Obstacles to Young Love

‘He does birds. Geese. Ducks. That sort of thing.’

‘I see.’

‘They look, you know, just…er…’

‘Just like real live birds, ducks, geese?’

‘Yes. Exactly.’

‘Oh, dear.’

Timothy feels humiliated, but Antoine continues.

‘When we get to know you all, Clive and I will take you under our wing. We’ll go to exhibitions. We’ll show you true art. Good art. Great art. Oh, and bad art. That’s always fun too.’

Timothy finds the prospect daunting. He isn’t ready for this. He’d almost prefer humiliation. It’s easier to deal with. Less emotionally demanding. He finds himself staring at a painting on the wall above the hostess trolley. It shows a ketch beating up the Deben towards a stormy sunset.

Antoine knows what he is thinking.

‘No,’ he says. ‘Not good.’

‘Bad?’ ventures Timothy.

‘No. Not bad. But what use is “not bad”? Not bad is no use. Why are all the paintings in this house pictures of boats?’

‘Naomi’s father sails.’

‘And her mother?’

‘No.’

‘Oh. That’s bad.’

‘Well, I think she gets sick. Very sick.’

‘No, no. I don’t mean it’s bad that she doesn’t sail. I mean it’s bad that all the pictures are of boats when she doesn’t sail.’

The conversation stops there. Antoine is perfectly happy for it to stop but Timothy thinks that it’s entirely his fault.

Now Penny calls across the table to Antoine and asks him questions about France, about his background, about his painting. Then she looks across at her husband, seeking help.

William, who has been staring wistfully at the schooner that is bowling along up the Solent above the bulky Victorian sideboard handed down from his family and impossible to sell until they’re all dead, gives Penny a slight nod, turns to Antoine, and says, ‘I believe quite a large proportion of people in French cities live in flats and apartments.’

‘Yes,’ says Antoine, as if it has been just the question he was expecting. ‘Probably more than here, I think. We do not all see the need to own a house. We are not quite such a nation of gardeners.’

‘Yes. So I’ve heard,’ says William. ‘I sometimes think only our gardens save us from mass outbreaks of insanity. You must have other escapes.’

Antoine doesn’t rise to this.

‘How did you and Clive meet?’ asks Penny brightly, oh, so brightly.

‘On the train,’ says Clive. ‘I was going back to college. I’d popped up to Edinburgh to see an exhibition. And there was this impossibly handsome man strolling sexily down the carriage. Naturally I followed him.’

There is a brief silence. Naomi cannot believe how bravely her parents are taking this. If only she’d known, maybe she and Timothy could have been honest with them. Too late now.

‘Your food is very different from ours, isn’t it?’ continues Penny remorselessly.

‘They eat frogs’ legs,’ says Isobel savagely. It is the only thing she says during the entire meal.

‘We eat all sorts of other things as well,’ says Antoine. ‘You should try our cassoulet.’

Poor Timothy. He can think of nothing to say. He assumes that what he is hearing is sparkling repartee. He hasn’t the experience to realise that this is one of the most stilted conversations he’ll ever hear. He feels out of his depth. He wants to talk to Naomi, but she is sailing down memory lane with her brothers and he has the feeling that she has forgotten she has a fiancé. And all the time his present sits there, in the lounge, waiting. He clings to the thought that, because it has been so wretchedly tied up, it will be all the more of a sensation when it is revealed. But he is not entirely convinced. How slowly time passes. That wretched ketch seems to have been sailing towards that bloody sunset (he apologises to God for his language) for hours, and they still aren’t onto the trifle.

Julian gets to his feet.

‘We must have a toast,’ he announces. ‘Is there any more wine? Everyone must have wine.’

‘Oh, sorry,’ says William. ‘We aren’t wine people, I’m afraid.’

He goes out and comes back with another, differently shaped bottle.

‘It’s not the same, I’m afraid,’ he says.

‘That’s a relief,’ says Julian.

‘Oh, Lord, wasn’t it good? Sorry. Maybe this’ll be better. Not doing my job, eh? Out of touch.’

Julian opens the bottle and makes no comment.

Antoine says. ‘I’d be on safer ground painting black towers.’

‘Right,’ says Julian. ‘All got a drop?’

‘Timothy hasn’t,’ says Antoine.

‘I don’t drink,’ protests Timothy.

‘Got to have a drop to toast our Naomi,’ insists Clive.

