The Lost Child (11 page)

As Derek escorted her to the top of the stairs and began to usher her back in the direction of their table, she noticed that Victor’s hand was resting on Pamela’s leg in the space between the hem of her skirt and her knee. Her friend appeared to be either unaware of this act of trespass or comfortable with his hand, but either way Monica found it unnerving. There was also a second drink standing beside the still-untouched round that Derek had brought from the bar. She took up her seat and spoke to nobody in particular.

“You’ll have to excuse me, but I don’t know if I can drink that much.”

Victor immediately made a grab for one of his pints and raised it in a toast.

“Of course you can. Drink up, Monica. To us.”

She lifted up her glass, but as she did, she noticed how Victor was looking at her, and she now had a good idea of what he thought of the two women that he and his pal were drinking with, but it was too late to say anything to Pamela.

Monica couldn’t really remember what happened next, for everything began to go fuzzy and she felt a headache setting in. Victor insisted that Derek go to the bar for yet more drinks, although she remembered Derek’s suggesting that they finish what they had in front of them first, but Victor teased him and called him tight, and so Derek reluctantly stood up from the table. Once he’d gone she had nobody to talk with, for Pamela had scrunched herself into Victor so completely that her skirt was riding up near the top of her nylons and Monica wanted to throw a blanket or something over her. When Derek came back, he pretended not to notice her friend’s performance, but the awkwardness didn’t last, for Pamela soon came up for air and started talking thirteen to the dozen. Then Victor sent Derek back to the bar for another round, and then another. At some point all four of them were on the dance floor, that much she was sure of, and they were dancing as individuals, not as couples, but Derek never took his eyes off her, which made her feel anchored and grateful. At some point, Monica remembered, the room started to spin, and Derek offered his arm, which she took, but the stairs back to the balcony were definitely steeper than earlier in the evening, and it seemed like there were more of them. Derek sat her down at the table while he went to the bar for a glass of water, and it was only now that she picked up on the fact that the place was starting to empty out, and for the first time all evening she felt truly unsure of what she was doing.

It was Victor who suggested that they go for a drive in his Ford Cortina and look at the moonlight on the river. Pamela jumped in the front passenger seat while Monica slid into the back next to Derek, who kept both hands on his knees and gazed out of the window. She was adamant that she didn’t want to do this, but nobody would listen to her when she muttered that she ought to be getting back. Before the car engine even started, Victor grabbed hold of Pamela and they began to engage in a bout of quick, open-lipped palaver that was only interrupted by Derek’s half-pleading, half-laughing “Hey, come on.” Pamela collapsed in a fit of giggles, and Monica closed her eyes and listened to the laboured cranking of the car engine as Victor tried to start it up. When they got to the river, Victor peeled Pamela from around his neck (“Chuffing heck, pack it in for a minute will you, Pam?”), and the two men excused themselves and began to stumble towards the water. In his haste Victor had left the driver’s door wide open, so Pamela reached over and pulled it shut and then hoisted herself around so that she was facing the back seat.

“They’re alright these two, aren’t they? And they’ve got brass.” Monica shifted her head so that she was now looking in the direction of the two men, who stood on the bank of the river clearly competing to see which one of them could pee the farthest. Pamela began to shriek. “I mean look at them, pair of daft clots. What are they like?”

This was a question that a confused Monica was beginning to ask herself, for in her presence Derek seemed reserved and almost timid, but with Victor he appeared to willingly take on the role of comic sidekick as though the pair of them were some out-of-date music hall act. As far as Monica was concerned, Victor just didn’t come up to scratch. She opened the back door and stepped out of the car, and careful to make sure that she wasn’t facing the river, she began to gulp the warm night air. She looked up at the stars in the black sky, and then she asked Pamela if she could see the clouds moving. Monica began to turn in a circle, and again she asked Pamela the same question, and then she asked it again, but Pamela wouldn’t answer, and then she felt Derek drape his arm around her neck like a warm scarf, and then he moved it down across her moist, sweaty back and lifted her into the rear seat of the Cortina. She heard him tell his friend that they’d best be going as it was getting late.

