‘Whoops,’ Jade giggles, clasping a hand over her mouth.
‘I like those natural names,’ Sasha muses, ‘like Summer or Autumn or Rain …’
‘Hail would be good,’ Rob mutters under his breath, striding back to the kitchen. ‘Or Thunder. Yep, Thunder Tambini has a certain ring …’ He blinks at the open shelves Nadine has arranged with all manner of quirky ‘finds’, as she calls them: little tin vehicles, a green crocheted frog, a glass paperweight with Dolly Mixture sweets trapped inside. While he found her single-girl’s flat a tad too cutesy for his taste on his first visit, it now feels claustrophobic. Horribly un-baby-friendly, too, with all her itsy-bitsy chokeable trinkets all over the place. Rain, he reflects. Great, if you want your child to be in psychotherapy by age six.
He is a little drunk, too, he realises now as he leans back against the baby-blue fridge. The kitchen is strewn with fairy lights – it’s like being in a bloody grotto – and Rob is overwhelmed by a pang of missing his old life. He craves Kerry and his children, all crammed around the slightly too-small table in their old kitchen in Bethnal Green, with its naff faux-teak units and the children’s drawings Blu-Tacked wonkily all over the cupboards.
The unrecognisable music has been turned up now, and the girls are shouting to be heard over it. He rejoins the group and tries, gamely, to join in, but they keep talking over each other and it becomes impossible to follow their conversational threads without bellowing, ‘Sorry, what did you say?’ like some wizened old man with an ear trumpet.
Escaping to the bathroom, Rob lands heavily on the loo seat and fishes out his phone from his pocket. Without considering what he’s doing, he calls Kerry’s number.
‘It’s me,’ he whispers.
‘Rob? What d’you want?’
‘Um …’ He realises he has no idea what he intended to say. He just wanted – no, needed – to hear her voice. ‘I er … wanted to say sorry for being so negative about the dog thing. Just wondered if the kids were excited when they met him?’ He puts his head in his hands, realising that what he really wanted to say was, I love you, Kerry. I love you so much and I want you back.
‘Hmmm,’ Kerry murmurs. ‘Yes, of course they were delighted. They’ll tell you all about it tomorrow and you’ll see him – Buddy – when you pick them up. Don’t worry, though – he’s been briefed not to home in on your crotch.’
‘That’s good, haha.’
There’s a small, tense pause. ‘Where are you?’
‘Um … at, er … the flat.’ He clears his throat. ‘Nadine’s place …’
‘Sounds like a party.’
‘It’s … a sort of girls’ night in.’
Kerry snorts. ‘What, like a sleepover?’
Rob senses himself flushing, and some part of that drink – the rhubarb component most likely – fizzles chemically at the back of his throat. ‘Not exactly, no …’
‘Are they painting their nails and applying face packs?’
‘No, they’re just … playing music and chatting, and I just wanted to call—’
‘Er, Rob,’ Kerry cuts in. ‘I’m kind of busy.’
‘Oh.’ His stomach slumps. Christ, the girls are singing now, punctuated by bursts of high-pitched laughter. He thinks of Kerry curled up on their knackered old sofa in Shorling and almost chokes with yearning.
‘You can’t do this,’ she adds.
‘What?’
‘Phone me out of the blue like this, just because you’re feeling out of your depth or whatever it is, and want something old and familiar.’
He frowns so hard, it causes his skull to throb. ‘You’re not old and familiar, Kerry.’
There’s a bitter laugh. ‘I’m going now.’
‘Oh … okay.’
‘Please don’t do this again. It’s not fair and it’s not very good for me right now.’ Her voice trembles as they finish the call.
Now Rob feels even worse. He didn’t plan to upset her – it’s the last thing he wants. He just wanted to say something nice to the woman he loves, and all he could think of was to praise her for going ahead with the dog thing. You’ve done the right thing, he’d wanted to say, if it makes Freddie and Mia happy after all they’ve been through. Christ, get them a whole bloody pack of hounds if you want to, and I’m sorry, so sorry for everything – for Nadine and the baby and fucking up so badly, and if I could do anything to make it not have happened, then I would …
But it’s too late for that. What Rob must do now is go back into the living room where the girls will have decided that his unborn child should be called Fern or Crocus. For a short while he’ll have to pretend to be enjoying himself, just to be polite. Then he’ll feign another migraine and take himself off to his cold, empty house, feeling as if his heart could break.
Chapter Twenty-Four
It’s gone ten by the time Kerry has finally coaxed the children to bed, having persuaded them that, yes, they still have to go to Nanny and Nonno’s with Daddy tomorrow, but it’s only for one night. And yes, of course Buddy will still be here when they get back on Sunday.
‘It’s not one night,’ Freddie bleated. ‘It’s two whole days.’
And now with the children in bed it’s just Kerry and Buddy, sharing the living room sofa (her no-dog-on-furniture rule lasted approximately five minutes). When she goes through to the kitchen he trots at her heels, his gaze un-wavering as she extracts the wine bottle from the fridge and pours herself a glass. He tails her to the music room, sitting expectantly at her feet as she starts to play the piano. And when she gets up from her stool to select a piece of music from her files, he looks up, following her every movement.
‘It’s okay,’ she says, patting his head. ‘I’m just going to the loo. Back in a minute.’ She hopes Buddy’s expression indicates that that’s okay (it’s impossible to tell). Yet, as soon as she’s shut the bathroom door behind her, his distressed whine quickly morphs into urgent barks. With a sigh, she lets him in, leaving the door open and trying not to feel under surveillance as she attends to business with him staring at her.
The flush of the loo seems to terrify him, and he shoots out, coming to a panting standstill at the front door.
‘D’you need to go out?’ she ponders, clipping on his lead and stepping out into the small, gravelled front garden. ‘Yes, I guess you do.’ There, just outside the house, she spots Buddy’s bag of food, document file and a couple of bowls all packed neatly into his basket; James must have dropped everything off without knocking. Just as well it hasn’t rained. Thanks a lot, Kerry mutters, deciding he clearly wants as little communication with her as possible. She circuits the garden several times until Buddy pees, then takes him inside, praying his barking doesn’t wake the children as she dashes back outside to retrieve the basket.
Is he exhibiting separation anxiety, like babies and toddlers have? Placing his basket in the corner of the living room and plumping up its paw-patterned cushion, she tries to coax him into it. He jumps up onto the sofa instead, wriggling to get comfortable, and when she sits beside him he rests his head on her lap. Now Kerry can’t fetch her wine or even reach the TV remote. She is trapped, and there’s nothing for it but to sit here with her now-sleeping dog, listening to the faint rush of the waves in the distance.
Her trilling mobile makes Buddy flinch, and she snatches it from her jeans pocket.
‘Kerry? It’s James.’
‘You