The Wish List

by Jane Costello

‘I’m not turning up on his doorstep, like a double-glazing salesman, to say, “Why, hello again. Could you possibly disclose whether you and I exchanged bodily fluids at the weekend?”’

  ‘Then all you can do is try to relax – and get yourself checked out.’

  ‘The incubation period for HIV is three months, chlamydia is three weeks and gonorrhoea a month. So, basically, I’ll be in purgatory for the foreseeable future.’

  She sighs. ‘Emma – I need to run. I was due to be in a monthly forecast meeting with my boss three minutes ago. But do me a favour and stay off those websites, won’t you?’

  I head back into the office, unable to focus on anything except how utterly rubbish being reckless is, when I bump into Perry on the stairs.

  ‘Just the gal! I’ve got a brilliant idea I want you to work up. You’ll love it. It’s about a bunch of kids and a dog who travel round in an old van trying to solve spooky mysteries. What do you think?’

  Chapter 14

  I’m opening the door to Asha that night when I spot somebody coming out of Rita’s old flat with a clipboard. Stacey mentioned she’d heard a survey was being done today. I watch the man, who’s in his fifties and balding, head to his Micra and get in, and I feel a shudder of resentment. To me, that apartment will always be Rita’s, and I feel inexplicably apprehensive about her replacement.

  I close the door and go to the kitchen, where Asha has flicked on the kettle. ‘How are you?’ she asks.

  ‘Apart from itchy?’

  ‘You could be imagining it,’ she offers. ‘Don’t give yourself too much of a hard time, Emma. Nobody can blame you for wanting a bit of action with the opposite sex. I was single for over a year before I met Toby and I was nearly climbing the walls.’

  We both pause, taking in her last sentence and the fact that Asha clearly doesn’t consider herself ‘single’ any longer, despite the circumstances.

  ‘Do you think he’ll leave his wife?’ I ask tentatively.

  ‘We’ve discussed it, but I’m trying not to even think about that at the moment,’ Asha says, lowering her head, ‘as certain as I am that I’m a symptom, rather than a cause, of the marriage breakdown.’

  Toby and his wife married after she accidentally fell pregnant at university only four months after they’d met. From what Asha’s told me, it was a match made in hell at the beginning and hasn’t improved much since.

  ‘I still feel terrible about this situation, though,’ she adds, closing her eyes. ‘That’s despite knowing their marriage can’t continue while they’re at each other’s throats. And despite knowing it’s surely better for the children to live with two separated but happy parents – rather than two who are together and at war.’

  ‘What do you think is stopping him?’

  ‘He’s got to work things out before he takes a step like that – money matters, who’s going to get the house, how it would work with the kids. He wants to do the right thing by all of them, not just disappear into the sunset. I’m not taking any of this lightly, Emma. But I love him. And I can’t live without him. It’s as simple as that.’

  ‘I know,’ I reassure her, clutching her hand.

  ‘You know, part of me thinks Cally’s right. At the end of the day, I’ve been a mistress for the last six months. What sort of bitch does that make me? This goes against all my principles.’

  ‘You’re not a bitch,’ I insist. ‘Some relationships in life just aren’t very straightforward, that’s all.’

  She sighs. ‘Have I ever shown you a picture of Christina?’

  ‘You’ve got a picture of his wife?’ I ask, incredulous.

  ‘I mean on Facebook. Is your computer on?’

  Reluctantly, I bring out my laptop. Asha logs onto her Facebook account and clicks onto to Toby’s profile. He hasn’t got many Facebook friends – only twenty-nine – and it’s clear from the lack of any photos – of his family or anyone else – that he’s joined only recently and is no avid user.

  Asha scrolls down his Friends list and clicks on the profile of a woman by the name of Christina Gregory.

  I finally put a face to a woman we’ve heard so much about over the last half-year. It strikes me, as I take in her glossy black hair, slightly over-done lipstick and oval eyes, that she knows nothing about me – but I know dozens more things about her than I ought to.

