Liverpool Love Song (7 page)

Adam smiled. ‘It’s the last thing I want, but it won’t happen.’

‘It happened to my Aunt Goldie.’

‘But years ago. This is the 1960s, all that can be avoided now. You must have read about it.’

‘Yes, but I don’t know exactly how . . .’

‘I do, and I’ve got what’s needed.’ He pulled himself up to the sofa to reach into the pocket of the trousers he’d removed, and showed her a condom.

‘That’ll stop it?’

‘Yes, guaranteed.’

Chloe hesitated, ‘I’ve read that it isn’t always reliable, that there’s a pill now which is better.’

‘We can get that later. This is what I have here and now. It’s perfectly safe.’

‘But what if it doesn’t stop . . . ?’

‘It will. I’ll take good care that it won’t happen. You must relax and not worry about that side of it.’

‘You are sure?’

‘Absolutely. But talking about it like this – hell, Chloe, it’s a real turn-off. Come on, we might as well get dressed and go out. Some other time, eh?’

The following week, Chloe was very much looking forward to Saturday, when she could take the train to Manchester again. She knew now what to expect, and felt she would have the time of her life if Adam made love to her. Being with him was far more fun than staying at home with her own family. They were really quite stick-in-the-mud. She felt she was living at last.

They were still in bed when he ran his finger down her cheek to move her hair away. ‘Stay the night with me?’ he murmured.

‘I couldn’t possibly.’ Chloe sat up with a jerk. ‘Mum would be aghast if I even suggested it.’

‘She’s an earlier generation, Chloe. In her day, the only way was to remain celibate, but modern science means we can enjoy the pleasures of life. We don’t have to worry about an unwanted pregnancy.’

‘When you took me home last week, Mum was really on edge. Well, you could see it, couldn’t you?’ Chloe had invited him in to have a cup of coffee. ‘She’s afraid for me, Adam. Afraid I’ll get into what she calls trouble. Once it’s happened in the family, the horror stays with us.’

‘We’ll have to give her time to get used to me,’ he said. ‘She’ll trust me eventually.’

Chloe got Adam to drive her home. It was just after half ten when he drew into her drive. ‘Mum thinks this is late,’ she said.

‘The generation gap again.’ Adam smiled. ‘People of our age think that’s impossibly early for a Saturday night.’

‘She’s waiting up for me.’ The lights were on in the sitting room. ‘Come in with me,’ Chloe said.

He was hesitating. ‘Last week, she wasn’t pleased to see me.’ ‘She needs to get to know you better.’

She led him into the sitting room, and Adam was as charming as ever to her mother. ‘How are you, Mrs Redwood? Well, I hope?’

Chloe went to the kitchen to make some coffee. Her mother, who was not at ease with Adam these days, came to take over from her.

‘It’s a very late hour to bring visitors in,’ she said.

‘You need to get to know each other,’ Chloe told her. But that seemed to make Helen more uneasy, because it implied Adam was going to be a permanent fixture in her life.

‘Can you ask him for lunch tomorrow?’ Chloe whispered, so Adam wouldn’t overhear and know she’d prompted the invitation. Helen’s face told her she didn’t want him here again.

‘It’s the only way, Mum. You’ll like him once you get to know him.’

‘I’ve already invited Rex, and there’ll be Gran and Marigold too.’

‘A good thing if everybody gets to know him,’ Chloe told her.

Her mother rushed to the fridge. ‘I’m not sure the joint will be big enough.’

Chloe almost smiled. ‘Mum, that’s an enormous leg of lamb. It would feed ten people.’

She got what she wanted, Adam was invited for twelve thirty. That meant they could go out in his car afterwards and have the rest of the day to themselves.

On Sunday, Gran was already dozing in her chair, while Rex was sipping sherry and trying to talk to Marigold about the new Labour government and Harold Wilson’s financial policy. He hoped to steer her away from giving another interminable account of the infirmities she and her mother were suffering. Helen was in the kitchen making gravy, and Chloe was pacing restlessly between the window and her chair.

When Rex heard the front doorbell ring, it came as quite a shock to see Chloe rush to answer it and then bring Adam in to introduce him. Helen hadn’t told him Adam was invited too. He’d brought a magnificent bouquet of flowers for her and an expensive box of chocolates for Chloe. Rex felt socially lacking; he hadn’t thought to bring gifts. He made a mental note to bring a bottle of wine next time he was invited. It seemed Marigold and her mother had not met Adam before, and he got a frosty reception from them.

