A Friend of the Family (7 page)

‘Hmm, well, Seany’s room is out of bounds – your dad’s got his old Norton in there. We could chuck a mattress on the floor in Tony’s room…?’

‘No way. It stinks of piss in there. And the walls are all covered in old bogies.’

‘Well then, you’ll have to have the sofa.’

‘The sofa! But, Mum – that’s not fair. I’ve been travelling for, like, seventy-two hours. It won’t do much for my jet lag.’

‘I know, love, and I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do – you could always come and sleep in our bed, like you did when you were little.’

‘Mum!’

‘Joke, Ned – joke.’

And Ned had smiled, not at the joke, but at the uncomfortable realization that some small, deep-seated, unformed part of him actually
wanted
to sleep in his parents’bed, wanted to snuggle down between them and hear them breathing all night long.

You sick, pathetic bastard, he thought to himself, no wonder your girlfriend went mad.

So he’d had a hideous night on the sofa, tossing and
turning, waking up every half an hour, despite the three Nytols his mother had given him to help him sleep. He’d had dozens of short, intense snatches of dreams, mainly to do with Monica. And then he’d finally fallen into a deep slumber some time after five in the morning.

He stumbled through the hallway and into the kitchen. His mum had left out his breakfast and a note that said, ‘Didn’t want to wake you – try not sleep until tonight. See you later. M x’

Ned nibbled half-heartedly on some toast and wandered aimlessly around the house for a while, trying to get his bearings, trying to feel normal. And failing. He was feeling unsettled and peculiar, caught between two places that had both at one time seemed like home but now felt like they’d been shifted off their axes by a degree or two. Everything seemed slightly off-kilter.

He’d known things had changed while he was away, obviously he did, but it was still bizarre seeing Tony without Jo. Tony and Jo had been together since Ned was a teenager. Jo was a fitness freak and made Tony do things like jogging and going to the gym. She was a workaholic like him and as a couple they’d oozed success, discipline and teamwork. But now Tony was – well, he was all middle-aged and fat. And sort of… sad-looking. His new girlfriend was great, though – Ness was completely different to Jo. Where Jo had been small and crisp with short dark hair, perfectly applied eye make-up and a mobile phone permanently attached to her ear, Ness was tall and rangy with wild blonde hair and a permanent megawatt smile. Where Jo had always
ordered something like a bit of fish and salad and pushed it around her plate, Ness ordered big hunks of red meat and ate with gusto, knocking back glasses of red wine and talking with her mouth full. She was absolutely gorgeous in a pre-Raphaelite, Charlie Dimmock kind of way, with bright-green eyes and incredible legs. Mum obviously adored her and she even seemed to have some kind of bond with Gervase – but Tony had virtually ignored her. Tony had never exactly been a laugh a minute, but even by his own slightly morose standards he was a complete grouch last night. The divorce had obviously hit him really hard and maybe Ness was some kind of rebound relationship. But whatever it was that was bothering Tony, it was incredibly unsettling to see the rock of the family looking so…
lost.

And then there was Sean. Fuck, it was all just mind-blowing. He was all
famous-looking –
Ned couldn’t explain it any other way. Sean had always just looked like a bloke, a bloke with some clothes on and some hair and that was it really. But now he had this
sheen
about him. His teeth seemed extra white and his hair looked extra thick. And he was so much more confident. Sean had always been the sensitive one of the family, the one who took things the wrong way. He slacked round like Ned, wearing clothes he’d had for three years, doing half-arsed jobs, watching American TV on Sky One and eating Mum’s food. Sean had never been in love before. Ever. Well, not since he was fifteen and Lindsay Morrow had broken his heart and humiliated him in front of the whole school. Ever since then he’d
been Mr Cool as far as relationships went – girls came and went and Sean barely seemed to notice. But now he was all glossy and content and
in love.
Ned suddenly felt like Sean was an awful lot older than him and an awful lot more mature, and he couldn’t quite imagine where he was going to fit into Sean’s new life. The thought made him feel incredibly sad.

