The Reading Group Part 17

'If I was ten years younger...'

'Fifteen, don't you mean?'

'All right, do you have to rub it in?'

Harriet and Nicole were in the temporary end-of-term high. Nine weeks lay ahead of not having to be up at six thirty barking orders like a drill sergeant and packing enough kit in book, boot, and ballet bags to keep a small third-world nation fed and clothed. That morning they'd 'done' Speech Day, floated in their pastel linens to a mothers' lunch (pretty liquid, for Harriet, who winked conspiratorially at Nicole each time she had turned down a gla.s.s of white wine) in the garden of the local pub, pottered around the town all afternoon getting giggly in the swimwear changing rooms while their offspring were cared for at various end-of-term bouncy-castle and Laser-quest parties. Now they had offloaded the lot of them on to Cecile, driven here and thrown themselves down on Susan's capacious sofa to make weakly lascivious remarks about Ed, who had left as soon as he politely could. Although he secretly thought Nicole was a bit of a dish too, or at least he would, had the words 'bit of a dish' been in his vocabulary. 'Hot', maybe. For an older woman, anyway.

Harriet looked at her friend. Why, when they had spent the day in exactly the same way bar three of four gla.s.ses of Chablis did Nicole still look uncreased, matt and fresh, like the girl in the Flake advert? She knew from a pa.s.sing glance in Susan's hall mirror that she herself looked as if she'd just come out of the spin cycle on an industrial was.h.i.+ng machine; hot, wrinkled and damp. Her linen was turned up at the corners like day-old sandwiches, and she had a five o'clock shadow on her calves. She smacked her forehead gently. Next time get an ugly friend. Ugly friend.

Susan remembered the end of term with a mix of nostalgia and envy. University wasn't the same. You didn't see them all term, and then they showed up with a car full of laundry, rickets and an unstoppable urge to go Interrailing the next day. Long summer days of playing on the lawn, picnic teas and orange-juice lollies seemed a long time ago.

They were pretty merry, these two, so she didn't have tremendously high hopes for the evening, as far as Margaret Forster was concerned. But they were great fun when they were like this a perfect double-act, Harriet the self-deprecating clown, Nicole the elegant straight man. Their friends.h.i.+p reminded her of hers and Polly's ten years ago, when kids were younger. They had a lot more money, maybe, but also, in a funny way, a lot more stress. Life had changed, and not necessarily for the better. Harriet and Nicole might have the big cars and the clothes, and not have to work, but their husbands were never home for bath time, like Roger had been, and that lifestyle, it seemed to her, was risky. The gaps between couples could get too wide maybe school-gate friends spent all that time together, that's what it was in some ways you were closer to your girlfriends, the good ones, than you were to your husband. But she was glad they were here, even if the book didn't get the attention it deserved. It was nice to have some laughter and chat in the house it had been too quiet since Alice had left. Where was Polly, anyway?

'I thought she loved coming. Is something wrong?'

'Is it because of Elliot? We need her, I think. It's just the four of us without her. Is that big enough? Or are we a reading clubette now?' Harriet's first thoughts were for the group. Nicole was more interested in Clare.

Polly had intended to tell them. It was obvious they would want to know why Clare had abandoned them, and she didn't have a problem with them knowing the truth. It was just that now, sitting here, she wasn't sure how to begin. Perhaps she should have let Susan do it. Susan had poured her some wine, and now she took a huge gulp of it. She looked down at the rope sole of her espadrilles, watched a blade of gra.s.s that was hanging on one shake as she lifted her leg to cross it, then fall on to the carpet.

'She's not coming because she's found out something that makes her want to stay away.'

Harriet coloured, and Nicole looked at her gla.s.s of sparkling water. Was it her? Had she guessed something about the pregnancy? How could she have done? She hadn't seen her since last month's meeting, and she definitely hadn't been showing at all then. Harriet was the only person who knew, and she wouldn't have told a soul, Nicole was certain of that.

Polly went on, 'She found out that the father of Cressida's baby is... her husband. Elliot.'