‘A boyfriend?’ Gran came to life and adjusted her spectacles to peer at him. ‘How long has this been going on?’

Marigold looked shocked. ‘You’re very young to have a boyfriend.’

Especially one like Adam, Rex thought. He looked sophisticated, almost a man about town in his navy blazer with gilt buttons, silver and navy silk tie and silver-grey slacks.

When he told them he’d driven from Manchester, they were shocked again that he had a car of his own and that he was prepared to come so far to see Chloe. They were bouncing questions at him. How old was he? Twenty-four? What sort of work did he do? How did he meet Chloe?

Rex tried to break the questioning up and help everybody feel more at ease, but before long he realised Chloe was doing a better job at that. It made him disheartened to see how preoccupied they were with each other. Their relationship had developed apace and it had put Chloe out of his reach. He felt she was lost to him. But would it last?

Helen moved them all to the dining room and asked Rex to carve the leg of lamb. It was presented on an enormous platter surrounded with roast potatoes and thyme and parsley stuffing. It had a great bone sticking up, which made it look a more complicated job than last week’s beef had been.

Rex hesitated as he approached the table. Chloe noticed and said brightly, ‘Adam’s good at carving. Would you rather he did it?’

Rex capitulated and said yes. Adam took his place and with great confidence gave a theatrical display of clashing the carving knife against the steel to sharpen it. He then proceeded to carve the joint with professional ease and arrange the servings neatly on the plates. It made Rex feel thoroughly inadequate.

It was a sunny afternoon, and when they’d eaten the apple pie and cream that followed, Helen took them all over to the summerhouse for a cup of coffee.

‘I thought it would look better than this inside,’ Marigold said. ‘Aren’t these your old garden chairs?’

‘Yes, I’d like to smarten it up, but how best to do it?’

‘It needs bright colours.’ It was Adam who held forth about a colour scheme of orange, yellow and brown for rugs and curtains.

‘Curtains?’ Marigold asked suspiciously. ‘Why on earth would you want curtains in a summerhouse?’

On a hot day, you might be glad to draw them against the sun,’ Adam said. ‘And bright colours would bring it to life.’ He went on to recommend shops in Manchester where they stocked suitable furniture. ‘I’ll take you and Chloe and help you choose if you like,’ he offered.

‘Mum, that would be lovely,’ Chloe said. ‘The three of us could go one Saturday and have a day out.’

More than anything else that drove home to Rex that Adam was indeed squeezing him out of the place he’d had in Chloe’s affections.

A few weeks later, Rex found the summerhouse had been transformed. It now looked smart enough to provide photographs to grace the centre pages of a luxury magazine. Helen and Chloe said they were delighted with it.

After that, when Rex was invited to take tea in the summerhouse, he’d say to Helen, ‘Gardening is dirty work. I don’t want my clothes to spoil your lovely cushions.’

‘You won’t hurt them,’ she’d say, but he’d insist on having a clean towel to spread over the seat of the large, well-padded cane chair before he sat down. The primary colours and the cube patterns reminded him of Adam. He didn’t care for them.

Adam was coming to Liverpool even more often to take Chloe out, and Rex saw less and less of her. She told him Adam was great fun and that through the summer he’d taken her on trips to the beach at Southport and Morecambe, and he was planning to take her to the Peak District next month. Rex knew she was having a more exciting time than he could give her.

Helen continued to confide her worries to him; they were working together in the garden one Saturday when she told him Chloe was going to Adam’s house almost every weekend and that she’d taken the train to Manchester again this morning.

‘Marigold is almost out of her mind. She’s convinced Chloe will make the same mistake she did.’

‘You must trust her,’ Rex said.

Helen had gone indoors to make them some tea when she came tearing back across the lawn, clearly very upset.

‘Chloe’s just rung me. She says she’s staying the night with Adam and she won’t be home until tomorrow. I couldn’t make her see reason.’

Rex knew this amounted to a crisis in the Redwood family. He threw his arms round her in a comforting hug.

‘The world has changed since we were young, Helen. The pill is changing everything. Young people can live like this now. It’s going to become normal behaviour.’