  I know about her sex life. I know about her children. And I know that her husband is sleeping with another woman. It’s not a thought I feel at all comfortable with, certain as I am that it’s an unworkable marriage.

  Asha leans across and moves the cursor, stretching awkwardly as she navigates the site. ‘Some of her pictures are public . . .’ she begins, but I don’t want to see any more.

  I’m about to object when she emits the sort of gasp that you’d expect from someone who’s been underwater for two-and-a-half minutes.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Oh my God. Oh my God Almighty! What the hell am I going to do?’

  Asha’s face blanches and she stands up, then sits down, then stands up again, her mind clearly racing about something, and there are several minutes of hysteria and panic before I find out what it is.

  ‘I’ve sent her a “friend request”,’ she shrieks. ‘I’ve sent a woman whose husband I’m having an affair with a bloody friend request!’

  Chapter 15

  When entering the Genito-Urinary Medicine clinic at the Royal Liverpool University Hospital, it is impossible to shake the feeling that you’ve got an enormous neon sign over your head reading: ‘I’M A GREAT BIG DIRTY SHAGGER!’

  I’m torn between walking into the department with feigned nonchalance, in the hope that people think I’m an off-duty nurse, or with a severe limp, to give the impression I’ve taken a wrong turn after having my ankle X-rayed.

  I arrive and sit before a smiley middle-aged receptionist who has obviously attended some sort of School for Non-Judgemental Grannies.

  ‘Hello, lovely, pop yourself down there,’ she beams, as if she’s about to serve me a cream tea. ‘I’m going to take some details.’

  After reluctantly parting with my particulars, I am invited into a further reception room, which is literally packed with patients, but at least has the benefit of being women only. Men – aka the horrible swines who got us into this mess – use another entrance.

  I don’t know what I expected from the clientele here, but I must say none of them look especially reckless or stupid or – the word on everyone’s tongue – slutty.

  The wait is interminable, but my mind is occupied in flipping between several issues. First, Asha: who was at my flat until midnight last night trying, between frenzied sobs, to get hold of Toby to confess her mistake. He was at a black-tie event – with Christina – and simply reassured her to leave it with him. She was unreassured.

  Then there’s my itching, which I’d almost convinced myself I was imagining until I walked through the door here, since when it’s increased tenfold.

  And that brings me to the final issue. How I’d never be in this mess if I hadn’t dumped Rob. There’s no way Rob would’ve given me something that made me feel like I’m wearing a wire-wool G-string, that’s for certain.

  How I crave being part of a couple again, without having to deal with this crap. I keep thinking about his arms round me, how warm and loved I felt and what the hell possessed me to do what I did.

  I’m hit by a flashback of the night I introduced him to Cally and Asha at our local pub quiz – and how impressive and lovely they thought he was, without being remotely showy. They warmed to him instantly – everyone does. I close my eyes at the thought of it. What the hell is wrong with me?

  I take out my mobile and scroll down to his number, for a split second considering calling it. I remind myself that phoning from the clap clinic probably wouldn’t make for the most romantic of reunions.

  The doctor I finally see is a skinny, soft-spoken man with an African surname and the same smiley manner as the receptionist. He
confirms all my details, before asking me what the problem is.

  ‘Right. Well. I had this, um . . .’ I lean in and whisper, ‘encounter . . .’

  ‘You had unprotected sex.’

  ‘Yes,’ I croak. I clear my throat. ‘I wouldn’t normally. I wouldn’t dream of it. I’m not that sort of girl.’

  I half expect him to grab me by the shoulders and shout: ‘You had unprotected sex? Are you insane? In this day and age? You idiot! Haven’t you heard that incidences of chlamydia have gone up by fifty per cent since 1999?’

  But he doesn’t. He looks at me as if to say: ‘It happens. Now let’s deal with it.’

  ‘Have you experienced any symptoms you’re worried about?’

  ‘Hmm. I think I could be . . . possibly . . . maybe . . . itchy. But I might be wrong.’

  ‘We’ll perform a full screen, shall we?’

  ‘That’d be lovely,’ I reply, as if he’s offered me a cut and blow-dry.

