East Fortune (17 page)

They walked back through the streets and along the canals, avoiding the movement of trams and bicycles. It was warm on the bridges and in the sunnier streets but Julia insisted that they walk through the shadier parts of the city. The sun was too bright and unforgiving. It showed her age, she told him. Douglas should know this. She didn't allow overhead lighting at home, she said. She liked the darkness.

They visited a shop full of mirrors on the Herengracht and saw themselves reflected back and forward, their images repeating in infinite regressions: Julia with her blonde hair and her red coat, Douglas with his black jacket, jeans and Converse trainers. Despite the distortion they looked like an ordinary couple. Douglas felt a fraud.

He bought blue flowers for their room, irises and cornflowers, and they browsed in bookstores and antique shops in the Jordaan. Douglas wondered how soon he could suggest they went back to their hotel.

Julia took his arm.

‘Isn't this fun?'

‘Yes,' said Douglas, unable to imagine how it was ever going to last.

Back in the hotel Julia said she was tired. She didn't want sex. She just wanted a rest. It was the first time she had said no to him.

Douglas raided the minibar and watched her sleeping. Her head was turned away from him, her blonde hair falling over her shoulders. Her sleep seemed so careless and he was almost angry with her for not being as tensely, vibrantly, anxiously elated; for sleeping through the storm of this uncertainty and desperation; for being so calm and detached when he was so engaged and complete.

He wanted to make love to her again. It would be the only way he could stop thinking, by losing himself in her, by embracing the darkness, by exhausting himself to the point of collapse and oblivion, finding that sated sense of self where nothing could reach him.

He pulled back the sheets and looked at her naked body. He remembered asking if she had a birthmark and she had said no, she had no marks anywhere, not even a freckle. He listened to her breathing and adopted its rhythm himself, rising and falling, trying to calm himself down, but it was useless.

Julia stirred.

What is it? I can't sleep, I want you. Again? Yes, again. Come on then.

She was still half-asleep, letting him do what he wanted. He tried to raise her energy, to stimulate her into some kind of response, but she lay back, more passively than she had ever done before. The excitement had gone.

It was like being married, Douglas thought. It was their first experience of bad sex.

Are you all right? I'm fine, I'm sorry it wasn't very good. That's all right, don't worry.

Her agreement came all too readily.

‘It doesn't matter,' Julia said.

But it did. Douglas knew that he had pushed it too far and felt ashamed. He felt worse than when he had begun. Now he would not be able to rest at all. He would have to wait until they were both ready and try again. He could not afford to mess it up. He wanted to make it right.

Julia was sleeping again. Douglas knew that he would never be able to make any sense of what he was doing. He could see no present and no future; only the past and everything that had led to this moment in which he was trapped, fearing the loss of this love, the end of his marriage, and all sense of himself. He had no idea how he was ever going to get out of it.

Sometimes Krystyna worried that she was spending too much time with Jack. He had begun to look anxious when she spoke. She wondered once more if he was scared of her. She did not think she had ever frightened a man before.

He had taught her a new word.
Discombobulated.
It had come out by mistake and she had stopped him as soon as she had heard it.

‘I'm sorry. I'm a bit discombobulated.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘In a flap, uncertain, thrown off balance.'

‘And why would that be?'

‘I don't know. It happens every time you visit.'

‘I'm sorry.'

‘I don't mind. In fact I quite like it. I just need a bit of time to get used to it, that's all.'

Krystyna asked him to repeat the word so that she could learn how to pronounce it.

‘Discombobulated.'

He had already taught her some of his favourite Scottish words: ‘fankle', a mess or entanglement; ‘stramash', an uproar or disturbance; ‘croozumit', a person living alone. She liked the sound of his voice; the softness of his accent.

She made Jack go through the variants.

‘I am discombobulated. You are discombobulating. This is a discombobulatory conversation.'

She had learned to tease Jack when he became too serious. It was good for him, she decided. Even though he was used to lecturing
in front of hundreds of students, there were times when he appeared to be incapable of normal conversation.

