Rebecca

‘I KNOW YOU DON’T want to write the divorce-lawyer book but you have been thinking about crime so it can’t hurt to meet up with John Sterling again. You never know, it might inspire you in other ways too.’

I watched the young women passing by the cafe where Matilda and I were sitting.

‘Look at them.’

‘I know. Why they can’t make the top of their trousers and the bottom of their tops meet I do not know.’

‘That’s not what I meant. They think they look great. They crimp and primp and shop and diet. They polish and wax and flirt. They dance before us on the high streets of Britain for a brief while and then, then they end up like us.’

‘Looking at this lot’ – Matilda gesticulated towards the pavement – ‘I think they’d be so lucky. Anyway, you need to cheer up. Get back out there.’

‘I don’t want a relationship, if that’s what you mean. Just the thought of it makes me shiver.’

‘I’m not talking about a relationship. Have a fling. Have a fling with John Sterling. He sounds nice and you said he was good-looking.’

‘And he’s in a relationship, I think. Anyway, I’m not the fling type, you know that.’

‘You’ve changed. Maybe you’ve changed in that way too?’

‘I’d rather work. I suppose it was talking to him about legal stuff, but I have had an idea. It’s for a play, a courtroom drama called Eros on Trial.’

‘Ah you’ve got a title already; always good to have the title sorted.’

‘Exactly. It’s half the work done, isn’t it? Anyway, Eros is literally on trial, for crimes against humanity. The play would be made up of witness statements, mostly for the prosecution. I thought I’d use the uplifting stories of happy marriages I was collecting for Angel-face. As you might recall they weren’t so uplifting after all, apart from yours, of course. My agent actually quite likes the idea. She said, and I’m quoting, “It would at least be a different audience, one that doesn’t feel utterly let down and betrayed.”’

Matilda considered.

‘Could work, I suppose. What does your legal adviser think?’

‘You mean John Sterling? I haven’t asked him.’

I read every book I could find on play-writing. I started to write down my witness statements. Were people allowed to stand up in court and give such lengthy statements? I decided to email John Sterling and ask.

Later on that evening I was about to sit down to supper when the phone rang.

‘Hi, it’s Melanie. We met the other day, with John.’

‘Absolutely. And what a coincidence. I’ve just emailed him. I need to pick his brain.’

‘Oh he’ll love that. He likes nothing better than talking about his work. Anyway, I’ve read your book. I loved it, I really did. I tried to get John to read it as well, but you know men.’

Not all of them, to be fair, Coco pointed out.

Leave me alone, I’m on the phone.

‘Hello, are you still there?’

‘Sorry, yes. I know he’s very busy.’

‘He’s a complete workaholic. He defines himself entirely through his career.’

‘Easy mistake to make.’

‘Big mistake too. I mean he’s successful, but how long will that last? There’ll soon be someone else coming on to the scene, someone younger and hungrier.’

I laughed.

‘You make him sound like a supermodel.’

‘Honestly, though, it goes on in all professions; yours too, I’m sure. I mean there’s always someone younger, a fresh new voice waiting to take your place.’

‘I try not to think about that,’ I said.

‘Well, I was really calling about my reading group. I told you about it when we met. As I said then, I would love it if you could come and talk to us. On the other hand, before you say yes I should check with them. They can be a bit snooty about their book choices – you know how it is.’

‘Yes.’

‘Anyway …’ Her voice was hesitant before regaining its confidence. ‘So many people would really benefit from reading your stuff. John, for one. I was really surprised when he agreed to me moving out. He’s always done the running in our relationship. Towards me, not away, if you see what I mean?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘You wouldn’t think so from the way he looks; I mean he’s gorgeous, even if he could do with a few more hours in the gym, but he’s really naive when it comes to women.’

‘I would have thought his work would have cured him of any naivety,’ I said.

‘Oh that’s different, isn’t it? You should see his exes,’ she snorted. ‘No wonder he thinks I’m completely gorgeous.’

‘Two gorgeous people,’ I said. ‘How perfect is that.’

‘You would have thought so, but actually, it’s not. He’s quite mixed up.’

