Alexandra, Gone (21 page)

“I know it sounds weird,” he said. “A bit hippy-dippy for a developer.”

“I think the fact that you’re using the term ‘hippy-dippy’ is weirder.”

Jane confided in him about her fear of living in that big house without her son.

“It’s totally understandable,” he said.

“It keeps me awake.”

“You need to start living for you again.”

“I think you need to take some of your own advice,” she said.

Tom stayed quiet for a moment. “Yes, there’s a part of me that knows you’re right.”

Jane had told him about her doomed love for Dominic as part of the apology for roaring at him the night she found him with Jeanette. He asked her about him now to change the subject.

“His marriage is over,” she said.

“He told you?”

“No, Elle did. He’s staying away.”

“Good.”

“Yeah,” she said. “It is actually, the first time in thirteen years I’ve a break from my son and his father.”

“And you’re not the slightest bit interested in how he is?”

“Nope,” she said. “I’m moving on.”

“Good for you.”

“What about Jeanette?”

“Oh don’t! I’m so embarrassed.”

“Trust me, I know how that feels.”

After they ate they walked together on Grafton Street. They stopped in front of a band playing for coins and listened to them for a while, and then they pottered on. Initially they were looking for a taxi, but as the rain had finally stopped and they were entertaining each other, they ended up walking all the way to Jane’s. She asked him in.

“I shouldn’t,” he said, looking at his watch. “It’s getting late.”

“Okay,” she said, “good night.”

“Good night.”

They both stood there rooted to the spot.

“We’ll do it again soon,” he said.

“Great.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

Tom bit his lip and Jane exhaled, and in that moment they were so close to kissing and yet so far from it. They heard the knocking and they both turned to see Rose tapping the glass. When she got their attention, she wagged her finger and pointed at Tom and gave him the finger. Jane and Tom laughed at the crazy drunk, and thankfully the moment passed.

Elle knocked on Dominic’s front door. He opened it and grinned. She walked inside, and he grabbed her by the ass. She slapped his hand, and then she ran to his bedroom with him hot on her heels. He gave chase around the bed, which she jumped over, and she ran down the hall into the spare room and around a chair. He tried to grab her, but she bobbed and weaved and ran to the boxroom, where he cornered her. They were both breathing heavily, and Dominic pinned her to the wall.

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” he said.

“That’s why it feels so good,” she said, and he kissed her and pulled at her panties, and she jumped on his hips, and if it hadn’t been for his bad back they would have finished up there but instead he finished lying flat on the floor. Afterward, when she’d returned from her shower and he was still lying there, she wondered if he was going to be okay.

“Fine,” he said, trying to make light of it.

“Good,” she said, “get up.”

He sighed and she helped him up. He rubbed his back and took two painkillers with water.

“You’re going to be the death of me,” he said.

“That’s nothing to what Jane would do to you if she found out.”

“But she won’t,” he said with alarm. “You won’t tell her.”

“No. I have as much to lose as you, if not more.”

Elle sat down at Dominic’s kitchen table and poured salt on it.

“So why are we doing this?” he asked. “And don’t say for fun.”

“Because I’m compulsive and you’d swing a leg over anything that moves.”

Afterward, when she’d gone and he was cleaning salt from his table with one hand and rubbing the small of his back with the other, he promised himself faithfully that he would not sleep with Elle again.

• • •

Leslie came out of the hospice on a Tuesday. Jim had the summer off from lecturing, so he offered to drive her home. Her spirits had picked up a little and she was looking forward to seeing her cat.

Deborah was in Leslie’s apartment cleaning out the kitty litter.

“Welcome home,” Deborah said, and she seemed genuinely glad to see her, but then again she had been feeding and cleaning up after a cat for nearly a month, and she hated cats the way some people hated iguanas.

“Thanks,” Leslie said, and she sat down on her sofa, because getting out of the car, walking to the lift, standing in the lift, and walking from the lift to the apartment had felt like a ten-mile hike.

The cat jumped up on the sofa and rubbed herself against Leslie and purred. Leslie rubbed the cat’s head and looked around at her apartment. It was good to be home.

Deborah finished cleaning the tray and made her excuses to leave. “It’s good to have you back,” she said again.

“It’s good to be back.”

When she’d gone, Leslie lay on the sofa and Jim made tea.

“Will you come out with me on Sunday?” he asked.

“Where?”

“Surprise.”

“I hate surprises.”

“Indulge me.”

“Why should I indulge you? I’m the one who’s just been mutilated.”

“Will you stop saying that?”

“It’s true.”

