Something growls inside me.
‘I want to hear about head gardeners,’ I say, and I turn and give her a gaze that would do Maleficent proud. My mother takes a step backwards.
‘All I was saying was –’
‘You’re always interrupting people,’ I say, ‘stop.’
From the corner of the room, April giggles. Dominic opens his mouth and stares in total silence. Ma stalks off, indignant.
‘Thanks, lovie,’ says Dad. And then he whispers, ‘She’s going to kill me later.’
‘No, she’s not, because I’m not going to let her,’ I say.
‘Is everything all right, pet?’
‘Yes, Dad,’ I say, ‘just, you know, the wholenear-death thing. Makes you really think of life,’ I say. I hate lying to poor darling Dad. But he shouldn’t have to put up with my mother, any more than I should have to put up with bloody Nate.
Steve and Angie are here, and they brought some catered sandwiches and nibbles. It’s all laid out on thedining-room table. There’s no sign of Finn or of Sid or, luckily, Bea. Bea is not welcome here. Not that I’ve told her that but she’s not stupid: she knows.
‘Where’s Finn?’ says Nate.
I look him straight in the eye, probably the first time since he has come into the house.
‘He couldn’t come,’ I say.
‘Oh, OK,’ says my husband, sounding very much not like my husband.
I’m coming downstairs after having taken a moment upstairs, because the general laughing and hilarity and everything being wonderful is getting to me a bit. And I meet Angie in the hall.
‘Can I talk to you for a minute?’ she says.
She looks different, although I can’t quite put my finger on what it is. Her clothes are still perfect and she looks like she should be on thejust seen at a fashion showpart of a glossy magazine. But it doesn’t affect me in the same way. Filling the gaping emotional hole with clothes has done absolutely nothing for me. All it has done has made me ignore what was going on around me.
‘Of course,’ I say, a clammy feeling in my stomach. What’s she going to say? Is she going to say she’s been seeing Nate too and she’s declaring herself? I’m not able for this.
‘Come on out, into the garden, it’s a bit cool.’ She guides me out by the shoulder. ‘I’ve got wine and two glasses because I’m not driving home and you don’t have to do anything. I’ll tidy up all the catering stuff and then you can sit down and relax.’
I note that she doesn’t say, ‘and look after Nate for the rest of the evening’ and that cheers me up a bit. Because so far all the conversations have been about how wonderfully I’m going to be looking after my husband and the amazinglylow-cholesterol meals I’ll be cooking for him and how I’ll be helping him get back to full fitness. As if minding my darling Nate is going to be the most important thing in my life.
The garden is a bit of a wreck beyond the pergola. We’ve got niceback-garden furniture, a dark rattan sort of colour that doesn’t change come winter or summer. In the good weather you can stick a few cushions on it and it all looks very nice. We’ve got astate-of-the-art barbecue, naturally, because Nate loves barbecuing. But Angie has set up a little spot near a wall where I keep my beloved sedums. Nate has no time for these lovely succulent plants, lovely joyous fat little creatures that fall over each other like puppies as they grow, happy and smiling and really needing so little work.
Angie pops the cork out of the wine. I haven’t had anything to drink since I came in apart from a strong coffee because I’m not sleeping well, and I need the coffee to keep me awake.
‘You will have a glass?’ she says. ‘I noticed you drinking the coffee earlier. Is it because you want to stay up at night and keep an eye on him?’
I look at her full on. She has an amazingly steady gaze. There’s no side to Angie, I realise. I don’t know why I thought there was before. I don’t know why I thought she talked to the men and ignored the women. That was my own prejudice.
In fact, she has often tried to be there for me. Tried to help at the dinner parties, said things like, ‘I wouldn’t do it, Steve knows better than to expect me to drum up a party after a hard day at the office.’ And I’d always taken it to mean that her work was so much more important than mine, that she couldn’t possibly do something like this, because it was beneath her. But now I think she wasn’t saying that: she was standing up for me.
‘It’s about Nate, isn’t it?’ I say, looking at her.
She nods.
‘He, didn’t...?’
I look at her and I think,prepare yourself for this body blow. She hands me half a glass of wine.
‘He tried.’
