The Sense of an Ending

One weekend in the vacation, I was invited to meet her family. They lived in Kent, out on the Orpington line, in one of those suburbs which had stopped concreting over nature at the very last minute, and ever since smugly claimed rural status. On the train down from Charing Cross, I worried that my suitcase — the only one I owned — was so large it made me look like a potential burglar. At the station, Veronica introduced me to her father, who opened the boot of his car, took the suitcase from my hand, and laughed.

‘Looks like you’re planning to move in, young man.’

He was large, fleshy and red-faced; he struck me as gross. Was that beer on his breath? At this time of day? How could this man have fathered such an elfin daughter?

He drove his Humber Super Snipe with a sighing impatience at the folly of others. I sat in the back, alone. Occasionally, he would point things out, presumably to me, though I couldn’t tell if I was meant to reply. ‘St Michael’s, brick and flint, much improved by Victorian restorers.’ ‘Our very own Café Royal — voilà!’ ‘Note the distinguished off-licence with period half-timbering on your right.’ I looked at Veronica’s profile for a clue, but received none.

They lived in a detached, red-brick, tile-hung house with a strip of gravel in front of it. Mr Ford opened the front door and shouted to no one in particular,

‘The boy’s come for a month.’

I noticed the heavy shine on the dark furniture, and the heavy shine on the leaves of an extravagant pot plant. Veronica’s father seized my case as if responding to the distant laws of hospitality and, farcically exaggerating its weight, carried it up to an attic room and threw it on the bed. He pointed to a small plumbed-in basin.

‘Pee in there in the night if you want to.’

I nodded in reply. I couldn’t tell if he was being all matily male, or treating me as lower-class scum.

Veronica’s brother, Jack, was easier to read: one of those healthy, sporting young men who laughed at most things and teased his younger sister. He behaved towards me as if I were an object of mild curiosity, and by no means the first to be exhibited for his appreciation. Veronica’s mother ignored all the by-play around her, asked me about my studies, and disappeared into the kitchen a lot. I suppose she must have been in her early forties, though of course she appeared to me deep into middle age, as did her husband. She didn’t look much like Veronica: a broader face, hair tied off her high forehead with a ribbon, a bit more than average height. She had a somewhat artistic air, though precisely how this expressed itself — colourful scarves, a distrait manner, the humming of opera arias, or all three — I couldn’t at this distance testify.

I was so ill at ease that I spent the entire weekend constipated: this is my principal factual memory. The rest consists of impressions and half-memories which may therefore be self-serving: for instance, how Veronica, despite having invited me down, seemed at first to withdraw into her family and join in their examination of me — though whether this was the cause, or the consequence, of my insecurity, I can’t from here determine. Over supper that Friday there was some questioning of my social and intellectual credentials; I felt as if I were before a court of inquiry. Afterwards we watched the TV news and awkwardly discussed world affairs until bedtime. Had we been in a novel, there might have been some sneaking between floors for a hot cuddle after the paterfamilias had locked up for the night. But we weren’t; Veronica didn’t even kiss me goodnight that first evening, or make some excuse about towels, and seeing I had everything I needed. Perhaps she feared her brother’s mockery. So I undressed, washed, peed aggressively in the basin, got into my pyjamas and lay awake for a long time.

When I came down for breakfast, only Mrs Ford was around. The others had gone for a walk, Veronica having assured everyone that I would want to sleep in. I can’t have disguised my reaction to this very well, as I could sense Mrs Ford examining me while she made bacon and eggs, frying things in a slapdash way and breaking one of the yolks. I wasn’t experienced at talking to girlfriends’ mothers.

‘Have you lived here long?’ I eventually asked, though I already knew the answer.

She paused, poured herself a cup of tea, broke another egg into the pan, leant back against a dresser stacked with plates, and said,

‘Don’t let Veronica get away with too much.’

I didn’t know how to reply. Should I be offended at this interference in our relationship, or fall into confessional mode and ‘discuss’ Veronica? So I said, a little primly,

‘What do you mean, Mrs Ford?’

She looked at me, smiled in an unpatronising way, shook her head slightly, and said, ‘We’ve lived here ten years.’