One Plus One, Page 8

  "You left me, Lara. On the twenty-seventh of May, on the way back from Paris. Remember?"

  "Details! You always twist my words with details! This is exactly why I had to leave you!"

  "I thought it was because I only loved my work and didn't understand human emotions."

  "I left you because you have a tiny dick! Tiny, tiny dick! Like a pawn!"

  "You mean prawn."

  "Prawn. Crayfish, whatever is smallest thing! Tiny!"

  "Then I think you actually mean shrimp. You know, given you just walked off with a valuable limited-edition print, I think you could at least have granted me 'lobster.' But sure. Whatever."

  He still wondered what those Italian curses actually meant. He drove for several miles that later he would not recall driving. And then he sighed, turned on the radio, and fixed his gaze on the seemingly endless black road ahead.

  --

  Gemma rang just as he was turning down the coast road. Ed answered before he'd had time to think about why he shouldn't.

  "Don't tell me. You're really busy."

  "I'm driving."

  "And you have a hands-free thing. Mum wanted to know if you're going to be there for their anniversary lunch."

  "What anniversary lunch?"

  "Oh, come on, Ed. I told you about it months ago."

  "I'm sorry. I haven't got access to my diary right now."

  Gemma took a deep breath. "Mum's doing a special lunch at home for them. Dad's coming out of hospital just for that. She wanted us to be there. You said you'd be able to come."

  "Oh. Yeah."

  "Yeah what? You remember? Or yeah, you're coming?"

  He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. "I don't know."

  "Look, Dad was asking for you yesterday. I told him you're tied up with a work project, but he's so frail, Ed. This is really important to him. To both of them."

  "Gemma, I've told you--"

  Her voice exploded into the interior of the car. "Yeah, I know, you're too busy. You've told me you've got stuff going on."

  "I have got stuff going on! You have no idea!"

  "Oh no, I couldn't possibly hope to understand, could I? Just the stupid social worker who doesn't earn a six-figure fucking salary. This is our dad, Ed. This is the man who sacrificed everything to buy you a fucking education. He thinks the sun shines out of your backside. And he's not going to last much longer. You need to get down there and show your face and say the things that sons are meant to say to their dying fathers, okay?"

  "He's not dying."

  "How the fuck would you know? You haven't been to see him in two months!"

  "Look, I will go. It's just I've got to--"

  "Bullshit. You're a businessman. You make stuff happen. Make this happen. Or I swear I--"

  "I'm losing you, Gem. Sorry, the reception's really patchy here. I--" He began to make shhh noises.

  "One lunch," she said, her social-work voice on, all calm and conciliatory. "One little lunch, Ed."

  He spotted a police car up ahead and checked the speedometer. A filthy Rolls-Royce, one headlight dimmed, sat half up on the verge under the orange glow of a sodium light. A small girl stood beside it holding an enormous dog on a lead. Her head turned slowly as he passed.

  "And yes, I do understand that you have a lot of commitments, and your job is really important. We all understand that, Mr. Big Swinging Technodick. But is just one awkward family lunch too much to ask?"

  "Hang on, Gem. There's an accident up ahead."

  Beside the girl stood a ghostly teenager--boy? girl?--with a shock of dark hair, shoulders slumped. And, turning briefly away from a policeman, who was writing something, was another child--no, a small woman, her hair tied back into a scrappy ponytail. She was lifting her hands in exasperation--a gesture that reminded him of Lara. You are so ennoying!

  He had driven a farther hundred yards before he realized that he knew that woman. He racked his brain: bar? Holiday park? He had a sudden image of her taking his car keys, a memory of her removing his glasses in his house. What was she doing out there with children at this time of night? He pulled over and glanced into the rearview mirror, watching. He could just make out the group. The little girl had sat down on the dark verge, the dog a mountainous black lump beside her.

  "Ed? Are you okay?" Gemma's voice broke into the silence.

  Afterward he wouldn't be entirely sure what had made him stop. Perhaps it was an attempt to delay his arrival back in that empty house. Perhaps in a life that had gone so far off the rails, making himself part of such a scene no longer seemed like an odd thing to do. Perhaps it was just that he wanted to convince himself, against all available evidence, that he was not entirely an arsehole.

