You, Me and Him (9 page)

I move my legs and he sits down next to me, resting his head against my shoulder. His eyes look blurred with tears. Stroking his hair, I tell him how sorry I am to have shouted at Dad.

‘It’s OK, Mummy. I know I’m difficult, I get a bit mental sometimes.’ George forgiving me so easily makes me feel even worse. ‘You don’t want a baby like me.’

‘I love you so much,’ I tell him.

He nods. ‘Do you love Dad?’

I take Baby from him and wrap it around both of us. George huddles in close. ‘Yes. You see, when you love someone, that’s when it hurts the most.’

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I had been seeing Finn for four weeks. He was more tender than I had expected; more patient than I could have hoped for. ‘And, oh, my God, he is so sexy,’ I’d confided to Tiana, still unable to comprehend that he was with me. ‘You’re a good catch too, Josie,’ she’d reminded me, as if I were a fish.

Finn only had to walk into a room and the atmosphere changed, girls instantly flicking their hair and applying gloss to their lips. ‘All they want to know is, “Who’s your friend?”’ Christo would often say in despair because Finn hogged all the limelight.

I couldn’t believe that it was my arm around him, that I was the one he kissed goodnight. Girls stared at me, no doubt wondering what I had that they didn’t. However, I wasn’t ready to sleep with him. ‘You make him wait,’ Tiana had advised too, ‘I jumped into bed with Sean on the second date and it’s game over.’ I loved her advice; it was entertaining and generous in its honesty. The truth was I was terrified I’d do it wrong and then the spell would be broken. I knew Finn found it difficult because he’d told me; but at the same time I could sense he relished the challenge because I hadn’t fallen into bed with him immediately.

I started to go to Finn’s club every Thursday after work. I’d dance all night and by the end of the evening have red raw blisters on my bare skin. He’d often bring his friends into the restaurant. ‘Josie, this is Paddy, Adam, Dom, and you know Christo.’ Finn liked to untie my short white apron or stick notes into my bra, ‘For the sex later,’ he’d tell his friends, grinning, and they’d all pound his back in approval.

I was getting to know them all well. Paddy had a gathering every Monday night. He always wore flared jeans and a thick woolly jumper. He played Reggae music, smoked marijuana, and his dad sold watches in India. Adam wanted to be an actor. Finn called him ‘the Thesp’. He teased Adam, saying his room was more like an English drawing room. ‘I caught him hanging a pheasant from his window,’ he’d told me incredulously. Dom was a drifter, living in his own world. He was the one who carried a stick like a shepherd’s crook and often wore mini-skirts. His father was a fashion designer who lived in Italy. I liked him because he was different, but Christo was my favourite of Finn’s friends. One evening at Momo’s I was carrying a couple of plates of penne and pesto when I saw a mouse scurrying over the worktop, near the baskets of bread. I shrieked and the plates crashed to the floor and smashed into smithereens. Finn and Christo rushed into the kitchen as if it were an Accident and Emergency ward. ‘Mouse,’ I managed to falter, as if I’d just been attacked by a great white shark.

‘Where? How do we kill it?’ Christo had grabbed a large broom and held it in front of him like a weapon.

‘Any traps?’ Finn looked at me. ‘Or glue? Where’d it go?’

I pointed a wobbling finger towards the bread bin. ‘Behind there.’

Christo took a few tentative steps. ‘Do we get it into a bag and then hit it with a rolling pin or something hard?’

‘That’s cruel,’ Finn said. ‘How would you like to be hit on the head with a rolling pin?’

‘I’m not a mouse. Josie, what do you think?’

‘I don’t care, just get rid of it!’ I hid behind him.

‘Christ, you’re a scaredy-cat, Josie.’ Finn was shaking his head at me now.

Christo leant in close to me. ‘Don’t worry, I’m scared of spiders.’ We watched Finn as he took a long loaf of bread out of its bag and in one deft motion lured the mouse onto it; it wriggled out of his grasp, whiskers twitching, and Finn had to dive for it again before finally placing it in the bag and running out of the restaurant. ‘Couldn’t kill it,’ he confessed when he returned, looking pale.

‘You were scared!’ Christo and I laughed at him.

Finn scratched his throat. ‘What’s the poor little thing ever done to us?’

I’d quizzed Christo on his background and learnt that his father came from Nigeria, his mother from Trinidad. He had always been educated in England. He’d gone to an English boarding school and had hated it. ‘It was positively Victorian,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘I can still remember the feel of those wafer-thin blankets and the cold horrible bathroom. There was no comfort in that school.’

‘Christo was put into the reject dorm, too,’ Finn added. ‘Tell J.’

It was the first time he had shortened my name and I did a double take before listening to Christo.