This was hard to take in. No one spoke: they must be trying to join the invisible dots that made it possible for Polly's daughter to be carrying Clare's husband's baby. It was like a television plot. Polly tried to answer the questions before they were asked: 'Evidently they met at college, where he works. Last autumn some time. And apparently, got... together' she didn't know how else to say it 'soon afterwards. I gather Clare had left him before she found out about Cressida and the baby. I think things had been going badly wrong for a while. Not that I'm making excuses for Cressida she knew he was married.' She paused. 'And now Clare knows about the baby... and that's why she won't be coming any more, I suppose. I think I understand why, don't you?'

'Um, yes, I suppose it would be difficult.' Harriet looked shocked.

'I thought Cressida's boyfriend Joe, wasn't it I thought he was the father.'

'I thought so too.' Polly smiled wryly. 'Turns out, they hadn't even slept together. She broke it all off with him because of the baby.'

'Poor Clare,' Nicole murmured. Gavin had his peccadilloes, but a baby? That was the one thing she had over all those other women, and she prized it highly: she was the mother of Gavin's children. Clare was never going to have that; and to find out Elliot had got someone else pregnant she must have been devastated. She could cry for her. Nicole had only met Elliot once, at Clare's house for the reading group, back in March. He'd come in, shy, waved at them. Handsome, in a small way. Everything about him had been almost apologetic. He certainly didn't look the type. Not like Gavin.

'Poor Cressida.' Harriet thought she saw at once how it must have been. Her imagination was always ready to flesh out the facts with a story cobbled together from a thousand made-for-television movies, bonkbuster novels and a romantic's heart. You weren't responsible for whom you fell in love with. It wasn't Cressida who had cheated, it was Elliot. A man with a broken heart what girl wouldn't have?'

'What's she going to do?'

'Clare or Cressida?'

'Both of them, really, I suppose.'

Susan interjected: 'Clare's with her parents for now. I think it really is over between her and Elliot. I don't know what she'll do eventually make a clean break, maybe. Who knows? It can't be easy living so close by.'

'And Cressida? Are she and Elliot...?'

'I don't know. I think she needs to have the baby first.'

'But Elliot? He wants the baby?'

'Oh, more than life itself, I think. I get the impression he's been just as gutted as Clare about them not being able to have a kid.'

'So you think he and Cressida might end up together?'

'I really don't know.'

'Are you okay about it?'

Polly almost laughed. My twenty-year-old daughter has been having an affair with a married man, and now she's pregnant, and she wants to give up college, and maybe the future she had planned as well, and have the baby, and this man, who I truly believe cannot make her happy, wants to be with her for ever. No, I am not okay about it. She shrugged. 'It's not what you dream of when you look into your daughter's cot when she's six weeks old, and it's going to be pretty hard for her and me, whatever happens. But it is what it is. She's an adult. I don't get to make the decisions any more.' She smiled sadly. 'I just get to deal with the fallout of the decisions she makes.'

Nicole nodded. She knew about relinquished control and about floating around on someone else's tide. 'We'll be fine. I'm sure we'll be fine.'

The others murmured affirmation. What else could they do?

The book didn't get a fair go. Harriet and Nicole hadn't been in the mood anyway. Now they were too interested in what was going on in real life. They tried, but none of them really wanted to champion it. Polly had read, and loved Georgy Girl, but the author was new to the rest of them. This one, she thought, was disappointing. She could see the craft in it, the skill, but it had left her feeling, So what? She wasn't moved. She didn't feel enlightened or connected. She thought maybe she hadn't concentrated properly. It was quite dense. It hadn't been easy, these last weeks: getting into bed at night when Jack wasn't there no longer meant a good long read. It meant listening, and wondering, and worrying, and thinking. The others weren't crazy about it either. Harriet harrumphed. 'Now this one, it was written by a woman, but in a Pepsi Challenge situation I would have guessed it was a man. It's holding something back.'

On this occasion Nicole was with her. 'I kept waiting for the real emotion. It never came.'

'I kept waiting for the big mystery. That never came either. 'It all fell a bit flat at the end, I thought.'

