Page 13 of A French Adventure
After Maxine left, Vivienne returned to the terrace, took a deep breath and phoned a still tearful Natalie.
‘I just don’t understand, Mum, how you can sound so calm. How long have you known about it? Is that why you decided to go to France, to get away from it for a while?’
‘No, I didn’t know about it before this week,’ Vivienne said and told her daughter how Jeremy had broken the news to her.
There was a stunned silence at the other end of the phone for several seconds before Natalie exploded with anger. ‘Bastard. What a horrible, cowardly thing to do.’
Vivienne opened her mouth to tell Natalie not to call her father that and closed it again. The name calling was justified.
‘Well, he needn’t think he’s going to get any sympathy from me because “he didn’t mean it to happen”, as if that absolves him of blame. Who is she anyway?’
‘Didn’t Dad tell you her name?’
‘Nope, simply said we’d learn it all in good time as things progressed, but he’d just wanted to tell us he and you were divorcing before the fallout became gossip and somebody else did.’
Vivienne sighed. ‘I told him he had to tell both you and Tim as well as Elizabeth the truth about everything, so I’m not going to tell you either.’
‘Mum!’ Natalie’s exasperation was clear.
‘As for divorcing, that is months away. How did Tim react?’
‘Oh, you know Tim. Didn’t say much. I didn’t either really. We just sat there together listening to Dad apologising over and over, saying it didn’t make any difference to his feelings for us. But it sure as hell makes a difference to mine for him.’ Natalie sighed. ‘In the end, we just thanked Dad for telling us himself and we both left. I did get the feeling, though, that it wasn’t entirely a surprise to Tim, but he’d gone before I got the chance to quiz him. But I will. He did say to give you his love and he’ll ring you as soon as he gets a chance – but I shouldn’t hold your breath. You know what he’s like.’
‘Was Granny Elizabeth mentioned?’
‘Dad was having supper with her tonight. Mum?’ Natalie paused. ‘Are you okay? I mean, I guess you’re not okay with the whole sordid business, you must be hurt and reeling from it, but you are so far away…’ Her voice trailed anxiously away. ‘I want to give you a hug and I can’t.’
Vivienne took a silent deep breath before answering. She didn’t want Natalie to get even more upset on her behalf, which was one of the reasons she’d insisted Jeremy told Natalie and Tim who his lover was. ‘I’m coping. I’m glad I’m away, to be honest. If I was at home, there would be no escaping from the problem – it would probably be row after row, which will no doubt happen when I return. But, right now, it’s like a bad dream that’s happening to someone else that I don’t currently have to deal with.’
‘Can you write? Or are you too stressed to concentrate?’
‘I have to concentrate I have a deadline to meet,’ Vivienne said, not wanting to confess how far behind she’d slipped. ‘Now I’ve settled in a bit, I do have a routine emerging.’
‘You said you had a friend there earlier?’
‘Maxine, the agent for the apartment. She’s lovely. Olivia who lives downstairs permanently is about your age and is nice too. You’ll meet her if you manage to come over next month.’
‘Oh I’m definitely coming,’ Natalie said. ‘I’ve blocked a possible week out in the diary. And if you haven’t cracked our French connection by then, I’ll be cross.’
Vivienne laughed. ‘I’ll do my best.’ When the call ended a few moments later, she was relieved that Natalie no longer sounded tearful.
Vivienne picked up the book that Maxine had brought her and flicked through the pages before putting it down and opening her laptop which she’d left up on the terrace table. Checking her email, she smiled. Céline had answered her, saying it was lovely to meet her and any time she came to Cannes she was welcome to call in and she’d put her address below. Vivienne flagged the email. She might well take Céline up on that offer before her holiday was over.
She glanced at the time. Nine thirty. She’d do a read-through of the chapter she’d written earlier in the day, correct any typos, maybe write a few more sentences before going to bed.
When her phone rang half an hour later, Vivienne was so deep into her story that she absently picked up the phone and pressed the button without checking caller ID first.
‘Well, I cannot in all honestly say that I’m surprised that Jeremy has finally found someone else more suitable for him. The surprise is that it took him so long,’ her mother-in-law’s accusatory voice with its perfect Home Counties accent jolted Vivienne out of her concentration. ‘But how I am to face everyone at the WI, I don’t know. My only consolation is thatmy friends have always wanted the best for Jeremy, he is such a popular person, they will understand, that, in the end, he really had no choice.’
‘Good evening, Elizabeth,’ Vivienne said. ‘Your son is not as popular as you think he is, and he did have a choice. He chose to have an affair and end his marriage.’
‘And I wonder why that is? If you’d been a proper wife, paid more attention to him, rather than spending all your time scribbling the rubbish you write, perhaps it would not have happened.’
Vivienne took a deep breath. ‘Perhaps it was more a case of “like father, like son”?’ she said, her patience with Elizabeth snapping at the mention of her writing. Early on in their relationship, Jeremy had told her that his father had once had a short fling with a work colleague at a conference, which, once Elizabeth learnt about it, was rapidly ended by her threatening divorce and naming the woman as co-respondent. Back in those days, outward respectability was required of everyone in the law firm Jeremy’s father worked for and hoped to became a partner in. Jeremy had made Vivienne promise she’d never let his mother know that she knew about his father’s ‘little indiscretion’, as his mother had apparently termed it. ‘Goodnight, Elizabeth,’ Vivienne said into the sudden silence that had descended and ended the call. She refused to feel guilty about her ‘like father like son’ jibe to the woman who had always been so mean-spirited towards her. Along with all the changes that were happening in her life, it was definitely time to lose all the bad karma Elizabeth had thrown at her down through the years.
Tiredly, Vivienne turned and went downstairs and made for her bed.
A day later, Vivienne stood in front of the wardrobe wondering what to wear from her limited selection of clothes for lunch with Maxine and dress shopping. Maxine had asked if she could be at L’Abri at ten o’clock today ready for a drive out of town to Valbonne, where her friend had a boutique. Vivienne wanted to look smart but also needed something easy to slip on and off for trying on dresses. In the end, she settled for an old favourite, a terracotta shift dress and her cream linen jacket with its pretty embroidery, and hoped it would do.
