Home Truths Page 20

  What I want to say is, For fuck's sake, Zac. I'm thirty-five years old and maybe my sodding hormones are hounding me. Most of the people I know have children. I would like to increase our family – a brother or sister for Tom, a baby for us. What the fuck is wrong with that? Why won't you take me seriously? All you say is ‘Oh Christ You're not going all broody on me?’

  So why Don't you talk to him, Pip? You who are so adept at being a shoulder, an ear, an embrace for the needs of others; you who can listen so well, mediate so constructively when it comes to the strife in other people's lives. You've spent your life arbitrating other people's discord, sorting out the ways forward from their crises, dispensing wisdom, advice, support and affection. You can gently coax others down off their high horse, you can enable them to see clearly without their rose-tinted glasses. But you have no faith in your ability to stand your own corner and proclaim what you feel. You have self-awareness in that you know what you want; but you lack the self-confidence to express it.

  She can't concentrate on her game. She thinks the right thing to do is to hide her hurt from Tom. It's much easier to put Tom at the centre of her equation than herself.

  ‘I won!’ Tom proclaims. ‘Pip is such a complete walkover,’ he says to his dad and the two of them disappear to play PlayStation, leaving Pip on her own.

  Seeds in a Packet

  ‘You're hot and you smell of – toast?’ Ben remarked with pleasure, in bed, spooning up against Cat, nuzzling her neck.

  ‘But I haven't eaten toast,’ she said.

  Ben took her hand to his nose. ‘Toast,’ he declared. He kissed the palm of her hand and flicked his tongue tip at the centre. Then he kissed her fingertips and sucked softly on her middle finger.

  ‘I've got a sackful of seed,’ he murmured, pressing up against her. ‘I've been saving it up for the last – Christ – week.’ Cat giggled. She travelled her hand down to Ben's hard cock, experiencing a buzz of excitement between her legs which caused her to turn towards him and find his mouth immediately. His hands caressed her breasts and she began to moan softly as his finger nudged at her clitoris, dabbing her with her own expectant moistness.

  ‘What do you say, babe,’ he whispered, ‘want to mate?’ He grazed at the side of her neck, dipped his head down to tease her nipple with his tongue tip. ‘Want to mate?’

  But Cat didn't writhe in reply. She didn't gasp the affirmative. His words had stilled her and his actions ceased to elicit a response.

  And then she sighed. ‘I do feel horny,’ she whispered back, ‘but I Don't want to mate. I'd rather fornicate.’

  ‘What You're saying is that you want me to give you a good seeing to? You Don't want to make love – you want me to shag you senseless?’ Ben gave a dirty laugh, his hands resuming a dexterous exploration of her erogenous zones. He rolled on top of her, his pelvis rocking as his cock probed its way between the lips of her sex. ‘You want me to fuck you, then?’

  Yes, that was precisely what Cat wanted and when Ben talked crudely to her, she wanted it all the more. And harder.

  ‘Shall I fuck you?’ Ben asked, desirous and gruff, doing precisely that with eager, ravenous thrusts.

  ‘With strings attached,’ she whispered, gasping as he powered into her. She bucked against him instinctively.

  ‘Strings, hey?’ Ben said. ‘Tie you up? A little light S & M on a warm June evening?’

  That's not what she meant at all.

  I meant, yes fuck me – but with conditions. But I'm so close. I'm so fucking close and my body is tingling with the anticipation of orgasm. It's welling. Fuck. God. Ben. Oh Christ.

  Ben felt Cat's sex close around his cock, every pulsation pulling him deeper inside her, luring his sperm, starting to suck it from his balls up his shaft; nearing the point of no return.

  ‘Christ Cat,’ he panted as his thrusts automatically increased in pace, ‘Christ.’

  But then Cat did something with her hips. And her knees. She'd never done it before and it took Ben by surprise, weakened as he was by being in thrall to his imminent orgasm. She levered him away and all of a sudden he was coming in the open, nowhere near her dark, damp gorgeous pussy. Instead he was spurting his load God knows where. In between her and him. Instantly, the orgasm became purely perfunctory. Not even as good as a wank. Simply as physical as a wet dream. A waste. He switched the light on, blinking, pissed off. He pulled the duvet off and regarded the sticky mess in Cat's pubic hair, caught too in the fuzz of his stomach.

