From the Inside

by Collette Heather

  “So, what about you?” I ask, keen to deflect the attention off myself and onto her.

  “Oh, I’m really desperately uninteresting,” she says, as if suddenly struck down by shyness, or modesty.

  “I don’t believe you. What do you do?”

  “I work in PR,” she says, taking a sip of her coffee and gazing thoughtfully out of the window.

  She watches the passing traffic, the cars bumper to bumper, moving at a snail’s pace.

  And I watch her.

  She’s really quite beautiful, I decide. It’s incredibly difficult to tell if she’s a natural blonde, like I am a natural strawberry-blonde. The vibrant gold definitely suits her, but today’s fashion for a full, dark brow makes it nigh-on impossible to tell with most women, including Beth, as her eyebrows are so on-trend, being full, dark, and perfectly shaped. Her bone structure is strong, her nose just stopping shy of being too big, instead lending her face a look of strength and beauty. She makes me think of Helen of Troy, for some reason, despite the fact I have no clue as to what Helen of Troy looked like. But I can easily imagine that the face that launched a thousand ships as looking a bit like Beth. Her bone structure alone speaks of dignity and strength of character, with her wide jaw, heavy-lidded, deep-set eyes and chunky cheekbones that would give Kate Moss a run for her money.

  “Working in PR sounds so glamorous,” I say wistfully.

  She turns her head sharply to look at me, and for a second, I’m sure that I detect a flash of anger in her eyes – either that or hurt. Just as quick, the look is gone again, and I decide that I have imagined it.

  “Trust me, it’s really not.”

  “Oh,” I say, for it’s clear that she doesn’t want to talk about her work. I can appreciate that, because I hate talking about my work – or lack thereof – too. “So, is there a Mr Jameson in Bethnal Green? Or any mini-Beths?”

  “One husband. No children.”

  She looks down at her coffee cup as she says it, as if reluctant to meet my eyes. She glances at her watch. “And speaking of which, I should be getting back. My husband will be wondering where I am. I would’ve called him, but my phone’s run out of juice.”

  “Oh. You can borrow mine, if you like?”

  “I don’t know his mobile number – how sad is that? And we disconnected the landline only last week, because we never use it. It was just a waste of money, paying for something that we never use. I mean, who uses landlines nowadays?”

  I do, actually, I thought, but didn’t say.

  It only then strikes me as a little cold that she referred to her husband as my husband rather than by his name, but I shrug it off. I am a stranger to her – she is in no way obliged to share private information about her life with me. But still. I hope that I haven’t offended her, somehow. I can’t think how I might have done, or why. I haven’t asked her anything that she hasn’t asked me.

  “Right. Yes. I should be making a move, too.”

  I have already drained my coffee and I speak the truth. I really do need to get home.

  “But we should totally do this again,” she says. “Without the mugging part.”

  “Come to my place for lunch next week,” I blurt out, catching even myself by surprise. She looks a bit startled, and now my cheeks are flaming in embarrassment. “I’m sorry, that was really weird, wasn’t it? I sound like a complete stalker. And besides, I expect you work every weekday, don’t you? How silly of me.”

  “Yeah, you do sound a bit like a stalker,” she says with a grin. “But I have Wednesday off next week, as it happens, because I have a few things I need to do in the morning.”

  “Really? So do you fancy coming for lunch next Wednesday?”

  “Sure. Why not? I guess I dig the crazy chicks.”

  “That’s me. Completely crazy.”

  “And thanks for asking.”

  “Any time,” I say, starting to feel a bit daft. She must think I’m desperate, or something.

  But then, maybe I am. I have been starved of female friendship for so long, I’m not sure how this whole, making friends thing is supposed to work. According to the unwritten rules, I should be befriending women with children Bella’s age.

  Guess you’re doing this all wrong then, I tell myself.

  “I’m not normally so forward,” I say. “I don’t really have any friends. I mean, I don’t really know anyone in London. Everyone I socialise with is on Luke’s side of things.”

  “It’s easy for a woman to lose herself in a relationship. You wouldn’t be the first.”

