Surprise Me(49)

‘I know.’ I nod. ‘I know we were.’

‘Of course, Dan has many fine attributes too,’ she adds after a pause. ‘He’s very … loyal.’ I know she’s making an effort to be nice, although clearly in her mind ‘loyal’ ranks several fathoms below ‘remarkable’.

We lapse into silence as the DVD plays on and a lump grows in my throat as I watch Daddy on screen, watching me marrying Dan. His face is noble and dignified. A shaft of light is catching his hair in just the right place. Then he glances at the camera and winks in that way he had.

And even though I’ve seen this DVD so many times before, I feel a sudden fresh, raw hurt. All my life, Daddy used to wink at me. At school concerts, at boring dinners, as he left the room after saying goodnight. And I know that doesn’t sound much – anyone can wink – but Daddy’s wink was special. It was like a shot in the arm. An instant spirit-lift.

My inner pendulum has stilled. I’m gazing speechlessly at the screen. Everything has fallen away to the sides of my brain, leaving only the headline news: my father died and we’ll never get him back. Everything else is irrelevant.





EIGHT


Next morning, my pendulum is haywire again. In fact, everything’s bloody haywire. I can’t possibly contemplate being married to Dan for another sixty-eight years. The last sixty-eight minutes have been bad enough.

I don’t know what got under his skin at Mummy’s place yesterday. Ever since, he’s been morose and broody and picky and just … argh. Last night in the car, on the way home, he started on a thing about how my family harks back to the past too much and it’s not good for the girls to keep dwelling. He even said did I have to mention my imaginary friend? What the hell is wrong with me mentioning my imaginary friend?

I know what Dan worries about, even though he won’t admit it. He worries that I’m unstable. Or potentially unstable. Just because I went and stood outside Gary Butler’s house that one time. And put one tiny little letter through his letter box. (Which, OK, I’ll admit I shouldn’t have done.) But the point is, that was a special case. I was in the throes of grief when I had my ‘episode’ or whatever we call it.

Whereas my invention of Lynn was long ago, when I was a child, and it was normal and healthy, because I’ve googled it, as he well knows, and what is his bloody problem?

Which is a basic summary of how I put it to him. Only I was hissing under my breath so that the girls wouldn’t hear, and I’m not sure he heard all my nuanced arguments.

Then I woke up this morning, thinking: Never mind, new day, new start, and determined to be cheerful. I even said hello to the snake, over my shoulder, with my eyes shut. But Dan seemed even more mired in gloom. He sat silently at breakfast, scrolling through his phone and then suddenly said, ‘You know, we’ve had an offer to expand into Europe.’

‘Really?’ I glanced up from the girls’ spelling test words. ‘Took.’

‘Tuh – oh – oh – kuh,’ Anna began intoning.

‘There are these guys based out of Copenhagen, who do similar stuff to us. They have a load of projects they want us to team up on, all in Northern Europe. We could end up trebling our turnover.’

‘Right. And would that be a good thing?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe. It would be a bit of a punt.’ Dan had a knotted, unhappy look that set warning bells off in my brain. ‘But we’ve got to do something.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘The business won’t grow unless we—’

He broke off and sipped his coffee and I gazed at him, feeling troubled. As I’ve mentioned, I know Dan pretty well. I know when his brain is cantering along happily with new, do-able ideas, and I know when it’s got stuck. Right then, it seemed stuck. He didn’t look pleased about expanding. He looked beleaguered.

‘Look,’ I said to Tessa, and she started sounding out:

‘Luh – oh – oh – kuh.’

‘When you say “grow”,’ I began, over the sound of her chanting, ‘what exactly—’

‘We should be five times the size we are.’

‘Five?’ I echoed, in astonishment. ‘Says who? You’re doing really well! You have lots of projects, a great income …’

‘Oh, come on, Sylvie,’ he almost growled. ‘The girls’ room is tiny. We’ll want to move to a new house before long.’

‘Says who? Dan, what’s brought all this on?’

‘It’s simply about looking forward,’ said Dan, not meeting my eye. ‘It’s simply about making a plan.’

‘Right, and what would this plan entail?’ I shot back, feeling more and more scratchy. ‘Would you have to travel?’

‘Of course,’ he said tetchily. ‘It would be a whole new level of commitment, of investment …’

‘“Investment”.’ I seized on the word. ‘So you’d have to borrow money?’

He shrugged. ‘We’d need more leverage.’

‘Leverage’. I hate that word. It’s a weasel word. It sounds so simple. You picture a lever and think: Oh, that makes sense. It took me ages to realize what it actually means is ‘borrowing stacks of money at a scary interest rate’.