Out on a Limb (22 page)

‘I’ve already read it.’

‘Did you like it?’

‘Yes, I did.’

‘He’s really good, isn’t he?’

‘At tennis?’

‘I meant at writing. Though he’s very good at both. How’s your leg?’

He looks down at it as if he’d forgotten it existed. But then, perhaps he has. ‘Actually, it’s much better, thank you.’

‘Are you going to book some more physio for it?’

‘D’you think I should?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then I will.’ He picks up his glass again and peers at the contents. Then peers at me. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘But this is vile.’

Spike, at this point, having presumably noticed that our chat has limped to an absolute last straw of excruciating-ness, begins scratching at the back door in a point-making sort of way.

Now it’s me that’s checking the time. Poor Spike must be cross-eyed by now. I push my chair back and stand up. ‘He’s waiting for his walk,’ I say.

‘Oh,’ says Gabriel Ash, pinging up from his own chair as if ejected via a slingshot. ‘I’m sorry. I’m holding you up. I’d better get off and let you get on, hadn’t I?’

Had he? He now doesn’t seem at all sure. God, why are men so useless at communicating? His discomfort is becoming louder than my mother’s purple lycra. And, like my mother, is just crying out to be noticed, it seems. ‘There’s no need,’ I say, wondering quite why that should be. Is he just plain old lonely while Lucy’s away? I must remember he’s only recently been bereaved too. I get the impression he and his sister aren’t close. Perhaps he’s just in need of a friend. Like I am right now. I bend down and pick Spike up, decided. ‘You know, you could always come with us. We’d like that, Spike, wouldn’t we?’

He hovers by his chair, and once again I have a powerful sense that though he doesn’t want to stay he doesn’t want to go either. Then he leaves it and comes across to stroke the top of Spike’s head. Nothing like a dog to help things along. ‘He has interesting fur,’ he says, leaning closer to inspect it. ‘Kind of wavy. What breed is he, exactly?’

‘We’re not entirely sure. So we’ve decided he’s the bastard love child of Hairy McClary from Donaldson’s Dairy and Madame Fifi La Bucket, who escaped from the circus.’

‘That so?’

‘We like to think so. He does speak the most beautiful French. His mother was a
Bichon Frise
, you see. Used to ride a small bicycle round a big top in Fréjus. Go on. Come with us, why don’t you? If you’ve nowhere else to be, that is. You can keep me company.’

‘I thought you talked to the dog.’

‘Don’t be silly,’ I say. ‘I only speak English.’

A version of it, at any rate. Though not, perhaps, his.

We do the same route most days, if we’ve time, Spike and I. We walk to the end of my road, down the next and round the corner. Then up Cathedral Road and into Sophia Gardens. Where we mess around a bit with his little rubber bone.

T he trees that line the river are becoming smudged with patches of banana and mustard, but it’s still a green summer sward that greets us in the park. Gaggles of after school teenagers mess about with balls and eat crisps, while lone joggers weave their way around them.

Having to w alk as well as talk seems to be good for Gabriel Ash. He’s left his jacket in my kitchen and has rolled up his sleeves, and thus unbuttoned he looks altogether more, well, unbuttoned. Though only marginally, it seems; when I ask him about his father’s stash of memorabilia and how he feels about it all, he tells me quick as you like that it doesn’t change anything, and in tones that suggest that it isn’t about to, either, so there seems little else to be said. So I move on to his daughter, about whom he’s much more talkative, and ascertain that he wasn’t ever married to her mother; they had a brief fling that wasn’t ever going to be going anywhere, and she didn’t know she was pregnant till after they split. But he supported her through it and has done so ever since. And when I comment that a lot of men would have made a bolt for the hills at that point, he seems genuinely shocked that I might assume he’d do likewise. How could he look himself in the eye if he abandoned his own flesh and blood?

‘Plus,’ he adds, ruefully. ‘You haven’t had the pleasure of meeting her terrifying Italian Grand
Mama
.’

Or the pleasure of having your own father abandon you, which I imagine is much more the point. ‘So this is a first, then?’ I ask him. ‘Getting married?’

‘Indeed,’ he says, pushing a hand across his hair.

‘Exciting.’

‘If stressful.’

‘Oh, they’re always that, aren’t they?’ I pull Spike’s bone from my pocket and reach down to unclip his lead.

‘So I’m told,’ he says qui etly, watching me. ‘So I’m told.’

