In Too Deep (21 page)

And then I see Susan outside in the grounds, walking back up towards the hotel along the path that meanders through the lawn, ending at the sheep field and the woods at the bottom of the slope. She’s with someone and, as they draw closer, I see it’s the boy from the photograph. Her son is even more good-looking in real life – tousled hair, a broad grin, lightly stubbled cheeks blooming with a tan – and I can’t help the pang of jealousy seeing mother
and son together as they veer around the outside of the building.

I knock back the rest of my drink and get the waitress’s attention as she walks past. I order another, a double this time, and when it arrives I force myself to concentrate on the day’s news.

‘Where’s that lovely daughter of yours?’ Susan’s voice is close, making me jump. She and her son are standing either side of the table, making escape from the window seat tricky. The bar has filled up in the last twenty minutes.

‘Oh . . . hello.’ I look up, smiling, glancing between them. ‘She’s gone up to the room,’ I say as pleasantly as I’m able. ‘Or she may have gone outside with Cooper.’ I make the bluff for Hannah’s sake, knowing what it feels like not to want company.

‘Hopefully we’ll catch her later then,’ Susan says, making the word ‘catch’ sound far more sinister than it need be. ‘This is my son, Tom,’ she goes on proudly.

We shake hands. ‘Very pleased to meet you,’ I say. ‘You have a lovely home.’

Tom makes noises about being lucky to live here, how he misses it when he’s away.

‘And this is such a lovely place to sit and relax,’ I say, hoping she might get the hint. While I enjoyed her company last night, I feel like being alone right now.

‘Do you like the fabric?’ she asks pointlessly, as if she’s trying to delay leaving. She runs her fingers down one of the curtains. ‘Phil actually helped me choose it.’

‘And if you knew Dad, you’d know that’s a minor miracle,’ Tom chips in, laughing. His voice is soft and deep, and I can’t help wondering what Jacob would sound like now – how tall he’d be and if he’d have started shaving.

Suddenly I’m struck by huge regret. We shouldn’t have come here, to the place Rick chose. It’s too soon. Cancelling the booking and forfeiting the money would have been the right thing to do, or I could have donated the break to a fundraising raffle.

I force a smile, making a pointless comment about men and interior design, but the way Susan looks at me makes me feel even more uncomfortable.

‘Come on, Mum,’ Tom says, nudging her. ‘Let’s leave the poor lady to enjoy her drink.’ He grins and shoves his hands in his pockets, shifting coyly from one foot to another.

‘Of course,’ Susan says quietly. ‘Will you be eating in the hotel tonight, Gina?’

‘I’ll check with my daughter, but most likely we will, thank you.’ My fingers tear at the corner of the newspaper.

Susan nods and then they are gone. I pick up the newspaper again, not really reading, rather thinking that Tom seems like a decent boy. With him and Hannah studying at the same place, it would make sense for them to at least be introduced.

I wasn’t much older than Hannah when I met Rick. We became close in such a short time – him showering
me with love and gifts and crazy surprises right from the start. Nothing was expensive, but it was the sheer thought he put into our time together that made me feel I was the only woman in the world for him.

And now it’s all gone. He’s gone.

I stare out of the window, watching as the sun sinks behind the trees, sending a dappled light across the damp lawn. Not caring who sees the tears roll down my cheeks.

Rick and I sat on the river bank. It was the end of my first day at work straight out of studying, and I was frazzled, hot, upset, and already wanted to jack in a conventional working life and become a beach bum. That’s what I’d told Rick on the phone that lunchtime, virtually in tears.

In response, a few hours later he’d pulled up at my bus stop in his ancient old Talbot and, parking on double yellow lines, he’d got out, sweeping his hand in a grand gesture indicating that I should climb in.

A broad, unstoppable grin had spread across my jaded, end-of-day face.

Climb in was correct, as Rick’s passenger door had been jammed shut since he’d bought it. ‘It was in an accident so I got it cheap’ was his explanation for buying the rusty old thing, meaning I had to get in the driver’s side, climbing and slithering over the handbrake and gear lever. It was oddly romantic, as were most things in his shabby yet endearing existence where nothing much worked, was either borrowed or blagged, often grubby, and always chaotic. I loved him for it.

