He smiles, and puts the disc in the player that is shaped like a steam train.
It starts with Massive Attack, ‘Unfinished Sympathy’ and he picks up Jasmine and bounces at the knees with his feet planted, mumbling the words into his daughter’s ear. Old pop music, two bottles of wine and no sleep are combining to make him feel light-headed and sentimental now. He cranks up the Fisher Price train as loud as it will go.
And then it’s The Smiths, ‘There is a Light That Never Goes Out’, and though he never particularly cared for The Smiths he continues to bob around, head down, twenty again, drunk at a student disco. He is singing quite loudly, it’s embarrassing, but he doesn’t care. In the small bedroom of a terraced house, dancing with his daughter to music from a toy train, he suddenly has an intense feeling of contentment. More than contentment – elation. He spins, and steps on a pull-along wooden dog, and stumbles like a street drunk, steadying himself with one hand against the wall. Whoa there, steady boy, he says aloud, then looks down at Jasmine to see she’s okay and she’s fine, she’s laughing, his own beautiful, beautiful daughter. There is a light that never goes out.
And now it’s ‘Walk On By’, a song his mother used to play when he was a kid. He remembers Alison dancing to it in the living room, a cigarette in one hand, a drink in the other. He settles Jasmine on his shoulder, feeling her breath on his neck, and takes her other hand in his, kicking through the debris in an old-fashioned slow-dance. Through the middle of exhaustion and red wine he has a sudden desire to talk to Emma, to tell her what he’s listening to, and as if on cue his phone rings just as the song fades. He forages amongst the discarded toys and books; perhaps it’s Emma, calling back. The display says ‘Sylvie’ and he swears; he must answer. Sober, sober, sober, he tells himself. He leans against the cot, settles Jasmine in his lap and takes the call.
‘Hello, Sylvie!’
At that moment Public Enemy’s ‘Fight the Power’ suddenly kicks out from the Fisher Price, and he scrambles to jab at the stumpy buttons.
‘What was that?’
‘Just some music. Jasmine and I are having a little party, aren’t we, Jas? I mean Jasmine.’
‘She’s still awake?’
‘’fraid so.’
Sylvie sighs. ‘What have you been up to?’
I have smoked cigarettes, got drunk, doped our baby, phoned old girlfriends, trashed the house, danced around mumbling to myself. I have fallen over like a drunk in the street.
‘Oh, just hanging out, watching telly. How about you? Having fun?’
‘It’s okay. Everyone’s off their face of course—’
‘Except you.’
‘I’m too exhausted to get drunk.’
‘It’s very quiet. Where are you?’
‘In my hotel room. I’m just going to have a lie-down, then go back for the next wave.’ As she speaks, Dexter takes in the wreck of Jasmine’s room – the milk-sodden sheets, the scattered toys and books, the empty wine bottle and greasy glass.
‘How’s Jasmine?’
‘She’s smiling, aren’t you, sweetheart? It’s Mummy on the phone.’ Dutifully he presses the phone to Jasmine’s ear, but she remains silent. It’s no fun for anyone, so he takes it away. ‘Me again.’
‘But you’ve managed.’
‘Of course. Did you ever doubt me?’ There was a moment’s pause. ‘You should get back to your party.’
‘Perhaps I should. I’ll see you tomorrow. About lunch time. I’ll be back at, I don’t know, eleven-ish.’
‘Fine. Goodnight then.’
‘Goodnight, Dexter.’
‘Love you,’ he says.
‘You too.’
She is about to hang up, but he feels compelled to say one more thing. ‘And Sylvie? Sylvie? Are you there?’
She brings the phone back to her ear. ‘Hm?’
He swallows, and licks his lips. ‘I just wanted to say . . . I wanted to say I know I’m not very good at this at the moment, this whole father, husband thing. But I’m working on it, and I’m trying. I will get better, Sylv. I promise you.’
She seems to take this in because there’s a short silence before she speaks again, her voice a little tight. ‘Dex, you’re doing fine. We’re just . . . feeling our way, that’s all.’
He sighs. Somehow he had hoped for more. ‘You’d better get back to your party.’
‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
‘I love you.’
‘You too.’
And she is gone.
The house seems very quiet. He sits there for a full minute, his daughter sleeping now on his lap, and listens to the roar of blood and wine in his head. For a moment he feels a pulse of dread and loneliness, but he shakes this away, then stands and raises his sleeping daughter to his face, loose-limbed now like a kitten. He inhales her scent: milky, almost sweet, his own flesh and blood. Flesh and blood. The phrase is a cliché but there are fleeting moments when he catches sight of himself in her face, becomes aware of the fact and can’t quite believe it. For better or for worse, she is a part of me. He lowers her gently into her cot.
He steps on a plastic pig, sharp as flint, which embeds itself painfully in his heel and, swearing to himself, he turns off the bedroom light.
In a hotel room in Westminster, ten miles further east along the Thames, his wife sits naked on the edge of a bed with the phone held loosely in her hand and quietly starts to cry. From the bathroom comes the sound of a shower running. Sylvie doesn’t like what crying does to her face, so when the sound stops she quickly wipes at her eyes with the heel of her hand and drops the phone onto the pile of discarded clothes on the floor.
‘Everything fine?’
‘Oh, you know. Not really. He sounded pretty drunk.’
‘I’m sure he’s fine.’
‘No, but really drunk. He sounded strange. Perhaps I should go home.’
Callum belts his dressing-gown, walks back into the bedroom and leans at the waist to kiss her bare shoulder.
‘Like I said, I’m sure he’s fine.’ She says nothing, so he sits and kisses her again. ‘Try and forget about it. Have some fun. Do you want another drink?’
‘No.’
‘Do you want to lie down?’
‘No Callum!’ She shakes his arm off her. ‘For Christ’s sake!’
He resists the temptation to say something, turns and walks back to the bathroom to brush his teeth, his hopes for the night evaporating. He has a horrible feeling that she is going to want to talk about things – ‘this isn’t fair, we can’t go on, perhaps I should tell him,’ all that stuff. For crying out loud, he thinks indignantly, I’ve already given the guy a job. Isn’t that enough?
He spits and rinses, returns to the room and flops onto the bed. Reaching for the remote, he flicks angrily through the cable channels while Mrs Sylvie Mayhew sits and looks out the window at the lights along the Thames and wonders what to do about her husband.