by Harper Bliss
“Alice, hello!” She spreads her arms wide for a hug and already I feel like I’m dying a little inside, like I betrayed my best friend in the very worst way, and I wasn’t able to feel the full extent of the grief I caused until I looked her in the eyes. She tried to call me again over the weekend, but I just stared at my phone in horror, thinking: this is it. “You’re a difficult woman to get hold of these days, but I can only assume that’s a good thing.” I used to be in the habit of picking up my phone after the first ring. “I hope you had a wonderful time.”
“I did. Thank you so much for letting me stay in your house. It’s gorgeous.”
“It’s such a relief. I was very worried about Joy turning up like that. I’m so glad you got along. Mind you, my daughter is quite an easy person to be around, but she does have her ways.” Miranda squeezes my shoulder. “But she told me you and she had a jolly time together.”
“We did. It was no nuisance at all,” I reply, and I find it easier to lie than I had expected, although what I’m saying isn’t a lie as such. “She’s a lovely girl.”
“Well, seeing as you enjoyed each other’s company so much, Joy suggested I’d invite you both to dinner on Friday.”
Instinctively, I flinch, retreating like someone is trying to slap me in the face. What is Joy playing at? I have no time to consider this, though, because I need to refuse Miranda’s invitation as quickly and efficiently as possible. “Thank you very much for inviting me, but that’s really not necessary. Besides, I have so much work to catch up on, I don’t think I’ll be able to make it.”
Miranda widens her stance and crosses her arms in front of her chest. “It’s funny, but Joy predicted you would say that. As did I, by the way. The point of a holiday is not to undo all its effects the instant you come back, you know? There’s absolutely no way you are working after eight o’clock on Friday. My daughter also firmly instructed me to not let you get away with lame excuses like that. She must have got to know you pretty well, huh?” Miranda extends an arm and pats me patronisingly on the upper arm.
What is this? An emotional sting operation organised by Joy to make me have a nervous breakdown? And what am I supposed to say now? Will it be more suspicious if I try to get out of it more, or should I just accept? “I’ll check my calendar, Miranda, but I can’t make any promises.” I try to buy myself some time.
“It’s just dinner, Alice. You used to come to dinner at my house all the time, remember?”
“I do, although not as fondly as I would if you hadn’t tried to set me up with Lionel Ashley a dozen times.”
“You aren’t still cross about that, are you? That was years ago. I think it’s time to reinstate the tradition. And I swear it’ll just be the four of us. No set-ups.”
“I’ll let you know.” It’s not in my nature to budge now.
“I’ll take that as a yes, either way.” Miranda smiles and I see so much of Joy in her smile it’s more like a blow to the stomach. “Nice tan, by the way, Alice. You look good. You have that post-holiday glow about you. I like it.”
“Thank you,” I mumble, figuring that not a lot of that glow will be left after a few more of these conversations.
“Let’s do lunch, okay? We have a lot to catch up on.” Miranda walks to her office and I realise that, just like Joy, she is so used to always getting her own way. She has no idea that in this case accomplishing that may leave her very upset.
✶ ✶ ✶
The familiarity of work is soothing to my nerves, and I even make it through most of lunch with Miranda without breaking out in cold sweats. We mainly talk about clients and matters she has handled in my absence, until the topic of conversation turns to Joy. Miranda talks about how the first week at her new job was promising, that Joy has told her the people were nice and the work challenging but interesting—for now, she adds, with an eye-roll—and I just have to ask.
“Speaking of Joy,” I say, and my voice trembles a little when I say her name. I’ll need to work on that. “Why did you never tell me that she is a, uh, lesbian?” Why is it so hard for me to say that word?
Miranda sighs. “Two reasons, I guess. First, I know you well enough to know you don’t like discussing very personal things like that. It makes you blush and stammer and you always tend to change the topic quickly.” Miranda clearly doesn’t mean this as an insult as she just continues. And while it’s true that I do like to keep a polite distance, and I value discretion, I can’t help but take offence a little. “Second, it’s not as if she’s ever been with anyone serious. Meaning longer than a few months. And, yes, I confess, it took me some time to adjust to the notion, but I have now. I just want her to be happy. I’m fifty-eight years old, Alice, and truly, that girl’s happiness is all I want from my life at this point. She doesn’t make it easy on herself, though. Let’s just say she has a bit of a flawed taste in women.”