'Me too. Brilliant idea, absolutely cracking. A box full of secret things, each with its own story, a flag on the landscape of her mother's past, left by a dead mother, presented to a twenty-one-year-old daughter, with the time and inclination to find out what they all meant. Trouble was, they were kind of odd, and when she did discover the reasons for the things being in there which, incidentally, she did in a series of implausible coincidences you didn't feel satisfied, did you?'

'I know it's been my hobby-horse lately, but I did think didn't the rest of you? it had interesting things to say about mothers and daughters. About mothers before they were mothers, and how a daughter can discover that as she grows up,' Susan said.

'And I liked Catherine from the beginning, when she says she can't accept the idea of her mother being perfectly happy, even though that's what is always trotted out to her.'

'I thought she was a spoilt brat, to be honest. I wasn't much interested in what she discovered.'

'None of us lost a mother young, though, did we?' Susan persisted. 'You would have questions, wouldn't you, curiosities, particularly if everyone kept giving you a sanitised version of her?'

'I suppose. It is true, isn't it, that when you grow up and have your own kids you see your parents in a different light? You imagine them in the same situations you find yourself in. And you start to see your mother in yourself.'

'Well, that's true. I remember my mum shouting at us and thinking I would never shout at my kids like that.' Harriet laughed.

'Yeah! And promising I'd never say ridiculous things like "Do you want a smack?" Now? I probably say it to Martha about once a day.' Nicole thought about it, and smiled. 'I never do it, though. One look at that little blonde head, and my hand freezes in mid-air. That's why she's such a monster, I suppose. She knows I don't ever mean it. My mum did. Top of the thigh, bare hand. It really stung.'

'How are you doing?' Susan had just waved the others off. Polly was still in the kitchen.

'I was wis.h.i.+ng I still smoked. I could do with a f.a.g.'

'We could walk down to the off-licence and get some?'

'Nah. Not a good idea. Emphysema, on top of everything else?'

'No. It wouldn't help, either.'

'Thank you, Mrs GP, I know that.' She smiled at her friend. 'Well, that went okay, don't you think?'

'What did you think might happen?'

'I thought they might be more...'

'Judgemental?' Susan shook her head. 'Nicole and Harriet were just a bit shocked. You've got to admit it's a good story if you're just hearing it, that is, not living it.' Polly nodded. 'I wouldn't expect them to sit in judgement, either. They're from a different generation from us, aren't they?'

'You make us sound like village elders. There's only about ten years in it.'

'Ten significant years. I don't think they see the world in the same way. I don't think they view marriage as we did, for a start.'

'Suze, I'm divorced.'

'I know that, but you didn't think you would be, did you? You married for life. We all did. These days, I think they get married for now, hoping for the best, probably, and believing the worst half the time. I think they give it a go, basically, and you can't blame them. If they ever turn on the radio or the television they get told the odds are that their marriage will fail. One in three, or is it even higher now?'

'Okay, so they're not surprised Clare and Elliot have split up. That doesn't mean they wouldn't have a view on Cressida having an affair with him before they did. Or about being stupid enough to get pregnant. G.o.d knows, I want to shake her sometimes when I think about that. It's not like she didn't know how not to, is it?'

'Accidents happen, Poll. Come on. That bit's over, so what's the point in rehas.h.i.+ng it? She wasn't careful. Or something went wrong. There it is. Weren't you just telling them you knew you had to live with it? I don't think those two see it that way. You're looking for things that aren't there.'

'What about you, Suze? As a representative of the "older generation"? Don't you judge her?'

Susan didn't answer straight away. Then, 'I've known Cressida for most of her life for fifteen years, anyway. I know what kind of a girl she was, and I think I've got a pretty good idea of what kind of a woman she has become. No, I don't judge her. I wish it hadn't happened to her I think it will make a time that should be carefree and happy, complicated and difficult. I think it might be disastrous for her to be with Elliot. But, no, I don't judge her. Or you. Or even him.' She looked straight at Polly. 'I promise you that. You're my best friend, Poll, and she's your baby, and I want to help both of you, any way I can. I promise,' she repeated. She put her hand on her heart to emphasise her sincerity.

