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‘Private school…? Whatever gave you that impression?’
‘Isn’t that where she met my son?’
‘No, it isn’t. I work as a secretary in some law offices. My pay cheque, generous though it is, manages to cover the mortgage and pay the bills and buy the essentials. However, it doesn’t quite run to private schooling.’
She hoped that she didn’t sound resentful of her state of affairs, or else defensive, but she had a suspicion that that was precisely how she sounded. And she also had a suspicion that that was precisely how he saw her. Wealthy people often led an insular life. They mixed in social circles where foreign travel was taken for granted, as were expensive meals out, best seats at the opera, and cars that were replaced every three years.
Anthony Newman had just been brought face to face with one of those more lowly creatures who didn’t lead the charmed life. It wasn’t apparent in his expression, but she found herself reading behind the good-looking, detached exterior, even though she was appalled by this inverse snobbery.
She wondered whether he was horrified by the thought of his son mixing with a girl from the wrong side of the tracks. There was nothing in his manner to suggest any such thing, but then he struck her as a man who was clever at concealing what he didn’t want the world to see.
He signalled for the cheque, and was irritated when she made an attempt to settle her half of the bill.
‘Right. So that’s settled then. Eight at Chez Jacques. Thursday.’
‘Unless you change your mind and decide to have a quiet word with Mark.’
‘Naturally.’
But he had no intention of changing his mind, and when they parted company outside the hotel she wasn’t quite sure whether she had done the right thing after all, or not.
She was also taken aback at the reaction he had provoked in her. She had gone to his office to ask for his help, one parent to another. Now she found herself thinking of him, and not simply as a parent. She found herself thinking of him as a man, and a disturbing one at that, although she couldn’t put her finger on the reason why. She just knew that his face kept popping up in her head.
For nearly seventeen years she had steered clear of any involvement with the opposite sex. She worked amongst them, went out for drinks occasionally with some of them, in a group, but she was careful never to get involved. Never to get involved was never to be hurt. It was a self-taught lesson. She had her daughter—life would only be complicated if she allowed a man to intrude.
And the decision had hardly cost her dear. In all those years she had never met anyone who had tempted her with the possibility of romance. A few had tried, and she had kindly steered them away. It hadn’t been difficult. Most men were frankly unwilling to get involved with a ready-made family unit anyway.
Anthony Newman, however, was in a league of his own. He wasn’t like any man she had ever met in her life before. Something about him had aroused a certain curiosity inside her, made her wonder for the first time what she had missed out on during all these years of self-imposed celibacy.
She had to remind herself that curiosity killed the cat.
She was sorely tempted to phone and cancel the dinner arrangement. She knew that he would not have objected. But that, she realised, would have amounted to running away, and it was ridiculous because she didn’t even know what she would have been running away from.
He was hardly going to pounce on her, was he? As it was, he had only suggested the arrangement with reluctance, and no doubt he would have been very happy never to clap eyes on her again.
On Thursday morning, just as Lucy was about to head off to school, and Jessica was busy in the kitchen, trying to do twelve things at once before she set out to work, she said, casually, ‘By the way, don’t arrange anything for this evening. We’re going out.’
She could tell from the silence behind her that she might as well have announced that they were departing for a last-minute trip to the moon.
‘Going out? Going out? Going out where?’
‘Going out for a meal, actually.’ She turned around, wiped her hands on the kitchen towel, and looked at her daughter. ‘People occasionally do things like that.’
‘People may do things like that, but we don’t!’
Lucy’s eyes were narrowed with suspicion. Her knapsack was half-open and slung over one shoulder, and her long hair was gathered over the other. At sixteen, she was already a couple of inches taller than her mother, and she didn’t look like a child. Sixteen. Jessica thought that she looked like an adult of twenty going on thirty something. It was frightening where all the time had gone.
‘I thought it might make a nice change,’ Jessica said, refusing to be provoked.
‘Why?’
Jessica could feel the familiar irritation gathering up inside her, and she swallowed it down and smiled.
