Games People Play (36 page)

‘Dana, you aren’t a bad mother. You weren’t, I mean; and you aren’t now. Ivan’s an adult. He’s responsible for his own mistakes; accountable for his own behaviour. He was a difficult child! Nothing you did; it’s just the way he was. I think him paying you back before his creditors is more because he’s too proud to admit that the business was failing, not because he was afraid of your criticism. I know you’re feeling under the weather, but try not to make yourself feel worse by blaming yourself. It’s not your fault.’

Ted releases me from the hug, picks the dog lead off the peg, and clips it on to Jackson’s collar.

‘Let’s take him for a walk,’ he says. ‘We can go slowly. Fresh air will do you good.’

I have heavy heart as I put on my coat and follow him outside. I believed that I would feel liberated by telling Ted the truth, but now I have just worried him more. I should have kept quiet. But I have been feeling so bad for Ivan, sorry for him, now that Anthea has gone and Rachel’s not speaking to him and Susie’s found out about Natasha. Even Natasha doesn’t want him now. He’s broke and alone. And Ted is disgusted with him. I do not feel liberated. I feel rather depressed, actually. And no matter what Ted says, I am still a bad mother.

Susie

‘We’ll go and sit in the car,’ I said to Ivan, more firmly than I felt. He was being so aggressive, yet I could sense the inherent weakness and despair fuelling it. I also sensed that perhaps it wasn’t just me he was angry with. But my knees were shaking so much that I was worried I wouldn’t even make it back to the car, which was parked on a meter in the High Street.

I unlocked the passenger door and held it open for him. As soon as he got in, he leaned forwards in the seat, rocking to and fro, his shoulders hunched in defeat. A broken man. He wrapped his arms over his head in a curiously childlike posture and moaned.

‘How can you be so vindictive, Susie? I mean, talk about kicking a man when he’s down.’

‘I haven’t been vindictive!’ I said hotly. ‘I don’t even know what you’re so upset about. If anything, it’s
me
who has a right to be upset.’

He snorted. ‘You? Oh, do me a favour.’

‘Yes, me. You haven’t even bothered to apologize for cheating on me – and I don’t care that you think it’s ancient history, because it matters to me.’

‘And so you thought you’d make me suffer for it, all these years later, and in the process break Anthea’s heart? You say that’s not vindictive ...? Huh.’

He made an ‘I rest my case’ gesture, palms open, which so infuriated me that I felt like punching him in the ear.

‘I haven’t said a word to Anthea. If she knows, she’s found out some other way.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

I shrugged. ‘Fine. Then don’t believe me. But it’s true, and I’d appreciate it if you stopped accusing me of things I haven’t done.’

He sighed. The windscreen was beginning to steam up, so I turned on the engine and put my window down by a few inches, letting in some welcome cold air. ‘How did you find out about Natasha, anyway?’ he asked sulkily.

‘I found a photo of you two in a box of stuff I’d left at Corinna’s. It wasn’t positive proof, but there was something about the way you were looking at her, and the message she wrote on the back. It was clear that she was more than just one of your players.’

‘You
must
have told Anthea...’

He was so infuriating. ‘Ivan, is that really how little you think of me? Why would I want to do something like that?’

‘Any number of reasons,’ he said, the old defensiveness creeping back into his voice. ‘Because you hate me. Because you wanted revenge on Rachel’s behalf, because she thinks I split her and Mark up…’ That one was a bit far-fetched, I thought. ‘Because you decided it was only fair to warn Anthea I was a two-timing “creep”, as you would doubtless put it.’

‘Well, there is that,’ I said. ‘But I didn’t tell her. Maybe somebody else did. Maybe, like me, she found something: a photo or a letter or something. People who cheat on their partners usually get found out. I’m amazed it’s taken me this long to find out about you and her.’

‘I didn’t two-time Anthea,’ he said wearily. ‘Not really. Tasha just keeps me on a string. Tells me she loves me and wants to be with me forever, and then dumps me. It’s been going on for years. Then I met Anthea, and started to get over Tasha. But she came back, a little while ago. I met her for a drink in Zurich, and again in London – she came over for a time. But I had too much going on, what with being on bail and all – it was right after I got arrested – and she was still really holding back. I just couldn’t be sure she really wanted me the way I want her. Hell, for all I know, she was only after free coaching. Maybe she never really loved me at all... Anyway, I told her that it was too late. I just couldn’t face going through all that again, however much I love her.’

