Sylvia Garland's Broken Heart (7 page)

Apparently only Sylvia could see clearly, by the end of that first visit, what was wrong; Jeremy had been caught up in Smita’s chariot wheels, as she put it to Roger after the young couple had left. They said goodbye at the airport, Jeremy all stiff and awkward as usual and Smita utterly charming but chilly. That was it, Sylvia complained to Roger; the girl was cold. She had set her sights on Jeremy for reasons of her own – maybe she liked the glamour of his career in broadcasting – and poor Jeremy was helpless, like a rabbit caught in the headlights.

Roger replied thoughtfully, “It’s unlike you to be so uncharitable, Syl. I must say, I found her a lovely young woman. A bit reserved maybe, yes, but I suppose she was on her best behaviour, wasn’t she?”

Sylvia tried hard to see things from Roger’s point of view. It would make the whole situation so much better if Roger were right. But, in her woman’s heart, Sylvia knew what was what and, besides, it went against Roger’s nature to think badly of any pretty young woman.

When Jeremy and Smita announced their engagement, about six months later, Sylvia sent an enormous bouquet, hoping to make up with an excess of flowers for her shortage of happy feelings. It was arranged
that she and Roger would have dinner with Smita’s parents when they were next home on leave.

Sylvia preferred to gloss over that acutely awful evening in a showy restaurant in St John’s Wood. Smita’s mother, Naisha, an optician – as she managed to mention in most sentences – talked nineteen to the dozen. Her father, Prem, barely spoke. Jeremy and Smita both looked exquisitely embarrassed throughout and Roger, in his hale and hearty way, was so determined that everyone should get on and have a jolly evening that he had far too much to drink and ended up making a number of distinctly risqué jokes. Oh, it had been dreadful and afterwards Sylvia had felt terrible for Jeremy who was walking so innocently into the clutches of those two predatory women, Smita and Naisha, who would both perch on him and peck him to bits. She had never really had the closeness with her son which would have permitted her to say something. If she attempted to say anything, it would certainly be a disaster and it was a pity that knowing that hadn’t stopped her from doing it.

It was only three weeks before the wedding, she had left it far too late and when she caught Jeremy on his own one evening – Smita was at her book group – she should have stuck to discussing the wedding arrangements and not suddenly burst out, clutching her G and T for dear life, “Oh Jem, are you absolutely sure about this?”

Jeremy looked appalled. His mother hadn’t called him “Jem” since he was about ten years old. “What on earth are you talking about?” he snapped, as usual reddening immediately.

Sylvia couldn’t contain herself any more. “You and Smita,” she asked desperately. “Are you really absolutely sure you’re right for one another?”

Jeremy laughed. It was a harsh sarcastic laugh. “You’re unbelievable,” he replied, shaking his head. “How long have Smi and I been together? Two years? And the wedding’s been planned for the last six months? And you’re asking me now, with just three weeks to go, whether I’m sure we’re right for one another? For Christ’s sake!”

He walked out of the room with Sylvia calling beseechingly after him, “I wasn’t implying anything. It’s just, it’s a big step you’re taking and, you know, your backgrounds are very different.”

Jeremy reappeared in the doorway. Icily, he said, “
You
may have misgivings about Smi and her ‘different’ background but I don’t.” He paused menacingly. “And I don’t want to hear anything more about it ever again.”

The wedding passed off as well as could be expected. There were two weddings actually: first the registry office and then a ceremony in a Hindu temple in Leicester which Prem and Naisha had apparently insisted on. Sylvia was entranced by the ceremony: all the chanting of prayers and the fire and the smearing of auspicious dabs of colour on the young couple’s foreheads. It took her back years to the myriad sensations of Delhi and she thought rather badly of Smita for looking so obviously bored and sulky throughout. Jeremy looked frankly ridiculous, with his groom’s garland and his loose coloured shirt. But Roger said good for him for agreeing to go along with it and putting on such a brave face. Even when he was decades
younger, there was no way that Roger would ever have agreed to sit cross-legged on the floor like that, draped in flowers, and let himself be daubed with coloured splodges. Sylvia snorted with laughter at the very idea of it.

The reception was held in a lavish country house hotel some way outside Leicester. For all her misgivings about the marriage and about her son being pecked to bits, Sylvia had to admit that it was a beautiful setting. Smita looked lovely and Jeremy, apart from grinning foolishly far too much, looked very dashing too. The large number of ill-assorted guests mingled good-humouredly and the sun shone. When Jeremy and Smita were driven away in a dark grey pre-war Bentley, Sylvia felt a predictable pang. She cheered herself with another glass of champagne and the hope that things might not turn out as badly as she anticipated after all.

Three years had gone by since then and Roger, poor dear Roger, had been starting to wonder aloud about grandchildren. Sylvia had reminded him hypocritically that young women nowadays had careers as well as children and it was only natural that Smita, having done so well, should want to make the most of it before having to deal with babies and nappies. Sylvia felt rather virtuous for appearing to speak in Smita’s defence when in actual fact – although nothing terrible had happened in these last three years – everything had reinforced her conviction that Smita was a cold calculating person. For all Sylvia knew, Smita didn’t even want children. Well, she had been proved wrong about that.

But look at the way Smita had welcomed her yesterday,
not even bothering to come down to open the door to their absurd loft-style apartment. Smita had a pernicious influence on Jeremy too. The poor silly boy was so easily led. It was certainly Smita’s idea, not Jeremy’s, that Sylvia should stay for a mere two or three nights in the comfort of the hotel before being packed off to a service apartment to save money. Once there, conveniently stowed away, they would manage her life as they saw fit. She was a nuisance obviously and they had decided to deal with the nuisance as best suited them.

