Читать книгу The Couple’s Secret - B Walter P - Страница 7

I lay my hands on the kitchen work surface and let my head fall a bit, just enough so the strands of my hair stay clear of the water in the sink. The sense of exhaustion throbs through me. Christmas should be an enjoyable time, but this year it feels like a stress on the calendar. I do love it, I really do, all the lights on the trees and the cold, although it never gets as cold as my childhood in Chicago. I’ve always thought that when English people moan about the weather they should be transported to the Windy City in the middle of winter. Then they’d really feel cold. Some part of me misses it; the layering up as if you’re about to go on some huge expedition up a mountain when you’re actually just going to the library or the shops.

I hear movement behind me by the door of the kitchen. ‘Do you fancy a top-up of wine?’ I call out to my husband. ‘My mother will be arriving soon, so you’d better get in quickly before she drinks us out of house and home.’

I take a pan of vegetables off the AGA as I talk, the billowing steam coating my face in a sheen of moisture.

‘Mum?’

My son’s voice takes me by surprise. He’s looking at the floor and something about his face makes me stop. Has he been crying? His eyes look red. Not red enough for me to rush to him and ask him what’s wrong, but just slightly tinged at the corners. He may be approaching his eighteenth birthday, but it’s amazing what little details can wind back the years and remind you that, not so long ago, your tall man-in-training was just a small, frightened child. Maybe he’s unwell, or his hay fever has been flaring up again. Unlikely in December, though.

‘Oh, sorry, honey. I thought you were Dad. You can have some wine, too. One glass.’ I wink at him and smile. I’m well aware his classmates are probably knocking back beer, wine, vodka and God knows what else every night in the run-up to Christmas. Not my Stephen, though. He’s not one of those seventeen-year-olds.

‘I’m cool with a Coke.’ He walks to the fridge and gets himself a can. He pours it in silence and then turns back to face me.

‘Mum,’ he says again, then hesitates.

I keep my smile going, but feel a slight coldness in my stomach. That simple word can be said in a whole galaxy of different ways. With love when they say goodnight, with anger when you tell them they have to do their homework, with annoyance when you probe too far into their personal lives or ask about who they’re dating. And then there are the times when they say ‘Mum’ in a way that makes your blood freeze in your veins. It’s immediately clear: something is very wrong. My mind starts to run wild, offering me a slide show of different horror stories, each more dismaying than the last. Maybe he wants to drop out of doing his exams? Is he being bullied? Has he got himself mixed up in something awful or criminal?

‘Stephen, honey, what is it?’ I say. I want to go to him and hug him but have learnt from experience it’s best not to crowd a teenager when they are about to tell you a piece of information that’s clearly causing them concern. In their overtaxed brains, flight is often an attractive solution to dealing with a problem. It’s best to stand well clear until the danger of this has passed.

Stephen moves his head, looking at the floor, as if he’s trying to gather his words but failing to get them in order. I try to be patient but fail. ‘Is it to do with your exams after Christmas?’ I see his face tighten as a result and curse myself for starting the interrogation too soon.

‘It’s … it’s nothing to do with that.’ He shakes his head, like he’s trying to brush his own thoughts away. I continue to stare, trying to keep my imagination at bay and remain calm.

‘Boyfriend trouble? Is it a problem with Will, then? Have you two had a fight?’ He winces, though I’m not sure if this is because I’m wrong in my presumption or because of my use of the word ‘fight’. He’s always been quite brutal about my ‘Americanisms’, as he calls them.

‘No, nothing to do with him either. It’s about … it’s about … Dad.’

This catches me by surprise.

‘What do you mean?’ I say, letting out a small, odd-sounding laugh. ‘What’s Dad done? Has he upset you about something? I know he goes a bit crazy with the pressure and all his talk about Oxford, but that’s only because he wants the—’

‘The best for me, I know.’ He cuts me off. His eyes are staring somewhere above my shoulder, still not meeting my gaze. ‘I told you, it isn’t anything about exams.’

‘Then I don’t see what he’s done to upset you.’

‘It … it isn’t like that. Forget it. I’m sorry, it was stupid to bring it up now. Especially when you’re doing all this for tonight and have your dinner party on Monday …’

‘It’s only Grandma coming to dinner, not a CIA operation,’ I say, playing down my own stresses. ‘And “dinner party” might be a bit of an overstatement – it’s just Ally and Louise and Ernest.’ The mere thought of the three of them descending upon us for our usual Christmas gathering makes me feel instantly tired, but I don’t let it show. ‘Just tell me. I’m sure it’s nothing we can’t fix. Has he said something about me? Something I’ve done wrong? Have I upset him? God knows it can be easy to, sometimes.’

‘No, nothing like that.’

I feel myself getting exasperated. ‘Darling, you keep saying that but don’t actually say what it is about. How can I help if I don’t know what it is? Are you in trouble with the law? I’m going to keep guessing until you tell me.’

‘I’m sorry, I’m being stupid, it’s really nothing. Do you need any help with the plates and stuff?’ He gestures at the kitchen table.

‘No, it’s all under control,’ I say distractedly, wishing it were true and trying not to think how many more things need to be done before my mother arrives. Now he looks me in the eye and I see fear. It’s cold and stark and horrible, the look a mother hates to see in the eyes of her child. I move a few steps forward and take his shoulders in my hands, feel his warmth and the firm muscles beneath his Abercrombie sweater. ‘Tell me.’ I say it calmly but firmly and he opens his mouth to speak.

‘Could you … could you quickly come upstairs for a minute?’

My concerns about the unprepared food fall away quickly. ‘Of course,’ I say. ‘Lead the way.’

As soon as we are upstairs, he leads me into his room and gestures at me to close the door. ‘Tell me now, what’s wrong.’ I walk to the other side of the room and sit down on his desk chair, facing him.

‘I shouldn’t have said anything,’ he mutters. He keeps glancing at the door as if it’s going to burst open at any moment.

The sentence frustrates me. How can he expect me to accept that as an answer?

‘Honey, Dad can’t hear us. I’m fairly sure he’s downstairs in the library, avoiding me in case I give him a job to do. We’re alone. And I’m not leaving until you tell me.’ I’m talking firmly now. Firm, but kind.

He finally looks me in the eye, takes a deep breath, apparently trying to choose his words carefully, and says: ‘I found something. Something a bit strange.’

‘Found what?’ My mind starts diving wildly to various different things he could have found. What does his father keep secret? Does he have a gun? That possibility is so unlikely it almost makes me laugh. Maybe evidence of an affair. That one sends a cold chill crawling across my skin.

‘It’s … it’s a bit hard to explain. They’re files. Files I found on Dropbox. In his folder.’

This takes me by surprise. ‘What? What do you mean? Why were you looking through his Dropbox folder?’

He sighs and rubs his eyes. This is clearly torture for him. I just want to hug him, but I’m scared of interrupting his explanation, so I sit still.

‘It’s … I think it’s something bad. Like, really bad.’

That cold chill is back. I really don’t like where this is going. A dark, menacing mass is forming in my head, as if it’s been let out of a deep, sickening recess of my mind.

‘What kind of thing are we talking about here?’

He stares at me and, for the first time this evening, I see resolve in his eyes. He’s going to tell me everything.

‘I think I’d better just show you.’

I nod, preparing for the worst.

‘Okay. Let me see.’