The Kindness (32 page)

The light was falling in the street. Some branches of orange blossom she had brought in from the greenhouse unfurled a deep scent into the room. She carried the vase and set it down in front of the fireplace, switched on some lamps, turned to the mantel and fiddled with a little ivory monkey that belonged to Julian. She held the monkey to her lips and closed her eyes. If she wished hard enough Karl might just disappear. As she returned it to the shelf the light made its jet eyes sparkle with mischief. Karl was clearing his throat.

‘Is it OK if I open this wine?’ He lifted the bottle to show her. She turned and nodded, caught the twitching smile that those who didn’t know him took for shyness. He’d already found the corkscrew and a couple of glasses. She was trying to remember the last time they’d met, caught herself glaring as she thought it must’ve been when he swaggered into town with those Dutch twins for Julian to drool over.

He noticed, said: ‘Can’t we try to be friends?’ His thick eyebrows were set in the imploring triangles of a sad clown. She was instantly ashamed. He handed her a glass and she took a gulp, trying to shrug and smile as though not being friends was a shockingly false accusation.

He buried himself deeper into the sofa and raised his glass in her direction. When their eyes met they both had to look away.

‘God, I need this.’ He ran a hand inside the collar of his shirt as though loosening a noose and a sudden flare of desire made her feel guilty to be alone with him.

‘What’s up?’ she asked. ‘Why all the deep sighing?’

She was still standing and he waved an exasperated hand to the chair. ‘Do you know, it’d be really nice if you sat down,’ he said. ‘I won’t take up too much of your time because I can see you’re busy, but I’ve had a hell of a day, and now to get here and find Julian hasn’t even remembered I’m coming, well . . .’

She sat with her legs folded away from him in her peapod-green chair. Karl leant towards her, his hands planted on his knees. She was intensely aware that she must not look at him and instead fixed her eyes on the vase of orange blossom. As he spoke she started to understand the depth of his disappointment at finding Julian not there. ‘My mum is dying and there’s nothing I can do,’ he told her. ‘Julian met her once, you know. Made a big impression. She told me tonight to send her love to my friend “that Adonis”.’ Karl’s wire-rimmed specs were steaming up. ‘I got quite a shock when I flew in yesterday. Dad didn’t really prepare me for how it’s progressed. All he wants is that she can remain at home. She’s very weak now, and there’s a nurse who stays.’

‘Is there no hope?’

‘No, none at all.’ He was hunched against the arm of the sofa. Julia thought the normal thing to do now would be to hug him. He reached out a hand as though he was going to clasp her and pulled it back almost immediately.

‘Denial is only a good option for a non-medical family; ditto crystals, healers, special herbs,’ he said. ‘But
we
know only too well what stage she’s at. It’s in the dying that you most clearly see the split between the cerebral and primitive brain. The intellect knows it must eat, but it gets harder to override the rest of the body. Soon my darling Ma will be down to crème caramel and formulations through a straw.’

He refilled Julia’s glass and her fingers brushed his arm as she reached for it. She recoiled as though from static and almost spilled the wine. He took a gulp from his, and straight away another, shuffled closer so their knees almost touched.

‘It’s very hard for me to keep working through this, but I have to go to Brighton tomorrow, I can’t see any way out of it. I’ve got three papers to deliver.’

‘How long is the conference? Couldn’t you come back to London afterwards?’

‘I must be back in Rotterdam by the weekend. Oh, really, Julia, don’t look so stricken. She’s got a little way to go yet. It’s just lovely to have time with her. My mother is very elegant, even in dying. Her skin has always been beautiful, but now she’s almost luminous. She’s tiny, as light as a moth. A pale and glamorous moth engulfed by her white nightdress. Just before I left tonight my dad and Jeanette, the nurse, managed to walk her from her bed to the piano in the sitting room. My dad sat on the stool to support her and she played the piano as though she was well again, preludes and nocturnes with the back of her head on his shoulder and her eyes closed, away with the morphine fairies.’ Karl sat back, took off his glasses and wiped them with the hem of his shirt, blew his nose on a tissue from the box on the table. She was less tense when he wasn’t so close.

He gestured around the room, taking in the bright fruit of the cornicing, the ripe-mulberry walls, the oriental vase with the fragrant blossom that made him sniff appreciately at its loveliness: ‘Goodness, Julia, it feels great here. You’ve made this place gorgeous.’

