Chapter 33

Years of experience, plus the close proximity of Mum, Alison, Cal and Aunt Mary, have taught me one very valuable lesson. The girls are in charge. So when Kathy and Charlie told me to make myself scarce (or, as they put it, go find some trees to photograph), I went to find some trees to photograph.

Actually I spent nearly an hour looking around for things to photograph, and found some good shots, or at least I thought them good. I took so many that I ran out of memory on the camera.

When the girls finally let me rejoin them they had a surprise for me.

“David,” Kathy said, “I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve asked Charlie to join us for dinner tonight.”

“If that’s what you want it’s OK with me,” I replied, turning to Charlie I added, “you’ll be very welcome.”

“Thank you,” Charlie replied, “are you sure, I don’t want to play gooseberry.”

Which is how I came to have two beautiful dates for dinner at the Sharma Indian Restaurant. Charlie and I walked Kathy home, and Charlie diplomatically stopped before we turned into her street, to give us some alone time, then Charlie and I set off towards home to change.

“You’re not going to tell me what you and Kathy were talking about, even if I beg are you?” I asked.

“Of course I will,” she replied.

We walked along in silence for a couple of minutes.

“Well,” I prompted.

“Well what?” she asked.

“Well, are you going to tell me or not?”

“No,” she said firmly, “I’m not.”

“But you said,” I began.

She held her hand up.

“I said Of course I will,” she repeated.

“Then go on,” I insisted.

“But that was after you asked if I’d tell you if you begged. You haven’t begged.”

“You want me to beg you to tell me?” I spluttered.

“Naturally,” she replied.

“All right, Charlotte, I’m begging you, what did you and Kathy talk about.”

“You,” she said, and started to walk again.

“Wait a minute, you can’t just say that and then start walking. What about me?” I complained.

“Just you,” she replied, “what a boy you are.”

The way she enunciated the word boy told me that what they’d said hadn’t been entirely complimentary.

“What do you mean what a boy I am?” I asked.

“The way you don’t open your eyes and look at what’s around you,” she replied.

“The fact that you’ve got Cal and Kathy and who knows who else absolutely head over heels in love with you, and you don’t even notice.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, “Cal I understand. But Kathy’s not in love with me, we’re just going out as friends. So that she can show her dad he can trust her around boys.”

“And the boy she wants to be trusted around is?” she asked archly.

“Just boys in general,” I said.

She shook her head and we carried on walking.

“Cal,” I said, “you can’t just say that and walk on. You have to explain.”

She stopped and turned to face me.

“What did you just say?” she asked.

“I said that you had to explain what you meant.”

“No, before that, what did you just call me?”

“Charlie, it’s your name,” I replied.

“No, you said Cal,” she said softly.

“I didn’t,” I replied.

“You did,” she stated firmly, “Cal, you can’t just say that and walk on, to be precise.”

“I didn’t?” It was a question and not a statement.

“You did,” she replied.

“I’m sorry Charlie,” I said, “I don’t know why I’d do that.”

“There’s no need to apologise,” she replied, “actually I’m quite flattered.”

She confused me with the word flattered.

“Flattered?” I asked, “how can you be flattered that I used the wrong name?”

“Because of whose name you confused me with,” she replied, “you got me mixed up with your soulmate.”

“Soulmate?” I replied, “you did hear about Munich?”

“Soulmate,” she said, with am air of finality, “David, your girlfriend calls her that, I can see it, both your mothers can see it, even she says it, but she does use past tense. David, she IS your soulmate, and I think everybody who knows you is hoping that the two of you can somehow get past the mistakes and move on together.”

“But she’s having another man’s baby, a man she told me she loved,” I replied.

“Is she?” she asked, “can you be one hundred percent certain that the baby isn’t yours? The pill isn’t totally effective, other things can affect the way it works, and it’s not unknown for women to have periods after they get pregnant. Or at least appear to have.”

“So you’re telling me the baby could be mine?” I asked.

“Could be? Yes, it could,” she replied, “Probably, no probably not. But David, they can’t tell that until the baby is born.”

“But if the baby is mine,” I began, “then.”

I trailed off.

“Then what?” she asked, “Everything is all right? It doesn’t matter that Cal cheated in Munich? The baby’s yours so you’ll step up and do the right thing? Why does whose baby it is matter? David, Cal, your best friend, the love of your life is in trouble, she needs your help, and your love, not to be virtually frozen out of your life.”

“She’s not,” I objected.

“No? When did you last call round to see her, just for the hell of it?”

“I don’t do that,” I said.

“No, I’ve been told that once upon a time you were both always round at the other’s house.”

“That was different,” I insisted.

“Oh, I see,” she said, and started walking again.

“Charlie,” I called after her retreating back, “just what are you up to?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“All this talking about me and Cal, what are you trying to achieve.”

“Just trying to show you your true feelings,” she said.

I trotted up the street to join her.

“And you’re an expert on this are you?”

