Chapter 38
38
Phil refastened the ties on his Ristorante Nico apron.
‘ Tutto bene ? All good?’ Nico Facetti, the owner and head chef, beamed at them.
‘All good.’ Phil hoped he sounded convincing, confident even. Come on, Phil, you can chop some vegetables.
Nico twisted an onion. ‘We do not cut that way, we cut this way. And we keep the handle of the knife like this – and then it is simple.’ The blade sliced up and down so rapidly, Phil was amazed the guy had any fingers left. A pyramid of evenly chopped cubes materialised on the wooden board. Across the stainless-steel counter, Cate’s face was a picture of concentration.
‘Shall I try now?’ Cate said, picking up a short-handled knife.
‘ Certo !’
Cate wasn’t half as fast as Nico but she chopped neatly and she’d remembered all the celebrity chef’s hints and tricks to complete the job without her eyes pricking with tears.
‘And now you, signore .’
Phil took a knife from the bewildering array of kitchen implements.
‘Ah, no. That is the knife for the cutting of the fish.’
‘Of course.’ Phil hadn’t even started cutting the onion and he was already messing up. He created intricate marquetry with the finest of chisels so why did the prospect of using paring knives and wooden spoons, spatulas and graters feel as cumbersome and unnatural as swimming in a ski suit? The steam from the other end of the kitchen where black-uniformed staff were beavering away, and the heat and bright lights from the camera crew were making him sweat. He looked around. The make-up girl with her ever-ready powder puff had disappeared.
What a chump he must look, dithering over such a simple task. They probably wouldn’t even use this bit of film; no one tuned into Luxe Life Swap to see a red-faced, middle-aged man prepping veg. He took a deep breath and began chopping.
‘ Bravo , Phil! You see, it is easy when you have the correct technique.’ Nico spoke in the same tone of voice Cate had used when they’d been struggling to house train Ted. ‘And now we check on our beautiful fish stock.’
Phil nodded. When he’d agreed to take part in Mandy Miller’s iconic show, he hadn’t signed up for this. He couldn’t cook, wouldn’t cook – unless you counted making things on toast. But at least there was no chance of setting a pan ablaze with the oily Nico getting right up into his personal space. He’d almost forgotten the humiliation he’d felt in that school cookery lesson. There had been so many humiliations before he was blessed with Evan’s protection.
The rugby pitch was flooded, afternoon sports lessons cancelled and the headmaster had decided he wasn’t going to leave a whole year group to their own devices. To the horror of their motherly school cook, the kitchens were commandeered. They’d never had a cookery lesson before but everyone else seemed to take to it except for Phil.
Phil didn’t know how he’d managed to set that pan on fire. He could still hear his classmates’ giggles turning to panic as the cook fought to put out the flames, the ear-splitting ring of the fire alarm. Everyone had been forced to stand outside in the cold and the rain, moaning and bitching that it was all his fault. They were still making snide remarks on the rugby pitch the next week and he’d got in such a state that he’d somehow sent the ball down to his own try line instead of kicking it into touch.
He didn’t care about being good at cooking or sports for their own sakes. He cared about being picked on, bullied, isolated. Failure told people you were weak. Weakness made you a target. All these years later, he could still feel Mr King’s hand on his thigh, his minty breath in his face. That oh-so-soft voice whispering in his ear, ‘Who do you think they’d believe, Philip? You or me?’
‘Phil!’
Cate’s voice snapped him back to his task.
‘How much stock did you say?’ They must be adding the stock now, mustn’t they? Even he could recognise a ladle.
‘No stock yet. First, we must add the white wine.’ Nico sloshed some into Phil’s pan, clearly deeming him incapable of doing it himself. ‘Aah, the smell – mmm, delizioso !’
‘Delicious,’ Cate agreed, beaming at the smarmy chef.
‘And now the stock, little by little. Let the rice absorb one ladleful of liquid before you add the next.’
