I’ve never before approached home from this direction.
Travelling back from university on a Friday evening, clearing the motorway and rolling into the proudly dishevelled byroads, I used to imagine my heart rate slowing down. Winding down the windows regardless of the season, my breathing would slow as my grip relaxed on the wheel. But now, driving up from London in bright July sunshine, the sight of the restless peaks has entirely the opposite effect. Swollen with summer, the hedgerows push into the road and scrape at the car as if trying to get at me.
Nettles to grasp, Henry.
Passports to swipe.
‘We’ll expect you at midnight, I suppose,’ Mum had said.
‘I’ll see you for lunch,’ I told her.
Zoe will be in Brighton by now; we kissed goodbye three hours ago and I’m already missing her silly sense of humour, her inelegant laugh, her touch. Vicky has organized a tight itinerary: beach, drinks, restaurant, club, stripper. ‘Wish me luck,’ Zoe said when we left her house together this morning. I nearly said the same thing back – Wish me luck – but as far as Zoe knows, the biggest challenge I face this weekend is a salon full of split ends and uneven fringes.
My car is still severely gouged along both sides, announcing my return to anyone who happens to notice. And while the cat will soon enough claw its way out of the bag and run yowling through the streets, I’d like to at least have a drink with my parents before people start throwing things. As such, I drive the long way round to the Black Horse, avoiding the village centre and busier stretches of road. Good weather is bad for business, Dad used to say, and it’s no surprise to find the pub car park largely empty on this clear and cloudless afternoon. I tuck the car away in the far corner of the gravel yard, count to ten and climb out. I haven’t forgiven myself for what I did to April, but time and miles have made it feel like a less real thing. Standing here now, though, the reality – You left her at the altar! – comes flooding back, cold and unforgiving. The fear, too. The side door of the Black Horse is maybe twenty paces away, but seems to recede before me, like a trapdoor in some old horror movie.
Mum has said she would talk to April, to warn her I’m arriving and, in her words, ‘lessen the shock for the poor girl’. How this news was received I haven’t asked, but I’ll bet it wasn’t with a smile. I am seriously contemplating the idea of getting back into the car when my mother’s voice lances down from an upstairs window.
‘For God’s sake, get inside.’
‘Some welcome,’ I say, once I’m inside and up the stairs.
‘What did you expect? A brass band and flowers?’
I put my arms around Mum’s neck and feel her posture soften as her hands wrap around my back and pull me against her. ‘I missed you,’ she says. ‘You stupid, stupid . . . I missed you.’
I kiss my mother’s head, inhaling the familiar smell of her hairspray. ‘I missed you too.’
‘And what the hell have you done to your hair?’
‘Disguise,’ I say.
‘Don’t get smart, Henry.’ Mum’s eyes narrow and her cheeks fill with colour. ‘Don’t you get bloody smart.’
Dad walks into the room, closes the door behind him and pulls me into a long, heavy hug. ‘What’s all this?’ he says, rubbing a hand over my head.
‘A hairdresser?’
I think this is the fourth time Dad’s asked this, but my mother has made the same enquiry several times herself, so it’s hard to be precise. Although when my mother asks, it’s with a sense of surprised pride, rather than the concerned suspicion that my father manages to inject into the two words.
‘A hairdresser, yes.’
I have explained the process by which I ended up cutting hair at The Hairy Krishna (‘That’s an odd one’), and reassured them both that I haven’t entirely abandoned dentistry. But the news is still taking a while to sink in.
Dad’s eyebrows are knotting together as he appears to struggle with a thought. ‘You’re not . . .’ – he raises his right hand as if about to take a vow and then let’s his wrist fall limp ‘. . . you know?’
‘For God’s sake, Clive, just because the boy has suddenly embraced his . . .’ My mum’s eyes go to my hair, and her expression changes from indignance to dread. ‘Son,’ she says, ‘is that why you left April? Living a lie? Isn’t that what they call it? Oh, Henry.’
‘I’m not gay.’
