Strictly Between Us

by Jane Fallon

  I felt my throat go dry. ‘Tell me.’

  Bea sighed. ‘I asked around a bit like you told me, which was probably a stupid thing to do.’

  ‘Oh shit,’ I said. I knew whatever was coming wasn’t going to be good.

  ‘There’s some story about him and a woman who works in HR. How they had a thing for a while …’

  ‘How does everyone supposedly know this, that’s what I don’t understand?’

  ‘She told people apparently. So the story goes he didn’t behave very well.’

  ‘And it’s over now?’ I said, clutching at straws that maybe – if it was even true – Patrick had just had a quick mid-life crisis and then immediately seen sense.

  ‘I think so, but … sorry … I don’t get the impression she was the first, though.’

  I felt my heart pound on the inside of my ears, as if it was trying to escape. ‘If I find out he’s cheating on her … honestly, I’ll fucking kill him.’

  Bea gave me an exasperated look. ‘Yes, that’d help.’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘So, let’s think about the worst-case scenario.’ Bea is ever the pragmatist. ‘Michelle finally gets pregnant. It’s all true. Patrick runs off with whoever and she ends up a single mother.’

  ‘Oh God,’ I said, putting my tuna and salad sandwich down. I couldn’t even think about eating it now.

  ‘So are millions of women …’

  ‘This is Michelle, though. For her it’s all part of the fairy tale. I can guarantee she has never factored in for a second that she might bring her kids up on her own.’

  ‘Well … what if Patrick died? Or, I don’t know, got run over on the way home or something. Then she’d have to.’

  ‘It’s not the same,’ I said, although it was hard to explain why.

  ‘It’s 2015,’ Bea said, as if that made a world of difference.

  ‘You don’t know her. She doesn’t just want to have a baby for the sake of having a baby. She wants a perfect family. A mum, a dad, three kids, a dog.’

  Bea shrugged. ‘Then maybe Patrick Mitchell’s not the person she should have settled down with. Because it doesn’t seem to me like he wants any of those things.’

  I picked up my tuna and salad again. Took a large bite. ‘Exactly.’

  4

  A couple of days after my conversation with Bea, Michelle and I were sitting in a hot tub, swimsuits on, trying to block out the chatter of the rest of the women around us. Trying to relax. I’ve never really understood hot tubs. For me it’s a bit like lying in a giant bowl of dirty soup, some of which is getting a bit agitated and slamming up against your spine. It always takes all my concentration to maintain a vaguely upright position, and to stop my legs drifting off and starting up random and inappropriate games of footsie with whoever’s sitting opposite. Plus, where are you meant to look? Doesn’t everyone else in there think it’s a bit weird that we’re all effectively in the bath together and we haven’t even exchanged first names?

  Anyway, the reason we were there was that Michelle loves a spa more than anything. She’s a bit like a cat in that respect. One hint of pampering and she’s anybody’s. Tickle her under the chin and within an instant she’s flat on her back, offering you her belly. So, for her birthday present I had bought us vouchers for a whole day at Syon Park. Treatments included. Full use of the facilities. It had been a good choice. She looked blissful lying there, head back, bubbles up around her jaw, blonde hair fanned around her like a mermaid.

  ‘What’s Patrick up to today?’ I asked, trying not to make my question sound loaded.

  ‘God knows,’ she said lightly. ‘I told him he has to pick up the dry cleaning at some point, but other than that the day’s his own. He’s probably watching kids’ TV in his PJs.’

  ‘Nice.’

  ‘He needs a day doing nothing,’ she said, repositioning herself in front of one of the jets. ‘He’s knackered at the moment.’

  ‘Really?’ I said, ears pricked up like a dog who can hear its owner’s Volvo coming up the road from half a mile away. ‘Why?’

  Michelle shrugged. ‘Work. Stress.’

  ‘Yes, it must be exhausting sitting in your office deciding who lives and who dies.’ I planted a smile on my face as I said this, so she knew I was just teasing. It’s always been one of my favourite things to do to Patrick, to compare him to a Roman Emperor giving a thumbs-up or thumbs-down to the poor peasants like me.

  ‘It’s a lot of pressure, you know that.’

  I desperately tried to think of an in to the conversation I really wanted to have. I knew I had to tread carefully. I couldn’t just blunder in with something like ‘So, there are rumours that Patrick’s putting it about a bit. Thoughts?’ Equally I didn’t want to let this opportunity slip. I decided on a ‘be vague and hope she says something enlightening’ tactic.

  ‘No worse than usual, though?’

  ‘No. Same old … you know.’

  I waited, hoping she might offer something else up. Maybe she had something heavy weighing on her chest, a worry about Patrick, an unconfirmed unease. That would certainly have made my task easier. She said nothing. Uttered a small groan that I assumed meant the jet of water was working its magic on her lower back. I decided to push it a little.

  ‘It feels like he’s been away a lot recently. That must be stressful.’

  ‘Mmmm …’

  Clearly, if Patrick was up to anything Michelle was yet to notice.

  ‘Does that ever bother you? Him having to go to all these events and set visits and stuff?’

  ‘Of course not. It comes with the job.’

