Made in Heaven (8 page)

‘I think Mrs Ashton has some ideas,' she said. ‘She mentioned wanting somewhere “suitable”. You can hire castles, she told me. She did strike me as the castle-hiring type. She'd want to make an impression.'

‘But the young couple, what do they want?'

‘Adrian will want what Zannah wants, unless his mother gets to him first. I don't know them well enough to judge how much influence she has on him. Quite a lot, I suspect.'

‘I think,' said Val, standing up, ‘that you ought to have a say, Charlotte. After all, you've been like a mother to Joss and a grandma to the girls. I know what I'd choose.'

‘It's not your wedding, Val,' Edie said quietly.

‘I know, I know. You should thank your lucky stars you didn't see mine! Cold sausage rolls left over from the previous evening in the local pub and a family who looked like gargoyles in fancy dress. I should have known, shouldn't I? That's why I think – well, never mind.'

‘Oh go on, spit it out! You know you'll tell us in the end.'

‘I think,' Val said, ‘that we could put on a damn good show right here. In this house. The garden would look lovely. We could have a marquee.'

Charlotte nodded. ‘That's occurred to me too, but young people nowadays have their own ideas, don't
they? I swore I'd never say that:
young people nowadays
, but I do. All the time.'

*

‘Don't hang up, Lydia, okay?' Gray said. He'd found a place where the reception was perfect and the silver phone had been pumping whatever ghastly radiation it possessed into his right ear for more than half an hour. Lydia, he knew, was on a landline, in the telephone kiosk she'd described to him in their emails. He also had a clear picture of her surroundings because she'd sent him photos of her kitchen, her study, her garden, the view from her windows. He'd offered to do the same but she'd refused. She wanted, she said, to think of him in an empty room in front of a blue screen. She wanted to know, to see, only his face, so he sent her pictures of himself which she deleted from her computer after, as she put it,
learning them by heart
.

‘Listen, just listen. I see why you're cross.' Wrong word. What could he call it?
Hurt, wounded, devastated?
‘But listen. All the time I've known you, the worst thing, the very worst thing has been the thought of you and Bob together. And you have been, haven't you? Go on. Tell me your married life hasn't gone on exactly as normal. You can't, can you?'

A silence hummed at the other end of the line. Gray continued, ‘There you are then. Now get this: all that time, I've had to live with images of him smiling at you, touching you, sharing jokes with you, brushing his teeth while you're in the bath, eating breakfast with you, going to the movies with you, laughing with you, fighting with you and worst of all, in bed with you … nothing but torture. Constant torture. How would you have liked imagining
me
doing all those things? Which I've done, Lydia, make no mistake. All of them. I wanted to save you that, can't you understand? I'm married to Maureen. We're connected in ways that have to do with time and children: things you know about because they
connect you to Bob. I wanted to be a single person in your mind. I just wanted to have a universe I could go into that had nothing but you in it. No one else. And I did. Whenever I thought of you, I knew you were thinking of me all by myself, just working and writing.'

‘I know.' Her voice was not much louder than a whisper. ‘I realize you were protecting me, but now … I can't bear the thought of you lying to me. Not trusting me to be grown-up enough to deal with the truth. Perhaps you're right too. Now that I've met your wife, it's hard to get certain pictures out of my mind. I know what you mean, Gray. But I can't bear any of it any longer. All of it. And it's worse now, because of Zannah and Adrian. I had no idea Adrian Whittaker was anything to do with you. Zannah didn't mention that the surnames were different, though she did say his father was really a stepfather. I should have asked more questions, I suppose.'

‘He's my stepson and I adopted him, but he chose his own father's surname when he was a teenager.'

‘It doesn't matter. I've decided. We must stop everything. Now. At once.'

Gray nearly dropped the phone. ‘What d'you mean?'

‘Exactly what I'm saying. Nothing between us any longer. No emails, no letters, no poems. Nothing.'

‘I can't do that, Lydia. I'd … I wouldn't be able to.'

‘It won't be easy for me either, but I've promised. I told Bob that we'd only meet as Zannah and Adrian's parents in future. I'm not going to break my word.'