  ‘What was that all about?’ he asked, flushed and frustrated.

  ‘It's not safe to come inside me,’ Cat said, disconcerted that Ben looked so displeased. She felt a nag of guilt over the greed for the quality of her own orgasm at the expense of his and it was spoiling the post-coital moment.

  ‘What the fuck do you mean, Cat?’ Ben objected. ‘What are you on about? Our sex life has been ruled by your charts and temperature.’

  ‘I'm not ready,’ Cat said gruffly, ‘not any more. Not without a condom.’

  ‘Cat,’ said Ben, sitting up, reaching for tissues, mopping at his belly, ‘I thought we wanted to start a family. Our game plan. We make decisions together.’

  ‘Bloody hell, Ben,’ she protested, ‘are you thick? In the light of recent events, why would I want to be pregnant?’ He stared at her, shocked by her aggression. ‘Parenting is a dangerous thing. Can't you see that?’ she shouted. ‘Believe me. It's not worth it. I should know.’

  Ben waited a moment and spoke calmly. ‘Cat, That's not an informed view – You're very tired and too emotional.’

  ‘You cold bastard!’ Cat hissed. ‘can't you see what I'm going through?’

  ‘Of course I bloody can,’ Ben said calmly, ‘but now You're being a drama queen. Christ if ever there was a time to take the “sins of the fathers” and make something good from them, then this is it.’

  ‘Fuck off.’ She turned away from him abruptly. ‘You Don't understand.’

  That last comment hurt Ben the most. He had no desire to spoon against her or nuzzle up to see if she still smelt of toast. If only this sodding rented flat had a spare room. He switched off the light, plumped his pillow and made an irritated grab at the duvet. And when all was still, he sighed emphatically.

  ‘For fuck's sake,’ he said, as if to himself, but loudly enough for Cat to hear. He sensed she was only pretending to be asleep.

  They didn't speak when they woke up. Ben didn't wake Cat with his customary ‘Rise and shine, sleepy head’. He went to have a shower and didn't pour her a cup of coffee, leaving the cafetière and its tepid contents on the table instead. Get your own mug.

  ‘See you,’ he said, already on his way out. Cat didn't look up from the newspaper. She continued to read, continued to sip her lukewarm coffee long after Ben had gone. The newsprint was illegible because the bruise of tears impeded her sight and the coffee caught harshly on the lump in her throat. She struggled with her tears as she walked to work, biting hard on the inside of her lip during the managers' meeting. She didn't want to be on the information desk. Couldn't she unpack deliveries instead? It wasn't beneath an assistant manageress to unpack deliveries in the back, you know. But Jeremy wanted her up front and the customers did too. Cat muddled through the morning, hauling a weak smile to her face and disappearing to the toilet on her break for a private cry.

  Pip would know what to do. She'd know what I should say. She'll be able to tell me if I'm in the wrong, or a little right. She's my big sister. I'll listen to her. She's the wisest person I know. She can tell me what to do.

  In her lunch break, Cat phoned Pip. Privately, it rankled Pip to hear about loving husbands actively wanting to make babies. But she had to listen because it was her job and her youngest sister was sobbing at the end of the phone, pleading with her to tell her what to do. Over the years, She'd conditioned herself to stop what she was doing, put thoughts of herself to one side, whenever she received those calls from her sisters that said, Pip? Pip? I need you. Can you help?


  ‘I thought I was ready,’ Cat cried, ‘but I'm not. I Don't even feel broody any more. I can't figure out this whole mother–father business. I'm scared, Pip, and confused.’

  Quietly, Pip considered her sister's predicament. ‘I understand, I do,’ she soothed, because on an academic level, she did, ‘but how I see it is that you've been gravely let down by a total lack of communication within our family – and the only history about to repeat itself is precisely this.’ She paused. Why couldn't she herself boldly practise what she so gamely preached?

  This Isn't about me. It's about Cat.

