‘Because I’m happy, darling! Well, hello,’ I drawled to Sam. ‘Can’t keep away, can you?’
‘Shut up and move across,’ said my dad, unreasonably officious for him. ‘Here, put this across the children.’
‘A seat belt,’ I boggled. ‘Didn’t spot that on the way over. Coming, handsome?’ I winked extravagantly at Sam.
‘That’ll do, love,’ said my father more gently. ‘And let go of his bow tie, there’s a good girl.’
‘Why?’
‘Because he doesn’t like it.’
I dropped it, disappointed. Sam’s head retracted and within a twinkling the cab door had shut on me. ‘Spoilsport,’ I pouted. Then I wound down the window and leaned out. Dad was already behind the wheel, though, and had the engine started. ‘Lovely party!’ I sang, hanging out of the window as we reversed.
As we turned back towards the gate, the headlights from our lorry lit up the back of the Land Rover beside us. Bare limbs shivered in the yellow beam: two people were kissing horizontally and half naked on the back seat. From the waist down, in fact. A pair of pearly white buttocks gleamed, a broad back still in its dinner jacket, the back of a man’s blond head, poised above a dark one. Suddenly Hope’s beautiful but startled face was caught in the spotlight. As we rumbled off across the field, leaving Sam standing in the midst of his acres, it occurred to me that, whilst I hadn’t recognized the buttocks, I had recognized the Land Rover. It rumbled through our village on a regular basis. It was Passion-fuelled Pete’s.
31
The following morning found me a radically altered woman. No longer on top form. No longer singing in close harmony with an aristocratic Austrian family fleeing the Nazis. No longer in heaven. This woman was in hell, not with the sound of music, but the sound of throbbing temples. Unable to move from her bed, or unleash her tongue from the roof of her mouth, or crowbar open her eyes – I managed, briefly, then shut them again – never had a person felt so unwell. Staggered by the weight of my limbs, which I could just about coax into a foetal position, I lay doggo. Deado. Dead. And went back to sleep.
Sometime later I was awoken by the sounds of momentum gathering next door. A grumbling volcano. My children were bubbling under like so much molten lava, surely about to erupt. Ah. There it was. Archie gave a shriek of outrage and Clemmie came running in.
‘Mummy, I think Grandpa put Archie’s nappy on back to front, but when I tried to do it he screamed. He won’t let me.’
‘I’ll come,’ I managed gnomically, as, with a heroic effort, I heaved myself out of bed. I tested my feet for support, rocked momentarily, then lurched next door.
Archie was indeed wearing a back-to-front nappy as he stood gripping the bars of his cot, together with what seemed to be a T-shirt of Clemmie’s. But at least they were alive; at least my father had had a go, I thought gratefully, as I heard him downstairs making tea. I lifted my baby son from his cot and nearly fell over. Had to hold the wall. Somehow I organized a clean nappy, and together we went downstairs, one hand in my son’s, as he insisted on doing every stair himself, one on my throbbing forehead.
‘Morning, Dad,’ I muttered, as my father caught Archie, who ran to him. He set him in his high chair. ‘Turn that down, would you?’ I waved at the blaring radio.
Dad grinned, looking horribly chipper, clearly freshly showered. He made a long arm to the radio as I sank down at the table, head in hands.
‘Morning, love!’ he chortled. ‘All right?’
It’s not often my father has the upper hand in the morning-after department; he was bound to milk it. I kept my head low and grunted non-committally.
‘How’re you feeling, then?’
‘Marvellous.’
Terrible. It was all coming back to me in glorious technicolor. Some little blue glasses. Bob leering at me throughout dinner. Chad’s desperate eyes. Hope careering round the dance floor as the horn blew to ‘John Peel’. Sam. Who I’d danced with, but – oh God, what had I said? I sat up slowly. Covered my mouth as my father put a cup of tea and two Nurofen in front of me.
‘Oh God, Dad, I think I flirted outrageously with Sam Hetherington last night.’
‘No, no, love. Not so anyone would notice.’
‘Really?’
‘Absolutely. Anyway, nothing wrong with a bit of flirting. Makes the world go round.’ He sat