‘Oh, thank God,’ says my dad. ‘I mean . . . thank God.’
My mum is still examining me shrewdly, the anger tightening her features again. ‘But there is someone, isn’t there?’
‘What? Don’t be . . . silly.’
‘Name?’
‘Who?’
‘I’m your mother, Henry. I know your stupid sodding face, and I know when you’re hiding something. Name?’
‘Zoe.’
‘Oh,’ says Mum, smiling insincerely. ‘I see. Zoe, is it?’
‘Sheila, give it—’
‘Didn’t bring her with you, heh? Didn’t bring Zoe with you?’
My mum is on her feet, and Big Boots rises to meet her, positioning himself between us.
‘Does she know? This . . . Zoe?’ as if, instead of her name, my mother is stating my girlfriend’s crime, condition or other failing: Killer, cheater, bitch.
‘Mum, please.’
‘Wait a minute, how long have you b—’
‘Mum, it’s been a few weeks, it has nothing to do with me and . . .’
‘Who, April? What’s the matter, can’t you say her name now?’
‘Sheila, sit down.’
Mum walks backwards to her chair and drops into it in a defeated heap. ‘She’s like a daughter to me.’
‘I know. What about me, Mum? What about what I want and what I’m going through?’
Mum looks as if she’s been slapped. But instead of angry, she looks all of a sudden contrite. ‘Like, I said. I said she was like a daughter . . . that’s all.’
Dad perches on the edge of Mum’s chair, takes her hand and rests it on his thigh. It’s an unusually tender gesture, and it does me good to see it. Perhaps my stupidity and subsequent exile has brought them closer together. I know I don’t deserve any kind of silver lining, but if this is one, then I’ll take it.
‘It’s been difficult, son,’ says my dad. ‘For all of us.’
‘How is she?’ I say. ‘April?’ And my mother is right, her name does feel strange in my mouth.
Mum and Dad look at each other and something passes between them.
‘What?’ I ask.
They look at each other’s hands, and Mum lets her head list sideways onto my father’s chest.
‘She’s seeing someone?’ I ask.
My mother looks at me with exasperation. ‘Well, did you expect her to wait for you, Henry?’
‘No.’
‘After everything you did to the poor girl?’
‘I said no.’
‘Becau—’
‘So,’ says Dad, ‘what’s the plan?’
I shake my head. ‘Don’t have one.’
‘Well, there’s a sodding surprise,’ says Mum, snatching her hand from Dad’s grip.
The house was finished three months before the wedding, making it one year old this July. Maybe today is its birthday. I have been inside before, April and I both have, but never at the same time – someone, it could have been me – deemed it to be bad luck.
I feel nothing towards this brick cube. No regret, no loss, no sense that this is where I should be. Yet here I am. Standing at the foot of the short drive, behind the closed gate, staring at the shut curtains.
April chose the carpets, wallpaper, curtains, the paint, the cupboard doors and everything behind them. There were discussions, but only in the sense that April was thinking aloud and trying out the sounds of various fixtures, fittings and ideas. When she asked what colour I wanted to paint the front door, my mind went blank with the shock of being consulted. I said blue, for no reason other than it was the colour of April’s nail varnish and she was growing impatient. April produced a colour card filled with twenty-five shades of the single colour and I dropped my finger onto its approximate centre.
The door is now black. My meagre input painted over and obliterated.
I have been standing here for five minutes now, but the coursing panic has abated not one bit. And I suspect it won’t even if I stand here all day. As I put my hand on the gate, the front door opens and I all but turn and run. Perhaps the only thing that stays my feet is the pure blanching shock of seeing my former best friend standing in the doorway of my former future house. He’s tanned, looks like he’s lost two stone and recently had a very good haircut. He looks extraordinarily well, even in a pair of bright orange slippers.
‘Brian?’
‘Tea?’ he says, holding one of a pair of blue mugs towards me. I was with April when she picked out those mugs.
‘You don’t have anything stronger, do you?’