I’m suddenly grateful Miranda lost the habit of discussing personal matters with me because this is making me highly uncomfortable. The remark about flawed taste doesn’t help. “Oh really?” I ask, though, because this is Joy we’re talking about and, despite myself, despite the resolve I have spent the entire weekend building up, I want to know more.
“She had an affair with her boss at her last job. It’s why she quit.” Miranda takes a gulp of wine. “While the pair of you were in Quinta, did Joy say anything about me, er, being a bad sport about accepting her being gay? I don’t mean to be, I really don’t, but Joy isn’t exactly the most patient person in the world and, well, I’m doing the best I can. Next time she’s seeing someone I will reserve judgement until I’ve met the person. I will be open-minded and non-judgemental, and will only focus on how happy this woman is making my daughter. I just wish she was more interested in girls her own age, you know? It’s hard enough as it is, but of course Joy needs to go after older women, as well. She likes to make things hard on herself, just like her father used to.” Miranda gives a nervous smile after her monologue. “Sorry, I’m rambling. I know better than to ask you to be indiscreet, Alice. Please ignore my question. That was just the worried mother in me rearing her head.”
“She said nothing of the sort,” I hear myself saying. I don’t know why I lie. Perhaps to calm Miranda down, or to make her feel better about herself, or to give the indication that Joy and I didn’t discuss personal matters. Either way, it’s a dishonest deflection, and it makes me feel like a terrible person. Half a day back on the job has made me lie to my best friend already.
“Thank you for saying that,” Miranda says and she sounds genuinely grateful, like I’ve just done her the biggest favour in the world. If only she knew.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
When I ring Miranda’s doorbell on Friday evening at eight o’clock sharp, it’s Joy who opens the door—of course it is. Throughout the week, I had to suppress the urge to text her many times per day to ask her what she was playing at, but I felt safer pretending I didn’t know what it was all about. In the end, I figured a confrontation with Joy was bound to happen at some point, and this way it can be over and done with quickly, and I can get on with my life. Despite the agony of carrying around a secret like this, work has normalised my emotions. I have found relief in my routine and, although I do lie awake at night more often than before, with images of Joy launching endless assaults on the back of my closed eyelids, it’s a manageable nuisance now that I’m back in my comfort zone.
“Hey,” she says, the way she always did in Quinta, and I feel my resolve melt into a puddle. She leans one shoulder against the door frame. It’s funny at first to see her with so many clothes on. In jeans and a blouse she almost looks like a different person. But, of course, she’s not. She’s still Joy with that beaming smile, and those bottomless eyes, and that tone of voice that undoes me a bit. I quickly realise I’ve made a big mistake coming here. “Come in.” She steps aside.
I can still turn around, I think. This situation can be avoided. But it’s as though I’m under Joy’s spell aga
in—another way I have started to look at the goings-on in Quinta—and I suddenly need to spend a little time in her company. So, I straighten my spine and tell myself this will be the vaccine I need. Ingest a small portion of the poison that will make me battle-ready to fight it later on.
“I’ve missed you,” she whispers as I pass her in the hallway.
I want to say something in return, but I’m in Miranda’s house and Jeff’s booming laughter coming from the other room holds me back. I just give her a stare which I hope is menacing, but I realise is probably as wanton as when she fucked me against that tree.
I head farther into the house, taking deep breaths, reminding myself to act normal. Joy and I are supposed to be friendly with each other. That’s one of the reasons I’m here.
“I figured you would have something better to do on a Friday night than have dinner with the likes of us,” I say to Joy after having kissed Miranda and Jeff hello.
