ONE DAY(118)

What? Call it a day? It seems melodramatic and degrading to issue that kind of ultimatum, and the thought of carrying out the threat seems inconceivable, for the moment at least. But she resolves that she will raise the subject tonight. No, not tonight, not with Jasmine staying, but soon. Soon.

After a distracted morning of time-wasting, Emma goes for a lunch-time swim, ploughing up and down the lanes yet still unable to clear her head. Then with her hair still wet she cycles back to Dexter’s flat and arrives to find an immense, vaguely sinister black 4x4 waiting outside the house. It’s a gangsters’ car, two silhouettes visible against the windscreen, one broad and short, the other tall and slim; Sylvie and Callum, both gesticu lating wildly in the middle of another argument. Even from across the road Emma can hear them, and as she wheels her bike closer she can see Callum’s snarled face, and Jasmine in the back seat, eyes fixed on a picture book in an attempt to filter out the noise. Emma taps the window nearest Jasmine and sees her look up and grin, tiny white teeth in a wide mouth, straining forwards against her seatbelt to get out.

Through the car window, Emma and Callum nod. There’s something of the playground about the etiquette of infidelity, separation and divorce, but allegiances have been declared, enmities sworn, and despite having known him for nearly twenty years Emma must no longer talk directly to Callum. As for the ex-wife, Sylvie and Emma have settled on a tone, self-consciously bright and grudge-free, but even so dislike shimmers between them like a heat haze.

‘Sorry about that!’ says Sylvie, unfolding her long legs from the car. ‘Just a little disagreement about how much luggage we’re taking!’

‘Holidays can be stressful,’ says Emma, meaninglessly. Jasmine is unbuckled from her car seat, and clambers up into Emma’s arms, her face pressed into her neck, skinny legs wrapped around Emma’s hips. Emma smiles, a little embarrassed, as if to say ‘what can I do?’ and Sylvie smiles back, a smile so stiff and unnatural that it’s surprising she doesn’t have to use her fingers.

‘Where’s Daddy?’ says Jasmine into Emma’s neck.

‘He’s at work, he’ll be back very soon.’

Emma and Sylvie smile some more.

‘How is that going then?’ Sylvie manages. ‘The café?’

‘Really well, really well.’

‘Well I’m sorry not to see him. Send him my love.’

More silence. Callum gives her a nudge by starting the engine.

‘Do you want to come in?’ asks Emma, knowing the answer.

‘No, we should head off.’

‘Where is it again?’

‘Mexico.’

‘Mexico. Lovely.’

‘You’ve been?’

‘No, though I worked in a Mexican restaurant once.’

Sylvie actually tuts, and Callum’s voice booms from the front seat. ‘Come on! I want to avoid the traffic!’

Jasmine is passed back into the car for goodbyes and be-goods and not-too-much-TV and Emma discreetly takes Jasmine’s luggage inside, a candy-pink vinyl suitcase on wheels and a rucksack in the form of a panda. When she comes back Jasmine is waiting rather formally on the pavement, a pile of picture books held against her chest. She is pretty, chic, immaculate, a little mournful, every inch her mother’s child, very much not Emma’s.

‘We must go. Check-in’s a nightmare these days.’ Sylvie tucks her long legs back into the car like some sort of folding knife. Callum stares forwards.

‘So. Enjoy Mexico. Enjoy your snorkelling.’

‘Not snorkelling, scuba-diving. Snorkelling is what children do,’ says Sylvie, unintentionally harsh.

Emma bridles. ‘I’m sorry. Scuba-diving! Don’t drown!’ Sylvie raises her eyebrows, her mouth forming a little ‘o’ and what can Emma say? I meant it, Sylvie, please don’t drown, I don’t want you to drown? Too late, the damage is done, the illusion of sorority shattered. Sylvie stamps a kiss on the top of Jasmine’s head, slams the door and is gone.

Emma and Jasmine stand and wave.

‘So, Min, your dad’s not back until six. What do you want to do?’

‘Don’t know.’

‘It’s early. We could go to the zoo?’

Jasmine nods vigorously. Emma holds a family pass to the zoo, and she goes inside to get ready for another afternoon spent with someone else’s daughter.

In the big black car the former Mrs Mayhew sits with her arms folded, her head resting against the smoky glass, her feet tucked up beneath her on the seat while Callum swears at the traffic on the Euston Road. They rarely speak these days, just shout and hiss, and this holiday, like the others, is an attempt to patch things up.

The last year of her life has not been a success. Callum has revealed himself to be boorish and mean. What she took to be drive and ambition have proved to be an unwillingness to come home at nights. She suspects him of affairs. He seems to resent Sylvie’s presence in his home, and Jasmine’s presence too; he shouts at her for merely behaving like a child, or avoids her company altogether. He barks absurd slogans at her: ‘Quid pro quo, Jasmine, quid pro quo.’ She’s two and a half, for goodness’ sake. For all his ineptness and irresponsibility at least Dexter was keen, too keen sometimes. Callum on the other hand treats Jasmine like a member of staff who just isn’t working out. And if her family were wary of Dexter, they actively despise Callum.