Walking dogs, on the whole, is not a dangerous pastime. But e ven before it does, I can see, without a doubt, that on this occasion anyway, it’s going to break with tradition. That it’s an accident waiting to happen. I think people in my line of work do tend to have a bigger visual vocabulary about such things – all those years and years of listening to excitably recounted traumas. Or perhaps it’s just because people who deal daily with the fall-out from injuries are more aware than most of how readily accidents
do
happen.

But I clearly don’t see it soon enough. I throw the bone a few times, and Spike, legs like little pistons, races joyfully to catch it. And then, just as I lob the bone into the air again, out of the corner of my eye, I see him. An Airedale,
the
Airedale; the scourge of the park. He wears a heavy leather collar and he travels alone. I don’t know who he belongs to because I’ve never seen his owner. I suspect they let him off the leash and then tootle off and go shopping.

Leaving him to terrorise the likes of
my
dog. ‘That bloody Airedale!’ I say, already now in motion, following the trajectory of the now airborne bone. There’s no question that the Airedale’s going to reach it before him, but possession is not always nine-tenths of the law. Not in the dog world, at any rate. But because Spike doesn’t realise he’s not an Alsatian, once the Airedale takes possession he’s ready to do battle, and charges across the park in pursuit.

Gabriel, whose legs are much longer than mine, sees what’s happening and starts running too, and soon –
quelle surprise
– overtakes me. But just as he’s closing in on the rogue canine, Spike, clearly keen to go for safety in numbers, suddenly changes course and runs right across his path.

And I know, I just
know
someone’s going to get hurt. I’d like to think it might be a some
thing
– that bloody Airedale, to be specific – but as he’s already a good ten metres clear by this time, I know that it will be the some
one
today. And I’m absolutely right. Because three seconds after my premonition hits me, Gabriel, though vaulting Spike with the grace of an Olympian, makes a miscalculation by forgetting that he isn’t one, and collapses heavily, awkwardly, down onto the grass.

The Airedale, by this time, is cantering away with Spike’s bone, and Spike himself, all out of puff now, can do nothing more useful than yap out a tirade of doggy abuse. I reach Gabriel a scant five seconds or so later, by which time all the colour has drained from his face. He’s lying on the ground in an embryonic crescent, rolling back and forth and clutching his knee. Were he playing for Liverpool, he’d be yellow card impressive. Except today there are no free kicks on offer and hence no dramatics; this is real. He’s hurt, that much is obvious. I drop down to my knees beside him.

‘Oh, Lord, Gabriel! Your knee ! That
bloody
dog.’

‘I’m okay,’ he says. He’s still short of breath as he speaks. And he patently isn’t okay.

‘No you’re not. Where does it hurt, exactly? And did you feel anything? Did you feel a popping sound?’

He shakes his head. Manages a grim smile. ‘No,’ he says. ‘No. Thank God. I’ve been there already. No. Just a medium sized dagger up the thigh. God, I’m so stupid.’

‘No. I’m the stupid one. I don’t know what I was thinking, letting you charge off after them like that.’ I cast my eyes around. ‘On this wet bloody grass. It’s lethal.’

He pushes himself up into a sitting position and gingerly flexes and unflexes his leg. ‘It’ll be okay,’ he says, exploring the area with his fingers. ‘Don’t worry.’

‘Right,’ I say, worrying anyway. ‘We need to get you sorted out.’ I swivel to look around me. ‘That’ll do,’ I say, gesturing to the rank of benches that flank the path at the edge of the park. ‘Let’s get you up and over there, and then I can run back and fetch my car.’

He shakes his head. ‘There’s no need. I can walk.’

‘You absolutely can’t. If you’ve torn that ligament again – and I suspect you might well have – I’m certainly not going to allow you to walk back.’

‘
Really
,’ he persists. He’s looking less pale now and his expression is determined. ‘I walked a good deal further when I ruptured the thing in the first place, believe me. Come on. Give me a hand up and let’s see how we’re doing.’

I help haul him up and he grunts as I do so. ‘Gabriel, it is really no bother whatsoever for me to go and fetch my car. It’ll only take me five minutes, and –’

‘No need,’ he says firmly. ‘Look, let’s give it a go, eh? If I can lean on you, I can avoid putting too much weight on it. It’ll be fine. Come on. If I can get as far as that bench, I can get back to yours. Come on.’ He grins. ‘And if it turns out I can’t, then you can give me a piggyback, can’t you?’

Spike, by now, has given up all hope of getting his bone back, and doesn’t kick up his usual fuss when I clip his lead back on.

‘Sorry, mate,’ Gabriel says to him, having got the hang of including Spike in the conversation, which is sweet of him. ‘I did my best.’

