Home Truths (30 page)

1.12 p.m.

hey Al, ta 4 drinx. See u soon?

7.56 p.m.

If Matt had at least forewarned me that he was going to be home late, I wouldn't be sitting here, feeling neglected.

8.00 p.m.

‘Oh, hi – is that Al?’

‘Yes?’

‘It's Fen.’

‘Oh – hi Fen.’

‘I just thought I'd give you a quick call – I sent you a text earlier but I think I forgot to put my name to it.’

‘Ah.’

‘Anyway, just thought I'd give you a quick call. How are you doing?’

‘Yes – good. And you?’

‘Oh, you know, busy.’

‘Cool. Cool.’

‘Anyway – I'd better go, I suppose. I just thought – maybe meet up for a quick drink or something?’

‘Cool – I'll give you a call.’

‘Great.’

‘OK, Fen – bye then.’

‘Bye. Oh. When? Ish?’

‘Sorry?’

‘Us fusty old mums need time to organize babysitters – so I was just wondering if you had an idea of when? You know – when you'd be calling and when we'd meet up?’

‘Oh. Soon. Next couple of days?’

‘Great. Bye Al.’

‘See you, Fen.’

That call was crap. Ought I to text him to rectify? Should I just compose one and see how it looks on the screen? Or should I sit on my hands and watch
Grand Designs
and keep shtum?

Who are you asking, Fen?

And by the way, where is Matt?

Matt is having an impromptu drink after work with an old mate, Jake, with whom he shared a flat and a certain level of rakishness in their twenties. Though their thirties have led them onto divergent paths, their friendship continues and they like to meet up every now and then and live vicariously through one another, just for the duration of an entertaining evening. Jake has taken to calling Matt ‘Daddy’, and Matt calls Jake ‘Twat’. They are in Soho and the area is buzzing. Matt hates to admit even to himself how long it has been since he last had a night out in town; he hadn't thought he'd missed it, he wasn't aware of having craved it but it's reviving to be back here, heading through the colourful milling crowd to a
bar, past shops specializing in everything from whisky to ship's chandlery, gay paraphernalia to hip and costly trainers, from sushi to sex. The bar is new to Matt though Jake informs him it's been open awhile, and is
the
place to drink and Where the fuck have you been, Daddy – it's where all manner of media scandal and celebrity debauchery are often chronicled. Shut up, Twat, and buy me a beer.

While Jake orders, Matt quietly wonders if he looks out of place, whether it's obvious that he's more accustomed to slouching in front of the television with a ready meal and being in bed by midnight. He scouts other people's clothing and footwear, feeling slightly faded and last-season in comparison; resolves to spend a lunch-time and a wage packet in Paul Smith the next day. Does he feel out of place? A little, just a little at the moment. But beer will help and make all equal.

‘They only do bizarre beer in piss-pale shades from places like Latvia,’ Jake apologizes, setting down two over-designed bottles in front of them. ‘Cheers anyway.’

‘Cheers mate,’ says Matt. ‘How's it going?’

‘Madly busy at work,’ Jake rues, ‘and complicated as ever at play.’

Matt laughs. Jake lights a cigarette and offers one to Matt who falters for a moment and then takes one. He was only ever a social smoker but the arrival of Cosima stipulated a nicotine-free zone and now, the head rush he experiences after the first few drags is slightly disconcerting yet nostalgic and oddly liberating.

‘There's this girl,’ Jake is saying, clasping the cigarette between his lips as he describes her assets crudely with his hands. ‘She's a total babe – Suze – pretty young but bloody bright. Anyway, I thought she was just after a good time, you know?’

Matt nods sagely as if he does.

‘Suited me fine – absolutely. You know, finally a woman after my own heart – or rather, not after my heart but only my body. No-strings sex and the like. But the weird thing is,’ Jake continues,
sotto voce
, ‘increasingly I find myself wanting a bit more.’ Jake slaps the table and roars with laughter. ‘What the fuck is all that about then? Usually they harp on at
me
about mini-breaks and meeting my parents and bollocks, and here I am, toying with the idea of asking her to move in. Here's
me
, pissed off if
she
hasn't phoned all day!’

‘Bloody hell!’ Matt marvels, with a glug and a drag.

‘Bloody hell is right,’ Jake says darkly. ‘Wedding bells and babies.’

‘Have you talked to her?’ Matt asks. Jake answers him with a look of ridicule.

‘As I say, she hasn't phoned all day,’ says Jake morosely, ‘but I'm damned if I'm going to call her.’