  After a few more relatively painless questions, the doctor leaves and is replaced by a nurse in her late thirties who could win an Olympic medal in talking.

  ‘Have you seen the queue out there?’ She snaps a strap on my arm and starts prodding around for a juicy vein. ‘It’s always like this in summer. Everyone’s back from their hols. I’m just back from Benidorm. Been anywhere nice yourself?’

  ‘Italy,’ I reply, because, even though the answer is France with Marianne for two days in March – we both adore the place – I am hit by an incomprehensible desire to not reveal anything personal in here. Apart from my genitalia, obviously.

  I am instructed to undress behind a curtain, then have to grapple with a hospital gown, which has approximately seventeen tabs and is clearly designed for a person with a humpback and five arms. The doctor arrives ten minutes later, as I am pacing up and down, having now read and memorised the medical abbreviations on the wall for everything from Cardiovascular Syphilis to Sex Worker, and applied enough hand gel to my palms to peel off a layer of skin.

  ‘Would you mind if we allowed a medical student to be present?’

  I hesitate, then reply breezily: ‘Not at all!’ I don’t want anyone to think I’d be daft enough to let my hang-ups hold back the next generation of medical professionals; the only sensible, grown-up option is to say yes.

  As he goes to the door to invite in the student, I am instructed by the nurse to leap onto a reclining bed and place my legs into two stirrups underneath a spotlight, enabling an optimum view.

  I stare at the ceiling, counting polystyrene tiles in an attempt to take my mind off the stranger who’s prising open my knees and peering between my legs.

  After a short rummage around, he senses my tension and says reassuringly: ‘I can’t see anything untoward.’

  ‘Really?’ I gasp gratefully, flipping up my head.

  Only, it’s not the top of the doctor’s head that catches my attention.

  It’s the medical student at his shoulder.

  And the reason he catches my attention is not because he’s nodding studiously as if having a guided tour of the Elgin Marbles, or because his mentor is gaily pointing out notable features of my vagina.

  It’s because this is not the first time we’ve met.

  I freeze and turn a violent shade of crimson as I’m assaulted with a flashback of Saturday night, when I last saw this student – who apparently doubles as Chris the barman from Alma de Cuba. The one I almost slept with. The one I would have slept with, had his shift finished two-and-a-half hours earlier.

  ‘The patient is concerned about previous sexual contact and has been experiencing abnormal irritation,’ the doctor tells him.

  It’s at that point that he glances up and makes eye contact with me, a split-second occurrence in which his expression shifts dramatically – and five words are screamed internally by us both: ‘Get me out of here!’

  He doesn’t move – he can’t. And neither can I, given that I’m in the sort of position into which you’d manoeuvre a turkey, pre-stuffing.

  Clearly at a loss as to what to do, the student bends down hastily to pretend to scrutinise the most intimate part of my anatomy. He doesn’t look up, but I can recognise one thing after the doctor’s commentary about my health concerns.

  Never in his life has he been as grateful as he is now for having been stuck with Saturday night’s late shift.

  Chapter 16

  Asha phones that afternoon to confirm she’s in the clear after what’s obviously been a torturous morning.

  ‘Toby got home from the event and, while Christina was getting changed, he logged onto her Facebook profile in their study. Hers is the default account on their PC and all her passwords are saved on there.’

  ‘So he rejected the friend request?’

  ‘Exactly, then deleted the notification she was sent.’

  ‘So – panic over?’

  ‘Yep,’ she says flatly. ‘I guess so.’

  Then there’s a silence. Because it doesn’t feel like much of a triumph somehow.

  Asha’s roller-coaster romantic life is a long way from that of my sister. Marianne is so firmly in the couple-zone these days, I’m worried she’s a step away from his ’n’ hers undies.

  ‘Brian and I are thinking of going away to Devon,’ she announces, when I Skype her later that night.

  ‘Really?’ I love Devon myself but I’m wondering when this became exciting to a woman who used to pop to New York for a weekend.

  ‘It’s meant to be lovely – he has family there. And things are a bit tight for him at the moment so going abroad is out.’