“David,” she said, looking at me seriously, tears starting to form, “my mother had me whoring myself for parts, almost as soon as the first hairs appeared on my cunt. I know all about fucked up young lives. Don’t do the same to yours, or Cal’s. Or Kathy’s for that matter.”

I’d never heard her use that sort of language before.

“Charlie,” I said, “I’m sorry. Sometimes I get so wrapped up in my own problems, I forget other people have them as well.”

Instinctively, I wrapped her in a hug and kissed her forehead. As I withdrew from her she looked up at me and smiled.

“Thank you,” she said softly.

“What for?” I asked.

“Being the nice guy that you are,” she said, “and for not trying to take that any further.”

I just inclined my head towards her, offered her my arm and we set off to walk the rest of the way home.

We parted company at the gate to our house and I watched her disappear into next door, turned and walked down the drive to my own.

Mum was in the kitchen preparing tea for the family.

“Hi,” I greeted her, “I’m just going to get a shower and changed to go out.”

“Yes, I know,” she said, “Oh by the way, Cal brought your guitar back, she put it in your bedroom.”

“Thanks Mum,” I said.

“Why thank me?” she asked, “Cal’s the one who brought it and put it up there.”

“For telling me Mum,” I told her, and set off upstairs.

Once there I got my towels out of my bedroom, after I put the guitar and amplifier away and headed off to the bathroom.

Where I found the door locked.

I tapped on it and was rewarded by my sister’s dulcet tones.

“Go away Andy, I’m having a bath,” were her words.

“And I need to have a shower ready to go out,” I replied.

“Then come in, the cubicle’s free,” she answered.

“Oh yes,” I said, “that’s great, you’re in the bath naked, I’m in the shower naked, and Mum walks in. That would go down well. We’d both be grounded until menopause.”

“Mine or Mum’s?” she asked.

“Mine,” I replied.

I heard her tinkling laugh.

“Ok, since it’s you, I’ll get out long enough for you to have a shower. But I’m going to leave my water in, so, no doing anything gross like peeing in it.”

“I won’t Pip, I promise,” I said.

A minute or so later, my sister, my thirteen year old sister came out with a towel wrapped round her, just and walked across to her bedroom, with an exaggerated swinging of her hips. I wondered what the hell had got into her.

I shook my head as I walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower.

Five minutes later, and with a towel wrapped round my middle, I tapped on her bedroom door, and told my sister the bathroom was free.

I managed to escape into my own room before she emerged from hers. I wasn’t sure what had got into her but it was something wicked and mischievous.

I dried myself off, sprayed myself all over with appropriate smellies, and pulled on my boxers, while wondering what to wear. I was pulling on my trousers, grey wool and lightweight, when my mobile rang.

I saw by the caller ID that it was Geoff Merkin.

“Hi Geoff,” I said as I pressed the answer button, “what’s up?”

“I found him,” he announced simply.

“Charlie’s Dad?” I asked.

“No, Santa Claus” he replied, “of course Charlie’s Dad, who else was I looking for. I have an address and telephone number for him.”

“Great, can you text it to me?”

“Sure, just give me a minute and I’ll get it to you.”

“Thanks Geoff, I owe you for this,” I said.

“I’ll just put it on the list,” he replied, “are you taking Kathy out tonight?”

“Apparently her AND Charlie, they arranged it between them and hey, I’m just a boy, I get no say in these things.”

“According to my Dad, we never have any say in the matter about anything,” Geoff said.

We agreed on that, and said goodbye and hung up, both of us laughing. A couple of minutes later my phone pinged twice, once with Charlie’s Dad’s address in Dubai, and the other with his phone number.

I texted a ‘Thanks’ back to Geoff and put the phone back in my pocket.

I walked back downstairs, stuck my head in the living room, where Dad was sat watching Rugby on the television, and headed out through the kitchen to walk next door.

I walked round and, for the first time since I got back from America, walked straight in, rather than knocking on the door and waiting.

Aunt Mary was sat at the kitchen table, her laptop open in front of her.

“Online shopping?” I asked.

“No, working on a short story,” she replied. Aunt Mary is an author, she writes short stories for women’s magazines. She’s also written a couple of novels, but she’s still waiting for the world to declare her the next Agatha Christie, or J K Rowling, or whatever type of author it is that she is.

“I’ve come to pick up Charlie,” I said.

“They’re in there,” she replied, there, judging by the thumb jerk she gave over her shoulder was the living room.

I walked through and found them watching TV.

“Hi,” I said, “I’m here.”

“He’s here,” Charlie said.

“He is,” Cal agreed, “I have noticed that he’s always here when he says he’s here. He’s never there. The trouble is I’ve never been there with him, so I don’t know whether he says he’s there when he is there.”

“No,” Charlie replied, “I’ve been there with him, and he always says he’s here when he’s there as well. Which probably just goes to prove that he is in fact, not all there.”