Morton grinned at her. “Sounds good to me. He needs new projects. May I warn you, though, he could get tired of the vegetable farm…”
Mary said she didn’t need the warning. “It’s a problem with retirement, Morton. Donald had his bird-watching; it had been a passion all his life; he’d longed for more time to spend on it, and after a few months, he even got bored with that. We started learning bridge just so he could focus on something else.”
“Don’t play bridge with my father, Mary,” said Morton. “He becomes extremely aggressive.”
“How do you think he’d be on archaeology? That’s always interested me.”
Morton considered this. “I can only say the world would hear of some amazing new buried city within months. As for the archaeological outfitters, how are they on bespoke shorts?”
“Russell, dear, do listen to me. I said, would you like to go for a walk?”
“Not just now, Sparrow. I’m worried about some of my stocks. Thinking of selling them. I’m going to draft a letter to my accountant just as soon as I’ve finished reading this.”
“Well, all right, dear. I’ll go on my own.”
“Mary, you know I don’t like you going out on your own.”
“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” said Mary impatiently, “what on earth do you think might happen to me? Might I meet a herd of wild boar in the lane?”
“Don’t mock me, Sparrow,” he said, and his eyes were quite hurt. “I want to look after you.”
“I know you do. But I need to get out. Can’t the stocks wait another day?”
“Possibly. Yes, all right.”
“Now, Russell, dear,” she said, tucking her arm into his as they walked through the gate at the bottom of the garden and into the wood, “I really would like to start planning our honeymoon. I don’t want to be cheated of it. Where would you like to go?”
“Anywhere you like, Sparrow. Italy, maybe-I’ve always longed to go there, would find all those works of art so wonderful. Or maybe the Seychelles, or even Vietnam…”
“Russell, I don’t think I want to do anything quite as… as adventurous as that,” said Mary.
“Well, why on earth not?” he said, looking genuinely puzzled. “We should do these things while we can, Mary, before we get old and stuck in our ways.”
“Oh, Russell,” she said, reaching up to kiss him, “I love you for so many reasons, but perhaps most because you don’t see us as old.”
“Well, of course I don’t. We’re not old. We’re certainly quite young enough to enjoy ourselves.”
“Yes, of course. But… well I would still rather have a quiet honeymoon. I’ve never been to the lake district. Wonderful scenery, good driving… and walking. Would you consider that? Just for now.”
“If that’s what you want, Sparrow. As long as we can go to Italy in the spring.”
“I promise you,” she said, “we’ll go to Italy in the spring.”
It had gone… not badly, but not really very well, Linda thought. They had been polite, but wary, undemonstrative. And Alex had been pretty similar; obviously nervous of appearing in any way foolish, romantically inclined, uncool. He hadn’t even touched her, except to kiss her hello and good-bye. And she felt under inspection by him all over again, seeing herself through their eyes.
It had been her idea to take them to a preview. A formal meal would be a minefield: where would they go? Somewhere easy and informal, obviously, but… high-profile like Carluccio’s or the Bluebird, or really local and undemanding. And then the former might seem like trying too hard, the latter like selling them short and not bothering much. And then it would be a minefield as well of silences and studied manners. If it had just been Amy, then maybe they could have gone shopping; although what self-respecting fifteen-year-old would want to go shopping with someone of… well, knocking on forty, and where on earth could she take her? And would she buy her lots of stuff, which would look like trying too hard, or not anything at all, which would look mean?
Not shopping, then. Anyway, they were all coming together, the three of them.
And then the tickets arrived for a new comedy smash hit, and that seemed too good to be true. She was sent two, asked for two more. The show was for early Friday evening, which was ideal, really; they could just go for a pizza afterwards, the ice broken by laughing-hopefully-and if it was going really badly, just a coffee at Starbucks and then Alex could take them home.
She chose what to wear with as much anguish as if she was going to meet the Queen or Brad Pitt. Both of whom would actually have been easier, she thought. In the end she settled on a short black skirt and polo shirt, and a leather jacket. Any hint of cleavage seemed a bad idea; the skirt was shortish, but that was all right. She initially put on pumps, but they looked wrong and frumpy, so she slightly anxiously changed into some Christian Louboutin high heels. She removed her red nail varnish, and wore much less eye makeup than usual.
Alex brought them to her office, because that seemed safer territory than her flat and a bit more welcoming than the cinema lobby, an acknowledgement that she was a bit more than a casual acquaintance, a bit less than a permanent fixture.
They walked in, smiled, shook her hand, said how do you do; she was pleasantly surprised by that, and by their slightly formal clothes. She had half expected grunting hoods. They were good-looking children, both of them, Amy an incipient beauty, with Alex’s dark colouring, all pushed-back hair and posh, languid voice, Adam blond, overtall and thin and horribly self-conscious, with spots, braces on his teeth, and a voice perilously close to breaking. Amy wandered round the office, looking at photographs, expressing polite interest when she recognised someone; Adam sat on the sofa, trying not to look at anyone as he sipped his Coke.
The taxi ride was silent; they arrived at the preview cinema in Wardour Street half an hour early. Not good. Linda met a couple of people, introduced them, and then withdrew into the safety of showbiz gossip. Amy looked bored, Adam embarrassed, Alex glowering and Heathcliff-like.
The film was a success: very funny, very glossy, quite cool. Linda sat next to Amy, then Adam, then Alex. They both laughed a lot, and afterwards Amy turned to her and said, “That was really cool, thank you so much.” Adam shuffled out, muttering, “Great, cool, yeah.”
“So… pizza, anyone? Or shall we just go to Starbucks or somewhere for a coffee? You guys choose.”
Guys? Should she have said that? More pathetic groping for street cred.
“Pizza?” said Amy.
“Don’t mind,” said Adam.
They went to Pizza Express in the end, the kids talking and giggling between themselves; what were they saying? Linda thought. Were they agreeing that she was gross, or pathetic, or even-just possibly-nice? There was no clue from the subsequent exchanges.
They ordered pizzas, preceded by garlic bread; conversation was strained and mostly about the film and other films they had seen. She longed to ask them what they wanted to do when they grew up, but knew that this above all was what people their age hated. She asked them their plans for the weekend, and they both said they didn’t know.
She asked them if their father had told them much about South Africa, and Amy said yes, and it had sounded really cool. Adam said yes, it had sounded great.
She had ordered one small glass of wine, but it was gone in her nervousness before they had even finished the garlic bread; she ordered another-“a large one this time, please”-and then worried they might put her down as an alcoholic.
A very large silence now settled; she almost let it go on, and then, thinking things could hardly be worse, asked them if they had heard about the music festival that Georgia, one of her clients, was putting on “for the victims of the M4 crash last summer; I’m sure your father will have told you about it.”