‘Don't you ever see your friends?' she asked.

‘I like being at home. And I like you being with me. I don't need anyone else.'

‘But we don't say very much.'

‘We can still enjoy each other's company,' Jack said. ‘I think they're called “sofa moments”.'

‘And what are they?'

‘It's when we just sit and read the papers, or listen to music. The idea is that we're so at ease with each other that we don't need to say anything.'

Krystyna stopped to think it through.

‘“Sofa moments”. Because they are plural does that mean you have to have more than one?'

Jack smiled.

‘No, I think you can have one sofa moment at a time.'

‘I think I prefer conversation.'

‘I suppose it's what the Americans call “hanging out”. The Scots word is “niffle-naffle”. You just trifle away some time together.'

‘I thought trifle was a kind of pudding.'

‘It is. But most English words have more than one meaning.'

‘It's so confusing.'

‘It's not meant to be. It just shows how versatile language can be. “Trifle” can be a pudding, or a small insignificant object. We could look it up, if you like. I think the pudding probably came first…'

Krystyna laughed. She was still amused by Jack's enthusiasm for language. He could get so excited about so little.

He walked over to the bookshelf and pulled out a dictionary.

‘Here we are. Golly, it's not what I thought…'

Krystyna had never heard anyone say the word ‘golly' before.

‘A false or idle story told to deceive or amuse; a matter of little value; a literary work that is light or trivial in style; a small sum of money; a dish composed of cream boiled with various ingredients. Now, a dessert of sponge cake (especially flavoured with sherry or spirit
) – I see, the sponge comes in later. Perhaps it started life as a kind of syllabub. The pudding seems to be seventeenth century; the nonsensical story is from the
Middle English
traif.
Fascinating, don't you think? There's even a bit of Henry James.
I stayed. I dawdled. I trifled.'

‘Do you do this with every word when you are translating?' Krystyna asked.

‘Yes. Well, a lot of the time. It's my job.'

‘So that is why it takes so long?'

‘I enjoy it, Krystyna.'

‘I can see. You could be lost for hours.'

‘By the way,' Jack continued, ‘talking of puddings, it's my mother's birthday next weekend. I was hoping you might like to come. There's a dinner party.'

‘I am sure I am not invited.'

‘You are. They told me to ask you. My parents would love to see you again.'

‘I will be shy.'

‘You're not shy. And everyone loves you. Besides, you wouldn't have to talk to me all the time.'

‘I like talking to you,' said Krystyna.

‘Do you?'

‘Of course. Why do you think I am here? You are the one who looks worried during our conversations: not me.'

‘I am sure you understand why,' said Jack.

‘No, I don't understand why.'

‘I just worry.'

‘And what are you worried about?'

He might as well say it, he thought.

‘I'm worried about liking you too much.'

Krystyna laughed. It was the first time he had seen her do so.

‘How can you like someone too much?'

‘You know what I mean.'

She put her right hand to her mouth.

‘You are so funny.'

‘I don't mean to be.'

‘That's what makes it funnier.'

Jack's mother thought back to the birthdays of her childhood. She remembered being taken into Edinburgh for her first party dress. It was black velvet with a white lace collar and she wore it with white
socks and black ballet pumps. She could still recall the children from the village walking up the lane or arriving on farmers' carts carrying the presents for her party. Then there was the excitement of organised games: pin the tail on the donkey, blind man's buff, sardines, and singing games:

There was a farmer and a dog
His name was Bobbie Bingo
B-I-N-G-O, B-I-N-G-O,
His name was Bobbie BINGO.

After pass the parcel her father would come into the room with the cake and candles. The year before he died there had been eleven.

Now she was going to be eighty.

Angus, Tessa and their children were staying the night. Elizabeth had asked them to make a weekend of it. She saw so little of her grandchildren and she knew their presence would cheer up her husband. They could pretend that he was not as ill as he was.

The family arrived with flowers, champagne and presents. Jack and Krystyna brought an antique music box.