Little by little . Phil could concentrate on this one simple thing. Mindfulness, wasn’t that what they called it? Now that Nico was supervising proceedings on the other side of the kitchen, not hovering over Phil’s shoulder, he could relax. If only he could get Mr King’s voice out of his head.
* * *
Cate inhaled the warm, stomach-rumbling aroma of shellfish stock and white wine. It was such a privilege to be taught by a chef who’d entranced thousands of Parisians with his Michelin-star fusion food before feeling the pull of his native Venice. And she was grateful their jam-packed day was keeping her occupied until tomorrow’s potentially life-changing encounter. There was something almost mesmeric about languidly stirring in each ladle of fragrant liquid.
She’d looked at the text from Belinda – her sister! – a hundred times: the one telling her that yes, her mother, Lina, wanted to see her. Tomorrow, she’d slip away to Burano whilst Natalie and Lucia took Phil to a squero . He was so excited to visit a boatyard where he could see the gondolas being worked on, he’d barely questioned why Cate wouldn’t be there.
She glanced across the counter at him, his face so endearingly serious, you’d think they’d been entrusted with cooking a six-course banquet, not rustling up a risotto no one but themselves would eat. Cate wasn’t worried about how hers would turn out. She was a decent home cook; she’d never have the talent of a starry chef, but it was the taking part that mattered. The only failure was the failure to try something new – that was what she’d always instilled in their two boys.
It was an attitude that flummoxed Phil. He’d stood on the sidelines at every infant school sports day, not understanding how she didn’t care that she’d trailed in last in the mothers’ race (though she’d started jogging round the park after that) or how she and Max were still smiling after failing to finish the wheelbarrow race, lying in a tangled heap on the playing field laughing and laughing until their sides ached.
There were worse foibles for a husband to have. Phil was only ever hard on himself, never on the boys. She smiled fondly at him, hoping the simple task of stirring risotto would provide him with the confidence boost to tackle the tiramisù they’d be making after lunch. But Phil didn’t seem to be stirring his. Should she lean across the counter and interfere or let him find his feet?
‘Ah, Cate!’ Nico waltzed up. He plunged a fork into her pan and held a few grains of rice aloft. He blew gently on the morsel before raising it to his lips. ‘ Perfetto ! Now remove from the heat and we stir in a knob of butter.
‘And how are you doing?’ He clapped a hand on Phil’s shoulder, making him jump. ‘But what is this! You have not been stirring? It is stuck! Stuck to your pan!’ He held up a forkful of Phil’s creation, examining the rice, congealed, crispy and brown, as though it were something unpleasant stuck to the sole of his shoe.
Phil didn’t reply, staring into the pan as though he had no idea how it had appeared in front of him.
‘Try adding some more stock. It’s probably just burnt on the bottom. Most of it will probably be fine,’ Cate cut in, ignoring the expression writ large on Nico’s face.
‘It’s ruined.’ Phil banged his hand against his forehead so violently, she flinched.
‘It’s only a risotto,’ Natalie interrupted, obviously trying to channel Mandy Miller’s relentless good cheer. ‘Don’t worry, we won’t show this on the programme. Could you stop the filming please, Lucia? Why don’t we all take a little break? I’m sure you’ll have more luck with the tiramisù after lunch.’
‘I’m not doing this any more,’ Phil said.
‘But Phil…’ Cate gave Natalie a helpless glance.
‘You don’t understand.’ His voice was bleak. ‘I can’t fail. I can’t.’
He started to wrench at the ties on his apron, struggling with the double bow.
Cate reached out a hand. ‘Here, let me. You’re knotting it tighter.’
‘I can manage!’ Phil snapped.
Ignoring his outburst, Cate gently pushed his hands away. ‘There you go!’
Phil stood silently, balling up the stock-splattered apron in his hands. He seemed to have shrunk several inches. Now she really was getting worried.