Victor searched through the cupboards in her kitchen, noisily pushing cups and saucers to one side until he found four ill-matched glasses, which he placed on the small table.

“You don’t mind, do you, Monica?” Pamela was smiling at her. “I told Victor about the brandy, for I’m not sure what I’ve got at my place.”

Victor paused before pouring, as though he had suddenly remembered something. Then he reached over to the stove and hauled himself up and onto his feet.

“What happens at the end of the picture before you go out?” Victor didn’t wait for an answer. “National anthem. Let’s have a good rousing singsong to show some respect.”

Victor began singing, but Derek lunged across the table and pulled him back down and into his seat.

“The children, Victor. We’ll have to keep it down, alright?”

An annoyed Victor smiled sarcastically and began to pour, but Monica took this as her cue to stand up.

“I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go and make sure they’re still asleep.”

Derek also stood up. “Shall I come too?”

“No, please. I won’t be a minute.”

Pamela giggled. “Our Lucy can sleep through a thunderstorm and not twitch a muscle, isn’t that right, Monica?”

Monica stopped and, looking at her friend, noticed that she could now see the black roots of Pamela’s “Autumn Sunset” hair beginning to emerge like blighted crops.

She quietly cracked the door and peeped through the darkness at the two boys, whose breathing was shallow but regular. Some days it felt as though the two kids were drawing the stamina right out of her body, for she was forever chasing them, or picking up after them, or placating one or the other, or simply begging them, but for better or for worse they were all she had, and not a single day passed when she didn’t remind one or the other of them that they had a responsibility to look out for each other. Ben’s arms were splayed above his head as though he was waving to a friend with both hands, while Tommy was curled into a tight ball with one half of his face entirely buried in the pillow. Between them, on the makeshift bed on the floor, Lucy slept on her back with her thin lips parted so a discordant nasal whistle sang out with every breath. Jesus Christ, what was Pamela thinking of? When they pulled up at Arnhem Croft, her friend didn’t say a word, and she just led the way until they all were standing on the walkway outside of Monica’s flat.

“Well,” said Victor, “are we stopping out here all night waiting for the tooth fairy?”

For some reason Pamela found this side-splittingly funny, and because she began to roar loud enough to wake all of the neighbours, Monica decided that she had no choice but to quickly find her keys and open up the door, feeling, not for the first time, that Pamela had let her down.

When she walked back into the kitchen, only Derek was there. He was sitting at the table and quietly drumming his fingers against the side of the half-empty bottle.

“Where did those two go?”

Derek half stood as she took up a seat, which struck her as an oddly polite way of going about things. However, she had to admit that she quite liked it.

“They went to your friend’s flat to see if she can find anything else to drink. Victor’s not much of a brandy drinker.”

She eyed the bottle and arched her eyebrows. “Really? You could have fooled me.”

She wanted to ask him why he went along with playing second fiddle to his obviously more idiotic friend, but this wasn’t the time.

“What about you?” he asked. “Are you partial?”

What kind of an antiquated phrase was that? It was like this Derek Evans was talking to somebody twenty years older. She guessed that he probably spent a lot of time with his father, or grandfather, down the allotments or going to dog races, or engaged in some other manly pursuit where the vocabulary of one generation could be casually absorbed by the next without any regard for its relevance to the present time.

“I’m not much of a drinker as I don’t get out that often.”

“I see.” He pushed the bottle away from them a little; then he looked at her and smiled. “I meant to say, back there at the Mecca, that I thought your dress was smashing. But seeing it now, in the light, so to speak, it’s even better.”

“I bought it when I went to university. Or more accurately, my mother bought it for me, but I felt a bit out of place in it tonight.”

“No, you weren’t.” He stopped suddenly, as though aware that his response might be interpreted as being overenthusiastic. “You looked grand, but I didn’t know that you went to university. It’s just that you don’t meet many lasses, or lads for that matter, who’ve been to university. Well, at least I don’t, although we’re beginning to get some applications now from students who want to begin on a regional newspaper and then work their way down to London.”

