A Friend of the Family (9 page)

‘How’s the jet lag?’

‘Just starting to hit me. Big time.’ He stirred his coffee and dropped the teaspoon in the sink and then, as he turned round to address Gervase, Ned noticed with a sense of unease that Goldie was lying at Gervase’s feet. Not just at them, but
on
them, looking all contented and happy, like he usually did with Dad.

‘What’s it like, then?’

‘What?’

‘Jet lag. What’s it feel like?’

‘I don’t know,’Ned shrugged, ‘kind of heavy and spacey. Disconnected. And a sort of floaty-leg thing, like you’re walking on a waltzer.’

‘Oh,’ Gervase nodded, ‘right. Never been further than Aberdeen myself.’

‘What – you’ve never been abroad?’

Gervase shook his head and lit up a cigarette. ‘I’m not really from that sort of background.’

Ned could sense a conversation unfolding here and decided he couldn’t face it. ‘Right,’ he said, cutting him off, ‘I’m going to my room, see you later, yeah?’

‘Yeah, mate,’ said Gervase, ‘see you around. Oh – hang on a sec. I forgot to say. A parcel turned up for you earlier. UPS. It’s in the hallway.’

‘Oh,’ said Ned, ‘right. Thanks.’

He wandered out into the hallway and saw a small box sitting on top of the ‘throne’, a red velvet chair with
curly gilt bits, one of Mum’s ex-display treasures. Who the hell would be sending him parcels? He’d only just got home. He picked up the box and shook it – it was incredibly light, almost as if there was nothing in it. He ripped the plastic pouch off the front and read the details. According to the UPS form, the sender was someone called Dilys Nickers who lived at 1345 Old Fish Drive in Sydney, Australia, and the contents were described as a ‘gift’.

Ned immediately had a bad feeling and opened the package gingerly.

Inside the parcel was a small cardboard box.

With the word ‘CUNT’ written on it in red marker.

Ned slowly peeled the tape off the top of the box.

And there inside was a pile of shiny dark hair.

Human hair.

Ned stopped breathing. He touched the hair, tentatively. It was soft and silky. He picked up a strand and brought it to his nose.

Monica.

Ned immediately dropped the hair back into the box and sealed it closed. He picked up his mug and was just about to walk up the stairs when the phone rang and made him jump so hard that he dropped his mug; the mug snapped clean in half and brown liquid slowly seeped across the wooden floor.

‘Fuck!’

‘Whoa,’ said Gervase, walking into the hallway, ‘ner-vy.’ He stretched over him to reach for the receiver. ‘Hello, the London residence, how may I help you?’

Ned twitched slightly and leant down to pick up the pieces of mug, listening hawklike to the exchange currently taking place.

‘No, she’s out at the moment, she’ll be back in about half an hour. Can I take a message?’

Ned breathed a sigh of relief and went into the kitchen to get some kitchen roll to mop up the coffee.

Gervase hung up and looked at him with concern. ‘That was some reaction there, Ned. Is that a jet-lag thing, too?’

Ned grunted.

‘You got something on your mind, Ned? You seem a bit
wired,
mate. If you don’t mind me saying.’

‘I’m fine,’ he snapped.

‘D’you want another coffee?’

‘No. Thanks. I’m fine.’ He wrapped the two halves of the mug in the damp kitchen towels, took them into the kitchen, threw them in the bin, picked up the UPS parcel and made his way upstairs to his room, where he collapsed on to his bed.

He opened the box again.

Fuck. It was still there. Mon’s hair. Her lovely thick, shiny, long dark hair. The only really feminine thing about her. It was definitely hers, no doubt about it. It smelt of her shampoo – it smelt of
her.

He stared at the hair for about five minutes, his mind in turmoil, his heart racing. An image of Monica standing in the bathroom with a pair of kitchen scissors and a hunk of hair in her hand went through his mind. Followed by an image of Sarah Miles in
Ryan’s Daughter.
He
slammed the box shut, re-sealed it and shoved it under his bed. He couldn’t deal with this. He really couldn’t deal with this at all.

He leapt to his feet and looked round his room. Gervase had officially moved out of it that morning but even though all his stuff had gone it still didn’t feel right. There was a discomfiting, lingering smell in the room, stains on the carpet that hadn’t been there before and Ned couldn’t bring himself to even look at the sink in the corner since seeing Gervase hawking into it the previous morning.

