A Question of Love Read online

  I felt my insides coil. ‘Already?’

  ‘It’s because the viewing figures were so good—plus there’s a real buzz about the show. The market research said the viewers like seeing the presenter put on the spot.’

  ‘Well, that’s our USP. But I won’t do newspaper interviews because I know they’ll ask me about Nick and I don’t want to talk about it.’

  ‘That’s fine. But the Channel Four press office do want you to do some publicity.’

  ‘Fair enough—it’s just a question of what.’

  ‘The Daily Mail and the Sunday Post have both asked you to contribute short pieces to their lifestyle pages—Nerys has e-mailed you the details. Have a great weekend.’

  I padded over to the computer, clicked on my inbox and read the two requests. They were both for those celebrity filler columns you see dotted all over the press. Usually I find these pieces either fatuous—My Cottage, My Second Bedroom—or horribly confessional: My Biggest Mistake, My Prolapse, The Worst Day of My Life. The one from the Sunday Post was called My Pet Hates, and I had to list three. 1) Nerys, I thought meanly, 2) my nosy neighbours, and 3) the way Felicity bores on about the baby. I could hardly use those, so as I showered and dressed I gave it some serious thought. My three pet hates…People who queue-barge; the dark—I really hate the dark—and—oh yes—those prisoners on probation who sell dusters and dishcloths door to door. I can’t stand them, not because I’m unsympathetic, but because they always turn up at night. As a woman living alone I find it alarming to encounter a strange man on my doorstep after dark, saying he’s on day-release from Wormwood Scrubs and would I be interested in some rubber gloves? They seem to work this area a lot, as a result of which I have two hundred tea towels and thirty tubs of Astonish.

  The request from the Daily Mail was to do The Last Five Things On My Credit Card—innocuous enough—and, as it happened, there were things I needed to buy. I hadn’t got Olivia’s christening present, and I wanted something special to wear—Felicity had issued the family with strict instructions that the dress code for us was ‘smart’.

  So half an hour later I made my way slowly up Portobello, through the throng of Italian and Japanese tourists, then browsed in the antique shops. I bought Olivia a Victorian silver jewellery box lined with midnight blue velvet, then turned down Westbourne Grove. Five years ago this area was full of antique shops but now the area’s become like a mini King’s Road. Put it this way, it’s got the only Oxfam shop I’ve ever come across which has regular ‘Prada Promotions’.

  I bought a copy of the Post then sat at a table outside Café 202, sipping a latte in the spring sunshine while I happily read Mark McVeigh’s TV review. Then I crossed the road to Agnès B. As I wandered around I luxuriated not in the clothes themselves, but in the delicious knowledge that lack of money was no longer the gut-churning problem it had been for so long. For the best part of three years I’d bought nothing that wasn’t essential, but now, with a presenting fee for each show on top of my normal pay, I could afford to indulge myself. So I went into Dinny Hall and spent £200 on a pair of gold and pearl earrings, for the simple reason that I could. The novelty of such extravagance was delicious. Except that it didn’t feel like extravagance at all. It felt like a reward to myself for having survived such a tough time. Then I looked for something to wear.

  I tried on tie-wrap dresses in Diane von Furstenberg, and floaty chiffon skirts in Joseph and Whistles, and cashmere cardigans in Brora, before going into L K Bennett and opting for a dark pink, fitted wool crepe suit which I knew would also look good on the show. I didn’t much like their shoes, so I crossed over the road to Emma Hope, and was just waiting for the assistant to get me a pair of crimson slingbacks in my size when I glanced out of the window. My heart stopped. There was Luke. He was walking past on the other side of the road, hand in hand with Jessica, his face alight with love and pride.

