The Reunion (24 page)

I had the loveliest birthday. The new boy, Andrew, took me out for a breakfast at Dino’s, which is just this little greasy spoon, but he’d arranged to have them bring over a bottle of champagne with my bacon sarnie (a bacon sarnie! See, I am getting into the student spirit). When I got back to my room later that morning it was
full
of orchids – he’d surreptitiously nicked my key and got some friends to sneak into my room while we were out and put them everywhere. My room is now so beautiful. I love it.

And I love it here. You’re going to laugh when you read this, but thank you thank you thank you for making me revise for my A-levels. I can even forgive you for locking me in my room the night before my history exam when Darren Sanders invited me to go to SW1 (VIP room!). I’m just having the best time – I’ve met the coolest people, honestly: they’re so different to my London friends, they’re not into money at all, they’re clever and interesting, they talk about art and philosophy and shit like that, and I don’t know what they’re talking about half the time, but they don’t seem to care. They like me! There’s this girl, Natalie, she’s on my course, and she’s just amazing, she’s read everything there is to read, and she can talk for hours about politics and poetry, and she’s funny and adorable.

And I’m in love with Andrew! Really. I think I mean it this time. And you’re going to adore him, Mum, I promise. He’s totally not like Darren, he’s an absolute honey. He’s really clever, athletic, he works hard and he treats me so well. Plus he’s drop dead gorgeous. I was thinking of asking him to come to London at Easter – would that be OK?

Anyway, have to go, have a tutorial in twenty minutes. Thanks again for the dress, Mum, and thanks for pushing me so much, and thanks for taking all my shit. I miss you loads, I’ll see you in a few weeks.

Love, love, love,

Lilah

THE SILENCE BLANKETING
the house seemed deeper even than usual. Calm after the storm. Jen slept in after a fitful night’s sleep, and yet when she woke all was quiet. She leaned over and flicked on the lamp next to her bed. Yes. She breathed a sigh of relief, turning it off again. The power was back. She could at least provide her remaining guests with hot water and a cooked breakfast.

She swung her legs over the edge of the bed and sat up. Her head swam a little and she thought for a moment she might be sick. She breathed in and out, slowly and steadily, placed a hand on her belly. All quiet and still there, too. She took a long, warm shower, leaning her forehead gently against the tiles, eyes closed. She wished her mind would stop racing, wished she could gain a sense of inner peace to match the quiet outside.

There were so many things to worry about: Andrew and Natalie, the state Lilah might be in, whether or not Andrew and Lilah would be able to get back to the house, that conversation with Dan last night. She felt a fluttering, a slight movement in her belly and then a sharp kick. Her shoulders dropped a couple of inches, she exhaled slowly, relieved. She didn’t like the way she’d been feeling the last couple of days, the dizziness, the sickness. But it was nothing: just stress, rich food, probably a glass or two more wine than was advisable.

Downstairs, she discovered she wasn’t the first up. Natalie, dressed in tracksuit bottoms and a T-shirt, sat at the table in the dining room, speaking to someone on her phone. Her voice was quiet and calm, so Jen guessed it probably wasn’t Andrew. She guessed wrong.

‘He thinks they’ll be able to get back here around lunchtime,’ she said, ushering Jen to a chair and pouring her a cup of coffee. ‘They’ll come with the snow plough.’

Before Jen could express her relief, Natalie launched into an apology. ‘I behaved horribly yesterday,’ she said. ‘I know I did. And I really regret it, regret causing so much trouble.’ Jen tried to say something, to reassure her, but Natalie went on: ‘I hope you understand that there were things I needed to say, things I’ve been carrying around, that have been weighing on me…’

‘I do, Nat. I do understand.’

Natalie held up her hand. ‘This was the wrong time, the wrong place. And the things I needed to say, I didn’t even say them right. I just ended up upsetting Andrew. I was supposed to be protecting him.’

There was a throb behind Jen’s eyes. She felt suddenly exhausted, she wasn’t sure she could bear to go over all this again. ‘It’s OK, Nat. Everyone was a little overwrought. It’s mostly my fault for the way I handled things anyway…’

‘No. I see what you tried to do, I know your intentions were good. I spoiled everything.’

Jen shook her head, sipped her coffee.

Mercifully, Natalie changed the subject. She asked Jen questions about her plans, had she chosen names yet (no), would she live with her mother in Tunbridge Wells when she moved to England (certainly not). Jen explained that she’d probably end up in London, or possibly Oxford. There was a possibility of a job at Oxford University Press. After a few minutes, they lapsed into more or less comfortable silence, sipping their coffee, enjoying the stillness of the morning.

They boiled eggs and made toast, chatted about Charlotte and Grace, and life in England, what Jen should expect. She’d been back for days, here and there, when her father got sick, for his funeral, but overall she’d probably spent less than a couple of weeks in her home country since the year of the accident. The chatter felt warm, companionable; this was the kind of breakfast Jen had hoped for when she’d invited them, only she’d envisaged there being six of them at the table, rather than just two.

‘The boys are sleeping in,’ she said out loud, stating the obvious.

‘Yes, well. Zac’s not long left adolescence, has he, and you know how teenagers can sleep.’ Natalie grinned at Jen, one eyebrow raised.

‘He is rather young, isn’t he?’

‘Young and beautiful. Can’t say I blame her,’ Natalie said with a shrug. ‘I mean, I don’t imagine they have an awful lot to talk about, but…’

‘They seem pretty happy,’ Jen said.