He wasn’t getting anywhere, so he decided to start again. “Will you come out with me on Sunday?”

“Where?”

“Leslie!”

“Tell me where.”

“It’s a garden center.”

She sat up slowly because even though she’d spent five and a half weeks lying in bed it still hurt to move.

“A garden center?”

“Yes.”

“I may be in menopause, but I’m not in my seventies.”

“It has a really good restaurant and the forecast is positive for once. The gardens are beautiful.”

“I’d rather just stay in.”

“Please.”

“Oh.” She sighed heavily. “Fine, we’ll go to your poxy gardens.”

“Great. And Leslie?”

“What?”

“You’re going to love it.” He grinned and winked at her.

She made a face. “I’ll be the one to decide that, shorty!” She laughed a little. She loved calling Jim names, and he didn’t seem to mind in the slightest.

Sunday arrived, and Jim picked Leslie up at midday. The car radio was on. Jack Lukeman was talking to a DJ about his upcoming shows.

“Oh shit,” she said. “I forgot to post them on the Web.”

“Do it later.”

“No, can’t.” She opened the door. “Wait here—it will only take five minutes.”

“Leslie, I don’t want to be late.”

“Trust me, the garden center will go on without us.”

Fifteen minutes later Jim appeared in the doorway, and he was not happy.

“Move,” he said.

“Two seconds,” she said.

“One, two,” he said, and he shut her laptop.

“Ah come on!”

“Get to the car!” he shouted, and he pointed.

“Right. Fine. Keep your high heels on.”

They were twenty minutes late. Jim was having a nightmare trying to find a parking space and he kept swearing, which was unlike him, and Leslie was beginning to wonder what the hell he was rushing for. When they finally found a parking space, he practically ran into the restaurant with Leslie following behind slowly and muttering that he was a pain in the ass.

She saw John first. Beside him his daughter, Sarah, was eating a burger and opposite them was a woman Leslie didn’t recognize. John glanced up and saw Leslie, then stood, pushing his chair back. Sarah looked up at her father and followed his eye line to where Leslie stood.

John was completely gray and his face was so lined it made Gordon Ramsay look Botoxed, and even though Sarah was sitting, Leslie could tell she was tall, like her mother, Nora. She had her dark complexion.

Jim grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the table.

John put his hand out to shake hers and she took it.

“It’s lovely to see you, Leslie,” he said.

“Good to see you, John.”

“And you know Sarah,” he said, “although the last time you saw her she was only five.”

“Hi, Leslie,” the teenager said.

“Hi, Sarah.”

“This is my wife, Claire.”

Claire offered her hand and Leslie shook it.

“It’s great to finally meet you,” Claire said.

Jim pushed a speechless Leslie onto a chair.

“I hope you don’t mind,” John said. “We were starving, so we went ahead and ordered.”

“No,” Leslie said, “not at all.”

Jim went off to get them some food, and she was left with Nora’s husband, her daughter, and John’s wife, and she hadn’t a clue what to say.

“I didn’t know that Jim had kept in touch with you,” she said after a while.

“Yeah,” John said. “Together in the trenches and all that.”

“I suppose,” she said.

“Jim told us about your operation,” Claire said. “Very brave.”

“Thank you.”

“If you think I’m doing what she’s done, you’re mad,” Sarah said to her father.

“Sarah!” he warned.

“You’ve been tested?” Leslie asked her niece.

“Not yet,” Sarah said. “Don’t want to know.”

“That’s crazy,” Claire said.

“We keep telling her it’s for her own good,” John said.

“I understand how she feels.” Leslie smiled at her sister’s child, who was a stranger to her.

Sarah smiled back, glad that someone at least had uttered those exact words.

Jim returned with food, and Leslie nibbled on it and listened to Sarah talk about her life, her hopes and dreams.

“Law, definitely law,” she said. “Dad says I could win an argument with Bono on the topic of his choice.”

“Like Nora,” Leslie said.

“Very like Nora,” John said.

“If I don’t get law I’m going to repeat until I do get it,” Sarah said.

“Good for you,” Leslie said.

“What do you do?” Sarah asked.

“I’m a webmaster.”

“Cool. What kind of websites?”

“All kinds.”

“Would I know of any?”

“A few gyms, a radio station—”

“Which one?”

“It’s a country one that specializes in folk.”

“Oh.”

“Jack Lukeman.”

“The singer?”

“Yeah.”

“Wow, I love him!”

“Really?” Leslie said. “I could take you to a gig if you’d like.”

“Backstage?”