  My first instinct was to run out of the shop waving and yelling—but he looked so happy, I felt I shouldn’t intrude. Jessica was half-walking, half-skipping, in her blue anorak and her polka-dot wellies, her white-blonde pigtails swinging behind her. Then she must have said something funny because he threw back his head and laughed, then hugged her to him. I felt my heart expand. As I watched them walk over the zebra crossing, past the church and down the road, until they were almost out of sight, I allowed myself to entertain a little fantasy in which Luke and I were living together—with Jessica, Magda having agreed to give Luke custody sothat she could spend more time with the goats. And the three of us had such a nice life…

  We went to Holland Park every Saturday and played in the adventure playground there, and as Luke and I pushed Jessica on the swings, she’d be shrieking with laughter, head thrown back, hair flying; then we’d all go home and have tea. And I’d have made her a chocolate cake, with loads of icing, and she’d get it on her face, so I’d wipe her mouth and hands. Then I’d help her with her piano practice, or her reading, or teach her to knit, or help her sort out her dressing-up box. And I’d tell her about the tickets I’d got for us to see Swan Lake at Covent Garden the following week, and about how first we’d go shopping together to get her something special to wear. And her face would be radiant with amazed delight.

  And in the evening the three of us would watch a video together, something really fun and wholesome like, I don’t know, Shrek, or The Princess Diaries—and Jessica would snuggle into Luke on the sofa while I sat a tactful distance away. And, as the credits rolled, she’d yawn like a little cat, and Luke would say, ‘Okay, time for bed my little girlie—say nighty-night to Laura.’ And Jessica would come and give me a hug and I ‘d feel her soft little face against mine, and I’d remind her that I was taking her for a riding lesson in Hyde Park the next day because she’s mad about ponies, and she’d sigh with happiness and then, to my joy, I’d hear her whisper, ‘Oh, I’m so lucky to have you as my stepmum, Laura…’

  ‘Blah blah blah blah blah…’

  And I’d reply, ‘Oh no, Jess—I’m so lucky to have you. I love little girls, I just love them, and you’re the sweetest little girl there’s ever been…’

  ‘Blah blah blah blah shoes, madam?’

  ‘Hm?’

  The assistant swam into focus. She was holding up the slingbacks. ‘Your shoes. Size 41.’ I stared at them. ‘Are you all right madam?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Are you all right? Would you like a glass of water?’

  ‘Oh. No…’ I thought of Monday, and of my date with Luke. I smiled. ‘It’s all right, thank you. I’m fine.‘

  ‘Don’t you look fine and dandy,’ said Mum as I met her and Dad outside St Mark’s church at half past two the next day.

  ‘So do you,’ I said, as I kissed her—or tried to; our hats collided. ‘Though I feel a bit overdressed to tell you the truth.’

  ‘Me too,’ Mum confided. ‘But then it isn’t every day your first grandchild gets christened, and our Fliss did say she wanted us to scrub up.’

  We were so worried about being late that we’d arrived a good twenty minutes early; so we went in and sat in the third pew on the right hand side. Swords of spring sunlight sliced through the stained glass, scattering splinters of colour like the fragments of a broken rainbow. We inhaled the sweet aroma of beeswax and dust. As the organ began to play, I perused the elegant Order of Service that Felicity had had specially printed. I read the dedication—a fragment of a poem by Emily Dickinson.

  As if the sea should part And show a further Sea—And that—a further…

  That must be how parenthood makes you feel.

  ‘Look at all these lovely readings and hymns,’ I heard Mum whisper next to me. ‘It’s a bit posh, isn’t it?’ she added with a giggle.

  ‘It certainly is.’

  But that had been obvious when the invitations arrived. The card was so stiff it was practically self-standing; the embossing on the flowing black italics so pronounced you could have read it with your fingertips, like Braille. D
espite their stricken finances, Felicity had eschewed the idea of a simple family christening for something much more lavish. Behind us, in the organ loft, the large choir was assembling. In front of us a string quartet was discreetly tuning up. On either side of the altar were two white floral arrangements the size of obelisks. A large posy of white and pink anemones hung from every pew.

  ‘It’s more like a wedding really,’ said Mum, as Hope and Mike arrived and squeezed past us.

  ‘A Royal one,’ Hope added with a smile. ‘She’s got an official photographer outside, and there’s someone videoing the whole thing.’

  ‘Totally over the top,’ Mike breathed. I glanced at him. He’s normally good-natured, but I thought that was sharp.

  ‘Well, why shouldn’t she go to town?’ said Hope fairly. She opened her Hermès Birkin bag and removed an elegant compact. ‘This is her special day after all.’