‘Where are we going?’ I was relieved not to have to sit on a bus full of strangers while drenched in the misery of a disappointing first day at a job I’d taken in desperation. Working in an accountancy firm as a general dogsbody wasn’t putting my history degree to good use. Or so Dad had told me when I’d broken the news that I wouldn’t actually be working for the BBC as a researcher or even staying on for postgraduate studies. I simply couldn’t afford it.

‘Aha’ was Rick’s only reply to my question, though he did tap his nose to indicate a secret.

I knew it would be nice. I knew it would involve allowing me to erase a grotty day that could be portentous of the rest of my life if I wasn’t careful. And I knew the idea would have come from Rick’s heart.

‘I’ll just have to stick it out until something else comes along,’ I told Rick as we stretched out, watching the river. I was trying to convince myself about the job. By this point, Rick seemed preoccupied. ‘I’ll look in the papers every week, apply for everything going.’

I could do better than filing and number-crunching, and certainly better than dealing with petty cash and making a continuous round of tea for the partners. But jobs were scarce and aged twenty-one and with little experience, I couldn’t be choosy.

‘That’s my girl,’ Rick crooned behind me. I could tell he was thinking about something else. Perhaps some
one
else.

The river bubbled a few feet away as we sat in the shade of the overhanging trees. Rick had driven us out of
the city and half an hour later we’d ended up in the most perfect spot just a short walk down a track leading out of a small village. The pretty glade was deserted, and I wondered how he’d discovered it.

The city heat and thrum of the office had baked my bones, drummed into me what the rest of my life could be like if I wasn’t careful. I desperately wanted to paddle. But I was feeling too lazy to even prise off my shoes as I lay back against Rick. He was loosely plaiting my hair, and the feel of his fingers, the warmth of the sun through the canopy of trees, was bliss.

I reached out beyond the rug and picked a daisy. One by one I pulled off its leaves, running through the rhyme silently in my head.

He loves me, he loves me not . . .

‘I have to go away,’ Rick announced.

I dropped the petals on my skirt. My day – filled with bossy know-it-alls – was suddenly insignificant as my sleepy eyes snapped wide open. The dragonflies and midges that had been softly buzzing in the late-summer sun now seemed like annoying wasps. I batted them away.

‘What . . . where?’ I sat up, leaning on my elbow, twisting round to face him.

‘Up north for a bit.’

Deep down I’d worried about this happening. I just hadn’t banked on it being so soon after our graduation. We were both still living separately, me having found a tiny flat with one of my college friends, though Rick and
I had been making plans over the past couple of years. Plans that involved both of us.

‘Where up north?’

‘Edinburgh,’ he said.

‘How long for?’

‘That’s the thing.’

Rick let go of my hair and it unravelled. I shifted across the rug, sitting cross-legged to face him. My heart kicked up again, back to the beat of a bad day.

Neither of us was from the area originally, but the university had brought us together. Me because I was from a working-class family and the first one ever to get a degree, let alone from somewhere like Oxford. Dad wouldn’t hear of me going elsewhere once the news broke that I’d won a place at St Anne’s College. And Rick went because his family was rich and he’d spent his childhood in private education. His parents had had it all mapped out since his birth, and I’d teased him about it no end. His life’s mission was to rid himself of his provenance, deeply despising it. That’s why everything he owned was broken or second-hand, and why he drove an old banger.

‘Do your parents know?’ I asked, stupidly with hindsight, because Rick barely spoke to them. It was family politics, he’d told me, advising me not to get involved.

He didn’t reply.

‘You can’t stop me going, Gina,’ he said, blank-faced and serious. His eyes blackened. ‘There are things I need to find out for myself. Decisions to make.’ He closed his eyes.

His comment cut deep. I had no intention of stopping him. All I’d wanted was a reason, perhaps some idea of when he’d be returning in order to allay my fears about us, our relationship, but I never got one. The remains of the picnic spread out between us suddenly looked tasteless and bland.

‘I’ll support you any way I can, Rick. I just thought . . .’ I shook my head, thinking about our plans. We were in love. Deeply in love. We wanted to get a place together, knew that one day we’d marry, and had talked about children, making a life together.

‘Why didn’t you tell me before I took this horrid job?’