‘But it’s wrong. I feel she’s heading for disaster and she won’t listen to me. I’ve given her the Marie Stopes books Marigold gave me, so she must know the risks she’s taking.’

Rex sighed. He’d had to accept that Adam was part of Chloe’s life, and Helen must too. ‘You can take it that she does,’ he said. ‘She’s been going to his house for weeks. What they’re doing is probably no longer new to them.’

The months were passing quickly and Chloe was having the time of her life. She enjoyed her job and she adored Adam. Occasionally one of her colleagues at work got married, and the frequent discussions about bridal matters made Chloe long for marriage too. Aunt Goldie had dropped hints almost from the time she’d introduced her to Adam; now Mum was telling her outright that she should marry him. But Chloe had to wait for him to propose. It was convention that the bride should wait for the groom to ask her.

He made love to her regularly, and because she was spending one or two nights each week with him, it must be obvious to her family that she was allowing this. One afternoon she was lying in his arms, both of them replete with love, when she said simply, ‘Adam, why don’t we get married?’

She felt him stir. ‘There’s no need, is there? Aren’t you happy?’

‘Yes, but I’d like to be married. It’s getting on for a year now, and Mum keeps asking me when it’ll be. She says I’m your wife in everything but name.’

He moved away from her and propped his head up with his arm. ‘I suppose, yes . . .’

‘I am. So why not make it official?’

He sighed, ‘It means nothing, it’s only a ceremony and a piece of paper.’

‘It’s more than that. I’m embarrassed when Mum asks. How can I tell her you don’t want to? That sounds as though you don’t rate me highly enough. I’m OK as a mistress but would be lacking as a wife.’

‘Hey, Chloe,’ he was gathering her into his arms again, ‘it’s not like that and you know it. I do love you, I really do.’

She pulled away. ‘But not enough to marry me?’

‘Why don’t you move in here with me? That would be just like being married, wouldn’t it? I’ve asked you before . . .’

‘Many times.’ She was out of bed and pulling on her clothes.

His big brown eyes were beseeching. ‘Then why not?’

‘I’d have to leave my job. I . . .’

‘You’d have to do that if we got married. You could get another job here. What’s the difference?’

‘My family would be shocked. Terminally shocked. Aunt Goldie would never get over it.’ This was the first serious tiff they’d had, and all the warmth and love Chloe felt for him suddenly cooled. ‘I want to go home.’

‘Now? I’ve booked a table at the Lansdown for half seven. You said you wanted to go.’

‘I’ve changed my mind.’ She was tossing her belongings into her overnight bag. ‘I’ll take a bus to the station and catch the train home.’

‘Don’t be like this, Chloe. I’ll run you into town if you really want to go. I’ll run you home.’

‘The station will do.’

On the way, he never stopped pleading with her to forgive him and stay. He told her a dozen times he was head over heels in love with her.

Chloe arrived home to find the house empty, because her mother wasn’t expecting her back until tomorrow. She looked in the garage and saw Mum’s car was there, so guessed she’d probably gone out with Rex. She found some leftover soup in the fridge and reheated that for her supper.

When she heard the key scrape in the front door, she was slumped in front of the television, though unable to follow the plot of the thriller because her mind was racing with mixed emotions about Adam. She heard Mum and Rex laughing as they came up the hall. It made her feel very much alone.

‘Chloe, you’re home! That’s nice. I thought I must have left the light on. I’ve brought Rex in for a drink, we’ve been to the bistro for supper. What would you like, Rex? Beer or a cup of coffee?’

‘Coffee, please.’

Chloe could see Rex looking at her in rather a strange fashion.

‘I’ll make it.’ She leapt to her feet, wanting to distance herself before they asked why she’d come home unexpectedly.

They were not laughing any more, and Rex now seemed uncomfortable. He drank the coffee quickly and took his leave. Helen saw him out, then came back to pause in the doorway to gaze at her.

‘You’ve quarrelled with Adam?’ she asked.

Chloe was glad her mother had picked up on it and she didn’t have to explain.

‘You look miserable. I can’t think of anything else that would do that to you.’

‘Yes,’ she admitted, but she couldn’t tell her why. Mum would say she’d done the right thing to throw him over and would be pleased.

That night, Chloe cried herself to sleep. The next day Adam rang her twice. The second time Chloe wouldn’t pick it up. She told her mother to say she didn’t want to speak to him.