Chapter 7
Wednesday 4 October
As far as Dan could remember, he had only cried once in his adult life, and that was four days ago on the third tee of Jeremy’s Pitch & Putt. He’d shed a few tears as a boy – tears of heartache at the death of his parents in a car accident, tears of pain and frustration at the many beatings and humiliations he’d endured at the hands of his brutal guardian. But never as an adult, not until that mysterious breakdown last week.
He thought about this as he drove his Ford Fiesta slowly along Broad Walk, back towards his office in Bramley Hill. He’d felt like crying a few times over the years, usually while giving driving lessons. Clipped wing mirrors, near collisions with parked cars and pillar boxes, driving across intersections or onto roundabouts without looking. Such incidents had spiked his heart rate and turned his ears pink, but his tear ducts had remained dry. The young man he’d just dropped off, Francis Broadbent, had a habit of doing the daftest things, like stopping for no reason, or not stopping when he ought to, at zebra crossings or red lights for example. Each time, Dan would ask him, “Why did you do that?”, to which Francis would unfailingly reply, “I don’t know to be honest.”
Dan had sometimes felt like crying, but he never did. Ever since his uncle died, he’d self-consciously adopted the role of paterfamilias to their small, two-person, later three-person, family. To Dan that meant being the calm one in the face of adversity. Lorna and Jeremy were allowed to cry, and they frequently did, but never Dan. So when he broke down on the third tee last week, it shocked all three of them – especially Dan. Once Lorna had got over her shock, she became upset. Until that moment, she’d believed Dan congenitally incapable of shedding tears, the way certain people, for example, can’t sweat. But now that she saw he could cry, it reawakened all her old jealousy about Dan and Jeremy’s relationship. On their way home that day, she told him she found it very hurtful, not to mention weird, that he’d never shed a single tear about their break-up but could somehow weep buckets over Jeremy’s reaction to it. She said it proved her point that Dan was fundamentally incapable of a serious relationship with a woman.
To this, Dan had no good answer. She was right that he could never give himself completely to a woman, not while Jeremy needed him. What he and Jeremy had been through together as kids had forged a unique bond between them, and any girlfriend would have to understand that and make allowances for it. Jeremy’s tears at the Pitch & Putt had destroyed Dan like nothing else, bringing back a shed load of horrible memories. The pain that poor boy had suffered since the age of ten was enough to make his heart break.
But he shouldn’t dwell on the past. What was it Bill Clinton said? Something about when your memories outweigh your dreams, that’s when you become old . Dan didn’t want to become old. He wanted to remain young at heart, and that meant focusing on his dreams. This weekend he would pick up the keys to his new flat. He’d taken the week off work to paint and decorate the place and buy furniture. He’d decided Lorna could keep the kitchen table. She could keep whatever she wanted, and he’d pay whatever outstanding bills she thought he owed. It would be worth it just to stop all the fighting. He was going to make a fresh start, and after nine long years that felt quite exhilarating.
Jeremy had offered to help him settle into the flat. His brother seemed to be coping astonishingly well considering all that had happened to him lately. Kay, this woman he’d been dating online, had apparently been killed in a hit and run. When Jeremy told him this, Dan was quite surprised he hadn’t heard about it, being a regular consumer of local news. According to the woman Jeremy spoke to, Kay had genuinely liked him, which was wonderful, but also slightly heartbreaking – yet another near miss for his unlucky brother. Still, the mere thought that a woman like Kay could be attracted to him seemed to have put an extra spring in Jeremy’s step.
Dan pulled up outside the premises of his little business, Perfect Drive School of Motoring. He climbed out of his car, which was decorated with the same cheerful red-and-white logo as the sign above his office, and strode into the little reception area. Jenny, his long-serving receptionist, looked up and smiled at him as he came in. Her sunflower fixation was in full bloom, he noted. In addition to the large Van Gogh reproduction on the wall, she’d set out a vase of the big yellow flowers on the front desk. The vase competed for space with a donation box for a charity drive at Jenny’s son’s school, a box of tissues, a bowl of sweets and a stack of unfiled files. It was all getting a little crowded, and not exactly the slick look he'd have liked for their “shop window”. Still, Jenny was an absolute treasure, everyone said so. She kept the show on the road, and put nervous students at their ease with cups of tea and words of motherly comfort. Dan could forgive her a little clutter.
