One Minute to Midnight (13 page)

‘Not better than the Julian one?’

‘Well, that was great and awful. This one was just great. God, this is such an amazing place.’

‘Isn’t it?’

‘I think we should come back here. When we’ve finished our degrees. We could travel, teach, do something important, you know?’

‘Gets under your skin, doesn’t it?’ Alex asked me with a smile.

‘What does?’

‘Africa.’

We sat there until the rising sun became too hot, and it was time to head back. Alex managed somehow to find someone sober enough to drive us home, where we snuck quietly into the house and went to bed. I didn’t fall asleep straight away, though. I just lay there, hugging myself, going over every detail of the previous night, thinking of Aidan’s laugh and his green eyes.

Chapter Seven

27 December 2011

I’M ON THE A40 heading west, listening to the radio and wondering why the fuck I’m doing this. I am seriously annoying my husband, risking all manner of nasty confrontations just two days before our holiday, purely so that I can go and visit a man who has pretty much never done anything but let me down.

Because he’s my dad. That’s why.

The last time I spoke to him was when he rang to wish me a happy thirtieth birthday. This was two years ago, the day I turned thirty-one. The last time I actually saw him was the night before my wedding. That was more than three years ago. He turned up for dinner the night before, had a drunken temper tantrum and left that night, so he never actually made it to the event itself.

Given our history, a surprise visit probably isn’t the greatest idea, but somehow I just can’t face picking up the phone and talking to him. Plus, I’ve turned off my phone because I don’t want to hear Dom’s irate messages, or read his angry texts. By the time I get to Ledbury, I realise that I’m not even sure I’ll be able to find his house, it’s been so long since I visited. And I’m right, I don’t remember the way, so I drive round and round for forty-five minutes, still not wanting to phone, until finally I spot The Castle, the horrible pub that he drinks in, which I know is just round the corner from his place.

It’s just after six when I walk up the concrete pathway to his front door. My hands are shaking. My mouth feels like something died in it – I’ve smoked six cigarettes on the way here and I don’t have any mints. I ring the doorbell. No one comes and relief washes over me. This is the best possible outcome! I’ve tried to see him and I’ve failed – but it’s not my fault. I can go to New York free of guilt. I turn and start off down the path, a spring in my step this time, but just as I’m pushing open the garden gate I hear the door open behind me and my heart sinks into my boots.

‘Nicole?’

I turn around and there he is, gaunt, grey and slightly stooped, a hundred years older than I remembered him.

‘You are here,’ I say. ‘I thought no one was in.’

‘You should have phoned,’ he says, and turns to go back into the house, calling out to me to follow as he goes. No kiss then, no hug, no tearful reunion. For a moment or two I hesitate at the gate, tempted by the almost irresistible idea of just getting back into my car and driving as fast as my Honda Civic will take me all the way back to London, to have dinner with my husband and friends.

‘I’m not bloody made of money you know,’ I can hear him shouting. ‘It’s freezing out and I can’t have the heating turned up high all day and night. Will you hurry up and close that door?’

As I step over the hearth onto the ugly orange carpet I can hear him muttering to himself. ‘Christ’s sake. With me poorly and everything she leaves the bloody door open for half an hour.’

He’s standing in front of the electric fire in the living room, rubbing his hands together like a miser over his hoard, his dirty grey tracksuit bottoms hanging from his bony hips.

‘You’ve lost weight, Dad,’ I say.

‘Yeah, well, cancer will do that to you.’ He turns and looks at me. ‘Didn’t know whether you’d come. You could have replied to my email. I don’t have anything in for dinner.’

‘We can get a takeaway,’ I say.

‘Money to burn, have you?’

‘Or I could take you out somewhere.’

Dad sits down in the chair nearest the fireplace. ‘There’s nowhere decent round here these days,’ he says.

I take off my coat and sit down on the brown velour-covered sofa. The room is unspeakably hideous, it looks as though it were decorated in 1978 by someone with absolutely no taste. Everything is brown or a dirty shade of orange. There are no books, no pictures on the walls, just an enormous flat-screen TV in one corner.

‘How are you feeling, Dad?’

‘Pretty bloody awful.’

‘I’m so sorry. When did you … when was it diagnosed?’

‘About a month ago. But I’ve been feeling rotten for a while.’

‘You should have told me.’

‘What? That I’ve been feeling unwell? What would you have done about it?’ He picks distractedly at some unseen lint on his tracksuit trousers.

‘Shall I make us some tea?’ I ask him, already desperate to put some distance between us, even if it’s just a matter of a few feet.

‘All right then.’

Standing in the kitchen, waiting for the kettle to boil, I feel like I want to cry, out of frustration more than anything else. Why is he like this? Why can’t he just make an effort? There’s a feeling like nausea rising up inside me, a feeling I remember from a long time ago, from childhood. Fear and disappointment. Pity, too. God, he must be lonely.

I take the tea back into the living room. He’s turned on the TV and he’s watching Sky Sports News, the sound up high. He accepts the tea wordlessly, takes a few sips, ignores me completely.

‘The operation’s on the second then, is it? Is that in Malvern?’

Nothing.

‘Dad? Could we turn the TV down a bit?’

He turns it off. ‘I just wanted to see the scores,’ he says, exasperated.

‘I didn’t say off, I said down.’

‘Done now.’ His mouth is set in a grim line. I want to slap him.

‘I was asking about your operation. Are you going to the hospital in Malvern?’

‘Gloucester.’

‘Do you need someone to take you there? How long will you be in for?’

‘Your uncle Chris is driving me. Only supposed to be in a couple of days, but you don’t know with the NHS, do you? I’ll probably get MRSA.’

Always look on the bright side.

We sit in silence, sipping our tea. He turns the TV back on, muted this time, and swears softly when he sees the football results.