‘“We’re English, we’re white, so we won’t make any of you prefects,”’ he explained. ‘That’s what they told us straight out. I was chucked into the reject dorm with two Chinese blokes. “You won’t ever be promoted to anything,” the headmaster told us. Don’t feel sorry for me,’ Christo insisted, looking my way, ‘that kind of thing has made me very self-sufficient. I got into music, it was my escape into another world.’

When I saw Finn and Christo together, it made sense to me why they were such good friends. They both had this sense of not being quite good enough, not fitting easily into Cambridge. Setting up their club was a way to carve out their own territory, do something meaningful to them both.

*

In between all of this, Finn worked hard. He had two essays to hand in each week, and had to work at least ten to twelve hours a day to get the reading done. ‘The first three years are dry, nothing but learning facts and more facts. Physiology, biochemistry, anatomy … I can’t wait to actually meet some real patients.’ Sometimes we’d sit on my bed and I’d test him on what each joint and tendon were called and, more specifically, how to spell them. I’d point to diagrams illustrating kidneys and intestines, liver and gall bladder, and test him on the function of each. I was learning a lot about the fibula and the tibia, the metatarsal joints, and how my blood supply worked. If I cut my finger I’d learn how the body had receptors that picked up the message of pain. There was one time when I got bored of testing him. ‘What’s this called?’ I asked, unbuttoning my top instead and pointing to my collarbone. He kissed it gently. ‘Josie, you’re distracting me.’ All his papers scattered onto the floor.

His discipline was admirable. Sometimes he’d look so tired, his skin washed out, hair dishevelled and cheeks sallow. But there was always a steely determination in his eyes; something he felt he had to prove to himself. It was as if no one had ever believed in Finn and what he could achieve, so he had to make up for it by believing in himself. Underneath his bravado I was discovering someone who was very different from the Finn I had first met.

On a Saturday night we’d see a film or go out for a meal, as long as it wasn’t pizza. One Saturday he took me to the local disco because they played my music there, he’d teased. On Sundays I’d join his friends in our favourite greasy spoon and we’d feed our hangovers on scrambled eggs, sausages, orange juice and coffee. At the end of an evening we’d lie on my single bed, our long bodies squashed together like a couple of happy sardines.

I loved everything about him: the smell of his skin, wet and salty after dancing; running a hand through his soft hair. We’d smoke joints in my room, the lobster ashtray becoming a best friend. There had been one time when Clarky was practising his violin next-door and Finn and I were listening to a new CD he’d brought round. ‘Keep it down. I’m trying to practise,’ Clarky had shouted through the wall.

‘Why does he play pieces that make you want to slit your wrists?’ Finn asked me.

‘But he’s brilliant. Listen.’

‘This is better.’ He’d put the headphones on me instead. ‘You like Kylie?’ I had stopped hiding my music collection under my bed.

‘I do. So?’

‘So do I. Nice bottom too,’ he’d added, grabbing mine instead.

It was all unexpectedly innocent, that’s what I loved about it most.

The more time we spent together, the less self-conscious I became, as did Finn. But I was aware of letting my friendship with Clarky suffer. I felt guilty but at the same time couldn’t help it. I didn’t want to start thinking about the fact that I had only a few weeks left in Cambridge and then Finn and I would be in different countries. But I did think about it. All the time.

*

‘I thought we could spend the day together?’ Clarky suggested. ‘Have some lunch, see a film.’

‘I’m sorry, I promised Finn. His granny’s coming to Cambridge for the day and …’

Clarky looked surprised. ‘Hardly a hot date with Granny around.’

‘We’re taking her out punting.’ I smiled, remembering Finn’s vow never to take me out on the river. ‘It’s what she wanted to do,’ he had explained, ‘and you’ll soon learn that what Granny wants, she gets.’

Clarky crossed his arms and clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. ‘Grannies tend to be the head of the household. If she doesn’t like you, well, that’s it.’

‘Thanks. I wasn’t feeling nervous, but now I am.’

‘When can I see you then?’

‘Finn’s working tomorrow night so I’m free.’ The moment I’d said it I wanted to take it back.

‘Thanks for making me feel second best, J. Thanks a lot.’

‘I didn’t mean it like that.’

‘Have a good time.’ He shut the door in my face.

*

It was a cold day but the sky was a clear blue and the air was calm. Cambridge was the chilliest town I knew. ‘Wear some extra-warm socks,’ Finn had told me. I walked down the high street which was heaving with enthusiastic shoppers, fellows in their gowns, students on their bikes. I saw the pub where Clarky and I liked to meet after work. I still felt guilty. I had made him feel like a stand-in when Finn wasn’t around. But he also had to stop being snide. Why couldn’t he be happy for me?