  ‘Don't let that happen, Cat. No secrets. We were kept in the dark – we weren't even lied to. We were ill-informed and misled. But Cat, Don't take that with you into your life. Don't let that same lack of communication decimate what you have with Ben. It sounds clichéd, but talk to him.’ She paused again.

  That's what June told me.

  ‘Tell him how you feel. He's your man, Cat. He's your future. You can turn to him. You must.’

  ‘But He's not speaking to me,’ said Cat, now smarting about the lack of coffee that morning. ‘He's mad at me. We never row. It was horrible. I feel sick. Suddenly Ben and I want different things, Pip. We're totally incompatible.’

  ‘It's not about how compatible you are, Cat – It's about how you deal with incompatibility,’ said Pip. ‘When did you last tell him you loved him?’

  When did Zac last tell me?

  ‘I Don't honestly know,’ Cat was saying, ‘but how do I start talking? And what do you think I should say?’

  On the other end of the phone, Pip was pinching the bridge of her nose and trying to strip her mind of Zac so she could concentrate on Cat.

  ‘You have to do the right thing,’ she heard herself say. ‘You have to open up and lay yourself bare – if you can't do this in front of your husband, then you are in serious breach of the trust and honesty you promised him when you married him.’

  Which makes me a fucking hypocrite.

  ‘Shall I phone him at work?’ Cat pressed. ‘Shall I ask my manager for a break?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Pip, ‘do.’

  ‘And tell Ben how I feel – even though some of it sounds daft?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Pip, ‘you must.’

  ‘Say he disagrees? Say he objects?’

  ‘Say he doesn't?’

  ‘Say He's cross?’ said Cat.

  ‘Say he Isn't?’

  Cat paused. The notion of Ben's love being just at the end of the phone, of his support and understanding being just a phone call away, of her being just moments from the comfort of his companionship, was thrilling. Suddenly, she wanted Pip off the phone.

  ‘Thanks,’ Cat said cheerfully. ‘I'll phone him right now. Can I phone you again, though?’

  ‘You know you can,’ said Pip.

  Pip hated herself for hoping that Cat wouldn't phone her again. She didn't want to listen to how the heart-to-heart had gone and she didn't have the energy for further counselling. But Pip hated herself more for her intrinsic inability to take her own sound advice. How easy it was to see the right thing to do. Crystal bloody clear. Talk it through. Lay yourself bare. Show your soul and open your heart to the person closest to you, the person who transcends a need for blood ties to create a bond. How pathetic, she felt, to be fundamentally incapable of doing this herself.

  Behind the information desk, Cat contrived to look important and busy. She wasn't. She was utterly absorbed in the pleasure of planning the reconciliation. She hadn't asked for a break because it was premature. She had to know exactly what She'd be saying before she phoned Ben. She had to be word perfect and her words needed to be honed for ultimate poetic and meaningful impact. He'd be in afternoon surgery. She couldn't phone now, she needed the best forum and no time restraints for her soliloquy to resound. But say he was still pissed off and went to the pub instead of coming home? And say he was pissed when he then came home? She couldn't endure another cold-shouldered night. She had to let him know that she was sorry, and soon. That there was an explanation. A text message could work – something sweet and slushy. But texts were somehow too easy to send. Who hasn't used a text message to avoid having to talk to someone?

  As she hung up from telling a customer's answering machine that their books were awaiting collection, Cat thought about message services. About telegrams and messengers and couriers. She phoned Ben's hospital and asked for the Sports Medicine department and when a female voice answered, Cat put on her most friendly, conniving voice.

  ‘Hullo? Is that Marjorie?’

  ‘Yes? Sports Medicine clinic – how can I help?’

  ‘This is Cat – Ben's wife. We haven't met but he speaks highly of you.’

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘Can you help me, Marjorie? I did one of those silly things – those over-emotional daft-cow things.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Marjorie, who had been no stranger to the syndrome in her younger days.

  ‘Ben has speaker phone, doesn't he – is that how you announce his patients?’

  ‘Yes, That's right, dear.’

  ‘Before the next patient can you tell him that his wife loves him and She's sorry for being a madwoman and that she can't wait to see him later?’

  ‘I can,’ Marjorie said with slight reluctance.

