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  ‘Oh, I was rescued.’

  He smelt of stale whisky and he had his shirt tucked in. What an unspeakable disaster, she thought, waving the children over. I married completely the wrong man.

  Rescued? He looked at her then, at the broad swell of her belly, at the place on her breasts where the wet fabric clung. Of course. He nodded. Always this. Always the knight in shining armour standing in the wings. Who had she been here with? Bloody Patrick Cumberbatch? Surely he wasn’t still sniffing about the place, was he? No, Mr Cumberbatch had been booted out of Shire Hall (ha!). He had been told to take his bonhomie, his management skills and his skinny-arsed wife and take a running jump to Corfu or Costa Early Retirement or wherever.

  ‘Frank? Is your back bad?’

  He wanted to crush her with a cold comment but her nipples had an insolent, brazen look to them. His eyes travelled up her throat as she swallowed, up to her neck where the skin was creased and crêpey. He looked at her uncertain mouth and offered a pained smile in the direction of the river.

  ‘Where are your shoes?’ She smelt weedy. It was important with Bea not to make too much of anything. Keep things on an even keel. She longed for melodrama and, like all women – not Wanda perhaps, but most women – she seemed to need a crisis once in a while.

  Screams and shouts curtailed by a series of splashes informed them that the children had managed to fall in. Adrian ran towards them, arms flailing, legs leaping, laughing and shouting that all three girls were in the water, that Rachel’s phone had sunk, Chanel couldn’t swim and Laura’s foot was stuck. Frank tore towards the river in his lopsided run. Bea gathered up her skirt and followed him, heavy-thighed and slow. She watched him sprint ahead of her, arms pumping, zigzagging round the tussocks, racing with surprising speed towards the emergency, and she remembered vaguely what it was like to love him.

  When she reached the bank, she found the dripping forms of the girls draped like leopards along a low willow branch. They were panting and smiling and swinging their hands and feet in the shallow water. Frank was supporting himself with one arm up against the trunk, catching his breath and trying to speak. Laura waved over at Bea and called, ‘We fell in too! Brutal!’ Adrian whacked the tree with a stick and said, ‘Are you all right, Frank?’ Laura pulled off her shorts and said, ‘I’m only going to have to walk back in me keks!’ Rachel said, ‘Minging,’ and Chanel said, ‘This branch is doing me an injury, innit though?’ Frank said, ‘Right, that’s it,’ and strode away towards the car park. They watched him go, stretching his arms down and splaying out his fingers, a gesture that had become a habit since Bea once commented that all his shirtsleeves were a little on the long side. He stopped and called back furiously to them.

  ‘Come on! I have a deadline to meet.’ Yes, he nodded to himself. There’s Lupa, there’s Close and Personal . . . The others stared at him like cattle. ‘And I do not want my evening to seep into your evening of non-sequiturs, pantomime hysteria, pizza crusts and . . .’ He took a few steps towards them and the girls scuttled, giggling, behind Bea. He pointed at them. Bea took a long, slow final breath in. Was he really pointing at them? Yes, I’m pointing, thought Frank, because things are about to change around here. Then he shook his finger at them and Adrian looked up at the sky. ‘I don’t suppose your mother has deigned to inform us of her expected time of arrival, but if you don’t mind, I would like to get back before it gets dark!’ Then he turned on his heel and set off for the car park.

  Halfway to the end of the path, he wondered if they were following and hoped that Adrian and Laura understood that it wasn’t that he didn’t love them. Of course he did. Well, he loved Adrian. Perhaps not Laura. Fond, yes. Love, no. There was something hard about her, and all that blingish she talked. What was that all about? An affectation. He was fairly sure that Laura wouldn’t know a US gang member if one came and bit her on the backside. The girl had too much of her mother in her. Katharine Kemp was a fierce, cold woman – ruthless, calculating, clever – the complete opposite of Bea. How Katharine and Bea had emerged from the same parents was a mystery. How Adrian had emerged from Katharine was a bloody miracle.

