Sisteria (11 page)

‘Oh, while I remember. Look, Naomi, I was just wondering. My friend Millie at the day centre, she collects autographs…'

‘Mum, that's no problem at all,' Naomi cut in, suddenly perking up. ‘Just give me her address and I'll get my assistant to put a signed photograph in the post.'

‘Oh, no, darling. It's not yours she wants. She can't stand you. No, she was wondering if you could get her Anthea Turner's.'

Naomi began winding the telephone wire round her wrist, imagining it was her mother's neck.

‘OK,' she said, ‘tell your friend Millie I'll see what I can do.'

‘You will? That's wonderful. Millie was worried you might be offended, but I knew you wouldn't be... Now, tell me about this new man, darling... Jago, Jago. Doesn't sound like a Jewish name...'

Upstairs, Melvin and Beverley were still deep in conversation. By now, Melvin was sitting on the bed, running his fingers through his hair. ‘A quarter of a million,' he said for the umpteenth time in the same gobsmacked, incredulous tone.

‘I mean, just think what we could do with that kind of money, Bev. We could buy a new car, go on holiday, get this place done up. No more debts. No more dodgy deals with Vlad the…'

‘What? Who?' she came back at him. ‘Who have you been doing dodgy deals with? It's those bloody toupees, isn't it…?'

‘Calm down,' he soothed. ‘It's nobody. Honest. Private joke. I was just thinking out loud, that's all.'

She knew full well he was lying, but decided to let it go for the time being.

‘So, come on, bottom line. What do you think about the idea?'

He picked up his dressing gown from the end of the bed.

‘Oh, God, I dunno,' he said, sticking his arm through one of the sleeves. ‘I mean, the money's one thing, but think what you'd have to do to earn it. Naomi is asking you to get knocked up by her boyfriend and carry a baby which would technically be yours, and then give it up...'

‘Melvin, please don't refer to my becoming pregnant as getting “knocked up”. You make the whole thing sound utterly grubby. Look, how many more times do I have to tell you - if I agree to this, I would be inseminated with a bloody syringe thing. I promise there would be no actual sex involved.'

Melvin grunted. He walked over to the window and stood with his back to her.

‘God, you're jealous, aren't you?' she said, smiling. Despite their lack of a decent love life, it was flattering to think that Melvin should still feel like that after twenty years.

‘Don't be ridiculous,' he snapped, without turning round. ‘Of course I'm not.'

‘It's OK, Mel. I'm glad you're a bit jealous.' She went over to him and put her arms round his waist. Finally he turned to face her.

‘Look,' she said, her head leaning on his chest, ‘I know it would be bloody strange to say the least - me carrying a child which wasn't yours - but it's not as if we're planning to keep it. It's not like the baby's the result of an affair and I'm asking you to be its father.'

‘No, I guess not,' he said quietly, acknowledging her point at an intellectual level, but buggered if he could take it on board emotionally. After all, he'd spent most of this week secretly obsessing and driving himself virtually insane with images of Beverley carrying on behind his back. Although he accepted she wasn't about to run off with this Tom bloke - he was in love with Naomi, who was beautiful, rich and successful, not a Finchley housewife - he still found the thought of Beverley becoming pregnant by anybody other than him (even if there was no actual sex involved) utterly humiliating. Irrational as it seemed, he knew that if Beverley went ahead with the surrogacy he would be left with an overwhelming sense of betrayal.

He stroked her head. She gazed up at him, her beautiful black eyes sparkling and eager. She suddenly looked about nineteen. He began pushing her hair back behind her ears.

‘You really want to do this, don't you?'

She nodded.

‘She's my sister, Mel. I love her.'

‘But Bev,' he said gently, ‘just look at the way she's treated you.'

‘Mel, let's not get into another argument about whether or not Naomi has changed. OK, I admit it. I can't be one hundred per cent certain. I know you're going to tell me I shouldn't trust her any further than I can throw her. Maybe you're right. But Mel, what sort of a woman lies about being infertile? I mean, she'd have to be pretty bloody warped. And why would she? I can't see what she'd have to gain.'