  "Gem, I'll have to call you back. It's someone I know."

  He pulled over and did a three-point turn, driving back down the dimly lit road slowly until he reached the police car. He pulled up on the other side of the road.

  "Hi," Ed said, lowering the window. "Can I help?"

  CHAPTER NINE

  Tanzie

  Tanzie's happy mood disappeared when she first saw Nicky's swollen face. It didn't really look like him, and she'd had to make her eyes stay very firmly on his when they would have liked to go somewhere else, even to the stupid picture of galloping horses on the wall opposite, which didn't even look like horses. She wanted to tell him about the maths competition and how they'd registered at St. Anne's, but she couldn't--not with the smell of hospital in her nose and Nicky's eye all the wrong shape. Tanzie found herself thinking, the Fishers did this, the Fishers did this; and she felt a bit scared because she couldn't believe anyone they knew would do this for no reason.

  When Nicky got up to go down the corridor, she put her hand gently into his, and even though normally he would have told her to "Scoot, small fry," he just squeezed her fingers a bit.

  Mum had to have all the usual arguments with the hospital people about how, no, she wasn't his actual mum, but as good as. And, no, he didn't have a social worker. And it always made Tanzie feel a bit odd, like Nicky wasn't a proper part of their family, even though he was.

  He walked out of the room really slowly, and he remembered to thank the nurse. "Nice lad, isn't he?" she said. "Polite."

  Mum was gathering up his things. "That's the worst bit," she said. "He just wants to be left alone."

  "Doesn't really work like that round here, though, does it?" The nurse smiled at Tanzie. "Take care of your brother, eh?"

  As she walked toward the main entrance behind him, Tanzie wondered what it said about their family when every single conversation they had now seemed to end with a funny look and the words "Take care."

  --

  Mum cooked dinner and gave Nicky three different-colored pills to take, and they sat watching television on the sofa together. It was Total Wipeout, which normally made Nicky pretty much wee himself laughing, but he had barely spoken since they'd returned home, and Tanzie didn't think it was because his jaw hurt. Mum was busy upstairs. Tanzie could hear her dragging drawers out and going backward and forward across the landing. She was so busy she didn't even notice it was way past bedtime.

  Tanzie nudged Nicky very gently with her finger. "Does it hurt?"

  "Does what hurt?"

  "Your face."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Well . . . it's a funny shape."

  "So's yours. Does that hurt?"

  "Ha ha."

  "I'm fine, Titch. Drop it." And then, when she stared at him, "Really. Just . . . forget it. I'm fine."

  Mum came in and put the lead on Norman. He was lying on the sofa and didn't want to get up, and it took her about four goes to drag him out of the door. Tanzie was going to ask her if she was taking him for a walk, but then the part came on where the wheel knocks the contestants off their little pedestals into the water and Tanzie forgot. Then Mum came back in.

  "Okay, kids. Get your jackets."

  "Jackets? Why?"

  "Because we're leavi
ng. For Scotland." She made it sound perfectly normal.

  Nicky didn't look round from the television. "We're leaving for Scotland . . . ?"

  "Yup. We're going to drive."

  "But we haven't got a car."

  "We're taking the Rolls."

  Nicky glanced at Tanzie, then back at Mum. "But you haven't got insurance."

  "I've been driving since I was twelve years old. And I've never had an accident. Look, we'll stick to the B roads and do most of it overnight. As long as nobody pulls us over, we'll be fine."

  They both stared at her.

  "But you said--"

  "I know what I said. But sometimes the ends justify the means."

  "What does that mean?"

  Mum threw her hands up in the air. "Nicky, there's a maths competition that could change our lives and it's in Scotland. Right now, we haven't got the money for the fares. That's the truth of it. I know it's not ideal to drive, and I'm not saying it's right, but unless you two have a better idea, then let's just get into the car and get on with it."

  "Um, don't we need to pack?"

  "It's all in the car."