“I’m sure I could arrange something.”

“Can I take my pal?”

“Absolutely.”

“Cool.”

“Is that okay, John?” Leslie asked.

“It’s great,” he said and he smiled at Jim, who was sitting with a big smug grin on his face.

“Hey, Leslie?” Sarah said.

“Yes?”

“You don’t know U2, do you?”

“No.”

“Okay, worth a try.”

On the way home Jim was still wearing his smug expression.

“I don’t know what you’re so smug about—that little surprise of yours could have gone very wrong.”

“But it didn’t.”

“Thanks,” she said.

“That’s what family’s for.”

“Is that what we are?”

“I like to think so,” he said.

“I’m pretty selfish.”

“What makes you think that?”

“I cut out John, Sarah, and you because I thought I was doing you all a favor, but the truth is I was just protecting myself.”

“How do you work that out?”

“Sarah is going through what I went through. She faces the same challenges. I should have been there for her.”

“So you’ll be there for her now.”

“Yeah. I will.”

“Nora would be happy,” he said.

“Yes, I think she would,” she said, lying back. “And, Jim, let’s do as you said—let’s get away to the sun in September.”

“Ha ha! That’s the spirit!”

When Leslie went to bed that night she thought about Jane, Elle, Tom, Jim, John, Sarah, Claire, and even Deborah. She had so many people in her life who cared and wanted to care. She no longer felt alone.

13
“Everybody’s Drunk”

I’ve been biding my time I ain’t that gone

maybe one or two or three or four or five or six too many

but it eases my mind and loosens my tongue,

so come on, sister, won’t you take my hand,

be my Alice I’ll be Wonderland.

Jack L,
Universe

September 2008

The plane was late, which was typical. Jane paced the arrivals area from one end to the other. As the area was about half a mile long, Elle spotted her only every five minutes or so. Elle sat and read a magazine and drank a wheatgrass shot, hoping it would negate the damage she’d been doing to herself recently. Elle was on a binge, and every other night she’d be found in a nightclub dancing on a table, her top optional. She was living on a diet of champagne and morning fry-ups, and when Rose questioned her on her late comings and goings she merely replied that life was too short.

Jane appeared and asked the time and then she was gone. Elle flipped the page, and there was a shot of Vincent and his bride, and he was holding her tummy, and she knew the woman was pregnant before she even read the caption because the bloody pose was so obvious. She wasn’t even showing and had just had her twelve-week scan.
I hope she loses it.
She turned the page. She started to read an article about being kind to feet, but the interview with Vincent was calling to her.

Read me.

No. Go away.

You want to know what I’m doing and how happy I am.

I do not. I hope you get knocked down by a bus and dragged for a really long time.

You want me to confirm that I’m in a perfect happy relationship and that the reason we didn’t work was you and not me. I’m stable and you’re a lunatic. You need to read it. You need to understand that I’m so much better off without you.

“Fuck you, Vincent!” she screamed to a room full of strangers.

The woman beside her with two toddlers picked up three bags, hung them on a double stroller, and with a child holding on to each side of the pram scurried to a place far away from the vulgar mental case. Elle put her explosion down to excessive tiredness and promised herself that she would have a bath later and then an early night.

Minutes later Jane returned and flopped down beside her sister. “I think I’ve just walked about ten miles. Where the hell are they?”

They were more than an hour late, and after her walk Jane was hungry. She turned to her sister to ask if she’d like to join her for a bit of lunch upstairs, then spied Martha arriving. Martha spotted her immediately and waved wildly and bared that awful sinister Osmonds-on-acid smile.

“Oh no,” Jane said.

“What?” Elle said.

“That woman, Irene’s mother.”

Elle looked around and saw her approaching and rubbed her hands together. “Oh yeah, playtime.”

“Elle,” Jane warned, “play nice.”

“Absolutely,” Elle said, shaking her head to suggest that she was planning on doing absolutely the opposite.

“Jane,” Martha said and air-kissed her, “you look so refreshed after a couple of months without a teenager in the house.”

“Martha,” Jane said, subdued and refusing to respond to her stupid redundant and annoying air-kiss or her barbed compliment. “This is my sister, Elle.”

Elle grinned and remained in her seat. “I’ve heard so much about you,” she said.

Martha sat in the seat opposite and removed her gloves. “All good, I hope.”

“Nope, all bad I’m afraid,” Elle said, smiling.

“Well,” Martha said, “aren’t you hilarious.”

“I try.” Elle smiled. “So, Martha, how are things with the kid you were screwing? Back together yet, or has he moved on to Betty White? I hear she’s a real goer.”

