Rise and Fall of a Domestic Diva (13 page)

Unconvincedby this and a lot of other, more general stuffhe invited an old assistant of his, Lucia, round to supper while Evie was in hospital, in order to gauge whether he was still the most sought-after man in the developed world. After only half an hour in Lucia’s companychecking to see that the twenty-six year old’s northern Italian pupils were dilating in the appropriate mannerhe was once more assured that all he had to do was click his fingers and Lucia would fuck an armadillo on his command.

After the operation Evie couldn’t do anything for herself and found it difficult feeding Aggie. Joel told her not to give up because nobody they knew used bottles. Shiteven the
Daily Mail
was promoting breastfeeding.

Joel had anticipated Evie being as successful at motherhood as she was doing business in Tokyo, and was therefore entirely unprepared for the Evie who sat sobbing in her hospital bed with a screaming, abandoned-looking baby sprawled in her lap.

When he ran out of visitors to tell the
Zadok the Priest
story to, it got to the stage where he could no longer bear to visit her himself and so sent his parents instead.

Following the birth of Aggie, neither Joel nor Evie ever really recovered from the depression and despair that came creeping, seeping into all that intact vitality both of them had thought so impregnable. The hardest part of all was losing the envy of their friends. For the first time ever, Joel had to deal with the fact that right then not only did nobody want to spend time with them, but people had stopped wanting to
be
them, and that was hard. Ever since he could remember, everybody he’d ever come into contact with had wanted to be him in some shape or form, and suddenly that stopped. The glowing, bouncing, enviable Evie he had known up to this point became nothing more than one of the variations on offer.

So, after six months, Aggie was in full-time childcare and Evie was hopping on and off planes to Tokyo again. Joel was only able to take on assignments that didn’t conflict with the Tokyo trips. The Clapham flat was exchanged for a semi-detached house in SE22, bought cheap because the house they were semi-detached to was social housing and the young kid living thereJoel had lately become convincedwas dealing in drugs, because even younger kids on scooters were forever dropping off packages there.

On one of the Tokyo trips, Evie had some sort of breakdown. Joel got a phone call from a frightened assistant who’d lost all plot of time differences and phoned at 3.00 a.m. to tell him Evie had locked herself in her hotel room with the
chambermaid’s bucket of cleaning fluids and refused to leave until she’d cleaned it herself, it was so filthy.

In the end he had to go to Tokyo to fetch her, telling everyoneincluding himselfthat she had acute glandular fever. Once they got back to London, Evie barely left the house. Joel turned down assignments and took over Aggie, who he was determined would be walking and talking before his brother’s daughterhis niece.

Evie was prescribed Seniton to help herand Joelsleep at night. Often during this time, he would wake during the early hours of the morning and know, as he watched her sleeping, that the part of Evie he’d never known existedthe part that frightened him most; the part he was actively medicatingwas also the part, if he hadn’t been so afraid, he somehow knew he loved the most.

Eventually Evie went back to work part-time, but no longer had the inclination or will to make things buzz around her. It came as no surprise to either of them when she was finally laid off.

Joel didn’t know what to do. He liked things to work…function. Somehow he pulled himself back from the brink. Their marriage…children (Evie was pregnant with Ingrid)…
were
going to be a success; happiness didn’t have to come into it if it didn’t want to.

He spent her redundancy on a lease and told everybody Evie was going into business, launching her own label, employing a team of young designers. So Boutique was born.

Things slumped a bit around Ingrid’s birth, which was elected Caesarean, but now the shop was really taking off. He was even thinking of a franchiseopening another branch in maybe Barnes or Wandsworth and getting Evie to put in for Best Independent Retailer of the Year award. They had childcare sorted, and he was moving out of commercial photography and trying to cajole his agent onto getting together
a studio retrospective of his work at Tate Modern. Then there was that stroke of genius: getting the house onto
Grand Designs
. The McRaes were happening again. Wherever he turned, he could see it in people’s faces…everybody wanted their lives to be as fulfilled as the McRaes. He was even thinking of contacting that toy manufacturer in Beijing that could make lifestyle dolls from photos. ‘Evie’ and ‘Joel’ dolls would make fantastic Christmas gifts.

Evie’s energy levels were certainly back up, he thought approvingly, watching her pace aimlessly between bed and wall. Okay, she did look kind of fidgety, but there were no signs of exhaustion or, worse still, inertiai.e. depression. He’d gone downstairs that morning at 6.00 a.m. to find her unpacking a Sainsbury’s shop: that had to be a good sign.

It occurred to him, watching her, that she was semi-naked. He leered pleasantly, meaningfully across the bed at her, thinking that really tonight they should…it had been ten days and it would be a good way for her to burn off some of that excess energy she seemed to have at the moment. Their marriage had to function on all levels. They were the couple who did everythingincluding sextogether. Still.

Evie got into bed and he rolled up close, trying not to acknowledge the smell of drink on her.

She smiled absently at him as he started to nibble at her neck.

