Angelica turned her thoughts to South Africa. She googled images of vineyards and dreamed about riding across the veld with Jack, the sun on their faces, the wind in their hair, their cares boxed up and left behind. They spoke often.
On Christmas Eve Angelica and Olivier drove up to Norfolk to spend a couple of days with Angelica’s parents and sister. Angelica always dreaded going home but returned yearly out of duty and a misplaced sense of pity. She began to feel anxious the moment they left the city. Her stomach contracted into a tight ball, and she had to wind the seat down and lie flat to stop it from hurting. Isabel and Joe sat in the back quietly playing Nintendo while Olivier listened to Radio Four.
Angie and Denny Garner lived in a bleak gray house on the edge of an equally bleak estuary. They had bought the house in the 1960s when Denny, who would have preferred a big house in Gloucestershire, could only afford a big house in an unfashionable corner of Norfolk. Angie longed to be part of the glamorous set who danced the night away at the Café de Paris. But she settled for her husband’s swinging parties at Fenton Hall, where she wore little dresses from Biba and faux-fur coats from Carnaby Street, hopping from lap to lap like a bunny, glass of cheap champagne in one hand, joint in the other. Her hair had been piled into a blond beehive then, her lips pale, eyes heavy with kohl and fake lashes. She had once been chocolate-box pretty. Now her face was swollen with the excesses of alcohol and cannabis, her beehive badly dyed an unsavory orange to match her skin. While his wife had expanded like a soufflé, Denny was as slim as he had been in his youth, though his long hair was now gray and tied into a thin ponytail. For Denny and Angie the world had stopped turning in about 1975. Angie staggered through their tasteless home in silk kaftans and bell bottoms, Denny in high-waisted tight trousers and big-collared flowery shirts from Deborah&Clare, always unbuttoned to expose his narrow chest and gold chains. They still held parties where cannabis cake put everyone in the mood for sex. There was nothing less redolent of the glory days than Angie and Denny’s impoverished and meager swinging scene, where the main subject of conversation was ill health and death.
Angelica was embarrassed by her parents. She’d rather die than introduce them to her friends in London, keeping them secret like a stain on the carpet hidden beneath a rug. As a teenager she had longed for them to be like other people’s parents—sensibly dressed in Barbour jackets and green wellies, with sleek dogs misting the glass of their Volvo estates. Olivier, on the other hand, found them entertaining and couldn’t understand why his wife was so appalled.
“You didn’t grow up with them,” she explained. “I’d hide in my room and play music really loudly so I didn’t have to listen to them all downstairs. What was acceptable when they were teenagers became grotesque as they grew older. I didn’t want to think of my mother having sex with other men. I just wanted them to be normal like everyone else.”
“No one’s normal,” Olivier reassured her. “People present as normal, but really everyone hides some sort of weirdness behind closed doors.”
“There’s weird and weird—my parents’ weirdness is a unique brand.”
“Which is why they’re such fun. They’re originals.”
“Thank God He broke the mold after He made them; otherwise, I’d be just the same. Mercifully, I was spared that life sentence.”
“At least they were loving parents.”
“I suppose. But all children need boundaries. We never had any. I longed for proper family meals at the table and regular bedtime. We just did what we wanted and saw too much. They thought it was natural for children to see their parents having sex.”
“It explains why you were so prim when I met you.”
“They almost put me off for life.”
Olivier grinned mischievously. “I gave you a taste for it.”
“I needed an older, continental man with experience.” She took his hand and smiled back. “Otherwise, I might have remained a virgin all my life.”
“You’re too sexy for that. Someone would have snapped you up.” He glanced at her. “You’re looking very good these days, you know.”
“Thank you.”
“I’m glad I married you.”
“And I’m glad I married you.” She pushed thoughts of Jack and Candace to the back of her mind. “We’re lucky, you know. What we have is very special.”
“I might be a bad-tempered devil sometimes, but I do love you, Angelica. Things haven’t been easy these past months, and I know I’ve been neglecting you. But I’ve never regretted marrying you.”