Marian Keyes - Watermelon (16 page)

The disappointment was so painful that I could hardly stammer out, "No, that's all right, thank you."

And I hung up the phone.

I stayed sitting on Mum's bed.

I didn't really know what to do now.

It had been such an ordeal to ring him. It was such a hard thing to do. And then, in spite of myself, I had been excited about talking to him. And he wasn't even there. I had gallons of adrenaline coursing through my body, making prickles of sweat break out on my forehead, making my hands wet and

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shaky, making me light-headed, and I just didn't know what to do with it.

And then the thought just struck me, where was James?

Please don't tell me that he's gone on vacation.

On vacation?

How could he go on vacation when his marriage was breaking up? Had broken up, in fact.

Maybe he's on a business trip, I thought desperately.

I half thought of calling the receptionist back and asking her where James was.

But I stopped myself. I wasn't going to throw away the tiny bit of pride I had left. Maybe he's sick, I thought. Maybe he has the flu.

I probably would have welcomed the news that he had terminal cancer. Anything, but don't let him have gone on vacation.

The thought of him having a life without me, the thought of him actually enjoying that life, was deeply unpleasant.

He mustn't have a care in the world, I thought, my imagination running wild. Probably off with his fancy woman in some exotic resort. Drinking Pi�a Coladas from Denise's shoe. His life resonating to the sound of champagne corks popping and fireworks exploding and surrounded by music and happy people, wearing party hats and decorated with streamers, dancing past him, whooping and doing the conga.

While I was freezing in this March weather, I became fully convinced that James was living it up in some very expensive Caribbean resort, where he had fourteen houseboys and a private swimming pool and the air was scented with frangipani blossoms.

I had no idea what frangipani blossoms were like. I simply knew that they regularly appeared in this type of scenario.

"Oh dear," I thought, swallowing. I certainly hadn't expected to feel like this.

Now what do I do?

Mum marched into the room with a huge bundle of freshly ironed clothes in her arms.

She stopped in surprise when she saw me.

"What's wrong with you?" she demanded, looking at my white, miserable face.

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"I called James," I told her, and burst into tears.

"Oh Lord," she said, putting the pile of clothes down on a chair and coming over to sit beside me.

"What did he say?" she asked.

"Nothing," I sobbed. "He wasn't there. I bet he's gone on a vacation with that fat bitch. And I bet they flew first-class. And I bet they have a Jacuzzi in their bathroom."

Mum put her arms around me.

And eventually I stopped crying.

"Do you want a hand putting the ironing away?" I asked Mum in a snivelly and tearful voice.

That made her look really worried. "Are you okay?" she said anxiously.

"Yes," I said. "I'm fine."

"Are you sure?" she said, still not convinced.

"Yes," I insisted, a bit annoyed.

I was fine.

I had better get used to feeling this upset, I decided.

Because it was going to happen a lot. At least until I came to terms with the fact that it really was over with James.

All right, so I really did feel awful now.

Hurt and shocked.

But in a while those feelings wouldn't hurt so much. The pain would go away.

So I wasn't going to take to the bed for a week.

I was going to square my shoulders and get on with things.

And I'd call him on Monday.

That'd be a really good time to talk to him. He was bound to be feeling really miserable then anyway, what with being back at work and having the postvacation blues and jet lag. I was trying to cheer myself up by pre- tending that I would be glad to see him being miserable.

And if I didn't think too hard about it, it would work for a little while.

"Right then, Mum," I said determinedly. "Let's put these clothes away."

I went purposefully over to the pile of freshly ironed clothes on the chair. Mum looked a little bit blown away as I started to quickly sort them out.

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I picked up an armful and said to Mum, "I'll put these in Anna's drawer."

"But..." started Mum.

"No buts," I told her soothingly.

"No, Claire..." she said anxiously.

"Mum," I insisted, quite touched by her concern but determined to pull myself together and be a dutiful daughter, "I'm fine now."

And I left her bedroom, making for Anna's.

Mum's door swung shut behind me. So her voice was muffled when she called out to me. "Claire! For God's sake. How am I going to explain to your father why his underpants are in Anna's drawer?"

