I cursed myself mentally. “No, not really. You know what he was like though. Or rather, what I told you he was like. Oh, you know what I mean–”
Why had I said that? I could hear Angus’s summation of Becca clear as day in my head, after I’d taken her with me to Caernaven that one time. Too tall, too loud, too unfeminine. It was my own fault, I’d wanted to know what he thought of her. I’d wanted him to approve of her and our friendship. I should have known better. Had there been anyone in my life that Angus approved of, ever? I had a sudden unwelcome thought: if Jessica had – had lived, had been known to us as an adult, would he have approved of her?
“Becca, I’m fine. Really. I know you would have come if I’d asked you to.”
She smiled and took another lung-busting drag on her cigarette. I regarded her with affection. Darling Rebecca; henna-haired Amazon, cloaked in cigarette smoke; fond of emphatic statements; fiercely intelligent, bossy, extrovert. I’d known her five years; she was my best friend.
“Let’s go inside and order, if you’re done,” I said.
Becca gave me a strong, one-armed hug. “We need to feed you up,” she said. “Look at you, skinny-malinky. Matt’s not been taking care of you. Where is he, anyway?”
“At home. He sends his love but he had a paper to do for next week’s conference.”
“He’s going away?”
“Just down to Brighton. Some dullsville academic thing. It’s only for a few days.”
“So you’ll be all on your own? Want to come and stay with me?”
“Really, Becca,” I said, slightly annoyed. “I can cope on my own for a few days.”
“So, how are you coping?”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, you know. Just – coping. With everything.”
We’d reached the table by now and seated ourselves.
“Becca, I’m fine, honestly. I don’t know why–“
I stopped.
“I don’t know why what?” she said.
“Oh, nothing.” I pushed my hair back from my face. I felt suddenly hot and cross. “I just don’t know why everyone’s treating me like some kind of fragile doll, all of a sudden.”
Becca reached for my hand. “You idiot,” she said, with a soft edge to her voice. “You’ve just lost your dad, that’s why. We just want to know if you’re okay.”
It was the way she said ‘your dad’ that got me. Angus had never been a dad. A father, maybe, but never a dad. I’m an orphan, I thought suddenly. The word seemed so archaic. My throat felt tight. I turned my face away for a second, getting my voice back under control.
“Thanks Becs,” I said, after a moment. “I’m fine, but thanks.”
We applied ourselves to the menus.
“Christ, I’m starving,” said Becca. “I’m going to have a starter as well.”
“Aperitif first?” I said. “Or straight onto the vino?”
“Ooh, G&T for me. And let’s get a bottle as well, to start with. The service here is always a bit hit and miss.”
I signalled to the waiter. I felt that wonderful sense of relief I always had in her presence. Becca didn’t care much what anyone thought. She just went for it, whatever it was, and it was as if I suddenly had permission to join in.
The waiter brought our drinks and we raised them to each other.
“Cheers.”
“Cheers, my lovely.”
When I got home that night, Matt was still working at his computer. The room of the study was dark, his face lit only by the bluish glow of the laptop screen.
“Still at it?” I said, surprised. “You must have been flat out all night.”
He raised his hands above his head in a ‘don’t shoot’ gesture. Then he flipped the screen of the laptop down and swung round in his chair to face me.
“I have been, truth be told. But it’s time I called it a night and this is the perfect excuse. How’s the fair Rebecca?”
“She’s fine.” I slurred a bit on the sibilant but that didn’t matter; Matt was used to me coming home tipsy from a night out with Becca.
“Did you finish your paper?”
“Just. A few footnotes to sort out and I’m done.”
“That’s good,” I said automatically. I wandered about the study, picking things up and putting them back down. It drives Matt mad when I fiddle with things, but it’s a nervous habit, I can’t seem to stop it.
“Maudie–”
“Sorry,” I said. I touched a finger to his big glass paperweight. It was like touching a bubble of solid ice. I picked it up, liking the feel of it in my palm.
“Listen,” he said, watching me. “Why don’t you come with me? To Brighton?”
“Oh, no–”
“It’ll be good for you. Change of scene and all that. You can amuse yourself during the day and come to the functions at night.”
I groaned inwardly at the thought of all those academics and their endless, impenetrable conversation, the way they all seemed middle-aged, even if they weren’t; the glasses of cheap white wine in plastic cups; the dehydrated sandwiches and sad little bowls of crisps laid out on scratched formica-topped tables. I imagined myself standing next to Matt on the periphery of each group, trying to yawn with my mouth closed.
I tried to sound regretful.
“Darling, I would but...I don’t really feel up to socialising.”
“You’ve just been to dinner with Becca. Put that thing down darling, please, and don’t fiddle.”
“That’s different,” I said, putting the paperweight back on the desk. “She’s my best friend. I don’t have to–”
“Don’t have to what?”
“Nothing,” I muttered. I picked up the paperweight again.
“No, what?”
I put the paperweight back down with a loud clack.
“I don’t need to pretend with her,” I said.
“Mind that, you’ll break it. What do you mean, pretend? You don’t have to pretend with my friends. Do you?”
I felt very tired suddenly. “It doesn’t matter, I didn’t mean it. Let’s just forget it.”
He opened his mouth and then reconsidered.
Despite my mood, I felt a spasm of drunken desire. We hadn’t made love since before the funeral. In fact, not since the day of Angus’s death, an hour after the phone call from Mrs. Green. Sex with Matt could be such an escape and that day, that was all I needed; to be as far away from reality as I could possibly be. I’d made him fuck me over and over again, until he collapsed, gasping, and said ‘no more’; until I was raw with it, a welcome physical pain to take my mind off the other, deeper kind.
But Matt didn’t make love to me that night. I lay awake beside him in the darkness of our bedroom for a long while, listening to him breathe, locked away from me in a thicket of dreams. I turned on my side and tried to empty my mind. Eventually, I did sleep, and dreamed again of Jessica, although not of the rocks and the monster. In the dream, we were riding our bikes along the harbour road in Penzance. Jessica pedalled faster and faster – she flew further away from me, as if her bike had wings. I watched her blonde hair flutter behind her as she dwindled in my vision.
I woke up suddenly. I’d been pedalling in my sleep – the covers were bunched and twisted about my legs. I had to pee and I was thirsty.
After my visit to the bathroom, I drifted to the kitchen to pour a glass of water. I didn’t turn on the light. The kitchen was lit with an orange glow from the streetlamp outside and the plane tree outside the window tossed its branches in a night breeze, the flickering shadows of its leaves moving across the kitchen counter. I shuffled into the living room and went to the window, idly twitching aside the curtain.