‘Easy. Women like Naomi see babies as some kind of fashion accessory. And she'd rather shell out for one than risk losing her figure by getting pregnant.'

‘That's what Rochelle said.'

‘Christ,' he came back at her, ‘Rochelle knows about this? Who else have you told? God, if you've mentioned it to Queenie it'll be all round the bloody day centre by now. Half of Finchley'll be gossiping about it.'

‘Don't be daft. I haven't said a word to Mum. I only told Rochelle because I needed to bounce it off another woman, that's all.'

She moved away and began needlessly rearranging bottles and jars on the dressing table.

‘Mel, you should have seen her sitting in that ridiculous restaurant,' she went on. ‘There were tears pouring down her face when she told me she couldn't have babies.'

‘I don't doubt it,' he said with more than a touch of cynicism in his voice. ‘And you think you're emotionally strong enough to give away a baby you've carried for nine months?'

‘Believe me, Mel, I've thought about nothing else for the last few days. But yes, I think I could do it.'

‘And what about the kids? I mean, you'd be giving away their half-brother or sister.'

‘I know. It'll need some delicate handling, but I thought if you and I were agreed, we could talk to them together and try to make them understand why I... we want to go ahead with it.'

He stood close behind her now, looking over her shoulder into the dressing table mirror. They gazed at each other. He could see the pleading etched into her face.

‘I'm going to need some time to think about this,' he said.

‘I know,' she said gently. “That's OK. I didn't expect you to make your mind up on the spot.' She turned round and kissed him affectionately on the cheek.

After she'd gone downstairs and he was getting dressed, Melvin found himself suddenly overwhelmed with guilt. In twenty years of marriage what had he given Beverley? Bollock all. Two kids to bring up in a shabby semi and an ever-increasing mountain of debt. Allowing her to go ahead with the surrogacy would in an odd way be his chance to make amends, to give her something she really wanted. Maybe he was underestimating his emotional strength. When the moment actually arrived, perhaps he would be able to cope with the idea of her carrying another man's child. Certainly the money would give him an incentive. He pulled on his jeans and began buttoning the fly. A quarter of a million. No more debts. No more hate mail. Security. Melvin allowed himself to wallow in the possibility, to sink deep into its embrace and feel its warmth. As he did so, the juggernaut being driven by Mr McGillicuddy and the Inland Revenue people suddenly went into reverse and began disappearing back down the tunnel.

***

It was only as he lay in bed that night with Beverley asleep beside him that he began to have second thoughts. Who was he trying to kid? How would he ever be able to look at Beverley or make love to her knowing that some other bloke's seed was growing inside her? His entire being was suddenly awash with revulsion. The money was beginning to be no comfort. The very opposite, in fact. He had wanted to be the one to get them out of financial trouble. More than anything, he'd wanted to prove to Beverley he was capable of making a decent living. He'd dreamed that one day he might even make their fortune. Now his chance was gone for ever. Beverley had got there first. Done it instead of him. The kids would see her, not him, as the family's financial saviour. If he wasn't already an inadequate saddo in their eyes, he was most definitely about to become one. Beverley would no doubt say he was raving, but the way he saw it, everything he spent from now on would be her money, not theirs. Christ, every time he bought a ticket to a football match or paid for petrol, it would feel like he was accepting a handout from his wife.

All the same, he couldn't bring himself to refuse her. He couldn't bear to watch her face crumple as he said no. All their married life he'd been saying no. No new carpets. No holiday this year. No new car. He couldn't bear the thought of saying no to this too. He would have to find another, infinitely more subtle, way of putting a stop to the surrogacy. His first line of attack would be to go and see Naomi.

Chapter 9

Naomi giggled into the kitchen phone and picked up another forkful of Aunt Bessie's Tidgy Pudd covered in Bisto.

‘...not half as much as I'm missing you, my darling,' she purred. ‘I'm just counting the hours till Friday night... What am I wearing? What do you want me to be wearing?'

She listened and let out another giggle.