I was on my knees in front of Anna's chest of drawers.

I paused in what I was going.

I wasn't putting Dad's underpants in Anna's drawer, was I?

I was.

I realized that I had better move them. Because there was no way that Anna would realize that there was anything unusual when she changed her underwear and found herself wearing huge, baggy men's briefs.

Assuming that she did in fact change her underwear.

Or wear underwear at all, now that I came to think of it.

I was sure I'd heard her going on about clothes--especially under- clothes--being a form of fascism. Vague talk of air needing to circulate and skin needing to breathe and needing to feel liberated and unrestricted just led me to suspect that underwear and the wearing thereof might not feature highly on Anna's list of priorities.

With a martyred sigh, I gathered up the bundle of underpants.

139

I was meeting Laura for a drink that evening.

I'd better give you a little bit of background here.

Laura, Judy and I were in college together. And we have been friends ever since.

Judy lived in London.

And Laura lived in Dublin.

I hadn't seen Laura since I fled from London, minus a husband and with a baby, but I had spoken on the phone to her a few times. I told her I was far too depressed to see her.

And because she was a good friend, she didn't get all huffy with me, but told me not to worry and that I would feel better eventually and that she'd see me then.

I told her that I would never feel better and that I would never see her again but that it had been lovely knowing her.

I had a feeling that she had rung Mum a few times over the past month to make discreet inquiries about the state of my heart (still broken at the last checkup), my mental health (still very unstable) and my popularity (at an all-time low).

But she hadn't pestered me, and for that I was very grateful.

But now I was feeling a good deal better so I called her and suggested meeting in town for a drink. Laura sounded delighted at this idea.

"We'll get plastered," she said enthusiastically over the phone.

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I'm not sure whether this was a suggestion or a prediction. Either way it was a foregone conclusion.

"I'd say we will all right," I agreed, if our encounters over the past ten years or so were anything to go by. I was feeling quite alarmed. I'd forgotten what an unbridled hedonist Laura was--she could have shown those Ro- man emperors a thing or two.

Mum said she would be only too delighted to look after Kate.

After dinner (microwaved frozen shepherd's pie, not too bad actually), I went upstairs to get ready for my first social outing since my husband left me. Quite an occasion. A bit like losing my virginity or making my first Communion or getting married. Something that only happens once.

I hadn't a stitch to wear.

I began to feel very sorry and very foolish indeed about the martyrish way I had left all my lovely clothes behind in London. Behaving like a condemned man on his way to the gallows, crying dramatically, saying my life was over and that I wouldn't be needing clothes where I was going.

I was left with no option but to misappropriate some of Helen's things. She would be annoyed. But she was annoyed with me anyway for the al- leged flirting with her boyfriend, so what did I have to lose?

I started to riffle frantically through Helen's hangers. Honestly, she had some really lovely clothes.

I felt the sap rising, the old juices start to flow.

I loved clothes.

I was like a man who was dying of thirst in the desert, who unexpectedly stumbles across a fridge full of ice-cold 7-UP. I had spent far too long in that nightgown.

I found a little wine-colored dress in her wardrobe. That'll do nicely, I thought as I clambered feverishly into it. I went back to my room and looked at myself in the mirror, and for the second time in two days I was surprised and delighted with what I saw.

I looked tallish and slimmish and youngish.

Not a bit like a single parent.

Or a deserted wife.

Whatever they're supposed to look like.

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With a pair of woolly tights and my boots I looked pleasingly girlish (ha!) and innocent (double ha!).

And, if the dress was a little bit too short for me, exposing an alarming amount of my thigh (what with Helen being a good deal smaller than me), then so much the better.

Then I piled on the makeup. I was quite excited about going out--I'd forgotten what fun it was.

Gray eyeliner and black mascara made my eyes look really blue. And with my newly washed shiny hair I was very pleased with the overall effect.

Of course, Mum wasn't.

"Are you going to wear a skirt with that top?" she asked.

"Mum, you know perfectly well that this is a dress, not a top," I told her calmly.

Nothing she could say or do would stop me from feeling good about myself.

"It might well be a dress on Helen," she acknowledged. "But it's too short to be anything but a top on you."

