Page 37 of Lost in Translation
‘Oh my goodness. Is it Dominic? Tell me what’s happened!’
Jean called out to Torquil, and Charlotte overheard a muted response — muted both in the sense of him being far from the phone, and the whooshing sensation of blood rushing to Charlotte’s ears. Why would Jean think it was to do with Dom? Unless…
‘No, it’s Alastair. He’s broken his arm quite badly playing football, but he’s OK. I don’t understand why you thought it might be Dom. He’s with you, isn’t he?’
Charlotte shifted the phone to her other ear, aware of gripping it so tightly her fingers throbbed. She listened to a mumbled conversation between Dom’s parents, picking up only the odd word. ‘Alastair … accident … confused.’
‘Are you there?’ Charlotte realised her voice was shrill, verging on hysterical. She looked up to see Robson standing in the doorway, a questioning look on his face. Pointing at the biscuit barrel, she shooed him away with a handful of Bourbon creams.
‘Yes, I’m here. And no, Dominic isn’t. Was he supposed to be?’ Jean’s tone was wary, as if Charlotte had caught her cheating at her weekly mah-jong get-together with the twinset-and-pearls group she called her friends. Except Jean wasn’t the one being accused of cheating. If Dom wasn’t with his parents, where exactly was he?
‘Sorry, I thought… I mean, he said you’d been poorly, and that he was going to spend some time with you. I must have got it wrong. Sorry again.’ Why the hell was she apologising? It was Dom who was in the wrong, not Charlotte. Or, for that matter, his parents.
Jean gave an irritatingly tinkly laugh which set Charlotte’s teeth on edge. ‘I’m perfectly well, dear. We haven’t spoken to our boy since — Torquil, when did Dominic last call us?’ There was another pause, then: ‘Around two weeks ago, I believe. He’s always so busy with work, but at least he calls regularly, unlike others I know of. Martha Hedgecock is lucky if she hears from her son twice a year. Quite shocking!’
Charlotte hadn’t the faintest idea who Martha Hedgecock was and had zero interest in the frequency of her exchanges with her offspring. ‘Well, I must have got things muddled up.’ She bit her lip, determined not to give away the maelstrom of emotions surging through her body. In particular, her desire to rip Dom’s head off and stuff it in the recycling bin.
‘Indeed. It is rather strange, but I’m sure there’s a simple explanation. Looking after two young boys in a foreign country must take its toll. Are you keeping well yourself?’
Great. Now Jean was hinting that Charlotte might have lost the plot, instead of concluding that her golden boy might be lying. ‘I’m absolutely fine,’ she snapped, knowing full well that she was a million miles from ‘fine’. Devastated, nauseous and convinced her husband was a lying, cheating snake would be more accurate. Not that she could voice any of that to Mummy dearest.
‘That’s good. Well, Torquil has whipped up a delicious scallops and black pudding with beurre blanc for supper, so I’d best be off. Oh, and give darling Alastair a hug from us. And Robson, too. Bye for now!’
With that, Jean ended the call. Charlotte stared at the phone and resisted the urge to smash it repeatedly on the tiled worktop. Instead, she resumed making the pizza, shredding basil with ferocious intensity.
‘Mummy, my armpit’s really itchy,’ wailed Alastair from the lounge.
Charlotte bunged the pizza in the oven, set the timer, and went to see the boys. ‘Oh, you poor thing. It’s because it’s so hot, I guess,’ she said, brushing a sticky strand of hair from his brow. The temperature had been in the high twenties for several days, and air conditioning wasn’t a feature of the house.
‘I’ll get the fan, Mummy,’ said Robson, leaping from the sofa and heading for the far corner of the room. He plugged it in and directed its cooling air towards his brother.
‘Thanks, sweetie.’ Charlotte patted him on the head and kissed the tip of his nose. Robson squeezed her around the waist and wandered off.
‘I can’t scratch it.’ Alastair attempted to reach his armpit, but only a tiny gap remained between his underarm and the constrictive binding.
‘I’ve an idea.’ Charlotte dashed upstairs to Alastair’s room and found his pencil case. She retrieved a plastic ruler and hurried back. ‘Try this.’
Frowning, Alastair took the ruler and carefully poked it through the gap. He wiggled it up and down a few times before giving a sigh of relief. ‘That’s better. Oh, the oven’s beeping, Mummy.’
With the boys duly fed, and ice cream and Gruyères meringues for dessert, Charlotte ushered them upstairs for a bath — or in Alastair’s case, a hose down of his lower half with the shower spray and a perfunctory wipe-down of the visible bits of his top half. She read them a quick story, snuggled up together on Robson’s bed, before tucking them both in and praying Alastair would get some sleep.
Back in the kitchen, Charlotte toyed with a cold slice of pizza. Her appetite was non-existent, shrivelled up like the three-day-old bag of salad she’d found lurking in the fridge. She poured herself a glass of white and set to cleaning out other past-their-best items as a distraction. An hour later she’d scrubbed the fridge interior, given the oven a once-over and mopped the floor.
What next?Charlotte glared at her phone. Nothing from Dom. She could ring Ruth, but didn’t want to burden her with this latest, kick-in-the-teeth instalment of her wavering marriage. Equally, she couldn’t confide in her parents — not until she was sure of what was going on — and telling either Sadie or Pamela was a no-no. The only person she felt she could really talk to was Jürgen. He’d been in the same boat with his second marriage — Charlotte dragged her fingers angrily through her hair. Why was life so bloody complicated?
Checking on the boys, both thankfully fast asleep, she gathered together their bits and pieces for camp the next day. She’d already emailed Miss Liddy to let her know about Alastair, and she’d assured Charlotte that there would be plenty of activities he could take part in for the remaining days. Just not physical ones.
Charlotte turned on the TV and watched a few minutes of BBC News before hunting for some light relief. She flicked through the channels, settling on the live-action version ofBeauty and the Beast.Belle was trilling away about a better, more exciting life when Charlotte’s phone rang. She grabbed it.Dom. Deep breaths, in and out. It was showtime.
Chapter 31
‘How’s it all going?’Dom sounded revoltingly upbeat for a man knee-deep in a swamp of secrets and lies. Not that he knew — yet — that she’d rumbled him.
‘You took your bloody time replying to all my calls and messages,’ retorted Charlotte. ‘Even when I said something had happened to Alastair, you still didn’t get in touch.’
Dom cleared his throat in that way he did when he’d been wrong-footed and was racking his brains for a suitable excuse. ‘Sorry, sweetheart, I had some problems with my phone. I put it on to charge and it kept showing no battery. I think the cable must be faulty, so I borrowed Dad’s.’
The sheer gall of the man! Charlotte pictured his nose extending Pinocchio-style as he blithely carried on the ridiculous charade.
