After Everything Read online

  What was Jeremy talking about? A breakdown? An accident of some kind? Sandy seemed perfectly fine when they spoke before Emily left for India. Perhaps not completely fine. But functioning, in his characteristically dysfunctional way.

  Penny read on. Now Jeremy was quoting ‘Anthem’ by Leonard Cohen.

  She didn’t need to be reminded about Leonard Cohen. She was the one who’d dragged Jeremy and Sandy to hear Cohen at the Isle of Wight festival whenever it was. She knew all the words of every song, from ‘Suzanne’ to ‘The Sisters of Mercy’. They’d never heard of him. Jeremy went on about razor blades and Sandy passed out. She’d worn her new black and white bellbottoms.

  She scrolled down. Jeremy said Sandy was making a good recovery and that she was not to worry. Recovery from what?

  ‘It could have been an accident, but apparently passers-by said he almost threw himself into the path of an oncoming car near the common. He’s not seriously injured but it could have been much worse. The hospital wanted to put him on the risk register. I talked them out of that, but it would mean so much if you could come back.’

  She sat for a minute, understanding for the first time. Jeremy thought Sandy had tried to kill himself and he assumed she already knew about it. Her immediate reaction was to say that of course she’d return as soon as possible, that she’d telephone Sandy and contact Emily and Matthew. The mental list began: flight times, asking the farmer down the lane to check on the house, arranging somewhere to stay in London. All the while a sharp prick of nervous perspiration on her back.

  Suddenly she was furious, with no clear idea why. She picked up her basket, reeking with the rich scent of truffles, and stomped out of the office, ignoring Francine who asked if she’d turned off the computer. All the way along the street she fumed, the beauty of the town invisible to her. A gritty wind picked up and stung her face as she passed the ancient town walls and climbed the track, forgetting to pick some wild flowers for the kitchen table. She walked faster and faster until her knees shook and she heaved for breath.

  Typical of Sandy to fall apart and let someone else pick up the pieces. And typical of Jeremy to assume she’d drop everything and rush to help. Jeremy wouldn’t have bothered to contact her if Sandy had married again, or if he had pulled off a big deal. Damn Jeremy with his psycho-babble and his fashionable quotations. Jeremy hadn’t bothered to notice her unhappiness during Sandy’s stream of affairs with eager-eyed young things from the music industry. He never said a word when Sandy dashed off to Los Angeles or New York, forgetting birthdays and school concerts and prize days.

  No, she would not call anybody. Sandy was alive. Jeremy had said his injuries weren’t serious, just bruises and concussion. He would recover in his own time. He could solve his own problems.

  She rushed into her house, locking the door behind her with shaking hands. Why should the messy past return to slice through this new, carefully constructed life of hers? That was the real reason she’d come here. Not because of cheaper house prices and reliable summer warmth, not in the hope of building a new network of acquaintances or friends. The only person she wanted to get to know better was herself. The only thing she wanted was peace.

  [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Hi little brother. Miss you, also worry about you too. All alone in the big city, no big sister to boss you about, nag you about keeping clear and clean. I had a thought. Why don’t you come over here, chill for a bit, bathe in the wonderful light? I’m in this hill town place, sort of like Varanasi, but not. Couldn’t hack Delhi, too many people. Dharamsala was too stupid for words, full of pizza shops, sushi bars and hamburger stands. Everyone selling something, enlightenment on special, 24/7. Goddamn place full of goddamn phonies, as our mate Holden Caulfield used to say. One guy I thought was a monk – he was in the full robes with the shaved head and beads – said he’d take me to a cheap hotel and then tried to jump me in a lane. No problemo for me. He was half my size. LOL. I kneed him and that was that.

  Here is so much better. Cheap, clean – well not too dirty – and I’ve enrolled in these amazing classes at the local ashram under a holy guy called Rosheme. No one has seen him for three years, but he has a crowd of followers, all sorts. It’s so good, the best. There’s this sacred cave I go to, up in the hills, and I meditate there. There’s peace there that I’ve never felt before. I can’t really describe it properly. You have to be there.

