Emma closes her mouth, a little too hard – I worry for a second that she might have bitten her tongue – and says, ‘Yes, I know Izzy, hello,’ and kisses Izzy on both cheeks, before saying, ‘And it’s so lovely to meet you, Rob.’
She puts her hand out and Rob shakes it, and then he says, ‘Hey, we’re bound together for life now as fellow godparents. We need to hug.’
Emma laughs politely and says, ‘You’re right,’ and they share a hug, while I stand there holding Thea’s hand, and do my best to arrange my features into a smile.
After Emma and Rob finish their hug, Emma says, ‘Hi, Callum. Lovely to see you again so soon.’ She looks at Thea and says, ‘Hello.’
‘This is my daughter, Thea,’ I say. ‘Thea, this is… an old friend, Emma.’ I glance at Emma and see that her features have gone a little taut. Yep.Old friendis a weird description, given the reality.
Then Emma smiles brightly and says, ‘Hi, Thea. It’s so nice to meet you.’
And then she moves herself so that Izzy is between us, and we all hover for a moment, and then Azim says, ‘Becca, shall we go in?’
By unspoken but clearly mutual consent, Emma and I arrange ourselves so that Rob and Izzy are between us, and thenI apply myself very hard to concentrating on the service; I don’t want to be disrespectful to anyone. It’s very difficult not to be hyper-aware of Emma three people away from me but I focus and say all the words in the right places and I’m pretty sure that no one will have noticed the tension between us.
After the service, we walk to the village pub for drinks and a lunch in an upstairs room.
It’s easy for me to avoid Emma as we walk over en masse, because it’s natural for me to walk with Thea, who has lots of questions about the christening as we wander along holding hands.
I avoid Emma very satisfactorily during the drinks, still talking to Thea plus the parents of another girl of similar age to her who she’s been talking to very seriously about horses, and – as I try hard to produce some pony knowledge and not track Emma out of the corner of my eye – I’m beginning to think I’ll get away with not really speaking to her.
Hopefully, on future occasions that we’re both invited to, we can continue with the not-really-speaking thing until eventually the memory of this past week has receded enough into the background for us to feel moderately at ease around each other, but for now it’s kind of torture.
I see Emma properly chuckle at something Rob’s saying to her and feel a twinge of something that I have to admit is jealousy. I should get used to it; when and if she meets someone else, there’s every chance she’ll bring them to one of these occasions and I’ll have to meet him and see them together.
‘Daddy.’ Thea’s sounding stern. ‘I can tell you haven’t read the horse book we bought.’
‘Sorry, darling. It’s right at the top of my to-be-read pile.’ I turn so that I can’t see Emma at all and won’t be distracted any more.
When Becca claps her hands and tells us it’s lunchtime and that there’s a seating plan, we all make our way over to the tables.
Azim and Becca have – of course – placed Emma and me next to each other.
Fortunately, Thea’s on my other side, and it’s always a pleasure to talk to my wonderful daughter, and Rob is on Emma’s other side and seems more than delighted to spend the whole meal talking very animatedly with both Emma and Izzy, his other seat neighbour, but mainly Emma.
If I’m honest, I find Rob a little dislikeable.
The lunch is a long one.
Afterwards, we all stand up and mingle and I take Thea to chat to Becca’s grandmother, before making the excuse that I promised Thea’s mum that I’d get her back to London in good time so she isn’t too tired before the sports camp she’s doing tomorrow morning.
I say goodbye to everyone, and with Azim and Becca’s eyes on us, I realise that I’m going to have to go over to say goodbye to Emma.
18
EMMA
I’ve seen out of the corner of my eye – which has been pointed surreptitiously in Callum’s direction for the past six interminable hours – him saying goodbye to everyone.
I’m pretty sure he’s going to come and say goodbye to me too; he’s going to have to or people might notice.
‘Emma?’ Becca says.
‘Yes?’ I reply with extreme brightness.
‘I said was the journey back with Callum a disaster? Azim and I told each other about the two of you and we thought you seemed really well suited, so if I’m being truthful we might slightly have been setting you up, but you look like you’ve been actively avoiding each other all day. I’m so sorry if you didn’t get on during the journey. I hope it isn’t too hideous being here together.’
Ohfuck.
