The Stepmother (15 page)

“Subtle.”

“As a beginners' violin class.” I frowned, remembering the strangely solemn children we'd had staying with us the previous Wednesday. “I'm doing something wrong.”

“Give them time,” said Ben. “It's impossible not to love you.” I squeezed his hand and was reminded how much strength my friends gave me. And how much I'd missed him.

“James asked me to marry him. They're not going to get any time.”

“You think it's a bit premature?”

“Oh, I don't know. The rest of my life might not be enough time. But if that's the case, should I do it at all? Does anyone like their stepmother?”

“Of course they do.”

“Who?”

“You want a name?”

“Yes.”

“Well, not Cinde-fucking-rella.”

“No,” I said, laughing in despair. “Not her.”

“So what was it? Cloud-writing, hot-air balloon, Jamie Theakston asking you live on air on James's behalf while you had tea in bed in the morning?”

My shoulders dropped.

“Oh, no,” said Ben, with a grand smile. “He messed up.”

“You could say that.”

“Thank God. Couldn't have been worse than mine.”

“You asked Sasha in Paris, Eiffel Tower. You're going to tell me now she had vertigo?”

He pulled a face. “That was the second time.”

You think you know a person…“What was the first?”

“Not my finest hour.”

“Please tell me. You'll make me feel so much better.”

“You ever tell Sasha I told, and we're finished.”

“I hear you. Now, spill.”

“Six o'clock in the morning, off my tits on E—”

“What?”

“I had a brief purple patch. Anyway, stripped down to jeans, all sweaty and jittery, I shouted my proposal outside her bedroom window, then slipped into some semiconscious state and had to be taken to a hospital to have my stomach pumped.”

“Nice.”

“She swore me to secrecy.”

“Not a hard one to keep.”

“No. Absolutely humiliating. But I meant what I'd said.”

“I always thought the Eiffel Tower was a bit over the top. Now I understand you had some ground to make up.”

“And did you note the size of the diamond?”

“Often.”

“Okay. Your turn.”

“Northern Line. Eight fifty-three a.m.”

“Late!”

“Exactly.”

 

T
HAT NIGHT
I
WENT BACK
to my flat happy, thanks to Ben. What did the tube matter? What did surly kids matter? Kids
were
surly, they answered back, had tantrums, sulked. I shouldn't take it personally. All that mattered was the question and who had asked it. My James Kent. Salt-and-pepper Man was going to marry me. I heard his familiar rata-tat-tat on my door and ran to open it. I threw myself around his neck and clung to him like a monkey. We struggled toward the sofa, with him holding me, an enormous bouquet of flowers, and a bottle of vintage champagne. I realized I wasn't making his life easy, but now he was here I didn't want to let go.

“I'm sorry I didn't say yes immediately,” I said.

“You did. I've forgotten the rest.”

“I couldn't be happier,” I said, kissing him all over his face.

“Good. Because you make me very happy.”

“I'm getting married!”

He smiled. “I know.”

“Exciting, isn't it?”

“Very. Have you spoken to your parents?”

“They rang a couple of times today, but I'd like to tell them in person. Maybe this weekend?”

“They might not be able to wait till then.”

My eyebrows rose.

“I met your dad for a drink last Thursday.”

“He didn't tell me he was coming to town.”

“I went to Oxford.”

“Why?” I was being slow. “Oh!”

James smiled.

“You asked my eighty-four-year-old dad for permission to marry me? I'm pushing forty, for heaven's sake.”

“Well, I did it for—” James stopped. Coughed. “Tradition's sake. I thought he might like it.”

That wasn't what he'd been going to say, but I buried that knowledge far behind boxes of tulle, silk, and choices of bouquets. “What did he say?”

“He said it was up to you, of course. But I wanted to ask him anyway.”

“No wonder they've been calling!”

James squeezed out from under me. “So, Mrs. Kent, how about a drink?”

I stood up. “Ms. King would love one.”

James crossed his arms. I uncrossed them.

I grabbed his hand. “I don't want to be the Second Mrs. Kent.”