If not exactly forthcoming, she seemed amenable; but he took things slowly, cautiously. He never would get over those times they’d tried to have sex after Aggie was born when Evie would just burst into tears. It wasn’t that he’d never seen her cry beforewhen they first started dating they’d cried a lot together at European films; only these tears had been wild, without subtitles or explanation.

Tonight his wife’s body felt warm, supple and familiar. He started to consider actually enjoying himself.

Evie, watching him now, gave the same jerky, preoccupied smile she had done earlier, showing no objection but no outright consent either. Joel waited, unsure, until the next minute she rolled compliantly onto her back. Misjudging how close she already was to the edge of the bed, she fell onto the floor.

The hysterical laughter started almost immediately.

Joel peered over the side of the bed at her curled up naked, shaking with laughter.

Laughter in bed needed to be complicit, but there was nothing complicit about this laughter.

Suddenly scared, he said, ‘Get up.’

Laughter.

‘Evieget up.’

Continued laughter. Was she ever going to stop?

‘What are youdyspraxic or something?’ he yelled. Was that the right word? He didn’t know, but it had the right effect on her because she stopped laughing and rolled over to stare up at him.

‘You’re forever walking into things or falling over stuffyou’re worse than Aggie.’

Now her whole face was gaping up at him. ‘My God, that’s it.’

‘What?’ Joel said from the bed.

‘That’s it,’ Evie said again, excited.

Why hadn’t she thought of it earlier? St Anthony’s had a special needs unit specialising in dyspraxia and dyslexia. All she needed to do was get Aggie statemented…

Ros stood inside the en-suite bathroom at No. 188 Prendergast Road, slowly taking out her earrings and inadvertently smiling at her reflection in the mirror.

Martin was home.

That hadn’t happened in a long time.

‘How were the kids?’ she called out.

Martin’s voice, coming from the bedroom, sounded as though he was on the verge of sleep. ‘Toby was fineLola took a bit of settling.’

She went and stood in the bedroom doorway as she rubbed in some face cream, aware that they hadn’t spoken face to facewithout the aid of a telephonefor weeks.

Martin was sprawled across the bed, dressed in casual wear he’d last worn at Christmas, staring at the wall opposite.

He started when she appeared in the doorway, as if he’d been caught outand this momentarily unnerved Ros, who stopped rubbing cream into her face and started to watch him more closely as he tried to smile at her.

‘Tired?’

He nodded apologetically. ‘Boring, isn’t it?’

She disappeared back into the bathroom without responding to this.

A minute later he joined her, standing close behind her at the sink and stretching over her shoulder towards the medicine cabinet.

They watched each other in the mirror until Ros leant suddenly forwards and washed her hands. Her back was warm from where the length of him pressed against her as he reached for the Seniton.

‘Seniton?’

Martin laughed cheerfully.

‘When did you start taking those again?’

‘Three weeks ago or something?’ he asked his own reflection in the mirror. Then, shrugging at himself, ‘I don’t know.’

‘But, Martinthose aren’t the herbal ones we agreed you
could
take.’

‘The herbal ones are shit useless,’ he said, still sounding cheerful. ‘Kind of like the difference between a cigarette and a Nicorette.’

‘You’re not smoking again as well?’

‘Course not.’

Not entirely sure she believed this, she said, ‘But what about that article we read connecting Seniton to male infertility?’

‘Roswe’ve got two children.’

‘But what if we want more?’

‘Lola is only seven months old.’

‘Later…later we might want more.’

‘Well that’s something we can think about…later.’

He turned away from her, taking the pack of Seniton into the bedroom.

There was no point talking about it. Martin clearly didn’t want toshe wasn’t even sure she was all that interested herself. But she knewsuddenlythat she wasn’t going to
sleep that night until they reached some sort of resolution as to whether or not a third child was a possibility at some stage.

Martin was lying on the bed again and Martin lying on the bed was something she no longer took for granted, she realised. His presence tonight made the familiar landscape of the bedroom seem suddenly precipitous.

‘Later when?’ she said, pressing her point

He stared at her for a moment, and gave his nose a quick scratch as a tiny feather poked its way through the pillowcase.

‘RosI don’t know.’

She moved away from the doorway and sat on the edge of the bed, giving his chest a playful prod. ‘Laterwhen?’ she insisted, trying to get her voice to do provocative, but it just came out sounding irate.

For a moment he looked angry, almost revolted by her. ‘I don’t knowwe’ll talk about it after the case.’

‘This case?’

‘This case.’ He tried to roll away, but she’d pinned the duvet down so that he couldn’t move. Up close, she smelt of mouthwash and the smell irritated him; irritated him in quite a profound way.

‘After this case there’ll be another one…there’ll always be another case,’ she added.

‘I suppose,’ he said, watching her now.

‘So my point still standslater when?’

He sighed and said loudly, ‘I don’t know. Why are we even talking about this now? I’m getting on average four hours’ sleep a night at the moment—’

Ros cut in with, ‘So why the pills?’

‘What pills?

‘The sleeping pills.’