  Why don’t you come, now the job is no more? And you can tell me about it in your own time. Don’t worry about Mum. She’s okay now and I bet she’d give you a ticket. Don’t worry about anything or anybody, least of all Dad. And please, stay away from that load of losers.

  Remember I love you. xxe

  Chapter 5

  Peter and Tim were only minutes late. They looked approvingly around the room before picking up their menus. Peter chose the braised beef cheek while Tim took far too long to decide on roast turbot.

  ‘So weird, just the three of us,’ said Tim. ‘Do you think we ought to pull up a chair for Sandy, just in case?’

  Jeremy glared.

  ‘Just a little joke,’ said Tim. ‘My pathetic attempt to say I miss him not being here. Is he okay?’

  ‘He was very lucky,’ said Jeremy. ‘No broken bones, just bruises and concussion from where he hit his head. The car was only going twenty miles an hour. The driver was in complete shock, said Sandy threw himself in front of his car. Sandy told me he’d tripped. It’s impossible to know what really happened. But why would he do something like that?’

  ‘Why does anyone do anything?’ Tim hunched his shoulders, a kind of inverted shrug. ‘Because their life isn’t working and they can’t stand it any longer?’

  Jeremy thought about how Sandy had looked as he’d helped him out of the taxi that morning. Some kind of chalky paste coated his stubble and his hair was pasted to his skull in greasy strands. There was a fine crosshatch of lines on his face that Jeremy had never noticed before. Sandy stumbled and nearly fell on the pavement and Jeremy grabbed his elbow to steady him, his fingers pressing through the soft skin until they reached bone. He threw his other arm around Sandy’s shoulder as he wrestled with the stiff lock on the front door and together, arm in arm, they made their way up the narrow staircase to Sandy’s flat.

  Jeremy had never been there before. Somehow they’d always met on his side of the river. He was shocked by the collapsing sofa covered in old newspapers, the empty bottles on the floor. He could tell Sandy was embarrassed, almost pushing him out of the door before he collapsed on the sofa, saying there was no need to stay, that the hospital had organised someone to come by later that day.

  ‘Do you think he needs to go to some kind of rehab, like the Priory?’ Jeremy asked Peter and Tim, immediately regretting his question. He fiddled with the stem of his wineglass as an image arose of Sandy sitting in a semi-circle of strangers sharing their secrets. Sandy didn’t carefully measure the facts and calculate the consequences of every pause in every statement the way Jeremy did. With one exception, Sandy just blurted out whatever had happened.

  Jeremy swallowed some wine. It wasn’t as good as he remembered and there was a burning sensation at the back of his throat. Maybe he had acid reflux, or worse, an incipient ulcer. He checked the drift in his thoughts and was about to steer the conversation away from rehab when Tim interrupted him.

  ‘The last place Sandy needs to be is in Roehampton surrounded by models and addled rock stars,’ Tim said, looking affronted. ‘He’d think it was Friends Re-United. Sandy needs something more connected with reality.’ Tim had that blaze in his eyes, the one Jeremy associated with religious zealots, the one he always saw when Tim talked about psychology. Maybe that’s the way all therapists were. However, he was relieved that Tim had rubbished the notion of rehab. Money saved as well, because Jeremy would have been the one to pay for it.

  ‘I’d imagine that Emily going away probably didn’t help,’ continued Tim. ‘Fathers
and daughters, all that sort of thing.’

  Peter began dissecting his beef cheek. ‘I didn’t know they were so close.’ He dolloped pureed potato on top of the meat and chewed slowly. ‘God, I could eat this forever,’ he said. ‘Sandy wouldn’t have let on that anything was wrong. Not showing signs of any emotion is one of the few things the English are still good at. Of course Sandy always appeared just fine.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Tim. ‘Fine is just an acronym for Fucked-up. Insecure. Neurotic and Emotional. Sandy and I talked about it once. He laughed.’

  Jeremy was put out. No one was acknowledging that he was the one who’d helped Sandy for so many years, or that he’d been the one to collect him from the hospital. He changed the subject.