Mum and Dad, though – they were still the same, thank God. Still strong and happy, still the perfect couple and the people he respected and loved most in the whole world. Ned had tried to explain his mum and dad to people in Australia but had never managed to do them justice. They’re the greatest coolest people in the world, he wanted to say, they really love each other and they really love their kids and they laugh together all the time. They still go out and drink and see friends and spend weekends together in hotels. They bicker but don’t row, they notice each other all the time but give each other space to have their own lives too. They swear and fart and let us talk about how pissed we got last night or how stoned we were at the weekend without thinking that we’re going to become drug-addicted, alcoholic drop-outs. They’re what every couple should be like. They’re my heroes.

The only unsettling thing about Mum and Dad last night had been the fact that they both looked ever so slightly older. Mum had more grey in her golden hair and Dad appeared to have shrunk. They were both nearing sixty; they were both getting old. The realization made Ned think about all the horrible things that could
happen to your parents, things like cancer and heart attacks and senile dementia. The thought of Mum and Dad not being around for ever, or not being the way they were now, made Ned feel scared and vulnerable.

He looked at his watch again. Eleven-thirty. A whole lonely, empty day stretched ahead of him with nothing to do except worry about Mon and feel out of sorts. He needed to speak to someone, take his mind off things. He needed something else to think about.

Carly, he thought with relief, that’s what he needed. Some Carly.

Ned’s thoughts had turned more and more often to Carly as his relationship with Monica had degenerated. To soft Carly, who never lost her temper or did weird things. To sweet Carly, who was absolutely normal in every way. He wondered what she was doing and how she was and who she was seeing. He wondered if she ever missed him and how she’d react if he was to turn up on her doorstep one day. He tried to imagine it, tried to imagine her wide face and her big eyes and her silky brown hair tied back in a pony-tail. He fantasized about her scrunching her face up into a frown and folding her arms across her big, soft chest and pretending to be angry with him for a moment, before giving in and grinning and giving him a big, warm,
normal
Carly hug.

Maybe they’d be friends for a while or maybe they’d just leap straight into bed and have nice,
normal
sex, without any staring and instant orgasms and fancy stuff; just good old-fashioned Ned and Carly sex. But it didn’t really matter what they did, in Ned’s fantasy, because
just being there with Carly would be enough, enough to make him feel normal again, and proper, and
home.

He pulled out his old address book and leafed to the ‘C’ page. There they were, all Carly’s numbers from over the years, written in different pens. At her parents’, her bar job, her job at Dorothy Day Fashions, her flat on Gipsy Hill. All the stages of her life. And the numbers all so familiar, sequences he’d pressed into dial pads a thousand, two thousand times. He tried her at work first.

‘Good morning, Dorothy Day Fashions.’

‘Oh. Yeah, hi. Can I speak to Carly, please?’

‘Carly who?’

‘Carly Hilaris.’

He heard her rustling through some papers.

Sorry – there’s no one of that name here.’

What! But, are you sure?’

‘Yes, sorry.’

‘Can you look again – she works in the cutting room.’

‘Neeta,’ he heard her calling to someone else, ‘d’you remember a Carly, used to work in the cutting room?’ She came back to him. ‘She left about three years ago, apparently.’

Left? Dorothy Day Fashions? ‘God. She left. Where did she go? Do you know?’

Ned heard more muffled conversation in the background.

‘Mexico.’

‘Mexico?’

‘That’s right. Lucky thing. She went backpacking or something.’

‘Backpacking?
Ned was incredulous. Carly, backpacking? In Mexico? But Carly didn’t even like going to Wales. Carly liked home. It was her favourite thing.

‘Er, thank you, thank you very much.’ He hung up and dragged his fingers through his hair. Carly was in Mexico. Or at least
had
been in Mexico. Maybe she was home now. He tried her home number with a growing sense of uncertainty. The answerphone clicked on and some girl called Nadia told him that she wasn’t home but that he could leave a message, while Destiny’s Child sang ‘Survivor’ very loudly in the background. Shit. He hadn’t considered this possibility. It hadn’t occurred to him that she wouldn’t still be exactly where he’d left her.

He’d run out of options. He was stumped. Completely stumped. In his Bondi-based fantasies, he’d never really thought beyond meeting up with Carly. Crystal Palace mast, Mum, Dad, Goldie, dinner at Mickey’s, Sean, Tony, own bed,
Carly.
And that was where it ended. Everything else, he’d assumed, would just sort of flow from there. Now he didn’t know what to do.