  “I guess not. Although, I’m not sure that I’d go as far as to say that I’m losing myself. That sounds a bit drastic.”

  It’s not remotely drastic, but that’s beside the point. It also sounds like she’s talking from experience, but I don’t say as much. I’ve already sensed once today that I accidently crossed a line with her, although I don’t know how.

  Neither do I tell her that I’m short on the friend front because my old gang dumped me when the affair came to light. It wasn’t an overnight dumping, but more of an insidious creeping, their judgement a constant, invisible weight that ultimately broke up our friendships. The truth was, I couldn’t wait to escape my old life where I wouldn’t feel ashamed every single day. London – and marrying Luke – was supposed to be my clean slate.

  “Where are you from, then, if not from London?”

  “Brighton.” Inexplicably, I feel as if I want to cry again, and yet again, I tell myself that it is just the aftereffects of being mugged. I clear my throat, ploughing on. “That’s where I was teaching anyway, for most of my adult life. I went to Brighton University, and just sort of fell into things there, as one does. I’m from Ramsgate, originally. How about you?”

  She waves a hand dismissively. “Oh, I’ve always lived here. London born and bred.”

  “I don’t detect a London accent,” I say, thinking of my recently sacked cleaner, who sounded like Eliza Dolittle.

  “I guess not. You know what it’s like, if you go to the right schools and then onto University. My Danny Dyer lilt has been bashed out of me. You don’t have an accent, either.”

  She has a point. We have that much in common at least, being educated and accent-less. “Do you have a Facebook?” I ask, pulling out my phone, which I tucked into the back pouch of the pushchair behind a nappy after I had called Luke.

  “No.”

  “No? You work in PR, but you don’t have a Facebook? Everyone has a Facebook.”

  “That’s precisely why I don’t. My job involves socialising and schmoozing – the last thing I want is to do that it my spare time, too. Facebook is too much like work.”

  Instead, she recites her mobile number to me – one number that she does seem to remember – and I tap it into my phone.

  “Guess we’re connected now,” she says with a smile. “You’d better not be crazy.”

  “Likewise, lady.”

  I feel more optimistic than I have done for ages. I’ve completely forgotten the simple joy of hanging out with a girlfriend. After the spectacular way in which I screwed up my life a few years back, I’m beginning to ask myself if I had subconsciously decided that I am not worthy of female friendship. I threw everything that I was into Luke, to escape my own guilt and hurt, and now I’m wondering how much of me there is left.

  Right at this moment, I am almost glad that I got mugged today.

  I do believe that I have made a friend.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  I sip my white wine – an icy sauvignon blanc – as the conversation of our guests flows over me. I’m only half-listening, picking half-heartedly at my pan-fried salmon and Caesar salad.

  “This is delicious, Luke,” Diane Lavington says. “You are so lucky, Tanya, to be married to such a multi-talented man.”

  “Yes,” I reply, unable to stop myself from thinking of that perfume I had smelled yesterday on his jacket and shirt, my smile feeling tight and unnatural on my lips. “Very lucky.”r />
  “It’s really nothing,” Luke laughs. “It’s just a simple piece of fish and salad. A monkey could cook this.”

  “Oh, you,” Diane says, laughing right along with him. “You can add modest to your long list of talents.”

  “I’m sitting right here, you know,” says her husband, Tony. “Are you going to trade me in for a younger model?”

  “It’s tempting, I must say.”

  “I am cut to the quick,” he says.

  Throughout, I keep the fixed grin on my face, but inside I am emotionally drained. Tony is something big in finance – not Luke’s boss, as such, as I don’t think it quite works like that when you get to their level, and they move in slightly different worlds, but Luke certainly needs Tony onside. He is a Portfolio and Marketing Manager, or something like that. Luke did tell me once, but I promptly forgot. I don’t mind Tony, it’s his horrible, fat wife that I can’t stand. Thankfully, I don’t see them too much – just at dinner parties or cosy foursomes like this every few months or so.

  But it’s enough.

