Bookends

by Jane Green

  ‘What do you mean, not a champagne type? What kind of type do I strike you as, then? A few pints of beer?’ I start to laugh.

  ‘Nah.’ He looks horrified. ‘Not beer. Lager, perhaps.’ And from that point on, I start to relax.

  *

  Halfway through my second glass of wine I start to have a good time. Not that I wasn’t having one before, but the alcohol loosens my inhibitions, and the more we talk, the more James smiles at me, the more attractive I start to feel.

  Although attractive isn’t quite enough. Actually, sitting here with the candlelight softly flickering on the table and James laughing at all my stupid jokes, I start to feel positively gorgeous.

  And suddenly I realize what Lucy, and Portia, have been banging on about. I haven’t felt like this in years. In fact, I don’t think I’ve felt like this ever. I know I’m being funnier than I’ve been for ages, and that there is a real spark between us, something that I was perhaps vaguely aware of before, but tonight it seems to be growing into a flame after all.

  And there seems to be so much to say. Neither of us can wipe the grins off our faces, and in our excitement our sentences are tumbling out, twisting and turning, overlapping, and it’s all I can do not to leap on the tabletop and start tapping out a dance of joy.

  This is what it’s all about. This is what I’ve been missing out on. And Jesus Christ, no matter how much I love Si, Josh and Lucy, it’s not a patch on this.

  I’m in the middle of telling James why Geminis should never be trusted, and he’s laughing even though he’s already admitted that he thinks all this star sign stuff is a load of rubbish, when the door of the restaurant opens, and I can just about see through the smoked glass someone handing their coat in, and, as I carry on talking, the someone steps into the restaurant and it’s Portia.

  I stop in the middle of the story, and James turns round to see what I’m looking at. ‘I don’t believe it,’ I say, about to push my chair back and call her over. ‘It’s my friend Portia.’

  I start to stand up as the door opens again, and Portia’s mystery date shakes the rain off his umbrella, and I smile to myself as I realize I’ll get to know a bit more about Portia’s private life, about which she seems to be so incredibly private.

  The manager greets them effusively before leading them into the restaurant. Portia’s companion has his arm around her to guide her to the table, and she makes a joke, and they look at one another tenderly and laugh.

  And when he looks at her I sit back down with a bump because the mystery man with his arm around Portia, looking at her with an extraordinary amount of tenderness and – dare I say it – love, is Josh.

  ‘Oh fuck,’ I whisper, unable to tear my eyes off them, even as they disappear into the back room. ‘He was bloody right.’

  Extraordinary how magic can disappear in a split second. I, we, had been having such an incredible time, but the minute I see Josh and Portia together, my evening is ruined.

  And poor James. It’s not his fault. I start trying to explain, but it’s too difficult and it hurts too much, and the only person I really want to talk to right now is Si, because he, after all, was the one who predicted this would happen right from the start.

  So this is what she meant by giving herself a happier ending. This is why she kept asking the questions about Josh and Lucy. But Josh? I just can’t believe Josh would do this. I can’t believe he would treat Lucy like this. And if this can go wrong, this marriage, this partnership that seemed so perfect, then what in the hell hope is there for the rest of us?

  ‘I understand, don’t worry,’ James keeps saying when I tell him that we have to leave, and even though I don’t say why, he can see I’ve gone as white as a sheet.

  He asks for the bill, and I’m so keen to get away from here, just in case they should come back through on the way to the loo or something, I forget all about the dilemma of should I offer, shouldn’t I, and just let James pay the bill, my mind far too distracted by other things.

  As we walk out, James turns, and I can see that he spots Josh and Portia, and that he really does understand, that it isn’t just a meaningless platitude, and he looks at me sympathetically as I try to push away the feeling of dread that’s now looming.

  And God, how different is this car journey from the one a couple of hours earlier. James tries to keep the conversation going, but my heart just isn’t in it, and after a while he gives up and switches the radio on.

  We pull up outside my house and I know I ought to invite him in for coffee, to try to make amends, as the last part of the evening has disintegrated so badly, but the only thing I want to do right now is get on the phone and talk to Si, quickly, because he’s the only one who will know what to do.

