The Lover's Children novel Chapter 18

GEORGIE

The hall is set with ranks of dining tables towards the main window, giving everyone a view out over the snow and the river. The head table is about half-way along and a bar has been set up towards the back. Fire blazes in an enormous hearth, but the space is huge. They must have some other heating running too for it to be so warm. Perhaps from the vents I can see dotted around.

It’s quite a plain space really, but with the tree and the place settings, colourful in red and green, and the flickering light of the fire, casting a glow over everything, you could be fooled into thinking otherwise.

It all looks absolutely beautiful. Happy guests. Pretty bridesmaids. Handsome men in suits and hats. Congratulatory family and friends. Smiling groom. The clichéd blooming bride.

Couples. Husbands and wives. Boyfriends and girlfriends. Families. Friends.

And me.

What are my options?

People mill and surge and mingle. The bar’s packed, people jammed tight, ordering drinks, or collecting what they pre-ordered.

I’d like a drink myself, but it’ll take a while to get served. I wander, find my place setting. I’m well off the main tables. I was only invited because they’re friends with Dad and he didn’t want me left out. I try to catch his eye, but he’s busy, up toward the top end, guiding in the other guests to tables, cloakroom facilities, the bathroom. He doesn’t notice me.

So, I make my way to the main window, looking out. Although it’s only mid-afternoon, the lowering cloud dulls the daylight. Snow falls steadily, individual flakes picked out in the poor light by the sparkle from the tree and fairy lights strung across the vast window. Flakes fall, dull and dim, to suddenly glitter bright in red and green, gold and silver, then just as suddenly, fade and fall.

It’s entrancing.

“Enjoying yourself, Georgie?” My father stands beside me, elegantly dressed in his dark suit.

Jolted from my reverie, “Um, yes. It’s been lovely.”

He pauses. “Really? You don’t sound too certain.”

“Well, er, I’m not really sure what I’m doing here. Kirstie hardly knows me. She’s Charlotte’s friend, isn’t she. And yours. Rather than mine.”

“You’re here because I asked her to invite you. It’s a happy occasion. A reason to celebrate all apart from Christmas and the New Year. I thought you would enjoy yourself.”

He means well…

And I shouldn’t spoil the day for him…

Injecting as much enthusiasm as I can into my voice, “I am enjoying myself, Dad.”

Fake jollity comes back at me. “I’ll get you a drink. What would you like?”

His words are cut short. “Ah, James, there you are…” It’s Ryan with his lookalike brother in tow. “I didn’t get chance to introduce you properly. Kyle, this is James…”

He looks one way and the other, obviously wanting to talk to me, obliged to talk to someone else.

“It’s alright, Dad. I’ll get my own drink. You go look after the guests.”

He nods, plastering his smile into place, offering his hand. “Kyle, good to meet you. You’ve just flown in…?”

Pushing through to the bar, I find myself standing next to Larry, leaning back, a whisky glass in hand, surveying the crowd. He glances my way… “Hello, Georgie...” … then seems to search for his next words… “Are you enjoying the wedding?”

Please stop asking me that…

“It’s a bit crowded for me,” I admit. “I’m not too good at all this social stuff. Doesn’t matter what I do, I always find a way to put my foot in it.”

Eyes rising to the heavens, he lifts the glass to his mouth. “Tell me about it,” he mutters. His face softens. “Can I get you a drink, Georgie? I find a mild alcoholic haze is often helpful in these cases.”

Truth…

“Thanks. Red wine, please.”

He flags down the barman. “Any particular red wine?”

“Rioja if they have it. It’s what Dad always used to serve at meals.”

“He often still does… A Rioja for the lady. A large glass…”

“Larry…”

A voice calls out from somewhere and he turns, following the sound over the crowd. His gaze sharpens. “You’ll have to excuse me, Georgie. Mitch wants me.” He tosses down a few coins, knocks back his drink and vanishes into the throng.

Pity…

They say Larry isn’t safe to know. But he’s always been fine with me. Oddly, I’ve found I enjoy his slightly taciturn company.

A very large glass of wine stands on the bar…

Just what I need…

… and I reach for it…

A hand knocks mine aside. “I think you’ll find that’s my drink.” The voice is sharp. Startled, I snatch my hand back, finding myself looking into a familiar face…

… Sort-of…

It’s the blond man I met, oh-so-briefly, at the town bar. His Scandinavian-silver hair is striking enough that there’s no mistake.

He scowls. “Oh, it’s you.”