  ‘Shall we get out for a bit?’ My fingers were starting to feel spongy.

  ‘Oh, that reminds me,’ Michelle said, standing up and clambering out. ‘I just remembered. What are you doing on Tuesday night? Patrick’s got to go up to Manchester. There’s some problem with that renovation show they’re doing – they’re massively behind and they’ve already gone over budget apparently – and he wants to take the producers out to dinner.’

  I felt my heart sink. ‘That’ll teach them.’

  ‘He needs to get to the bottom of what’s going on, I suppose. I guess that’s easier over a bottle of wine.’

  And maybe provide himself with an excuse to stay out all night?

  ‘Right. Sure. Lovely.’

  ‘Great. I’ll get something in. What do you fancy? Salmon? Sea Bass?’

  I hardly heard her, though, because my mind had started whirring. I was relieved when someone came to call her away for her facial.

  ‘What if she recognizes my voice?’

  Bea was not happy, I could tell. She has this thing where her left eye starts to twitch in the corner when she’s panicking and I could see the flicker starting to happen now. I knew she’d agree in the end, though.

  ‘She won’t, why would she?’

  ‘Because I speak to her all the time.’

  ‘She speaks to hundreds of people every day probably, and anyway, even if she thinks, That woman sounds like Bea from Castle, why would she doubt what you were saying? Honestly. Trust me.’

  What I was asking Bea to do wasn’t actually that onerous in the grander scheme of things. I thought it might be an idea to check whether Patrick’s ‘date’ with the producers of Old House, New Look was real, so I’d suggested she call his assistant, pretending to be from the production to confirm the details. There was no one else I could trust.

  Bea sighed and I knew I’d got her.

  ‘I’ll put on an ac
cent,’ she said. ‘Can I shut myself in your office?’

  I let her, of course. A couple of minutes later she opened the door again and beckoned me to come in.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘She didn’t rumble me. I did Scottish – want to hear?

  Bea started talking in some kind of cod Glaswegian gibberish that sounded something like ‘Heyloo ma naieem ish Morag.’ I had no patience for it.

  ‘What did she say? About Patrick I mean?’

  ‘They’re having dinner at his hotel at seven thirty. And the producers are both men, by the way. I googled it.’

  For some reason I felt deflated. I’d thought I was being so clever.

  ‘That’s good, isn’t it?’ Bea said when I didn’t respond.

  ‘What if he’s meeting someone up there afterwards? He has dinner, it’s the perfect cover and then he’s off out somewhere after … or he has someone stashed in his room, I don’t know.’

  ‘Shit. He could phone an escort service,’ Bea said, suddenly wide-eyed. ‘Or go to one of those dodgy massage parlours. They’re everywhere.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘We’re getting carried away. This is Patrick we’re talking about here. I can’t believe he’d stoop that low.’

  ‘What do you want to do?’

  ‘Nothing,’ I said decisively. ‘I’m being ridiculous. Let’s just forget about it.’

  I meant to take my own advice, I really did. But I’ve never been a good listener.

  5

  I was in Michelle’s kitchen, chopping tomatoes for a salad a week or so later. I’ve always been so at home there that I often find myself starting to prepare food if it’s anywhere close to a meal time.

  ‘How was Patrick’s trip to Manchester?’ I asked as nonchalantly as I could.

  Michelle looked up from the pine nuts she was weighing out for pesto. No ready-made jars in this household. ‘Oh, fine, I think. He didn’t say much about it.’

  ‘Right.’

  I couldn’t think of anything else to say.

  I feel as if I should have a go at describing us all here so you can get the full picture, but I’m not sure I can do much more than the basics. I’ll have a go, though. Just to give you an idea.

  Michelle, as you know, is blonde. She’s average height, slim, blue eyes. Yes, I know I’ve just described about a fifth of the female population, but I’m not sure what else to say. She’s definitely pretty. She was always slighter and more graceful than me. But she’s completely unaware of it. It’s almost as if she’s defying it to last. I’ve never met anyone with such a complete lack of the need for grooming. There is no adornment with Michelle. She was just granted good genes and the rest is down to chance. I’ll try to think of a comparison. She’s a bit like Naomi Watts if she was playing an accountant. By which I mean Michelle has a conformist streak that governs how she styles her hair and her dress sense, too. Plus she wears glasses for reading pretty much anything. You know who she looks like? She looks like that secretary character who you don’t even notice until she takes off her specs and messes up her hair and then you realize she’s lovely, you just haven’t seen it before.

  Patrick is always rough shaven. He likes that perma-stubble look. His hair is … well, it’s sort of bog standard man’s hair. What can I say? Shorter on the sides than the top. He also has blue eyes, as you know, so their kids are pretty much destined to be full on Hitler Youth. Only his are a piercing icy blue. They’re paler than you’d expect and it still sometimes takes me by surprise. He’s a jeans and retro band T-shirt kind of man outside of work.

  As for me, here are a few of my good points: big eyes (brown), good hair (thick, brown with chestnutty highlights), taller than your average bear (five foot eight). Good enough figure when clothed. Take them off and it’s apparent in a second that I’ve rarely done a day’s exercise in my life. One of these days I’ll start, I really will. Before it all begins to go south.