  ‘Are you going to be okay?’ James says, and I nod. ‘You’re not going to do anything rash, are you?’ his voice slightly more nervous. ‘Like call Lucy or anything?’

  ‘God, no! I need to get this clear in my head first.’

  ‘You know, you might be wrong. It might just be a friendly supper.’

  ‘James, they were having dinner in Barnes when they both live in North London, and presumably they chose it because they didn’t think they’d see anyone they know. Plus I saw the way they looked at one another, and it’s just all so fucking obvious now.’ My voice starts to rise with anger, and I stop and take a deep breath, forcing myself to calm down, even managing a smile for James’s sake.

  ‘I know this might sound like a lie, given the events of the latter part of the evening, but I really did have a lovely time.’

  ‘I bet you say that to all the boys,’ James says, a small grin on his face, ‘next time it could be even better…’ but my mind is back to Josh and Portia, and I’m climbing out of the car as James carries on saying something, but I’m not listening. I give him a distracted wave and let myself into the flat, heading straight for the phone.

  ‘Si, it’s me.’

  ‘And what are you doing home at this early hour? Unless of course’ – he drops his voice to a whisper, although God knows why because he’s definitely on his own – ‘unless the gorgeous James is in your bedroom, pulling off his boxers at this very moment.’

  ‘We saw them. Josh and Portia. You were right.’

  There’s a gasp on the other end of the phone, then silence for what feels like a very long time.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I know. I feel sick. I can’t believe it.’

  ‘What do you mean, you saw them? Saw them where? What were they doing?’

  ‘We were sitting in this little French restaurant in Barnes – ’

  ‘Why did you schlep over to Barnes?’

  ‘I could ask the same of Josh and Portia, really, couldn’t I? Except I doubt the answer would be the same. I suspect that James chose it because it was lovely, rather than for its discretion. But anyway, there we were, when the door opened and Portia came in…’ I proceed to tell Si the rest of the story, and when I’ve finished I realize from the silence that he’s as shocked as I am.

  ‘Jesus, Si. Say something. You were the one who said she was after Josh from the beginning.’

  ‘I know, but I didn’t think she’d actually succeed. I mean, Josh loves Lucy. What the hell is he thinking of?’

  ‘I know. That’s exactly what I thought. But more to the point, Si, what the fuck are we going to do?’

  ‘Well, I know what we can’t do and that’s tell Lucy.’

  ‘But we can’t just sit back and watch the marriage of our best friends disintegrate. This is just horrific. I can’t believe how horrific this is.’

  ‘What about if we talk to Josh? Why don’t we talk to Josh?’

  ‘I just don’t think I can, Si. Maybe you could.’

  ‘Oh God, I don’t think so. I hate these confrontations. Look, we’re just going to have to sleep on it tonight. Maybe by the morning we’ll have a plan of action.’

  But of course we don’t have a plan of action the next morning, and that’s despite me
having hardly slept a wink, tossing and turning, too busy thinking about Josh and Portia to get a decent night’s sleep.

  And do you know the worst thing about it? The worst thing about it, and I can’t believe I’m actually saying this because it feels like such a betrayal, but the worst thing about it is that, seeing them together last night, they looked perfect. They looked far more right together than Josh and Lucy have ever done, and, as much as it pains me to even think it, they look as though they belong together.

  I will never ever tell anyone I think this. Not even Si, not even during our numerous phone calls the next day, starting at eight in the morning and continuing until mid-afternoon, when I tell him to quit or someone will start suspecting something. This whole fiasco has brought out something incredibly protective in me towards Lucy; I feel that I ought to be close to her, to somehow try to shield her, and I follow her around for the rest of the afternoon, making sure she’s okay, although the shop’s so busy we hardly have time to speak, let alone have a proper conversation.

  ‘Excuse me?’ I look up from sorting out the new stock to see a middle-aged woman standing in front of me, looking imperious. I give her a smile and she, not smiling back, asks: ‘Can you tell me where I’d find the new Dava Sobel?’

