Us (24 page)

Yet undeniably there had once been a time when I made Connie laugh constantly, and when I became a father I had hoped to develop this amusing persona further. I pictured myself as a kind of Roald Dahl figure, eccentric and wise, conjuring up characters and stories out of air, our children dangling off me, their faces bright with laughter, delight and love. I never quite achieved this, I don't know why; perhaps it was because of what happened to our daughter. Certainly that changed me, changed both of us. Life seemed a little heavier after that.

Anyway, I don't think Albie ever appreciated my lighter side. I did my best but my manner was queasy and self-conscious, like a children's entertainer who knows his act is failing. I could remove the top of my thumb and put it back again but unless a child is particularly witless, this material wears pretty thin. And Albie had never been witless. When I put on funny voices to read a story, he became visibly embarrassed. In fact, when I thought about it, it was hard to recall if I had ever made my son laugh through something other than personal injury, and I sometimes wished Connie would tell him, ‘You might not appreciate this, Egg, but once upon a time your father used to make me laugh so much,
so
much, we'd talk all night and laugh until we cried. Once upon a time.'

Now, I feared the wurst.

Sadly we left before breakfast and took an early taxi through the sleeping city to Munich Airport, about which there is little to say. Picture an airport.

I dreaded England. Like a failed football team returning from some nine-nil humiliation, we sat in the departure lounge, quite unable to speak or even raise our eyes.
I'd like to apologise for my son.
Forever I would carry with me the sight of his face, the shock and shame, as if I had slapped him, which in a way I had. And it was here, I suppose, that the football team analogy broke down. We weren't a team. I was the goalie who had let in all nine goals.

Would I go back to the office nearly two weeks early? What would they say? Would they sense it? This man's holiday was so bad that it destroyed his family! They fled, actually fled; one in Holland, one in Germany. Even if I didn't go to work, even if Connie and I stayed at home with the curtains drawn, we would be tormented by the absence of Albie. As I remarked more than once, he might be having a perfectly civilised time. He had a passport, a phone, access to money, Camus and a highly sexed girlfriend; in some ways it was an enviable situation. But without knowing for sure, with those words still between us, it was impossible not to squirm with anxiety.
Apologise for my son.
Was he in some crack-den in Berlin? Drunk on a branch line in the Czech Republic, stoned in a squat in Rotterdam, beaten up in an alley in Madrid? Would he return in September, October, Christmas, at all? What about college? Would he abandon the education he had fought for, albeit rather feebly? What if Europe simply … swallowed him up?

I could no longer sit still. ‘I'm going to go for a stroll,' I said.

‘Now?'

‘There's plenty of time.'

‘I'll see you at the gate,' she shrugged. ‘Take your bag.'

There's a certain optimism in going for a walk in airports. What on earth do we expect to find – something new and enchanting? I strolled off to see what a German newsagents looked like and, having discovered that it looked like a British newsagents, was about to purchase some Soft Mints with the last of my loose euros when my phone rang.

I scrabbled in my pocket. Perhaps it was Albie. The display indicated a +39 number – Spain, Italy?

‘Signor Petersen?'

‘
Oui, c'est moi
,' I said, disorientated.

‘
Buongiorno
, I'm calling from the Pensione Albertini, about your reservation?'

‘
Ja
,
ja
,' I said, jamming a finger into my other ear.

‘I have done my best, but I'm afraid that I cannot bring your reservation forward at such short notice. My apologies.'

‘My reservation?'

‘Your change of plans. You are now arriving in Venice tomorrow night?'

‘No, no, not at all. Not for three, four days yet.' That was our plan, a train across the Alps then one night each in Verona, Vicenza, Padua then on to Venice. ‘When did he, I mean
I
, when did I call?'

‘Perhaps fifteen minutes ago.'

‘By telephone?'

Pause for the lunatic. ‘
Sì
…'

‘My reservation was for one single and one double room. Which did I ask to rearrange?'

‘The double room.'

‘For tomorrow?'

‘
Sì
, tomorrow. But we spoke about this just fifteen minutes —'

‘Did I by any chance say where I was calling from?'

‘I don't understand …'

‘And you're sure it was a Signor Petersen?'

‘
Sì
.'

Albie! It must have been Albie calling, tampering with my itinerary, trying to use our hotel reservation to save money. They were on their way to Venice after all.

‘Well,
grazie mille
for trying.'

‘So we will in fact see you in Venice in four days' time as we had previously arranged?'

‘
Sì
,
sì
,
sì
. In four days.'

‘Splendid.'

‘You've been very helpful.
Auf Wiedersehen!
Ciao!
'

I was some way from the newsagents now, the Soft Mints warming in my grip, unpaid for. A fugitive! I checked the departure board. Boarding commencing. Checked my pockets. Phone, passport, wallet, all I would need. In my hand luggage, a phone charger, a book, a tablet computer and a history of the Second World War. I stepped back onto the concourse, saw Connie, saw some stairs leading to a raised balcony above the lounge. I climbed the stairs and watched her, unseen.

I watched her for fifteen minutes as departure time approached, eating my way through the contraband Soft Mints, a real bandito. I watched her quite, quite full of love, despite her palpable irritation and impatience at my absence, and I came to a decision.

I would not lose my wife and son.