“There are a few others, you know. My sister-in-law, Faith, my mother…”

I pulled him toward me, rose on tiptoe, and kissed the end of his nose. “You know what I mean.”

“I fell in love with Tessa King. You'll always be Tessa King to me.”

“I'll drink to that,” I said and opened the bottle.

After that we foolishly let the champagne get warm.

 

L
ATER WE LAY HEAD-TO-TOE IN
a deep bubble bath and toasted our happy future.

“How will you tell the girls?”

“I thought we should do it together on Wednesday night.”

“Don't you think it would be better to tell them by yourself in case they don't like the idea? They won't be able to say anything if I'm there.”

“Tessa, when are you going to understand that those children think you're great?”

I didn't want to tell him he was wrong. “It's quite quick.”

“Too quick?”

“Not for me. But it's a lot for them to take in.”

“Children adjust better than adults.”

“At least tell them on your own. I can materialize when they've asked you all the questions they'll want to ask you and might not if I'm there. It's important they don't feel I'm taking you away from them.”

“They need to know we're a united front. I've made that mistake before.”

“We will be. But let them have this last thing with you on their own. And until then we don't tell anyone.”

“Okay, wise girl, though that'll be hard. I want to tell people on the street.” He kissed my foot.

“What about Bea?”

“Well, that's a bit tricky.”

I sat up. “I thought you said she—”

“Tricky because she already knows.”

“What?”

I could tell James knew he'd made a mistake, because he reached out of the bath for the bottle and refilled my glass. Diversionary tactic. It didn't work so well on adult women.

“Well, I mean, I told her I was going to ask you, so it won't come as a surprise.”

It surprised me! I'm sure that in my logical right brain, or wherever logic is supposed to reside, I was thinking, break it to her gently, in stages, warn her of what lay ahead. Bring the ex on-side. Very sensible. But all I could think about was that James had told his beloved Bea, his confidante, the woman he had stayed talking with long into the night before he'd told me.

“Tessa, she feels bad about what happened. She just wants me to be happy. And I am. And that makes it better for her, don't you see?”

“I guess,” I said, though it sounded a bit cockeyed to me.

“Then, of course, you'll have to meet the rest of the Kent clan. They'll love you, I know it. Mum's offered to host an informal gathering on a Saturday when we have the girls.”

“Your mother.” I grimaced. “What's she like?”

“Well, she has a particular way of doing things.”

“Okay,” I said, none the wiser. “Do I bring my parents?”

“'Course. The more the merrier. That's our motto.”

“What about some mates for backup?”

“Why don't we leave that for the engagement party?”

“Engagement party?”

“Well, you don't want to be meeting all the cousins for the first time on your wedding day.”

“How many do you have?”

“Twenty-seven.”

I swallowed hard and felt fear for my little three. “Big wedding,” I said.

“Great wedding.”

I felt myself being drawn in. “We could cover the orchard at Mum and Dad's with a marquee, keep the dwarf pear trees on the inside, and cover them with fairy lights.”

“You've thought about it, then?” James seemed pleased. I didn't realize I had to alter my response accordingly. I was a novice. Learning on the trot.

“It's what I wanted to do for their ruby wedding anniversary. But Mum wasn't very well that year so we shelved the idea. I calculated we could seat about eighty.”

“After family, that doesn't leave much space for mates,” said James, a little tense.

“Well, since all those cousins went to your first wedding, perhaps they wouldn't mind missing out this time.”

Too late, I saw I'd made a mistake. James put his glass on the side of the bath. “It's got cold,” he said.

“I'll put some more hot in.”

“Actually I forgot to phone someone back. They're waiting for an answer.” He stood up. “Won't be a second.” The water disappeared. I felt exposed. He wrapped a towel around his narrow hips and, leaving watery footprints behind him, went to find his phone. I sat in the shallow, cold bath. I hadn't meant it to sound so barbed. I just wasn't thinking. If anything, it was supposed to be funny. Ha-ha. But what did I know of the conflicts involved in facing an aisle for a second time?

