Not What They Were Expecting (28 page)

‘I’d say she’s had more important things on her mind than tidying up over the past week,’ she said, although she’d just seconds before been marvelling at the old newspapers still left stacked against the wall, and what looked like a basket of clothes left in a corner as furniture had been pushed back to let people mingle. Still, she wasn’t going to agree with him.

‘Becky dear,’ he continued, ‘we need to have a chat about the trial.’

‘I don’t think this is the place.’

‘Just a few dates and times, my brief wants a quick chat beforehand.’

‘Look, I don’t want to talk about it, Dad.’ Rebecca felt herself get as angry as she could allow herself to be in the circumstances.

‘It’s just some admin-y things. There’s no sense burying your head in the sand, you know.’

That was enough to flick a switch for her. He was right of course, but he had no idea why. Time to put that right.

‘OK, fine,’ she snapped, ‘we’ll go into Ben’s office, on the left just before the garden.’

They headed through the crowd from the front living room towards the back of the ramshackle Victorian house, Rebecca smile-frown-smiling at everyone, Howard walking behind greeting them with a too-cheerful ‘lovely service’.

‘Shadow Business Minister over there. Blinking unreformed Trotskyite. I’ve a mind to go over and ask him when did they start teaching Marx at the bloody expensive private school his parents sent him to.’

‘Do you want to talk to me or not?’

‘Fine. Fine. I’ll get him later. Met his father a couple of times actually. Decent bloke. For a lefty.’

They slid into the tiny dark study next to the garden, which Rebecca always thought would be much better used as part of an open-plan kitchen/diner. As the only place in the house Ben could have sneaked a cigarette, it would probably need to be fumigated to clear the smell of smoke, though. For a second Rebecca had to take some deep breaths through her mouth to calm her currently hair-trigger retch reflex. She couldn’t imagine her mother letting part of their house get like this.

‘Christ, she really had made an effort to clean up out there if this dump’s anything to go by,’ said Howard.

‘So what is it you wanted to tell me?’

‘Straight down to business, eh? OK then. So, you know the trial’s set for the end of next month, but Maplestone wants to get you in to speak to this lawyer he’s got in to represent me in court. Not a proper barrister, but he tells me he’s the best for dealing with this sort of scrap in a local court. Now we were thinking, maybe Wednesday then after that you could come ba—’

‘I’m not doing it,’ Rebecca announced. She was a bit surprised at herself, but when she said it out loud, she finally knew she was doing the right thing.

‘Well if Wednesday’s no good, we could schedule—’

‘The whole trial and witness thing. I’m not going to stand up and lie for you.’

‘This again, darling? It’s not lying, it’s just a means of getting pertinent information into the proceedings that wouldn’t be possible otherwise. It’s an essential part of the case we’ve put together.’

‘I had a visit from a journalist.’

‘Is that what it is? Freaked you out, eh? I know you don’t want any publicity, and not once have I asked you to appear in public on my behalf. We’ll keep to that.’

‘He told me about Manchester. And Edinburgh.’

Rebecca watched her dad react. His eyes flickered up to the left. She knew that meant something, but couldn’t remember what.

‘He’s lying.’

‘Lying about what, Dad?’

‘Well, bup…he…he probably made up something scurrilous to unsettle you into blabbing something else about our personal lives. Oldest trick in the book.’

‘You didn’t say anything to him did you?’ Howard continued.

‘Threw him out of the house.’

‘Good girl.’

She could see her father’s shoulders relax.

‘But I believe him.’

There was a pause.

‘Believe him about what?’

Howard wasn’t going to get caught assuming he knew what the journalist was talking about twice.

‘About the other places.’

‘Other places.’

‘Ah Jesus, don’t make me say it, Dad. I know.’

‘It’s all just a misunderstanding.’

‘Don’t!’

‘They can’t talk about it during the trial,’ he said softly.

‘What do you mean?’

‘It would be prejudicial, and irrelevant, as long as I’m careful about my good character. You should know this, it’s standard practice. I’m beginning to worry about all that money we spent on law school.’

Rebecca couldn’t speak at first. The level of duplicity was staggering to her. And what was this? An admission? It was too much to take in. But it didn’t make a difference to her resolve.