  At the end of the meadow was the kissing gate, where Frank had to stop while a young couple went through. The girl and then the boy became trapped and then were freed with a kiss. Frank waited and coughed, aware of the ache in his lower back beginning to climb. He could smell charcoaled meat from the beer garden, and laughter rose up from the hum of voices. He looked back the way he had come, saw the swallows dive and swoop in the evening air but saw no sign of the others. When the gate was free, he let himself through, going through the paces of the silly foxtrot of love on his own, went to the car and got in. He waited, eyes closed, door open, listening to Bob Dylan on Radio 2. Funny, he thought, how they had reached the stage in life where they listened to Radio 2. They would have laughed at that ten years ago when they first met.

  The first time he saw Bea was on the Oriana en route to Madeira. In the lounge a pianist played Abba medleys on the white baby grand to an empty dance floor. When heavy rain forced passengers down from the top deck, the dance floor filled with pensioners and a red spotlight swept the crowd in time to the music. Bea walked up to him then with wet hair and a lost expression on her face. He loved her mouth straightaway. It had a vulnerable look to it that made him want to open doors for her. She was holding a Dubonnet and lemonade and a Bloody Mary and said, ‘Have you seen an elderly lady in red?’ They both laughed. The dance floor was a swarm of old women, swaying together to the strains of ‘Lady in Red’ at half past three in the afternoon—

  ‘Frank!’

  It was Laura, calling and waving from the entrance to the car park. Bea and the other girls were behind her, wet and muddy and cheerful. Bea had her jacket tied round her waist and no skirt on. Rachel wore Bea’s skirt like a sarong. Laura wore just a bra and what appeared to be Adrian’s school trousers. Chanel had a long furry-hooded winter coat zipped up to her nose and shoes that squelched when she walked.

  Frank got out of the car. ‘Where’s Adrian?’ At the sight of the empty path, he felt suddenly sick.

  Bea put the front seat forward so the girls could get in.

  ‘He’s being slow because he’s so gay,’ said Laura.

  Bea sat in the passenger seat. Frank got in beside her and waited. Then he got out of the car and went to the gate just as Adrian appeared. Adrian wore only the sweatshirt, which barely reached his thighs.

  ‘The cows started following me,’ he said. ‘I think it’s their path. I had to stay near the hedge.’

  ‘Someone told me they only threaten females,’ said Bea.

  ‘That’s what I said. He’s so gay,’ said Laura.

  ‘Come on, get in,’ said Frank.

  Adrian dipped his head inside the car, then stood up and looked mildly at it. ‘Problem,’ he said.

  Frank looked at Adrian and then at the car. It was full.

  ‘Ah,’ said Bea.

  ‘I’ll walk,’ said Frank, tossing the keys on to the driving seat. ‘It’ll be a pleasure.’

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ said Adrian, following Frank up the lane. He waved to Bea and the girls as they drove past.

  Frank turned to look at his nephew and said, ‘For God’s sake, Adrian, take that bloody sweatshirt off.’

  ‘But then I’ll be nearly naked.’

  ‘Turn it inside out then. You look like a bloody fool.’

  ‘The girls made me wear it,’ said Adrian, beginning to lift it over his head. ‘For their homework.’

  ‘You’re talking gibberish now, Adrian.’ Frank began to stride up the lane, towards the main road. ‘I have rather a lot of work to do, so if you want to come with me you’ll have to keep up.’

  Adrian stumbled along beside Frank but his head became stuck in the neck of the sweatshirt. Frank stopped and gave it a tug. Adrian yelled. What Frank needed now was a large drink and a good blast of Beethoven at his most tortured. He gave it another yank. What he nee
ded now was Wanda, naked, face down on the couch, swearing in Polish.

  Frank stopped pulling and gave the headless torso a push. It staggered and fell into the blackberry bushes. ‘I very much doubt that Laura’s homework was to make her brother wear a sweatshirt saying “Nobody Knows I’m a Lesbian”.’

  Adrian put the sweatshirt back on inside out. His ears were red. ‘It’s ironic,’ he said. He held Frank’s hand as they waited to cross the main road. ‘They had to find an example of irony. And I’m it.’

  Hot

  KATHARINE STEPPED through Bea’s front door backwards, throwing the central locking on her 4x4, which was parked in the middle of the road, hazard lights flashing. She said, ‘Damn this sodding car,’ and ‘Sorry, sorry about the time,’ and ‘Two trains cancelled then unbelievable traffic all the way from the station,’ and ‘What’s wrong with your phone? I’ve been trying to ring all evening.’