“Your three o’clock is here, Dan,” she said, beaming at the only other person in the room, a young woman seated on one of the black plastic chairs that lined the laminated wall. She was in her mid-twenties with a clear, open face framed by dark, wavy hair. She had large, bright eyes that looked grey at first but he found out later were blue. Her pale lips had a natural pout and curved upwards at the corners. She was, he thought, remarkably pretty, and bore more than a passing resemblance to the young Hillary Rodham Clinton. This was a surreal coincidence. Only last week, Lorna had remarked to him that she could turn herself into a twenty-five-year-old version of the former first lady and he still wouldn’t want her. Looking at this young woman now, he decided she might just be wrong about that.
For years he’d hidden his crush on the woman who would go on to serve as Barack Obama’s Secretary of State, not only from Lorna but from everyone, including Jeremy. It was, he thought, a bizarre and shameful kink, and maybe the weirdest part of it was that it had nothing to do with his identification with the man she would later marry. He’d managed to keep his peculiar pash a secret until one night about five months ago when, in the throes of lovemaking, he’d shouted Hillary! instead of Lorna! At first, Lorna thought he might have been thinking of an ex-girlfriend. Her anger didn’t greatly diminish when he admitted the truth, though her faith in his soundness of mind did. He later identified that moment as the point of no return for their relationship.
Facing this young woman now, he wondered if he had been subliminally affected by Lorna’s remark and was now seeing Hillary Rodhams everywhere. Except he hadn’t seen any in the four days since she’d said it. This was the first.
“Hello,” he said, “and you are?”
“Elaine,” she said shaking his proffered hand. “Pleased to meet you.” Then she blushed. “Gosh, I’m so nervous!”
Her voice was high, soft and slightly husky – pleasant, but quite home-counties English, somewhat marring the Hillary effect.
“This’ll be your first lesson then?”
“Yes.”
“Have you filled in our New Customer Form?”
“She did, and I have it right here, along with a copy of her provisional licence,” said Jenny.
“Good,” said Dan, and he cocked an eyebrow. “Ready to go out?”
“I suppose so.”
He’d seen this sort of anxiety many times, and greatly preferred it to the false bravado of many young first-timers, especially the boys, who may have done some go-karting or driven around their parents’ driveway and thought they knew it all.
“You’ll be fine,” he said with a grin, holding the door open for her.
On the street, he asked her to read out a number plate on a van parked twenty metres away. As she was doing so, he found his own eyes drawn to her dark blue, floral, knee-length dress, which seemed a tad swish for a driving lesson. She looked damn good in it though. He opened the passenger-side door on the Fiesta and motioned for her to get in .
“We’ll go to a nice, quiet cul-de-sac near here and I’ll get you started on some basics, okay?”
“Sounds good,” said Elaine.
As he drove, he asked her in a conversational way, as he often did with his debutants, why she’d decided to learn to drive.
“Mother issues,” she replied. “She doesn’t think I’m good at anything and says my whole life hasn’t amounted to a hill of cornflakes. She may be right about that, but I want to prove her wrong in one respect at least.”
Dan laughed. He’d never had a response like that one. “Well, I hope I can help you do that.”
“I hope so, too,” she said earnestly.
He sensed she was watching his face as he drove, and it made him a little uneasy.
“Have you been teaching people to drive for a very long time?” she asked.
“Eight years now.”
“And it’s your own business? That’s quite impressive.”
“I inherited a bit of money – enough to set up the school.”
“Had a rich uncle, did you?”
Dan thought briefly of Uncle Nigel, who’d been rich but miserly and had threatened to burn or bury his wealth rather than leave a penny to him and Jeremy. He probably would have done, too, if it hadn’t been for that sainted blood clot foiling his evil plans. But Dan didn’t want to sully the atmosphere with mention of his guardian, so he told her the money had come from his parents, even though, in truth, less than a third of his inheritance had come from them. “They died when I was young,” he explained.
“I’m so sorry,” she said.
“It was a long time ago… Ah, here we are.” He pulled up next to the kerb in Compton Close, relieved they could get back to the business of driving instruction. The conversation had taken an uncomfortably personal turn. His own fault – he didn’t know why he’d mentioned his parents’ deaths.