  I remembered Felicity’s last ‘special day’, twelve years before, and how miserable I’d been, and by delicious, but unexpected contrast, how elated I felt today.

  ‘You look smashing, Hope,’ said Mum proudly. It was true. Hope is always immaculately turned out in her expensive, perfectly accessorised little suits, with her neatly shod feet, and her glossy tights, and understated make-up and her perfect, face-framing bob, as smooth and shiny as a helmet. She’s dark and petite—the physical opposite of Fliss, who is voluptuous and milk-maidy blonde. I resemble neither of my sisters—gangly, frizzy, and with strong, slightly angular features. Luke used to say that if I was a painting I’d have been a Modigliani. Felicity, being fair and fleshy is pure Rubens while Hope…

  What was she, I wondered as I stole a glance at her profile. A Dora Carrington, maybe? Small and sharp. Inscrutable. Efficient-looking. She tends to radiate a slightly chilly competence. She was flicking through the hymnal, marking the relevant pages with tiny Post-It notes.

  I always find it amazing that the same ingredients could have produced both my sisters. Where Fliss is untidy, expansive and spontaneous, Hope is highly organized, reserved and self-controlled. It’s almost as though she’s the responsible eldest, and Fliss the indulged baby. I’ve always been the pivot between the two. When we were in our teens we discovered that Mum had had another pregnancy between Fliss and me but that it hadn’t worked out. I think about that lost baby sometimes…

  From behind us now we could hear muted conversations. The pews were beginning to fill.

  ‘How many people has Felicity invited then?’ Dad asked as he had a swift look behind us.

  ‘A hundred and fifty,’ said Hope, as she brushed an imaginary speck off her cuff. ‘I imagine that as it’s a Sunday she’ll have a pretty good take-up—probably seventy per cent—so there should be at least a hundred of us.’

  ‘Ridiculous,’ Mike muttered, folding his arms. If I hadn’t liked him I would have felt angry at this second swipe, but I decided that his ill-temper was due to stress. He and Hope both work in the City—she as head of PR for the metal exchange, he as Vice-President of an investment bank—and I knew he’d been working all hours on some massive deal. But, although he looked exhausted—and I noticed that his close-cropped dark hair was greyer than before—I felt his intolerance was due to more than fatigue. He had a tetchiness about him as though he really didn’t want to be here. But then christenings probably bore him to bits.

  Mike and Hope don’t have children—by mutual agreement. Mike’s never shown the slightest interest and Hope has always joked that she’s ‘anti-natal’. And it’s not a front to protect herself against possible disappointment—it’s a sincere and deliberate choice. ‘I have no maternal feelings,’ she says happily if the subject ever comes up. ‘Absolutely none—not interested.‘ She was always like that. When she was ten, for example, my parents offered her a rabbit, but she refused. So they offered her a gerbil, and she politely declined that as well. She explained that she didn’t want to look after a rabbit or a gerbil or a mouse or, in fact, anything, thank you—and that resistance extended, in adulthood, to kids. She told me a long time ago that she didn’t want the responsibility of children, or the ‘chaos’ and ‘mess’.

  She’s nice with other peoples’ babies mind you. She’ll jiggle them and play ‘peek-a-boo’ with them and do ‘round and round the garden’—but then she’s genuinely happy to hand them back. She and Mike have been married for six years, and on their first date she told him that she didn’t want kids and that she would never change her mind, so it was essential that he knew that right from the start. Because he was so besotted, he accepted it. Felicity once asked him whether he didn’t ever mind. He just shrugged and said it was ‘a question of love’.

  But he and Hope have a fabulous life. They have a large house in Holland Park—creamily luxurious, fitted with every mod con, including an oven which cost them six grand, but which they hardly use, because they eat out all the time. They go on amazing holidays—you should have heard them whining about Concorde being taken out of service! They have weekends in Paris and Prague. Hope has got just the life she always wanted. I don’t think she’d ever allow anything to go wrong.

  I glanced at the back of the church. Fliss and Hugh still hadn’t arrived. I didn’t mind. It was nice just sitting next to my parents, quietly chatting. They can’t come to London much because of their bed and breakfast—a large farmhouse—plus they live a long way north. We grew up in Ealing, but five years ago they retired to Nether Poppleton, the beautiful Yorkshire village where Mum grew up.