‘Crotchless? OK, Tom, they're crotchless. God, I hope there isn't somebody on the bloody hotel switchboard listening to this... My nipples? Huge, darling. Absolutely huge... No, you dope, I can't suck them. I can't get my head down that far... What? No, of course I'm not chewing anything. Believe me, all I want to chew is you... Oh yes, they're open, Tom - wide open... Wet? Baby, you should feel what I can feel down there. The floodgates have opened. Little Rose Bud is swollen and so, so wet. God, your breathing's got really heavy all of a sudden. I bet you're really hard. Come on, tell me how hard you are.'

While she listened, she ran another piece of ready-made Yorkshire pudding round the plate, mopping up gravy. She put her hand over the telephone while she ate it.

‘OK,' she said, trying to make her voice as deep and sexy as possible and at the same time swallow her mouthful of food, ‘imagine I'm giving you a tongue bath. I'm straddling you in these crotchless pants... What?... Oh, I dunno, red with black lace... Right now I'm licking you all over - dead, dead slow... Yes, I can feel your hands squeezing my breasts... Yes, of course I've got the vibrator on. Can't you hear it?' She jumped up from the kitchen table and stretching the curly phone lead as far as it would go, went over to the cooker hood. As she switched on the extractor fan, she popped the last bit of Tidgy Pudd into her mouth. ‘OK, now I've got Little Tommy deep in my mouth. I'm running my tongue all over you from the bottom to the top. Feels good? Ooh, I bet it does... Tom, honestly, you have to believe me. Why would I be eating at a time like this? Come on. Now pretend you're doing that special thing I like... What do you mean, what thing? You know the thing... with the feather and the Issy Miyake bottle.

‘Oh God, yeah, I can feel it. Ooh, you've really hit the spot. Oh, now you're inside me. You're licking my hard little love buttons. And thrusting. Thrusting. Ooh, ooh, can you feel me, Tom? Can you feel how hot and wet I am for you, baby? Oh God. Oh God. Oh... Oh...'

She could hear him trying to get his breath back.

‘Great?' she sighed. ‘That was more than merely great, darling. That was blissful. Now then, go and get something to eat and I'll speak to you tomorrow. Yeah, love you too. Bye.'

***

Naomi put down the phone. Tom had been away filming in Newcastle for almost two weeks. Each evening, around this time, he would call her from his hotel room, tell her how much he was missing her and then persuade her to play their telephone sex game. Only she could never really be bothered. Even when they were in bed together she felt the same. She usually put it down to exhaustion and overwork, but if she was honest, she'd always been pretty unenthusiastic sex-wise with each of her boyfriends.

Tonight she'd felt as apathetic as usual, but added to this, she'd also been starving. In fact she'd been ravenous, on account of still being furious with the British Association of Rose Growers. But she would do anything rather than disappoint Tom or put their relationship in jeopardy, so whenever they made love she faked it. And Naomi, being Naomi, faked it quite magnificently.

Tom was the best thing that had happened to her in years. She knew she wasn't in love with him, but love was of little or no interest to her. He was handsome, talented and successful. He even coped with her bad temper. Naturally she tried not to reveal that side of herself too often, but despite her best efforts she was incapable of being pleasant for more than two or three days at a stretch. After one of her regular explosions she would burst into tears and beg forgiveness. This was always forthcoming.

Another factor Naomi considered vital to her relationship with Tom was that, with the commercials he made quietly on the side, he earned very nearly as much as she did. This meant there was no question of him only being with her for her money. All in all, she'd decided a matter of hours after being introduced to him at a party at Soho House that Tom Jago was everything she required in a consort.

She brought the plate to her face, stuck out her tongue and began licking up remains of Bisto. Only when there wasn't a trace of brown left did she put the plate in the dishwasher. What she fancied now was something like jam roly-poly or spotted dick and custard. But after downing twelve mini Yorkshire puddings, she decided to make do with fruit. She also made a mental note to phone Summer the next morning and book a colonic. She broke off a stem from the bunch of grapes in the fruit bowl and went into the living room.