  ‘Oh,’ said Cat, forlorn, ‘is it something to do with hospital policy?’

  ‘No, dear,’ said Marjorie, ‘but can I reword it? I think I should say—In fact, He's ready to see his next patient. You can listen in.’

  Cat pressed the receiver hard against her ear, giving Jeremy who was loitering an irritated ‘Shh!’ before turning her back on him.

  ‘Dr York,’ Marjorie could be heard to say, ‘before I send in Miss Drew, I have been entrusted with the following announcement.’

  Cat's heart raced. Marjorie's pitch changed, as if she was having to be heard across a football pitch. ‘Your wife wishes you to know that she loves you truly, and that she is extremely sorry for her behaviour. She would like you to know that she looks forward to your homecoming tonight – and that she would be pleased to talk through the circumstances.’

  Cat couldn't hear Ben's response, but she fully approved Marjorie's handling of the situation. ‘You're a genius, Marjorie,’ she said, and she planned to send her some books in gratitude.

  ‘Cat!’

  Cat turned to see Jeremy looking put out.

  ‘We do not, as a rule, take personal calls – let alone make them.’

  ‘I know,’ Cat beamed, ‘I'm sorry – there was a family crisis. It's all sorted now. It won't happen again.’

  The manager thought she spoke of the personal calls.

  Cat stopped beaming on her journey home. It struck her that nothing was actually solved. All She'd done, hopefully, was give Ben an inducement to come home, pacify his anger and open a door to communication. They still had to talk. And reach an understanding, an agreement.

  But he wasn't home and her confidence was instantly sapped. She started to allow herself to feel the wounded party. Why hadn't he figured out why she might now be reluctant to start a family? Why hadn't he been instinctively more supportive? Her mobile phone buzzed through a message.

  U ok? Here 4 u. P xx.

  Good old Pip, coming to the rescue. At least someone knows me inside out and understands.

  ‘He's not home yet,’ Cat phoned Pip in a whisper, in case Ben should be just about to come in. She told Pip of Marjorie. She could sense her sister's smile, her approval. ‘But suddenly I Don't know what to say when he does come home. Say He's still cross. Say he didn't like my message? Say we can't sort this out?’

  ‘If you look out your window, will you see him walk up the street?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Cat.

  ‘So, the sight of him will incite an emotional reaction in you. Act on it.’

  I speak from experience. I could hardly bear to look at Zac when he came home half an hour ago. So I invented some urgent shopping.
And I'm now advising my sister from the canned-goods aisle in Sainsbury's.

  ‘You're a genius,’ Cat told her. ‘Thank you. God, thank you, Pip.’

  ‘Call if you need me,’ Pip said, by rote. But Cat had already hung up.

  Cat has been gazing out of the first-floor window for almost half an hour. She's elaborately decided that if three red cars pass in succession, Ben will be the next pedestrian to walk down the street. But blue cars and white vans and the occasional candy-coloured scooter keep interrupting and there's no sign of Ben. What a gorgeous evening. How lovely to see a couple of children playing hopscotch on the pavement. Clapham doesn't seem so unattractive today and Boulder doesn't seem so far away. The world seems smaller, more friendly, more manageable. Listen! That evocative jingle – an ice-cream van! When had she last had a gloriously synthetic whippy with a Flake? She can't remember. But she heads out of the flat and down to the street. She's second in the queue. She's first. She's being served.

  ‘A medium 99, please,’ she says.

  And Cat sees Ben.

  He's turned the corner.

  He's only a hundred yards away.

  ‘Two!’ Cat says. ‘Make that two!’

  Can Ben see me? Has he seen me yet? He has.

  But is he smiling?

  He is.

  Cat walks fast towards Ben who is strolling along the street with his shirtsleeves rolled up, his jacket slung over his shoulder. All her words have gone, her memory stripped of the soliloquies She's spent the day perfecting. All she can do, within yards of Ben, is brandish the ice cream She's bought for him.

  ‘Look!’ she declares holding out the ice cream. Ben thinks she looks like the Statue of Liberty in jeans and a T-shirt. ‘I didn't even take a bite of your Flake.’

  ‘Well,’ says Ben, ‘if That's not a sign of your true love, then what is?’