He kicked off his shoes, pulled off his jeans and climbed back under the eiderdown on the sofa, thinking that so far this being-back-at-home thing was not turning out anything like he’d expected.

Skiving in the Park

‘Hi – hi, who’s that? Oh, Aliyah. Hi, it’s Tony. Look, I’m feeling a bit, er… under the weather today so I think I’ll work from home. Oh – it’s going round is it? Oh right. Oh, OK. So anyway – if anything urgent comes up, you can contact me here. I don’t think there was much on, was there? No. I didn’t think so. I’ll call in later, just to check everything’s ticking over. Yeah. OK, thanks, Aliyah. And have a good day. Yeah, I will. Thanks. Bye.’

Tony took a deep breath and wiped the sweat from his brow. Yes, of course, it was utterly ridiculous to be so nervous about pulling a sickie on your own bloody company, but it was the first time he’d ever done it. In his life. It just wasn’t in his nature to slack off. He was a grafter, always had been since he was a little kid and used to earn himself 5 ρ for helping his dad polish antique silver. Tony liked to work. He liked going to work, being at work, working. He resented colds and coughs that kept him from doing his job. He hadn’t even taken a holiday since he and Jo had split up. Couldn’t see the point. But in a way he
was
sick today. Sick in the head. Sick of his life. Sick of himself.

Lovesick.

He considered his options now that he had a day to himself. He could go for a jog, maybe, or to the gym. He could take the car to be valeted. Maybe just go for a good long walk on Dulwich Common and have a quiet drink in a pub somewhere with the papers.

And then it occurred to him – Ned, he could spend the day with Ned.

Tony felt a bit bad about last night. He’d been so pissed off about Gervase turning up and so eaten up with jealousy every time he looked at Sean that he’d barely said a word to Ned. He’d had hardly any contact with Ned while he’d been away. He was too busy to send e-mails, and the time difference always seemed to work against him picking up the phone for a chat. And he really had missed him, particularly during the divorce. The whole family had enfolded him like a great big blanket but it hadn’t felt quite complete without Ned.

A part of Tony had been angry when Ned left. The Londons were a family of five – that was their
shape:
pentagonal. It just didn’t work quite so well as a square. And, if he was to be completely honest with himself, it wouldn’t have been quite so bad if it had been Sean who’d gone away and misshapened their family, because Ned was the
bridge
between Tony and Sean. He was one of those sunshiny people who got on with everyone, and with Ned around the gulf between the two eldest brothers hadn’t really shown up. With three of them there was banter; with just the two
of them there was the altogether tougher option of conversation.

Ned was grimacing when Tony turned up to collect him from Beulah Hill later that day.

‘What’s the matter?’

‘My fucking back. Mum stuck me on the sofa last night – didn’t want to kick her precious
Gervase
out of my room.’

Tony scowled. ‘Fuck’s sake.’

‘Nice car,’ said Ned.

‘D’you think so?’

‘Yeah,’ he said running his hand over the paintwork, ‘it’s really cute.’

Cute? thought Tony.
Cute?
Well, that just about summed it up. That was exactly,
succinctly,
what was wrong with his red sports car. It was
cute.

‘Yeah, well – get in, then.’

They drove past the shops and restaurants of Westow Street in a companionable silence. Ned was drinking in the scenery, the plethora of restaurants completely out of proportion to the size of the area, the library with its intricate carved stonework, the tiny branch of Wool-worth’s, the huge pub up on the roundabout.

‘It’s all the same,’ he said in wonder.

‘You’ve only been gone three years. What did you expect?’

‘God, I don’t know – just new shops and stuff I suppose. Just things to be…
different’

‘Ned, nothing ever really changes – haven’t you learnt that yet?’

‘Yes, it does,’ said Ned, with a hint of sadness in his voice, ‘everything bloody changes. And I really wish it wouldn’t.’

Walking through Crystal Palace Park was always good for exacerbating an already melancholy mood. Tony had had a wander through most of London’s big parks over the years – Regent’s Park had its frou-frou rose gardens and its outdoor theatre, Hyde Park had its Serpentine and its horses, Battersea Park had its Buddha and its river views and Hampstead Heath had that whole countryside thing going on – but not one of them even began to compare to Crystal Place in terms of pure atmosphere.