‘Woof,’ says Spike. ‘Bloody Airedale.’

That bloody Airedale, I decide, has a great deal to answer for. Though, at that point, I have no idea
how
much.

Chapter 22

‘S
O THIS IS HOW
we do it, okay? You put your right arm around my shoulder, okay? That’s it. And I’ll put my left around your waist –’

‘And then we do the hokey-cokey and we turn around, right?’

‘Don’t be silly. Concentrate. And then we walk in synchrony.’

‘Dancing now, is it?’ He took a step. ‘Ow!’

‘Right. This is no good, is it? I’m going to get the car.’

‘No, no. Sorry. Sorry, miss. We walk in synchrony. Okay.’

‘So go on, then. Take it more carefully this time. Put your weight on
me
. That’s it. How does that feel?’

‘Er. Like I’ve torn my anterior cruciate ligament. Again.’

‘Yes, I think I knew that. But how does it feel? How much does it hurt? Can you actually put any weight on it at all?’ We took a step. ‘How was that?’

‘Not too bad.’ We took another. ‘That’s okay. No, that’s fine. See? No problems. Mind you, you must get sick of doing this, don’t you?’

‘What ?’

‘Living on a perpetual busman’s holiday. First your mother, and now me. What a pair.’

I laughed. ‘ There is zero comparison. You may be heavier on the back but believe me, Gabriel, you are infinitely lighter on the ears.’

‘Like that, is it?’

‘It tends to get that way, yes. When it’s twenty -four / seven.’

‘But hopefully not for too much longer, though. Yes?’

We had to stop then, so Spike could make the acquaintance of a slug that was slithering across the pavement and into the road. Where it would surely die a horrible death.

‘In theory,’ I said. ‘But the trouble is that she has absolutely no interest in leaving.’

He squeezed my shoulder. ‘Why would she when she’s got the likes of you on tap, eh?’

Quite.
Quite
. ‘Do you think it’s morally reprehensible,’ I asked him, ‘not to want to have your mother to live with you?’

‘Depends on the mother,’ he said. ‘Depends on the you. Depends on the circumstances, doesn’t it?’

‘Would you?’

‘Have had my mother to live with me? I doubt it.’

‘And you wouldn’t feel guilty?’

‘It never came up.’

‘But you wouldn’t? If it had done? Even if she’d asked you?’

‘I don’t imagine she would have.’ I felt him shrug. ‘But if she had…well…yes, still a ‘no’, probably.’

‘On what grounds?’

‘On the grounds that it wouldn’t have worked.’ He lifted his free hand and drew it across his jaw. And, Spike done, we resumed our slo-mo three-legged-race walking. ‘But, you know, it’s not even that. It was never an issue. She was too independent. I lived away lots. It just wasn’t expected. She always made it clear that if she became ill or infirm we must promise to put her in a home.’

Much in the same way that I do with my boys. Much in the way most parents do. But my mother is not like most parents. ‘But what if things changed?’ I persisted. ‘You know, when it came to it? What if she changed her mind? Wouldn’t you feel guilty then?’

He shrugged again. ‘I honestly don’t know. That’s the truth. How could I?’ He shook his head. ‘Hey, you know, morally reprehensible is a bit strong, don’t you think? I don’t think there’s any
moral
obligation involved. Yes, you have a moral obligation to look after your children, but I’m not sure that holds true when it’s the other way around. Do you?’

‘I guess not.’

‘I mean, people tend to do it because they want to. Because it feels right.’

‘But what if it doesn’t?’

He shrugged. ‘Then you don’t.’

‘Just like that?’

We stopped for Spike again, and he turned around to face me. There was a blade of grass stuck in his hair. ‘You know,’ he said. ‘You’ve just got to do what you think is best for
you
.’

‘But what about what’s best for her?’

‘Abbie, I can’t comment. I don’t know either of you well enough. Look, all I know is that if it feels all wrong it probably
is
all wrong. Whatever the reason –’

‘Oh, God, there are
so
many reasons.’

We continue d walking. ‘Then you mustn’t feel you should.’

‘I know that.
Rationally
I know that. But I just feel so
guilty
.’

He grinned then. Nudged me. ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘So do I!’

‘About your father?’

‘God, no. I didn’t mean that. About
you
. About the position we’ve put you in.’

‘It’s not your fault. This point could – probably would – have happened eventually.’

‘But not now. Not so unexpectedly.’

I smiled. ‘I guess five years in which to prepare would have been nice. To cram a life in. Have some fun. I just don’t feel
ready
for all this stuff, you know? You’re right. It has all been a little bit sudden.’