  ‘Sure. It should be on that table at the fr…’ I tail off as the woman starts walking away, no ‘thank you’, nothing, leaving me stranded in mid-sentence. Bill, who’s manning the till, catches my eye and rolls his eyes. ‘I hate it when that happens,’ he says, as I sigh.

  ‘Just tell me you’ll be the one to help her when she comes back to ask again.’ I grit my teeth, seeing that the woman has, as they always do, gone to the wrong table and is currently browsing through biographies. ‘I don’t think I’ve got enough patience to deal with that today.’

  ‘No problem,’ says Bill, stepping forward, as the woman marches back to the desk, saying in a loud, disgruntled voice: ‘It’s not there.’

  ‘I’ll find it for you,’ he says with a smile, leading her away, and I huddle back behind the desk, wishing I were in a better mood, because normally these things just don’t bother me, but today, obviously, isn’t a normal day.

  *

  ‘Cath, darling!’ Lucy’s voice is breathless as she dashes back behind the bar, and for a second it almost makes me think that last night must have been a nightmare; it feels so unrealistic when Lucy’s voice is still exactly the same. ‘I can’t believe we haven’t had a chance to speak today. Give me a hand with these cups, and then you can tell me how last night went with the lovely James.’

  ‘Lovely.’ I try to make my voice sound as normal as possible. ‘I’ll tell you all about it later.’

  ‘I’ve got a better idea,’ she laughs. ‘Josh has another meeting tonight, so I’m on my own again. I haven’t got the energy to cook, but if you won’t tell anyone we can order pizza and you can tell me all about it. How does that sound?’

  Scary, is how it sounds, because I know that the memory of Portia and Josh together will loom all evening, but the desire to see Lucy properly, out of the work environment, to be somehow reassured by her, is far more overwhelming than the fear. ‘Great.’ I say. ‘I’ll supply the wine.’

  ‘All right, my darling. We’ll go home together. Whoops, Bill’s calling you, must be about that order you put in yesterday.’ Either that or another bloody customer.

  In the event I end up going home first, because it’s freezing and I didn’t turn the heating on when I left, and the one thing I can’t stand is going to bed in a freezing cold flat – it means I won’t sleep for hours. So I dash home to put the heating on for later, and tell Lucy I’ll be round in about half an hour.

  It’s ridiculous to feel even more nervous about seeing Lucy, seeing her socially, as opposed to in the shop, than I did last night when I saw James, but it’s the truth. And I know I’ve spent the whole day in the shop with her, but it isn’t the same. I’m not altogether sure how we’ve managed this, but during the day, at work, you’d never know how close we are.

  Despite that old myth that you should never get involved in business with friends, we seem to have found a way to make it work. It’s not as though we don’t talk during the day, in the shop, we just try to keep it as businesslike as possible, particularly given that Bill and Rachel are around most of the time as well. And already, in just over six weeks, we’ve developed a routine that seems to work perfectly for us.

  We tend to get in first, Lucy and I, usually around nine, an hour before the shop opens, just to give ourselves a bit of breathing space. Lucy sticks the coffee on, while I check to see what was sold the day before, muttering to myself in frustration as I try to decipher my own handwriting, should I have been the one to have been manning the till at the time.

  And then Lucy brings the coffee over as I get on the phone to the wholesalers to reorder the books that have been sold, and to place orders for customers who are looking for things we don’t usually stock.

  Yesterday a man came in and asked where he’d find The Guide to Natural Plant Life in Outer Mongolia. I checked the computer, because I knew he was the type who wouldn’t take no for an answer without actually seeing me check the stock, and when I said I could order it for him he flew into a deep rage and demanded to know why, given that we are a bookshop, we didn’t have it in stock. I tried to explain that we cannot possibly stock every book ever printed just on the offchance that someone should want it, and that with more obscure titles we do have to order them.

