Page 10 of Oleander

“He can be very sharp-tongued,” Gideon said, before lowering his head so that he could whisper. “Would you believe that he really is a sweet boy underneath?”

“No.” It was out before I could stop it. My cheeks burned. My bladder ached.

Gideon laughed louder and placed a hand on my shoulder.

“I like honesty, young Jude. It’s so rare these days. Caspien is rather dreadfully insincere.” This was said as though it was an admirable quality. “Tell me, how are my gardens coming along? Your uncle promised he could restore them to their former glory. Did he overpromise?” He looked out in the direction of the gardens.

“Luke is the best gardener in The Channel Islands, Sir Lord Deveraux.”

“Oh, Gideon is fine,” he said, waving me off. “Is he now? Well then if anyone can bring this dead old thing back to life then it is the best gardener in Channel Islands.” He looked at me. “Andhis nephew.”

I gave him my most enthusiastic smile. “We’ll try our best, sir – Gideon.”

I left him staring out at the garden as I skirted past him quickly to the bathroom emptying my overfull bladder into the rose-pink toilet bowl.

We were driving home when I asked Luke: “Do you think it’s weird that they live there together, just the two of them?”

Luke was the nicest person I knew. I could count on one finger how many times I’d heard him say anything bad about anyone. And that was because some guy refused to pay him for a month’s work on a holiday cottage down in Brown Bay. He took him to court and got the money but it took almost a year. Even then he hadn’t called the guy a wanker with the same fervour that Caspien Deveraux had called me a gypsy.

“Well, do you think if something happened to Beth – god forbid.” He patted his head. “That it would be weird for you to live with me?”

“No.”

“Exactly. So I don’t think it’s weird, no. People like to talk about all sorts of things that don’t concern them. Most of the horrible stuff people say is just in their own twisted heads.”

I thought about that. “Is that what happened then? Did something happen to his mum?” I couldn’t bring myself to say his name.

“Yeah. I’m not sure of the full story, mind you. Again, lots of nonsense people have likely made up. But after she passedaway, Caspien lived with his uncle. She was Gideon’s sister. So it makes sense from where I stand.” He shot me a warm smile.

“What about his dad?”

“No one knows,” said Luke. “Well, someone knows. But not me. I’m not one for gossip. We’re just there to fix his garden.”

I nodded, thinking about Gideon Deveraux and how desperate he sounded when he asked if we could bring his garden back to life. I really hoped we could. I tried not to think about how similar Caspien and I were; of how we’d both lost our parents and how we went to live with our uncles, and how if he wasn’t such a horrible snooty twat, we might have had something in common we could talk about.

We might even have been friends.

“I met him today,” I told Luke as I stared out the window. “Lord Deveraux.”

“Yeah? He’s nice enough, isn’t he?”

“Yeah…nice enough.”

That night at dinner, Beth told Luke she was pregnant. They both cried while I smiled and ate my spaghetti.

Three

Back then, I was sure my sister hated me. I was certain the resentment she felt at having to look after me when our parents died was a little too all-consuming for her to love me properly. She’d been married to Luke just over a year when the accident happened. They’d just moved into their first home - Luke was born in Jersey and they’d met online before she’d moved here to be with him. They were newlyweds looking forward to starting their own life together and then I, a moody, bookish eight-year-old who’d just lost his parents, was foisted upon her.

I was a ‘surprise’ to my parents, born the year after my sister left home for university. I’m not sure what they were thinking, or if they’d been thinking at all; they’d just gotten rid of one child and now here was another one to tie them down for a further eighteen years. Since I’d popped out when my sister was eighteen, our relationship had never been a usual sibling one. We’d never lived in the same house and we had no shared childhood memories. She’d stopped being a child long before I came along and so when I moved into the house she shared with Luke, I was like a blood relative she didn’t know very well.

If my sister had been a different sort of person, our lack of a sibling connection might have made it easier for her to fall into the role she’d been expected to take up. But my sister wasn’t a very maternal person. It wasn’t a failing, it just didn’t seem to bein her genetic make-up at all. She wasn’t warm or particularly loving and in fact, there was a distinct coldness to her that made little sense to me since my mother had been almost overbearing in her affection for people. At least, that’s how I remember her. Smothering, but kind, open-hearted and generous.

So my sister’s teary emotional reaction to being pregnant was a bigger shock than the news itself.

Also, it meant we would have to move.

Luke and Beth still lived in the quaint two bedroom house they’d had since they got married and now we needed a nursery. They spoke about it over dinner, about how they could have the cot in their bedroom for a little while, but obviously not long term. My sister had given me a look that made me think she was going to ask me to move out, but then Luke reached across and grabbed my hand and squeezed it.