Secrets (18 page)

‘OK,’ she says. But when it's brewed she doesn't go downstairs and he waits awhile before bringing it up, halfway. They stand there, awkwardly.

‘Thanks,’ she says, ‘for the tea and the Transporter.’

‘I wish I could show you the Milau,’ Joe says.

‘Maybe when you're back,’ Tess says.

He laughs. ‘It's in France.’

Tess feels embarrassed. ‘Oh.’

France. France tomorrow. Tonight I almost kissed her.

‘Anyway –’

‘– anyway.’

And he knows he could take a step up towards her. He could kiss her then. Or he could reach up for her hand from where he's standing now. But there's a mug of hot tea between them and, over and above that, there's the look of startled faun about her now. The moment has passed. There's a flatness – just as her hair is now lank against her head, curtaining her expression, whereas on the bridge, it was buffeted away from her face revealing the dark sparkle in her eyes.

‘Well – night, then, Tess,’

‘Goodnight Joe.’

‘Thanks for –’

‘Thanks for finding a miracle cure for Em.’

He'd gone before she was up. Crept out earlier than he needed to. He'd slept badly; fretful dreams vexing him. He woke deciding it was crazy to have feelings for Tess. Absolute madness. For a start, he didn't know when he'd be back, when he'd have to go again. And anyway, he didn't know how long she'd stay either. And though she'd arrived with hardly anything visible to her name, he sensed she brought a lot of hidden baggage with her. And if she added hers to all of his, there wouldn't be room enough in the house for much else.

Gone to France.
Will call.
Take care.
Joe

Chapter Fifteen

Tess pretended not to notice that Joe was no longer there. She refused to give the answering machine more than a nonchalant glance each time she returned to the house. In the evening, either the television or the radio was on to bypass the taunting silence of the phone not ringing. She had his mobile number, it still shared the hook with the calendar on the kitchen door and every now and then she'd look at it quickly, as if checking the correct quota of eleven numbers. It was the only mobile phone number that she knew off by heart, yet she'd never once rung it. She lacked the confidence to phone just to say, hullo, how are you, how's France.

All of this was very different – the situation, the feelings – from simply missing someone. Missing someone causes one to feel incomplete, it's a vulnerable state. Tess had missed Em in a desperate, primal way when she'd been at work; a creeping, invasive hollowness that was only counteracted when her child was back with her. Over Joe, Tess did not feel fragile or gut-wrenched, she felt simply sad and alone because his company had recently enhanced her life. And though she currently kept the study door shut, as Joe always did when he was working, she couldn't create the illusion that he was in there. It seemed to her that, whichever room she was in, Joe was like an essential item of furniture suddenly gone. Nothing seemed quite right now. The time he'd spent at home recently had been so satisfying for her that it had shrunk her world, made it seem a safer and more intimate place; his presence had formed a moat and a drawbridge around her. It was a feeling of self-sufficiency. But with him gone, she felt cut off.

Strangely, though she had thought about Mary even while Joe had been home, her allegiance was now so firmly with Joe that whatever it was that prevented him mentioning his mother, was enough for Tess to respect. If there were sides to be taken, she was on his. Thoughts of Seb too, had dispersed as if they'd been but lively sparks from a bonfire – which have no real substance, not even ash. So it was unnerving, to say the least, to come across both people in quick succession a week after Joe's departure.

‘Laura – she's gone again.’

‘Who has?’

‘Mrs S – or in your case,
Mary
.’

‘Mary? You sure?’

‘Just checked her room.’

‘The morning room?’

‘Not there.’

‘Playing rummy?’

‘No.’

‘Sunroom? She does like the sunroom – sits herself down right in the far corner where she can gaze out to sea.’

‘She's not in the sunroom. I told you, Laura – she's scarpered.’

‘Well, we know where she'll be headed.’