Brian laughs. ‘Not before six, no.’
He sits on the front step, and I sit down beside him.
‘Nice slippers,’ I say.
‘Thanks. Oh, and fuck off.’
‘Cheers,’ I say, clinking my mug against Brian’s. ‘It’s good to see you.’
Brian nods: Yes, it is.
We drink our tea in silence for a while, exchanging the occasional sideways glance and half smile.
‘I’m glad it’s you,’ I say.
‘Yeah, me too. Not going to knock my tooth out again, are you?’
‘I won’t if you won’t.’
Brian laughs under his breath. ‘The Dentist.’
‘Do you remember making those birdhouses?’ I say.
Brian nods. ‘There’s still plenty of fences with missing panels round and about.’
Wrecking one thing to make another.
‘I’m sorry I dropped you in it,’ I say. ‘At the . . . castle.’
‘It’s not me you need to apologize to,’ Brian says, looking over his shoulder to the house.
‘How is she?’
Brian nods: Good. ‘I knew you weren’t right,’ he says. ‘You and April.’
‘You didn’t think to share this?’
Brian shrugs. ‘Not my place, is it. And anyway, would you have listened?’
Maybe. Very very maybe.
‘So what’s this?’ I say, indicating the two of us sitting on the doorstep like a pair of little boys.
‘I just wanted to talk to you first. Get one thing out of the way before the other, you know.’
‘Thanks.’
Brian takes a deep, bracing breath. ‘I suppose we should go in.’
‘Is it six o’clock yet?’ I ask.
We both know six is a long way off, but Brian checks his watch reflexively. ‘Close enough,’ he says. ‘Ready?’
‘No.’
Brian opens the door. ‘After you.’
In all the years I was with April, I don’t think I ever saw her reading a book, but she’s reading one now.
Sitting on the sofa with her back to me, her blonde hair in a high neat ponytail, she closes the book, sets it down on the coffee table, pauses for what could be two seconds or eight thousand years, and then turns to face me. Like Brian, she is radiating good health. Tanned, clear skinned, bright eyed, she looks amazing.
‘You’re late,’ she says.
My game plan, such as it was, consisted of receiving abuse gratefully and with contrition, and then apologizing to April and any attendant family into submission. But April’s composure and lack of apoplectic outrage, it throws me.
‘That’s . . . that’s a good one.’
April cocks her head with pantomime smugness. ‘Well, I’ve had time to work on it, haven’t I.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I’m so, so sorry, April.’
And now her face hardens. ‘Jesus Christ, Henry. Where do I begin? How could you do that to someone you’re supposed to love? To someone who . . .’ She puts a hand to her eye, then takes a slow, deep breath, regaining her composure as if willing herself – commanding herself – not to cry. ‘Have you any idea what you did to me?’
I have nothing to say, and all I can do is shake my head.
‘If you didn’t want to marry me, why propose, Henry? Why?’
‘I did. But . . .’
‘Do you think you’re better than me?’
‘No. Never.’
‘I wonder about that, you know. But I’m real people, Henry! I like who I am and where I’m from. And the way you treated me is . . . I don’t even know what it is.’
‘Sweetheart . . .’ says Brian. ‘Nice and easy, yes?’
April closes her eyes and allows her features to relax.
‘Do you want anything?’ he asks.
April opens her eyes, nods. ‘I’ll have one of those teas,’ she says, and when she smiles at Brian, she winks. Her eyes follow him out of the room and the affection is absolutely sincere.
She is still sitting on the sofa, head turned to the side so she can see me standing in the doorway. I decide to risk moving further into the room. I make it as far as the armchair, but before I get a chance to sit, April shakes her head, says, ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Right, I’m . . . sorry. I never thought I was better than you,’ I say. ‘I loved you.’
‘Loved. You’re a coward, do you know that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh, shut up! Yes. You should have told me. To my face, not in a stupid . . .’ April picks up a piece of folded paper from the coffee table, clenches it in her fist and throws it at me. I don’t need to pick it up to know this is the letter I left behind on the morning of our wedding.
