We didn’t really have a chance to discuss it further because once we’d gone through the morning deliveries and emails, Anita had arrived and needed help setting up in the reading room, but I was hopeful that David’s plan had the potential to solve two festive problems in one go. In the waiting room I let myself drift off into a daydream of Nathan running some sort of home for abandoned dogs (from David’s house, which may or may not have been feasible) where he met and fell in love with a nice young woman in a Fair Isle jumper who wanted to adopt a Staffordshire border terrier with one eye – and then concluded that I have been watching too many Hallmark Christmas movies.
After about an hour of waiting, a weary-looking man in crumpled cotton scrubs emerged from one of the clinical rooms with a clipboard and called Mum’s number. I went to get up from my seat and was immediately admonished.
‘You don’t need to come in to see the doctor with me, Harriet,’ she said, a cross expression on her face. ‘Don’t be silly.’
‘Okay, sorry,’ I said, sitting back down. ‘I just thought… you’d said you wanted a bit of support?’
‘Not in the examination room!’
‘Right, fair point. Well, I’ll be here,’ I said, pointing to my chair. ‘As requested.’
I reopened my paperback in an emphatic fashion to indicate my annoyance. She was making it sound as though I’daskedto be here today. But I was hugely relieved not to be going into the examination room with her. Aside from finding most hospital environments low-key terrifying, the last thing I wanted was to have to listen to Mum recounting the number of times she’d had unprotected sex over the past few months or indeed, the type of sex she’d had. I suspected the policy in this clinic was thatno question was deemed too personal or intimate and I had no intention of being present when my mother inevitably chose to bare all.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Mum was in the clinical room for less than half an hour and emerged looking buoyant, carrying a large paper bag.
‘Nurse Geoff told me they see a lot of patients in their sixties,’ she said as she wrapped her scarf around her neck.
‘Youdidtell him your real age?’ I said, ushering her towards the exit. ‘You aren’t in your sixties, Mum.’
She batted away my quibble. ‘Over sixty, he meant. He says there’s an epidemic of STIs – meaning sexually transmitted infections – in the senior population because nobody’s worried about getting pregnant.’
‘That makes sense I guess,’ I said as we made our escape into the cold evening air. ‘So nobody’s using protection.’
She nodded gravely. ‘He gave me a huge supply of condoms,’ she said, patting the paper bag, ‘and told me to be hypervigilant in future. No excuses, he said.’
‘Well – good,’ I said. ‘And the – uhm – the gonorrhoea?’
‘Swabs and blood tests done. They’re checking for chlamydia, HIV, hepatitis, gonorrhoea, bacterial vaginosis and something called trichomonas.’
‘The full bingo card,’ I said.
‘Hmm, yes. Sounds quite pretty really,trichomonas, don’t you think? Anyway, I’ll know in the next few days.’ She pointed to her handbag, presumably where her phone was. ‘They’ll text me apparently. All very confidential and hush hush. It doesn’t even go on my health record. Which is something of a relief. I’d hate to think of my lovely GP Dr Baramghoudar finding out I’d been to an STD clinic. She was such a support to your father at the end. I simply wouldn’t be able to look her in the eye.’
‘I’m sure she’d understand.’ I pulled out my umbrella and we both huddled under it as we walked back to the car. ‘Besides,’ I said. ‘It’s not as if you’re somehow being unfaithful to him or his memory. You’ve very much moved on. As you said on our spa day.’
She gave me a shrewd look, which I avoided by squinting through the rain to where the car was parked.
‘And you’re okay with that, Harriet?’ she said. ‘The fact that I’ve moved on?’
‘Yes, of course. It’s the right thing to do. I said so at the time.’
‘It’s just that you don’tsoundlike you’re okay with it.’
‘Let’s just get back to the car, Mum. It’s freezing and it’s been a long day.’
She remained silent until we were safely inside the car, seatbelts on and collective breath steaming up the windscreen.
‘Is there something you wish to get off your chest, Harriet?’ she said eventually. ‘Do you have a problem with the life choices I’m currently making? Do you feel that Iamin fact being unfaithful to the memory of your father, despite what you just said about Dr Baramghoudar?’
I took a deep breath. ‘Not unfaithful. No. I just – I understand everything you said about needing to live your own life. I get that you don’t want to commit to having to look after someone else for a while. I do genuinely understand that.’ I paused as we pulled out of the car park into the city traffic. ‘It’s just… this flitting from one unsuitable bloke to another, the constant series of mediocre men and one-night stands. It does feel a bit – reactionary.’
I risked a glance at her and regretted it. Her mouth was set in a thin line.
‘I see,’ she said.
‘I feel like you’re trying to prove something to yourself,’ I said. ‘I’m not sure what exactly. Maybe that you’re still attractiveor…?’ I glanced again. Shit. I was digging myself further into this hole and she looked deeply pissed off. But on the other hand, I was a bit cross too, even if I wasn’t entirely sure why. ‘I just wonder,’ I said. ‘Why it’s not enough to know that Dad adored you for his whole life and – and why you still feel this need for validation from men who are at best mediocre and at worst, downright idiots. Is it just – vanity, or what…?’
