The Case of the Missing Boyfriend (32 page)

‘Hello. Can I speak to . . . um . . . my mum, please?’

‘Mum,’ he repeats.

‘Yeah. My mother.’

‘Angela?’

‘Yes. Is this, um, Saddam?’

‘Yes,’ he says. ‘Saddam.’

‘Well, um, good. Good to finally talk to you. So is she there?’

‘Yes. I give you,’ he says.

I grind my teeth as I wait for Mum to come to the phone.

After some muffled conversation and some scraping noises, she finally answers. ‘Hello, darling. I was hoping you’d call.’

‘Yeah. I got your message, so . . .’

‘So . . .’

‘So what’s up?’

‘Well, this has gone on long enough, really hasn’t it?’

I pause for a moment, swallowing my pride and then say, ‘Yeah. I suppose it has.’

‘So you spoke to Saddam?’

‘Yeah. I did. His English seems good.’

‘Yes, it’s getting better each trip. They learn so fast at that age.’

I swallow hard. I have been trying to blank the age thing from my mind. ‘So how long is he over for?’ I ask, trying to sound casual.

‘Well he has to come and go for now. Because of the visa business.’

‘Sure.’

‘But he’s been over for two weeks. He goes home on Sunday. Next Sunday, that is. Not tomorrow.’

‘Right,’ I say. ‘So everything’s still fine between you two.’

‘Oh yes, dear. Better than fine.’

‘Well, good.’

‘That’s why I called. I want you to come next weekend. Well, I wanted you to come
this
weekend really, but I expect it’s too late now you’ve waited three days to call me back.’

‘Yeah, sorry. I’ve been really busy. And I have to book a car and everything so it is probably, as you say, a bit late.’

‘It’s such a shame. That’s why I phoned you three days ago.’

‘Yes. But I’ve been really busy.’

‘It only takes a second to pick up the phone.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘So why can’t you do that? Why can’t you just call me back when I leave a message. It’s not like I call you every day, is it?’

‘No, Mum.’

‘It shouldn’t be too much to ask, should it?’

‘Probably not.’

‘
Probably
not?’ she says, starting to sound outraged.

‘Mum. Stop. It
is
too late now anyway.’

She sighs deeply. ‘But I want you to meet him.’

‘Yes.’

‘And I’ve got some . . . never mind. That can wait.’

‘What?’

‘Nothing dear. But I want you two to meet. So that we can all move on with things.’

‘Right,’ I say, rubbing the bridge of my nose with my free hand.

‘So can you come?’

‘Before he leaves?’

‘Well, yes. It would have to be Friday night.’

‘But by the time I finish work . . .’

‘Oh, of course you can come!’

‘I’m not sure, Mum. I’ve got quite a lot on at the moment. Work-wise and stuff.’

‘You said in your email that it was like a morgue.’

‘Yeah. Um. Well, it was. But we’ve got this new contract. I have to go to Cornwall. Well, Devon anyway.’

‘At the weekend?’

‘Well no. Maybe. I mean, I don’t know yet.’

‘I wish you’d just say, yes. It’s important to me.’

Behind her, I hear Saddam. He says it very quietly, but I hear him. He says, ‘Leave. She doesn’t matter. We don’t need.’

And with the realisation that allowing myself to be relegated to
not needed
isn’t going to increase my power to influence my mother one iota, I quickly re-evaluate my position. ‘OK, Mum. Of course I will,’ I say in my warmest tones. ‘I’ll have a word at work and juggle some dates around.’

‘Excellent. Friday, after work?’

‘Saturday. I’ll book a car and be there by lunchtime, OK?’

‘Friday would be so much better dear, because—’

‘Mum, I can’t.’

‘Can’t or won’t?’ she says. ‘Because I really don’t see . . .’

‘Mum!’ I interrupt. ‘I’ll come on Saturday. Or not at all. You choose.’

‘Where did you get to be so stubborn?’ she asks. ‘It must come from your father, because you certainly don’t get that from my side of the family.’

I pull a face and think that it’s a good job we don’t have videophones yet. ‘So I’ll see you on Saturday?’ I say.

She coughs. ‘OK, Saturday then. But Saturday morning. And you’ll stay the night?’

Again, I hear Saddam: ‘No, not Saturday night. I must get to airport early on Sunday, remember.’

And I hear myself say, ‘Yes, Mum. Of course I’ll stay the night. We’ll have all day Sunday to talk that way.’

After I hang up I sit and stare at the phone for a while and wish I still had a brother to discuss this all with. And then strangely, as if he hasn’t been dead for nearly twenty years, I hear Waiine say, ‘
As long as she’s happy, who cares?
’

And the answer is that
I
care.

