A Hundred Pieces of Me (33 page)

‘It’s already coming off by itself,’ Nick pointed out. ‘In most of the rooms.’

‘Have you two been rehearsing this routine?’ asked Gina, amused. ‘Lorcan, if you get Ryan to make me some tea, I can ask Nick all about plastering while he’s photographing.’

‘I don’t know.’ Lorcan raised his hands at Gina. ‘You models and your diva demands.’

‘We’re worth it. Milk, no sugar. ’ And Gina let Nick steer her towards his makeshift studio in the drawing room.

Lorcan’s team had already started to prepare the areas of the Magistrate’s House that didn’t require building consent for the first stages of repair work. The hall parquet was protected with plastic sheeting, and the stairs had polythene covers over their twisted oak banisters to shield them from the drills and barrows being marched into the downstairs rooms. Most of the panelling in the hall had been removed in sections so the old walls underneath could be patched up with new timber and fresh plaster where they’d decayed. Gina never ceased to be amazed at how simple even the most magnificent houses were beneath the polished wood and paint. Just lime and horsehair, wood and nails, like every other house.

The drawing room where Nick was working was shrouded in dust-sheets (‘good natural reflectors’); he’d set up a trestle table with a couple of chairs in the wide bay window that looked out onto the far end of what would have been – and might still be - the croquet lawn. There wasn’t much sun and the borders were overgrown but, even so, Gina’s imagination supplied a padded velvet seat round the three sides of the window, with deep chintzy sofas, and tea on silver trays.

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ said Nick, seeing the direction of her gaze. ‘Window-seat? Right?’

‘No,’ Gina lied. ‘I was thinking that I need to chase up the window specialists.’

She wasn’t sure why that had come out. It was
good
that Nick had the same sort of vision of the house as she did. But either he seemed to have a knack of seeing into her head or she was very easy to read, and on days like today, with Stuart’s visit playing on her mind, it made her feel self-conscious.

‘But, yes, a window-seat would be amazing,’ she agreed, unable to help herself. ‘We could put radiators underneath and get Lorcan to build latticed covers over them.’

‘I love that idea,’ said Nick. ‘Encouraging the croquet players from the comfort of inside when it’s raining. Do you want to sit down? This’ll take five minutes, then we can talk plaster. I promise.’

He cleared a space at one end of the table, stacking the camera magazines and letters into heaps, then pulled out a small velvet pouch and tipped a tangle of charm bracelets onto the table. He took a few shots of them in a pile on the white background. Then, at his suggestion, Gina slid them onto her wrist one at a time while he took close-ups of the charms and the links.

Nick murmured instructions, and she spread her fingers, picked up a cup, balanced her hand at an angle, watching the light fall onto her skin. As with the eggs, Gina had the strange sensation of seemingly seeing her hand and wrist for the first time.

Funny how that knobble on the wrist looks so delicate, she thought. When it’s actually a reminder of the solid bone underneath.

‘Nice manicure,’ Nick observed. ‘Going somewhere glamorous tonight?’

‘Thank you. And no. The only thing in my diary is my ex who’s coming round to collect a box of stuff tomorrow night.’

It had slipped out. She frowned at herself.

But Nick didn’t react, just carried on clicking away. ‘I see. Is it for his benefit? Does he notice things like that?’

‘No. I always do my nails.’

‘Why’s that? Don’t they get chipped, working in places like this?’

She hesitated. There was a reason why her nails were always neat, but it was personal: her favourite oncology nurse had encouraged her to wear dark varnish to strengthen her nails during chemotherapy – and to give herself something to do in all the hanging around. Her nails had split and ridged during the treatment, but Gina had persevered with creams and oils until they grew back. She never talked about her treatment at work: it had hovered over her like a label when she was at the council. But Nick sounded genuinely interested, and something about their closeness, yet lack of eye contact, made it slip out.

‘I was advised to keep my nails covered with varnish while I was having chemotherapy,’ she said. ‘If they go black, it stops it being so noticeable too.’