  ‘Albert used to cook those beef cheeks in his old restaurant off Grosvenor Square. The whole thing takes three days. You have to skin the cheek of sinew, marinate it, and then cook it incredibly slowly. Albert told me himself …’

  Peter and Tim weren’t listening. They’d begun a separate conversation about wealthy Chinese businessmen favouring top Bordeaux vintages. Jeremy surveyed the room again. A woman two tables away, with wild brunette hair, was appraising his little group, a smile hovering. Behind her was a large gold-framed mirror. Reflected in it was a trolley laden with cheese, and an incongruous trio made up of himself, a balding man with a tendency to freckles and bulkiness, but with an undoubted air of affluent authority; Tim, a slight figure with an old-fashioned mop of salt and pepper curls wearing an ill-fitting jacket; and Peter, the good-looking one. No one ever noticed what Peter wore. What would the woman have made of Sandy, his quick gestures and crooked smile giving a false impression of youthfulness until closer inspection revealed the drinker’s belly under the shirt and the bloated flush along his cheeks?

  Jeremy’s eye travelled on. Although the restaurant had opened only a month ago, it looked as though it had been here for decades, something he approved of. Jeremy dealt with constant fluctuations throughout his working day, so he didn’t like change in his private life. Sally and Isobel would disagree, but ex-wives were like that. Isobel once snarled that he showed more loyalty to his friends than his family. Maybe she had a point.

  Sandy was his closest friend. It didn’t matter that Sandy was a songwriter and Jeremy worked in finance, just as it didn’t matter that Tim had given up property development to become a psychologist and Peter directed television commercials. What mattered was that all four had known and liked each other longer than almost anyone else in their lives.

  Tim and Peter had stopped talking about wine and returned to the subject of Sandy. ‘How things have changed,’ said Tim. ‘Remember him at Oxford? Quite the golden boy.’

  Jeremy sniffed the remaining dregs. Sometimes the bouquet was almost as good as the taste, but not this time. He should have checked that there was food in Sandy’s flat and got his secretary to make an online order. He’d call Sandy when he got back to the office.

  He checked his watch. ‘Got to go. There’s a kid coming by at three o’clock with a lazy ten million and I need to put it to work, for him and for me.’

  The waiter was already hovering by his side. Service was included but Jeremy added another ten per cent to the bill, and punched in his pin number.

  ‘Lunch soon?’

  Tim and Peter nodded, still drinking their coffee. Jeremy stood up and patted both their shoulders. ‘Okay, until then, mes amigos.’

  He returned to his office feeling gaseous and bloated. He worried about his meaty breath. He fretted about worrying and tried to conjure up a lovely confident feeling, but failed. Just before the kid arrived, he belched loudly and loosened his tie.

  Chapter 6

  She washed the eggs and put them in a bowl by the sink, then brushed the dirt off the mushrooms and the small truffle with an old toothbrush. The kitchen smelled of musty earth, garlic and something richer, like post-coital sweat. But she wasn’t salivating. Her mouth was dry. She could feel her lips pursing, that telltale vein jumping in her neck.

  She left the pile of cleaned mushrooms and walked into the sitting room. There it was, her beautiful doll’s house silhouetted in front of the window. She had done a good job. The reddish brown of each hand-painted brick, the dove grey of the tiled roof, the cream of the porch columns. Carefully she opened the door. How sweet its interior was, how precise, exactly as she had left it.

  Here was the sofa that fitted into the palm of her hand, with cushions she’d stitched herself from one of Emily’s Liberty print smocked dresses torn too badly to repair. And the matchbox-sized mirror hanging on the wall, its frame encrusted with fake diamonds from Emily’s fairy wand, discarded when she was seven.

  The beds upstairs were covered in striped quilts made from the beloved baby rag Matthew took everywhere until he was five, when he threw it into the garbage bin with a brave flourish. She had retrieved it, carefully washed it and put it in her box of special things. Snuggling under the quilts were the survivors from his first collection of Lego men. Inside the pillows, sewn from her mother’s collection of doilies and linen handkerchiefs, she had secreted a milk tooth and a lock of hair from each of her children.

  On the sofa was a new catalogue from the doll’s house company. She flicked through the pages, stopping when she reached something called the Grosvenor House. It was enormous, shoulder height, with a Palladian façade, white like a wedding cake. She counted the rooms. Fifteen, including a parlour, two kitchens, a servants’ sitting room, bedrooms and nurseries. A grand family house.