Martha got up and walked away without a word.

“You’re welcome!” Elle called after her as a grin spread across Jane’s face.

“Who’s Betty White?” Jane said.

“One of the
Golden Girls.
”

“I used to love
The Golden Girls.
Which one was Betty White?”

“Rose.”

“Ah, that’s right, a pleasant Rose. God, I wish she’d been our mother.”

Elle nudged her. “Jane.”

“Yeah?”

“Look.” Elle pointed to the arrivals gate and to her nephew, brown as a berry, his blond locks bleached white. He was waving.

Jane’s heart soared as she jumped to her feet and ran to him, managing to hurdle a suitcase in the process. They met at the barrier, and he dropped his bags, and they hugged and hugged and hugged.

“It’s good to be back, Mum.”

“Oh God, I missed you!” she said, and her eyes were full and of course she was crying because she always cried.

Elle was next to give her nephew a hug. “You look good,” she said. “Better be careful or Irene’s mother will make a move.”

Kurt laughed and looked back at Irene, whose reunion with her mother was slightly tamer and colder. Her mother air-kissed her and made her stand back so that she could look at her, and then she squeezed her for a second or so. Kurt turned to his mother and shook his head.

“Poor Irene,” he said. “I’d hate to be going back to that.”

Irene ran over to Jane and Elle and hugged them both far more warmly than she had her own mother.

“We had a ball—we’d do it again in the morning. Can you believe how well Kurt did in his exams? When we got our results we were sitting at a beach bar. Incredible. Can you believe he’s got Medicine and I’m going to be a nurse? I just scraped by, thank God. Oh Jane, this summer was the best time in our lives!”

“I can’t wait to hear all about it,” Jane said.

“I have to go,” Irene said, and she seemed a little sad.

“I understand,” Jane said. “Come for dinner tomorrow night.”

“Great. I’ll have some photos by then.”

She kissed Kurt and ran off to join her mother, who was waiting by the door.

“Are you hungry?” Jane asked Kurt.

“I’d eat a scabby leg,” he said.

“I’ll take that as a yes. Did I tell you how proud I am?”

“About a million times, Mum.”

She put her arm around her son and together they walked to the airport restaurant, with Elle in tow pushing the cart carrying his bags.

Dominic arrived at Jane’s just after six. He ran up the steps, and Kurt was waiting by the door. They hugged warmly and Dominic messed Kurt’s bleached curls. “Jesus, son, albinos have darker hair!”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“Great to have you home.”

“Sorry about Bella,” Kurt said as they walked into the kitchen.

“Never mind.” Dominic smiled at Jane. “Long time no see, stranger.”

She nodded. “Good to see you, Dominic.”

She was hoping her heart wouldn’t flutter. She hadn’t seen him in just over two months. She had not missed him once and had told herself categorically and in no uncertain terms that she was to stop loving him. She did feel a flutter—
Damn you, Jane
—and her pulse did race a little, and although this disappointed her, she managed to work out in those few seconds that even if she was still attracted to Dominic she didn’t love him. She had been glad of the distance, she had enjoyed it, and so she could live with a flutter now and then because they were only friends and that suited her just fine.

Jane cooked a family dinner to include Rose. Elle had made her excuses because Leslie needed help with something she wasn’t at liberty to divulge.

Rose promised to be on her best behavior around Dominic.

“I’m not a child, Jane. You don’t have to monitor my behavior.”

“Of course I do, Rose. You have the capacity to insult someone with a mere look. I just want this to be nice for Kurt.”

“And don’t you think I want it to be nice for Kurt? He is my grandson.”

“Fine, fine, but I’m warning you—do not bring up Bella.”

“Hmmmmmm,” Rose said.

At dinner Kurt talked about the various Greek islands he’d been to; he talked about Paris, Milan, Rome, Barcelona, and Amsterdam, at which point he shared a little knowing grin with his dad.

“I saw that,” Jane said.

“What?” Kurt said innocently.

“Don’t play dumb with me.”

“What are you talking about?” Rose said.

“Nothing,” Jane said.

“Sex and drugs on every corner, Gran,” Kurt said.

“Well, do you hear that, Janey? Maybe you should get yourself to Amsterdam. God knows you could do with something to lift both your mood and your skirt.”

“Rose!” Jane screamed in exasperation, but Kurt and Dominic were holding themselves, they found it so funny.

Rose grinned at her daughter, who mouthed the words “You are dead, old woman.”