'Thank you.'

'You're welcome.'

Harriet Harriet lay on the sofa, one eye on the Danielle Steel made-for-TV movie, and one on Josh and Chloe rampaging around the garden. She'd shut them out there half an hour ago. It was only two thirty, only the second week of the summer holidays, but already she was exhausted. She felt that way all the time, to be honest. Pathetic, but true. She'd begun the holidays with good intentions booked the children on to different courses (Josh for cycling proficiency, Chloe for pony riding), invited half their respective cla.s.ses for endless play dates, and been to the Early Learning Centre to stock up on paints, craft paper and the dreaded PVA glue that children could spread in to the strangest places if you turned your back. They'd been to the library, to the park, to the lido, to McDonald's. Six weeks to go. They'd be away for one in Portugal only one: she'd told Tim the kids needed more stimulation than the villa could provide, that they were excited about their courses and their play dates.

That wasn't true, of course. They'd stay at Tim's parents' house under that yellow sun, digging in the sand, eating ice-cream and turning prunish in the cobalt pool all year round if they could. It was she who couldn't face it. As it was, a week meant seven evenings alone with Tim, after her human s.h.i.+elds had been tucked, catatonic with healthy tiredness, into their beds. Alone with no television to pretend she was engrossed in, no housework to claim had rendered her exhausted. Alone with Tim. In the Danielle Steel movie the beauty-pageant-pretty heroine had been widowed, crying perfect round tears which didn't leave her face looking as if she had an allergic reaction into a grave, willowy in black chiffon. The next lover was the guy standing across from the grave fixing her with loving, yet l.u.s.tful blue eyes. Life was awfully convenient for Danielle Steel heroines. Marry the wrong guy? Don't sweat he'll be dead in a few minutes, and you'll be free to love again, properly, without any scarlet-woman stigma. Nothing so vulgar as adultery, or shudder leaving a husband and children.

Was she actually fantasising about Tim dying? She thought she might be. Tears sprang into her eyes. She wasn't sure whether she was rehearsing or crying real tears at how mean she was. Bit of both, really.

She was trying, she told herself, really trying. She'd been a model wife since that disaster with Nick. The kids had hung banners and balloons on the front door when she got back that Sunday. 'We missed you, Mummy,' they read, in Josh's irregular capitals. Chloe had drawn rainbows round the words, the colours in the exact order of the song. Harriet thought about the pot of gold. It hadn't been there with Nick, and it wasn't here. Except in the children.

She switched off Danielle Steel and stood at the french windows, watching them. Josh, always so messy, hair across his forehead, Chloe so neat, holding court at a tea party for her dolls on the blanket Harriet had laid out, talking happily to herself.

She'd be doing it to them if she left Tim, or if she made him leave. They adored him. 'Family cuggle,' Chloe said, pulling Tim and Harriet towards her, as Josh insinuated himself under their arms. 'Family cuggle.'

The b.l.o.o.d.y tears were still there. She felt so trapped.

After she'd cried with Nicole she had gone to the doctor. Nicole said she should. She had cried there too, wanting the ground to open up and swallow her. The doctor had been brilliant. She didn't touch her, or stare, or say anything soft. She had just pa.s.sed her a box of tissues, and said, as though Harriet was showing her a boil or something, 'Don't worry, this happens a lot in here.' And she had asked what was wrong, and Harriet had lied. How could you sit there with a virtual stranger and say you didn't love your husband any more, that you thought you were going to suffocate? That you felt like your life was over? She said she didn't know why she felt this way. That she loved her husband, her children and her life, and that she didn't have money, health or other worries and that she didn't understand it.

So the doctor told her about depression, that it was an illness, a chemical imbalance in the brain. That there wasn't any point in feeling guilty about having it because you couldn't help it any more than you could if you had s.h.i.+ngles or multiple sclerosis. That she should take pills. She wrote a prescription and told her to come back in a month.

Harriet had put the pills in her knicker drawer. She hadn't taken one and she knew she wouldn't go back. She didn't think she was depressed, because she thought there was a reason why she felt this way. A reason she hadn't told the doctor. If she had, surely she wouldn't have prescribed Prozac: she'd have sent her to Relate, or to a solicitor. Part of her didn't want to feel better the guilty part.