I ignored her.

"And did you ask Helen if you could borrow it?" she said, obviously hell-bent on destroying my good mood. "Because I'll get the flak from Helen. You won't care. You'll be in town with your rowdy friends knocking back the Malibu or whatever it is you drink. And I'll be here, being shouted at by my youngest daughter. And it's not like any of us are in Helen's good graces at the moment anyway."

"Oh shut up, Mum," I told her. "I'll leave a note for Helen explaining that I've borrowed it. And when I get my clothes from London she can borrow some of mine."

Silence from Mum.

"Is that okay?" I asked her.

"Yes." She smiled. "And you look lovely," she added grudgingly.

Just before I left my bedroom to go downstairs, a glint from the dressing table caught my eye. It was my wedding ring. I had forgotten to put it back on after my shower. It lay there winking up at me, obviously eager to get out of the house for a bit. So I went over and picked it up. But I didn't put it on. My marriage is over, I thought, and maybe I'll start to believe

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it if I don't wear my wedding ring anymore. I put the ring back down on the dressing table.

Of course it was furious--it just couldn't believe that I wasn't going to wear it. And then it was upset. But I didn't give in. I couldn't afford any sentiment. I decided to leave before the recriminations started. "Sorry," I said shortly, turning my back, switching off the light and walking from the room.

Dad was watching golf on the television when I went in to him to borrow his car keys. I think I gave him a bit of a fright when I finally managed to wrench his attention away from the men in the plaid pants.

"You're very glamorous," he said, looking startled. "Where are you off to?"

"Into town to meet Laura," I told him.

"Well, don't get the bloody car vandalized," he said, alarmed.

Dad came from a small town in the west of Ireland, and although he had lived in Dublin for thirty-three years, he still didn't trust Dubliners. He thought that they were all petty criminals and thugs.

And he seemed to think that the center of Dublin was like Beirut. Except that Beirut was far nicer.

"I won't get it vandalized, Dad," I told him. "I'll leave it in a parking lot."

But that didn't calm him down either.

"Well, make sure that you pick it up by midnight," he said, getting very agitated. "Because all the parking lots close then. And if you don't get it, I'll have to walk to work in the morning."

I forbore from telling him, but only just, that he wouldn't have to walk anywhere in the morning if I got the car impounded. That there was actually nothing stopping him from borrowing Mum's car or using public transport.

"Don't worry, Dad," I assured him. "Now give me the keys."

He reluctantly handed them over.

"And don't go changing the radio station. I don't want to turn it on in the morning and be deafened by pop music."

"If I change it, I'll change it back," I sighed.

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"And if you adjust the seat forward make sure you move it back again. I don't want to get in in the morning and think I've put on loads of weight in the night."

"Don't worry, Dad," I told him patiently as I picked up my coat and bag. "See you later."

It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than to borrow the car off Dad.

As I closed the sitting room door behind me I heard him calling after me, "Where are you going without a skirt?" but I kept walking.

It was awful leaving Kate. It was the first time that I had gone out without her and it was a real wrench. In fact, I nearly brought her with me but then I realized that she'd be spending enough time in noisy smoky pubs when she was older, so no call for her to start just yet.

"You will check on her every fifteen minutes," I said tearfully to Mum.

"Yes," she said.

"Every fifteen minutes," I emphasized.

"Yes," she said.

"You won't forget?" I said anxiously.

"No," she said, starting to sound a bit annoyed.

"But what if you're watching something on TV and you get distracted?" I suggested.

"I won't forget!" she said, sounding definitely annoyed. "I know how to look after a child, you know. I have managed to rear five of my own."

"I know," I told her, "it's just that Kate is special."

"Claire!" said Mum in exasperation, "'will you just bloody well go!"

"Fine, fine," I said, quickly checking that the baby intercom was switched on, "I'm going,"

"Have a nice time," called Mum.

"I'll try," I said, bottom lip trembling.

The drive into town was nightmarish.

Did you know that if you listen hard enough everything sounds like a baby crying? The wind in the trees, the rain on the roof of the car, the hum of the engine.

