A Place in the Country (32 page)

“It's not as bad as it first seemed. Not that there's a lot, because of what happened, but James had in fact made trust funds for you and Issy, and also for Asia.”

“Of course! Jackie must have known about that and thought she'd get her hands on it.”

“It was the bank's fault,” Mark told her. “‘An error in accounting,' they called it. Anyhow, there's enough now for Melanie to buy their apartment and to live on, though she'll still have to work.”

“So will I,” Caroline said. “Nothing wrong with that. These days women have to fend for themselves.”

“But not children. They must be looked after and however bad James was, he recognized that responsibility. Life goes on,” he said. “And
your
life?” he added. “How's it going?”

“Good. Great.” Caroline took a gulp of champagne. “Any time now,
partner,
our restaurant will be opening. I'm just waiting for the furniture to be delivered. Sarah's moving into the cottage while I'm away and she'll check out how well our kitchen functions. I know exactly what I'm going to serve, in the beginning anyway, and to start with I'm planning on forty customers, but only on Friday and Saturday nights.”

“Hmm, we won't make our fortunes yet then.” He smiled.

“Just you wait, before too long they'll be clamoring at the door,” Caroline said, and with a sudden drop of fear in her stomach, she hoped she was right. Everything depended on it.

Melanie's apartment building was close to Orchard Road, near the boutique where she worked. Asia was quiet in the car and Caroline saw Issy squeeze her hand, heard her say it would be all right, her mom would be waiting.

But Melanie was not waiting for them in the foyer, and Asia pushed the elevator button for the sixth floor.

Caroline took a deep breath.
This is it,
she told herself.
Moment of truth time. I'm about to see the woman my husband really loved. No, that's wrong; he really loved me too, and then his love moved on, and because of that we have Asia as well as Issy.

Melanie was waiting at the door. She was petite, with delicately boned Thai features, an exquisite skin the color of dark-gold honey, and long black hair in a neat bun speared with an ebony stick. She was wearing an amber-color lace top that left her shoulders bare, with skinny jeans and flats.

Issy held out her arms and Asia raced into them. Neither of them said a word, they simply held each other as tightly as possible. Then Melanie and Caroline looked at each other. “Welcome,” Melanie said. “Won't you please come in.”

The apartment was very small and simple with a dining area at one end and an open-plan kitchen. A pair of sofas in front of a large television set were piled with colorful Thai-silk cushions, and sliding glass doors opened onto a tiny terrace.

In a corner was a small red-lacquered kitchen-god shrine with a Buddha-like deity lit by a flickering votive. In the bowl in front of him was an offering of fruits.

“Please, sit down,” Melanie said. “Can I offer you some tea?”

Her English was as flawless as her face and Caroline thought how could James
not
have fallen for her? She was gentle, beautiful, and anxious to please.

“It's difficult for me to meet you,” she said now to Caroline. “I know you cannot like me, it is inevitable, but you took care of my daughter when I did something wrong and sent her there.”

“You did nothing wrong,” Caroline said, reminding herself she had already lost James by the time he met and fell in love with Melanie. “We were glad to meet Asia, find a new sister.”

So far, though, Melanie had not so much as looked at Issy, who had shrunk into a corner of the sofa and was staring miserably down at her feet.

“Issy took care of me.” Asia twitched at her mother's jeaned leg, gazing up at her.

“Then we must say thank you.”

Melanie finally looked directly at Issy. “Your name is as pretty as you are,” she said. “Isabel is beautiful. James told me that about you.”

Issy lifted a non-caring shoulder and said nothing. She really didn't want to know her father's lover.

Melanie turned away from her and went into the kitchen and came out with a bottle of Portuguese Vinho Verde. She poured three glasses, put them on a tray with a can of Coke for Issy and a glass of orange juice for Asia.