‘Christ, this thing is so fucking uncomfortable,' she groaned, sprawling out on the Regency chaise-longue and holding the grapes, Greek goddess style, above her mouth. But comfort wasn't something Odd ever considered when he was designing a room.

‘Form, elegance, grace. These are what matters, darling,' he'd gushed the first time they met at the flat to discuss the decorations. He'd not so much wandered as glided round the place, proclaiming, ‘Barbarians. Savages,' whenever he came across an anaglypta-covered wall or a fitted wardrobe.

Finally he'd come back to the living room where she was waiting.

‘Well, my darling, I won't pretend it's going to be easy, or cheap,' the celebrated Norwegian interior designer had said, adjusting the cream cashmere pashmina hanging over his shoulder and assuming the balletic second position. ‘For the vestibule and bedroom I see walls bathed in fromage frais. Then for the living room, since we have this wonderful Georgian fireplace and huge French doors to work with, I think we should go a tad off piste with lots of rich purples and golds. I see cherubs, perhaps an ornamental fountain in the middle. Maybe a love seat even. Ooh, and a Grecian-style mural - a trompe-l'oeil even - on the far wall... Oh yes, definitely.'

Odd - nobody knew his second name - might well have interior-designed everybody from Geri Halliwell to Idi Amin, but Naomi was starting to have doubts.

‘Odd, with the greatest respect,' she said (her sycophancy knew no bounds where the rich and famous, or the ‘geniuses' and ‘virtuosi' employed by the rich and famous, were concerned), ‘this is a home, not a - how can I put it? - a tart's boudoir.'

‘Now then,' he said, slapping her playfully on the wrist, ‘what have I told you about trusting me? If you don't I shall flounce, darling. Simply flounce. I did it to Ivana when she argued. Don't think I won't do the same to you.'

In the end she managed to convince him to ditch the love seat and the fountain, but he won out over the gold cherubs (two over the mantelpiece, one at each end of the walnut credenza) and the mural. The wall painting was a replica of Botticelli's
Birth of Venus
. It was exact in every way except that the Odd Venus had the face of Naomi Gold.

Odd had also got his own way over the black and white tiled floor when she'd wanted stripped boards (‘Ooh, no, darling, no. Very five minutes ago'), the purple walls and the exquisite, but unyielding, Regency furniture which had cost tens of thousands. She had to admit that with lighted candelabras and huge vases of white lilies everywhere, the room had a definite grandeur about it, but if she wanted to get comfortable, like now, she had to go to bed.

While Naomi was less than keen on the way the flat had been decorated, but pretended to adore it because the entire art-showbiz-media world both sides of the Atlantic considered Odd to be a genius, Tom loathed it. Every time he walked in he said he felt like he should be prancing around in a powdered peruke and a beauty spot. One Saturday night, when they were sitting around trying to think of something to do, he suggested going to the Bastille to watch a couple of guillotinings.

Mrs Triplet, Naomi's cleaning lady, wasn't any more supportive.

‘Well, at least the bedroom's nice. I like a four-poster and you can't go wrong with magnolia walls. I've got it indoors.'

‘No, no, Mrs T,' Naomi said patiently, ‘it's not magnolia, it's fromage frais. Cost me forty quid a litre.'

Mrs Triplet squinted for a few seconds and grunted.

‘Well, if you say so, Naomi, but it looks exactly like magnolia to me.'

As Naomi finished the last of the grapes, she looked round the room. She had everything, she thought: the Holland Park address, a flat decorated by the world's most fashionable designer, a live-in lover who looked like he should be starring in something opposite Julia Roberts. She even had a baby planned, even though this had less to do with maternal desire than with another, more Machiavellian plan entirely. And yet, still, somewhere deep inside her, there was an emptiness she couldn't quite put her finger on.

Naomi picked up the miniature bronze nude which lived on the small table next to the chaise-longue and began stroking her head.

‘What is it?' she whispered, staring at the nude's face. ‘What is it?'