‘Gina . . .’ He seemed to want to tell me something, but never quite got it out. Perhaps he thought he’d already hurt me enough. I loved him all the more for it.

Then it struck me. The perfect solution.

‘I’ll hand in my notice! I won’t even go back tomorrow. I’ll come with you to Edinburgh and we’ll start new lives up there. I’ll find another job, a place for us to live. I’ll work shifts – I don’t care. Anything.’

‘Gina, no. It’s not that simple.’

Rick paused while I waited. Both of us watching the flowing water, each of us seeing different things. If there was ever a time he was going to tell me it was over between us, that would have been it.

‘We’re still young, Gina. We have to find our own way before committing.’

‘What are you talking about?’ I felt sweaty and faint.

This was nothing like the plans we’d made – the shiny
new graduate jobs we’d soon get, saving for a down payment on a house, or when we’d start trying for a family.

If it was a break-up in disguise, I wished he’d just spit it out.

‘Who is she?’ I stood up. A sandwich squashed beneath my foot. ‘Who the fuck is she?’

Rick remained on the ground, sprawled on the rug. ‘It’s not like that, Gina. It’s just me. I need to do this.’ He lit a cigarette, staring up at me, his black eyes turning velvet.

‘Do
what
?’ My voice was cracking.

‘It’s a master’s degree. There’s a strong chance I’ll get offered a PhD on the back of it.’

I turned to the river, walking down towards it. I kicked off my shoes and stepped right into the water, wobbling and staggering on the rocky bed. Rick came up beside me, beginning with my blouse, unbuttoning it, peeling it off my hot shoulders.

Later, on the rug, we lay with our fingers meshed and a bottle of wine passed back and forth. We stared up at the sky, watching it grow dark.

In the end there was no master’s or doctoral degree. And I never told him that the daisy had said,
He loves me not
.

‘Mum!’ I sit bolt upright on the bed, wiping my face and plastering over it with a smile. I didn’t think she’d be back from the bar so soon.

‘You’re crying.’ Her voice is soft and wraps around me. She sits down on the bed.

‘Not really,’ I say, though my eyes are puffy and stinging, and my nose is blocked and streaming. ‘Probably hay fever,’ I say, though Mum’s expression tells me she doesn’t believe me.

‘Talk to me.’

I reach for a tissue from the box on the bedside table. ‘There’s nothing to talk about,’ I tell her, blowing my nose. ‘I miss Dad, that’s all.’

Mum leans in to hug me, her eyes filling with tears. She smells faintly of sweet alcohol – the scent I have come to associate with her in the last few months.

‘Me too, love.’ She presses herself against me, squeezing me until I almost can’t breathe. ‘Maybe we shouldn’t have come.’

I shake my head, knowing how much this break means to her. ‘I just want everything to be how it was. I want none of this to have happened.’

My head rests on her shoulder and I listen to her heartbeat. The safe sound of a mother, so comforting to a baby in the womb. My tears fall silently.

After that first kiss in the doorway, Tom and I saw each other often. We didn’t share any modules as our courses were wildly different, but we made sure that we spent as much time together as possible over the next couple of weeks. It felt so natural being with him, as if we’d known each other for ever.

‘It’s not cooked,’ Tom said, wrapping his arms around my waist while nuzzling my neck.

‘God, get a room, you two,’ Karen muttered.

‘You’re just jel.’ I brandished the spatula at her. ‘And I’ve got the chicken covered, OK?’ I said to Tom, kissing him again as his face came round to mine.

We ate at the big table in the communal kitchen, chatting with my flatmates as they came and went – some surviving on bowls of breakfast cereal three meals a day, while others at least attempted to cook.

‘You’ll make a great wife someday,’ Tom said as he ate. He winked when I gasped, my jaw hanging open.

‘I don’t believe you just said that.’ I had a piece of chicken between my teeth. I made a face.

‘A man appreciates a woman who can cook.’

‘Don’t let my mum hear you saying that,’ I said, hoping it was only a joke.

‘Don’t tell me she’s brought you up as one of those bra-burning feminists, my lovely Hannah?’

‘No,’ I said immediately, almost ashamed of what he was implying. Or was it that I was ashamed of my beliefs?

We carried on eating, chatting about what to do later, and discussing the rehearsal schedule for the play we’d both been cast in. Tom put down his knife and fork.