‘I know. And I’m sorry.’

‘You don’t need to apologise.’

‘But you know,’ he said, stopping again of his own volition, causing me this time to backtrack two steps and turn around. ‘About the house sale and everything? I know you must feel badly about it all, but, well, there’s quite a bit more to it than you probably think.’

I b egan to shake my head. Shrugged. ‘Well, that’s…’

‘With my sister. Corinne’s in a bad place in her marriage right now.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Her husband… Well, in words of one syllable, he…well, he’s been violent.’

‘Oh, God, that’s
awful
.’

And shocking. And completely unexpected. Though not to him, obviously. He nodded grimly. ‘Not to the kids, thank God, but to her. And it’s got worse this past year. She has to leave him. Get away. Take the children. And my father’s death…the house and everything…well, it’s obviously not the best way for it to happen, but at least it finally gives her the chance.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ I said again. ‘I really had no idea.’

‘Why would you? You don’t know them. And in any case, who ever does?’ He fell silent. We hobbled in silence a little further. Who indeed, I thought. She’d seemed so self-possessed, so confident. So in control. How easy, I thought, it is to misjudge people. How complex and unfathomable other lives could be.

We’d reached the junction of my road by this time. ‘I’m glad you told me,’ I said, as we carefully dismounted and then mounted the kerbs. ‘I know it doesn’t make any difference to anything, but, well, if nothing else, it makes me realise I don’t have a whole lot to complain about, do I?’

‘I don’t know. You tell me. Mother notwithstanding, of course.’

‘No,’ I said firmly. ‘I don’t. I have two healthy sons, and a job that I love, and a nice home, and I’m pretty fit, and…well…er…my knees are both intact.’ I grinned. He didn’t.

‘And what else?’ he asked, voicing my very thoughts.

I shrugged. ‘And nothing. Isn’t that enough?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said, turning. ‘Is it? You tell me. ’

I was just tussling with how best to answer that one, when it was answered for me anyway. Charlie, clutching a carrier bag, was walking up my garden path.

He’d already seen me. Seen us.
Was
seeing us. He raised an arm to wave. ‘Who’s that?’ asked Gabriel.

‘Ah,’ I said, letting go of his hand to wave back. ‘That’s…um… Charlie. He…I…we used to work together. At the hospital. Before I joined the clinic.’

‘Oh, right,’ he said lightly. We continued our jerky progress up the road.

B y the time we reached the house, Charlie had already deposited the carrier bag on the doorstep and was making his way back down the path.

‘Just thought I’d drop your things off,’ he said as he approached us. Then he gestured to Gabriel’s leg. ‘Hello?’ he said. ‘Have we got an injury here?’

I nodded. ‘Torn ligament, we think. Nothing too dramatic.’

‘Oh, dear,’ he said, stooping to stroke a now belly-up Spike, while Gabriel and I manoeuvred our way around the gate. Then he straightened and stuck a hand out. ‘Charles Scott-Downing,’ he said.

‘Gabriel Ash,’ said Gabriel, removing his own hand from my shoulder to shake it.

Their eyes locked in masculine appraisal for a moment, very obviously and naturally attempting to calculate what part the other man played in my life. Which was novel, if uncomfortable, provoking unwelcome stirrings of the furtive nature of the life I’d lived these past months. ‘I’m sorry,’ said I, wishing he’d been a little more specific about my things. Things from work, perhaps. Things
for
work.
Some
thing at least. ‘I should have introduced you,’ I added, hastily. ‘Gabriel is Hugo’s son. You remember Hugo?’ Charlie nodded. ‘How are you, anyway?’

‘I’m just fine,’ he said. He looked it. Hale and hearty. Lightly suntanned. Much like the Charlie I’d first become infatuated with. Except not. Because that Charlie didn’t really exist. He was a construct; a full-blown romantic ideal. A hero on which to hang the hook of a silly crush. But all things must pass. And this had. I felt gladdened. He smiled at me. ‘You?’

‘I’m fine too,’ I said.

‘Your mother?’

‘Getting there. Almost stickless now.’

‘Well, hurrah for that!’ he said brightly.

I turned to Gabriel. ‘Charlie replaced my mother’s knee.’

‘Oh, I see.’ He nodded.

‘Well,’ said Charlie. ‘Let’s hope
yours
remains in one piece, at least. You’re in capable hands, at any rate. Um. Well. Best be off, I guess.’ He stepped around Spike and placed a kiss on my cheek.

