It’s apparently Chantelle who’s making the escalating squeals.
She sounds like she’s being pushed by a murderer ever nearer the edge of a cliff, although the view from where I’m standing, on the threshold of the bedroom, is somewhat less cinematic. They’re on the bed, far too near the hard wooden headboard for comfort. A thrust too far and Toby will knock himself out. Not that either of them are aware of this. They’re far too busy going at it hammer and tongs, their passion no doubt heightened by the fact that I could arrive back at any moment.
The unavoidable focal point is the spectacular pumping action of Toby’s neat rear, which seems far more enthusiastic than it’s ever been my privilege to witness …
A feeling of nausea hits, and as the full horror of what I’m witnessing finally penetrates my disbelieving brain, Chantelle’s cries build to a crescendo and she tumbles with one final shriek of surrender onto the rocks below.
Five seconds later, she spots me beyond Toby’s shoulder and gives a horrified squeak.
When Toby turns, his face is a picture.
I’ve seen plenty of dramas where the heroine catches the hero naked in their bed with another woman, and I’ve sometimes wondered what I’d do in those circumstances.
Let fly with a stream of abuse? Start hurling things at them, such as hair-drying implements and bedroom chairs? Or stand there speechless (which is what I’m doing), wondering how he could possibly do this to me?
Time freezes as we gape at one other and my future crumbles into dust around me.
I’d like to be cool about it and say something like, ‘Hey, this looks fun. Budge up, will you?’
But frankly, I’m feeling the very opposite of cool. In fact, as Toby scrambles off the bed and starts pulling on his jeans, hopping all over the floor in his haste, I can feel an angry flush spreading over my whole body. Chantelle hasn’t moved, apart from to grab the duvet and clutch it around her bosomy nakedness, staring at me all the time in frozen horror.
I can’t believe Toby would do this to me! After all the negative things he said about Chantelle! He must have fancied her all along …
Tears sting my eyes at his unbelievable betrayal. I thought I knew him; I really thought I was safe with Toby. How stupid I was to imagine he’d never ever hurt me!
I recall his words when he phoned me earlier. ‘You just enjoy your walk. No hurry!’ He wasn’t thinking of me. He was just making sure he had the time to get down and dirty with Chantelle, the low-life snake!
Fury is mounting inside me.
I glance at the bedroom chair but it looks a bit awkward and unwieldy.
So instead, I hurl some choice words. ‘You … fucking bastard! I suppose that’s why you phoned me. To make sure the coast was clear for a while so you could … do this.’ I gesture wildly.
Toby blanches, not accustomed to hearing me swear. Then he utters the classic line, ‘Daisy … this really isn’t what it looks like.’
I give a hoot of laughter. ‘Right, so what is it actually? Chantelle wanted some advice on her finances so you thought you’d conduct the meeting in our bed stark naked? Do me a favour, Toby, and at least admit when you’ve been caught with your pants down, shagging a woman with “ridiculously large mammaries”.’ I do the quotation marks in the air and shrug at Chantelle. ‘His words, not mine.’
This snaps Chantelle out of her trance. ‘Toby? Is that true?’ she asks crossly.
Toby shakes his head. He looks so painfully conflicted, I’d feel sorry for him if I wasn’t currently trying to contain the urge to cut off his extremities with a blunt knife.
I go to pull my cardi around me but realise it’s not there. I must have dropped it after leaving Jake’s camp in such a hurry. It strikes me as horribly ironic that I raced back to Toby, determined to shower him with love – only to find him showering Chantelle with something else altogether …
Emotion is welling inside me to dangerously unmanageable levels. If I don’t leave the tent now, I’ll break down completely and it will all be very messy, and I don’t want to cry in front of them.
I’m determined to hold on to my pride, if nothing else.
Escaping the tent, I blunder over the grass towards Clemmy’s house, tears rolling down my face, feeling totally humiliated. I just want to see a friendly face. Plus something else is starting to worry me, stabbing my gut with panic, making me feel quite sick.
It’s a dread that seems surprisingly out of proportion, bearing in mind that I’ve just witnessed my boyfriend committing the ultimate betrayal in our bed.
What if I dropped my cardigan somewhere in the woods and I never find it?
*
Clemmy answers the door. I must be looking pretty terrible because she immediately bundles me inside, asking what’s happened.
I flump down at the table and stare at her. My head is whirling with gut-wrenching images of Toby and Chantelle, and Clemmy has to gently tease the facts out of me. Saying the words – I just found Toby shagging our next-door neighbour – smacks me in the gut and makes me feel as if I’m going to throw up. But I take a few deep breaths to calm down and then I start telling Clemmy about the sneaky phone call Toby made to ensure I’d be away from the tent.
‘Were you out for a walk?’ she asks gently.
Nodding, I glance down at my lap, thinking of Jake and feeling suddenly ashamed. What will Clemmy think of me if I tell her about Jake? If I tell her that actually, while Toby and Chantelle were getting it on, I was kissing Jake in the woods?
I don’t have the right to be angry at Toby. I’d be a hypocrite.
‘You can stay here tonight,’ says Clemmy firmly. ‘You’re definitely not going back over there.’ She hesitates. Then she adds, ‘And listen, Daisy, this might not be the right time to say this – but I’m going to say it anyway because I care about you.’ She takes a deep breath. ‘What if Toby isn’t the right man for you anyway?’
‘What do you mean?’
She shrugs. ‘I know you’re fond of him but maybe, after all, he’s not for you.’
I immediately think of Jake and more feelings of guilt rush in.
Oh God, I can’t be in love with Jake Steele. Not when he’s still so obviously hung up on Laura …
A cloud of despair settles over my head. I wish I could be the sort of person who inspires the kind of enduring devotion Jake so obviously feels for Laura. I thought Toby felt that way about me. I fooled myself into imagining he was the rock I could always rely on. How wrong could I be?
I think of Rosalind’s reaction when she finds out Toby and I have split up, and a wave of unbearable sadness washes over me. Rosalind will be devastated. She was already joking about buying a hat …
What will happen to our friendship?
Rosalind is Toby’s mum so of course she’s bound to be loyal to her son. I can’t see how our friendship will be able to continue under the circumstances. So I’m not only losing my relationship, I’m losing the whole happy future I envisaged as part of Toby’s family …
Suddenly, it’s all too much. Laying my head on my arms, I start to sob, and Clemmy jumps up and puts her arms around me.
I’m not even sure what I’m weeping for. Everything, I suppose.
My wrecked relationship. A glamping holiday that’s ended in disaster. Being plagued by thoughts of kissing Jake and what that implies. His grief over Laura. Finding that a woman called Arabella might actually be my biological mum but secretly hoping it’s not true.
It’s all those things, I realise, but there’s a bigger, much more powerful reason for this deluge of sorrow that I no longer have the strength to stem.
I’m crying for Mum.
For the first time since she died, I’m allowing myself to feel the raw edge of my grief, instead of automatically swerving away from it. If she were still here, she’d hug me tightly, wrapping me up in her love and telling me that Toby was never good enough for me anyway.
But she’s not here and the pain of my loss is overwhelming.
There’s an empty cavern inside me that I wanted Toby and his family to fill. But no one can ever replace my mum. That’s the brutal truth and I can see it now. Even the search for my biological mother now seems like simply a desperate attempt to fill the frightening void in my life.
‘I miss my mum so much,’ I whisper and Clemmy’s arms tighten around me. I’ve never felt so glad of another human being’s touch. I feel safe enough in Clemmy’s care to sob for Mum until there are no tears left.