“Nonsense. Besides, I owe you the pleasure of my company to make up for crashing your holiday.” She smiles a smile I can’t read, more of a smirk, really. What does she mean, anyway? Perhaps I should have contacted her beforehand. Or feigned sudden illness after leaving work. My stomach is upset enough. “I’ll take that.” She reaches for the bottle of wine that I’m still carrying and puts a hand on mine. Our eyes meet and I have a choice between crumbling, dissolving at her touch, or steeling myself the way I do when I’m about to persuade a potential client to hire us. If Joy has invited me here to play a game, she’s in for a treat. I haven’t become the lawyer I am today by giving in easily.
“Thank you,” I say and, not smiling, give her the bottle.
“Jeff is on cooking duty tonight.” Miranda heads into the living room with a tray of pistachios and a ripe and oozing Brie. “So we can just relax and gossip.” Miranda winks at me because she knows how much I hate talking behind other people’s backs. “Please, sit.”
I know this house so well, and have spent so much time here over the years, but I find myself looking around for a seat, as if I’ve lost my bearings.
“G&T?” Joy asks. “I’m on drinks duty so Mum can just relax and be a princess.” She curls an arm around her mother’s shoulder and squeezes it before heading to the kitchen without waiting for my reply.
Her head peeks out from around the kitchen door. “Yes?” She eyes me again, her stare bold and piercing.
“Sure,” I say, because I could sure do with something to take the edge off right now.
Miranda and I talk about work briefly, until Joy re-enters the living room with three tall glasses. “Enough shop talk, I command you,” she says, as she deposits the drinks on the coffee table. “It’s the weekend, for heaven’s sake. There’s more to life than work. Did you know, for instance, Mum, that Alice has much better taste in music than you?”
Already, I feel a drop of sweat making its way down my spine. But Miranda has no reason to not take the quip in jest. “Yes, Alice is superior to me in many ways, I’m well aware.” Miranda picks up her glass and holds it out so I can tap mine against it.
Joy sits down next to Miranda and doesn’t take her eyes off me.
“Am I allowed to inquire about your new job?” I ask her, my voice sounding too insecure for my liking.
“Oh, it’s fine. It’s basically the same as what I did before, except for other companies and with different co-workers. It’s not rocket science, but it pays the bills.”
“It’s never too late to get your law degree, darling. Stephen’s son did just that and he’s working for us now.” Miranda is not in a position to see how Joy rolls her eyes.
“You’d go mad if I worked for you,” Joy says to Miranda. “I’d challenge you at every turn and wouldn’t take any shit.”
“Language, dear,” Miranda is quick to say, but I can tell she’s just toying with Joy, the way Joy is with her. It’s clear how much Miranda enjoys her daughter’s company. How easy they are around each other.
“Oops, better wash my mouth,” Joy says and takes a large gulp of her drink.
We talk back and forth like that for a while. Nothing harmful is being said and Joy behaves, until Jeff invites us to the table. I’m seated opposite Joy and, as soon as I sit down, I feel a toe against my ankle, then slowly crawling up my shin. Stupidly, I look around, but it can, of course, only be Joy, because Jeff and Miranda are busy serving food and replenishing drinks. When I work up the nerve to look at Joy, her chin is resting on her fist and her eyes shimmer with something that is about to drive me mad. But it’s not her gaze undoing me, it’s the touch of her foot against my leg—burning through my stockings. It doesn’t matter. I might as well be wearing a knight’s armour, I’d still feel the heat of it shooting up my flesh. And then I know that Joy has used her own mother to seduce me. Perhaps it’s payback for not replying to her texts, or for not getting in touch—even though I never made such a promise—because of the vague pact we made to keep an open mind. Perhaps from my lack of response she deduced that involving her mother was the only way to see me, and to make clear that she still wants me. But, despite what seeing her, and feeling her toe now close to my knee, does to me, I find her tactics wholly disrespectful. What if Miranda does find out some day and realises what was happening underneath her dinner table? The very table she’s about to feed us on.
It’s also disrespectful towards me and my desires. Surely Joy knows that if I had wanted to see her, I would have been in touch. Or perhaps that’s the problem. Although I have been pining for her since she left Portugal, I haven’t made that clear at all. Or perhaps it’s simply lack of attention.