  “I enjoy cooking, it’s an entirely agreeable way to spend a Saturday afternoon. It’s nice to just relax with Tanya and Bella and potter around in the kitchen.”

  “Can’t say that I’ve ever cooked,” Tony said in that blustery way of his. “You’re clearly one of those new-fangled types. No one at work would ever guess that you wore a bloody pinny at home. Your husband is ruthless, dear Tanya. Absolutely ruthless.”

  I don’t doubt it. I smile along with him, but all this forced conviviality is making my jaw ache.

  “It’s true,” Diane says. I hate her voice, it’s so upper-crust, it reminds me of a whinnying horse. “He wouldn’t know one end of a bloody saucepan from the other. But then, a clear division of labour has served us well. How about you, Tanya? Do you have plans for any more children? Or shall you be getting back to work in the foreseeable future?”

  I find her bluntness borderline offensive. It’s possible that she doesn’t know what a pain in the arse she is, but I doubt it. I think she’s an evil, fat witch.

  “I’m busy for the moment, with Bella,” I reply, as tactfully and as politely as humanly possible.

  “Well you must be bored. What do you do with yourself all day? When I was your age,” she booms, “I had three. And I didn’t have a cleaner, either.”

  “We don’t have a cleaner anymore,” Luke interjects, before I have a chance to defend myself. “Tanya caught her with her hand in the cookie jar.”

  I close my eyes for a second, irritated at Luke for telling her this. Diane is the biggest gossip in London, and if she blabs her mouth off about poor Isobel Stamford, her name will be mud. I don’t know why I care – the girl is a thief, when all is said and done, but I still feel bad for her. We all make mistakes. God knows, I’ve made my fair share.

  “You did?” Diane asks, her eyes shining with this delicious snippet of gossip. “Did she steal money? What was her name? It’s disgusting how some of the lower classes act.”

  “I don’t think that her name is important,” I say quickly, before Luke has a chance to name and shame. “And she didn’t take anything that much, just a few beauty products and some tampons.”

  I’m hoping that my indiscretion in such polite company is enough to jolt her out of questioning me further, that the conversation will swiftly move onto different pastures.

  Instead, Tony guffaws laughter. “She stole your tampons? The whole packet? Clearly, you weren’t paying her enough if she has to steal her sanitary products.”

  Luke shoots me a look, despite Tony’s obvious amusement. He always behaves so properly in company, I’ve very rarely seen him anything other than perfectly composed. He is always jovial, yet with a steely, professional edge.

  “Well, this is what happens when you invite strangers into your home to do your work.” Diane says in displeasure.

  “You have a cleaner, too dear,” Tony reminds his wife.

  “That’s different. I’m sixty-seven, I don’t bend as well as I used to, I’m not as fit as I used to be.”

  “Tell me about it,” Tony mutters.

  “What was that?” Diane asks sharply.

  I can’t figure out if she did hear him, and she is just calling him up on it, or if she didn’t quite catch it as she’s old, and therefore not as sharp of hearing as me.

  “Nothing, dear,” Tony says, before turning his attention to Luke. “You really must come fishing with us, if and when the great British Summer ever does decide to make itself known.”

  I know exactly what Tony’s talking about, because Luke has mentioned it – and moaned about it – on more than one occasion. Tony and a few of his cronies from the financial sector go to Cornwall, usually St Ives, in the height of Summer and hire a fishing boat – plus fisherman – for the day. It is usually netting for mackerel, and it is a type of netting that Luke is wholly unused to, nor has any interest in. It is mostly team-building crap that is supposedly good for morale, and Luke has been dodging this event for the entirety of the two years and one month that we have been together.

  “Yes,” says my husband. “That sounds great.”

  I am impressed at the smoothness of his lie. Instinctively, I glance at the baby monitor on the sideboard, silently willing Bella to start hollering to save me from this dinner party from Hell before I remember that Jessie Wilkes is up there with her.

  Hawk-eyed Diane, unfortunately, whose eyesight is not remotely impaired, unlike her hearing, follows the fleeting trajectory of my gaze.

  “What’s the matter, dear? You have a nanny up there with her, don’t you?”

