole extended analogy about grief being like an anchor that will keep me in the same place, while I need to rest and take stock, which is okay for a time, but that when I'm ready I shouldn't be afraid to bring it up to the surface and take it on board, because then it will free me, and I can move on, and go where the tide takes me, or steer my own course, maybe into another safe harbour . . .'

They looked at each other, and then Rachel couldn't help it, her inappropriate-reaction button activated, and though she tried to suppress it, laughter gurgled up through her chest and escaped, unfortunately via her nose first, in the form of a kind of convulsive snort. She tried to cup her mouth and nose with her hand, as if that would stop the deluge. But it was no use. And then Tom started to laugh, openly and loudly, and Rachel gave up, laughing along with him. And the laughter kept coming, in great rolling waves. And every time it subsided they caught one another's eye and burst into peals of fresh laughter all over again. Rachel laughed until her sides ached and her face was wet with tears.

Finally Tom let out a loud sigh, wiping his eyes with the heels of his hands. ‘I haven't laughed like that in ages.' He paused and looked across at her. ‘Thanks, Rach.'

‘Any time,' she said. Then she had a thought. ‘In fact,' she added, leaning forwards on the table, ‘really, any time you want to have a laugh . . .'

‘What are you saying?'

‘I'm not good for much,' said Rachel. ‘I can't organise things like Catherine does, and I can't cook, or whatever Lexie's doing for you.'

‘Cooking,' he confirmed. ‘Casseroles and cakes. Coming out of our ears.'

‘Okay, I'll make you a deal,' she said. ‘When it's all getting too
much and you want to have a break from being the grieving widower, call me, or come over, whatever. I'll be at your disposal.'

Tom was listening intently.

‘You can laugh, tell stupid jokes, get drunk, be totally inappropriate. Whatever you want. I won't tell anyone.'

A smile slowly formed on his face. ‘I'm going to hold you to this, young lady,' he said.

‘That's the idea.'

Rachel paced herself much better than Tom, and after he had consumed the best part of half the bottle of Scotch, he stopped making any sense at all and his eyes were struggling to stay open. It took some convincing, but she finally talked him into calling it a night. Getting him inside and into bed was a little more challenging. Just getting him upright was a feat in itself, and he had no hope of walking in anything like a straight line. He leaned heavily on Rachel, and he was not a slight man; lucky for her she wasn't a slight woman.

When they got to his room, he fell forwards onto the bed before she could stop him.

‘Tom, roll over,' she said. ‘You can't sleep like that.'

He grunted in reply but didn't budge. Rachel kneeled up on the bed beside him and heaved on his shoulder to turn him over. He groaned. She hoped he wasn't going to throw up, that'd be stretching the friendship. She leaned over him and started to unravel his tie.