‘Pick it up,’ April says. ‘Take it with you because I’ve read it enough times.’
I do what I’m told and shove the balled-up note into my pocket.
‘We were kids when we met,’ April says, sneering.
‘April, please—’
‘You’ll always have a special place in my heart. I mean, my God! Did you not cringe when you wrote that . . . shit!’
‘I should have told you.’
‘Yes, you fucking should. It’s the very very least you should have done. Do you know what? I’m glad you did it.’
April looks at me, as if waiting for a response, but we both know there isn’t one.
‘Do you want to know why I’m glad?’
‘Yes, why?’
‘Two reasons, Henry. First, because you are clearly a cruel, weak, fickle bastard. And I’m glad I found out before things got any more complicated. The thought that I might have had a baby with you makes me physically sick.’
April is glaring at me, waiting for a reaction, so I nod, mutter sorry under my breath.
‘And second?’ April asks. ‘Second, because I am happy now. With Brian. Happier than I ever was with you. And I’m not just saying that to make myself feel better. I’m saying it because it’s true.’
‘I’m glad you’re happy.’
April nods. ‘I suppose I should thank you . . . but I never will.’
And it isn’t until she begins the process of standing up from the sofa that I notice the bump. It’s a big bump.
‘Oh my God,’ I say, pointing at April’s stomach, and dropping into the armchair after all. The bump looks even bigger from down here and I jump back to my feet. ‘Oh my good G— wait, what month is it?’
‘It’s July, Henry.’
‘Wh . . . w . . .’
‘October,’ April says. ‘We were meant to get married in October.’
I start counting on my fingers: ‘October, November, December, Ja—’
‘Nine,’ April says. ‘Nine months ago.’
The book on the coffee table is titled 501 Baby Names; it’s impossible to tell at what letter it is splayed open, but it looks pretty central – M, maybe; N, perhaps, none of which clarifies anything.
‘You’re pregnant,’ I say, looking for some stability in solid fact, but not finding much.
‘Who told?’ says April.
Again, I point at the bump, which can’t possibly have grown in the last thirty seconds, but nevertheless appears to be expanding before my eyes. ‘Is it . . .?’
‘Yes?’ says April.
I swivel the finger around so that it’s now pointing at me. ‘Is it . . .?’
‘Mine,’ says Brian’s voice from behind me. He is carrying a small round tray, red with white polka dots, which I seem to remember buying in the Trafford Centre about twelve months ago. ‘Here you go . . .’ Brian hands a mug of herbal tea to April, then a tumbler of whisky to me. I empty it in a single swallow.
‘Congratulations,’ I finally manage. ‘How . . . long?’
‘Don’t worry,’ says Brian, ‘it’s definitely mine.’
‘Eight months,’ says April, a touch of defiance in her expression.
‘So you . . .’
Brian shrugs.
‘November,’ says April, looking at my hands, and I realize I am counting on my fingers again.
‘Congratulations.’
‘Yeah, you said that.’
‘Another?’ says Brian, reaching for my glass.
‘Henry has to go now,’ says April.
Brian and I shake hands, and then we hug. ‘Give it time,’ he whispers into my ear, clapping a hand on my back.
I was supposed to carry April over this threshold, into the house. Instead, she escorts me in the opposite direction, my best friend’s baby growing inside her.
‘I’m happy for you,’ I say.
‘I suppose that makes it easier for you, does it?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe a little.’
‘Well, don’t think I forgive you, because I don’t. I fucking don’t, Henry.’
‘I know.’
‘I’ll always be that girl, thanks to you. That girl who . . .’
I nod towards the house. ‘What about Brian, the baby?’
‘Brian’s amazing.’ April’s face comes alive when she says his name. ‘And he’ll make an amazing father,’ she says. ‘But it doesn’t change . . . it doesn’t make what you did right.’
‘I’m sorry, all I am is sorry.’