‘I meant,’ says Matt, ‘have you talked to her about – you know – how you feel? Longevity? The C word.’

‘Cunt?’ says Jake.

‘
Commitment
,’ says Matt. ‘Twat.’

‘Well. Almost. You see, what complicates it,’ Jake says, ‘is that Ellie is still on the scene – casually.’ Matt covers his eyes in mock distaste. ‘I mean, I never ring her, really. Well, not really,’ says Jake. ‘Sometimes I do – if I'm bored or drunk or both. And when she rings me – well, it's a bit mad to turn it down, isn't it?’

To Matt, Jake's life sounds dictionary-definition mad. Momentarily, it all seems a little unsavoury too, unnecessarily complicated and way too tiring. It's not a been-there, done-that derision Matt feels as he never quite subscribed to Jake's low-level ethics, more it's an uncomfortable feeling of what the allure can still be for Jake. Isn't he bored after well over a decade of bawdiness? Oughtn't he to have outgrown
such philandering? Doesn't he aspire to a more grown-up way of life? A quiet side of Matt is slightly insulted that his own lifestyle, the developments and changes, the achievements and differences, appear to hold little attraction for Jake. Though Jake usually asks after Fen, after the baby, after the mortgage and the mundanity, Matt detects a perfunctory edge before Jake deviates to humorous accounts of his own ongoing hedonism. Jake is a great raconteur – and that's the point of such evenings. But Matt has to admit that the fact that their lives are now so disparate is also the reason that they now meet so infrequently.

However, alcohol is a great leveller. Once a certain level of inebriation has been reached, Matt finds he and Jake are blokes with equal charisma, wit and highly entertaining neuroses. So they drink and they smoke and they banter. They put the world to rights, they re-train the England soccer squad and they recite lengthy tracts from
The Office
. Jake confides that he had to be treated for chlamydia after a mad week in Aya Napa and Matt reveals that a baby and a sex life is a contradiction in terms.

‘Do you not fancy Fen like you used to?’ Jake asks, with slurred concern. ‘I've heard about this – it's a syndrome, mate. Once you've seen what her vagina is really for, you can never see it as your playpen again.’

But Matt shakes his head.

‘Oh!’ Jake whispers. ‘Oh.’ He nods his head earnestly. ‘I've heard about that too,’ he says. ‘It's another syndrome – that childbirth alters, well, the feel of the fuck. Like a familiar room with all the furniture moved around. Or, worse,
gone
.’

Matt laughs but shakes his head. Jake looks a little surprised that he's wrong again.

‘Too tired?’ he tries.

‘Partly,’ says Matt.

‘Oh God – she's not up the duff again is she?’

‘Hardly!’ Matt snorts. He contemplates the cocoon of ash lying pristine on his knee. He flicks it away. ‘I'm not getting it because Fen seems to have gone off me.’

‘Maybe she's still – you know –
sore
?’

‘What, ten months on?’ Matt argues. ‘Mate – it's like her opinion of herself has altered. She has this whole new identity. She loves being a mummy but she's not that into being my girlfriend.’

‘She turns you down?’ Jake is appalled.

‘I guess,’ says Matt, ‘yes. And when we do have sex – I sense it's more like she just wants a simple shag. An orgasm – and quick.’

‘Man,’ sighs Jake, ‘I've been searching my whole life for a simple shag.’

Matt shrugs. ‘You know what I mean.’

Jake doesn't, but he nods anyway as he's not particularly interested in developing this strand of the conversation.

‘You know something,’ says Matt, ‘I wonder if we hadn't had Cosima whether we'd have split up by now.’ He picks at the label on the beer bottle. ‘But I also wonder if our relationship would have been better without having a baby. Terrible thing to think, really.’

‘Like you can't have the one without the other – or you can't have both? Or something?’ Jake asks, his eyes drawn to three girls ordering at the bar.

‘Something like that,’ says Matt.

‘Fantastic,’ says Jake. Matt frowns until he realizes he's referring to the girls who are sending lascivious glances in their direction.

Usually, the point at which Jake starts to prowl is when Matt decides to bale out and go home. He tends to glance at his watch and calculate the maximum sleep he needs against the hours of sleep he's actually going to have. This is when Matt usually slaps Jake on the shoulder and tells the girl, or girls,
to look after his mate. And this is the point when Jake says ‘Goodnight, Daddy’ and feels a slight sense of relief that he's free to continue the evening in his own inimitable way. This is when Matt goes home. As you'd expect. He's a father after all. It's not seemly to drink into the small hours; it's irresponsible. So go home, Matt.