 

W
E PUT THE INCIDENT BEHIND
us, or rather brushed it under the carpet. Then, a few days later, on a crisp, cold night, James wowed everyone by collecting me from work on a Virgin taxi bike. It spoke volumes to me that I hadn't shared a Valentine's night with anyone since I was eighteen and a hippie on a beach in Vietnam had presented me with a dreadlock as a sign of undying love. I had spent a long time loving a man I couldn't have, because it was safer that way. It had taken me more time again to work out that living in a precarious world was better than no life at all.

I didn't know where the bike was taking us, but as we passed the Brompton Cemetery, I had my first inkling. “A bit of making out behind a
tomb?” I shouted through the helmet when we stopped at traffic lights. “Or a certain sexy hotel nearby?” He gave me a thumbs-up. I blew him a kiss. The location of our first date. Hopefully, it would end better this time.

 

I
T WAS A SET PIECE
. I assumed a room was booked, but didn't ask. Pink champagne at the bar. Everyone else a couple. The first thing I noticed was that there wasn't a lot of noise among my fellow lovebirds. In fact, the whole place felt a little tense. Well, we weren't going to be like that. Except it's quite hard to be normal when twelve other couples are listening to your every word. After a few hideous false starts about our day, which sounded so trite in the echoing silence, we, too, fell quiet. The music was atrocious. Every cheesy love song ever written on Pan pipes. Why didn't I know this when I was single? Why didn't someone tell me that Valentine's dinners were awful and cheesy and I was better off with a DVD and a takeout?

Pink crab pâté arrived in the shape of a heart. I laughed. A couple of women looked daggers at me. We did our valiant best, but the oppressive mood of the place swallowed any joy. It was simply impossible to be romantic to order. One couple was arguing. Thank God. At least it gave us something to talk about. But even that lost its amusement value when I realized that the poor girl was being dumped and not, as she'd hoped, proposed to. She left in tears.

“James,” I whispered.

He looked like a fish out of water. This was his Eiffel Tower. And all I wanted to do was jump.

“I don't care how much this costs, but I'm paying the bill and we are getting out of here.”

“What?”

I mimed slicing my neck. “I'm sorry. I did this to you, and thank you for trying, but let's get the fuck out of here before it kills us.” I said all this in a throaty whisper.

“You can't pay,” said James.

“Watch me.”

I stood up. Walked to the maître d', told him I wanted to settle the bill and leave. Then I returned to the table, punched in a PIN number,
and that was that. We were free to go. “Sorry,” I said to the manager. “It's just too—”

“Don't worry. Worst night of the year. Chef's just won the pot.”

“Pot?”

“How long before someone leaves in tears. Chef had thirty-six minutes. He was bang on. Have fun.”

I took James's arm and we walked out into the night. We found a kebab house on the Fulham Road, ordered chicken kebabs with extra chili sauce, and walked, leaving behind a trail of spotted sauce on the pavement. It was bliss. It was fun. It was us. And I was happy. I couldn't wait to show him his Valentine's present.

 

T
HE LIGHTS WERE ON IN
the front room. I looked at James.

“It's okay. My sister Lucy's there.”

I saw my slow striptease vanish before my eyes and immediately a lump settled in my throat. I hadn't met any of James's siblings.

Lucy was James's younger sister. I stopped walking. “You didn't tell me.”

“Well, Bea needed bailing out, so the kids are at mine. I didn't want to cancel and, luckily, Lucy had no plans.”

“Why didn't you tell me?”

“Well, you've been so brilliant about making time for the girls recently that I knew you'd want to come home and see them, and I was determined to have our night.”

“Want” was one interpretation. James walked up the path and put the key into the lock. I felt sick.

“Jimbean!” said a pretty, blond girl in the hall.

“Lucy, this is Tessa.”

She walked toward me and I put out my hand. She brushed it away and gave me a kiss. “Great to meet you, he doesn't stop talking about you.” She smelled of patchouli oil. “I'd love to stop and chat but I've got a date.”