‘I’m not doing it.’

‘Darling…’

‘Do you realise what that could do to my career?’ Rebecca was angry now, and for once didn’t even need to think about what she was going to say before she said it. She was going to let him have it.

‘It wouldn’t be a career, it’d be a former career. I’d be fired, thrown out of the profession. I could end up in jail! I could have a baby and end up in jail. I cannot believe we’re even having this conversation.’

‘They’re not going to put a decent young mother like you in prison.’

‘What, because things like that don’t happen to people like us?’

‘Don’t start going all lefty on me again, dear. You’re not a teenager any more.’

‘And I’m not going to lie to Mum any more. Or to James. He’s been defending you too you know.’

As he finally realised Rebecca was going to stand by what she said, Howard’s face went red, and his voice took on a low, tight tone, his anger rising to match his daughter’s.

‘I cannot believe what an uncaring, snide, sanctimonious bitch you’ve grown up to be. How can you do this to your family? You’re going to ruin me, our family business, and break your mother’s heart. You’re such an…such an ungrateful child. I did everything I could for you when you were growing up—’

‘You were a parent! That was your job.’

‘And didn’t I do that? Didn’t you get everything you wanted? Fucking little madam you could be at times too.’

‘How would you know? You were never there.’

‘Yes, well. If we’re being honest now then I can say I’d wanted a boy.’

‘Well, some things don’t change.’

‘I am not a queer!’

‘Stop trying to fuck them then!’

The loudness of their voices seemed to register with both of them, and they watched each other, quietly seething. Howard was the first to gather himself, and he pointed to the study door.

‘There’s people mourning the death of a man out there. My age. A father. And you can still do this. My case collapses now, and it’s too late to change anything because of your dithering, selfish cowardice. I’m ashamed of you.’

‘I blame the way I was raised.’

Howard, grabbed the door handle, and without another word was gone, slamming the door shut behind him. Rebecca sat down, stunned and shaking. She could feel Bomp kicking and squirming away. At least someone was enjoying the adrenaline rush. Her feelings were all over the place, but the main sense she had was one of relief. She’d done it. She’d stood up for herself. But she’d said such horrible things to her dad. Guilt was coming in a close second.

A little while later, when she re-emerged into the gathering, she saw her dad and mum saying goodbye to Maggie. Watching them now, you couldn’t have imagined barely ten minutes ago she and her dad had had the biggest row of their lives. It was as if nothing had happened. After a lot of sympathetic head nodding, and what she could tell from a distance was him doling out ‘life goes on’ platitudes, her parents headed for the door. Howard paused briefly to make a joshing finger-wagging point to the shadow minister, and was gone. They hadn’t even tried to find her to say goodbye.

‘There you are,’ said James, walking up behind her and putting his arms around her shoulders. ‘You missed the fun. There was a big bonfire of Ben’s clothes, and old completed crossword books and shit. All that was missing was some fireworks.’

Rebecca thought about the fireworks there’d been in Ben’s old room, and wondered how she could tell him.

‘I hope she didn’t torch his collection of ethically sourced porn,’ mused James.

‘You OK?’ she asked.

‘For a day when I’ve cremated my dad and seen my mother display keening and mourning traditions from around the globe in front of forty baffled middle-aged people? Not too bad, actually. You?’

‘Shattered.’

‘Good of your folks to come.’

‘Hn,’ Rebecca grunted. ‘I spoke to dad about the trial. Told him I wouldn’t appear as a witness, it’s all too near to the due date.’

‘Really? Will they be OK with just a written statement in the circumstances?’

‘I’m not saying anything. I think that…that the lawyers wanted me to say more than what had happened when I’d spoken to Dad. And I think the timing was a little confused too, which meant it wasn’t really helpful for the case anyway.’

She could feel him studying her face.

‘OK,’ he said with a smile she couldn’t quite interpret.

‘It’ll be his word against the police, now. Which…’ She couldn’t speak any more. Her throat constricted as she felt a wave of guilt at the likely result of her decision. It was crazy. She shouldn’t be feeling bad for refusing to lie. For protecting herself and her child.