  I resist the urge to roll my eyes – I am growing quite tired of her passive-aggressive digs. “She’s not a nanny,” I’m quick to point out. “She’s a babysitter.”

  Luke jumps to my defence, for once. Possibly because he doesn’t want the Lavingtons to think badly of us. Or him, specifically. “She’s a lovely girl, and it’s just nice for us to have some adult time, now and again,” Luke explains patiently. “As we are in such fine company tonight, neither of us wants to be running up and down the stairs all night. Having you both around for dinner, is, to us, no different to going out to eat. We want to give you our undivided attention.”

  I find this whole charade faintly nauseating, because these aren’t our real friends.

  “Sounds perfectly logical to me,” Tony says quickly, before his wife has a chance to leap in and criticise me. “Host a dinner party, or be a parent. Better to do one job well than two jobs half-cocked.”

  Luke smiles and nods his head in agreement. “Our sentiments exactly. We adore Bella, don’t get me wrong, but sometimes it’s good to make time for us, too.”

  I smile along with him, but inside I wonder how serious he could possibly be. Not very, I should imagine. This dinner party isn’t making time for us, it’s work. Luke is social-climbing, or perhaps one could better call it networking. Either way, I would hardly call this dinner party time for us.

  Besides, personally, I’d much rather that the babysitter wasn’t upstairs with Bella, so that I might have an excuse to run up and down the stairs all night. The conversation drifts onto other matters, namely, their most recent holiday to see their grown-up son and his family in Florida. Diane is drearing on about how brilliant and exceptionally bright her grandson is, just like their son was at his age, and my attention wanders. I suddenly realise how lonely I am, how empty my existence is. How I have no real connection with anyone, apart from Bella.

  I suddenly realise how much I miss my old life, pre-Luke.

  *

  We finally get rid of the Lavingtons at a quarter to eleven. We have been in the living-room for the past hour, with coffee, handmade chocolates and a drinks’ tray of digestifs.

  Tony had easily drunk the most of the four of us, and he attacked the port with impressive gusto. By the time it came for them to pile into a taxi, he was decidedly red around the cheeks and unsteady on his feet.

&nb
sp; As always, Luke, throughout the evening has given the impression of having drunk more than he really has. He made it look as if he was matching Tony drink for drink, but he really wasn’t. As jovial as he is, he shows no signs of inebriation.

  “Boy oh boy, I wouldn’t want to be Tony in the morning. Thank God they’ve gone,” I say, as soon as the front door shuts behind them and we are safely back in the hallway.

  “Why don’t we have a nightcap in the living-room?” Luke asks, sliding an arm around my shoulders.

  I am wearing a fitted, wraparound dress by Diane Furstenberg in my customary shade of light beige. It has cute, capped sleeves that perfectly compliment the flattering, square neckline, and Luke’s fingertips graze the bare skin of my upper arms. His touch makes me shiver, causing me to break out in a rash of goose-bumps. I turn and gaze directly into his dark eyes – eyes that are directly parallel to mine. He is so handsome, yet I am dismayed to admit to myself that it is not longing that is making me shiver.

  I am shivering because I am inexplicably on edge. It’s almost as if I am frightened of him.

  “I should go and relieve Jessie of her duties,” I say lightly. “It’s late, I’m sure the poor girl is desperate to get home.”

  “And I’m sure that she is perfectly happy to stay a little while longer. Time is money.”

  He pulls me closer, nuzzling the side of my neck, one hand gripping my hip, the other slithering up and down my back in a way that makes me tremble.

  Right then, all I want to do is get away from him. I may not be aroused, but neither am I repulsed, exactly. It’s more complicated than that, he’s just so intense, yet, at the same time, completely unreadable.

  “No, really, I want to check on Bella,” I say firmly, using his broad chest in the black shirt as leverage to push myself back from him.

  “And I want us to have a drink together in the living-room.”

  I continue to push against his chest, but he is still holding me tightly around the middle. And he is grinning at me, but it in no way touches his eyes. They are sparkling, as intense and as searching as ever, but the look in them is utterly, chillingly cold.