I waited to feel the swelling of outrage and disbelief in my chest, but none came. Deep down, I knew he was still telling the truth. He was a self-pitying bugger, though.

A woman tapped on Ivan’s window and we both jumped. For a moment I thought it was someone else from his murky past, but when he put down the window, we saw she was pointing at the parking ticket balanced on the dashboard.

‘Terribly sorry,’ she was saying, ‘I was just wondering if you were going, and if so, could I have that? I’ve got no change and there’s a traffic warden on the prowl.’

She was in her fifties, jolly and posh. She probably knew Gordana, I thought. Probably pitied her for the deliciously juicy scandal of a son being accused of paedophilia. Prior to now, everyone thought of Gordana as a pillar of the community; a brave soul who’d overcome hardship and poverty. We’d all heard the stories: how she got pregnant and all her hopes and dreams were crushed, then Ted came along. What did they all think now?

Ivan handed my ticket to the woman, who beamed and nodded and backed off. Typical.

‘Ivan! I haven’t finished with that – I’m supposed to be meeting Karl for lunch.’

‘I’ll buy you another one. I just wanted to get rid of her.’

When the woman had gone, we sat in silence again as I digested what he’d told me.

‘So, do the police know about your debts?’

He nodded wearily. ‘It’s all come out because they’ve been investigating my finances, so now I’m going to be declared bankrupt too. I know I’ve been an idiot. It’s just that the club means so much to me. And being a success means so much to Mama, I just couldn’t admit that I was struggling with it; that I couldn’t pay her back.’

‘She’d have let you off. She’d never have insisted you paid her back.’

‘I know. But I so wanted to prove myself to her.’

I shook my head. Poor, sad Ivan. I felt so sorry for him; and with my pity came a kind of release; an end to bitterness and resentment I’d harboured towards him for so many years.

‘Let me help you,’ I said impulsively. ‘Gordana and Rachel have got too much on their plates at the moment. Ted needs to be there for Gordana. Anthea’s gone. I’m not as involved. I want to help. You need a friend.’

He sniffed and looked out of the window. But he didn’t instantly refuse.

‘Just tell me one thing, Ivan. I swear that what you say will stay inside this car; I won’t tell a soul. But I have to know:
did
you download and pay for any of that porn?’

He shook his head instantly, turning to face me with burning eyes. ‘I really didn’t, Susie, I promise you, on Mama’s life. I’d swear on fifty bibles. Someone else must have done it.’

‘On your computer?’

‘I think so. I don’t know much about these things but I don’t think it could’ve been done from any other computer.’ He leaned his head against the side window. ‘I’m not remotely interested in children in that way. In fact, I hate the way they get exploited like that…’

‘
Natasha
was only fifteen when you met her. A child.’

‘I know. But she looked twenty-one. Not that it’s any excuse, but she didn’t look or act like a child; and I certainly didn’t coerce her into anything. I wasn’t actually even coaching her in Hungary, not at first, until after we’d met up. Then she got herself transferred to my Junior squad, and that’s how I found out how young she was. I was horrified, but I was involved by then. I know I’m a bit of a Lothario, Suze, but since then I swear I’ve never looked twice at a girl without checking her age first, and if she’s under eighteen, I’ve run a mile.’

Tears ran down his cheeks again, and he swatted them away with the backs of his hands, sniffing like a child. ‘If I get convicted, I’ll definitely lose the club. But if I’m declared bankrupt, I’ll lose it anyway. Mama will never get her money back. Rachel will suffer...Oh God, I can’t bear it. I know some of it’s my own fault, but not
all
of it. And all I’ve been trying to do is avoid Rachel getting hurt. Give her the best chance she can have of success. Now I’ve ruined everything.’

He scratched the stubble beneath his chin. I noticed that the car was filling up with a strange kind of sweaty fug: the scent of Ivan’s despair. I wound down the window even further, almost gasping in the fresh, damp air. Imminent rain hung in the atmosphere; the thick dark grey clouds were so low they seemed to press down on the buildings and pavements.