I knew I should end the conversation there. A person of style and integrity would not listen to this kind of puerile gossip about someone who had been both kind and helpful to them.

‘Is he really? In what way?’

‘I just don’t think he knows who he is. He plays parts. Behind all that professional bravado there’s this frightened little boy.’

Another one, I thought to myself.

‘Most women wouldn’t have seen that side. If I did one good thing, and I think I did quite a few, actually, it was getting him to see a therapist. I think it’s really helping him. Then again he’s good at dissembling. He’s quite obsessive. Life is a series of goals to him. When he and I met, he was totally focused on finding the perfect woman to settle down with, someone attractive and independent, so I knew he wouldn’t let me go that easily once he’d found me. As I said, I was quite surprised he didn’t try to stop me from moving out; male pride, I suppose. It was really quite touching how pleased he was to hear from me when I phoned him up. Anyway, I just wanted to tell you how much I loved your book. We must get together. Just the girls, I mean. It would be fun.’

I almost never drink whisky but somehow, having finished the call with Melanie Ingram, I felt the need for a glass of the stuff.

Mine’s a double, Coco said, throwing himself down in the armchair and putting his large feet up on the coffee table.

I put on some music, Dolly Parton. I adore Dolly Parton. I don’t care what anyone says: the woman is a marvel.

I topped up my glass. Dolly sang, I’ll always love you.

This time I had to take issue with her.

‘You know, you just think you will, but really you won’t. You might, however, end up singing things like this: I’d be devastated if I lost him, but it would mean I could redecorate the house and get rid of that ghastly old winged chair. Or, I wouldn’t say we’re happy exactly, but then life’s not about that, is it? Alternatively, you could just cut to the chase and tell him to bugger off.’

Dolly obviously wasn’t listening, begging instead for Jolene not to take her man away.

My grandfather on my mother’s side used to bring my grandmother breakfast in bed each morning: a tiny pot of tea, some butter and jam, a rack of toast and always a single orchid, whatever the time of year. He adored her. When they married he was twenty-five and she was thirty-eight. He loved her so much that he wouldn’t let her grow old.

He killed her? Coco asked.

No, of course not. You know he didn’t.

He just didn’t allow her to grow old. Wherever he went, she went. He travelled to Paris or Rome, so did she, even when she could no longer walk or see. He hired the services of a nurse, who was also trained in dressing hair, so that every morning my grandmother would be looking her best, not for him, because to him her beauty was undisputable, but for my grandmother herself, who had indeed been a renowned beauty and vain with it.

‘But she can’t see,’ my mother had protested.

‘She knows,’ he had replied, ‘she knows just by putting her hand to touch her hair if it’s right or not.’

Towards the end, my grandmother confided to my mother that she would very much like just to lie back and rest; no travel, no trips to the opera, no visitors, just quietly rest, with her hair going grey and the bald spot left for all the world to see.

‘So tell him,’ my mother said.

‘Oh no,’ my grandmother replied, ‘it would break his heart.’

She died aged ninety-eight, while watching La Boheme from their box at the opera.

Was it love that my grandfather had felt for my grandmother, or was it obsession?

Let’s call it obsession, Coco said. It’ll make you feel better.

I had asked my mother, not so long ago, if it had been wonderful growing up in a home with such happily married parents. She told me that it wasn’t especially because she, their child, was just the pale fruit on the tree that was their love.

I had no doting husband and no fruit of my love, pale or otherwise. Instead, I was destined for a life in which weekends were my least favourite time, summer holidays were spent insisting to my friends that I had always preferred travelling on my own, and Christmas meant weighing up the pros and cons of decorating a tree just for me. When I woke up with a start, jaw aching with silent screams, from the dream where my sister lies helpless on the floor and I can’t reach her to ease her back into her chair because my feet are welded to the floor and my arms weighted with irons, there would be no one to reassure me. No longer could I turn towards the comforting shape of a lover, touch his sleep-crumpled face and feel the warmth of his breath as I snuggled close enough for our legs to touch but not so close so as to wake him.

Then again, Coco said, you can always have lots of casual sex – at least until the time comes when you need your pubic hair dyed.

Why do you have to be so vulgar?

That’s exactly what I was about to ask.