  That really set him off. Obscure? he said. Obscure? And then he proceeded to go into a detailed rant about how he had read this book twenty years ago and it had changed his life. Rachel got the giggles, which nearly set me off, and eventually, feeling evil, I sent him off to Books Etc., knowing full well that they wouldn’t have it either, but figuring he could vent his fury on them instead, and I told him it was only a five-minute walk. Ha!

  But, despite the occasions when people are just plain peculiar, I love it. We all do. And although we aren’t actually in profit yet, it won’t, according to Josh, be long now. It looks like I made the right choice after all.

  I stand on the doorstep of Lucy’s house, place a hand over my heart to calm it down, and ring the doorbell. I hear footsteps, and Ingrid comes to the door, followed closely by Max.

  ‘Hello, Cath,’ she says, with what looks like, unless I’m very much mistaken, a suspiciously warm smile. Has this woman gone completely crazy? I peer at her closely, refraining from asking her if she’s feeling all right, and give her a faint smile in return.

  ‘Lucy has popped out to get some vegetables. She said she would be back by half past. How are you?’ she says over her shoulder as I follow her down the hallway, trying very hard not to step on Max, who is jumping from side to side in front of me.

  ‘Fine,’ I say slowly. ‘Umm, and you?’

  ‘Oh, fine,’ she says breezily. ‘Would you like a glass of wine? We are having one.’

  ‘We?’ I follow her into the kitchen, and I swear to God I’m not exaggerating this, but my heart threatens to leap into my mouth and I actually gasp because sitting at the kitchen table, as cool as a cucumber, is Portia.

  I stand, frozen, in the doorway, and not sure whether to reverse immediately and run far away, or to walk in and pretend nothing’s wrong, although considering I’m doing a very good goldfish impersonation right here, I think that it would be fairly difficult to pretend there’s nothing wrong.

  What the fuck is she doing here? Oh Christ, oh no. Please tell me she’s not here to confront Lucy, to do something awful like tell Lucy that she and Josh are in love and Lucy should leave. Oh Christ. Get her out of here. Get me out of here.

  And then I notice that Portia’s expression is exactly the same as always, and she doesn’t have any qualms at all about sitting at the kitchen table of her lover’s house, and she probably isn’t going to confront Lucy, she’s probably here to see Josh before they go off to her flat for an evening of passion.

/>   Christ. I could kill her.

  I mean, does she have to be so obvious about it? Look at her, in her plunging shirt with her cleavage on view for all to see, what the hell does she think she’s playing at?

  ‘Hi, Cath,’ she says warmly – bitch – standing up and coming over to give me a kiss as I stand there like a statue, hardly moving. ‘I was just leaving.’

  ‘Here to see Josh, were you?’ The words are out before I have a chance to think about what I’m saying, and I can’t hide the sarcastic, bitter tone in my voice. Portia gives me a strange look, and you know what? I don’t care if she knows that I know. I want her to know because I will not play her game and I will not protect her.

  ‘What?’ she says carefully, looking at me strangely, and I know she doesn’t think I know. For a second I think she looks flustered, but no, Portia’s far too cool for that. ‘I was just passing, so I thought I’d pop in and see if Lucy was home,’ she says. ‘I brought her this recipe book from Italy I’d told her about,’ and she gestures to a cookery book lying on the kitchen table.

  Ha. A likely bloody story. But what’s really weird is that I’ve heard of unfaithful husbands buying their wives unexpected gifts when they’re having an affair, but I’ve never heard of the mistress doing it. It’s the classic sign, isn’t it? The husband who never pays any attention to his wife, suddenly starts pitching up with roses and jewellery, saying that it’s his way of apologizing for working so late all the time, when he’s just trying to find a way to appease his guilt and live with himself.

  I suppose the mistress isn’t usually friends with the wife. Maybe if she were, she’d be doing exactly the same thing as Portia. Maybe she’d be turning up with cookery books too.

  Or maybe she’d be turning up with any old lame excuse just to see more of the husband. At least Josh is out and she’s had to put up with Ingrid, which is a punishment I wouldn’t wish on my closest enemy, except at this point in time I feel it would take a lifetime with Ingrid to inflict the sort of pain I feel would be appropriate.