April nods. ‘Yeah, I know. So,’ she says, crossing her arms, ‘you seeing anyone?’
‘I . . . kind of.’
April shakes her head. ‘Kind of? You’re amazing, Henry.’
‘It’s complicated. She’s had . . .’
‘You know what, Henry? I don’t want to know. Just . . . Actually, I really hope you sort yourself out, okay. I hope you and whatever she’s called get together and fall in love and . . . I really do.’
‘Thank you.’
‘And then I hope she leaves you standing at the altar.’
‘Fair enough.’
‘Yeah, fair enough. And call your mother more.’
‘Right.’
‘Make sure you do, she misses you, Henry. Big Boots, too.’
‘I will. Thank you.’ I go to hug her, but April steps away from me.
‘Sorry. Okay then, well, it’s been . . . it’s been nice seeing you. Both. All three of you.’
April nods and – against her will, it seems – smiles.
I make it all the way to the gate before remembering; and when I turn around, April is standing in the doorway, waiting. ‘Yes?’
‘I don’t suppose you’ve got my passport?’
April laughs.
‘You remember where Mum and Dad live?’
As I walk, I sing ‘Sweet Home Alabama’ inside my head. I sing slowly and drag my feet, but it does nothing to shorten the distance.
April must have called ahead, because her old man is waiting on the step when I turn the corner. At his feet is a battered Samsonite suitcase – they’re advertised as indestructible but it looks like someone has had a good go at disproving this claim. The shell is dented and scratched, the pull-up handle twisted and bent, and the zip is broken. But it’s still standing.
April’s father says nothing as I shuffle down his drive, his expression doesn’t flicker. And if it turns out the old bugger died six months ago and has since been stuffed and placed outside to scare off burglars, then I have to wonder why April forgot to mention it. As I get within punching distance, however, I can hear the old man breathe and see the hairs in his nose quiver under each exhalation.
‘Derek,’ I say, nodding.
Derek’s jaw tightens, the muscles bunching at the hinges. His hands clench into fists.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say, and Derek shakes his head very slowly, the message as clear as the sky: Don’t! He toes the case and it wobbles.
‘Right,’ I say. ‘I . . .’
Another shake of the head. ‘Don’t mek me break a promise to my daughter,’ he says. ‘She’s had enough of that, don’t you think?’
To pick up the case I will have to bend down, placing my jaw within six inches of Derek’s foot. I don’t know if he’s been working today, but April’s dad is wearing his work boots. Again, he nudges the case with his foot.
I bend at the waist, stretch forwards and grip the handle, but as I snatch at it, the handle comes free, leaving the battered case still wobbling on its wheels. I try again, bending further now and needing both hands to lift the case out of Derek’s range. He doesn’t kick me in the face.
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘My passport’s in the . . .’
Derek’s nostrils flair, he exhales slowly and turns to go back into the house. ‘George sends his love,’ he says, and he closes the door in my face.
I wait until I get round the corner before sitting on a wall and opening the case. The crotch of my swimming shorts has been slashed, my new linen beach trousers have lost a leg, my sunglasses have lost both arms, a hole has been cut in the heart of my favourite shirt. Underwear, socks, shoes, sandals, hat, everything has been destroyed. The book I had packed to read on holiday is now a loose collection of torn pages. And all of it stained and sticky from the contents of, amongst other things, a skewered bottle of suntan lotion, and – to look at it – a jumped-on tube of toothpaste. On the front of the suitcase is a separate, zipped compartment. Inside are our tickets, intact, unused and expired. Also in this compartment is my passport, in one piece, and containing all its pages. No one has taken a pair of scissors or a blowtorch to it. No one has drawn glasses on my picture, a dagger through my neck, a penis on my h—
‘Fucking jilter!!!’
The thrown hamburger hits me square in the chest, bull’s eye. It’s hard to be sure with mustard in my eyes, but the receding car looks an awful lot like George’s Ford Cortina.
