The Casual Vacancy

vicinity of her slamming doors, her vicious looks and caustic asides, Gavin tended to forget that Gaia had any independent existence at all; that she was not simply part of the uncomfortable backdrop of stale sheets, bad cooking and festering grudges against which his relationship with Kay staggered on.
    ‘Does Gaia like Pagford?’ Samantha asked.
    ‘Well, it’s a bit quiet compared to Hackney,’ said Kay, ‘but she’s settling in well.’
    She took a large gulp of wine to wash out her mouth after disgorging the enormous lie. There had been yet another row before leaving tonight.
    (‘What’s the matter with you?’ Kay had asked, while Gaia sat at the kitchen table, hunched over her laptop, wearing a dressing gown over her clothes. Four or five boxes of dialogue were open on thescreen. Kay knew that Gaia was communicating online with the friends she had left behind in Hackney, friends she had had, in most cases, since she had been in primary school.
    ‘Gaia?’
    Refusal to answer was new and ominous. Kay was used to explosions of bile and rage against herself and, particularly, Gavin.
    ‘Gaia, I’m talking to you.’
    ‘I know, I can hear you.’
    ‘Then kindly have the courtesy to answer me back.’
    Black dialogue jerked upwards in the boxes on the screen, funny little icons, blinking and waggling.
    ‘Gaia, please will you answer me?’
    ‘What? What do you want?’
    ‘I’m trying to ask about your day.’
    ‘My day was shit. Yesterday was shit. Tomorrow will be shit as well.’
    ‘When did you get home?’
    ‘The same time I always get home.’
    Sometimes, even after all these years, Gaia displayed resentment at having to let herself in, at Kay not being at home to meet her like a storybook mother.
    ‘Do you want to tell me why your day was shit?’
    ‘Because you dragged me to live in a shithole.’
    Kay willed herself not to shout. Lately there had been screaming matches that she was sure the whole street had heard.
    ‘You know that I’m going out with Gavin tonight?’
    Gaia muttered something Kay did not catch.
    ‘What?’
    ‘I said, I didn’t think he liked taking you out.’
    ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
    But Gaia did not answer; she simply typed a response into one of the scrolling conversations on the screen. Kay vacillated, both wanting to press her and afraid of what she might hear.
    ‘We’ll be back around midnight, I expect.’
    Gaia had not responded. Kay had gone to wait for Gavin in the hall.)
    ‘Gaia’s made friends,’ Kay told Miles, ‘with a girl who lives in this street; what’s her name – Narinder?’
    ‘Sukhvinder,’ said Miles and Samantha together.
    ‘She’s a nice girl,’ said Mary.
    ‘Have you met her father?’ Samantha asked Kay.
    ‘No,’ said Kay.
    ‘He’s a heart surgeon,’ said Samantha, who was on her fourth glass of wine. ‘Absolutely bloody gorgeous.’
    ‘Oh,’ said Kay.
    ‘Like a Bollywood film star.’
    None of them, Samantha reflected, had bothered to tell her that dinner was tasty, which would have been simple politeness, even though it was awful. If she wasn’t allowed to torment Gavin, she ought at least to be able to needle Miles.
    ‘Vikram’s the only good thing about living in this godforsaken town, I can tell you,’ said Samantha. ‘Sex on legs.’
    ‘And his wife’s our local GP,’ said Miles, ‘and a parish councillor. You’ll be employed by Yarvil District Council, Kay, are you?’
    ‘That’s right,’ said Kay. ‘But I spend most of my time in the Fields. They’re technically in Pagford Parish, aren’t they?’
    Not the Fields
, thought Samantha,
Oh, don’t mention the bloody Fields.
    ‘Ah,’ said Miles, with a meaningful smile. ‘Yes, well, the Fields do belong to Pagford,
technically.
Technically, they do. Painful subject, Kay.’
    ‘Really? Why?’ asked Kay, hoping to make conversation general, because Gavin was still talking in an undertone to the widow.
    ‘Well, you see – this is back in the fifties.’ Miles seemed to be embarking on a well-rehearsed speech. ‘Yarvil wanted to expand the Cantermill Estate, and instead of building out to the west, where the bypass is now—’
    ‘Gavin? Mary? More wine?’ Samantha called over Miles.
    ‘—they were a little bit duplicitous; land was bought without it being very clear what they wanted it for, and then they went and expanded the estate over the border into Pagford Parish.’
    ‘Why aren’t you mentioning Old Aubrey Fawley,