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A Novel
by Francesca Hornak
Book Reviewed by:
Olivia realizes she is daydreaming—it's five past three and her family will be waiting. She puts the call through and suddenly, magically, there they are crammed onto her screen. She can see that they're in the kitchen at Gloucester Terrace, and that they have propped a laptop up on the island. Perhaps it's her hangover, but this little window onto Camden seems so unlikely as to be laughable. She looks past their faces to the duck egg cupboards and gleaming coffee machine. It all looks absurdly clean and cozy. Her mother, Emma, cranes toward the screen like a besotted fan, touching the glass as if Olivia herself might be just behind it. Perhaps she, too, can't fathom how a little rectangle of Africa has appeared in her kitchen. As she withdraws, Olivia's father, Andrew, offers an awkward wave-salute, a brief smile replaced by narrowed eyes as he listens without speaking. He keeps pushing his silver mane back from his face (Olivia's own face, in male form), frowning and nodding—but he is looking past her, at the Buffalo Hotel. Her mother's large hazel eyes look slightly wild, as she fires off chirpy inquiries. She wants to know about the food, the weather, the showers, anything—it seems—to avoid hearing about Haag. There is a lag between her voice and lips, so that Olivia's answers keep tripping over Emma's next question. Her sister, Phoebe, hovers behind their parents, holding Cocoa the cat like a shield. She is wearing layered vests that Olivia guesses are her gym look, showing off neat little biceps. At one point, she glances at her watch. Olivia tries to tell them about the cockerel that got into the most infectious ward and had to be stoned to death, but her mother is gabbling: "Have a word with Phoebs!" and pushing Phoebe center stage. "Hi," says Phoebe sweetly, smiling her wide, photogenic smile and making Cocoa wave his paw. Olivia can't think of anything to say—she is too aware that she and her sister rarely speak on the phone. Then she remembers that Phoebe has just had her birthday (is she now twenty-eight or nine? She must be twenty-nine because Olivia is thirty-two), but before she can apologize for not getting in touch, Phoebe's face stretches into a grotesque swirl, like Munch's Scream. "Olivia? Wivvy? Wiv?" she hears her mother say, before the call cuts off completely. She tries to redial, but the connection is lost.
Chapter 1
December 17, 2016
Andrew
The Study, 34 Gloucester Terrace, Camden, 4:05 p.m.
From: Andrew Birch andrew.birch@the-worldmag.co.uk
To: Ian Croft ian.croft@the-worldmag.co.uk
Date: Sat, Dec 17, 2016 at 4:05 p.m.
Subject: copy Dec 27th
Ian,
Copy below. If this one goes without me seeing a proof, I will be spitting blood.
Best,
Andrew
PS: Do NOT give my "like" the "such as" treatment. It's fucking infuriating.
PPS: It is houmous. Not hummus.
THE PERCH, Wingham, Berkshire
Food: 3/5 • Atmosphere: 1/5
By the time you read this, my family and I will be under house arrest. Or, more accurately, Haag arrest. On the 23rd my daughter Olivia, a doctor and serial foreign aid worker, will return from treating the Haag epidemic in Liberia—plunging us, her family, into a seven-day quarantine. For exactly one week we are to avoid all contact with the outside world and may only leave the house in an emergency. Should anyone make the mistake of breaking and entering, he or she will be obliged to stay with us, until our quarantine is up. Preparations are already under way for what has become known, in the Birch household, as Groundhaag Week. Waitrose and Amazon will deliver what may well be Britain's most comprehensive Christmas shop. How many loo rolls does a family of four need over a week? Will two kilograms of porridge oats be sufficient? Should we finally get round to Spiral, or attempt The Missing? The Matriarch has been compiling reading lists, playlists, decluttering lists, and wish lists, ahead of lockdown. Not being a clan that does things by halves, we are decamping from Camden to our house in deepest, darkest Norfolk, the better to appreciate our near-solitary confinement. Spare a thought for millennial Phoebe, who now faces a week of spotty Wi-Fi.
Of course, every Christmas is a quarantine of sorts. The out-of-office is set, shops lie dormant, and friends migrate to the miserable towns from whence they came. Bored spouses cringe at the other's every cough (January is the divorce lawyer's busy month—go figure). In this, the most wonderful time of the year, food is the savior. It is food that oils the wheels between deaf aunt and mute teenager. It is food that fills the cracks between siblings with cinnamon-scented nostalgia. And it is food that gives the guilt-ridden mother purpose, reviving Christmases past with that holy trinity of turkey, gravy, and cranberry. This is why restaurants shouldn't attempt Christmas food. The very reason we go out, at this time of year, is to escape the suffocating vapor of roasting meat and maternal fretting. Abominations like bread sauce have no place on a menu.
The Perch, Wingham, has not cottoned onto this. Thus, it has chosen to herald its opening with an "alternative festive menu" (again, nobody wants alternative Christmas food). Like all provincial gastropubs, its decor draws extensively on the houmous section of the Farrow & Ball color chart. Service was smilingly haphazard. Bread with "Christmas spiced butter" was good, and warm, though we could have done without the butter, which came in a sinister petri dish and was a worrying brown. We started with a plate of perfectly acceptable, richly peaty smoked salmon, the alternative element being provided by a forlorn sprig of rosemary. The Matriarch made the mistake of ordering lemon sole—a flap of briny irrelevance. My turkey curry was a curious puddle of yellow, cumin-heavy slop, whose purpose seemed to be to smuggle four stringy nuggets past the eater, incognito. We finished with an unremarkable cheeseboard and mincemeat crème brûlée, which The Matriarch declared tooth-achingly sweet, yet wolfed down nonetheless.
Do not be disheartened, residents of Wingham. My hunch is that you, and your gilet-clad neighbors, will relish the chance to alternate your festive menu. We Birches must embrace a week of turkey sandwiches. Wish us luck.
Andrew sat back and paused before sending the column to Ian Croft—his least favorite subeditor at The World. The Perch hadn't been bad, considering its location. It had actually been quite cozy, in a parochial sort of way. He might even have enjoyed the night in the chintzy room upstairs, with its trouser press and travel kettle, if he and Emma still enjoyed hotels in that way. He remembered the owners, an eager, perspiring couple, coming out to shake his hand and talk about "seasonality" and their "ethos," and considered modifying the lemon sole comment. Then he left it. People in Berkshire didn't read The World. Anyway, all publicity et cetera. The main thing was the bit about his own life. He felt he had made his family sound suitably jolly. The truth was, he wasn't much looking forward to a week at Weyfield, the chilly Norfolk manor house Emma had inherited. He never quite knew what to say to his older daughter, Olivia. She had a disconcerting way of looking at him, deadly serious and faintly revolted, as if she saw right into his soul and found it wanting. And Emma would be in a tailspin of elated panic all week, at having Olivia home for once. At least Phoebe would be there, a frivolous counterpoint to the other two. Sometimes he felt like he and his younger daughter had more in common than he and Emma—especially now that Phoebe worked in the media. Hearing about the hopeless TV production company where she freelanced, and where all the men were in love with her, always made him laugh. He was about to shout upstairs to Phoebe to ask if she'd like to help him review a new sushi place when an unread e-mail caught his eye. It was from a name he didn't recognize, indicating some unsolicited rubbish from a publicist. But the subject, "Hello," made him pause. It read:
From: Jesse Robinson jesse.iskandar.robinson@gmail.com
Excerpted from Seven Days of Us by Francesca Hornak. Copyright © 2017 by Francesca Hornak. Excerpted by permission of Berkley Books. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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