On Sunday I bravely phone Norman as well.

He can’t talk, he says, but offers to take me to dinner on Friday.

So as Guinness and I sit down to choose my third film of the weekend, I think, with dread and hope all mixed up, that whatever happens, at least next weekend isn’t going to be like this one.

All I have to do is get through another week.

Test Drive

I get to Indian Zing ten minutes late. The second I enter the restaurant I see Brown Eyes seated against the far wall. He is suited again, but has removed his tie. He also has a newly sprouting beard.

‘Hiya,’ I say, trying not to look at his chin; trying to remember what he looks like without it. ‘Sorry I’m late, but my taxi got stuck . . .’

‘No problem,’ Norman replies, half standing and then settling back into his seat as I hang my coat over the back of the chair and sit myself.

‘So what’s with the disguise?’ I ask, unable to resist trying to find out if the beard is a permanent thing or not.

‘Disguise? Oh, this?’ Norman says, rubbing his beard and smiling. ‘You like it?’

I shrug. ‘Not sure,’ I lie.

He shrugs. ‘I thought maybe you weren’t going to turn up. To get your own back on me for cancelling last time.’

‘Not my style,’ I say.

‘Sorry about the work garb,’ he says. ‘But . . .’

‘It’s Friday night,’ I say. ‘I just came from work too.’

‘Well you obviously make more effort with your work clothes than I do,’ Norman says with a wink.

I’m wearing a French Connection ensemble. I smooth a hand across my skirt. ‘Well, it’s easier for guys, isn’t it? It’s jeans or a suit really. Or combats, I suppose.’

‘Yeah, I suppose it is. So what work do you do again?’

‘I work in advertising, well . . . if you can call it work.’ Norman frowns so I continue, ‘Oh, it’s just so calm . . . nothing’s really happening at the moment. It’s quite worrying really.’

‘The slowdown?’

‘Yeah. It’s hitting us hard. I spent most of this week reading the newspapers online. But that’s depressing too.’

‘It’s hitting everyone hard. They’re laying people off at my place too.’

‘What is it you do again?’

‘I’m in IT.’

‘Right,’ I say. And then I cock my head to one side. ‘I thought you were in social services . . . Halfway houses or something.’

Norman purses his lips and shakes his head. ‘No. IT,’ he says, flatly.

‘Weird.’

‘Well, IT generally fails to impress the girls, so I tend to gloss over it.’

‘Well, I know what you mean. Advertising doesn’t always get the warmest reception.’

‘No?’

‘No. One guy told me it was about selling crap to people who don’t need it.’

‘A bit extreme,’ Norman says.

‘Well yes. And a bit true as well.’

‘I guess.’

‘It’s really strange,’ I say. ‘I’m sure you said something about halfway houses.’

‘Maybe I was configuring a network for one. There have been so many jobs since then I don’t really remember. April, wasn’t it?’

‘Something like that, yes. March, I think.’

He licks his lips and then coughs. ‘So the slowdown is really hitting you,’ he says again.

‘Yes.’

‘Right.’

And then suddenly I can’t think of anything else to say. My brain is perhaps too occupied analysing the meeting to come up with fresh subject matter.

There’s a vague sense of expectation in the air, a little unease, partly caused by the new bearded face. But mainly, this doesn’t, for some reason, feel much like a date. Maybe it’s because it’s just taken us too long to get this far.

A waitress crosses to our table and asks us if we’re ready to order. ‘Not quite yet,’ I say, pulling a sheepish grimace and opening the menu. ‘Have you eaten here before?’ I ask Norman.

‘Yeah. Quite a few times. The Kharphatla is lovely. Aubergine and prawns. And this chicken stew thing.’ He leans towards me and points at the item on my menu. His beard is very close to my face. I can smell his cheap cologne.

‘Right,’ I say. ‘Well, I have no idea really, so I’m happy to go with those two.’

‘Good. Me too,’ he laughs.

He waves the waitress over again and orders the dishes for both of us along with a bottle of house white. Being ordered for feels unfamiliar and vaguely quaint.

As we sip our wine and begin on the starters, I (because of my doubts) toss a few more questions at Norman about his job. But he answers so confidently that I decide I must have got the halfway-house thing from someone else. It’s maybe a little shallow of me, but as he tells me about his (dull) job, he starts to become more of a Norman in my mind and far less of a Brown Eyes. I rather liked the idea that he did something social.

After the starter, which is really pretty sumptuous, Norman makes a trip to the loo. On his return, he hesitates, hovering awkwardly beside the table.

‘Busy?’ I ask.