‘Doesn't make it any the less a pain in the arse – I've got better things to do than chase through town for an eighty-year-old. She's crafty, that one. She never does as she's told. I don't know why you've such a soft spot for her.’

‘She's not eighty – she's only seventy-five. It's her condition that makes her seem older.’

‘Over there! Look, Laura – there she is, pegging off past Garnet Street.’

Laura had already left the room.

There was a scatter of elderly residents of the town taking the air on the elevated position of Marine Parade above the pier and beach. Laura had never become inured to their grace – their pace, the way they sat or stood, content for silent companionship, patient with each others’ witterings. Mary, however, was practically jogging. It was as if the pensioners enjoying the view were acting their age while Mary defiantly was not. She appeared oblivious to the melancholy expanse of the North Sea, the majestic dominance of Huntcliff reaching out into it, the breadth of golden sands. She was walking off with a pace and purpose at odds with both her peers and the vista.

Laura always preferred to run before she could walk – because she knew it could startle the elderly lady if she approached at speed. So she'd run until Mary was in reach, then she'd walk briskly until she was abreast when finally she'd slow down and match her stride.

There she is. There she is. Between Diamond and Pearl Streets. Laura could slow down now.

‘Mary,’ she called in a sing-song voice from a little way off, to advise her she was all but caught. ‘Mary,’ she said again, gently this time, when she came up alongside her. She touched her elbow and fell into line with Mary's pace as if they were power-limping side by side intentionally. Soon enough, Laura gave Mary a quiet but insistent pull and the old lady stopped abruptly.

‘I just want to go home, Laura dear,’ she said with great lucidity and weariness. ‘It's been so long.’

‘I know,’ Laura soothed, ‘I know.’ Then she said, Mary love – you've come out without a brolly. She passed Mary a small red folding umbrella.

Mary pulled out a patterned plastic rain hat from her coat pocket and gave Laura a look that said, you'll have to do better than that, dear.

Laura looked out to sea. A container ship almost stuck to the horizon. At this distance it looked as innocuous as a child's drawing of a generic boat. But she knew they were over a thousand feet long; she'd seen them hulking their way for fuel at Seal Sands at the mouth of the Tees. She glanced at Mary and thought how her life was like that container ship; mostly so distant that it was inconsequential though it could suddenly loom large and in pin-sharp focus and fill her mind. But it always sailed away from her until she was just an infirm pensioner, muttering to herself while she gazed out of the window in the overheated sunroom of an old-age home.

‘Well – I wonder whose brolly this is,’ Laura murmured because she often chose to appear less bright than she was – a ploy she used with the residents because she thought it was patronizing, intimidating even, to bandy her youth and savvy in their presence.

‘Elsie's, probably,’ said Mary, ‘daft old bat.’

‘Elsie is lovely,’ Laura said.

‘Or else it'll be Catherine's.’ And Mary started to laugh. ‘She's a one. She never knows where things are. She never knows where they belong. She forgets what they're for. Her fanny being a case in point.’

‘Mrs S!’ Laura protested.

‘Everyone knows about Catherine's fanny,’ Mary said and she had to stop completely because she was laughing so much, ‘not that
she
does. She didn't know when it fell right out.’

‘Mary, you're unkind – it was a prolapse. It can happen to anyone.’

‘I'm not unkind,’ Mary said very straight, quiet but sharp.

Laura wanted to say, I know you're not – it's your condition that's so unkind. Memory loss one day, inertia the next, sudden aggression or unpleasantness but, cruellest of all, acute lucidity every now and then. ‘Catherine – Mrs Tiley – can't help it,’ Laura said.

‘Nor can I,’ Mary said, stopping, ‘nor can I.’ She looked at Laura squarely. ‘I may not have had a prolapse but I know something dreadful is happening to me. They're right to call me mad or doolally. I've heard them. I feel it coming. I know I try to run away – but often it's only when you bring me back again that I know I've even been.’

Laura linked arms with her and gave a little squeeze.