‘Because it’s been a rough few months for us. You’ve got exams on the horizon. I thought it might be nice to eat out for a change.’
Lucy shrugged and looked suddenly bored with the conversation. ‘Okay.’
‘So please be home on time!’ Jessica told the departing back, a remark which didn’t even warrant a response. Lucy was already out of the door and on her way.
By seven-thirty, Jessica was bathed and dressed and waiting in the sitting room for her daughter, who still had not shown up from school. She had taken a magazine to read, so that she could at least pretend to herself that her frame of mind was still relaxed, but the magazine lay unopened on her lap, and her fingers were clasped together.
Now, she thought wearily, there would be another shouting match, and they would arrive at the restaurant with tempers frayed, if they got there at all. Lucy might just not turn up at all.
But turn up she did. Five minutes later. In a rush, and full of apologies.
‘Honestly, Mum, I completely forgot. I had to go to the library to check out something for English lit, then I wanted to see Mr Thomas about some maths homework, and by the time I looked at my watch it was after six!’ She said this in the voice of someone who was amazed that time could play such a dirty trick on them. ‘When do we need to leave?’
‘In five minutes. The taxi’s booked…’
‘Okay.’
Jessica sat back, closed her eyes and felt like someone who had been caught in the path of a wayward tornado. She heard the sound of the shower, rushed footsteps, followed by the slamming of cupboard doors, then Lucy appeared in the doorway dressed in a long black skirt, a pair of ankle boots with laces which had seen better days, and—where on earth had that T-shirt come from?
‘You can’t go dressed like that,’ Jessica told her flatly, standing up. ‘It’s a proper restaurant, Luce, not a burger bar. And that T-shirt is at least ten sizes too small for you. What about that striped cotton shirt I gave you last Christmas? You could tuck it into the skirt and put on some proper sandals.’
‘Not again! Stop nagging me!’
‘Don’t you take that tone of voice with me, my girl!’
‘I’m not twelve any longer, Mum!’
‘I’m only trying to get you to look a little…’
‘More conventional?’ She said that as though it were a dirty word.
‘If you like, yes. At least tonight.’
‘I like this outfit. I feel relaxed in it.’
Jessica sighed out of pure exasperation. There was no time left to argue the toss.
‘Well, let’s just say that I’m not happy with the way you look, Lucy.’
‘You’re never happy with the way I look.’
Here we go again, Jessica thought. Another brief exchange of words developing into an all-out battle. Theoretically, this meal out should have been a relaxed one, but as they were driven to the restaurant she could feel the atmosphere charged with tension. One word on the subject of time-keeping, or dress, or school—or anything, for that matter—and Lucy, she knew, would retreat into moody silence.
‘How was school today?’ she asked eventually, at which Lucy gave a loud, elaborate sigh.
‘You’re not going to start going on about homework again, are you, Mum? Not the old boring lecture about the importance of education?’
Jessica felt a prickle of tears behind her eyes.
‘I’m just interested, honey.’
‘School was as boring as it usually is. Mrs Dean said that it’s time we made some decisions about what subjects we want to study in sixth form.’
Jessica held her breath. ‘And what have you got in mind?’
‘Maths, economics and geography.’
Jessica tried to conceal her sigh of dizzying relief. She had been sharpening her weapons for this battle for quite some time now, making sure that she was well prepared for when Lucy announced that she had decided to quit school at sixteen and get a job in a department store.
‘If,’ her daughter said casually, ‘I bother to do A levels at all. Most of the girls are just going to try and find jobs. Kath’s thinking about a computer course. One of those six-month ones. There are always jobs for people who know how to use computers.’
‘We’ve been through all this before,’ Jessica said, closing her eyes, feeling exhausted. ‘You’ll get much further in the end if you go on to university, get a degree…’
‘While all my friends are out there, earning money…’
‘Life isn’t just about tomorrow, Lucy. You’ve got to plan a little further ahead than that.’