Antoine fills a quarter of a glass with wine and hands it to Timothy.

‘Right. The toast. To my dear sister on her eighteenth birthday. How pretty you are, Naomi. Hasn’t she grown pretty, Clive?’

‘Every inch a Juliet.’

‘To our lovely sister Naomi. Happy birthday,’ say the brothers in unison.

‘To Naomi,’ they all cry, raising their glasses.

Timothy takes a sip and almost chokes, but it doesn’t taste too bad, it’s reasonably sweet and warm, he can’t think what all the fuss is about.

Clive leads them into singing ‘Happy Birthday to You’.

William moves his lips but he is so embarrassed that no sounds emerge, Antoine doesn’t know the words, Penny sings too loudly to drown the silence, Julian growls like a stag in rut, Isobel performs as if she’s in an opera but goes too fast and gets ahead of everybody else, Teresa smiles blankly, coolly, beakily, and Timothy succumbs to his choking fit and turns purple. It cannot by any stretch of the imagination be described as a musical triumph, and, after they have all sat down, there is another moment of silence.

Naomi stands.

‘I think I should make a speech,’ she says.

There are cheers and cries of ‘Hurrah’. William hunches himself against further embarrassment and dreams of sailing sweetly into St Peter Port harbour on the evening breeze.

‘Thank you all for coming,’ says his daughter. ‘Thanks for the lovely chicken, Mum, it was really great, and for the wine, Dad, very nice. It’s really great to have my best friend Isobel here, and I’m thrilled that my dear brothers could make it, and it’s really great to meet their partners. But above all it’s great to have my fiancé here tonight. I’m really looking forward to that intriguingly shaped present. I’m sure he’s got me something really great.’

There is warm applause.

‘And now a great English delicacy – trifle,’ Penny tells Antoine.

‘I’m enchanted,’ says Antoine.

Three people have seconds, and all the while Timothy’s tension grows.

As at last they leave the dining room, Timothy finds himself walking just in front of Julian and Teresa, who have not been able to discuss matters with each other during the meal.

‘All right?’ whispers Julian.

‘Just about,’ comes Teresa’s answering whisper, ‘for one who’s been completely ignored because they’re all fawning over the Frog poofter to show they aren’t prejudiced, and if that girl had said “really great” once more I’d have thrown up.’

Timothy is surprised by this, but he supposes that it’s impossible to please everyone.

He has decided that he hates Julian, so he is slightly discomfited when Julian whispers, ‘“That girl”, as you call her, is my lovely sister. What did I ever see in you?’

But now they are in the lounge and he can hear no more.

Even now it isn’t time for the presents. There’s coffee first.

‘Now. The presents,’ says Naomi at last. ‘I can’t wait another moment. Julian?’

Nobody knows quite why it has always been Julian who hands out the parcels, but the family sees no reason to change its traditions now.

‘Er…just before Julian plays his part in what is obviously some cosy family ritual that I know nothing about,’ says Teresa, ‘I’ve got a bit of a headache. I’m off to bed if nobody minds.’

Nobody minds, nobody would miss Teresa if she jumped off a cliff, and that now includes Julian. But there is a little awkward feeling in the room, which affects everyone except Timothy.

When Julian had told his parents that he was bringing Teresa, there had been a brief discussion between Penny and William. They had both agreed that Julian and Teresa should not sleep together under their roof. Penny had thought that William should tell them. William had hoped that Penny would.

‘You’ve so much more rapport,’ he had said.

‘And why is that?’ she had retorted. ‘Because you don’t try, and because you sail for a month every August and miss most of our holidays.’

This had shocked William, who had felt that after eleven years of silence on the matter the sore had healed. He had immediately agreed to tackle the issue.

He had felt awkward talking on the phone to Julian about this. He always felt rather awkward talking on the phone, he always felt rather awkward talking to Julian, and he always felt very awkward talking about anything relating to sex.

‘Julian, old chap, how are you? Look, it’s like this. Um…bit of a problem over the…um…the sleeping arrangements. You’ll probably think we’re desperately old-fashioned, and probably we are, but there it is, and I am an elder in the church and your mother does teach at the Sunday School and we…what you do in your lives is up to you, you’re adults, but…um…I’m afraid we can’t condone sex before…um…before…um…marriage under our roof. I mean, sex under our roof, not marriage. I’m sorry, old thing, but that’s all there is to it. If Teresa comes, you must share a bed with Clive like old times…nice, eh, memories of camping, memories of Guernsey, happy times?…you are still there, are you?…Oh, good…and Teresa will just have to muck in with Clive’s girlfriend and hope they get on. Or, I mean, one lot could go to a B & B, we have recommendations.’ He had realised that this sounded a bit dry, so had added, ‘But we hope you’ll stay. Be nice to have all the family under one roof.’