I was convinced that I could hear Kate crying for me, al-

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ways faintly, nearly out of earshot. It was unbearable, and I very nearly turned the car around and went back home.

If it wasn't for Common Sense making a guest appearance in my head, that's probably exactly what I would have done.

"You're being ridiculous," said Common Sense.

"You're obviously not a mother yourself," I retorted.

"No," admitted Common Sense, "I'm not. But you've got to realize that you can't be with her every moment for the rest of her life. What about when you go back to work and she has to go to day care? Well, how are you going to cope then? Just think of this as good practice."

"You're right," I sighed, calming down for a moment. Then panic gripped me again. What if she died? What if she died that night?

Just then, like an oasis in the desert, I spotted a pay phone. I swung the car over, much to the annoyance of the drivers behind me, beeping their horns and shouting things at me, the heartless bastards.

"Mum," I said tremulously.

"Who's this?" she asked.

"It's me," I said, feeling as if I was going to burst into tears.

"Claire?" she said, sounding outraged. "What the hell do you want?"

"Has anything happened to Kate?" I asked breathlessly.

"Claire! Stop this! Kate is absolutely fine."

"Really?" I asked, hardly daring to believe it.

"Really," she said in a nicer voice. "Look, this does get easier, you know. The first time is the worst. Now go and enjoy yourself and I promise that I'll call you if anything happens."

"Thanks, Mum," I said, feeling a lot better.

I got back into the car and drove into town and parked the car (yes, in a parking lot) and went down to the pub to meet Laura. She was already there when I arrived, and it was wonderful to see her. I hadn't seen her in months.

I told her she looked lovely, because she did. She told me that I looked lovely. Although I'm not sure whether I did or not.

She said that she looked like an old hag.

I said that I looked like a dog.

I said that she didn't look like an old hag.

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She said that I didn't look like a dog.

Pleasantries over, I went to get us some drinks.

There were several million people in the pub. Or at least that was how it felt. But Laura and I were lucky enough to get seats.

I suppose I must be getting old. There was a time when I would have cheerfully stood, pint in hand, in the midst of all these people, being swept along like seaweed in the tide. Not minding that the person I was supposed to be talking to was now several yards away and that most of my wine was spilled on my wrist.

Laura wanted to know all about Kate. And I was only too happy to tell her.

When I was younger I'd promised myself that I would never turn into a baby-bore. You know, the kind of people who go on and on about their baby and how she smiled at them for the first time today and how beautiful she is and all that, while all around them people are twitching and going into spasms of boredom. And I was a bit alarmed to find that that's exactly what I was doing. But I couldn't help it. It was different when it was your own baby. The only thing I can say in my defense is that when you have one yourself you'll know what I mean.

Maybe Laura was bored out of her skull, but she did a very decent im- pression of being interested in Kate.

"I'm dying to see her," she said. Gamely, I thought.

"Why don't you come out this weekend?" I said. "We'll spend an after- noon together and you can play with her."

And then Laura wanted to know what giving birth was like. So we dis- cussed that in gory detail for a while. Laura started to look a bit sweaty and faint.

And then, of course, we moved onto the main item on the agenda. The real business of the evening. The main feature. The star act.

James.

James Webster, the Incredible Disappearing Husband.

Laura had all the details already.

From a variety of sources--my mother, Judy and a lot of other friends. So she didn't really need to know what had

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happened. She was more interested in how I was now and what I was planning to do.

"I don't know, Laura," I told her. "I don't know whether I'll go back to London or whether I'll stay here. I don't know what to do about my apartment. I don't really know what to do about anything."

"You'll really have to talk to James," she told me.

"Oh, don't I know it," I said. Slightly bitterly, I must admit.

So we discussed my responsibilities for a while. And we hazarded guesses as to what my future was going to be like.

Then I got a bit distressed talking about that, so I changed the subject and asked Laura who she was currently having sex with. It was much more entertaining talking about that, let me tell you, especially as it turned out that the lucky recipient of Laura's current sexual favors was a nineteen- year-old art student.

"Nineteen!" I shrieked, at a decibel level that caused glasses to shatter in the hands of several startled drinkers in a pub about half a mile away. "Nineteen! Are you serious?"