  That would be her next project, taking a satisfyingly long time to complete. Lovely dawn raids online, hours spent contemplating paint charts, entire days spent varnishing and marbling. There were still so many things stored in the special box. Matthew’s tattered teddy bear, a Playmobil farmer and his wife, lace handkerchiefs from her mother and Emily’s taffeta fairy wings.

  To mark her decision, she went to her desk and pulled out bits and pieces from the drawer to make a vase of flowers. It would look just the thing in the bow window of the Grosvenor House.

  She traced the circle of a Euro coin on some cardboard, then cut it out with a pair of manicure scissors. She glued a thumb-sized candlestick onto the cardboard circle and covered its base with sticky wax, making sure it was smooth all the way around. Now the flowers. She had a spray of miniature artificial roses and she prised each one from the bunch, measured, cut and pressed them into the wax. She unfurled each tiny artificial leaf and blew the dust off each yellow bud.

  The telephone rang and she jumped. The long shadows of trees played in the courtyard. Making the vase had taken longer than she thought. Perhaps the telephone would stop. It did, but then began its raucous sound again.

  ‘Hello,’ she said.

  ‘Pen, it’s Angie.’ The breathless husky voice hadn’t changed. ‘Have you read your email?’

  ‘Yes, actually I have.’ Penny knew what was coming and she was already annoyed. ‘Although what I’m meant to do about it over here, I’m not quite sure.’

  There was a well-meaning pause and the sound of inhaling breath. ‘Tim just called me from the car on his way home. I thought you might want someone to talk to. It must have come as a shock. I mean, I know you and Sandy aren’t together, but somehow you’ve always seemed so connected. Tim says Sandy always talks about you so much.’

  ‘Really?’ replied Penny. ‘I knew from the children that Sandy wasn’t in good shape and that money is tight. But he’s in the same boat as a load of other people. I don’t recall him having suicidal tendencies.’

  Over the faint static there was another pause. Penny pictured Angie sitting near the whispering Aga in her cosy kitchen in the perfect farmhouse outside Ludlow, only miles from the cottage Penny and Sandy once owned. Angie would be drinking something herbal from a thick mug and wearing one of her floaty-sleeved vintage numbers.

  Penny imagined Angie was preparing one of her long speeches, delivered from a platform of smug satisfaction that she and
Tim had survived where others had fallen. Penny dusted the desk with the sleeve of her jumper.

  She heard Angie inhaling, as if she was smoking a cigarette. ‘Things were bad. Jeremy took Sandy back to his flat from the hospital. They’d found one of Jeremy’s cards in Sandy’s wallet. Apparently the flat was horrendous – buckets in the bathroom catching drips, dirty clothes everywhere, a month’s dishes growing mould in the sink, bills piled up, not even opened, and empties everywhere you turned.’

  Penny stopped dusting and began fiddling with the miniature flowers. One of the buds was stained rusty brown. Perhaps she could wash it. ‘I still don’t understand,’ she said. ‘If it wasn’t an accident, why would he have done something like that? I mean, he has the support of his friends. That must count for a lot. They’ve been lunching and drinking and droning on about football for decades.’

  ‘None of them saw anything wrong with Sandy,’ said Angie. ‘The only one who noticed anything was Carolyn de Farge …’

  There was a pang of obsolete jealousy, still familiar. Had Sandy had an affair with her as well? ‘What has Carolyn de Farge got to do with anything? I haven’t seen her since we were picking up the children at the school gates.’

  ‘You know how bad news travels. Carolyn told Jeremy she’d run into Sandy on the King’s Road one morning, that he stank of alcohol and looked like he’d been sleeping rough. He told her he’d had enough of everything. She feels dreadful that she didn’t contact anybody. Things might have been very different.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear all this, truly I am,’ said Penny. ‘But Sandy always put on the brave face, tried as hard as he could never to let me know what he was feeling. I used to imagine he confided in Jeremy and the others, that I was the odd one out.’ She remembered resenting them, wanting Sandy to have lunch with her occasionally instead of his friends, longing for him to seek her undivided company for an hour or so in the afternoon. ‘Sometimes I thought he cared more about them than he did about me.’