  Bea said, ‘Mum rang.’

  ‘What?’ said Katharine, turning and looking behind her. ‘Where?’

  ‘She phoned me.’

  ‘Oh.’ Katharine stopped. ‘What did she want at this time?’

  Katharine looked at her watch, at the flyers by her feet for pizza, tandoori and minicabs, down the hall for signs of the children, back at the car and then at Bea. Why didn’t she do something about her hair? ‘Adrian! Laura!’ she called. ‘Sorry, yes, go on about Mum. Where’s Frank?’

  Bea shrugged. ‘She didn’t want anything. Just to talk.’

  Katharine shut the door and put her briefcase down, then picked it up again. Some people they knew had been robbed like that because kids look through the letter box, see the briefcase, handbag, whatever, break the glass, release the door latch and take the bag. All over in ten seconds. Good heavens, was it really half past eight?

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘Quite,’ said Bea so that Katharine looked at her properly, which was when she noticed that her sister looked suddenly older. Bea walked away from her, slow and heavy, towards the kitchen. All she needed to do was to lose a few pounds and get her hair done. It wasn’t beyond her, surely.

  ‘What do you mean, “Quite”?’

  Bea stumbled over the children’s school bags and shoved them against the wall with her foot. ‘I mean, she is, as in she’s still alive, existing. But the how, well, I don’t know.’

  Katharine scanned the notes and letters on the kitchen counter. Nothing of interest there. Bea was being obtuse. Best not to provoke her.

  ‘Well, if only she would agree to move closer to us. Of course she’s lonely, stuck out there in the sticks.’

  She noted her sister’s ridiculous collection of souvenir donkeys trooping across the windowsill, noticed the wilting flowers and the half-finished glass of wine and thought, this is what happens if you don’t have children or a challenging job. She sat down at the table and stopped herself saying, ‘I hope they aren’t watching crap TV on your bed,’ and ‘You haven’t let Adrian buy any more of those fireworks, have you?’

  Bea began clearing the table. ‘Let’s give Mum a surprise birthday party.’

  Katharine felt weak at the thought of it all. The move to London, her new job, Laura’s school problems. ‘But it’s so soon.’ Was it soon? October sometime, wasn’t it? ‘There’s no time, is there?’

  ‘It needn’t be a big deal. Just the family. We’ll have it here.’

  Katharine looked round the cramped kitchen. Bea’s collection of ceramica from Spain and Greece adorned every space of wall while jugs and bowls filled every shelf. Dusting those must be a full-time job. They gave the room a warm vibrancy, Katharine couldn’t deny that, but it was absolutely too cramped here for a birthday lunch. And as the front room was where Frank did whatever it was that Frank did in there, well, you couldn’t really have a party in a two-up two-down, could you? She watched Bea make a neat pile of the children’s school clothes and suddenly wondered whether her sister was all right for money.

  ‘Oh, but our house, surely,’ she said, except it couldn’t be their house, they were moving any day now. Katharine wondered whether Bea would be offended by a cheque.

  ‘Here will be fine.’ The party would be swamped at Katharine’s in her chilly dining room that seated sixteen. What Bea envisaged was a cosy, informal gathering round her own kitchen table. They could open the back door and put Adrian in charge of a firebasket on the patio.

  There was no point reasoning with Bea. Katharine could tell she had already decided. ‘Well, the next few weeks are impossible so I would have to leave the arrangements to you. Get Wanda to help maybe.’ She looked again at her sister and wondered whether something had happened to her. She hoped to God she wasn’t ill. ‘Have you been swimming, Bea? Your hair looks . . .’ No, knowing Bea, she probably just needed to ease up on the alcohol.

  Bea touched her head and mumbled something about the river. She felt foolish now. Frank had said not a word to her about it and she decided to let the children tell Katharine. She barely knew how to describe what had happened herself. It frightened her a little, how she had ended up near the fast-flowing centre of the river. Her skirt was soaking upstairs and it had turned the water green. Adrian had found a gleaming black leech jerking determinedly up the side of the bath, and now she was bone-achingly tired and what she really wanted was for everyone to go so that she could watch television in bed and pass out.