  ‘It’ll be nice.’

  ‘I think so. I spent years travelling to places like Ibiza and Paris and never really discovered half of the UK. Hey, Brian’s just come in! Why don’t you say hello?’

  Marianne disappears and after a short background conversation, followed by shaky webcam adjustment, I am confronted by a gargantuan brown jumper, a tent of an item, underneath which is a man I recognise – just about – to be Brian. I say just about because, since the last picture Marianne showed me on Facebook, he has grown enough facial hair to knit a matching hat.

  ‘Emma, we meet at last!’ he grins. At least, I think he grins. The beard moves, certainly.

  ‘Hi Brian – how are you? I’ve heard a lot about you.’

  ‘Not too much, I hope! So, is your job keeping you busy? I’d love to have a good chat to you about it.’

  According to Marianne, Brian is fascinated by my job because of his own aspirations to be a television writer. I’m really trying not to be too sceptical – I mean, I manage to make a living as a scriptwriter despite it being notoriously competitive.

  The difference is that I have a steady job working for an established company, and I’ve learned the ropes over the course of eight years. Brian’s on-the-job experience is limited to operating the jet wash at Gleamers.

  Despite that, I can’t deny he seems nice; he’s funny and unassuming and he obviously adores Marianne.

  If I hadn’t ever met Johnny – dynamic, entrepreneurial, charismatic Johnny – I probably wouldn’t think twice about her new boyfriend. But I have. And the stark, glaring contrast between them means it’s impossible to conclude anything other than that Brian is punching above his weight with my sister.

  When I end the Skype call, the rest of my evening becomes dominated by one other very pressing matter: what’s going on – to use Cally’s phrase – ‘down there’. I will spare you the detail, but say simply this: there is not a shadow of a doubt that something is wrong. Very wrong.

  As I grimly open the fridge, I spot the list and gaze at Cally’s teenaged handwriting.

  After almost two weeks, I’ve managed to cross off only one ‘achievement’ – a one-night stand – and add another unexpected one: I’ve contracted my very first sexually transmitted disease. What a proud moment. I wonder if I get a certificate?

  The only thing I’ve got in for dinner is a ready meal that claims to be �
�beef hotpot’ but actually contains so little meat I’m convinced the Vegetarian Society would approve it. After my three-and-a-half-minute dinner, I log onto my laptop in front of the TV for another fun-packed session of Googling medical conditions.

  I flick onto Facebook first. Only, my usual unquenchable desire to look through the wedding photos of people I have never met and never will meet is diverted by the notification of a friend request. As I scrutinise the name and picture, a tight knot develops in my stomach that I know has nothing to do with the hotpot.

  Matt Taylor.

  My mouth widens enough to swallow a whole mango. It’s him. My one-night stand. I click the link to a message.

  Hello Emma,

  I hope you don’t mind me contacting you – you suggested when we met that I should either phone or look you up on Facebook. The number you left had seventeen digits, several of which I could recognise only as Ancient Sanskrit, so that was out.

  I just wanted to say that it was nice to meet you. I thoroughly enjoyed the brief time we spent together and your job as an air hostess sounds fantastic – I’ve never seen anyone so passionate about what they do for a living.

  Sorry I missed you on Sunday morning. Despite my battered ego struggling to come to terms with the possibility that you never want to set eyes on me again, the born optimist in me thought I’d drop you a line in case you were interested in getting together again.

  If not, fair enough. But I couldn’t let you go without saying I think you’re a fantastic woman with an amazing sense of humour and, given the choice, I’d love to get to know you. If not, I feel duty bound to say anyway that you do the best in-flight safety demonstration I’ve ever seen.

  Take care and best wishes,

  Matt

  xxx

  PS I really hope you didn’t wake up with regrets about Saturday night. If you did, rest assured that I’m a model of discretion.

  Regrets? Re-bloody-grets? Well, yes, I’ve got a few, thank you very much, Mr Matt Itchypants Taylor. And that’s without knowing the full details of my in-flight demonstration.