If the notion was unacceptable to me, I would not accept it. I would not return to England now and spend our last summer slowly dismantling our home, watching Connie separating herself from me, dividing us in two and making plans for a future that did not include me. I refused to live in a house where everything I saw or touched – Mr Jones the dog, the bedside radio, the pictures on the wall, the cups from which we drank our morning tea – would soon be allocated, mine or hers. We had been through too much together, and it was not acceptable, and neither was it acceptable to have my son wandering the continent in the belief that I was ashamed of him. It could not, would not be allowed to happen.

I finished the stolen mints. There's a saying, cited in popular song, that if you love someone you must set them free. Well, that's just nonsense. If you love someone, you bind them to you with heavy metal chains.

Connie was standing now, anxiously looking for me, left and right, no doubt thinking,
this is strange, this isn't like him at all, always there two hours before departure, laptop in a separate tray, liquids and gels in a Ziploc bag
. Well, not any more, my love! The new me dialled her number, watched as she groped in her handbag, found the phone, glared at the screen, picked up …

‘Douglas, where the hell are you? The gate is closing in five—'

‘I'm not catching the flight.'

‘Where are you, Douglas?'

‘I'm in a taxi. In fact I've already left the airport. I'm not going back to England.'

‘Douglas, don't be ridiculous, they're calling our names—'

‘Then get on the plane without me. Make sure you tell them I'm not coming, I don't want to inconvenience anyone.'

‘I'm not getting on the plane without you, that's insane.'

‘Listen to me, Connie, please? I can't come back until I've put things right. I'm going to find Albie first, and apologise face to face, and then I'm going to bring him home.'

‘Douglas, you have no idea where he is!'

‘Then I'll find him.'

‘How can you find him? He could be anywhere in Europe by now, anywhere in the world …'

‘I'll find a way. I'm a scientist, remember? Method. Results. Conclusion.'

I watched her now as she lowered herself back into the seat. ‘Douglas, if you're doing this to … prove something … to me … well, it's very touching, but it's not really the point.'

‘I love you, Connie.'

She spanned her forehead with her hand. ‘I love you too, Douglas, but you're tired, you've been under a lot of strain, and I don't think you're thinking straight …'

‘Please don't try and talk me out of this. I'm going to go on alone.'

A moment passed, and she stood. ‘Are you sure that's what you want?'

‘I am.'

‘What will I tell people?'

‘I don't care.'

‘Will you at least call me?'

‘When I've found him. Not before.'

‘Can I talk you out of this?'

‘No, you can't.'

‘All right. All right, if that's what you want.'

‘I'm afraid you'll have to carry the suitcase. Get taxis, won't you?'

‘But what will you wear?'

‘I've got my wallet and my toothbrush. I'll buy myself clothes along the way.'

Her head lolled backwards; in distress, perhaps, at the thought of me buying my own clothes. ‘Okay. If you're sure. Buy nice things. Look after yourself.' She put her hand to her eyes. ‘Don't fall to pieces, will you?'

‘I won't. Connie, I'm sorry we won't see Venice together again.'

‘I'm sorry too.'

‘I'll send postcards, though.'

‘Please do.'

‘Kiss Mr Jones for me. Or shake his paw.'

‘I will.'

‘Don't let him sleep on the bed.'

‘I wouldn't dream of it.'

‘Seriously, because if he gets into the habit—'

‘Douglas. I won't.'

‘I love you, Connie. Did I say that?'

‘You mentioned it in passing.'

‘I'm sorry if I've let you down.'

‘Douglas, you have never—'

‘I won't let you down again.'

She said nothing.

‘You'd better catch your flight now,' I said.

‘Yes. I'd better. Gate …?'

‘Gate 17.'

‘Gate 17.' She shouldered her bag and began to walk.

‘You've forgotten your book,' I said. ‘It's on the chair.'

‘Thank you,' she said, picked it up, then hesitated a moment. It didn't take her long to search me out on the balcony above. She raised her hand and I raised mine back.

‘I'll see you when I see you,' I said.

But she had already hung up. I watched Connie walk away and then I set off to save my son, whether he needed it or not.

–

Sometimes she went so far as to wish that she should find herself in a difficult position, so that she might have the pleasure of being as heroic as the occasion demanded.

Henry James,
The Portrait of a Lady

In Venice I proposed to Connie.

Not the most original scenario, I know. In fact, there was nothing much original in our trip that February, the third anniversary of our meeting. We entered the city by water taxi on a bright, crisp day, nestling in seats of burgundy leather as we bounced across the lagoon, then standing wind-whipped on deck as the city appeared and two thoughts battled in my head: was anything in the world more beautiful, and was anything in the world more expensive? This was my Venetian state of mind; awe versus anxiety, like browsing in a wonderful antiques shop where signs constantly remind you that breakages must be paid for.

And so we did what tourists do in Venice in the winter. We sheltered from the rain and when the sun came out drank bitter hot chocolate in chilly squares of quite staggering grace and beauty, and sipped Bellinis in dim, expensive bars, bracing ourselves for the bill. ‘It's a tax on beauty,' said Connie, doling out the notes. ‘If it were cheap here, nobody would ever leave.'

She knew the city well, of course. The trick in Venice, she said, is to see St Mark's once, then bounce off it to the outer edges. The trick is to be spontaneous, curious, to get lost. Instinctively, I resisted the notion of getting lost. For accomplished and enthusiastic map-readers like myself, Venice offered untold challenges and I spent a great deal of time tracing our route until Connie snatched the map, lifted my chin with her finger and commanded that I look up for once and appreciate the beautiful gloom of the place.