‘Why?’
Jessica gave up. They had been through this argument so many times recently that it gave her a headache just thinking about it.
The taxi pulled up outside the restaurant, and Lucy said, incredulously, ‘We’re eating here?’
‘I thought it might be fun to splash out for a change.’ she thought of Mark’s father and felt a flutter of nervous apprehension spread through her.
‘We can’t afford it,’ Lucy said, stepping out of the car and eyeing her mother and the restaurant dubiously. ‘Can we?’
‘Why not?’ Jessica grinned. ‘You only live once.’ And Lucy giggled—an unfamiliar, endearing sound.
Virtually as soon as they walked in Jessica spotted them—seated in silence at a table in the far corner of the room, partially hidden by some kind of exotic plant. She wouldn’t have noticed them if she hadn’t immediately glanced around the dark, crowded restaurant, looking. Lucy still hadn’t seen them. She was wrapped up in excitement at the prospect of eating in a proper restaurant, where waiters hovered in the background and the lighting wasn’t utilitarian.
‘You should have said that we were coming here, Mum! I would have worn something different.’
‘I did mention…’
‘Yes, I know!” Lucy hissed under her breath, as they were shown to their table, her eyes downcast, ‘but you always tell me that I don’t dress properly.’
‘You look stunning, whatever you wear,’ Jessica murmured truthfully, fighting to keep down the sick feeling in her stomach as they moved closer to where Mark and his father were sitting, still in complete silence. She didn’t dare glance at them. She didn’t want her eyes to betray any recognition, not even fleetingly. Was he looking at her? she wondered.
She had put a great deal of thought into her outfit. A knee-length dress with a pattern of flowers on it, belted at the waist. It was the sort of dress that could be dressed up or dressed down, and because she had never made the mistake of wearing it to work it still had that special ‘going out’ feel to it that she liked.
She found herself wondering what sort of image she presented, and was immediately irritated with herself for the passing thought. She frankly didn’t give a jot what Anthony Newman thought of her. To him, she was a sudden and inconvenient intrusion. To her, he was merely the means towards an end. It was irrelevant whether he found her attractive or not.
They were about to sit down when Lucy gave a stifled gasp, and Jessica followed the direction of her eyes with what she hoped was polite interest.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked, playing the part. ‘You’ve gone bright red.’
‘Fine. Yes. I’m fine,’ Lucy muttered, flustered. She sat down and chewed her lips nervously, darting quick glances at the table behind them. Mature though she looked sometimes, she still had that childish lack of control over the expressions on her face. Jessica could read them like a book. Her daughter had been surprised at the sight of Mark Newman, then deeply embarrassed. Now she was wondering whether she should acknowledge him or not. He still hadn’t seen them. His back was to them and his father, after a quick, indifferent glance at them, was now sipping his glass of wine and consulting the menu in front of him.
Jessica pretended to ignore her daughter’s agitation. Eventually Lucy said, under her breath, ‘I just recognised someone, that’s all.’
‘Really?’ A waiter handed them menus and took an order for aperitifs. ‘One of your teachers?’
‘No!’
‘One of your schoolfriends?’ She looked at her daughter over the top of the menu. ‘I didn’t think that there was anyone here under eighteen apart from you.’
‘No one that you know, Mum,’ Lucy mumbled, diving into the menu and frowning savagely.
‘Oh.’
‘He hasn’t seen me.’
‘He…?’
‘Don’t look around. You’ll just make it obvious!’
‘Why don’t you say hello if you know him, whoever he is?’ Jessica asked with studied indifference.
‘He’s wearing a jacket!’ She made that sound like a sin, and Jessica did her best not to smile.
‘How awful!’
‘Very funny, Mum.’ She stared at the menu, still red-faced and frowning. ‘I suppose I’d better say hi.’
Jessica nodded, holding her breath. ‘Good idea, darling.’ She placed the menu to one side, having read precisely nothing on it. ‘Silly to be antisocial.’
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