‘Really?’ He didn’t react to the mention of chemo, just nodded. It made her more inclined to go on.

‘Yup. I liked having nice nails when everything else seemed to be falling out, or making me throw up. It made me feel less . . . grey.’

‘I like that colour. What do you call it?’

‘Parchment.’

‘Appropriate.’

Gina picked up her mug of tea with her other hand and sipped from it. ‘I like greens and blues but, as you so correctly observed, it’s easy to chip on a building site, and I think it’s important to be chip-free, as a project manager.’

‘I agree,’ he said, without taking his eye from the viewfinder. ‘Although, in my old-fashioned book, you can’t beat red nail varnish.’

‘A red
nail
,’ Gina corrected him, as he turned her charm bracelet, so the little heart charm was uppermost, nestled in the hollow of her wrist. A bright drop of scarlet enamel, like blood. ‘The correct fashion term is “a red nail”. Like “a bold lip” or “a smoky eye”.’

‘I’ll remember that. Next time I’m photographing a top model.’

It felt intimate, Nick’s close focus on her hands, their no-eye-contact conversation. Their voices had dropped not quite to a whisper but lower than normal, as if the camera were a third person they didn’t want to distract.

And then he looked up, straight at her. His grey eyes were merry, she thought, randomly – merry, like the Merry Monarch. Hooded, long-lashed Jacobean eyes.

Gina’s mind went blank. Say something else about fashion singulars. She wasn’t even a fashion person. All she could think of was ‘a trouser’ and that sounded . . . too flirty.

‘So when did you have chemo?’ He sounded interested, but not nosy.

‘Six years ago. I had breast cancer. They caught it early, blasted me with the worst chemotherapy in the world, put me on Tamoxifen, and now it’s in remission. Touch wood.’

‘Glad to hear it. Touch wood.’

Nick moved as if he were about to raise his head, and Gina felt an urge to change the subject before he looked at her in a new way. She didn’t want to see him examine her for signs he might have missed before.

‘So, is Amanda back this weekend?’ she blurted, the first thing that came into her head. ‘She must be curious to see what’s going on.’ I’m getting enough emails about it, she added to herself. She assumed Nick was getting them too, as he was cc’d into most of them; something she found a bit odd.

‘Sadly not.’ Click, click. ‘She’s got a meeting with a different client in New York on Friday so she’s going to stay in Paris an extra night, then fly out there. Easier than driving here, driving back, getting an early plane. It’s OK,’ he added, ‘I’ve been Skyping her in the evenings, showing her what we’ve been up to.’

‘And she’s happy?’

‘Very happy. Well, as happy as you can be when it’s not very exciting.’

‘I know,’ said Gina. ‘It takes a while to get to paint charts. So will you be spending the weekend pulling plaster off the walls?’

‘Of course! Isn’t that what everyone does at the weekend? No, I’ll probably go back to London for a few days. Leave the plaster removal to people who know what they’re doing.’

Gina wondered why she felt a bit disappointed by the reminder that Nick didn’t really live here. This was just their country weekend place. Why should he stay here on his own?

‘It’s a good chance to catch up with all the friends Amanda’s not keen on.’ Nick waggled his eyebrows conspiratorially. ‘OK, to be honest, I might stay here and pull plaster off the walls. Lorcan’s shown me the special tool. It’s surprisingly addictive. One more. Splay your fingers.’

He took a final photo of the charm bracelet, and Gina relaxed, picking up her tea out of shot. While she was sipping it, Nick lifted his camera and took a single photo of her. ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘I couldn’t resist. You looked so funny. Here, I’ll show you, don’t panic.’

He turned the camera round so she could see the image. There she was, face half hidden by the white mug, her eyes above it, round and brown like a Manga heroine’s, and her hand stretched out with the charm bracelet dangling languidly from her skinny wrist.

Her wrist wasn’t skinny: it was just how Nick had shot it. Her, but not her. Her seen by someone looking at her and only seeing what was there.