Gray closed his eyes. He spoke as reasonably as he could, although he was on the point of tears. He didn't cry often and when he did, he regarded it as a kind of failure. He said, ‘And the promises you made to me? Don't they mean anything to you?'

The silence at the other end went on for so long that Gray checked the reception. It was fine. He said, ‘Lydia, are you still there?'

‘Please call me Joss. Lydia's just a pseudonym.'

‘It's
not
just a fucking pseudonym!' He was shouting now. If he managed to hold back tears, this was what often happened: an explosion of frustration and rage. ‘It's my name for you. You were Lydia when I met you and that's what you've been ever since. God, I don't know what's wrong with you. It's as if it all meant nothing. You're ready to give everything up. Everything we have … '

‘What do we have, Gray, when you come down to it? Nothing. Words on a screen or on a page. Nothing real.'

‘It is to me! It's real to me!' Even though he was shouting, the tears were now dangerously close. ‘And it used to be real to you. Don't pretend it wasn't. What's your husband done to you? Has he threatened you? Tell me.'

‘No, Gray. Nothing like that. But I can't leave him and I can't jeopardize my daughter's marriage to your son.'

‘Stepson.'

‘You know what I mean. I'm not going to say a word to the girls. I don't see that it's any of their business. I've got to return to normal and I can't do that if you're still part of my life. That's it, Gray. I've made up my mind.'

‘Please, Lydia. Please meet me just once. I have to see you again. I won't be responsible for what I do if you refuse me … '

‘Are you saying you'll tell Adrian about us? That's not worthy of you, Gray. I can't believe you'd do something like that.'

‘I'm sorry. But please … don't you have to come to London for something? Please.'

‘I do have to see my editor, that's true. I could arrange something.'

‘Thank God. Next week, Lydia. I hate feeling like this. Next week?'

‘Okay. Okay.' He could hear her sighing. ‘I'll tell Bob I have to see Mal and that I want to chat to Zannah about arrangements. We did rather cut that short yesterday. Yesterday … God, it feels like a lifetime ago.'

‘I don't care about anything, now you've agreed to see me. Walking on air. Email me, Lydia. Let me know which day. I've got to square it with work. I can't wait … I can't wait to see you.'

‘I haven't changed my mind, Gray. I'm not getting back into what we used to do. It's over. You'll get one email from me telling you when I'll be in London and that'll be it. D'you understand?'

‘I'll see you again. That's what I understand.'

‘I'm going to ring off now. Goodbye.'

‘Goodbye, my darling.'

Silence. More silence. Gray listened and heard nothing but the dialling tone. He turned to call history and deleted the call, which had used up most of the money on his phone. Never mind, only a few more days and then he'd see her. He'd be able to hold her. Kiss her. She'd relent when she saw him. She must. He could feel the blood moving more swiftly through his veins as he walked towards the car-park. Better get home before Maureen put lunch on the table.

*

‘So how did it go, then, the family get-together?' Cal said.

‘Don't ask. Really, don't ask. I can't go into it now.' Zannah looked round and saw that they were alone. Emily was still in the shower and Isis was getting ready to go to Wimbledon Common with her father.

‘Bad as that, eh?'

Zannah did sometimes wonder at Cal's tolerance. He was perfectly happy for her, it seemed, to go out with Adrian, to fall in love with him and now even to marry him. How come he didn't loathe the very idea? How come he wasn't even the least bit jealous? She could still
bring back feelings of searing pain just thinking about Cal and his Russian lover and she wondered how long she'd have to be with Adrian before the pain disappeared completely. And however hard she tried, she found it impossible to dislike her ex-husband. Her college friends, her friends from home weren't always available for confessions and discussions, so she relied on Claire and Louise, her fellow teachers. They'd become very close over the last couple of years. They sat in the staff-room at school and one of the things they often talked about was amicable divorce. The others didn't believe in it, and maintained that the phrase was a contradiction in terms.

‘Wanting to strangle your ex goes with the territory,' said Claire, who taught Year Four.