But Naomi wasn't one to waste her time running fingers over the map of her psyche in an effort to locate and explore some far-flung emotional continent. Instead she decided to have a bath and go to bed. She'd put the statue back and was just getting up from the chaise-longue when she heard the buzz of the intercom. She looked at her watch. It was nearly nine. A puzzled frown on her face, she made her way to the front door, throwing the grape stalks on to the unlit fire as she went. She pressed the intercom button.

‘Yes?'

‘Naomi, it's Melvin. Could I come in for a few minutes?'

‘Melvin?' she said, utterly taken aback. ‘What, as in my brother-in-law Melvin?'

‘Yes.'

‘Christ. Right. Yes, I guess so. Come up.'

She opened the front door and waited for the lift.

***

‘Melvin,' she said, ushering him in and trying desperately, but failing, to hide her shock. ‘Gosh, this is a surprise. The last time you spoke to me you were throwing me out of your house.' She eyed the unease on his face, and couldn't make out if it was anger or nervousness. She made no attempt to kiss him hello. He made no move towards her.

She showed him into the living room.

‘Blimey,' he said looking round, ‘Beverley said you were living with a bloke. She didn't tell me it was the Scarlet bloody Pimpernel.'

She ignored the comment and smiled.

‘Sit down, Mel. Sit down.' She pointed to one of the hardback chairs and sat herself at one end of the chaise-longue.

She looked at him for a few seconds, taking in the battered leather bomber jacket and baggy Levis.

‘So...' she began edgily, ‘I take it Beverley has told you about our little meeting the other day?'

‘Yes, she told me,' he said acidly, putting his hands into his jacket pockets. ‘Told me last night.'

‘And she's made up her mind?'

‘Pretty much.'

‘So?' Naomi said, leaning forward, her eyes wide with expectation. ‘Come on... don't leave me in suspense, what has she decided?'

‘Oh, she'll do it all right,' Melvin said, with faux casualness. ‘Can't wait, in fact.'

‘Bloody hell...' Naomi squealed with excitement, failing to notice the black expression on Melvin's face. ‘You mean she's said yes? Beverley's actually said she'll do it?'

‘Yup.'

‘God.'

She stood up and began wandering round the room.

‘Beverley's agreed,' she repeated over again. ‘Jeez. I just can't believe it.' Eventually she came back to the chaise-longue and sat down. She looked at Melvin.

‘So, if Beverley wants to go ahead,' she said, sounding puzzled, ‘why hasn't she phoned me to let me know?'

She was looking at his face now.

‘Oh, right,' she said, ‘I get it. You disapprove. Hence the visit. Does she know you're here?'

He shook his head.

‘She thinks I'm working late at the shop,' he said. ‘Look, at the end of the day, I can't stop Beverley agreeing to the surrogacy, but I'm begging you, Naomi, please don't ask her to do this. Have you even the remotest idea what it will do to a woman like Beverley - to give birth and then give up the baby? She adores babies, you know that. When Natalie and Benny were born she used to sit for hours cradling them in her arms, just staring at them. She didn't just love those little mites, she was in love with them. If she has to part with a baby, she'll end up in the nut house. I'm warning you, Naomi, don't let her go through with this. It'll finish her off.'

Naomi thought for several moments.

‘Finish
her
off, Melvin - or you?' she said coldly. ‘I think my sister possesses a damn sight more strength than you think.' She got up and began pacing round the room. ‘God knows, she's put up with you long enough. Twenty years you've failed to earn a living, Mel... twenty years. In all that time she's scrimped and saved, gone without and stuck by you. You may call that weakness, but I don't.'

She was facing him now.

‘Be honest, Melvin. You're not bothered about what effect this will have on Beverley's mind and emotions. We may not have seen each other for five years, but I've known you a long time, Mel, and you can't fool me. You coming here tonight isn't about Beverley's emotions. It's about yours.'

‘That's utter crap, and you know it. It's Beverley I'm worried about.'

‘I don't think so. Look, I can understand you might find it hard knowing Beverley's carrying another man's child. A lot of men would feel the same...'

‘Hard?' he said with a grimace. ‘That's a bloody understatement. How do you think it feels, knowing your wife's about to become a tart and have a bloke's baby - for money?'