‘You should go home,’ James said, giving her shoulders a rub. ‘I’ll see the stragglers off, help Maggie clean up and see that she’s OK, and get back later. You two need your rest.’

‘Are you sure? Are you OK? I shouldn’t go, I should be here.’

‘We’ll be fine. Bompalomp’s the priority. Don’t let her hear it, but it’d be good to spend some time with Maggie.’

As they spoke, Margaret walked by them, chatting to someone related to James, although Rebecca wasn’t sure who or how.

‘Of course the next big event in this house will be the naming ceremony for our grandchild,’ they heard her say as she passed. ‘You must come back for that. Happier times.’

Rebecca looked at James. He shrugged it was the first time he’d heard of it.

But how could she be sure that that was the truth any more? And why had he not seemed more surprised about her dad? Did he realise what she’d admitted? She was getting more confused, and frustrated, and on the verge of anger again. She didn’t know what to do. She was certain she couldn’t carry on though, with this voice in her head, questioning every expression on James’s face, and every utterance he made. Even on a day like today. Again she wondered why she was letting this happen to herself.

‘James…’

‘Yes, dah-ling?’

He looked at her expectantly as he gathered up a handful of plates and glasses left sitting on various ledges. She tried to work out what she needed to say to him.

But now was not the time. She’d taken one step to stand up for the new family she was creating today. That’d be enough. Now he needed some time to be with the family he had come from.

‘I’ll probably be asleep when you get in, so try not to knock anything over.’

Chapter 37

James scanned the shelves of the chemist, not sure where he needed to be to find the cocoa butter cream he wanted to pick up for Becs. He wasn’t even sure exactly what it was, and it was only after reviewing the context of the conversation in which she mentioned it that he’d realised that it was something you smeared on yourself, rather than on a piece of toast. He was quite glad that, when Rebecca had been slouching in his lap on the couch saying it was probably already past the time she should have got some cocoa butter, that he hadn’t said that he thought there was some Nutella in the back of the larder she could probably have.

But he wanted to buy her something. It had been ages since he got her something just spontaneously. Having a bank balance that was like a gas meter dial spinning backwards towards zero didn’t help, but it was more about the time. There didn’t seem to be time for him to just be out and about, doing his stuff. It was occasions like that, when he was doing his own thing, when he’d think of Rebecca and want to do something for her for when he got home. Now every minute of his day seemed occupied with little jobs: being sent to get something, checking on his mother, going to an antenatal class, back to the job centre, at his temp job, looking at which nappy bin is best, finding out what a nappy bin is… The baby wasn’t born and they didn’t seem to have any time for themselves, or each other. Their parents weren’t even that old and they were having to look after them more and more already. Even though there were only three of them now.

And it was only a few weeks ago that he’d turned down the opportunity for a fuck with Gemma. What he thought about that was still jumping all over the place. There was the guilt that he’d even let it get as far as it had, but also a bit of pride that he’d had the opportunity. She really was very hot. He could only imagine what she would have been like in the sack. And to be honest he did still imagine it from time to time.

Then it all crashed around him at the thought that when it happened Ben had been dying.

But he’d done the right thing, and he was relieved that he had. He’d finished his drink and ran from the pub, basically. He’d been too wound up to go straight home though, after it happened, and since he had said he’d be out with Kam, he decided to take the chance to go to the movies and eat crap cinema snacks and watch a bit of 3D violent horror. He’d actually been in a fantastic mood when he came in the door, just before he heard about his dad. From then on he hadn’t given a thought to what had happened earlier until he checked his phone in the middle of the night when he couldn’t sleep and got the voice messages from Rebecca, and a ‘heads-up’ text from Kam.

Sitting on the toilet, James had done a quick bit of texting to his friend, explaining his version of events. Kam, up late himself with one of the kids, filled him in on what he’d said to Rebecca. Guiltily, James got his story straight. Then he’d let his friend know about Ben. It had been weird to put it down in black and white. Or rather, to put it in a light green speech bubble on his phone’s screen. Kam had texted back straight away with an offer to call, but James couldn’t speak right then, and not just because he was hiding in the loo. Talking about Ben was just too much. He didn’t know how to react, his brain would rebel against the truth, and something stupid would come out.