Ned opened a window, rolled up his sleeves and decided to apply himself to something proactive to take his mind off the hair sitting in a box under his bed, and the insane,
bald
ex-girlfriend on the other side of the world. He swapped his mattress for the old saggy one in Sean’s room even though it smelt a bit damp and was nowhere near as comfortable. He just couldn’t stomach the prospect of sleeping on the same mattress that Gervase had been using. It wasn’t that Gervase
smelt
or anything. It was mainly the thought of him wanking on it that had done it.

He got a bucket, a bottle of washing-up liquid, a load of J-cloths and a big sponge and cleaned his room thoroughly – skirting boards, window frames, handles, on top of things, under things, round the back of things. He poured bleach into his sink and let it soak for ten minutes before scrubbing it to the point of obsession. He hoovered his sofa, his curtains, every inch of carpet, even patches of carpet that hadn’t seen daylight for
more than two decades. He sprayed the room with something called Tranquillity room fragrance, hoping it might have a similar effect on him, opened the window and let the room air for half an hour. And then he retrieved his PC from Tony’s room, plugged it in, reestablished all the connections and, with his heart lodged firmly in his throat, went to his Hotmail account.

Jesus, he muttered to himself as he waited for his mail to appear, so slow, so slow. His inbox finally popped up and he scanned it quickly. Forwarded things from his mates in London who didn’t even know he was home now. A bulletin from his temp agency in Sydney. Stuff from Amazon. But nothing else.

Nothing from Mon.

‘Ned, mate,’ there was a soft tapping at the door, ‘all right if I come in?’It was Gervase.

Ned looked at him with something approaching relief. ‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘sure.’

‘Look,’ he said rubbing his hands together, ‘a suggestion. It’s your Mum’s night at the Beulah tonight and I reckon she’d be really made up if you came along.’

‘What – to see her sing?’

‘Yeah. She’d be chuffed silly.’

‘Are you going?’

‘Yeah. Highlight of my week. Never miss it.’

Ned looked at his computer screen and his watch and thought about the options. He could either a) stay in his room all night, checking his e-mail obsessively and going slowly insane; or he could b) go and have a pint or two, watch his mum sing and take his mind off things.

‘OK,’ he said, ‘yeah. Why not? What time?’

‘Leave at seven?’

‘Cool.’

So he found himself half an hour later at the Beulah Tavern, on a wet Wednesday evening, watching his mum in a pink spangly top and black velvet trousers belting out a hairs-standing-up-on-the-back-of-the-neck version of ‘Diamonds Are Forever’.

It was a strange sensation, watching his mum singing. He’d seen her singing before. She’d sung to all the boys when they were little and still appreciated it, and he’d seen her singing at cousins’ weddings and things. But never in the pub around the corner. People hadn’t come here specially to see her sing. They didn’t
know
her. They’d come for a pint and she just happened to be here. Some people were ignoring her entirely, which upset Ned. A lot.

‘Pisses you off, doesn’t it? People not paying attention?’

Ned started. It was their first exchange since Bernie had got up to do her set. Ned nodded but didn’t really know what to say.

‘She’s a real talent, your mum. A
real
talent.’

Ned nodded again. ‘Yeah – she’s not bad.’

‘I was blown away by her, that first time I heard her sing. Totally. Blown away.’ He folded his arms and leant back in his seat as if to say that his word was final. He stared intently at Bernie as she sang, then stood up when she finished, clapping and whistling as if he was in the back row at Wembley Arena. Ned looked at him in
surprise, and then looked around to see if anyone else thought he was as mad as he did, but no one seemed to have noticed.

Gervase sat down slowly, still clapping gently, then lit a cigarette.

‘So,’ he said, ‘what about you then, Ned? Can you sing?’

Ned laughed. ‘Er – no. Categorically not.’

‘So, what’s your USP, then?’

‘My what?’

‘Your USP: Unique Selling Point. Your mum can sing, your dad can restore things, Sean can write and Tony’s an entrepreneur. What’s your thing?’

His
thing?
Jesus. He didn’t have a
thing.
He had a degree – that had always been his
thing.
But since making Mum and Dad cry with pride on graduation day, there’d been no more
things.
Just working in clothes shops, curating in galleries and running away to Australia with psychotic strangers. He shrugged. ‘Fucking up, I suppose,’ he muttered.

‘Nah. You’ve done all right, haven’t you? Got a degree? Had some adventures?’

‘I guess so. But, you know, I’m twenty-seven now. I’m supposed to be taking things a bit more seriously.’

‘So – what’ve you got in mind?’