“I’m sorry. Someone bought me a drink… I thought…” I look up and down the bar again, but there’s no other glass. “I think it’s mine. Really.”

His eyes narrow. “Does it come naturally to you, being this rude all the time to strangers at bars? Or is it something you have to work on?”

What remains of my confidence crumbles. “I’m sorry…” Fighting the heat behind my eyes, I flee through the crowd, making for the door and, despite the weather, the solitude of the outdoors.

*****

The storm is gusting, repeatedly dying away to nothing, then squalling up to blow freezing grit against my face.

Can’t decide if it’s hail or snow…

The gravel-like ice stings my cheeks and eyes, and my pullover, warm and cosy in the still air of the indoors, is from the point of view of the wind, just a collection of loosely connected holes. Biting air whips through the previously cozy fabric, stripping away my body heat, gnawing at fingers and nipping my nose.

This isn’t sensible…

I should go inside…

Find a quiet corner… Stay long enough to be polite… Then go…

But as I’m about to retreat to the warmth and shelter of the indoors, the wind drops again and the snow returns to drifting vertically downward like some overblown Christmas card. The clouds open, displaying an azure streak and through the gap, sunlight spreads bright fingers.

Just like that, the world transforms into a sparkling fairy-tale.

Rimed edges at the water slice the light into dazzling blades. Snowdrifts, piled against walls and embankments, dazzle the eye. Even the powdering of snow over wind-cleared pathways glitters like the frosting on some enormous Christmas cake.

Then, as suddenly as it opened, the gap in the clouds closes, the sunlight is cut short and the world dulls to grey.

The wind squalls up again, blustering under my skirt, lifting the filmy fabric and hastily, I brush it down. It might have worked for Marilyn Monroe, but I’m not about to display my All to the world.

Above me, something buzzes.

What…?

I look this way and that, trying to identify the source of the noise. Then I see the cables, taut, humming with the wind. Holding a tarpaulin in place, they’re stretched out over the roof of a close-by out-house and a scaffolding tower propped against it.

Guy-ropes secure tarp and scaffold, vibrating with tension in the gusting wind. Wind whistles through the cables, making them sing like the rigging of a yacht as the tarp billows, and steel tubing creaks and groans. Some of the ropes are anchored on the edge of the tarp. Others span it, resisting the ballooning canvas and the lift of the wind. Some are anchored to the ground, pins knocked into hard earth, or eye-bolts in the wall. Others are tied into the scaffold, itself braced against the wall.

The wind drops once more, and the tarpaulin drops with it, flaccid over the roof, ropes slackening. But almost immediately, it gusts again, hard. The sheeting billows up, cables snapping tight again.

Something Pops! Then, something else.

As I watch, a third brass eye on one corner of the canvas Pops, then Pings, flying loose and impacting the brickwork, which chips and splinters. The wind gusts once more, tough canvas strains, stretches and then, with a ripping sound, tears.

With every blow of the wind, the tear grows. It reaches a seam and, stitch by stitch, the tarpaulin rips itself apart, disintegrating as I watch. Flapping loose, the roof open now to whatever the weather throws at it, the tarp slaps from side to side like some deranged flag…

That’ll piss them off…

Gonna be a hell of a clean-up job in there…

Another gust, now bodily lifting the tarp, tugging it back and forth. Moment by moment, it loosens, ripping at its fixings. A ground peg tugs free, then another. Ropes spin loose and it dawns on me that this is not a safe spot. Ducking just in time, a whiplashing cable is a near miss.

Another cable snaps loose. If the wind were constant, it might merely tent the canvas, but the repeated gust-and-drop, squall-and-blow rhythm is taking the whole thing apart. Seconds have passed, no more, but the tarp is free of the roof, almost free from the scaffolding, flapping loose. And now, the storm has a real hold on it, snapping the canvas one way then the other.

Not all the fixings fail. Some hold. Looped around the scaffolding tower, firmly in place, they grip tight. The tower shudders and vibrates, and as I watch, another squall whips the tarp up high, rocking the tower.

The rocking grows, an increasing oscillation, the scaffolding becoming more unstable by the moment, but still secured to the main wall by anchor ropes.

With a pop, a rope snaps, lashing toward me. Abruptly aware that I have more to be cautious of than goose-pimples, I step back into the shelter of the porch…

Another rope ruptures, and like some kid playing the xylophone, one after another pops loose in a line following the wall. The now free-standing tower, rocks and sways, threatening to spin…

Is it going to topple?