‘Oh, really?’ she said, miming indignation. ‘Last time you visited you said you needed sunglasses or you’d get a migraine.’ She couldn’t stop herself.

He laughed and set his face to bashful. ‘Did I? Are you sure that was me? If it was, I was probably just jealous of you and Julian having such a lovely home when I can’t seem to settle anywhere.’

Ribbing him lightened the atmosphere. ‘Yeah, and you brought not one but two sexy girls with you. Now that wasn’t very nice, was it?’ she said, and put a chastising hand to her hip.

His smile twitched again. ‘Aw, Julia. I was just showing them the sights of London.’ And she had to restrain herself from leaping up to poke him in the ribs, tickle him, pinch him. She half rose from her chair but willed herself to back down and turn off the banter because who knew where it might lead.

He took a deep sniff. ‘That smell of heaven . . . is it those branches?’

She nodded: ‘Yes, they’re from a Madagascan orange I was pruning earlier.’

‘If you’ve got any spare I’d love to take some for my Ma.’

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘You can take these, I’ll wrap them for you.’ She rose to see to it immediately, but Karl put out a hand to stop her. His fingers gripped her arm only briefly, but she felt them long after he let go. ‘Are you throwing me out so soon? Can’t we get a takeaway or something? Or have you already eaten?’

She assembled a tray in the kitchen while he pulled the cork from the second bottle of wine. Her hands shook as she sliced bright rings from the salami. He worked out the music, put on Neil Young and shouted through to see if that was OK with her. She revived a French stick by brushing it with milk and putting it in a warm oven. She tipped cornichons into a bowl, the Camembert oozed when she released its waxy wrappings.

Karl tore the baguette and handed her a piece. She concentrated on the food but it became difficult to swallow anything other than the wine he kept pouring. He was asking about Julian, about what he called ‘his gig’ in Paris. Her mouth was chewy with bread. She gulped at the wine. She knew she had to eat in order not to get too drunk but something was overruling her usual common sense. Her primitive instincts were winning. She wasn’t putting up a very good fight as Karl refilled her glass. Her head started spinning and she retreated to the fireside chair to get away from him, turned the conversation to Julian.

‘He’s besotted with Claude De’Ath’s films,’ she said. ‘Have you seen any? No? Me neither,’ and she started giggling. ‘But he’s so excited, he’s only called once since he got there. He’s even forgotten that we’re supposed to be making a baby.’ She placed her hand on her belly, thought, why am I telling him this? But continued anyway.

Karl’s face paled. He put down his glass, stood up and sat down again.

She felt herself grow hot, said: ‘I mean it’s the right time of the month . . .’

Karl buried his head in his hands.

‘My God, Karl, what’s the matter?’

His shoulders were shaking.

‘I can’t do this any more,’ he said. ‘Oh God, Julia. This is the conversation I came here tonight to have with Julian.’ He was barely whispering. She stood and took a step towards him to hear what he was saying. He held out a hand, motioning for her to stay put. She sank back into the chair.

‘Karl, what is it?’ She tasted the first salt of tears but had no idea what she was crying about or why her heart was hammering.

His shoulders were heaving. At first she couldn’t make out what he was saying. He had to repeat it, looking straight at her. ‘Julian can’t have children,’ he said. There, he’d said it again. ‘His sperm has zero motility. I’ve seen it. I’ve actually tested it several times.’ He managed to hold her gaze. ‘Zero,’ he said, making a perfect 0 with his finger and thumb.

She burst out laughing. ‘That’s not true, Karl. That’s a terrible thing to say.’ She snapped her fingers in front of her face: ‘That’s how fast we got pregnant before. It’s only my age that’s making it take so long now.’

Karl stood up. ‘Yes, almost four years. Is that how long you’ve been trying?’

She thought she should slap him, or at least ask him to leave.

‘That’s a long time, Julia. It’s what I was trying to tell you at the zoo.’ He pointed to her stomach. ‘That baby wasn’t Julian’s.’

Twenty-eight

Peace has broken out in the back of the car: Mira is indulging Ruth by allowing her a turn with the Walkman. Mira’s face is turned to the window, though there’s not much to see through the mist. Julia twiddles through the radio stations. There’s nothing to distract her from her thoughts.