‘Did you have money on it?’ I ask.

‘Just a tenner.’ He stares down at his hands, clenches and unclenches his fists. It’s a gesture I remember from childhood, and I’m hit by another wave of nausea.

‘How about that takeaway then? Do you have any menus?’

He jerks his head backwards. ‘Second drawer down in the kitchen.’

I suggest pizza, but he wants Chinese, so for the second night in a row it’s crispy aromatic duck and black bean stir-fry, only this time the duck is oversalted and the black beans are dry. Dad doesn’t seem to notice, he wolfs his food down.

‘I’m glad to see you’ve got an appetite, despite not feeling well,’ I say.

‘Well, I don’t get to eat stuff like this very often. Too expensive. This is a treat,’ he says, and he almost smiles.

After dinner, we drink our Tsingtao beers (two free with any order over fifteen quid), and I finally pluck up the courage to ask him what I’m doing here.

‘Dad, in your email, you said that there were some things you wanted to talk about …’

He mutters something unintelligible and looks away. ‘Come on,’ I say, ignoring his embarrassment, ‘what was it? I’m here now.’

‘I was feeling a bit low when I sent that,’ he says. ‘It wasn’t really necessary for you to come.’

‘Oh. Well. I’m glad I did, anyway. It’s good to see you.’ Liar, liar, pants on fire.

Dad drains the last of his beer and puts the bottle down on the table. ‘So. How’s Dominic?’

‘He’s well. Working hard as usual.’

‘Good. Good to hear it. Still no kids then?’

I laugh nervously. ‘No, not yet.’

‘Best get on with that, hadn’t you?’

‘Plenty of time,’ I say.

‘Hah! Is that right? You shouldn’t waste time, you know. It’s always later than you think.’

‘Would you like some more tea, Dad?’ I ask, eager to end this conversation, which has suddenly veered from mundane to morbid.

‘How’s your mother doing?’ he asks, ignoring my question.

‘She’s fine,’ I say, getting to my feet and clearing away debris from the takeaway.

‘Spend Christmas with you, did she?’

‘No, not this year.’

‘Where is she then?’

‘She’s on holiday. In Costa Rica.’

An ugly sneer crosses his face. ‘All right for some, I suppose. She still with that tosser, then? What was his name?’

He knows very well what Charles’s name is, he knows very well that they’re still together. I’m not getting drawn into a conversation about it: I know what he wants to do, he wants to rail at me about how badly she treated him, he wants to insinuate that Charles and Mum were sleeping together before the split, he wants to go over and over what happened, rewriting history as he tries to absolve himself of blame. We’ve been here before, and I’m suddenly furious with myself for coming: why did I think this time was going to be any different?

I
clench my fists now, digging my nails into the palms of my hands. I can’t shout at him, I can’t storm out. His illness holds me hostage. I take a deep breath, sit back down opposite him and give him the brightest smile I can muster. ‘Is there anything I can get you, Dad? Anything I can do for you?’

He shakes his head, passes his hand over his eyes. He looks exhausted. I bite hard on my lower lip in an attempt to stop the tears coming. He looks up at me, surprised.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asks. ‘Is something wrong? You’re not going to cry, are you?’ He hauls himself to his feet, shuffles across the space between us and sits down next to me. He takes my hand in his. ‘I’m not dead yet, love,’ he says, and I burst into tears.

I promise to visit again in the morning, before I drive back to London. On the way to the B&B I pick up a bottle of wine and twenty Marlboro Lights from a corner shop. The rooms at the B&B will be non-smoking, of course, but I can always hang out the window. Like a thirteen-year-old.

The B&B is nicer than I’d expected: a pretty Victorian house with large rooms and a distinct lack of chintz. I lie down on the queen-sized bed with a glass of red, luxuriating in solitude, wishing I could stay here for days. No one, I realise, knows where I am. I have disappeared. I am off the grid. It’s delicious, the best kind of escape, completely irresponsible and utterly selfish.

I can’t enjoy it for long, though, because my mobile phone, still switched off, sits on the bedside table, a silent, accusing presence. I have to turn it on some time. And so I do, and then wish I hadn’t.

Message received today at 16.24.

‘Nic, I can’t believe this. What are you doing? I’ve already invited Matt and Liz – they’re probably already on their way down. I said we’d go for a drink first. I just don’t understand … Am I honestly supposed to think this was a spur-of-the-moment decision? Christ, this pisses me off.’

Message received today at 16.32.

‘Call me back, for fuck’s sake. You do realise we’re supposed to be getting on a plane to New York the day after tomorrow?’

Message received today at 17.15.

‘You know what, Nicole? Don’t come crying to me when this turns out to be a disaster.’

After the third one I can’t stand to listen any more, and now I know that there’s no hope of me drifting off to dreamless sleep. I lie awake, I’m anxious, guilt-ridden … I open my laptop and make a perfunctory attempt to get some work done. I type up the notes from the afternoon’s meeting with Annie, but that just makes me feel worse. Finally, I open my secret Hotmail account and check my messages.

There’s another message from Alex, sent just an hour ago.

Alex to Nicole

Are we not talking again? Or are you just busy?

Maybe you’re at the in-laws.

Well, you’ll get this some time. I confronted Aaron about Jessica this morning. I meant to be all cold and businesslike about it, but then I just fucking lost it, screamed and cried and threw stuff. So humiliated now. He was contrite, begged forgiveness, told me it was ‘a stupid, meaningless sex thing’ – as though that’s supposed to make me feel better. Fucker. So what do I do, Nic? He promised me (before I threw the soapstone elephant that you bought me in Cape Town at his head – don’t worry, it’s not broken) that he would end it with her, that he would never see her again. I don’t think I believe him.

Ax