‘No, I erm . . . I’m regretting not doing something when you arrived. I’m regretting not giving you a peck. Because now I have to spend the whole evening trying to work out when I can slip that first kiss in.’

‘There’s a scene in a Woody Allen film about that.’

‘Is there?’

‘Yeah,’ I say.

‘How does it get resolved?’

‘Um, they kiss.’

‘Right,’ he says.

I look up at his expectant smile and spot a tiny piece of bread lodged in his beard, and physically shiver.

I cough. ‘Just sit down please,’ I say.

Norman shrugs cutely like a schoolboy caught-out, and takes his seat. ‘I’ll take that as a “no” then shall I?’

I shrug back. ‘Take it as “a maybe, but definitely not yet.”’

‘Right,’ he says. ‘Sorry. It’s just that different people have such different rules about that stuff . . . It’s hard to know
what
you’re supposed to do these days.’

‘No worries,’ I say, a little impressed at his ability to express the situation so eloquently.

And then, for two whole minutes, silence reigns. I try to think of a subject, anything other than the weather, but momentarily my mind’s a blank.

Eventually Norman speaks, ‘Rubbish weather we’ve been having,’ he says, and I almost laugh.

‘Yes. Too much rain. Especially at the weekends.’

‘Yeah.’

‘I sometimes think I need to go and live somewhere sunny.’

‘What, like abroad?’

‘Yes. France, or Spain, or somewhere.’

Norman raises both eyebrows and nods slowly.

‘Not your cup of tea then?’

‘No,’ he says. ‘No, it wouldn’t suit me.’

We sit again in awkward silence until Norman thinks of another subject. ‘Weren’t you going to some weird exhibition or something when we last met?’

I nod slowly. ‘Good memory,’ I say.

Norman smiles. ‘Well, I have some failings, but bad memory isn’t one of them.’

I decide that I rather like the way his eyes wrinkle when he smiles. It makes him look lived-in. If I can just keep my eyes away from his furry mouth . . . ‘Yes, it turned out to be a
very
weird exhibition,’ I tell him. ‘A gay friend took me.’

He nods. ‘So you’re gay friendly,’ he says. ‘That’s good.’

I frown. ‘Is it? Why’s that then?’

‘Oh, no reason,’ Norman says, pushing his lips out. ‘My little brother is gay, that’s all.’

I laugh. ‘Well, as long as
you’re
not . . .’

He looks at me questioningly, so I expound: ‘I’m just a bit fed up with getting crushes on guys who are batting for the wrong team.’

Norman nods and then slips into a grin. ‘No worries there,’ he says. ‘Feel free to crush away.’

I frown. ‘I didn’t mean . . .’ I say.

‘I’m teasing,’ he laughs. ‘Relax.’

‘Right,’ I say. ‘Anyway . . .’

‘The exhibition,’ Norman prompts.

‘Yes. Well. It was a Latin-American photographer. From Colombia. And the photos were a bit saucy really. They all had a bit of an S&M theme.’

Norman raises an eyebrow. ‘Really,’ he says.

‘Men in harnesses and stuff.’

‘Right. No women then?’

‘A few. Oh, you mean the photos? No, well, the photographer – he’s called Ricardo Escobar – he’s gay as well I think, so . . .’

‘Right.’

‘The guy I went with – my friend from work – he ended up posing for him.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes, he tied him to the bottom of the stairs, made him wear a doggy mask, and did oil paintings of him.’

‘Wow,’ Norman says. ‘So he paints too.’

I nod, a little surprised that the ‘wow’ was apparently prompted by Ricardo’s artistic abilities rather than his pervy ways with models.

The main course arrives and the conversation stalls again, but this time for a good reason. The chicken ‘stew,’ which turns out to be a Kerala chicken curry, is absolutely sumptuous. ‘Jesus, this is good!’ I murmur.

He smiles and winks at me again. ‘I may not know much, but I know about curry.’

‘Do you cook as well then, or . . .?’

‘Yeah. I love to cook,’ he says. ‘I don’t do it so much these days because . . . well, for many reasons, really.’

‘Being in Newcastle all the time?’

‘Yeah,’ he says. ‘That kind of thing.’

I smile and fork another mouthful. ‘The chicken is really juicy,’ I say.

‘Yeah. I always use organic chicken myself. That makes it even better. You get a much meatier taste.’

‘Sure,’ I say.

Despite his poor start with cancelled dates, dull-as-ditchwater job, and failed request for a beardy kiss, Norman is shifting back to becoming Brown Eyes again. He smiles a lot (which I’m a sucker for), he’s reasonably self-effacing which I like, and he cooks to boot. With organic meat! And of course, best of all, he still has those brown eyes – big enough to skinny dip in.