During dessert Kurt talked excitedly about doing Medicine at Trinity. He couldn’t believe he had gotten the scores necessary, because study was so boring that mostly he’d just played computer games.

“Your mother was like that,” Rose said. “When Janey was seven she got one of those kids’ encyclopedias that were so popular in the eighties. She read it in a week and I swear you could ask that kid any question and she’d know the answer. Remarkable, really.”

“My God, Rose, that’s the first nice thing I’ve heard you say about Jane ever,” Dominic said.

“I stated a fact, Dominic, and anyway, how’s your wife?”

“Rose!” Jane warned.

“She left me,” he said.

“Good for her,” Rose said. “I’d like to propose a toast to Bella—may she find herself a half-decent husband next time around!”

“That’s it! One more word from you and you’re going back to the basement,” Jane said.

Kurt leaned back on his chair. “I really missed this,” he said. “I love you, Gran.”

“I love you too, darling.”

They clinked glasses, and he drank his beer and she inhaled her wine, and it was just like he’d never been away.

Leslie walked out of the dressing room feeling monumentally self-conscious. She was wearing a red bikini bottom and a matching red flowing top picked out by Elle. Elle had also picked out a wide-brimmed white hat, but Leslie had refused to wear it.

“Well,” she said, gesturing to the bottom and top, “can you see?”

“No, I can’t see,” Elle said. “You look lovely. I told you red is your color.”

Leslie looked at herself in the mirror. The top had enough material to conceal the fact that she had no breasts, and instead she just looked flat-chested.

“Try it on in green,” Elle said.

“It will look the same,” Leslie argued.

“No, it will be a different color and that changes the outfit utterly,” Elle said.

Leslie went back into the dressing room. Elle’s phone buzzed and it was a text from Dominic. «J
UST HAD DINNER AT
J
ANE’S
. F
EEL LIKE SHIT
. W
HAT ARE WE DOING
?????» She put the phone back in her bag. Leslie appeared in the same outfit in green.

“Looks good,” Elle said. “Buy them both.”

“Really? I feel so exposed.”

“You’re going to be on a beach, not at the opera. Buy the clothes, please.”

“Okay.” Leslie took one last look at herself and secretly she was pleased. Although without clothes her body was broken, with clothes she looked quite good for her age.
I can do this.

They spent another hour buying a holiday wardrobe for Leslie, then stopped off for coffee and a toasted sandwich in a coffee shop that Elle hadn’t been to since she was a student.

“It’s a bit grotty, isn’t it?” Leslie said.

“That’s character.”

Leslie sat on a bench and pushed the table toward Elle and fixed herself in the seat. “Since when has filth become character?” She pointed to a large cobweb in the corner.

“It’s a cobweb, Leslie, not a dangling bucket of shit.”

“And there goes my appetite.”

They were finishing their coffee when Elle confided what she was doing with Dominic.

“Two more coffees, please,” Leslie said to the waiter. “You are insane. Why would you do that?”

“I don’t know. I can’t help it. It makes me feel …”

“Feel what?” Leslie asked.

“It makes me feel, full stop.”

“Well, stop feeling because it will end in tears.”

“It was easy when Kurt was away, but now he’s back and that means that Dominic is back in Jane’s life. When Kurt was away we could pretend that it didn’t matter.”

“So stop.”

“So Jim’s all packed and ready for this sun holiday, is he?” Elle asked.

“Don’t change the subject.”

“Excited, I bet.”

“Stop what you are doing,” Leslie said.

“I know, I know,” Elle said. “Stop what you’re doing with your nephew’s father, you hillbilly lunatic.”

“Well, that wasn’t exactly where I was going, but close enough.”

Leslie was leaving for her sun holiday with Jim the next day, and she was anxious about what she would wear, how she would look, how she’d feel, whether or not it was too soon, and how they would get on. She had thought many times about pulling out, but it had actually been Deborah who managed to talk her around one day when they met in the lobby.

“Why the face?” Deborah asked.

“I was born with it.”

“Oh ha ha ha. What’s wrong with you?”

“I’m having second thoughts about going on holiday.”

Leslie got into the lift. Deborah followed her and pushed the button for their floor.

“You’re going,” Deborah said.

“I’m scared,” said Leslie, “not to mention sore, tired, and itchy.”

Deborah’s demeanor softened. “You’ve been through a lot. You deserve to have fun.”

“But will it be fun?”

“I have no idea,” Deborah said, “but it will definitely beat sitting in that apartment of yours and staring at four walls.”

Leslie sighed. “I don’t do that so much anymore.”

“Not as much, but you still do it.”