The children saw her.

'Come and play, Mummy,' Chloe cried. 'Are they happy tears?' she asked, as Harriet sat down on the blanket.

She wiped her eyes roughly. 'That's right, darling. Happy tears.'

Chloe had already poured warm orange squash into a teacup; she required no further explanation. Children were nice like that. She handed it to Harriet. 'I'm telling my friends all about our holiday, Mummy.' Then she adopted the teacher-like tone she always used with her dollies. 'Now, in Portugal, Daddy likes to eat hairy fish. Isn't that disgusting? I like to eat pink ice-cream that means its strawberry flavour, you know.'

'Or raspberry,' Josh interjected. He'd exhausted himself kicking goals in the suns.h.i.+ne, and was lying spreadeagled nearby.

Chloe glared at him. 'And then Daddy always buries me and Josh in the sand-'

'Or cherry.'

Another glare. 'And do you know, the sand that's under the ground is really cold, and Daddy says that's because it's wet, and the sun doesn't-'

'Or bubblegum flavour.'

'Muuummm!'

Harriet missed Nicole.

Polly and Jack 'Sounds serious.'

'It is. I'll see you around eight?'

'I'll bring some wine. Love you.'

This was going to be hard, Polly knew that. She just prayed he was going to understand. She knew he'd done more for her in the last few months than he had ever been expecting to have to do. She hoped, oh, so very much, that he was going to do this for her too.

Susan had made her think of it. Watching her with Alice. How the roles had changed. If not easily, then inevitably, somehow. Susan was a member of the 'sandwich generation', apparently. She had laughed when she told the reading group about it one evening when they'd finished talking about the book and moved on to the rest of the universe. She'd heard about it on Woman's Hour: still to be caring for her own children, and also for an elderly parent made her the filling in a caring sandwich. She said she thought she was probably Spam. Nicole and Harriet had considered their own positions, and agreed that it was likely to happen to them too.

Polly didn't have parents to worry about, but it had started her thinking in a new way about Cressida and the baby. She wanted to be the melted cheese on a Croque Monsieur, rather than a sandwich filling, spreading herself to cover the ham and the bread. And she wanted Jack to be the mustard. Now she thought she'd better leave out the food a.n.a.logy for the time being: cooking him dinner looked like fifties housewife bribery. And putting out nibbles was altogether too jolly and partyish. The wine would have to do, and she put a bottle into the fridge to cool.

When he arrived Jack kissed her deeply, and she revelled in the feeling of being in his arms. He was big, and he smelt fantastic, and he loved her, and that was all good.

'So,' he said, as he uncorked the wine in one easy movement, and poured two gla.s.ses, 'the kids are not in evidence you want to talk?'

Polly took a gulp of wine. 'I do. Let's go and sit down.' Blurting it out seemed the best way. Give him all the information, then let him sift through it. Less artful that way. 'I want to raise the baby for Cressida, not adopt it, or anything legal like that he or she will always be her baby just take care of it for now. And one day, when she's finished college, and had her adventures, got on in her career, whatever, I hope it will go and live with her. I want to be a mother to both of them, just for the first few years, that's all. I'm only forty-four and I can do it, with some help.'

Jack drank deeply, said nothing.

She went on. 'It's easy enough to say, isn't it? You hear parents say it all the time "I'd do anything for my kids". And I would, you see, anything at all, for her to have her chances. She wants the baby and, G.o.d knows, I understand that, but I want so much more for her alongside the baby...'

'Have you talked to her about this?'

'Not yet. I wanted to talk to you about it first. It affects you as much as anyone.'

Jack laughed tightly. 'Just a bit.'

'But we can make it work, I know we can. Cressida will still be here, for holidays and weekends, and Dan'll muck in. And my friends. It's not like we'll be completely tied down. She's a kid, Jack, she's twenty years old. Think of the things we've seen and done she hasn't done any of it yet.'

'You make it sound like we're finished.'