Before I Met You (46 page)

John looked at her and then at the tower of phone directories on the table in front of him and smiled defeatedly.

‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said.

Betty grinned at him. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘I’m glad we both understand our roles here.’ He raised an eyebrow at her and opened his directory, and Betty opened hers.

It was a strangely companionable thing to do together. The library was virtually empty on this sunny June lunchtime, and there was something hypnotic about the rhythmic turning of the pages, the occasional pause to write down a number or to take a sip of coffee from the paper cups they’d brought with them.

‘Anything interesting?’ Betty asked after a few minutes.

‘A few Minchins, nothing conclusive. You?’

‘Same.’

They carried on turning the pages, pushing directories to the side once they’d finished with them until suddenly John slammed his hands down on to the directory in front of him and said, ‘There’s a Minchin! In Rippon Road!’

‘What!’

‘Yes! Look! Derek Minchin. 24 Rippon Road, SE3.’

‘Give me that.’ Betty pulled it away from him and stared at the listing. And there it was. In black and white.
Derek Minchin
. ‘Oh!’ She inhaled loudly. ‘Oh my God. This is it. This is it. We’re there. Oh my God.’ She put her hands over her mouth and stared at John incredulously. ‘Let’s go,’ she said. ‘Let’s go and phone him!’

John watched her intently as she pushed in the number on her mobile phone outside the library a moment later and she smiled
at
him nervously. She cleared her throat and patted down her hair, and then she stood up straight when the phone was answered on the third ring.

‘Hello?’

‘Oh, hello, is that Derek Minchin?’

‘Speaking.’

‘Oh, hi,’ she said, ‘I wonder if you could help me. I’m looking for someone called Clara –’

‘Yes,’ he interrupted, smoothly.

‘Clara Minchin,’ she continued.

‘Clara Davies, these days,’ he interrupted. ‘My sister.’

Betty blinked. And then she paused as a massive swell of euphoric laughter threatened to overwhelm her. ‘Oh,’ she said eventually. ‘That’s wonderful, that’s –’

‘What’s it regarding?’ Derek Minchin asked, suddenly sounding suspicious.

‘Well, it’s kind of a private matter. I wondered if you might have a number for her?’

‘Well,’ Derek drew in his breath audibly. ‘I think you can understand that I might not want to do that. Not without knowing what the matter is regarding. I mean, it’s a matter of privacy, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, yes, of course. Yes. I see that. But maybe you could ask her to call me? As soon as possible.’

‘Well, that wouldn’t be easy. She’s in Benidorm.’

‘Benidorm?’

‘Benidorm. With my other sisters. They go every year. But I can’t go because of my problems, you know?’

Betty had no idea, but said, ‘Oh, I see. And when will she be back?’

‘They’re coming back in tomorrow, I think. Hold on, let me check …
Dad
!
Dad
! When are the girls back?’

Dad, thought Betty. Dad?

She heard a muttering in the background and then Derek
came
back on the line and said, ‘Yes. Tomorrow, getting in late apparently. But I’ll give her your number, let her know to call you. Is there anything you can tell me, so that, you know, she has an idea why she’s calling you?’

‘Tell her it’s an inheritance.’

‘Ooh,’ said Derek, ‘an inheritance. That’ll be nice. What a run of luck she’s having. She just won a thousand on the lottery, too.’

Betty laughed. ‘Lucky Clara,’ she said.

‘I’ll say,’ said Derek. ‘So, tell me what your name and number is, hold on, let me just get a pen … oh, flipping hell, there’s never any pens what work in this bloody house. Here, right, off you go …’

She gave him her name and number and then, before she hung up she said, ‘Can I just ask you one thing, before you go, about Clara?’

‘Try me.’

‘Well, this might sound like a strange question – you’ll probably think I’m mad for asking – but Clara … is she … I mean … what colour is she?’

‘Ha, how funny that you should ask. Well I never, but yes, Clara is a black lady. Yes, she is. Rest of us is white. She’s black. And there’s a story behind that. If you’re interested. But maybe I’ll leave Clara to tell you all about that. When you see her.’

Betty smiled. She suspected she already knew.

