The Dinner Guest by B Walter (best short books to read txt) 📕

call him if I needed somewhere to retreat to if things got tough in the days ahead.

When I arrived at Wilton Crescent, I was informed by my mother that Titus had slept in late and had been quiet and subdued when she had spoken to him briefly that morning. She said he’d been quite upset the night before and that I should keep an eye on him. One of the big things I would regret, in the weeks and months, maybe even years, to come was that I didn’t pay more attention to Titus on that day. In fact, I barely registered him as he slipped into the seat next to me in the car and grunted his acknowledgement when I told him Matthew was coming home. I was too caught up in thinking about the knife I would use. And the look I might see in my husband’s eyes as I slipped it into his heart.

In the end, after an hour’s deliberation back home, I decided on a heavy, weighty carving knife as the tool for the job. It fitted in my hand like a glove and its sharp edge glinted in the warm light of the setting sun. I laid the table for dinner as I listened to Titus wander about upstairs. I’d said he could stay the night at Melanie’s flat and he’d looked suspicious at my apparent ease at the suggestion, then elated. We hadn’t discussed his outburst the previous day. To be honest, I barely remembered it. I was so caught up in anticipation for when Matthew got home, the whole episode just seemed trivial and irrelevant.

Things became tricky when Titus arrived in the kitchen and said he wasn’t going out after all. Melanie had another boy at her apartment, apparently. It seemed both of them were sleeping around. No wonder my disapproval of Titus having multiple girls on the go seemed prudish to him. ‘Well … perhaps you could see if another friend is free?’ I said, tentatively.

He sighed. ‘I get it, you probably want to have a fight with Dad without me listening. Don’t worry, I won’t get in your way. I don’t want to talk to him. I’ll just have some food and leave you to it.’

This wasn’t ideal. I knew it, and yet I still carried on. The idea of Titus being present in the house should have stopped me. I would come to understand that seconds after Matthew’s death. But before, I don’t think I was capable of thinking rationally.

Matthew looked nervous when he walked in, as if expecting gunfire to erupt from the landing above. I just called out, ‘In the kitchen,’ and let him walk the short distance alone, no doubt wondering what mood he’d find me in.

‘I’ve got the food,’ he said, by way of a greeting. He placed the Ottolenghi bag on the neatly laid table. ‘Where’s Titus?’ he asked, looking around, noticing the table was set for three. ‘You said in your text he’d be out.’

‘He’s upstairs. His plans fell through. His friend couldn’t see him tonight after all. He said he’ll come and eat. Then we’ll talk.’

The look of a frightened rabbit facing down an oncoming lorry flashed across his face, but he didn’t argue.

We dished up the food in silence and before long Titus wandered into the kitchen and sat down, ignoring Matthew’s presence.

‘I’m sorry I had to go away,’ he said, going over and awkwardly trying to hug the boy, who remained stiff and unresponsive, sitting straight-backed in his chair. ‘But I’m home now. Things will get back to normal, I promise.’

This didn’t elicit a response, so Matthew sat back down and started to eat slowly, his eyes darting between me and Titus.

I felt a cold gust of air flow around the table. If I’d been in a more present state of mind, I’d have registered it properly and investigated where it came from and realised that Matthew had, in his trepidation on entering his once peaceful, happy family home, left the front door open, his travel bag stopping it from closing properly.

‘I thought you were going to be at a friend’s,’ Matthew said to Titus, probably trying to get onto a nice, easy topic.

‘I was supposed to be at Melanie’s,’ Titus said, looking at his food rather than at Matthew.

‘Ah,’ Matthew said, clearly less impressed with this. ‘Is she busy or something?’

‘Probably getting fucked by Nathaniel. He’s in the year above me. He gets laid a lot. Always manages to work out which girls are easy. And Melanie’s definitely easy.’ He said this with a half laugh, half sneer. Again, if I’d been properly alert, I too would have been disconcerted by his language, but it felt as if I were observing the whole scene playing out under water. It was all strangely distorted and murky, like shapes and sounds, instead of people and words.

‘Titus, I know you must be upset with me, and I don’t blame you, but there’s no excuse for language like that. And I especially don’t want to hear you talking about women that way.’

Titus did his half laugh again. ‘But it’s true. She’s got quite a few of us on the go. That’s why I’m fucking Pippa. And I doubt I’m Pippa’s only conquest, judging by how well she sucked me off the first time. But I dare say sluttiness runs in the family…’

‘That is enough!’ Matthew shouted at him, rising from his seat. Titus leapt up too, white with anger, and slammed his chair back into the table, causing the plates to clatter. He stormed out of the living room and ran up the stairs, leaving Matthew and me sitting in the now oddly silent room.

That was, of course, the moment I should have realised Titus knew about Matthew and Elena. And that Pippa must have been the one who told him. But I wasn’t in the right state to make the connection. Instead, I was having an odd flashback to when I had, for