The woman shakes her head, turns her mouth downwards. ‘Not until late. She’s gone to Sutton Coldfield.’
Something flickers in his belly; panic, some sense of betrayal. ‘That’s a long way,’ he says, in an effort not to ask a direct question; after all, they’re complete strangers.
The woman smiles, almost conspiratorially. ‘She’s gone to pick up her daughter-in-law.’
For a brief, insane moment, William wonders who that could be. He stares at the sequins across the woman’s feet, notices her varnished toenails through the beige mesh of her tights.
‘She’s going to help Evelyn get ready for her wedding.’ The woman’s face tightens in concentration on William. ‘Can I tell her who called?’
‘No.’ William is already back at his car, opening the door. ‘Thank you. It doesn’t matter.’
60
A flock of daffodils stand proud and golden in the late afternoon sun on the patch of grass at the turning into their street. From this distance, the Lavery and Sons sign looks small and understated. It’s taken him three and a half hours to drive from Swansea to Birmingham. He called Martin from a service station and asked if he could keep the car for a few days; he was going home. Now, finally and unexpectedly parked beneath the Lavery and Sons sign, all he feels is tired.
The forecourt is empty and the relief is immense. He’d wondered if he was going to find Robert and Howard entertaining Evelyn and Gloria, and where on earth he’d fit into that. After staring at the illuminated tulips under the window, he gets out and lets himself in. The grandfather clock in the hallway stands sentinel, tick-tocking over the unassuming order of Howard and Robert’s carefully lived life. He hangs his anorak on the hook furthest to the right, as he used to. The adjacent one, Gloria’s, is empty. He stands for a moment, listening to the silence of the house, then heads through the adjoining door at the end of the hall to the funeral home.
The mortuary is clean, orderly and silent. All as it should be. He places his hands on the table. If there was a body waiting, he wouldn’t hesitate; that would calm him, let him disappear for a while. Instead, he checks on supplies in the cupboards, turns the taps on and off, fiddles with the instruments. Eventually, he walks back through to the house.
Walking into his bedroom is the hardest. The orange poppy duvet and matching curtains, the oak dressing table, the leather armchair, just as they always were. He scans the bare surfaces; the antimacassar stretches out on the dressing table, not rumpled and rucked without any perfume bottles or tissues. No hand cream, bracelets, safety pins or lipstick. No nurse’s silver fob watch. He opens her wardrobe and a few wire coat hangers rock gently. It’s worked. He left her so she could leave him. And now, he sees, she has.
He must have fallen asleep, but wakes to the sound of car doors closing. There’s a click and then a swish of carpet downstairs.
‘Robert? Howard?’ He moves quickly to the top of the landing, not wanting to scare them.
The men stand, faces upturned; identical expressions of surprise, swept away by broad smiles. As William comes down the stairs towards them, Robert’s arms lift, like a child to a parent.
They embrace while Howard stands with one hand on Robert’s back and one on William’s shoulder.
‘Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?’ Robert stands back and grins at William.
‘I didn’t know I was,’ William answers.
‘I’ll put the kettle on,’ says Howard, squeezing William’s elbow.
‘Please!’ William realises he hasn’t eaten or drunk anything since this morning.
‘Toast and Marmite?’ Howard claps his hands together.
‘Yes!’
‘Just to keep you going,’ he says, disappearing into the kitchen. ‘We’ve got toad in the hole in a couple of hours.’
William and Robert go to the sitting room, hearing the rumbling kettle, the chink of a teaspoon, the opening of the fridge, through the open serving hatch.
‘How long are you staying?’ Robert says. ‘How long have you been here? Is that your car in the driveway?’
‘Robert!’ Howard laughs from the kitchen. ‘Too many questions, give him a chance.’
He sits on the sofa. Robert, on the armchair opposite, stares at him, smiling but intense and enquiring. Howard comes in with three mugs of tea and a packet of gypsy creams.
‘Start on these while the bread’s toasting.’
‘Thanks.’ Howard’s flouting of the savoury before sweet rule has always struck William as quietly, delightfully anarchic.
‘So, what’s going on?’ Robert slides to the edge of the seat, towards William. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Sort of.’ He shrugs. ‘I went to see Mum this morning.’
‘In Swansea?’ Robert is shocked. ‘From Cambridge?’
He nods.
‘Why?’
William takes a gulp of tea, holds his mug in both hands. He glances from Robert to Howard and sees the same intensity of gaze upon him. ‘It’s gone on long enough, hasn’t it? We don’t have forever.’
Robert quickly wipes his cheek with the back of his hand.
‘But she wasn’t there,’ he says, ‘she was here, wasn’t she? Picking up Gloria.’
‘How do you know?’ Robert’s cheeks are pink.
‘Her neighbour told me.’
‘And you drove straight back here?’ Howard passes him the plate of biscuits. William takes one.
‘Didn’t know what else to do.’
‘You missed them by less than an hour,’ Robert says softly.
‘We’re just back from taking them to Spaghetti Junction,’ Howard says. ‘Your mum was worried she’d get on the wrong way and end up in Ipswich.’
‘Were you going to tell me?’
‘What, that she’s been here?’ Robert gestures with open hands at the room.
‘That she and Gloria have somehow become best friends.’
Robert looks to Howard first, then to William. He exhales, shakes his head. ‘Glory be, William, none of us knew what to do for the best. But you should have talked to her,’ he says, with a pleading in his face.