Issy stared surprised. Her own mom didn't even know you served Coke in the can for chrisakes! And it was icy cold, exactly the way it should be. She looked at Melanie as she said thank you, observing how much younger she was than her own mother, and that she was lovely, like some girl from a Singapore Airlines ad, and also that she was so nervous she almost dropped the tray. Issy put out a hand to stop it tilting and received a grateful smile. The woman even had perfect white teeth, she'd bet she had never had a cavity in her life.

“Mommy,” Asia said, sitting next to Issy on the sofa, “will you please love Issy.”

Issy felt the mortified blush and gave Asia a nudge. Asia said “ow” and spilled her juice all over the sofa and the Thai-silk cushions.

Caroline laughed. “It's just like being at home,” she said, and Melanie laughed too.

Then Mark had a serious talk with Melanie, telling her about the small trust fund that would enable her to buy her apartment, and pay for Asia's education. Melanie did not cry when she heard the news, but she put her hands together in that Thai way and bowed her head, saying thank you.

“Why don't we all drink to James?” Mark said, “taking the bull by the horns,” as Caroline was to tell everyone later.

“James was a good man,” Melanie said loyally.

“A good daddy,” Asia said.

“Yes, to both those,” Issy agreed.

Caroline raised her glass too, it was hard but she told herself she could get over it; she always had, hadn't she? Then she tucked the memory of James's and her life into the special place she would keep it forever. And Asia came and sat on her knee, and she heard Issy asking Melanie about the kitchen-god shrine saying she remembered one exactly like it in their old apartment, and Mark was sitting back with a Cheshire cat grin on his face.

She hoped he wasn't about to ask her to marry him.

 

chapter 76

Caroline realized,
after an hour, there wasn't really that much to say. She and Melanie might have James's daughters in common but they were not women who would normally have sought each other out. They could never be real friends. She was just about to say it was time to leave when Asia remembered her surprise.

“Where is it, Mommy?” she demanded, jumping excitedly up and down. “Is it an iPhone?”

Mark laughed and said, “Didn't it used to be Etch-a-Sketch?”

“It's in the bedroom,” Melanie said.

They heard her yell of surprise and
oh my oh my oh my,
then she came running back, clutching a sweet-looking black kitten. Issy was immediately on her knees and both of them stroking and coaxing. The kitten began to purr loudly.

“Oh, Mommy, it's the
best
surprise,” Asia said.

“What will you call it?” Caroline asked.

“Why, Brenda, of course,” Asia said, as though all kittens were automatically named Brenda. “She's not blind,” she explained, “so I can't call her
Blind
Brenda.”

Issy said, “But you'll have to promise to love her and look after her, and feed her properly.”

“Oh, I will, I will,” Asia promised.

It was a good time to say goodbye. There were hugs, there were kisses, Asia cried and so did Issy.

“Come back and see me, little sister,” she whispered and Asia promised she would.

Caroline told Melanie it was wonderful to have met Asia, and she was sure they would see each other again.

“We will see her again, won't we?” Issy asked when they were in the car and Caroline reassured her, thinking, by hook or by crook, they would. She couldn't allow Asia to slip out of Issy's life now.

They were all hungry and they stopped off at one of the hawker areas with fifty or sixty busy stalls, where they ate spicy pork and noodles so thin they melted in their mouths.

On the way back to Mark's they drove past their old apartment building. “Why not stop and take a look?” Mark asked, casually. “I happen to have the key.”

Caroline glanced at Issy who was looking longingly at her, and knew she had to let her go “home” again.

The elevator smelled the same, of polished wood and Windexed mirrors, and opened with the same perfectly smooth swoosh onto the big empty apartment that had been their home for so many years. It was the same but oh so different, empty and soulless without its family.

Caroline searched for the appropriate memories, but they refused to come. For her, it was in the past.

She waited while Issy went to look round, peering at the closet where she used to play with her father's ties, in the kitchen where they'd eaten dinner together, in her old “little girl” bedroom.

She walked slowly back and Caroline took her hand.

“It's over, Mom,” Issy said quietly.

The past had finally become the past.

*   *   *

Later, when Issy
had gone to bed, Caroline sat on Mark's hard modern sofa looking out at the lights of the marina. Music came faintly from a nearby club; there were snatches of laughter, a car horn …

“Is it all in the past, Caroline?”