Betty had taken all three children to a café around the corner from Amy’s house, to get them out from under her feet while she ran around frantically organising caterers and sound equipment. Betty breathed out in relief as silence fell upon their table and the three children sat eating happily and quietly. It had been a truly extraordinary, overwhelming day. As she sat here, Clara Pickle/Minchin/Jones/Davies would be enjoying her last evening in Spain, sitting in a bar perhaps, or on the balcony of
a
sea-facing apartment, drinking Sangria and wishing that she could stay for ever. This time tomorrow she would be on her way to the airport and by Monday morning, she would know that she was the recipient of the contents of the bank account of a lady from Guernsey who’d once loved her father.

A shiver ran down her spine at the prospect.

And then she saw Donovan about to knock a large glass of organic orange juice across the café table and she stretched her arm out to catch it, and as she did so another arm appeared, clothed in black leather and attached to the body of Dom Jones.

‘Steady, mate,’ he said to Donovan, who immediately jumped to his feet and ran around the table and into his father’s arms.

‘Daddy! Daddy!’

Betty smiled uncertainly, unsure how this impromptu visit fitted into Amy’s vision for the night and also how she felt about seeing Dom again after their fractious encounter the previous morning.

‘Don’t worry,’ said Dom, smiling sheepishly over the top of Donny’s head, ‘I’m not planning on taking them anywhere. Amy knows I’m here. I’ve just been to the house and she said it was OK. And listen,’ he sat himself on Donovan’s seat, with his son held upon his lap. ‘I just wanted to say I am so, so, so incredibly, unbelievably sorry about yesterday morning. I mean, really. I was completely out of order. Totally. A total and utter prize …’ he silently mouthed a derogatory one-syllable word.

Betty smiled grudgingly. ‘Yeah,’ she said, ‘you were a bit.’

‘And you were absolutely right to stop me taking Donny out.’

‘No!’ shouted Donny. ‘She was absolutely wrong!’

They both smiled at Donny, who frowned back at them both and stuck his fork grumpily into his eggs on toast.

‘No, really. You were very professional. You did your job well. Thank you.’

Betty’s smile softened. She shrugged and rubbed her elbows.

‘Where’s Daddy’s egg?’ Dom asked Donovan, his mouth opened wide.

Donny slowly and very seriously detached a hunk of bread and egg with his fingers and offered it to his father. Dom gobbled it up and licked Donny’s fingers and squeezed his son tight to him. ‘
Dee
-licious,’ he said, kissing Donny’s neck and squeezing him again. ‘Thank you. And how are my girls?’ he asked.

Acacia glanced at him across the table and blew him a kiss, her newest trick, before turning her attention back to her scrambled eggs and mushrooms.

Dom pretended to catch the kiss and drop it into his heart. Acacia looked at him again through her long lashes and sighed, as though her father was truly the most magnificent man in the world. The baby sat in her high chair and smeared ice-cream into the tray with two flattened hands.

‘You’re so good at this,’ said Dom, surveying the contented brood. ‘You make it look so easy. When you eventually get round to having your own –’

‘Not for a very long time,’ Betty interjected.

‘No, not for a very long time. But when you do. Lucky kids …’ His gaze dropped to the top of Donny’s head and he smiled again.

Betty smiled. Having her own children felt about as distant a concept as time travel. ‘Are you going to the party?’ she asked, changing the subject.

‘Oh, f – God, no. No way. If … flipping hate all those people. Half the reason we …’ he mouthed the words ‘
split up
’. ‘Anyway, I’ve got a gig tonight.’ He looked at his watch. ‘In fact, yeah, I’d better push off in a minute. But not until I’ve had a bite of Donny’s fairy cake.’

Donny snatched the waiting cake towards him and clutched it at his chest while Dom pretended to try to steal it.

Betty watched him, curiously. He was doing it again, that human chameleon thing. Here he was, sober, apologetic dad,
playing
by the rules, doing low-key mucking about with his children, before heading off to work.

He caught her staring at him and smiled. ‘I want to square stuff with you, Betty,’ he said. ‘I want to explain myself. What are you doing tomorrow?’

‘I’m doing this lot,’ she said, gesturing towards his children, ‘until Amy can face doing them herself.’

Dom smiled wryly. ‘Right, so, late then. Send me a text message when you’re heading home. I’ll come and ring on your bell,’ he said.

‘I’ve got a houseguest.’

‘Well, come and ring on mine.’

‘I’m not sure, Dom …’

‘Just to talk.’ He skewered her with an intense look. ‘I just want to talk to you.’

She shrugged. ‘OK,’ she said.

