She turned the dimmer switch by the door so that the lighting level in the room went down, and hoped that a combination of flashing tree lights, low overhead lighting and algae would make it difficult for Winke to pick up where he left off.
Five minutes later the doorbell rang and she went to answer it. The porch light illuminated Winke, a crate of Belgian beer, and a younger, slimmer, taller version of Winke with blond blow-dried hair.
‘Paul carried the beer for me,’ he said, stepping back into the house and leaving his son and the beer on the doorstep.
‘Everyone’s in the kitchen,’ Linda said. ‘Straight ahead. Just there.’ She put her hands on Winke’s back and pushed him in the direction of the kitchen.
Paul was stamping his feet loudly on the doormat. ‘Mind if I come in?’
‘Oh, I’m sorry.’
She stood to one side and watched as the Niemans’ son carried the beer into the kitchen, treading snow laced with mud from the soles of his shoes into the hallway carpet, which was beige. Resisting the urge to get down on her hands and knees and start removing the stains, she followed Paul into the kitchen.
The crate, which had been put on the dining-room table, was being unpacked by Daphne. The cutlery and fantailed napkins were pushed to one side, and two of the candles had fallen over.
‘Linda – we need glasses here,’ Daphne called out.
Linda squeezed past Mick, who was staring at the wooden gazelle he’d just picked up from the sideboard, and got to the cupboard where she kept her glasses. She made a show of moving around some tumblers and a couple of Jessica’s old baby beakers. ‘No beer glasses,’ she said, hoping it sounded as though they’d once had some.
‘Any cognac glasses?’ Daphne persisted.
‘I’ve got these.’ Linda held up a couple of tumblers.
‘Make it wine glasses. The bigger the better.’
‘Joe,’ Linda said, ‘we need glasses from the drinks cabinet.’
Joe unlocked the door in the sideboard behind him.
‘These’ll do,’ Daphne said, pushing past Mick who was still contemplating the gazelle, and taking the glasses out of Joe’s hands.
Everybody had a glass. Everybody had to drink. Daphne had taken over.
Linda tried to catch Dominique’s eye, but Dominique wasn’t seeing straight. Why weren’t they sitting on the sofas in the lounge with their pre-dinner drinks like she’d planned? Why were they all crowded round the dining table instead with an empty crate of Belgian beer on it and Joe and the Niemans – all the Niemans – pressed up against the frosted glass that acted as a divider between the kitchen-diner and the hall.
‘You’ll stay and eat with us?’ Daphne asked Paul.
Paul shrugged.
‘He doesn’t have to if he doesn’t want to,’ Linda said. Repeating, ‘Really, he doesn’t have to.’ There was enough gazpacho for six people. There were six pieces of salmon and six dining-room chairs. Paul would make them seven, and she didn’t have the stamina to pull off the ‘fish and loaves on the shores of Galilee’ stunt tonight.
‘He’ll stay,’ Daphne said.
Linda stood smiling back at her. ‘So – will he eat fish fingers?’
Daphne laughed. In fact, she didn’t stop laughing for a long time after the fish-finger joke. Only Linda wasn’t joking. Fish fingers were the only thing she could think of to remedy the disaster of turning an evening for six into an evening for seven, and she was working on the premise that all children like fish fingers. Only Paul wasn’t a child. He was the tallest person in the room, and he was drinking beer. In fact, there were no children here tonight. Linda felt her hormones take a quick dive. She had to stop thinking about Paul Nieman.
‘I’ll get Jessica down,’ she said. Then, ‘Maybe she and Paul could eat before us?’
‘Yes, I’d like to meet Jessica,’ Winke said sadly.
‘Jessica,’ Joe yelled up the stairs.
‘Why don’t we just all eat together?’ Daphne asked.
‘I’ll get her, Joe.’ Linda went upstairs and knocked on Jessica’s door. When she went in, her daughter was sitting at her desk. ‘Jessica?’
‘I’m busy.’
‘What are you doing? Homework?’
‘No. Just something.’
‘I need you to come downstairs.’
‘I don’t want to.’
‘You have to come and have something to eat.’
‘I already ate. You told me to get something earlier.’
‘Well, now you have to eat something with us. Downstairs.’
‘I’m busy.’
There was an A4 pad on the desk with the words ‘Biological Hazards’ written across it. Then a list underneath: Anthrax/splenic fever/murrain/malignant – she couldn’t see the rest. ‘Paul Nieman’s here, that’s why I need you to come downstairs. You know Paul, don’t you?’
‘He’s in my physics class.’
‘Well, then – downstairs. Now.’
Jessica stood up. She had a pair of washed-out jeans on and an oversize black T-shirt with the word ‘Kontagion’ printed across it in white.
‘For God’s sake, Jessica. I told you to get changed.’
‘Well, I got changed.’
Linda grabbed hold of her daughter’s arm, and kept hold of it as she pushed her down the stairs in front of her.
The crockery didn’t match and nobody commented on the gazpacho. There wasn’t enough elbow space, and Paul and Jessica, who Linda had hoped to sit together, were on opposite sides of the table in deckchairs from the garage – ones she hadn’t been able to wash the mildew off. She hadn’t even got round to lighting the candles.
‘Computers’ll never take off,’ Joe said.
‘You’re not tempted to get one for the office?’
Joe shook his head and Winke put his reading glasses on.
‘In two years’ time you won’t be able to avoid them.’ Then, waving his spoon at Joe, ‘The school’s ordered thirty-five BBC computers.’
‘When?’
‘Last week.’
‘How d’you know?’
‘I ordered them.’
‘At the last Governors’ meeting, we appointed Winke Information Technology Liaison Officer.’
Linda started to clap then saw the look Jessica was giving her.
‘We were thinking of starting up a distribution company – when the time’s right,’ Daphne added.
‘As well as double glazing?’ Linda asked.
‘For a while.’ Winke turned to Jessica. ‘You’ll get to use them maybe … learn some basic programming skills.’
‘You’ve got daughters, haven’t you? You should bring them over,’ Daphne was saying to Dominique.
‘Steph’s too young and Delta’s looking after her.’
‘Delta – that’s a beautiful name.’
Linda stood up and started to clear away the gazpacho bowls so that she wouldn’t have to listen to the story of how Delta was conceived in Egypt at the mouth