  Bad points: big mouth. BIIIG. I’m not talking Julia Roberts here, more wide-mouth frog. When I laugh it must be like staring into the depths of the Grand Canyon. Short legs. Not on the global scale of things but proportionately. Short for my height. No skinny jeans for me. I’m a classic pear, a size bigger on the bottom than the top, with a tendency to put on weight around my hips, no doubt due to my unwillingness to go for a run. I spend a large part of my life thinking of ways to shift a few stubborn pounds. It’s a hobby.

  Put all those attributes together like an e-fit and I imagine you’d come up with a picture of an orangutan. It kind of works OK for the most part, though. Mustn’t complain, as my mum always says. Mind you, she also says, ‘Cheer up, it’ll never happen,’ quite a lot, so I make a point of not listening to her.

  So, now you can visualize us all sitting round the table: secretary Naomi Watts, Clint Eastwood’s younger, more ordinary brother and his simian mate Clyde.

  Michelle and Patrick’s house is GROWN UP. They have a coffee machine and a dedicated lemon zester. The art on their walls is actually art and not posters or old holiday photos they’ve had framed. They get a paper delivered every day (the Independent) and an organic food box once a fortnight. I realize this might make them sound like a pair of tossers to a few of you, but I am in awe. My own place – now a two-bedroom flat in an impressive red-brick terrace, with a beautiful bay window in the living room – is a master class in disorganization. I have a lot of lovely things, they’re just in the wrong places or buried under a topsoil of clutter. Going round to Michelle and Patrick’s is like a sanctuary for me.

  Not so much on this day, though, because, however hard I tried to ignore them, my mind was still whirring with the whispers I’d been hearing. Bea had managed to glean a few more bits of – alleged – information. Patrick, as far as the stories went, was a serial womanizer. He simply could not resist a pretty face. There was no one woman, more a series of discarded dalliances, a litany of it-meant-nothings. It seemed, she said, as if we were the only people not to know about this. Common knowledge, that was the phrase she used.

  ‘Are you going to the Lifestyle Cable Choice Awards?’ Michelle said out of nowhere. We were all still working our way through the pasta mountain Michelle had knocked up to go with the salad I’d made. Patrick was on dessert duty, which meant he would put some ice cream in a bowl and squirt all manner of gooey stuff on top of it. We called them our Heart Attack Saturdays.

  I had been doing – I thought – a pretty good job of acting normally around the two of them. By which I mean I was drinking too much and making stupid jokes as per usual. Patrick’s and my friendship only exists on a very surface level. A piss-taking, teasing level. We can make each other laugh, but we never go deeper than that. It works for the most part too. It has to.

  ‘God, no. We don’t have anything nominated and those dos are so deathly dull if there’s not at least the possibility that your name might get read out.’

  ‘Pad’s going, aren’t you?’ Michelle said and reached out a hand to stroke Patrick’s head, as if in sympathy.

  My head whipped round like the kid in The Exorcist.

  ‘Are you? Has one of your shows been nominated then?’

  ‘No, but I think it’s good to show your face at these things sometimes.’

  ‘Really? I can’t imagine anything worse …’

  Patrick smiled a disarming smile. He has a range of disarming smiles. One for every occasion. I’m pretty much immune to them these days. Or at least, I thought I was. ‘Me, too, to be honest.’

  ‘You should make Michelle go with you. At least then you might have a laugh.’


  Did I imagine it? Did he look a little shifty, a tad nervous for a second?

  ‘It’s work. I’ll have to network my arse off. You know how it is.’

  I did, of course. It really wasn’t done to take your partner unless you were there because you’d personally received a nomination. I understood that. But I still couldn’t understand why he was going at all. As far as awards ceremonies went the Lifestyle Cable Choice Awards was right down there with the Technicals. I couldn’t really imagine someone in Patrick’s position making invaluable contacts over the lamb cutlets. But it was a great excuse if he wanted a night out with no possibility his wife would want to tag along. Which was hardly a hanging offence in itself but, given the latest intel I’d been given, it suddenly felt dangerously convenient.

  My heart hiccupped a little. A tiny missed beat.

  ‘Well, rather you than me,’ I said, turning my attention to my pasta and pesto. But my appetite had left the building.

  6

  Bea was filing things in my office. Or, to be more precise, she was clearing the detritus of a hundred lunches and mid-afternoon snacks off my desk so that she could locate some papers that needed to be filed. Every time I eat at my computer I wonder whether we should think about doing a show around work station cleanliness. A sort of How Clean Is Your House, but with forensic experts tracking all the germs left by the crumbs of old egg mayonnaise sandwiches and slices of Anne Marie’s homemade cakes. I read somewhere once that your computer keyboard is five times dirtier than your toilet. Who discovered this and why I couldn’t tell you. Some people have way too much time on their hands.

  Anyway, she was tutting in a kind of jokey way, armed with an antibacterial wipe and a black bin bag, gingerly shuffling bits of paper around and occasionally picking one up and examining it.

  ‘This?’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Post-production schedule for House Wars. Didn’t that go out on air already?’