But Matt sees little point in going home. Fen will just say he stinks of booze and fags and forbid him from going anywhere near the baby and then reproach him for the fact that it all amounts to her being the one who's always up at the crack of dawn despite her matchless tiredness. So Matt doesn't go home because just now he doesn't like who's at home; what he likes more is the upbeat revelry of his immediate milieu. And he likes the girls who have come, pouting and posturing over to him and Jake. He likes the way one of them licks her lips while he's speaking. She's hanging on his words and his arm because she's a little unsteady on her feet; not surprising, considering the combination of cocktail and the precarious height of her fuckme shoes. Matt doesn't quite know what he's talking about but she seems to find him scintillating and hysterically funny. When she throws her head back like that, her throat looks so lickable. He likes her pierced navel, there's a sparkly dangly thing hanging from it. And look at the tantalizing wobble of her high, nubile – oh Christ – braless breasts.

What did you say her name was, Matt?

‘Are you married?’ she's asking him.

‘Nope,’ Matt says.

‘Is your mate?’ she asks, trying to focus on Jake who has an arm around each of her friends.

‘God no,’ Matt laughs.

‘I'm so pissed,’ she complains, lolling into Matt's chest.

‘Me too,’ Matt agrees, using it as an excuse to drape his
arm around her and flop his hand down to the small of her back. If she brings her face up, he knows they'll snog. In fact, he wants her to, so he strokes the small of her back and extends his fingertips beyond the unmistakable boundary to her buttocks. Up comes her face and in slips Matt's tongue. He can taste Bailey's and Marlboro Lights. For the first time in five years, he is sharing his mouth with a woman other than Fen.

‘Hey! Daddy!’ says Jake. ‘Let's go to Eddie's.’

Matt takes his mouth away from the girl's though his hand keeps her clasped against him. ‘Who's Eddie?’ he asks, wondering why Jake isn't raising eyebrows at him, or looking remotely shocked, or even amused.

‘It's this late-night drinking den in Dean Street,’ Jake says with a glance around, as if embarrassed to be in the company of someone who's never heard of Eddie's.

‘Why did he call you Daddy?’ the girl is asking Matt, who ignores her.

‘Nah!’ Matt says to Jake. ‘I'm going to head home.’

The girls with Jake look at their friend. ‘You coming to Eddie's?’ they ask her.

‘Nah,’ she says, just like Matt.

Jake and the girls shrug, say a brief goodbye and head off.

So, Matt, are you going to head home then?

Yeah, I'll just have one for the road first.

One what?

When it's very late and you're drunk and horny in a bar in Soho, where do you go? As Matt snogs the girl, he asks himself this question. They're still in the bar, but they've found an enclave with a curved leather banquette. He's bought them a drink which they haven't yet touched. They've been
groping at each other while sucking face; there's a teenage randiness to it all which Matt is, literally, lapping up. He is sitting, legs spread, with a hard-on bulging shamelessly through his trousers. Every now and then, the girl sweeps her hand over it in a kind of maintenance check. Matt's been feeling her breasts through her top and because it's so skimpy and because she's not wearing anything underneath, she's as good as naked to his touch.

‘Let's go back to yours,’ she suggests.

Matt looks at her as if she's mad. But how's she to know his child and the mother of his child are there? He's told her Jake calls him Daddy because he's the eldest. He's told her he calls Jake Twat because he is one.

‘Can't,’ he replies to her, ‘there are people there.’

She shrugs this off.

‘Where do you live then?’ he asks.

‘Purley,’ she says.

Even in his drunken state and despite his aching balls, Matt assesses that Purley is pointless. The taxis would cost a fortune. ‘Purley,’ he says. ‘Oh.’

‘There's the loos here,’ she says. ‘They're big and posh and this place turns a blind eye to people going in pairs.’ She taps the side of her nose as if she knows a secret and it takes a while for Matt to realize she's alluding to cocaine.

‘Have you got any?’ he asks, actually feeling his desire for drugs is more iniquitous than the adulterous lust bulging in his trousers.

‘Ruby's got the wrap,’ she says forlornly, ‘but I reckon your mate had most of it anyway.’

Matt thinks he's probably relieved. At the same time, he's slightly disconcerted that he didn't realize Jake had been doing drugs that evening. That Jake hadn't offered any to him. Though, in all probability, Matt would have refused. If this girl had in fact had some, would he? He's too drunk to
debate it. She's winking at him, nodding her head in the direction of the toilets.