‘Thanks for bringing my things round,’ I said.

‘You’re very welcome. Take care, now.’

We watched him cross the road and get into his car, and then headed up the path ourselves. I scooped up the carrier as I put the key in the front door, re-locating it and its incriminating contents to the third step up the stairs. Though there was really no reason for me to do so, I felt strangely uncomfortable with the notion that Gabriel might deduce what we’d been.

‘Right,’ I said, helping him over the doorstep and into the kitchen. ‘Rice is what we need here. Come on. Let’s get that leg up.’

He sat down heavily on the kitchen chair I pulled out for him. ‘Rice?’

‘Yes. Rice. R.I.C.E.’ I pulled out a second chair and dragged it round to face the other. ‘Haven’t you heard that before? Rest, Ice, Compression and Elevation. Come on. I’ll help you.’ I reached to do so. ‘Except…’ I stopped. ‘There’s a thought. You’re going to have to take your jeans off, aren’t you?’

He winced as he straightened his leg out in front of him again. Then he smiled. ‘Yes. I suppose I am, aren’t I? My, you certainly know how to sweep a guy off his feet. What an afternoon this is turning out to be!’ He pulled himself upright again. ‘Er…’

‘Tell you what, ’ I said, ingesting his comment and realising that perhaps having a man in his pants in my kitchen was not the most professional way to proceed. ‘I’ll pop up and get you Seb’s bathrobe. Won’t be long.’

‘There’s really no need,’ he said, unbuckling his belt.

There absolutely was, of course, so I skipped off up the stairs to get it anyway. And the letter about Seb that I wanted him to translate. Take his mind off the throbbing while I bound his leg, perhaps. But by the time I got back downstairs with them both, the jeans were hanging over the back of a chair, and he (barelegged now, and with shirt tails covering said pants) was back on the chair again, grunting as he bent over to inspect his knee. There were coils of damp hair sticking to the back of his neck. It had been no small thing, him walking all that way. I should have insisted. Should have been firmer. I tried not to worry about the proximity of his pants.

‘Here,’ I said, coming around the table and shunting his shoes underneath it. ‘Let me get that up on that chair for you.’

‘It’s okay. I can manage.’

‘I’m quite sure you can, but I shall do it even so. It’s me that got you in this state in the first place, after all.’ I eased it up on to the chair seat and then grabbed another seat pad to give it a bit of extra height. That done, I fetched an ice pack from the freezer.

‘No peas, then?’ he asked, as I gently placed it across his knee.

‘No peas. We have all mod cons round these parts.’ I straightened. ‘And two paracetamol, I think. And a cup of tea. A cup of tea, yes?’

‘You know I can’t think of a single thing I’d like more at this moment. Except perhaps an other Amaretto.’

‘Oh! Then –’

He winked. ‘Only kidding.’

So I made a pot of tea and sorted some food out for Spike and rummaged for some biscuits in the cupboard. The light was beginning to fade now, and the kitchen was growing dusky. It was a pleasant enough gloom, but hardly useful right now. I went across and switched on the lights at the wall, and then, on an impulse, to cheer the place up, I lit my little row of scented tealights on the windowsill above the sink. They flickered gaily, dancing in the slight draught from the hall.

‘Right, then,’ I said when I was done. ‘ No football for you for a bit, I don’t think.’

He grimaced. ‘Right now I can’t imagine for a moment that I’d want to kick a feather, much less a ball.’

‘You know,’ I said, coming round to join him at the table with two mugs. ‘You really do have to be careful, though. You’ve obviously been left with some residual weakness. You’ve got to remember you’re not so young any more.’

‘Gee, thanks for that.’

‘But you do. Contact sports are so risky. You wouldn’t believe the number of horrific injuries I’ve seen over the years in men of a certain age who still think they’re teenagers.’

‘I hope you’re not suggesting I take up golf.’ He sipped his tea. ‘You’re painting a very gloomy picture here, you know.’

‘Oh, it’s not that bad. Not quite yet, anyway. But you do need to exercise those thigh muscles properly. It’s really important that you do them regularly. You’re coming in next week, aren’t you? Remind me to show you how to do them properly. I’ll give you a sheet to take home.’

‘Yes, miss.’

‘Right, then,’ I said, getting up from my own chair and c oming around the table. ‘Let’s take a look and see how we’re doing.’ I took the pad, now just coolish, from his knee, and made a gentle exploration of its contours. The swelling had got no worse, thankfully. If tear it was, it was hopefully quite minor. I ran my fingers over his skin, feeling the hard line of his original scar.