He had been so exhausted, after the emotional challenge of the longest speech he had made in his life outside weddings, classrooms and yachts, that he had entirely forgotten that the job was only half done and that he hadn’t rung Clive.

Julian and Teresa had agreed, Teresa very reluctantly, and then Clive had turned up with Antoine. Clearly Teresa couldn’t sleep with Antoine. That would solve nothing.

Penny had given William a bit of an ear-bashing for not phoning Clive to discuss the arrangements. ‘Never face more awkward moments than you have to, do you?’

‘I just assumed Clive would fall in with the plans. How was I to know his partner was a…’ He had pulled back from using a derogatory term.

There had been talk of trying the B & Bs, but time had been short and in the end Naomi’s parents had agreed that the two couples could sleep together.

‘But we agree under duress,’ William had said. ‘And…er…’ He had looked even more embarrassed than usual. ‘I don’t think I need to say more, but…’

‘But you will,’ Julian had interrupted.

‘Yes. Yes, I will. I think and hope that I can trust all four of you to respect our family home and not…um…try any…um…funny business.’

Teresa had looked furious, but had said nothing. Antoine had looked amused, but had said nothing.

Clive had said, ‘Please don’t stay awake all night listening, Dad, especially to us, wondering what we get up to, as if you didn’t know. After all, even Catullus did it.’

‘I find that attitude unhelpful, frankly, Clive. If you had told us in the first place that Antoine was a man, none of this need have happened.’

‘If I had told you Antoine was a man, it would have suggested that I thought it something I needed to apologise about. Let’s leave it there, shall we, Dad?’

They had left it there. Only now, as Teresa leaves the room, is there any need to think about the matter and recall how difficult the early part of the evening has been.

‘Right,’ says Julian brightly, to show that he isn’t upset by Teresa’s departure. ‘The presents.’

He picks up Timothy’s misshapen offering and carries it over to Naomi as if it might explode.

She begins to tear at the paper, but the parcel proves almost as difficult to unwrap as it was to wrap.

If you have a dead curlew handy, try wrapping it and then unwrapping it bit by bit. It will not reveal the secret of its identity easily. For quite a while nobody can tell what on earth it is. Everybody feels the tension, but nobody more than Timothy.

At last the curlew is fully revealed, its magnificent curved beak, its barred grey-brown plumage, and its eyes. Its eyes look out at the group, sharp, inquisitive, dead. Naomi holds the dead curlew in her hands. She goes cold all over. She is in shock. She hates the lifeless feel of its feathers in her fingers. She heard a curlew trill one morning on the moors and thought that she had never heard a more beautiful sound. She hates it dead. Hates it.

She cannot tell Timothy this.

There is silence in the room.

‘It’s a curlew,’ explains Timothy.

‘Yes, I know,’ says Naomi. ‘I’ve seen them. But not dead.’

‘We didn’t kill it,’ says Timothy. ‘It crashed into a greenhouse up beyond Tangley Ghyll. It’s mine. My very first effort. I did it for you. Dad let me.’

‘I didn’t realise,’ says Naomi.

She is staring at Timothy. He doesn’t know why. He wishes she wouldn’t stare at him. But she has to, for fear that she will catch someone else’s eye. Anyone’s eye. If she does, she’ll succumb to hysterics.

‘Thank you,’ she says. ‘Thank you, darling.’ Saying ‘darling’ makes her feel about eighty, but she doesn’t know what else to call him. ‘It’s…it’s lovely, Timothy.’

She puts the curlew down on an occasional table. She feels so much better now that she’s no longer holding it. She moves back and surveys it.

‘Really lovely,’ she says. ‘Oh, Timothy. You did all that for me.’

She goes over to him and hugs him.

He beams.

‘Was it dreadfully horrid, doing it? You know, putting your fingers up it and…whatever it is you do. Was it awful?’