Sylvia’s dimly glimpsed resolve of the morning swam into view, now large and solid and unavoidable as an iceberg. Jeremy and Smita would no doubt kick up a fuss, they would reproach her for playing havoc with their tidily laid plans. But she was not going to live in their pocket. It was silly to run back to the airport, she acknowledged that now. She would have to live in London; she really had nowhere else to go. But she was not going to live round the corner from Jeremy and Smita, no thank you.

She would go back to a part of London which she knew, somewhere she had once belonged and she would make the best of things there on her own terms. Not Chelsea; that would be far too painful and besides those little postage stamp houses were exorbitantly expensive nowadays. But it would have to be an area she was familiar with and one which was a long ride away from Belsize Park. She felt sad at the thought of being a long ride away from her grandson. But maybe he would be allowed to stay for longer with her on each visit if it took some time to get there. In her mind, she revisited the haunts of her
youth as drowsiness slowly began to get the better of her. She remembered all the places where she had been young and happy and, just before sleep blotted out her thoughts, she set her sights on Kensington.

Smita was horrified to discover, one morning towards the middle of May, that she could not do up the waistband of her favourite black trousers. She could pull and strain but the two sides wouldn’t meet, however hard she tried. For a few moments, she felt something close to panic. Of course she knew, in the abstract, that when you were pregnant your tummy swelled up. Now it was actually happening to her, she felt suddenly desperate, trapped almost. It was as if she was losing control of herself, of her body; she, who had always prided herself on her supreme self-control. Now her body was doing something she didn’t like, didn’t approve of and there was absolutely nothing she could do about it. Angrily, she forced the zip closed and left the two buttons undone, to be concealed under a long top. It was uncomfortable but it worked. She was nearly halfway to the Tube before it occurred to her that cramming her expanding belly into tight trousers might harm the baby and, terrified, she had to rush back home to change. Thank God, Jeremy had already left for an early meeting so she didn’t have to explain her sudden return to him. He would have been really angry with her and accused her of putting vanity before their child’s welfare.

Smita felt annoyed, not for the first time, that Jeremy
seemed to be adjusting to prospective parenthood so much more quickly and easily than she was. It was all very well for him, she thought rancorously, as she changed into a loose grey tunic dress with a sober black top underneath; he had so much less to lose.

She had noticed the reactions at work when she broke the news of her pregnancy – and they hadn’t all been congratulatory by any means. There had been some quickly concealed irritation from her boss at the inconvenience but also perceptible glee from certain of her colleagues as if, with her announcement, Smita the front runner had voluntarily sidelined herself. Of course Smita intended to return to work at the first possible opportunity. There was no way she would ever be a stay-at-home mother. But still she realised that, from now on, her single-minded dedication to the Gravington Babcock consultancy would be forever in doubt.

So losing her figure was the last straw really. The thought of buying maternity clothes filled her with gloom. She had imagined that she would manage somehow by leaving her jackets unbuttoned and wearing things that were stretchy and loose. But she understood now how ridiculously unrealistic that was. She was only sixteen weeks and already her trousers wouldn’t do up. There were still five months of this humiliating experience to go and it was obvious that by October, even if she starved herself, she would be as big as a bus. She stood sullenly on the crowded Tube, feeling sorry for herself and resentful. At least she didn’t show yet; if some slightly younger and much slimmer girl stood up to offer Smita her seat, she would simply die.

By the time she got to her desk, she was in such a black mood she could barely concentrate. Of course, in all the to-do over changing clothes, she had not had time to get any breakfast and now she felt guilty about that too. She was too disciplined normally to succumb to the ten thirty round of muffins and croissants but today when one of the secretaries called, “I’m going over to Starby’s. Does anyone fancy anything?” Smita answered “Me please” and of course the stupid girl seized on it and joked loudly, “Ooh, eating for two, are we?”

Smita replied stonily, “A skinny decaf latte and a low-fat muffin please.” She was pleased to see the girl looking embarrassed as she collected Smita’s money.

Smita ate the muffin and drank the coffee without enjoyment. How was it that so much seemed to be slipping out of her control suddenly? Over the past few months, there was an endless succession of things which hadn’t gone the way she wanted.

It had all started of course with Roger’s sudden death and then her mother-in-law’s return to the UK. The timing had been simply gruesome. Smita had already suspected she might be pregnant for about ten days. But the awful shock of Roger’s completely unexpected death – while inspecting a building site in terrible heat – and then the gathering of the family for the funeral had made Smita put off a pregnancy test. She didn’t want her proud announcement to be overshadowed by everyone else’s sadness. She felt a secret last minute reluctance too. She had gone ahead with “trying for a baby” because it was what one did after a couple of years of marriage and
everyone else – Jeremy, her parents – seemed so keen. But privately she was hoping it would take much longer than this to happen. So in a way it was good to have an excuse to put off finding out.

But, the morning after the funeral, she could bear to wait no longer and she used the testing kit which had been lying ready in a drawer. It came up positive so quickly that she had no time to get nervous. She stared at the two inky blue lines in the little window and felt horrified. What had she
done
? She hadn’t even made up her mind yet if she wanted children.

Hurriedly, she went to find Jeremy, knowing that his excitement and enthusiasm would be contagious. He was sitting at his desk, looking down at a great confusion of papers. “It’s amazing,” he said, without looking up, “how much there is to do when someone dies.”

Smita said, “Turn around and look at me and, please, for a moment, don’t think about your father.”

Jeremy spun his chair round and looked at Smita in disbelief. “Hang on a minute Smi, we only buried him yesterday. What’s that you’re holding?”

Smita clasped her hands, one of which was still holding the pregnancy test wand, behind her back. “Concentrate,” she instructed him. “Promise me you’re not thinking about your father or the funeral or the cemetery or anything sad.”