  ‘Now, our Laura,’ she said to me, as the organ began to play a Pachabel toccata. ‘I don’t see as much of you as I’d like, so tell me—’ I braced myself—‘how’s your personal life? Have you made any new friends?’ she enquired meaningfully. ‘I understand Fliss has invited one or two single lads for you today.’ My heart sank. I’d completely forgotten.

  ‘She doesn’t need them,’ said Hope, as she flicked dust off her Gucci pumps with a silk hanky. ‘She’s seeing Luke again.’

  ‘I hadn’t told you that yet,’ I protested.

  ‘Felicity told me. You know how she blabs. She phoned me up specially, she was so thrilled about it.’ I rolled my eyes.

  ‘Luke?’ Mum repeated wonderingly. ‘Luke from university?’ I felt blood suffuse my face. ‘You’re seeing Luke again?’

  ‘Well…’ I didn’t want to overstate the case. ‘I’ve just met him again, that’s all.’ I told her about his surprise appearance on the quiz.

  ‘Oh I liked Luke!’ she exclaimed. This is what she had kept saying after we broke up, I now remembered. ‘I liked Luke,’ she’d say regretfully, about ninety times a day. ‘Oh, I did like him.’ It had driven me mad. ‘Derek—’ Mum was nudging Dad in the ribs now. ‘She’s seeing Luke again.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Luke. Our Laura’s seeing Luke again. You remember Luke? The one she knew at Cambridge. You know. The one who broke her heart.’

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘Sorry, love, but your father’s hearing’s not what it was. But I liked Luke,’ she said again. ‘Now he was a laugh.’ This, I knew, was a dig at Nick, who they’d always found too serious—which is probably why I’d gone for him in the first place. Felicity, in particular, had never warmed to him.

  ‘Too bloody worthy,’ I’d overheard her telling my parents a week before our wedding. ‘I know he’s a good egg and all that, but he’s not much fun, is he?’ This had stung me. Because I knew she was right. Nick wasn’t exactly the life and soul of the party. But he was interesting and affectionate, reliable and good; and he was ‘safe’. Or so I thought.

  ‘I remember Luke always had some snippet of trivia up his sleeve’, Mum added appreciatively. ‘Some of the things he used to come out with like—what was it?—oh, that’s right, that a mosquito has forty-six teeth. Can you imagine? Forty-six teeth! A mosquito! I’ve never forgotten it. I mean, that’s more than we’ve got isn’t it?’

  ‘Not if you count our milk teeth,’ said Dad. ‘That would give us fifty-two
.’

  ‘It isn’t forty-six,’ I said. ‘It’s forty-seven. And in any case that isn’t Trivia, Mum.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘No. It’s Useless Information.’

  ‘Same thing.’

  ‘No it’s not the same thing—it’s very important to distinguish between the two. Trivia is stuff about popular culture—who’s doing what to whom in soap operas, or how much footballers get paid, or who paints Victoria Beckham’s toenails. Useless Information is quite different—it’s the study of fascinating, but entirely irrelevant facts like, for example, the fact that Anne Boleyn had three breasts.’

  ‘Did she?’ they all said.

  ‘Yes—and six fingers on her left hand. Or the fact that babies don’t have kneecaps.’

  ‘Don’t they?’

  ‘No—they don’t develop them until they’re two. Or the fact that an octopus has three hearts.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘That is Useless Information,’ I explained. ‘Luke has always excelled at it,’ I added proudly. Which is how, I now remembered, we first met.

  I’d noticed him of course—around college—but I’d deliberately ignored him because I found him so attractive, but knew that he was out of my league. But then, one evening, he’d sidled up to me at a party, where I was leaning against a wall, watching the dancing, and he’d just stood there, saying nothing, swigging his bottle of designer beer. Then, without any introduction, and without actually looking at me, he’d said, ‘Did you know that the fingerprints of koala bears are indistinguishable from human ones?’

  ‘Really?’ I’d returned, indolently, despite the fact that my heart was racing.