Polly (26 page)

Polly went into her sitting-room, through to her tiny kitchen and drank down a glass of water without pausing for breath.

Yeuch! Thames Water – I'd forgotten how strongly it tastes and smells, but what can one expect? It's been filtered through six other people. In Vermont, our water is fresh from the mountains.

This
is
your water, Polly, don't lose sight of that. You'd better reacquire a taste for it.

She didn't dare boil the kettle though the notion of a cup of Earl Grey was all that had kept her from screaming on the flight. She opened the fridge, looked inside and assessed those contents which established a connection with Jen Carter, and those which presented utter disparity. She closed the fridge door. She had a headache.

Sitting on her settee, she gazed out to her small patio and was pleased to see, though now withered, a crowd of daffodils whose bulbs the squirrels had not pillaged. She yawned and realized that she was too exhausted to draw the curtains, to leave the settee into which she was now welded. She knew she was too tired for dawn to intrude on her slumber and so she curled up, smiled in welcome at her Picasso print, and fell asleep deeply. Somewhere, in a fugged corner of a nondescript dream, she heard someone laugh and gasp. And then she saw and heard nothing until the sound of the floorboards creaking above roused her. It was half past nine.

I'm awake. Wide. I am. I'm back. Here comes Jen. No? Not yet? She's gone into the bathroom. Wake up, Polly, stay awake!

Here comes Jen.

Polly sat neatly on the settee, clasping her hands and then unclasping them, taking a book to her lap and then putting it aside, while she counted the five stairs being descended.

Here comes Jen.

Jen jumped out of her skin.

‘Hullo, at last,' Polly smiled.

‘Who are you?' gasped a horrified Jen Carter. ‘You Polly?'

‘'Course I'm Polly,' she laughed, holding out her hand, taking Jen's and shaking it warmly.

‘What you doing here?' Jen continued, her eyebrows so furrowed that they had all but merged into one.

‘I
live
here,' said Polly cautiously, tipping her head and wondering why the girl looked so appalled.

Aha! That's why.

Both girls turned their heads in the vague direction of the bathroom above. Someone was having a shower.

Hussy! Woman after my own heart! Put it there.

Polly held out her hand once more. Jen held on to it, somewhat distractedly. ‘What you doing here?' she repeated.

Polly swivelled her head to regard the answering machine. It was flashing.

‘I left you a message,' she explained, ‘from Logan. Yesterday. Evening. For you. Did you not receive it?'

Frowning hard at the answering machine, Jen walked over to it and pressed ‘play'. Nothing happened.

‘Guard,' Jen said, over and over; Polly finally realizing it was to the good Lord whom she petitioned, not some hitherto unknown function of her answering machine.

‘Volume,' Jen shrugged in apology to Polly, turning it back up so that the last drifts of Polly's message could be heard.

‘I'm sorry,' Polly said, though for what she was unsure.

‘No problem,' Jen said distractedly, her head pulled as if by some imaginary magnet in the approximate direction of the stairs. Polly watched Jen gulp as they heard the footfalls descend the short flight.

‘I won't tell,' Polly smiled in what she hoped was a conniving and sisterly way.

Serves you right, Chip!

‘Look—' Jen starts.

‘Ssh!' Polly dismisses amicably.

‘Breakfa—' says Max, entering the room, wearing boxer shorts and nothing else.

Serves you right, Polly.

N
ow hold on a minute. Wait up. Hang about a bit. Steady on. What on earth? Whoah!

Leave the three of them suspended in their agony. Catch up on the events in England. We've hardly seen Max these past weeks. We've been too caught up with Polly. Did we really stop and wonder whether she'd written much, to Max, to anyone? Weren't we rather caught up in the tumble and sport that constituted Polly's spring term? We thought of Max in passing. We wondered what on earth Polly was doing. But we were also compelled to bear close witness to all that she was to do. Even if it meant we too pushed Max just out of our field of vision for a while. It's not just Polly who's been turning a blind eye. Unashamedly – regrettably.

Back track. Rewind.

‘Polly get off OK?' Dominic asked Max when he returned from the airport.

‘Fine,' Max smiled wistfully. ‘She said “yes”.'

