The Road Trip(22)

It’s been four hours since Addie pressed that single, burning kiss to my throat in the clutter of her little kitchen, and I’ve barely slept an hour since. My brain is rammed with rushed, heated poems, borderline erotica; they look even worse when I write them down. In a moment of insanity at around six in the morning I decide to fold them and post them under her bedroom door, but thankfully I stop myself just as I head out of my room, realising that this will almost certainly make me look creepy, or – perhaps worse – desperate. Instead I return to my bed and imagine reading them to her here, naked, then I have to take a cold shower.

It’s ten in the morning before I see her again. She arrives on the terrace where Terry and I are taking our coffees – she’s fresh-faced, wearing a patterned little dress that flirts around her upper thighs with each step. In her hand is a paper bag dappled with buttery stains: fresh croissants from the nearby village. Her fingers graze mine as I take the pastries. Never has patisserie been so sexually charged.

‘Thank you,’ I murmur.

‘You look a little peaky,’ she says, and that mole on her upper lip shifts as she tries not to smile. ‘Didn’t sleep so well?’

‘I owe you an apology, my nephew tells me!’ Terry calls. ‘I’m sorry for barging in, it was very ungentlemanly of me.’

When she turns from me to Terry I want her gaze back immediately. I want her all to myself.

‘I’ve forgotten it all,’ Terry says, waving his arm. ‘Don’t remember a thing. All right?’

Addie pauses for a beat. ‘Thank you,’ she says, with a small smile. ‘I appreciate that.’ Then she turns and walks away.

‘Where are you going?’ I blurt.

She looks over her shoulder at me. ‘Jobs to do,’ she says, smiling. ‘You’ll see me around.’



She returns while we take lunch on the terrace; she’s wearing a red swimming costume and proceeds to clean the leaves out of the swimming pool. I think I am going to cry. The task involves an excruciating amount of bending over.

I get drunk mid-afternoon, thinking it might help, or at least make Uncle Terence seem more interesting. All it does is loosen my tongue.

‘I think she might be the one,’ I tell Terry, flopping back on the sofa. It’s too hot to sit outside now – we’ve retreated to the cool of the enormous living room with its silk tapestries and endless cushions.

Terry chuckles. ‘See if you still feel that way once you’ve . . .’ He gives a crude gesture that makes me want to throw the bottle of wine at his head.

‘It’s not like that,’ I insist, topping up my glass. ‘She’s so . . . wonderful. I’ve never fancied someone this hard.’

I meant to say this much, but what I’ve said is more accurate. I’m pained with wanting her.

‘Ah, the impulsivity of youth,’ Terry says benevolently. ‘Wait until you’ve seen her gain twenty pounds and develop a fascination with the shopping channels.’

‘Uncle Terry. Literally everything you say is totally unacceptable.’

‘Your generation, so sensitive,’ he says, sitting back and balancing his wine glass on his beer belly.

I knock back my drink. No day has ever passed as slowly as this day.



Terry invites Addie to have supper with us when we pass her in the hall, but she declines, her eyes on me. I’m not sure what it means: is she turning down more than just that invite, after a day to think? The idea that she might not want me to come to her flat tonight makes me positively light-headed with despair.

Over dinner Uncle Terry doesn’t stop talking about Uncle Rupe and how poorly he invested his money in the 1990s. This could not be less interesting to me – I despise talking about money, it makes me uncomfortable – and all the ranting means Terry eats so slowly I want to reach across and stab the rest of his steak with my own fork to steal it off his plate. He’s not quite finished mopping up the juices with his bread when I get up to clear away the plates, and he squawks as I whisk it out from under him.

‘I know why you’re so keen to get rid of me,’ he says as I carry the plates through to the kitchen and leave them on the side. ‘You want to sneak down to the servant’s quarters, don’t you?’

I grit my teeth. ‘I want to see Addie, yeah.’

‘She’s already got you wrapped around her little finger, I see. Swanning around in swimwear and teasing you all day long.’

I walk back into the dining room as he shakes his head and laughs.

‘You’re going to have your hands full with that one.’

Terry is always obnoxious but hearing him talk about Addie like this is intolerable. I bunch my fists. He isn’t as bad as Dad, at least. For a moment I imagine what it would have been like if the whole family had come on this holiday, as my father had intended. Uncle Rupe and his wilting American wife; the trio of sharp-nosed cousins from Notting Hill; my brother, Luke, without his partner, Javier, because Javier is never invited. Luke would endure the sly homophobia of my family in quiet, stifled agony, and I would want to punch somebody, and Dad would tell us how disappointing we are and Mum would spend the holiday desperately trying to fix everything, as she always does.

No, this holiday is a gift, despite Terry’s presence. I slowly unclench my fists.

‘Look,’ I say. I must try not to sound desperate, though, of course, I absolutely am. ‘If you can just spend tonight on your own, you and I can go on a tour of the local vineyards tomorrow. All day. Just us. I won’t even drink, so I can drive you.’