  Tanzie knew Nicky was thinking what she was thinking--that Mum had finally gone mad. But she had read somewhere that mad people were like sleepwalkers--it was best not to disturb them. So she nodded really slowly, like this was all making good sense. She fetched her jacket and they walked through the back door and into the garage, where Norman was sitting in the backseat and giving them the look that said, "Yeah. Me, too." It smelled a bit musty in the car, and she didn't really want to put her hands down on the seats because she had also read somewhere that mice wee all the time, like nonstop, and mouse wee could give you about eight hundred diseases. "Can I just run and get my gloves?" she said. Mum looked at her like she was the crazy one, but she nodded, so Tanzie ran and put them on and thought she felt a bit better.

  Nicky eased his way gingerly into the front seat, and wiped at the dust on the dashboard with his fingers.

  Mum opened the garage door, started the engine, reversed the car carefully out onto the drive. Then she climbed out, closed and locked the garage securely. Then sat and thought for a minute. "Tanze. Have you got a pen and paper?"

  She fished around in her bag and handed her one. Mum didn't want her to see what she was writing but Tanzie peeped through the seats.

  FISHER YOU LITTLE WASTE OF SKIN I HAVE TOLD THE POLICE THAT IF ANYONE BREAKS IN IT WILL BE YOU AND THEY ARE WATCHING

  She got out of the car and pinned it to the bottom part of the door, where it wouldn't be visible from the street. Then she climbed back into the half-eaten driver's seat and, with a low purr, the Rolls set off into the night.

  --

  It took them about ten minutes to work out that Mum had forgotten how to drive. The things that even Tanzie knew--mirror, signal, maneuver--she kept doing in the wrong order, and she drove leaning forward over the steering wheel, clutching it like the grannies who drove at fifteen m.p.h. around the town center and scraped their doors on the pillars in the municipal car park.

  They passed the Rose and Crown, the industrial area with the five-man car wash and the carpet warehouse. Tanzie pressed her nose to the window. They were officially leaving town. The last time she had left town was on the school journey to Durdle Door when Melanie Abbott was sick all down herself in the coach and started a vomit chain reaction around the whole of 5C.

  "Just keep calm," Mum muttered to herself. "Nice and calm."

  "You don't look calm," said Nicky. He was playing Nintendo, his thumbs a blur on each side of the little glowing screen.

  "Nicky, I need you to map read. Don't play Nintendo right now."

  "Well, surely we just go north."

  "But where is north? I haven't driven around here for years. I need you to tell me where I should be going."

  He glanced up at the signpost. "Do we want the M3?"

  "I don't know. I'm asking you!"

  "Let me see." Tanzie reached through from the back and took the map from Nicky's hands. "What way up do I hold it?"

  They drove through the roundabout twice, while she wrestled with the map, and then they were on the road out of town. Tanzie vaguely remembered this road: they had once come this way when Mum and Dad were trying to sell the air conditioners. "Can you turn the light on at the back, Mum?" she said. "I can't read anything."

  Mum turned in her seat. "The button should be above your head."

  Tanzie reached up and clicked it with her thumb. She could have taken her gloves off, she thought. Mice couldn't walk upside down. Not like spiders. "It's not working."

  "Nicky, you'll have to map read." She looked over, exasperated. "Nicky."

  "Yeah. I will. I just need to get these golden stars. They're five thousand points." Tanzie folded the map as best she could and pushed it back through the front seats. Nicky's head was bent low over his game, lost in concentration. To be fair, golden stars were really hard to get.

  "Will you put that thing down!"

  He sighed, snapped it shut. They were going past a pub she didn't recognize, and now a new hotel. Mum said they were looking for the M3, but Tanzie hadn't seen any signs for the M3 for ages. Beside her Norman started a low whine: she figured they had around thirty-eight seconds before Mum said it was shredding her nerves.

  She made it to twenty-seven.

  "Tanzie, please stop the dog. It's making it impossible to concentrate. Nicky. I really need you to read the map."

  "He's drooling everywhere. I think he needs to get out." Tanzie shifted to the side.

  Nicky squinted at the signs in front of them. "If you stay on this road I think we'll end up in Southampton."

  "But that's the wrong way."

  "That's what I said."

  The smell of oil was really strong. Tanzie wondered whether something was leaking. She put her glove over her nose.