‘Yes?' puzzled Dominic. ‘Want a beer?'

‘Yes,' said Max.

‘She said “yes” to a beer?'

Max gave his brother a withering look of profound pity and affection. ‘To
marrying
me, twat.'

‘Hadn't she said “yes” already?' Dominic questioned with an air of suspicion.

‘Just what I thought,' Max laughed. ‘Anyway, it's all official and sealed and just waiting to be signed now. Perhaps some time in the autumn.'

‘Feathering her bed, no doubt,' Dominic said very quietly and not to Max, who heard nevertheless.

‘What did you say?'

‘Nothing.'

‘No, Dominic,' Max persisted defensively, ‘what do you mean?'

‘Nothing. Honestly.'

‘Honesty? Well, tell me what you said then – I mean, I know what you
said,
but what are you implying?'

‘Look,' said Dominic, trying to appear nonchalant and rifling somewhat pointlessly through the contents of their fridge to increase this impression, ‘I don't know. It's just – I don't bloody know – but you're my brother and, if she marries you, she'd better treat you a damn sight better than she has this last fortnight.'

‘What are you on about?' Max asked, backing away slightly, feeling at once humiliated and also angry. ‘And how about your behaviour towards her? I don't think I heard you ask about Vermont at all.'

‘You're my brother,' Dominic stressed, seeing the bait but tactfully swerving from it, ‘my younger brother. It's my duty and my pleasure to look out for you.'

‘And?'

‘As I say, I just feel that Polly was distant. Uncharacteristically so.'

‘You know she has her little quiet periods,' Max said impatiently, ‘it would be impossible to sustain her level of effervescence constantly.'

‘I'm just saying that she seemed distant, Max – aloof. Different.'

‘You don't know what you're talking about,' Max warned.

Dominic shrugged.

‘Fuck you, Dom.'

Dominic shrugged again.

Over the next month, the more Dominic fell for Megan, and the less often Polly wrote – and the less she wrote when she did – the more Dominic's suspicions seemed well grounded, the less he liked Polly, and the more he wished to protect his seemingly unsuspecting brother.

‘I know what you mean,' rued Megan reluctantly, running her fingers through Dominic's hair. ‘Her last letter to me was basically a carbon copy of that which she wrote to Max, not that I let on – he seemed delighted with it. A couple of paragraphs about the school revue and pink salopettes.'

‘Don't you think it a little suspect?' Dominic asked, taking Megan's hand from his head and kissing each finger in turn.

‘Pink salopettes and Polly is a notion more frightening than suspicious,' Megan laughed, wishing to lighten the tone, close the conversation and get down to some steamy sex.

Dominic couldn't resist. What was Polly worth anyway? Certainly not coming between him and the untold pleasures and wiles of Megan's gorgeous body.

‘The trouble with Polly,' Megan pondered later, while sharing a post-coital bowl of cornflakes with Dominic at midnight, ‘is that she does so adore people. She's so tactile and trusting. She loves to be loved – I feel it's what she lives for.'

‘But can we trust her?' Dominic asked, placing a single cornflake on Megan's collar bone and then dabbing it off with his tongue. Megan swooned at his gesture and then pulled away to consider his words.

‘I really can't believe that we couldn't. Not after all this time. Not Polly Fenton.'

Whenever specks of doubt and flickers of unease touched down on Max, he swept them away as if they were dust on his shoulder. Furthermore, he reprimanded himself for being stupid, told himself to get a grip and threw himself into his work. He took on more commissions than he could handle in a working day, often staying in his studio until nine at night. This had a threefold function: it kept him utterly occupied and focused, his bank balance breathed a sigh of relief, and it kept Dominic at bay and off his back.

Max had always looked up to his older brother; previously he had been easily swayed by him. Swapping bicycles for skateboards. Having a flat-top haircut. Drinking a yard of ale. Supporting Spurs over the Gunners. Dropping acid on Primrose Hill. Going on the Waltzer at Hampstead Heath fair. Going for the vindaloo. However, when it came to the opposite sex, Max had never sought Dominic's advice, never subscribed to his methods, or been remotely envious of his brother's ability to maintain a ready selection of keen, separate and secret participants. He was thus insulted that his brother should insinuate that Polly was anything other than Max knew and loved her to be.