He smiled, and the smile took the breath out of her. It was real and sincere. It was, she felt, utterly without guile, a rare sighting of the real Dom Jones. And she liked it. She felt an overwhelming compulsion to jump to her feet and squeeze him hard. Instead she laughed.

‘What?’

‘Nothing,’ she said, ‘nothing.’

He smiled at her again, that sweet sincere smile and she smiled back. And then, after a round of hugs and kisses and nibbles of various children’s fairy cakes, he was gone into the summer evening, off to be a pop star.

The party was a crashing disappointment, lots of people talking about schools and nannies and restaurants with Michelin stars in Chelsea. Betty made her excuses at 11 p.m. and headed up for bed. She peered through the window of her bedroom (a boxroom next to the baby’s room) at the street below. The pavement was pooled in yellow light from the ornate Victorian
streetlamps
, and Primrose Hill itself was bathed in blue, a luscious swell of bucolic splendour rising from the heart of north London. And there they were, like rats in jackets, the paparazzi, hoping for something shocking to splash all over the front pages of the Sunday papers. Betty felt like opening the window and shouting out, ‘Go home! They’re all really boring!’ But instead she climbed into her pyjamas and got into bed.

It took her a while to fall asleep that night, the sounds of the bass from the sound system banging through the bones of the house and into the very marrow of her. She eventually dropped off at about midnight and when she woke up an hour and a half later, her first thought was that one of the children must have set off the monitor and disturbed her, but then she realised there was someone in her room. She sat bolt upright and searched for the light-switch with her hand.

‘Ssh,’ said a voice, ‘it’s just me. It’s just Amy.’

Betty groaned and croaked, ‘What? Are the kids OK?’

Amy took a few steps towards Betty’s bed. ‘Kids are fine,’ she said. ‘I just went in and checked on them.’

‘Oh,’ said Betty, running her hands down her bed-messed hair and rubbing her eyes. ‘Good.’

‘They look so beautiful when they’re asleep,’ Amy breathed, perching herself gently on the edge of Betty’s bed.

Betty pulled herself up into a full sitting position and moved towards the wall.

‘Like angels. You think you couldn’t love them any more. You think you’re going to die of it. Their beauty. Their innocence. Their little hands curled up into those tiny fists. And then they wake up the next morning, and Jesus fucking Christ, you wonder why the fuck you ever had them.’

She laughed and then sighed. ‘I don’t really mean that,’ she said. ‘Of course I don’t. It’s just, you know, they’re all so little and I don’t really know them yet, and I know that one day, when they’re older – you know, proper little people – I’ll be so so
grateful
I had them, but right now …’ she sighed again. ‘Jeez. I dunno. It’s such hard work. Even with my beloved Betty.’

She squeezed Betty’s hand under the duvet and smiled into the darkness, and now that Betty’s eyes had adjusted to the dark she could see that Amy was drunk. Or if not drunk, incredibly stoned.

‘What would I do without you, my wonderful Betty? You know, I do honestly believe that my husband is a humungous prick of the highest order, but he got it right with you. I’ll give him that. That was a good call.
Good call, Dom
!’ She paused and stared at Betty. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

Betty smiled awkwardly. ‘You’re welcome,’ she said. ‘It’s a pleasure. Your children are great.’

‘Aren’t they?’ smiled Amy. ‘And you know, shit, I watch you with them and I think, shit,
why
can’t I be like that with them? Why can’t I just be patient and kind and gentle like that? Like Betty? You’re a special girl, Betty Dean. A very special girl. You know, forget the two-week trial. Seriously. I’m sold. I’ll sort you out on a salary from Monday. OK?’

Betty nodded. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

And then Amy slowly lowered her face towards Betty’s and kissed her gently on her cheek.

Betty froze.

Amy stroked her hair away from her face.

‘Sleep tight, pretty Betty,’ she said. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

She paused and stared at Betty dreamily for a moment, before squeezing her shoulder and tiptoeing quietly from her room.

The following morning it was as if the whole thing had been a dream. Amy came down just after eleven, showered and bleary-eyed, dressed in a vintage summer dress and slippers, her titian hair woven into two plaits. Betty and the children were in the garden playing in the sandpit.

‘Good morning, my lovely children,’ she called from the kitchen doorway where she was clutching a mug of coffee and a strip of painkillers. ‘Good morning, Betty.’

Betty smiled at her brightly. ‘Morning!’