‘That's my experience,' Louise said firmly, and when Zannah objected that Claire was happily married and Louise far too young and still single so how could she possibly know what she was talking about, they shook their heads, tucked into their sandwiches and declared that it was a matter of observation. You only had to look around you and it was obvious to anyone who had more than two brain cells to rub together: when love died, that was it. You hated the person who'd let you down, and if you were the one who'd done the letting down it didn't seem to make any difference.

‘I don't hate Cal,' Zannah told them. ‘Sorry. No one could hate Cal. Most people love him.'

They raised their eyebrows and muttered about ‘denial'. They were wrong. Cal Ford was lovable, and that was that. For two pins, Zannah thought, I'd pour out my heart to him right now and tell him about Ma and what happened yesterday and even pick his brains about wedding venues. He looked just the same as he always had: like a large, rather friendly dog. His brown hair was shaggy without actually covering his eyes. They were brown too, and looked out at the world in
a trusting way. He didn't care about grooming, and although he practically lived in the shower, his clothes were haphazard and he wore them to keep him warm and cover him up. Zannah never failed to be amazed that a journalist on a national newspaper could be so ignorant about matters of design and fashion. Cal claimed he never registered advertisements even when they were right there in front of him, and when Zannah had chided him for his ignorance, he would shrug and smile and say, ‘Who gives a shit about the difference between Armani and Versani? Not me.'

‘Versace,' Zannah had said, knowing it was useless.

‘Whatever,' Cal would answer, waving his cigarette around and scattering ash all over the place. He was a smoker when they were first married and only gave up when Isis was born. Recently, she'd seen him smoking from time to time, although as far as possible never in front of Isis, who scolded him whenever she suspected he'd been at the fags.

‘Daddy, I'm ready!' Isis rushed into the kitchen, her pink rucksack already on her back. ‘Let's go. Now.'

‘Hang on a mo, Icey, I'm having a word with your mum. We'll go in a minute, okay … oh, hi Em. You coming on a picnic with us, then? Go on. We're going to Wimbledon Common.'

Emily's smile, Zannah noticed, lit up her whole face. She couldn't hide it. She was thrilled to bits to be asked to join them. Zannah knew about Em's crush on Cal, even though she herself hadn't said a word. She hadn't needed to. Zannah had started going out with Cal when her sister was only sixteen and from the first time she'd laid eyes on him, it was obvious that she was besotted. She'd done quite a good job of hiding her feelings but they shone out of her eyes for anyone to see who was looking properly and Zannah was good not only at looking but at understanding what she was seeing. She'd been so in love with Cal back then, and he with
her, that Emily's crush didn't worry them. She'd never been difficult or unpleasant about it. She didn't go into a decline. She didn't let Cal and Zannah's marriage cramp her style and their parents' house was always crowded with her admirers, boyfriends, hangers-on and cronies. Em's crush was exactly the same whether she was going out with someone or not. At the moment, she had a collection of boyfriends, but no one she could ever be committed to. Zannah wondered if it was worth asking Adrian whether he knew anyone eligible, and decided it probably wasn't. Her sister had very definite views.

When Zannah and Cal had divorced, Emily wasn't much more than twenty. When Zannah had suffered her kind-of-breakdown, it was Em who had tried hard to persuade her to go back to him. She couldn't understand why one ‘lapse', which was what she called it, should mean the end of a life together. Her face had been screwed up with pain.

‘What about Isis, Zannah? She needs a dad. You can't do this to her,' Emily had said, and Zannah answered, ‘I'd never stop him seeing his daughter. You know I wouldn't. But I can't trust him. I'll just keep thinking of him with that woman. I won't be able to relax. Images will come into my mind. You don't understand.'

‘No, I don't. I think you ought to forgive him. He's asked you to, hasn't he?'

‘I can't,' said Zannah. ‘I just can't face him any more. He's not the same Cal.'

‘But you still love him, don't you?' Emily asked.

Zannah didn't answer. She could see that her sister didn't understand how it might be possible for Cal's adultery to have killed off most of the love she used to feel. It hadn't stopped her hurting like hell, but the love … that was something else. It had mutated; changed beyond recognition.