Heading towards Magdalene Bridge, I spotted Finn standing by the steps leading down to the water. Beside him was a tall, smart-looking woman in a blue woollen coat and matching skirt.

Finn turned round as if he could sense I was close. He waved and told his grandmother who I was.

I held out my hand. ‘You’re late,’ was the first thing she said to me in a voice that sounded as if she had smoked since the day she was born; either that or she was dying of thirst.

She examined me, just as Finn had. ‘It’s lovely to meet you,’ I said.

She huffed, ‘You don’t know what I’m like yet.’

‘Great, let’s go,’ Finn suggested, taking Granny’s arm and leading her down the steps. She was broad-shouldered like him, with a generous chest, but her legs were as thin as twigs, her long and narrow feet planted in elegant blue high-heeled shoes to match her outfit. I wondered how they carried her weight.

Finn led her to a punt and helped her sit down. ‘Thank you, darling,’ she said, brushing the creases from her skirt once she was carefully positioned at one end. The punt rocked in the murky water. Finn took a striped wooden paddle and his pole. He rolled up his sleeves and stood squarely on the platform at the rear of the punt. ‘Here goes. We call this part of town the Backs, Granny,’ he said, trying to manoeuvre us out into the middle of the river. ‘And it’s called that because you can see the backs of all the famous colleges.’

‘You’re a bit quiet, aren’t you?’ Granny said to me.

‘My father always says, keep silent unless you have something worth saying.’

I noticed the sapphire rock on her finger. ‘You’re the new piece of fluff in Finn’s life, then?’ she continued, unabashed.

‘Er, yes, I am.’ Though ‘fluff’ was hardly the word I’d have used.

‘What happened to that Hatty girl?’ She stuck out her chin, waiting for a response.

I looked at Finn.

‘She had lovely little legs but I didn’t like her,’ Granny continued. She started to twist the ring round her finger. ‘She was a gold digger, that one.’

‘You think all women are gold diggers. Anyway, what was she digging for? I’m a penniless student.’

I laughed in mock disappointment. ‘Shucks! I thought you were rich!’

Granny crossed her arms tightly. ‘My boy’s going to be a successful doctor. You’re a waitress, aren’t you?’ she couldn’t resist adding.

‘Josie’s an artist,’ Finn informed her. ‘She’s got a lot of talent.’

‘Ah, thank you,’ I said.

‘Well, you have, J. So, Granny, I’ll tip you out of the punt if you’re not careful what you say.’

‘Twaddle! He wouldn’t dare.’

‘Finn will be a fantastic doctor,’ I returned the compliment.

‘Ah, thanks, J.’

‘I bet you’re proud of him, Mrs Greenwood?’

She nodded. ‘And he’s going to row for Cambridge. He’s going to be on the box.’

‘No chance! Not fit enough, I drink and smoke too much.’

‘He’s a dreamboat, isn’t he? I tell you, he’s the spitting image of his father.’

I was enjoying the openness of our conversation. Finn’s pole got stuck in the riverbed then and he lost his balance as he tried to retrieve it. ‘Come out, you bastard,’ he muttered. The punt started to rock from side to side and Granny was clutching onto the edge with both hands, her knuckles white. In the end he let the pole go and we started to paddle back to retrieve it. ‘Don’t worry, Finn, you’re doing great,’ I encouraged. A party of children with purple balloons tied on the back of their punt glided past us. A man in a boater hat and green waistcoat was steering them down the river in a beautiful straight line. They laughed and pointed at us. Granny shooed them away with her hand. I was trying not to laugh at Finn’s pained expression; this was his idea of hell. Instead I asked Mrs Greenwood where she lived, how many grandchildren she had and what her husband did.

‘He’s dead. Passed away on St Valentine’s Day, 1992. I cooked him a romantic meal and he expired, just like that. Heart attack.’

I was still trying to find the appropriate response when thankfully Finn stepped in, telling me his grandfather had worked on a luxury liner, organising fabulous cruises. ‘Granny always wears blue, the colour he loved her in best. If I’m half as happy with the woman I love as Granny was with Grandpa, well, I’ll be a lucky man.’

‘My video player has broken down,’ she suddenly announced. ‘I miss not having a good handyman in the house.’

‘What was your husband like?’ I asked.

‘Bobby was the salt of the earth. He loved ballroom dancing.’ Her brown eyes came alive at the memory. ‘I have dancing legs, you know.’ She lifted her skirt to reveal sheer tights and smooth sculpted legs beneath. Not a hair in sight. ‘I’m a freak of nature,’ she boasted. ‘We loved the movies, always sat right at the back, if you know what I mean?’ She was tapping her long nose. ‘Now, on to the things that really matter.’ She raised one eyebrow. ‘What does a girl like you want with my boy?’