For now, I have no choice but to tap into my steely reserve again and get through dinner. I don’t have to stay late. I’m exhausted enough after a week back at work and insufficient sleep. I hope Jeff hasn’t made dessert. Since when did he become such a chef, anyway?
Once we start eating, Joy’s foot retreats, and Jeff talks about his job as a hedge fund manager the way he always does—like it’s the single most important activity on earth—but, nevertheless, I focus my attention on him, and ask him questions indicating I’m interested in what he has to say, to avoid the conversation flowing into a direction I can’t handle.
In between the first course and the main, I excuse myself to wash my hands—and splash some cold water in my face. I look at my reflection in the bathroom mirror for long seconds, telling myself to get a grip, even though outwardly, I think I’m giving a good enough performance to convince Miranda that I’m not coming apart at the seams because of Joy’s trickery. An oblivious mind is easily fooled.
Once I’ve perked myself up enough to face Joy again, I open the bathroom door only to find her waiting for me in the hallway. Before I can say anything, she brings a finger to my lips, quieting me.
“Don’t speak,” she whispers. “Just nod yes or no.”
The touch of her finger against my lips has me so flummoxed I’m nodding already.
“Please, meet me somewhere after dinner. I need to speak with you. Please.” Her facial expression is sincere, and she stands so close to me, her body heat radiating onto my flesh, her perfume drifting up into my nose, I couldn’t say no if I wanted to.
“Fine,” I whisper, against her instructions to simply nod, “but only if you stop touching me under the table.”
She cocks her head and gives a small smile. “Deal,” she says.
✶ ✶ ✶
After I’ve said my goodbyes and thanked Jeff and Miranda for dinner, kissing both of them and Joy briefly on the cheek, I walk slowly to the end of Miranda’s street. My own house is only a ten-minute walk away. I don’t look back. And in those few minutes I don’t know if I want Joy to actually come after me, because that’s what I suspect she will do. Say her own goodbye to Miranda and Jeff and come find me. If she does find me before I get home, and starts talking to me, starts getting under my skin, I’m not sure what will happen next. One of my specialties is hiding my thoughts behind an impassive mask—i
t’s practically a job requirement. But just because I kept a straight face and conversed fluently with my hosts, doesn’t mean that I wasn’t falling apart on the inside.
Soon enough I hear a pair of footsteps approaching, and it makes me think about Joy’s foot on my leg, her toes running along my calf. When I got up from the table, I was afraid her shenanigans would have left a run in my stocking. I slow my step, let her catch up with me.
“Hey,” she says again. And when she says it now, it’s as though I’m only just now absorbing the shock of seeing her again, of standing face-to-face with the woman who unpeeled layer after layer of my indestructible guard in Portugal.
“Let’s go to my house,” I whisper, ridiculously afraid of being overheard. “Where no one can see us.”
“Sure.” Side by side, wrapped in a tension-laden silence, we make our way to my house and as soon as we walk in, I feel as though I can properly exhale for the first time tonight.
“What you did was so unfair,” I start to say to Joy. “You basically entrapped me.”
“You could have tried harder to decline the invitation, Alice,” Joy says as if me showing up at Miranda’s house regardless is the biggest giveaway about my feelings.
“God, you’re so arrogant. So incredibly cocky. Do you have any idea how being in that situation made me feel?”
“I’m sorry, Alice. I wanted to see you. And I wanted to make you see that being in the same room with Mum and me together would not instigate the end of the world.”
I can only shake my head, because, as far as I can tell, she has only reached the exact opposite result. “What were you thinking?” I ask, after a few mute seconds have passed.
“The fuck if I know, Alice… All I know is that I can’t stop thinking about you. And every day, I try to convince myself it’s wrong, and every day, I’m more convinced that it’s not.” Joy is the one crumbling now and I see something new in her eyes. Agony. A need unmet. And I wish I could do something about it, and I also realise that my age is an advantage here. I’ve had to suck up so many things over the course of my life. And it’s never easy when you can’t have something you desperately want, and it always comes at a price, and there’s no way I can impart this knowledge to Joy in the state she’s in now.