‘I’m not sleeping. Over-exhaustion. My mind won’t stop
so I just have to shut it down.’ He paused. ‘It’s because I’m terrifiedall the time at the momentof missing something.’

‘Missing something?’

‘Missing the point; something vital that will swing this for us.’

‘The point?’

‘The point.’

‘Of the case.’

‘Of the caseright.’ He paused again, ‘And I haven’t been home in over a week or something.’

‘Ten daysyou haven’t been home in ten days.’

‘That’s a long time,’ he conceded, ambiguously. ‘So now isn’t the time to talk about big stuff.’

‘There’s never a time to talk about big stuffthe big stuff’s the stuff you have to
make
the time for.’

‘But not right now, not tonight. I really am fucking knackered, Ros.’

That was the second time Martin had swornMartin never swore.

‘I just need to know that there will be a time, that’s all.’

He didn’t say anything.

‘That a third child’s on the cards…at some point.’

‘But, Rosd’you even want another one?’

‘Not right now, but maybe at some point I willI just need to know that it’s a possibility.’

‘Or what?’ he said.

‘And I was thinking,’ she carried on, ‘if a third child
is
on the cards, we’d have to think about movingat some point.’

‘Moving?’

‘Maybe out of London.’

‘Ros…’

‘Just think what we’d get if we sold thiswhat we’d get for our money in, I don’t know, Kent or something. You could commute.’

‘Commute.’ He groaned.

‘Okay, okay. But we will talk about it?’

‘Another kid, or moving?’

‘Well, they’re sort of interconnected.’

‘Look, Rosat the moment, we just need a break.’ He paused. Ros was looking at him, terrified. ‘I mean, Tobes has got into St Anthony’s so we’ve got nothing to worry about until he’s eleven. We just need to relax.’

‘But what if Toby hadn’t got into St Anthony’s?’

‘Roshe did get in, so…’

‘What if he hadn’t?’ she insisted. ‘Would you have considered moving out then?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Whatyou would have been happy for him to go to Brunton Park?’ Ros yelled in disbelief.

‘Ros, this is too…too hypothetical for me right now.’

Martin finally managed to turn away as Ros got up, slipped off her dressing gown and left it in a silky pile on the floor before getting into bed. This was something she never didshe always hung things up.

It was cold and she instinctively curled herself against Martin’s spine.

Martin flinched.

Thinking he might be in the process of falling asleephe often made jerking movements as he started to lose consciousnessshe kissed the top of his arm.

Martin flinched again.

She thought he might be asleep, but he wasn’t and as he rolled onto his back, she started to move her hand across his chestthe fingers spread out, feeling their way. She wanted to kiss him and touch him; she was entitled toand was beginning to feel almost tearful as she thought about all the things she was entitled to that never seemed to happen any more.

Then, at just the wrong moment, she flicked her eyes up the length of his chest and caught him staring, transfixed, at the ceiling, his hand curled back on his forehead. A million miles away.

She rolled quickly away from him onto her back, subconsciously adopting the same pose.

‘Listen, Ros…’

She felt herself start to blush at the sound of his voice. She always blushed before she criedshe’d been doing it ever since she was a child. ‘Martin,’ she cut him short, then hesitated. She didn’t know what to say. All she knew was that she had to stop him speaking because he was about to say something that was going to change all their lives forever and she wasn’t about to let him do thatnot now, not tonight. ‘You’re tired,’ she said, ‘tired, that’s all.’

Martin tried to speak again, but the Seniton caught up with him and a minute later there was a snapping sound not unlike a spring being released as his head fell to one side, a thin line of saliva running across his cheek.

Ros lay awake for a long time after this.

She had surprised herself with that comment about moving out of London; wasn’t aware until she’d said it that she had consciously thought of it as a solution to the whole disaster of Toby not getting into St Anthony’s. Martin
could
commute from Kent. She
could
start up Carpe Diem Life Classes in Kent. She tried to picture them all living somewhere in rural Kent…embarking on a new beginning among oast houses, apple orchards and hop fields. To start with it might be exciting, but after that…when they’d settled down? It might occur to them that they’d had their last new beginning and all that was left to them was to grow oldor apart.

If only Toby had got into St Anthony’s then none of this would be happening. If only her nose wasn’t so bigif only her breasts
were
then none of this would be happening.
She pulled herself up short. What was it exactly that she thought
was
happening? And anyway, she was an educated woman. St Anthony’s, her nose, her breasts: these were all things she was more than capable of coping with…dealing with…rectifying.

She became aware of her shoulder blades digging into the mattress they’d had since their first flat together in Finsbury; that had moved with them three times now and that needed replacing, but that she couldn’t bring herself to replace.

This mattress had absorbed as much of their life together as they had. It used to absorb a lot of laughter, but Martin didn’t laugh so much any more. He smiled, but his smiles had the effect of disconnecting rather than connecting her to him. Martin’s smiles just weren’t right and now, alone in bed with him, she was beginning to doubt whether his laughter ever had been either.

One of them had lost the willand it wasn’t her.