Which, to Carole’s way of thinking, was an extremely odd thing to say.
Carole had spent the rest of the following day putting it off. Gulliver had no idea why he had had an extra-long walk that afternoon, but he was delighted anyway. By the evening, though, Carole knew there was no escape. She’d made the decision and she had to go through with it.
Carole Seddon had an almost photographic memory for figures and especially phone numbers. She could still remember most of the numbers she had dialled regularly during her Home Office career, and at home never resorted to the use of the storing facility or quickdial on her phone. There was one number, however, to which she had never given houseroom in her mind, so she was forced to look it up in her address book.
He answered straightaway.
“David, it’s Carole.”
“Ah yes. Stephen said you might be calling.”
So the stage management had been busying away on both sides of the divide. His voice, even in the few words he had spoken, opened a Pandora’s box of unwelcome emotions, but Carole pressed on. This was just something that had to be done. “I’m meeting up with Gaby’s parents next Tuesday.”
“Yes…erm. So I gathered.”
She always forgot about the ‘erm’ until she heard it again. David’s erm was a nervous tic. He uttered very few sentences that didn’t contain at least one. Carole remembered the agony of anticipating its inevitable appearance, like waiting for the second shoe to fall. He hadn’t seemed to do it when they first met, at least not so much. But when their relationship soured, as David became more nit-picking, the erm-rate increased. It was like a symptom of his fastidiousness, a necessarypunctuation while he selected his next word. Carole had forgotten how much the erm had infuriated her.
“Well, I was thinking,” she soldiered on, “if I am going to meet Marie and Howard – ”
“You won’t find them any problem,” David reassured her. “They’re…erm…well, they seem to be very good people.”
Good? If ever there was a word that damned with faint praise, thought Carole. “What are they actually like, David?”
“Well, it’s…erm…They’re difficult to describe. But you won’t dislike them. They’re not difficult or…erm…” But this erm failed in its function. David didn’t seem able to find a word that encapsulated the Martins.
Carole’s anxiety about the following Tuesday’s encounter increased. But even that wasn’t as distasteful as the task she was about to perform.
“David, we’ve been apart for quite a long while now…”
“Yes,” he agreed cautiously.
“…and we’re both grown-up people…”
He didn’t deny this.
“…so I’m sure we would be able to meet up now without any particular animosity.”
“Oh, yes, I’m…erm…I’m sure we could.”
Carole felt she was floundering. The breezy words she had planned to say to him didn’t seem to be coming out right. She tried to get control of herself and as a result sounded too forceful when she announced, “The point is that we’re definitely going to meet on the fourteenth of September, when – for both Stephen and Gaby’s sakes – we really must present as united a front as we can.”
“Oh, certainly.”
“And no petty animosities between us must be allowed to spoil their big day.”
“I couldn’t…erm…agree more, Carole.”
“So I was thinking we ought to meet before then – just to talk – clear the air.”
Again the words came out too aggressively. Carole knew she sounded hectoring, the archetype, in fact, of the nagging wife. But David didn’t seem fazed by her manner.
“I was…erm…going to suggest the very same thing myself,” he said.
“Good. Well, do you want to fix a time now?”
“Erm…”
She remembered another infuriating habit of her ex-husband’s. He was very bad at making arrangements on the hoof. She had always had to plant the idea of a social engagement, then give him a little time to assimilate it. A few days later, once he had taken the suggestion on board, he would then raise the subject himself and be ready for the fine tuning of dates and times.
Wishing to give him time to go through this essential routine, and by now desperate to get off the phone, Carole said quickly, “Think about it. Get back to me after Tuesday, when I’ve met the Martins.”
“Yes. I think that would be…erm…a good scheme.”
“Fine. I’ll hear from you then then. Goodbye, David.”
At least, Carole thought as she put the phone down, the idea has been broached. I have reestablished contact – that was always going to be the most difficult one.
But ‘difficult’ is a relative term. She wasn’t actually looking forward to the subsequent contacts that would inevitably follow.
Four
Jude hovered by the front door. In her hand was the brightly woven African straw basket she used for shopping. She was dressed in her usual warty style – a long Indian print skirt in burgundy tones, a voluminous amethyst silk jacket over a pale pink T-shirt. The blonde hair was held up by an insufficiency of chopstick-like wooden pins.
She looked across at the sofa. In the last forty-eight hours Gita had gained a bit more colour, but still did everything in a kind of slow-motion lethargy. She had retained the jogging bottoms, but the trainers had given place to smart grey sandals, and the tracksuit top to a well-cut loose denim shirt (whose sleeves were still long enough to hide her bandaging). There was the lightest of foundations on her face, a touch of mascara and a dash of pale lipstick. It wasn’t her full working war paint, and the white central streak was still in her hair, but it was a step in the right direction.
“I was just off to the shops, Gita. Anything you need?”
This prompted a sleepy smile. “You know there isn’t anything I need.” Her speech was still a littleslurred, as though the words were too big for her mouth.
“Well…”
“And it’s very unlike you, Jude, to be so indirect.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning that what you’re really saying is: ‘Gita, are you sure you’ll be all right on your own here while I go to the shops?’”
“All right.”
Jude parroted, “Gita, are you sure you’ll be all right here on your own while I go to the shops?”
“Absolutely. My emotions are so damped down by the medication that I’d hardly react to the news of an imminent nuclear holocaust. I’m OK. You don’t have to worry.” She gestured to the pile of women’s magazines on the sofa beside her. “I’ll be quite all right here, reading very slowly, checking out the opposition.”
Gita was a journalist; a feature writer. A very good feature writer. Or at least she had been until recent events.
“That’s good,” said Jude. “Well, I’ll have my mobile with me if…”
“If what?”
“If you think of anything you need at the shops.” There was another tired, wry smile from Gita.
“Meaning: ‘If you suddenly feel bad and need me’.”
“Well…”
“This is really most unlike you, Jude. Look, OK, we both know what I did, but I can assure you I’m not about to do it again.”
“No.”
“And my staying here with you – for which I am more grateful than I can say – well, it’s not going to work if you’re constantly afraid of letting me out of your sight.”
“No. Right. I accept that.”
“Good. Off you go.”
With a surprisingly sudden movement, Gita reached for her handbag. “Ooh, there is something I want you to get at the shops.”
She handed across a twenty-pound note. “Convert that into Chilean Chardonnay, will you? My contribution to the Woodside Cottage domestic economy.”