“Is that what you’re hoping to do? Work your way down to London?”

He laughed nervously, but Monica could see she had put him in a bit of a bind, for his eyes made it clear that he was trying to work out what it was that she wanted to hear. Either he wanted to go to London, and he therefore viewed the north as inferior, a kind of stepping-stone, or he was happy to stay put, which might give her the idea that he was a bloke without any kind of ambition. She regretted putting him in this predicament, and wished that she could take back the question.

“London’s a big place, isn’t it? I’ve been, but just the once to visit the Imperial War Museum. I used to be into history, particularly anything about the last war, but I’ve not got much time these days. But it was a great day out, riding on those red buses, and I even got on the tube a couple of times.” He paused and lowered his voice. “Listen, I know it’s none of my business, but I was just curious if there’s a dad in the frame. For the boys.”

Now it was her turn to laugh. “Well, if there is, I think you’d best be making your exit before he gets back.” She paused and watched his alarmed face. “I’m only joking. Would you laugh if I told you that I’ve hardly ever been out with anybody? I once wore this dress on a date with a chap at university. He took me to see a film called
Giant
, a western, and all I remember thinking was, Is this picture ever going to end because I’m ravenous? And when it did end, he never asked me out again.”

“Is that so?”

Now that she was able to get a good look at Derek she could see that he really wasn’t anything exceptional. Average height, sandy-coloured hair that was prematurely thinning, and a nice face, if a bit podgy; however, his charm was his best feature.

“Well,
I’d
have asked you out again, that’s for sure. I think I told you, I’m a bit of a nature buff. I’m fond of rambling.”

Monica smiled to herself. She had nothing against nature, but it wasn’t really her thing. In fact, she didn’t even like plants in the flat, for they grew so slowly you could never tell what they were up to.

“I’d like to kiss you, but I’m not one to force myself upon people. But would I be right in thinking that there’d be nothing wrong with a kiss?”

Monica reached over and took a tiny sip from her hitherto untouched glass of brandy, and then she put it down and braced herself, for she knew that she wasn’t going to be able to stop it from happening. She wished that this man could have found the courage to kiss her on the dance floor in the darkness while he’d had his hands on her waist, and while nobody could have possibly seen them, but he had been too busy playing the gentleman. Now he was getting her involved in the process, which she instinctively knew was the wrong way to go about these things. He reached over and placed a slightly clammy hand to the side of her face.

“I’ll stop whenever you say.”

“No, Derek, they’ll be back.”

His collar and tie were now unfastened, and as he listed towards her, she could smell the alcohol on his breath.

“I’m pretty sure they’ll not be coming back, Monica. Not if I know Victor.”

She suddenly remembered how messy and noisy kissing could be. It was nothing like in the films, and as she felt her mouth drawing tight in anticipation, she closed her eyes and promised herself that she wouldn’t resist.

Monica lay back on the bed and looked up as the man reached clumsily for a cigarette and lit one. She watched the tiny orange circle glow into life as he took a deep pull. “I hope you don’t mind,” he said. She touched his cheek with a finger as though making sure that he was for real; then she noticed his surprisingly weak chin. She tried not to think of the chaotic trail of clothes that she imagined lay on the floor between the kitchen and her cupboardlike bedroom, but she realized that at this very moment she should be factoring in the consequences of one of the children’s waking up and walking in on her.

Derek was concentrating hard, and then he blew a perfectly formed smoke ring, which gave him another reason to be pleased with himself.

“Do you have anybody special, Derek? I should have asked.”

He carefully laid the cigarette down on the pack in such a way that the lit end was hanging over the edge of the box and would burn itself out at the filter. Then he rolled over next to her and pulled her close.

“I do now.”

He moved in and kissed her quickly on the mouth.

“I’m not like Victor, with birds everywhere. As I said, I’d be keen to see you again.”

“Go steady, you mean?”

“Well, one step at a time, but something like that. My situation’s a bit complicated as I’ve got a wife, and so has Victor, but unlike him, I’m kind of separated.”