‘Swallows is very comfortable, Laura dear. And you are a love. But I don't
want
to belong at Swallows. More than that, though, I don't want the mind I have now. It's like Babel in here sometimes.’ She tapped the side of her head. ‘And I'm trapped.’

‘Let's get away from this cliff – there's a strong wind today. Let's follow the road round. Let's buy a fancy something from Chocolini's. Let's not talk about sad things.’

‘Tomorrow – even this afternoon – Catherine might be talking about
me
because I may be talking claptrap again but of course I won't know it.’

‘Let's not talk about Mrs Tiley.’

‘I don't like what's happening to me, dear. It's the normal periods in between that make it so dreadful. I almost long for the day to come when I'll be permanently gaga. What fun I shall provide Mrs Tiley and the gang then.’

‘Come, Mary, be kind to yourself.’

They turned into Milton Street, the jewel streets running down from Marine Parade acting as a filter to the brunt of the slicing wind that can come off the North Sea at all times of the year.

‘There's that girl of Joe's,’ Mary suddenly said.

Laura looked ahead and saw Tess peering in through the ornamental grilles in front of the dusty old windows of Keith's Sports. ‘So it is.’

‘Haven't seen Joe, have we. Not for some time.’

‘No,’ Laura said, ‘we haven't, not for a bit.’

‘Dear!’ Mary called ahead. ‘Dear! Emmeline and mother! Emmeline and mother!’

Tess was surprised to hear her baby's name and more surprised to see who called her. She waited under the old iron and glass canopy as they approached.

‘What
is
your name, dear?’ Mary asked. ‘Laura here thinks it's Tess but I don't think that's right. Joe's girl isn't called Tess, I keep telling her. Joe's girl is called Kate. It's been Kate for a long, long time.’

Kate? Who's Kate?

Laura could see Tess trying to compute the information.

‘Not Kate,’ Tess said as if it wasn't an issue, ‘it really is Tess.’

‘Well, I liked Kate,’ Mary said indignantly, pursing her lips, which tempted Tess to say, well, Joe likes
me
.

‘Chocolini's,’ Laura said as if it was a password or peace offering. ‘You coming, Tess?’

Ice cream was a luxury and an extravagance that Tess couldn't allow to cross her mind too often. It was, however, the perfect day for one, with May so close and the weather mild.

‘Where are we going?’ Mary asked.

‘To Chocolini's – the fancy place you love,’ Laura said.

‘Would you like an ice cream, Mary?’ Tess asked, clearing her throat.

‘I'll have vanilla. A licky, not a cup,’ Mary said. ‘Kate, you are kind.’

‘Tess,’ Tess said quietly, feeling disconcerted by Kate, ‘I'm Tess.’

She had to extend the offer to Laura. And she couldn't deny Em. And it would look very strange if she was the only one not to have an ice cream so Tess rifled through her purse and paid as quickly as she could, snapping the clasp shut when she was midway through calculating what remained. Mary and Em derived much merriment swapping a lick of strawberry for a lick of vanilla and they chuckled and conversed as easily as if they were contemporaries.

‘He's gone again, has he?’ Laura asked Tess, aside. Tess nodded. ‘He didn't come by, you know, not this time. I don't know how, but she always knows when he's in town, does Mary. But he didn't come by this time, like.’

Tess felt compromised. She didn't want to consider that Joe might not be the dutiful son she'd like to earmark him as. But nor did she want to talk about Joe – she'd much rather ask about Kate. ‘He was very busy. I don't know when he's coming home. A week or so, I imagine.’ How to slip Kate in? Think of a way!

They licked their ice creams, both thoughtful for different reasons.

‘You been together long, then?’

‘Who?’

‘You and Joe?’

‘Me and Joe?’ The ice cream tasted suddenly more lovely.

‘You're an item, aren't you? Mary says you're Joe's girl.’

Tess knew she had a single chance, before confirming or denying this. ‘And Kate?’