‘Lovely to see you, Krystyna. You look stunning.'

She was wearing a tailored white blouse and a mother-of-pearl scallop-shell necklace.

‘I hope it is not too much.'

‘Of course not. Did you choose the music box?'

‘No, I did,' said Jack. Maggie had always picked the presents in the past.

‘Such a pity Annie and Kirsty couldn't be here,' said Elizabeth.

‘I'm sorry,' said Jack. ‘They're both away.'

‘I understand. I don't mind. And it's lovely to see Krystyna.'

‘Our children are here,' said Angus. It irritated him that his mother missed the relations who were absent rather than appreciate those who had made the effort to come.

Gavin had taken the train up from London but surprised his grandmother by sporting a hairstyle that involved a shaved stripe across the right side of his head.

‘What on earth have you done to your hair?'

‘The razor slipped, Granny.'

‘You're not expecting me to believe that, are you?' Elizabeth also noticed that he was wearing a
Proud to be Pakistani
T-shirt. ‘And you're not from Pakistan, as far as I know…'

‘My mother was born there,' said Tessa, defending her son's choice of outfit. It had been hard enough to persuade him to come without policing his dress code.

‘Which makes me a quarter Pakistani,' said Gavin. ‘So I'll be safe, come the revolution.'

‘What revolution?'

‘When Britain becomes a Muslim state. Just think, Granny, a teetotal Britain…'

Elizabeth couldn't imagine the Taliban thriving in East Fortune. At least her nieces were well presented. No tattoos or piercings
yet,
as far as she could see.

She opened her presents: three bottles of bath oil, a cushioned dining tray, a friendship book, and a bottle of gin. The family began to look embarrassed.

‘Sometimes I feel about a thousand years old. I'm giving Methuselah a run for his money, I can tell you.'

Gavin gave his grandmother
The Worst Case Scenario Handbook.
Now she would know how to escape from quicksand, perform a tracheotomy and fend off a shark.

‘Sorry, I couldn't think what to get you.'

‘At least it's better than hand cream and bath essence,' Elizabeth replied. ‘That's all I seem to get these days.'

‘Well, I'm sorry,' said Sarah, who had given her exactly that, ‘but it is high quality.'

‘I'm not complaining.'

Ian gave a low chuckle.

‘Oh I rather think you are.'

There was a ring at the doorbell and a barking of dogs as Douglas and Emma arrived. They were late. It was obvious that they had argued in the car and that Douglas had been drinking.

‘Happy birthday, Mother.' He had brought some flowers that had clearly come from a petrol station. Emma had wrapped up a cookery book.

Douglas gave Angus a hug and inspected him for his dress sense.

‘You look like a schoolteacher who's been sacked for a bit of indiscretion.'

‘We can't all afford Armani.'

‘Sorry, I suppose that's a bit tactless.'

‘I haven't been sacked.'

‘Oh, sorry, I thought…'

‘Not in front of Mother.'

They were eleven at the table: Ian and Elizabeth; Angus, Tessa and the three children; Jack and Krystyna; Douglas and Emma.

Douglas insisted that he sat in the middle between what he called his ‘favourite nieces'.

‘We're the only nieces here,' said Imogen.

‘You don't like Jack's children?' Krystyna asked.

‘I was joking, Krystyna.'

‘Still. It is rude.'

Douglas was surprised to be taken to task.

‘Well, I'm very sorry.'

‘It's all right,' said Jack. ‘It doesn't matter.'

Elizabeth tried to give Douglas something to do.

‘Will you open the red wine?'

‘I think Angus has already done it. He's just a bit slow on the delivery.'

‘I suppose not everyone can keep up with the speed of your drinking,' said Emma.

‘There's no need to draw attention to it.'

‘I'm not. You're perfectly capable of doing that yourself.'

‘Now, now,' said Ian. ‘That's quite enough. It's Elizabeth's birthday. We are here to enjoy ourselves. And I'm going to start with this rather marvellous chicken.'