By the time she arrived at Charles de Gaulle Julia was swollen with secrets. She had never known herself cry as she cried on that flight. She had checked herself in the mirror of the airplane loo, spidery red legs shot across the pink whites of her eyes and still the tears wouldn’t stop. She pulled away the blue scarf she’d wrapped around her head. It was still damp. She’d washed her hair before leaving, there hadn’t been a choice: the strand she pulled to her mouth had tasted of the sea. There wasn’t time to dry it, she’d been an idiot not to allow longer at home. It was only at the last moment she’d wrapped and added the padlock to her hastily assembled bag. Shamefully, she had completely forgotten whatever it was she’d been intending to buy for his birthday. She’d wound the scarf around her wet hair like a turban and if she hadn’t run for the tube would’ve missed her flight. Her brown T-shirt was saggy at the neck, around her face an unruly mass of snakes. She redid the blue scarf, despaired that she hadn’t thought to dress in something lovely for his birthday. There hadn’t been a moment to think: they almost hadn’t let her through to the gate. She splashed her face with water in the pongy cubicle, didn’t have a clue what to do about the racing of her heart.

Julian was in impossibly high spirits; he came bounding towards her across the concourse with his huge grin. It was a wonder he didn’t notice her swollen eyes. Grabbing her, not her bag, which had been cutting into her shoulder, he was covering her in kisses and bouncing in his trainers. ‘Thank God you’re here,’ he said. If he’d had a tail he’d have been wagging it. ‘Mmmm. You smell delicious.’

She shifted the bag to her less-troubling shoulder, could feel herself flushing with guilt as he snuffled her neck, thinking of the bath she’d taken that morning, of how carefully she’d washed the salt from her skin and hair. He sensed no change in her as he zigzagged to the taxi queue, looping back a couple of times to embrace her. He had no reason to be anything but happy.

She eased her bulging overnight bag from her poor ancient shoulder. ‘So, twenty-five, how does that feel?’ Her voice sounded brittle and false, but he was oblivious. He put his lips to her ear: ‘Randy is how it feels right now. Let’s go straight to the hotel.’ She felt herself freeze, closed her fingers around the gift-wrapped padlock in her pocket, griping it to give herself courage. Although Paris was warm, almost muggy, she had a chill realisation that at that moment sex with Julian was something she would only be able to do if she were very, very drunk.

They came to a standstill at the taxi queue. She suggested they get the taxi to drop them close to the Pont des Arts. There was still sunshine to walk in but rain forecast later. He slid his hands to her bum and pulled her in close.

At the Pont des Arts she urged him to lock the padlock to the railings. On the plane she’d made a pact with only the devil knows who. Their love would be safe locked to the bridge, something like that. Silly.

She had to make herself stop biting her lip because she’d made it so sore willing him to do it, to throw the key to the jaded waters of the Seine. He was apologetic. He wanted to own the padlock a little longer, he said. They wandered on, getting drunker in the warm Parisian sun. She gulped from various glasses until her legs were wobbly and she had to clasp his arm and let him carry her heavy bag. She was trying to lose herself to pastis and wine. His gaze never left her.

Sometimes it was irritating, that sense of being watched, to look up from something absorbing, like a book, to find him staring at her from across a room. When she had a bath he was always there. She had been glad of the bathroom with the egg-shaped bath at Firdaws because it was the only one with a lock. At mealtimes his eyes followed the food from her plate to her lips. He blamed it on writing in dog voices, told her to thank her lucky stars he didn’t shag her leg when she walked through the door. She never once conquered the shyness she felt while he watched her undress.

The hotel in Paris was the swankiest place she’d ever stayed, him too. Dark panelling from the lifts to the bar displayed paintings of slightly debauched little boys in lace collars, pansy-eyed comtes and aristocratic papas with cruel moustaches and military honours. The faces and their gilded frames shone only by the light of candles. At various points bucket-sized vases of roses with blown petals in lingerie colours of blush, peach and cream flickered and glowed. Ornate mirrors were dappled with mercury, turning passers-by to ghosts. The hotel was so dimly lit it was an effort not to stumble around like a blind person, even the lift was muted so she couldn’t make out the numbers without her glasses, and Julian laughed and said maybe that was how the place stayed hip, by making it impossible for oldies like her, and she kicked him.