‘Oh, come on, Dom, I know you make soufflé …’
‘I’ve never made soufflé in my life before. Have I ever made soufflé before, Mick? Mick?’
Mick looked up. ‘What’s that?’
‘I said, have I ever made soufflé before?’
‘You and soufflé? Never. Dom doesn’t cook, she – well, she just doesn’t cook.’
‘So you’ve never made soufflé?’ Linda persisted, thinking of Delta in the kimono; Delta who had lied to her. Why?
‘Linda, I’m telling you …’
‘Well,’ Linda lifted up the cake slice, her stomach vibrating with nausea, ‘this is mandarin cheesecake.’
‘I love mandarin cheesecake,’ Paul said.
Taking one last look at herself in the mirror, Dominique turned off the light in the en suite and went through to the bedroom where Mick lay with his head propped in his hand and A History of Winemaking open on the pillow.
‘You’re tired,’ he said, looking up at her.
She nodded, still yawning. ‘I don’t know how you can read – aren’t you drunk?’
‘I’m not drunk.’
‘You looked drunk tonight.’
‘Just doing a good impression – to make it look as though I was enjoying myself. For your sake.’
‘You weren’t enjoying yourself, then?’
‘Come on, Dom.’ He paused. ‘We had mandarin cheesecake.’
‘You shouldn’t pretend for my sake.’
‘I should.’ He shut the book and sat up, pushing the dressing gown off her left shoulder.
‘I can’t sleep,’ Stephanie said, walking into the room and bringing the smell of burnt hair with her.
‘Steph –’ Mick fell back onto the bed.
‘Come on, baby, it’s sleep time. And you can’t sleep in this,’ Dominique said, lifting the yellow hard hat off her daughter’s head. Stephanie was dressed in the full emergency services outfit she’d insisted on wearing to bed earlier and in the end Dominique had given in.
‘What time is it?’ Steph pulled the hard hat sharply back down onto her head.
‘It’s after midnight.’
‘Then it’s tomorrow. That’s late.’
‘It is late and you should be in bed now.’
‘I want to see Dad.’
‘Dad’s trying to sleep.’
‘But he just waved at me.’
Dominique turned round to see Mick lying with the pillow over his head and his right hand in the air, waving.
Stephanie squealed and jumped onto the bed as Mick pulled the pillow off his head and threw it at her. ‘I made up some new jokes,’ she said, bouncing up and down.
‘Like …’
‘Like – what d’you call a one-legged horse?’
‘I don’t know, what d’you call a one-legged horse?’
‘A unicycle,’ Stephanie said, still bouncing. ‘And – what d’you call a one-legged cow?’
‘I don’t know, what d’you call a one-legged cow?’
‘A unicycle. And – what d’you call a one-legged pig?’
‘A unicycle?’
‘Noooo.’
‘Why not?’
‘Just because. I haven’t thought of a joke for a one-legged pig yet.’
‘But why can’t a one-legged pig just be a unicycle like a one-legged horse and a one-legged cow?’
‘Mick,’ Dominique interceded.
Stephanie jumped off the bed and went running back to her room.
Dominique followed her.
‘Don’t worry,’ her daughter said from under the duvet, ‘I’m asleep.’
A china toadstool with a china mouse family inside illuminated the room with a dull red light.
‘Steph – you can’t sleep in that hat.’ She paused. ‘We’ll get an appointment at the hairdresser’s tomorrow morning – first thing.’ Dominique waited a few minutes. ‘Night,’ she said from the doorway.
‘Ssh, I’m asleep.’
When she got back to the bedroom, Mick was lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling.
Taking her dressing gown off, she got into bed next to him.
‘What’s this?’ Dominique said, as something sharp dug into her left ear.
‘I was looking at it tonight.’
She picked up the wooden gazelle from the pillow and put it on her bedside table. ‘This is Linda’s, Mick.’
‘I got attached to it.’
‘You stole it?’
‘I put it in my pocket – they won’t notice.’
They lay there not talking and neither of them made a move to turn out the light.
‘I didn’t realise Laker was going bust,’ she said after a while.
Mick rolled over and looked at her, but didn’t say anything.
‘They’re going to make you redundant, aren’t they?’
‘Maybe – I’m over forty anyway, Dom.’
‘That’s what lunch was about.’
‘That’s not what lunch was about.’
‘How soon?’
‘I don’t know – nobody knows – I’ve probably got another month.’
‘Another month? When were you going to tell me?’
‘There’s nothing to worry about, Dom – the terms of the package we’re starting to discuss are very generous.’
‘You’re not going to look for another job as a pilot?’
‘We should go away,’ he said.
She didn’t say anything.
‘We should. We should go away.’
‘Where would we go?’
‘New Zealand.’
‘And what would we do in New Zealand?’
Mick raised himself up on his elbow. ‘We’d have a vineyard.’
‘A vineyard?’
‘I’d call it Dominique’s, and even though it would take a few years to set up and those first few years would be tight – difficult – after that we wouldn’t look back – award-winning wines – a huge export business – the girls helping – acres of land.’
‘My God, Mick.’
‘What?’
‘You’ve been thinking about this?’
‘I’ve been thinking.’
‘But