Natalie shrugged again. ‘What’s it like, by the way, seeing Dan again?’ she asked. Jen started a little. How did we get from Lilah and Zac to Jen and Dan? What was she trying to say? Did she know something? Jen tried to read her expression, but she looked innocent enough. ‘You haven’t seen him, have you? Since.’

‘No, I haven’t.’

‘You were so close, for a while.’

‘We were.’

‘The film, it was…’

‘I don’t really want to talk about that, Nat.’ Natalie thought
that
was why they hadn’t spoken. She didn’t realise that Jen had never seen the film, couldn’t care less about the film.

‘No, sure. But you and him, it’s not difficult?’

‘It’s fine,’ Jen replied, trying to keep her voice light. She could feel her cheeks reddening, felt as though she’d been caught in a lie. She got to her feet abruptly, turning away from Natalie, asking, ‘You want another cup of coffee?’

‘I’m OK, thanks,’ Natalie said. Jen could hear the note of puzzlement in her voice.

Dan chose that moment to make his entrance, suitcase in hand.

‘Morning all,’ he said brusquely, walking through the kitchen and into the hallway where he left the case. ‘Any coffee going?’

Jen looked at him, her expression questioning. ‘Sure,’ she said, pouring him a mugful and handing it over.

‘Cheers,’ he said, turning away. He walked to the window and gazed out. ‘They’ll clear the road today, won’t they?’ he asked. ‘Because I reckon I’ll probably need to get going this afternoon.’

‘Oh. Yes. They will, this afternoon I think. The driveway, though…’

‘It’s all right. I can do the driveway.’

So that was it. She searched his face for some trace of the tenderness there had been last night, but it was gone. When he smiled at her it was the polite smile of a friendly acquaintance, and his chatter had reverted to the slick, superficial glibness of his first night here. She hadn’t given him the response he wanted, so that was it. Shut down, closed off. It was all or nothing with him. She felt desperately sad, bereft almost, to have the glimpse of something, friendship or more, to be able almost to grasp it, and then to have it snatched away, just like that.

It made her feel impossibly tired, her limbs leaden. If she didn’t have guests she would quite happily have gone back to bed, she was sure she could sleep all day. But there were things to do, food to cook, people to entertain. She was dismayed to notice that there was barely any firewood left, either next to the burner or in the living room; it meant a steep climb up the hill to the woodshed. The sound of Zac’s heavy footfall on the stairs lifted her spirits; she knew very well that there was no way he’d let her do the heavy lifting.

In the end he took Nat out with him – she was eager to get out of the house after more than thirty-six hours of being cooped up. Jen saw the look of panic flit over Dan’s face as he realised he was going to be left alone with her and for the briefest of moments she considered letting him off the hook, disappearing upstairs, but the impulse passed.

‘I wish you wouldn’t go,’ she said. He was looking out of the window, he didn’t turn to face her. ‘Stay until tomorrow.’

‘No. It doesn’t feel right now,’ he said. He still hadn’t looked round.

‘You’ve spoken to Claudia?’

‘I phoned her last night. And she rang back this morning. She’s spoken to her husband. She’s told him about us. She’ll be in Paris tomorrow.’ This was expressed without emotion. He sounded neither happy nor excited. He got up from the table and turned to look at her at last. ‘So it’s all sorted.’ As he walked past her to go back out to the barn, he touched her arm, gave it a squeeze. ‘No going back now,’ he said.

Zac and Dan spent the best part of an hour shovelling snow off the driveway. They were almost finished when she heard the steady tractor-like chug of the snow plough coming up the hill.

‘Nat,’ she called out, ‘they’re back.’

Natalie almost fell down the stairs, yanked on her boots and ran out into the snow. Jen hadn’t seen her move that quickly all weekend.

‘Andrew!’ she called out. ‘Oh, thank God you’re back.’

Jen stood on the front door step, watching Andrew and Lilah clamber down from the snow plough; Zac scooped Lilah up into the air, effortlessly spinning her around, kissing her on the mouth. Andrew and Natalie just stood there hugging each other. Jen wished she had a camera, they looked so beautiful out there in the snow and the sunshine. Dan, standing next to his car, turned to look at her, and he smiled, a real smile this time, and she felt tears come to her eyes.

‘You should stay,’ she called out.

‘What?’

‘I said you should stay!’

He started to walk towards her, Andrew and Natalie caught up with him, Andrew slapped him on the back, they were laughing about something, Jen couldn’t hear them though, there was an odd sound, a kind of ringing in her ears, she looked up at the sky and it was blinding, her heart, oh God, her heart was racing, racing, racing, and then the light was gone.

May 1996

SHE’D KNOCKED HER
head on something. She could feel the lump forming on her temple, the blood already starting to collect in her eye socket. She was going to have one hell of a shiner.

‘Jen? Jen, are you all right?’

She looked up. Conor was kneeling down, at her side. She hadn’t knocked her head, she’d fallen down. She was lying on the floor.

‘Jesus, Jen. What happened? Are you all right?’

She tried to sit up, but her head was throbbing painfully. She felt like she was going to throw up.

‘I think I fell,’ she said.

‘You did, babe, you fainted.’

‘Oh. God. Really? I fainted. How melodramatic. How very Victorian of me.’ She smiled at him, reached out for his hand. ‘Conor. It’s OK. I’m OK. I think I’m OK. I hit my head. But I think I’m OK. It’s just this heat, I think. And the booze. I shouldn’t have had that glass of wine earlier, I haven’t eaten anything today.’

Conor helped her up into a sitting position. She was aware, all of a sudden, that she was surrounded by a crowd of people, all peering anxiously down. She could feel sweat at the nape of her neck and on her lower back; she felt as though she were radiating heat.