  What Bea really needs, thought Katharine, is a complete restyle with a proper hairdresser, not that little place round the corner that she’s been going to for years. The woman needs a total overhaul and a new job while she’s at it, because languishing in Shire Hall all these years is probably doing no good at all for her self-esteem, let alone her bank balance.

  Katharine said, ‘How’s work?’ and then she said, ‘You know, if I do get the consultant paediatric job in London, there’s no way I can commute.’

  Bea tried to arrange too many glasses on the top shelf of the dishwasher. ‘We’ve been restructured. Efficiency measures. And we’re about to be inspected so everyone is—’ There was a crack. She pulled out a broken glass and dropped the pieces in the bin.

  A small explosion on the front doorstep was followed by screams, thundering footsteps upstairs and the smell of gunpowder.

  Adrian’s voice called down from above. ‘Sorry!’

  Katharine went to the foot of the stairs and shouted up. ‘Come on, Adrian, we have to go. Where’s Laura? Laura!’ She took a few wary steps upwards. ‘Come on. Time to leave!’

  Bea stood in the hall and heard Laura’s voice wheedling from the landing.

  ‘Do we have to go now? We haven’t had our ice cream.’

  ‘Well, we’ll have that when we get home,’ said Katharine.

  ‘There isn’t any. You know there isn’t.’

  ‘We’ll get some on the way. Sainsbury’s. Who’s up there with you?’

  ‘No one. I’m doing my homework.’

  ‘That’s a lie,’ said Adrian.

  ‘Shut up!’

  ‘I think you’re tired, darling,’ said Katharine.

  ‘I’m not. I need a shower.’

  ‘That’s true,’ said Adrian.

  ‘Shut up!’

  ‘You can have a shower at home, Laura.’

  ‘I fell in the river.’

  ‘You fell in the river?’ Katharine looked to where Bea had been standing but Bea had disappeared. Really, things had got completely out of hand with this arrangement. ‘What happened? For heaven’s sake, Bea? Bea!’

  ‘Bea fell in too.’

  ‘But it’s nearly October.’ (Was it nearly October? It could be nearly March – time just flew.) ‘And there’s Weil’s disease, darling, you don’t want that. You might . . .’ She took a step up towards Laura, who shrank from her. Katharine stopped where she was. What was the matter with the child? All Laura’s boundaries were becoming blurred. God knows what was going on at that school. ‘Are your glands up? Do you feel achey at all? Where’s your uniform?’

/>   Laura coughed and looked ill. ‘Can I stay here tonight?’

  ‘What’s that noise?’

  ‘My French tape.’

  ‘Are you watching television up there?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I can hear it.’

  ‘Well I’m not.’

  ‘That’s a lie,’ said Adrian.

  ‘Shut up, ugly!’

  ‘Yes, be quiet, Adrian. Don’t provoke. Go and wait outside.’

  ‘Mum, school said they’re sending you a letter. But it’s not true, what Stella said I did. I didn’t write those things . . .’ Laura began to cry.

  Adrian leapt from the house, saying, ‘Abort. Abort.’ He landed just past Bea, who was sitting on the doorstep.

  She tried not to smile. She had put his filthy trainers by the wall so he wouldn’t forget them. She could smell autumn in the air and saw it in the curled dry tips of the wisteria leaves. She waved at Nesrine over the road. Nesrine was watering her front garden, where she coaxed a little bit of Cyprus in vine and fig from the fenland soil. Adrian crouched on the path and lit a twisted wrap of paper that puttered and plumed blue and red and green and smelt of cordite and sulphur. They could hear voices raised from inside. Chanel and Rachel skittered past them into the September dusk trailing ‘Bye’s in their wake.

  Adrian stuffed his feet into his trainers, treading the backs down, and climbed on top of the garden wall. For the hundredth time that day, heat roared up inside Bea, coursing from her solar plexus through veins and nerves to the top of her head. Whatever aberrant process was going on, it had the force and struggle of that hot air balloon she watched once from her mother’s lap as it struggled to ascend, gasping and breathing fire, scudding low, too low over the trees on the clifftop at Hastings. Three Die in Hot Air Balloon Tragedy.

  Bea cooled her head against the wall. The Jeep crouched in the road, its orange hazard lights throbbing like a pulse.

  Adrian sat on the wobbly slab on top of the gate pillar and said, ‘Would you rather be cremated or buried?’