When they first spent the night together at David’s flat, Rab hadn’t been surprised. He watched them, that first time, slink off to David’s tiny room. Rab sat on the settee, where he planned to stay all night, speeding and writing his endless sentence.
David said, “I wish you could have an endless fuck like you can a sentence.”
“I like endings,” said Colin. “I like starting again, fresh. I like putting things in brackets for later, I like feeding them through semi-colons, propping them in parentheses. I like the endless sexy tussle of sub-clause on sub-clause. Those tickly commas. Do you want me to carry on with this punctuation-as-fucking conceit?”
“No,” said David. “Just…dot dot dot.”
In the dawn Billy Franks drove his Volkswagen back to his digs. Telling himself jokes, singing a loud, tuneless song.
I knew a girl who made me
a gift of her marvellous
youth and her
thighs
and
by my eyes!
Her thighs were a size…!
It isn’t true. When I was young, my thighs were delectably slim. I was slim as stair rods.
TWENTY-SEVEN
All the way there he wanted to make jokes about it. When they walked up the beach in a procession he wanted to laugh at the motley bunch they made, carrying rugs, foldaway chairs, a couple of battered hampers. They walked slowly, letting him take the lead, letting him find their spot on the deserted beach. Anne walked with him, a tartan rug bundled up in her arms. He wanted to laugh and ask her if this was his funeral procession: were they going to push him out to sea as a lost cause, watching him dwindle away on the grey, distant water? But something held Pat back from laughing. He was touched they’d all come out with him today. What a rabble they were, though.
“The good Lord’s smiling on us with the weather,” Anne said, startling him.
“The who?” he said. “Since when did you…”
“Since you stopped asking,” she said wryly, still staring at the clear, November sky. The warmth was quite puzzling. “I’ve not had a complete conversion. You needn’t worry.”
“A devout Anne is something worth thinking about,” he smiled.
“I’ve thought about God, this past year,” she said. “Even before our Lindsey died. Ralph’s very big on God, of course. Pictures on his walls. A Catholic.”
The old man’s mind had gone blank. “Ralph?”
“You see how little you ask?” she said gently. “Ralph’s my man.”
“Your man. Of course. You don’t talk about him much.”
She shrugged.
“You’ve become part of the family again, Anne.”
She looked at him. “What a funny year it’s been.”
They were heading towards a soft hollow of pale sand, set back from the tide. Tussocks of stiff, sun-faded grass kept it in shelter. “Why not here?” he asked, and flapped his arms briefly to alert the others.
“I’m glad,” he said, sitting down carefully, testing the ground. “I’m glad that I won’t have to think about next year. The years keep on getting more and more complicated.”
“I know,” she said.
“I just want Christmas. I want it to be a success. Will you stay here for Christmas, Anne?”
“Yes, of course. Ralph isn’t expecting me back in Newton Aycliffe.”
“You’ve been away months…”
“He’s always busy. He holds these Crusades, in his house. Saving people.”
“One of that sort,” said Pat, amused.
“So we’ll have a… family Christmas.”
“Funny family we’ve got.”
They watched the others settling themselves, ranging at close but separate spaces on the sand. Wendy was with Timon and Belinda and hearing about Belinda’s trips here as a youngster, about plunging into the freezing sea. How purging it was. She was laughing, throwing back her head. Her brother, the Captain, still in his immaculate yellow coat, was actually carrying Astrid, who had brought her chair, but who knew it wouldn’t run on sand. Gallantly the Captain had lent a hand. Her single long plait bobbed on his shoulder. He set her down on a blanket, which Anne was smoothing out. “Here we are,” said Anne. “All settled.” It was just past lunchtime, the best part of the day.
Colin was talking with David, who’d brought them the van and driven them here. Anne didn’t know much about this David, but she decided she’d go over there and thank him in a moment. When his and Colin’s rather animated, quiet conversation was finished with. Last came David’s friend, Rab, in his odd woollen hat, throwing sticks for his daschund, making it splash into the tide. Rab was the funny, skinny one that none of tem really knew. He seemed reluctant to sit down, to be part of them. Anne could understand that. Other people’s family groups could be off-putting, and yet they were hardly the usual family. There was very little blood here. Still, and all. Anne felt a warmth towards all of them and it surprised her. Even for Captain Simon, talking about Germany with Astrid. Anne decided that maybe she had put the Captain in an impossible situation. Of course they couldn’t conduct an… affair under her ex-husband’s roof. She could see that it wouldn’t do. You couldn’t rely on other people to be brave. Best to let it come as a surprise, a bonus. You can’t simply demand that they be brave. Anne shook her head at herself.
“Have a nap,” said Pat. “You look ever so tired.”
“I was making sandwiches at seven this morning. I don’t know why so early.” She lay back in the sand and, with Pat watching her, she drifted off.
Wendy took a while to decide she was in the spot she wanted. “Perfect.” She flopped down. “I like this better than red hot and sunny. It’s warm and still.”
“You’re very affected by your surroundings,” Timon observed. “I’ve watched you. You settle in and then… it’s not that you blend in, exactly.” He looked around, thinking. “Putting you in a place, that’s like dunking a biscuit in a cup of tea, hon.”
She sat up, leaning on one elbow. “That’s not very flattering.”
“Has she changed, then?” asked Belinda.
“Quite a lot,” said Timon.