The first drops of rain began to fall on the car roof, gathering speed and momentum. Within a minute, it was hammering all around us, sending people scurrying to their cars or into shop doorways. Funny how Ivan and I were back in a rainstorm, I thought, although the last thing he was likely to do was to bend me over a balcony and impregnate me. Thank goodness.

I wound the window back up as rain was splashing into the car and on to the side of my face and my shoulder.

‘While you’re being honest with me, for once, I want to ask you something. About that LTA party back in ’ninety-five?’

Ivan looked at me as if I’d lost my mind. ‘What party?’

‘The one I was invited to as well. That you ended up going to on your own, because you claimed that you were being stalked by a psycho ex-girlfriend called Tracy, who then mysteriously vanished out of your life as fast as she’d appeared?’

He looked shame-faced. ‘Oh. Yeah. Her.’

‘There was no Tracy, was there? That was a cover, so you could meet up with Natasha, wasn’t it?’

‘Sorry,’ he said lamely, fiddling with a packet of chewing gum I’d left in the pouchy leather surround of the clutch.

I tutted with irritation. ‘Ivan, you are the worst liar in the world. I knew you were lying, even back then! I knew there was no Tracy. You just wouldn’t admit it. Have a piece of gum – your breath smells like a brewery.’

‘Actually, there
was
a Tracy, an ex of mine. She wrote to me around that time and asked to see me again. I just, um, exaggerated it.’ He put a lozenge of chewing gum in his mouth and a fresher, mintier scent replaced the stale alcohol halitosis.

‘The only good thing about you being a dishonest cheating pig of a man is that at least you’re bad at it. That’s how I know you’re telling the truth about the downloads. I can see right through you, you know.’

‘You never used to be able to.’

‘Well, call it perspective, or experience, but I can now. You’re a total bloody idiot, Ivan.’

‘I know,’ he said humbly, and for the first time in almost ten years, I thought I might be starting to be fond of him again.

Two young girls in tennis whites ran past, obviously heading back to the shelter of the club. Ivan shrank down in his seat, but even through the rain, one of them spotted him and nudged the other, who stared unsubtly back at him over her shoulder. He pretended he hadn’t seen them. Rachel said there’d been rumours of reporters and detectives down at the club in the first weeks after his arrest, so the whole place was probably agog with speculation and censure.

‘I’ll take you home. You can sleep it off,’ I said. ‘Let me think about all this, see if there’s anything we can do.’

‘What about your date?’ said Ivan gruffly as I got my phone out of my handbag.

‘I’ll stop by the restaurant after I drop you off and see if they’re still there. But it doesn’t matter. I’m not really in the mood anyway.’

I started up the engine and pulled out into the slow traffic. The storm had already blown over, as suddenly as it started, but rain still flooded the streets, and queues had built up both ways.

‘Susie,’ Ivan said, chewing his gum with his mouth open in the way which had always irritated the hell out of me, but which he did when he felt awkward about something.

‘Yes?’

‘Thanks. I mean, thanks for believing me. I know I can be a shit, and I’ve done some wrong things in my time – some of them to you – but I’m not that much of a shit.’

I didn’t look at him as we stopped at some red traffic lights near his house.

‘Listen, Ivan, we’ve had our differences. But I don’t like seeing you in this state. Are you getting any help? Counselling, I mean?’

I waited for him to snort derisively, but instead he gave a meek nod. ‘Yeah. Been going since I was arrested.’

‘Oh, right ...well, that’s good.’ I was astonished.

Ivan had always been the type who’d rather pluck out his own eyes with toothpicks than voluntarily seek help from a professional.

‘If there’s anything I can do, just let me know, OK? ‘

‘OK.’

Good grief, I thought, after I’d dropped him off. How the mighty – or not so mighty – fall. I watched him shambling up his unkempt front garden path, a crushed, drooping figure, such a contrast to the once proud, fit athlete who could hit a ball as if each smash were a personal triumph. I felt so sad for him.

But at least I now knew for sure that he wasn’t connected with the child porn. There had to be some other explanation. And, really, it didn’t matter about Natasha, not any more. I would never admit it to Ivan, but he was right; it was in the past. It was Anthea’s problem now, not mine.