‘It’s one of those moments I was talking about the other day,’ said Nick, seeing her expression. ‘The first cup of tea after a boring photo shoot. Treasure it.’

‘You didn’t take a Polaroid,’ she said.

‘No, I didn’t.’ He paused. ‘Do you want me to?’

‘Um. Yes.’

But when he got the camera out of the plastic crate of equipment under the table, Gina held out her hand for it. He hesitated, then handed it over.

The last time Gina had taken a photo on a Polaroid had been at Naomi’s fourteenth birthday party: it had been her and Naomi, crowding into the frame at arm’s length, wearing Minnie Mouse ears. She’d stayed over because Naomi’s brother Shaun had slipped them four bottles of Diamond White and Janet could detect alcohol on Gina’s breath from the other end of the street.

‘Say cheese,’ she said to Nick, and he grinned obediently.

The camera whirred and clicked, and the flat slip of film slid out.

‘I don’t like having my photo taken,’ he said, as she shook it around. ‘And contrary to popular belief, by the way, you don’t have to shake it. Like a Polaroid picture.’

‘No?’

‘No. The professional way to speed it up is to stick it under your armpit.’

‘I’ll remember that.’ She stuck it under her arm, then checked the image: there he was, photographer Nick, photographed. Looking right up at her, his smile broad but more self-conscious than in real life. The empty house in the background and the off colours of the old film stock blurred the time period. There was something faintly Seventies about the drawing room now.

She’d framed the photograph well: he was plumb centre of the shot, his shirt neck open at the perfect angle to show the hollows either side of his throat. Gina hadn’t noticed it in real life but as she stared at the photo she noticed the two tanned indentations, shadowed on his smooth skin, framed by the checked cotton. There was something very masculine about them. The bones under the skin again – delicate but strong.

‘Good picture,’ he said, leaning over to see, and she caught a whiff of the smell that had seemed so familiar the first time they’d met outside. It was like something she already knew. Probably just his shampoo, she told herself.

‘Thanks,’ she said.

The following day, Stuart rang the doorbell at dead on six o’clock, and Buzz darted into his basket in the corner of the kitchen, where he’d been hiding while she hoovered the flat.

‘Don’t worry, no one’s coming to get you,’ said Gina, and he flattened his ears, in a way she could now differentiate from his scared ear raise.

She pressed the intercom buzzer to open the front door, and rested her knuckles on her hips as she surveyed the sitting room. It would be a shock to Stuart: this was the emptiest, whitest room she’d ever lived in. Apart from the sofa and footstool, only the bright blue vase filled with red tulips splashed colour onto the paleness. There were a few boxes left to sort through but she’d shut them in the bedroom, out of the way. The last thing she wanted was for Stuart to start scratching through them now.

Importantly, though, Gina’s flat felt like home. The sorting agony had been worth it. Everything here was hers. Not theirs. Hers.

She heard his feet bound up the stairs. Then he rapped three times on the door. Even though she was prepared, Gina suddenly felt nervous: this was the first time she’d seen him since they’d moved out of Dryden Road.

She opened the door and there he was, in his football-training kit, a bag slung over his shoulder.

‘Hey.’

Gina didn’t want to, but she couldn’t stop her eyes sweeping Stuart’s face for changes: his tawny hair was a little longer than she remembered, and there was a definite beard along his jaw, but otherwise he was completely as normal. He didn’t look a lot different from the twenty-seven-year-old she’d met at Naomi’s. Which was annoying. The least he could do, after what he’d put her through, was look as if he’d had a few sleepless nights. Instead, he had a faintly smug glow about him.

She forced a smile, and hoped it didn’t look too tense. ‘Hello. Come in.’

‘Thanks for letting me come round,’ said Stuart, politely, as he passed her, gazing at the white walls and the paintings she’d hung. He stopped at the window and stared at the vase as if he couldn’t quite place it, then turned back.

Gina decided that she didn’t like the beard: it made him look more football manager than star striker.

‘I’ve put everything in there,’ she said brightly, indicating the box on the coffee table. ‘Including the Murano bowls.’