‘You don’t put your fingers up it. There is no up to put your fingers up. You build a form, with papier mâché, and wire to hold the legs and beak and stuff. It’s like sculpture. You don’t stuff a bird, because you put the skin on at the end, over what you’ve built. It’s an art. It’s what I do. It’s what I’m going to do with my life. It’s my job. Of course it wasn’t horrid.’

‘I didn’t realise,’ she says again, weakly. ‘Well, thank you.’ And she kisses him on the cheek.

‘Well…follow that,’ says Julian, strolling over to the pile of presents.

‘A most original present and a most personal gift,’ says Antoine firmly to Naomi. ‘And Timothy, as a fellow artist I would love to come and see your father’s workshop.’ He looks at the curlew critically. ‘Not at all a bad first effort, Timothy.’

‘Thank you,’ says Timothy. ‘My dad says if you’ve done it really well its eye will follow you wherever you move.’

Naomi tries to hide her horror at this prospect.

Naomi and Timothy are only a few feet away from each other in the great, dark, solemn church. Only Darren Pont, Lindsay East and Sally Lever are between them. All the others in the class, except for Sally Lever, are younger than Naomi and Timothy, who have both rather enjoyed setting an example, and pretending to be mature.

With its fine hammer roof and fifteenth-century font cover, the church is one of only two buildings in Coningsfield to merit a complimentary mention in Pevsner, and the other has now gone to make room for a monstrously ugly multistorey car park whose entrances and exits snake so sharply that few motorists venture into it. The Poles have rebuilt their major cities in all their historical glory, but this is England.

Naomi is not thinking about Poles or the hammer roof. She is thinking of the hammering of her heart. Why does it hammer so? Could it be because she has realised that she and Timothy are poles apart?

She has a pit in her stomach and several moths are flying round there, trying to escape. She is uncomfortably aware of Timothy. She loves him, of course. She is supposed to be going to marry him. But…there is that distance between them.

It’s the curlew. How could he give her such a dreadful thing? How could there be such a chasm between their sensibilities? She keeps it in a cupboard, so that she never has to look at its reproachful eye following her round the room saying, ‘Why did you humiliate me in this way?’ but she is still aware that it is there, in her home, polluting it. She tells Timothy that she keeps it in her bedroom beside her photograph of him. This means that, when he calls round, she has to bring it out in her gloved hands and put it there, in case he pops upstairs and peeps, to see how his proud creation sits, how fine it looks, how happy Naomi must be to wake up from her beauty sleep and see it there, reminding her of him.

It isn’t just the curlew. It’s God. Timothy looks so fervent, so exalted. She cannot feel either fervent or exalted. Why is she here? Because her parents are Christians, her father is an elder, her mother teaches at Sunday School, she sings hymns in school assembly, she prays in school assembly, she writes ‘C of E’ on forms, she tells the careers officer she is C of E. To write ‘agnostic’, to keep her lips clamped during hymns, to keep her head defiantly unbowed during prayers, to upset her parents, what a burden that would be. No, when it comes to religion, the playing field is not level. Oh, there is so much more than just Darren Pont, Lindsay East and Sally Lever between them. Will today bring them closer together? Once they have eaten the body of Christ and drunk the blood of Christ, will they be able to reignite their love?

She recalls the last time he had visited L’Ancresse, a week or so ago. She had felt obliged to take him up to her room, to show him the curlew that she had taken out of the cupboard that morning.

‘There it is,’ she had said, hating herself. ‘In pride of place.’

‘Who’s that?’

His eye had fallen on a sepia photograph, beautifully framed, sitting in the centre of her dressing table. It showed a very handsome young man, with perfect features and a trim moustache. She had found that she didn’t want to tell him, which had surprised her. He was her secret, her harmless secret.

‘Just…a family friend,’ she had said evasively.

She thinks about her evasion now. Her desire to evade seems significant to her. She tries to concentrate on the Bishop’s words, spoken with such uninspired solemnity.

‘To the end that Confirmation may be ministered to the more edifying of such as shall receive it…’

What a strange way to put it. Nice to be thought of among the more edifying, but still…odd.

More words, but she isn’t listening. A dreadful truth has assailed her. It isn’t just God and the curlew. It’s Steven Venables. He’s asked her out. She finds him attractive. He’s so self-contained, so confident, so sure of himself. If she went out with him, he would tell her where he was taking her. Timothy asks her where she wants to go. And then says, ‘Are you sure?’ and they fuss about it till she doesn’t know where she wants to go any more.