‘Phil!’ She needed to get him out of the kitchen, out into the fresh air.
Phil raised his head. Cate’s breath caught. She could hardly believe what she was seeing. Her husband was doing something she’d never seen before – not even on the days Oli and Max were born.
Phil was crying.
* * *
Despite wearing an apron, Cate had managed to splash fish stock on her dress. She pushed aside the pang of irritation. Even though she and Phil were sitting in a rather smart wine bar around the corner from Ristorante Nico , her appearance didn’t matter. Nothing, not even tomorrow’s trip to Burano nor the nagging realisation that she’d failed to make the usual call to the nursing home to check on her dad, was as important as discovering what had made Phil fall apart. But Phil wasn’t making it easy.
‘You need to tell me what’s bothering you. It can’t just be messing up in the kitchen. I couldn’t care less about the risotto and we can pay for the pan if it’s wrecked.’
Phil gulped another mouthful of red wine.
‘Talk to me, Phil.’
He twisted his hands together. ‘I do love you, Cate. You know that, don’t you?’
She waited for the ‘but’, the wine churning in her empty stomach. Was the relationship that had sustained her for two decades about to collapse? Had his seemingly casual attitude to their neighbour Kiran been a clever bluff?
She looked into her husband’s dead eyes. ‘Are you leaving me, Phil?’
He shot forward in his seat. ‘Leaving you? How can you think such a thing?’ Her words seemed to knock a spark of life back into him.
‘You’re not having an affair?’
‘Cate, Cate!’ He shook his head. ‘Of course not. You’re more likely to leave me.’
‘Why? I’d never do that. You’re a great husband, a wonderful father. And a good man.’
‘A good man? You wouldn’t say that if you really knew me.’
‘It’s not just me who thinks that. Your children love you, your parents, your old friends like Evan and Lucy.’
‘Evan.’ He spat out the name. ‘Sometimes, I wish I’d never met him.’
He reached for the bottle of Valpolicella. She placed her hand over the top of his glass.
‘Phil. Talk to me. Whatever it is, you have to tell me or I’ll be imagining something worse. It’s Venice, isn’t it? You haven’t been yourself since the TV company told us where we were being sent. Is it something to do with Evan? Something that happened on your school trip? But you’re still such good friends…’
‘I don’t blame Evan for what happened. It was all my fault. But it was all because I was scared. Scared of… him .’
‘Of who?’
Phil bit his lip. Tears pricked his eyes again.
Cate waited.
‘Mr King.’ Phil dropped his head.
‘One of the teachers? You’ve never mentioned him.’
‘King was only there for a year. They didn’t tell us why he left. I wondered later if they – the school – had found out about him and got him to leave quietly without a fuss. They used to do that, you know, schools like mine: move a teacher on with a good reference rather than cause a scandal.’
He reached for the bottle again. This time, she kept her hands folded in her lap.
‘King was straight out of teacher training, young, handsome, charismatic. He taught PE; he was a brilliant cricketer. He wasn’t very tall and with his baby face, he could almost pass for one of us. Most of the boys looked up to him, as though he were a cool older school chum. But all that charm was a front. I thought I was the only one he picked on but there were probably others like me: a scholarship boy, without a deep circle of friends, a boy who knew he didn’t really belong, who was desperate to be accepted, to fit in. He could smell weakness; the more I failed, the more he’d goad me. I would never have signed up for the school trip if I’d known he’d be there. He joined at the last moment after the art teacher broke his hip falling off a ladder pinning the third form’s watercolours to the classroom wall.
‘He used to sneer at me, make me feel small; at school, he’d bash into me in the corridor accidentally on purpose, knock my books out of my hand. And in the changing rooms, if I wasn’t quick enough, he’d corner me…’
Cate’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘He touched you?’
