I knocked; I could hear voices coming from behind the house. Leon’s mother, saying something about Mrs. Thatcher and the Unions, a man’s voice—The only way to do it is to—and the muted chink of someone pouring from a jug filled with ice cubes. Then, Leon’s voice, sounding very close, saying, “Vae, anything but politics, please. Anyone want a lemon-vodka ice?”
“Yeah!” That was Charlie, Leon’s sister.
Then, another voice, a girl’s, low and well modulated. “Sure. Okay.”
That must be Francesca. It had sounded rather a silly name to me when Leon had told me over the phone, but suddenly I wasn’t sure anymore. I edged away from the door toward the side of the house—if anyone saw me I would tell them I had knocked but had received no reply—and peered around the edge of the building.
It was much as I had imagined it. There was a veranda behind the house, shaded by a large tree that cast a mosaic of light and shade over the tables and chairs that had been placed underneath. Mrs. Mitchell was there, blond and pretty in jeans and a clean white shirt, which made her look very young; then Mrs. Tynan, in sandals and a cool linen dress; then there was Charlotte, sitting on a homemade swing, and facing me, in his jeans and battered sneakers and his faded Stranglers T-shirt, was Leon.
He’d grown, I thought. In three weeks his features had sharpened, his body lengthened, and his hair, which had already been borderline in terms of St. Oswald’s regulations, now fell across his eyes. Out of uniform he might have been anyone; he looked like any other boy from my own school but for that shine; the patina that comes from a lifetime of living in a house like this, of learning Latin with Quaz in the Bell Tower, of eating smoked-salmon blinis and lemon-vodka ice instead of half a lager and fish and chips, and never having to lock your bedroom door on Saturday nights.
A wave of love and longing overwhelmed me; not just for Leon, but for everything he stood for. It was so powerful, so mystically adult in its intensity, that for a moment I barely noticed the girl at his side, Francesca, the fat little pony girl of whom he’d seemed so contemptuous on the phone. Then I saw her, and for a time stood watching, forgetting even to hide in my amazement and dismay.
Fat little pony girl she might once have been. But now—there were no words to describe her. All comparisons failed. My own experience of what constituted desirability was limited to such examples as Pepsi, the women in my father’s magazines, and the likes of Tracey Delacey. I couldn’t see it myself—but then again I wouldn’t, would I?
I thought of Pepsi and her false nails and perpetual smell of hair spray; of gum-chewing Tracey, with her blotchy legs and sullen face; and of the magazine women, coy but somehow carnivorous, opened up like something on a pathologist’s slab. I thought of my mother, and Cinnabar.
This girl was a different race entirely. Fourteen, maybe fifteen; slim; tawny. The embodiment of shine; hair tied carelessly back in a ponytail; long, sleek legs beneath khaki shorts. A small gold cross nestled in the hollow of her throat. Dancer’s feet kicked out at an angle; dappled face in the summer green. This was why Leon hadn’t called; it was this girl; this beautiful girl.
“Hey! Hey, Pinchbeck!”
My God, he’d seen me. I considered making a run for it; but Leon was already coming toward me, puzzled but not annoyed, with the girl a few steps behind him. My chest felt tight; my heart shrunk to the size of a nut. I tried a smile; it felt like a mask. “Hello, Leon,” I said. “Hello, Mrs. Mitchell. I was just passing by.”
Imagine, if you can, that terrible afternoon. I wanted to go home, but Leon would not allow it; instead I endured two hours of utter wretchedness on the back lawn, drinking lemonade that soured my stomach while Leon’s mother asked me questions about my family and Mr. Tynan slapped me repeatedly on the shoulder and speculated on all the mischief Leon and I got up to at school.
It was torture. My head ached; my stomach churned, and throughout all of it I was obliged to smile and be polite and reply to questions whilst Leon and his girl—there was no doubt now that she was his girl—lounged and whispered to each other in the shade, Leon’s brown hand laid almost casually over Francesca’s tawny one, his gray eyes filled with summer and with her.
I don’t know what I said in answer to their questions. I remember Leon’s mother being especially, agonizingly kind: she went out of her way to include me; asked me about my hobbies, my holidays, my thoughts. I replied almost at random, with an animal’s instinct to stay hidden, and I must have passed scrutiny, although Charlotte watched me in a silence I might have found suspicious if my mind had not been wholly taken up with my own suffering.
Finally, Mrs. Mitchell must have noticed something, because she looked at me closely and observed that I was looking rather pale.
“Headache,” I said, trying to smile, while behind her Leon played with a long strand of Francesca’s honey-mink hair. “I get them sometimes,” I improvised desperately. “Better go home and lie down for a while.”
Leon’s mother was reluctant to let me go. She suggested that I lie down in Leon’s room; offered to get me an aspirin; overwhelmed me with kindness so that I was almost reduced to tears. She must have seen something in my face then, because she smiled and patted me on the shoulder. “All right, then, Julian, dear,” she said. “Go home and lie down. Perhaps that’s best, after all.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Mitchell.” I nodded gratefully—I really was feeling ill. “I’ve had a lovely time. Honest.” Leon waved at me, and Mrs. Mitchell insisted on giving me a large and sticky slice of cake to take home, wrapped in a paper napkin. As I was walking back down the drive I heard her voice, low and carrying from behind the house: “What a funny little chap, Leon. So polite and reserved. Is he a good friend of yours?”
5
St. Oswald’s Grammar School for Boys
Tuesday, 5th October
The official report from the hospital was anaphylactic shock, caused by ingestion of peanuts or peanut-contaminated foodstuffs, possibly accidental.
Of course, there was a terrible fuss. It was a disgrace, said Mrs. Anderton-Pullitt to Pat Bishop, who was there; school was supposed to be a safe environment for her son. Why wasn’t there any supervision at the time of his collapse? How had his schoolmaster failed to notice that poor James was unconscious?
Pat dealt with the distressed mother as best he could. He’s in his element in this kind of situation; knows how to defuse antagonism; has a shoulder of comforting proportions; projects a convincing air of authority. He promised that the incident would be thoroughly investigated but assured Mrs. Anderton-Pullitt that Mr. Straitley was a most conscientious Master and that every effort had been made to ensure her son’s safety.
By then, the individual concerned was sitting up in bed, reading Practical Aeronautics and looking rather pleased with himself.
At the same time, Mr. Anderton-Pullitt, school governor and ex-England cricketer, was pulling rank with the hospital administration in his attempt to have the remains of his son’s sandwiches analyzed for nut residue. If they yielded as much as a trace, he said, a certain health-food manufacturer would be sued for every penny it possessed, not to mention a certain chain of retailers. But as it happened, the tests were never made, because before they could get started, the peanut was found floating and still mostly intact, at the bottom of James’s can of Fanta.