‘Nothing really.’

‘Bernie says you were into art, used to work at Sotheby’s or something. Couldn’t you try getting back into that?’

‘No. Not now. It was just a graduate thing anyway, it wasn’t a proper job.’

‘Thought about doing some work for your dad?’

Ned shrugged and grunted. ‘Bit of a step backwards, isn’t it? I mean – that’s what I used to do when I was at uni.’

‘Couldn’t you think about it a bit more seriously now, though? A serious concept. Go into business with him?’

‘What – like London & Sons, you mean?’Ned laughed.

‘Yeah. Why not. Your dad would be made up.’

‘No,’ he said, taking a slurp of his lager, ‘I don’t think so. I couldn’t do what my dad does. You’ve got to really love it. It’s a skill. You know.’

‘What about your brother?’

‘Which one?’

‘Tony. Couldn’t he give you a job?’

Ned laughed. ‘Tony? Are you kidding? I couldn’t work for him.’

‘Why not? He seems like a decent bloke.’

‘Yeah. He is. But you know – he’s my
big brother.
I’ve spent half my life being bossed around by him. No way. Anyway, he’d do my brain in. He’s a real control freak.’

‘Yeah,’ said Gervase thoughtfully, ‘yeah. He’s a funny one, that Tony. I don’t think he likes me very much.’

‘Really? What makes you say that?’Ned shot back, not knowing what else to say.

‘I’m not really sure. He’s just being protective, I suppose, of his folks, his mum. I suppose he’s wondering who the hell I am, what the fuck I’m doing there.’

Ned fiddled with his earlobe, noncommittally.

‘But he shouldn’t worry, you know, Ned. None of you boys should worry.’

‘We’re not worried.’

‘Nah. Of course you’re not. But, you know. Just, if you were. Everything’s cool.’

‘Yeah,’ said Ned, trying to mask the concern in his voice. There was nothing more worrying than being told that there was nothing to worry about when you hadn’t been worrying in the first place. ‘Yeah. Of course it is.’

Ned shrugged again. And then something really strange happened. Gervase suddenly got a really concerned look in his eye, as if the thought of Ned ever worrying about him was breaking his heart. He rested his cigarette in the ashtray, and then, before Ned had a chance to complain, he grabbed his hand and began staring into his eyes, really deeply. The
really
strange thing, however, was that Ned quite liked it. It made him feel warm and safe, and his stomach felt like a big ball of melting chocolate. Ned wasn’t sure how long the hand-grasping and staring went on for, but it didn’t stop until Bernie’s song was over and the sound of enthusiastic applause cut into his subconscious. Gervase slowly let go of Ned’s hand and reached for his smouldering cigarette. He shook his head slowly.

‘You need to sort it out, mate.’

‘Sort what out?’

‘You know.’

‘No. I don’t.’

Gervase sighed and leant in towards Ned. ‘It’s not going to go away if you ignore it. You can run, but you can’t hide. You know that, don’t you?’

Ned licked his lips. He didn’t like the direction this
conversation was taking. ‘What? What isn’t going away?’

‘Your little problem.’

Ned frowned.

‘Your mess. The mess you left behind.’

Ned gulped. ‘You mean – you mean in Australia?’

‘Uh-huh. There’s still a lot of pain there. You left a lot of pain. And I know it’s not your fault, Ned. I know that. But you can’t just run away and pretend that it hasn’t happened. It’ll catch up with you sooner or later, one way or another. Deal with it now or it’ll only be more painful.’

‘Monica?’ said Ned, quietly. ‘Are you talking about Monica?’

Gervase pulled away from him suddenly, as if someone had cut through a piece of thread that had been tying them together. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and knocked back half his pint of lager.

‘I don’t fucking know, do I?’

‘Oh.’Ned picked up his pint, too. His hands were shaking. And then Gervase suddenly banged his glass down on the table, stood up really quickly and stalked off to the toilet.

Ned breathed out a huge chilled lungful of air and tried to concentrate on his mum singing, but it was really hard. He wished there was someone sitting with him, a mate or something, so that he could just laugh and say, ‘Blimey, what the fuck was all that about?’But as it was, he was stranded with his head full of the last thing he wanted there: Monica. Ned tried to recall exactly what Gervase had said. ‘You’ve got to sort it out.’ He shuddered.
Because whether Gervase knew what he was talking about or not, he was right. It was a mess. But just because that mess was on the other side of the planet, didn’t mean it had gone away.