  "I think we should just head back to where we were and start again," Nicky said.

  With a grunt Mum swung the car off at the next exit. They all tried to ignore the grinding noise as she turned the wheel to the right and headed back down the other side of the dual motorway.

  "Tanzie. Please do something with the dog. Please." One of the Rolls's pedals was so stiff she almost had to stand up on it just to change gear. She looked up and pointed toward the turnoff for the town. "What am I doing, Nicky? Coming off here?"

  "Oh, God. He's farted. Mum, I'm suffocating."

  "Nicky, please can you read the map."

  Tanzie remembered now that Mum hated driving. She wasn't good at processing information quickly enough. She always said she didn't have the right synapses. Plus, to be fair, the smell now seeping through the car was so bad it made it hard to think straight.

  Tanzie began to gag. "I'm dying!"

  Norman turned his big old head to look at her, his eyes sad, like she was being really mean.

  "But there are two turnings. Do I take this one or the next?"

  "Definitely the next. Oh no, sorry--it's this one."

  "What?" Mum wrenched the car off the motorway, narrowly avoiding the grass verge, and onto the exit. The car juddered as they hit the curb and Tanzie had to let go of her nose to grab Norman's collar.

  "For Christ's sake, can you just--"

  "I meant the next one. This one takes us miles out of the way."

  "We've been on the road almost half an hour and we're farther away than when we started. Jesus, Nicky, I--"

  It was then that Tanzie saw the flashing blue light. She willed the police car to go past. But instead it drew nearer and nearer until its blue lights filled the car.

  Nicky turned painfully in his seat. "Um, Jess, I think they want you to pull over."

  "Shit. Shit shit shit. Tanzie, you didn't hear that." Mum took a deep breath, adjusted her hands on the wheel as she started to slow.

  Nicky slumped a little lower in his seat. "Um, Jess?"

  "Not now, Nicky."

  The police car was pulling over, t
oo. Tanzie's palms had begun to sweat. It will all be fine.

  "I guess this isn't the time to tell you I brought my stash with me."

  CHAPTER TEN

  Jess

  So there she was, standing on the grass verge of the motorway at eleven forty at night with two policemen who were both acting not like she was a major criminal, which was sort of what she'd expected, but worse--like she was just really, really stupid. Everything they said had a patronizing edge to it: So are you often in the habit of taking your family out for a late-night drive, madam? With only one headlight working? Were you not aware, madam, that your tax disc is two years out of date? They hadn't actually looked up the whole no-insurance thing yet. So there was that to look forward to.

  Nicky was sweating, waiting for them to locate his stash. Tanzie was a pale, silent ghost a few feet away, her sequined jacket glittering under the lights as she hugged Norman's neck for reassurance.

  Jess had only herself to blame. It could hardly get any worse.

  And then Mr. Nicholls turned up.

  She felt the remaining color drain from her face as his window wound down. And a million thoughts flashed through her head--like who was going to mind the children when she went to prison, and if it was Marty, would he remember things like the fact that Tanzie's feet grew occasionally and then would he buy her new shoes instead of waiting until her toenails curled in on her toes? And who would look after Norman? And why the hell hadn't she done what she should have done in the first place and just given Ed Nicholls back his stupid roll of money? And was Ed about to tell the police that on top of everything else, she was a thief?

  But he didn't. He asked if he could help.

  Policeman Number One turned slowly to look Ed over. Number One was a barrel-chested man with an upright bearing, the kind who took himself seriously, and bristled if everyone else didn't. "And you are?"

  "Edward Nicholls. I know this woman. What is it? Car trouble?" He looked at the Rolls as if he couldn't believe it was actually on the road.

  "You could say that," said Policeman Number Two.

  "Out-of-date tax disc," Jess muttered, trying to ignore the hammering in her chest. "I was trying to drive the kids somewhere. And now I guess I'm driving it home again."

  "You're not driving anywhere," said Policeman Number One. "Your car is now impounded. The tow truck is on its way. It is an offense under Section Thirty-three of the Vehicle Excise and Registration Act to drive on a public road without a valid tax disc. Which also means your insurance will be invalidated."