‘He only ever touched me through my clothes, but I was terrified. I was so relieved to find we slept in dormitories in Venice like we did at Hillingdon. I knew he wouldn’t dare creep in there in case someone like Evan was awake. Looking back, I don’t think he was even interested in me that way. It must have been a power trip, letting me know what he could do to me. He preferred prettier boys with sharp cheekbones and pouty, petal-pink lips, so they said. Girls, too. The police found all sorts on his computer at the next school where he taught.’
Cate lowered her voice, conscious of three elderly ladies sitting nearby. ‘Did he go to prison? Has he come out?’
Phil stared at a point beyond Cate’s head. ‘He can’t go anywhere. Not any more. They say he ripped up his sheet and twisted it into a rope. And the weird thing is that when I heard he was dead, all I could think about was my trainers, that now I’d never get them back.’
‘Your trainers? I don’t understand.’
Phil rubbed his forehead. ‘Grandad died a few months before we went to Venice. He left me a few hundred pounds out of his meagre savings. Dad got the rest; he insisted on using most of his share to pay for the school trip. I should have saved the money or bought something sensible but I longed for these trendy trainers with bright-yellow laces I’d seen one of the sixth formers wear.’ Phil took another great swig of wine. ‘I stupidly thought the other boys would see me differently, that people would want to be friends with me. My best friend Raj told me to save the money for uni, for books and stuff and not waste it on trying to impress people. Raj grew up on the same estate as me, he won a scholarship the same year I did, but he never seemed to care if anyone looked down their nose at him, or maybe he just didn’t show it.
‘I got the trainers delivered to the school; they arrived just in time for the trip. I felt I was the bees’ knees when I got them out of my suitcase. A couple of the boys were impressed like I’d hoped but others just took the mick. King was even worse. He sidled up and hissed in my ear that they looked stupid on scum like me.’
Phil paused. He fiddled with the stem of his wine glass. ‘The afternoon before the masked ball, one of the boys was showing us some magic tricks and King got out a pack of cards. He challenged us to a game of poker and told us all to put some money in. It was against the rules but the other teacher wasn’t around and he knew no one would dare report him. Everyone was excited to play except Raj; he just sat and read a book and wouldn’t join in. The boys were slapping down tens and twenties like it was Monopoly money. I lost all my term’s pocket money. King said I’d have to sell dishcloths and dusters door to door round the council estate and everybody laughed.’
Phil picked up his glass, looking momentarily surprised to see it was almost empty, and put it down again. ‘King poked my trainers with his toe and said I could put them in, joked they weren’t worth much now someone like me had worn them. I felt sick at the thought of losing them, but everyone started chanting, “trainers, trainers, trainers”, louder and louder. I saw Raj shaking his head but I didn’t want to stick out like him so I put them into the pot. King won that hand, scooped up all the money and held up my trainers like he’d won the FA Cup. He wore them to the ball that night even though they looked stupid with his Plague-doctor costume. He did it just to taunt me. I was so glad when he disappeared halfway through the evening.’
Cate felt the tension she didn’t realise she’d still been carrying lift away like a dandelion puff blowing through the air. Now everything made sense. The predatory Mr King had to be Nat’s attacker. Her hand itched to reach into her bag for her phone, to give Nat closure, whatever that was worth. But right now, it was Phil who needed her.
She reached across the table to hold his hand. ‘Why haven’t you said anything to me before? Why have you kept it all to yourself?’
‘Because whatever King did wasn’t an excuse for what I did next. I knew being friends with Evan and his mates would protect me. I would have done anything to join their gang. And I hate myself for it.’
Cate frowned. ‘I don’t understand. You and Evan are best friends.’
‘Not the way Raj and I were.’ He finished his glass of wine in one gulp. ‘If I tell you the truth, you’ll despise me, the way I despise myself. And I just couldn’t bear it.’
‘Whatever you did back then, you were just a child. But I have to know.’ Her other hand tightened around her wine glass. ‘Phil, you have to tell me the truth or we can’t go on. You have to tell me what else happened in Venice.’