She could feel him looking at her, knew what was coming. She removed her glasses, pushed back her fringe and took a deep breath.

“Yes,” she said simply. “I don't belong here anymore. I'm not the person I was when I lived here. I don't belong, Mark.”

“Then you won't marry me?”

She laughed. “Oh, Mark, you didn't even ask me.”

“I was afraid to ask because I knew the answer.”

“But we are still friends. I need you in my life.” She took his hand. It was pleasantly warm, strong, like Mark himself.

“Is there someone else?” He needed to know the truth so he could give up hope.

Caroline thought seriously about his question. She thought about Jim and what was happening between them. It was exciting, nice, lovely. But was it the real thing?

She lifted her shoulder in a gesture that spoke words. “Maybe,” she said.

Mark got up and poured a glass of the champagne left over from earlier that evening, when he'd still had hope.

“You'd better make a success of that restaurant,” he warned and they both laughed.

 

chapter 77

To Caroline's surprise,
when they arrived back at London's Heathrow Airport, Georgki was waiting for them. “Jim was going to pick you up, but last minute could not,” he said, putting his arms carefully round Caroline so their bodies did not touch. As though he was afraid of her she thought, kissing his cheek. And maybe he was.

“Well, I'm glad it's you, Georgki,” she said, as he hefted their bags from the luggage trolley into the back of the Hummer. “There's nobody else whose smiling face I would rather see.”

She got into the front seat next to Georgki, turning automatically to check Issy. “Seat belt?” she asked.

Issy sighed loudly. Her mother always asked that.

“It's only because I care,” Caroline told her serenely.

“Mom, of course I've fastened my seat belt. You don't have to ask me anymore, I always do and I always will.”

“And I'll still ask,” Caroline said, and then without waiting for the expected question answered, “Just because.”

Issy rolled her eyes. “Because
what
?”

“Because I'm a mom and that's what moms have to do. Get a handle on it, Issy, after all these years I thought you would have realized that.”

Georgki threw her a nervous look, worried they were having a fight.

Caroline threw him a nervous look back; shouldn't he be keeping his eyes on the road? She sighed and closed her eyes, deciding to allow her daughter and Georgki to take care of themselves for the moment. It had been an emotional few days, she was just off a long-haul flight and was exhausted. And of course, she thought repentantly, so was Issy, and now
she
was being bitchy with her. “Sorry,” she called without opening her eyes but Issy was already asleep. And soon, so was Caroline.

They woke though, when Georgki turned off the motorway. Issy yawned and ruffled her hair.

“There you are,” Caroline said, turning to look at her.

“You were sleeping too.” Issy gave her mother's shoulder an affectionate pat. She looked at Georgki, at his stern face and his big hands clamped on the wheel, at the sheer height and size of him. He could play the bad guy in any movie.

“You know you're really
scary,
Georgki,” she said.

Caroline frowned at her and she added quickly, “I mean you're just so big and you don't smile … much.”

Georgki shrugged. “Is only I am Russian.”

“From Estonia,” Caroline informed Issy.

“From Serbia,” he corrected.

“Right. Serbia.” She would never get his story straight and nor, she suspected, would he.

He said, “I'm sorry, if I scare you. I care very much for you and your mother. I am good friend.”

“You
are
my good friend.” Caroline patted the hand nearest to her. “And you always will be.” Mark and Georgki, she was thinking, two “friends” in love with me.

Issy was checking out the two of them, wondering. Her mother couldn't possibly have a thing going with Georgki, could she? Bloody hell, she hoped not!
No,
she told herself,
no, she can't.
If anybody it's Jim, who must be half her age anyway. She sat back in her seat, wondering morosely how to deal with her mother.

Georgki parked in front of the pub and took care of their bags while Issy barged inside. Caroline followed, remembering the two of them arriving at the pub that first night. She realized how much their lives had changed. They had new friends, family, affection, warmth, a security of the heart she had never known before.