‘…which order is very convenient to be observed; to the end, that children, being now come to the years of discretion…’

Discretion, is that what I’ve come to, it doesn’t seem like it to me, thinks Naomi. I’m light years away from discretion.

‘…and having learned what their godfathers and godmothers promised for them in Baptism…’

Auntie Flo is my godmother, but who the hell is my godfather? Oops, language, Naomi. I should be scared, using the word ‘hell’ in my thoughts in church, in the presence of the Bishop. But I’m not. Hell, hell, hell. Not frightening, because there is no hell except the one we humans make.

She’s drifted away from the Bishop’s words again. He really is a very dull bishop. Concentrate, Naomi.

‘…may themselves, with their own mouth and consent, openly before the Church, ratify and confirm the same; and also promise, that by the grace of God, they will evermore endeavour themselves faithfully to observe such things, as they, by their own confession, have assented unto.’

She looks across at Timothy. He looks swollen with good intentions, of consenting, of ratifying, of confirming, of evermore endeavouring, of faithfulness and of assenting unto.

Now the candidates for confirmation move forward towards the altar. They become more than a congregation now. They become active participants in the ceremony.

‘Our help is in the Name of the Lord,’ says the Bishop.

‘Who hath made heaven and earth,’ cry Timothy, Darren, Lindsay, Sally and all the others except Naomi.

‘Blessed be the Name of the Lord,’ exclaims the Bishop.

‘Henceforth, world without end,’ whispers Naomi, trying to join in, knowing that her feelings towards Timothy and God are inextricably and perhaps senselessly joined together on this oh, so solemn day. In a few moments she will be confirmed. It’s too late now to do anything about it.

‘Lord, hear our prayer,’ thunders the Bishop.

‘And let our cry come unto thee.’ Naomi can hear Timothy’s voice above all the others. She senses that he feels nearer to God than the others, and therefore further away from her.

‘Almighty and everliving God, who hast vouchsafed to regenerate these thy servants by Water and the Holy Ghost…’ the Bishop finds extra reserves of solemnity, ‘and hast given unto them forgiveness of all their sins…’

No longer to have to be ashamed of those three nights in Earls Court, especially the second one, and all those lies to Mum and Dad, but what’s the point of forgiveness if you can’t forgive yourself?

‘…Strengthen them, we beseech thee, O Lord, with the Holy Ghost, the Comforter; and daily increase in them thy manifold gifts of grace…’

Steven Venables has a sister called Grace.

‘…the spirit of wisdom and understanding…’

The dentist thinks I may be going to have a bit of trouble from a wisdom tooth.

‘…the spirit of counsel and ghostly strength, the spirit of knowledge and true godliness…’

The abstract words plop meaninglessly into Naomi’s abstracted brain.

‘…and fill them, O Lord, with the spirit of thy holy fear, now and for ever. Amen.’

The word ‘fear’ horrifies Naomi. She gasps so loudly that Darren Pont turns to look at her in amazement. The fear of God. It crystallises all her doubts in a second.

They are kneeling before the Bishop now, and he begins to lay his hand upon the head of every one of them, saying, ‘Defend, O Lord…’

She can’t go through with it.

She must. It’s too late.

She can’t. It’s never too late.

She doesn’t.

She stands, turns, runs from the church, flees, flees from the Bishop, from God, from Timothy.

‘…this thy child with Thy heavenly…’ In his astonishment the Bishop hesitates for just a moment, then recovers. ‘…grace, that he may continue thine for ever…’

Timothy sees Naomi go, he wants to follow, he wants to rush out and say, ‘Naomi, my darling, what’s wrong? Don’t cry.’ For he knows that she is crying. ‘I am with you. God is with you.’

But he doesn’t. He has come so far and he wants to be confirmed. He is exalted. The ritual is both exhilarating and comforting. He cannot let down his godparents, dear Uncle Percy Pickering and Auntie May Treadwell, whom he has neglected so shamelessly. He wishes to enter this hallowed world, in which the sons of taxidermists are equal to dukes in the eyes of God.

He will see her afterwards, when he is fully with God and is therefore able to help her better. That makes sense.

He is troubled, but the shared solemnity begins to comfort him, it’s so exciting to share the ritual and be as one not only with God but also with Darren Pont, Lindsay East, Sally Lever and all the other confirmees.

If he had followed her, maybe their lives would have been very different.