I mean, what would Dom know? Meg's the first woman who's proving more than a flirtation whereas Polly and I have been together for five years. I think I'm entitled to know best what she wants in life and I know that she wants for nothing in me.

At weekends, Max socialized with friends and assured them that Polly was fine, having a super time and yes, let's all do something when she's home in six weeks. What was the point in taking on board any of Dominic's misgivings? Max was sure to talk breezily about Polly in front of his brother. There was nothing wrong, nothing remotely amiss, anyway. Was there?

There's not a lot to say, really – certainly nothing to confide. Yes, she writes infrequently. Yes, her letters are becoming shorter and less, well, personalized. But I'm happy to credit distance with her distance – and acknowledge that her distance is most probably her means of survival. Anyway, the girl does want to spend her life with me after all. Doesn't she?

When no Valentine's card arrived, however, Max was somewhat unnerved. Not because he was taken in by all the commercialized panoply of the day, but because Polly was traditionally ridiculously slushy on February 14th. Last year she had cut the bread into heart-shapes before she toasted it. The year before, she left a trail of love-heart sweets from her front door to her bedroom, with an agonizing detour to the patio doors. The year before that, she'd hidden champagne and plastic cups in a bag under a thatch of shrubs on Golders Hill Park. This year, it was a hasty note which arrived two days late.

On Valentine's Day itself however, Max wondered, very quietly, if perhaps he was making excuses for her. Almost immediately, he told himself to shut up.

School revue, remember, on top of essays and dorm responsibilities.

He knew Polly; he loved her; there was nothing to worry about. Why should her termly absence cause any change to his life?

The nub of the matter was that he feared that the fact he doubted her somehow implied he was having doubts himself. Previously, he'd never really thought twice about the longevity of his relationship – once Polly was on the scene, he'd never touched upon the thought of her not being there. Of her not wanting him. Of him not wanting her.

‘Hullo. Is that Jen?'

‘Yeah?'

‘Hullo there, this is Dominic Fyfield.'

What am I doing?

‘Hi Dom, how you doing?'

‘I'm very well, thanks – you?'

‘Cool!'

‘I was – we were, Max and I – wondering if you'd like to come over tomorrow night?'

Not that I've mentioned it to him just yet.

‘A Tuesday night?'

‘Not just any old Tuesday – it's Shrove Tuesday and we're going to have a pancake fest.'

‘Hey, that sounds fun.'

‘Edible fun, I hasten to add.'

‘I'm there. I'll see you guys later.'

‘Er, no – tomorrow?'

‘Yeah – sure. That's what I said, hey?'

‘Super.'

‘Bye for now.'

I just want to observe
, Dominic decided as he gazed at the telephone,
I just want to see if those signs are still there. I want to see if she sparkles at Max again. He deserves to be sparkled at
.

Jen sparkled. Dominic smiled. Megan licked her lips. Max enjoyed himself very much.

Max won the Highest Toss Grand Prix. Megan continued to lick her lips. Dominic was victorious in the Most Pancakes Consumed Competition. Jen brought maple syrup for which her English friends developed an instant and highly dangerous penchant.

‘If it was snowing, we could have Sugar on Snow,' Jen explained. Max prayed out loud for snow. Everyone rushed over to the window to check and then collapsed on the sofa laughing.

‘I'm going to have to repaint the kitchen ceiling,' Max moaned.

‘That's some small price to pay for being Highest Toss Supreme Champion,' Jen justified.

‘I don't want to think about pancakes,' Megan protested, patting her stomach and looking doe-eyed at Dominic for reassurance. His wink more than sufficed.

Ready?
he mouthed.

Megan's wink more than answered.

‘Right,' said Dominic, ‘we're off.'

‘Brilliant evening,' said Megan, ‘see you at school, Jen.'

‘Later, guys,' said Jen without looking at either of them.

‘See you,' said Max.

‘Do you think that's OK?' Megan wonders. ‘To leave them? Unchaperoned?'