‘You didn’t think to tell me?’ I say to Mum.
‘Of course I did,’ she says. ‘But it wasn’t my place, sweetheart. Here . . .’ she licks her finger and rubs it through my eyebrow, ‘. . . bit of mustard.’
‘You got off lucky,’ my old man says. ‘I’d have knocked your head off.’
Mum smiles at my father with affection.
Nailed above the front door to the pub is a small oblong plaque with the name of the licensee painted in white on black. When I turned eighteen, Dad had had my name added so that it read: CLIVE SMITH & SON. LICENSED TO SELL ALL INTOXICATING LIQUOR FOR CONSUMPTION ON OR OFF THESE PREMISES. From a man of few sentimental gestures, it meant a great deal. Not only did it announce my arrival as a man, but it signified my father’s pride in his son. It put us together, as equals. So it was a huge shock to see my name had been painted over when I walked through the front door an hour ago.
‘So,’ I say, ‘I guess I’m not licensed to sell intoxicating liquor anymore.’
My dad frowns in confusion. ‘You’ve lost me, son.’
‘The licensee thingummy,’ Mum says. ‘Honestly, Clive, I do worry about your memory.’
‘Right,’ he says, cocking his fists. ‘Bobbed when I should’ve weaved.’
‘Weaved when you should have bobbed,’ finishes my mother, and again the smile.
‘So,’ I say, ‘the sign?’
‘Well, you see, son. You’re not the most popular man in town.’
‘By a long chalk,’ says my mother.
‘Thing is, lad, someone took a brush to it.’
‘Clive Smith & Bastard,’ says my mother. ‘Licensed to sell blah blah blah.’
‘They did a good job, too,’ says Dad. ‘Din’t they, Sheila?’
‘Very good, I reckon it was weeks before we noticed.’
‘Anyway, son, I thought it simplest to just . . .’ He makes a gesture as if painting out a bastard.
‘Thank you, I suppose.’
‘So,’ says my mother. ‘You’ve no excuse not to come back for our anniversary now.’
‘Except for not being the most popular man in town by a long chalk, you mean.’
‘Smith and Bastard,’ says my dad, laughing.
Mum shrugs. ‘Time heals. More slowly in some cases than others, but it heals.’
‘When is it, exactly?’ I ask, earning a scowl from my mother. ‘What? It’s not my anniversary.’
‘Ninth of August,’ Dad says. ‘Haven’t lost all my marbles yet, see.’
Mum leans across the bar and kisses Dad on the cheek.
‘What’s got into you two?’
‘It’s not every year you get to have a ruby anniversary,’ says my mother.
‘Well, that’s kind of the point, isn’t it,’ I say. ‘So, what’s the plan?’
‘Thought we’d have a bit of a do here on the Saturday,’ says Dad. ‘Friends, family.’
‘Well, I guess that includes me. Will April be here?’
‘Of course, love. She’s like a—’
‘—daughter to you, I know. But her, me, Brian, their bloody baby . . .’
‘Time to move on, Henry. April knows that.’
‘Anyway,’ says Dad, ‘can’t see her throwing much in her condition.’
‘Well, that’s reassuring. Anyway, it’s not her I’m worried about.’
Dad leans forwards on the counter, resting his weight through the knuckles of both hands. ‘There’s nowt else to worry about. They know whose son you are.’
It seems like the thing to be done, so I lean across the counter and kiss my father. He acts embarrassed, but it’s an amateur show.
‘I’ll be here,’ I say.
‘Maybe you could bring that Zoe?’ says my mum.
I laugh out loud. ‘Are you sure? You could barely say her name a couple of hours ago.’
‘Well, I can’t blame the girl for the sins of my son, can I? It’s not her fault you’re a bastard.’
Dad laughs and walks to the other end of the bar to serve a customer.
‘Thanks, Mum, but . . . I don’t think it’s a good idea.’
‘Think about it. It would be nice for you to have someone with you.’
‘Okay,’ I lie. ‘I’ll think about it.’