For the next half an hour, he went through the basics with her: starting the engine, pedals and their function, how the gears worked, clutch control, steering, mirrors, indicating. Then he gave her a turn behind the wheel. She was nervous at first and stalled a few times, but fear quickly turned to elation as the car began to move under her control. By the end of the lesson, she’d managed to change into second and third gear, and turn a few corners.
“That was amazing!” she said, once they were parked again. “I never thought I’d get that far in one lesson.”
“You’re a natural,” he said. “Twelve more lessons and you’ll be ready for your test. Thirteen tops.”
“No way!”
“Absolutely. I have every faith in you.”
“You’re such a good teacher,” she said, giving him full beam with her eyes. This was when he noticed they were actually blue.
“That’s kind of you to say.”
“No, I mean it. You’re so calm and patient. I feel very relaxed when I’m with you. I bet you’re the best teacher in the whole of North London.”
Dan cleared his throat, embarrassed. “Well, maybe in Enfield. Top ten definitely.”
She laughed – a natural, bubbly sound that flowed from deep within her. “Stop being modest. You’re ace, you know you are!” She paused, becoming serious. “Look, I realise I’m paying you for this lesson, but I feel like I want to do something more for you, for being so kind and patient with me. If you ever want a bakery lesson, I’d be glad to give you one. For free I mean. As a mark of my appreciation.”
This was getting quite strange thought Dan as he started the car and began the journey back to Bramley Hill. Was she propositioning him? It had happened once before, and he’d immediately cancelled all future lessons with the customer concerned. But he’d been with Lorna then, and anyway the woman in question hadn’t interested him. This was different. He was single now, and Elaine was extremely attractive. She seemed like a nice person, too, if a little… effusive –but that could just be nerves. He’d be interested in getting to know her better, but he’d have to be careful because he’d only just come out of a relationship and had no desire to bounce straight back into one. Bu t if Elaine was only seeking a bit of no-strings fun, what was the harm? Or maybe she wasn’t actually propositioning him at all. The bakery lesson could be just that, and not a euphemism for anything else.
Dan decided to respond to her offer with a straight bat. “That sounds great,” he said. “What sort of things do you bake?”
“What sort of things do you eat?” she asked. “I can do banana bread, carrot cake, brownies, chocolate chip cookies, a gingerbread Ford Fiesta. Whatever you fancy.”
“Would that be the Mark VII or the Mark VIII Fiesta?”
“The Mark VII. The Mark VIII is quite beyond my skillset.”
They were both smiling by now, trying to keep straight faces.
“So when do you think you might be free?” she asked. “How about this weekend?”
“Wow!” Now he couldn’t help bursting out laughing. “Really?”
“What?” she deadpanned. “Or is that when you do your serial killing?”
His laughter faltered. “Sorry, what?”
“I’m just saying what you’re probably thinking,” she said. “That I hardly know you, so what the hell am I doing, inviting you to my flat for a bakery lesson? I must be mad, right?”
“Right!” he said. “Unquestionably.”
The shy, nervous young woman he’d met an hour ago had entirely disappeared, if she ever existed. In her place was a lively, zany character, who might well be certifiably insane.
“So?” she asked. “Is that a date then?”
“I might be able to fit you in between murders,” he said.
She laughed – again that effervescence welling from deep within her.
“Great!” she said. “Baking and murder it is then. I can even help you get rid of evidence if you like – maybe we could do some meat pies.”
He snorted with amusement. She was something else this woman. “Are you like this with everyone you meet?” he asked.
“Like what?” she asked, poker-faced. “I’m just planning my weekend. How does Sunday afternoon at three o’clock work for you?”
And that was when he remembered – he’d planned on spending Sunday painting and decorating the new flat. “I’m afraid I can’t,” he said. “It’ll have to be the one after.”
“No problem,” she said. “That works for me. Shall I text you my address?”
“Uh, yeah, okay.”
By this time they’d reached Bramley Hill. Dan parked the car outside the office, took out his phone and gave her his personal number. A moment later, an address in Bush Hill Park flashed up in his messages, followed by “Elaine” and a double kiss.
She climbed out of the car and leaned in at the window. “Thanks again, Dan. I’ll see you Sunday week.”
“Sure.”
He watched as she sashayed off down the street. It was only once she’d disappeared from view that it occurred to him she hadn’t mentioned booking another driving lesson.