‘What about your first husband?’ Mike said, a faint glimmer in his eyes.
‘What about my third husband?’ Rosalie countered, munching toast, glinting back at him. ‘I’m going to finish our packing,’ she said after a pause, standing up and collecting her things together.
‘I’ll come and give you a hand,’ Mike said. ‘I’ll get the pictures and put them in the car.’
He was taking a couple back with him for their apartment. He said he wanted something to remind him of home. Rosalie had examined them on Friday afternoon with her portable magnifying-glass – for all the good it’d do her: they were Edwin Walter’s London print series and not up to much. I could see her in her apartment, waving her hand at them in a faux-casual manner as she ushered guests past them into the lounge that overlooked Central Park. ‘Those? Yes, they are beautiful, aren’t they? They’re from my husband’s family home in England. Edwin Walter was his ancestor. Yes. I know. It’s a beautiful place, quite old. Queen Elizabeth the First. We’re hoping to go back for Christmas again this year.’
They went out, and Mike put his arm round Rosalie’s shoulders as they receded into the corridor.
‘Lizzy,’ said my mother suddenly, from the other end of the table, ‘I meant to say yesterday but I couldn’t find you. Well, your father and I wanted to say it, really.’
Dad looked alarmed. He picked up a spoon and bashed his boiled egg with unusual vehemence.
‘What?’ I said.
‘Well, about Miles. Darling, I’m sorry.’
‘Thanks, Mum,’ I said.
‘We think he’s great.’
‘Thanks,’ I said, grabbing more toast.
Tom said, ‘Suzy…’
‘Well, he is,’ Mum continued. ‘And I wanted to tell you. Because you know we weren’t very supportive when you told us on Wednesday. I suppose it was a bit of a shock. And because of David – we did love him, you know. But Daddy says he was behaving most oddly last night. Swearing and – well…’
‘Thanks a lot, Mum,’ I said, because I appreciated the gesture. Jess was knitting her figures together helplessly. ‘Actually,’ I said, ‘Miles and I split up last night, I’m afraid, so don’t worry about it too much.’
‘What?’ said my mother. ‘You split up? What does that mean?’
I glared at her. ‘It means…we’re not together any more.’
‘Oh,’ said Mum, discomfited. ‘Oh, darling.’
‘Really, don’t worry about it, Mum,’ I said. ‘I’m fine, honestly. They’re both mad. And weird. And not for me.’
‘So you’re sure neither of them will do for you?’ said Mum, hopefully.
‘Nope,’ I said, reaching for the Marmite. ‘Yes, I mean. I’m safe, sane and single, and I’m staying that way. For the moment, anyway. Roll on LA and m’ future husband George Clooney.’
‘Well,’ said Dad, from behind his Observer, ‘she’s certainly given it her best shot with each of them. We can’t expect any more from her, can we? Any cousins of theirs we should know about? What’s their father up to, these days? He should watch out. I might have to have a word with him to warn him off.’
‘Dad!’ Jess and I yelled.
‘John,’ Mum murmured reproachfully. ‘Well, that’s that, then. But you’ll still be friends, won’t you?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Absolutely no.’
‘No way,’ Tom and Jess chorused.
‘Dear me,’ Mum said. She looked at each of us in alarm. ‘What did they do?’
‘Well,’ I said. My brain started to hum confusedly. Dad had put down the paper. Mum was looking on expectantly. Tom jumped in helpfully.
‘Miles has always had the horn for Lizzy. I mean, he thinks he’s in love with her. He lied to her to get her to break up with David, he did the same to David, then he was all “Oh, Lizzy, I understand what you’re going through. Let me take you out for expensive meals and make you laugh and soothe away your problems, so you’ll think you like me, and then I’ll pounce and have my own way and get to shag you.’” He assumed a high falsetto: ‘And Lizzy’s all “Oh, Miles, you are a bit like David. I’m all confused, go on, shag me, and at least I’ll have a boyfriend for Chin’s wedding, and David will be pissed off, ha, ooh, it’s all so complicated.”’
‘Tom, don’t be vile,’ Jess said warmly. ‘That’s not how it was.’
‘Really?’ said Mum, turning sunken eyes on her younger daughter.
Dad coughed, and stroked the table.
‘No,’ Jess said. ‘It wasn’t like that at all.’
‘Thanks, Jess,’ I said. ‘I love you.’
‘It was more “Ooh, David, I love you, I love you, I love you! Ooh, David, I hate you now, oh, you’re so mean, I’m going to cry all the time and get nothing done for months and months. Ooh, David! You’re horrid! Oh, no, you’re not, you’re great!”’
‘It’s really not about me most of the time,’ I said, embarrassed, blushing in what I hoped was a flatteringly modest way.
‘Hm,’ said Jess severely, and went back to her tea in silence.
‘Well, I don’t know,’ Mum said. ‘La, la. Hum. Should I invite Alice Eliot to our mulled-wine party this year then, or would it be too embarrassing? Poor woman. Imagine having sons like that. They sound mad, both of them. How funny. I always thought they were quite normal.’
‘And then they met Lizzy,’ Tom chimed in. ‘Ask yourself, Suzy. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?’
‘Tom, I’m going to deck you in a minute,’ I hissed.
‘It all seems perfectly clear to me,’ said Dad, unexpectedly.
I turned to look at him. ‘Does it?’
‘Yes,’ said Mum, as Dad got up and went out. ‘Me too. Perfectly. But you have to see it clearly yourself. And you don’t.’
‘I—’ I began.
‘So,’ Mum said, changing the subject, ‘did you see that Sophia Gunning girl snogging the trumpet player from the band?’
‘No!’ Tom said.
‘Yes,’ Mum said gleefully. ‘Our saviour was rather the worse for wear. She disappeared with him behind his kit for a good ten minutes, I’d say.’
‘Mum!’ Jess said. ‘You are awful. Talking of awful, though, did you see what Eliza Baker was wearing? A cut-off denim skirt. With stilettos.’
We spent the next forty minutes in this manner. Tom ate ten pieces of toast, Jess eight, me seven. Mum made another pot of tea. Jess went back to bed. The marquee men arrived to – you guessed it – take down the marquee. Mike appeared and gave them a hand. Rosalie went into the study with Dad, and showed him how to use Excel spreadsheets. I helped Mum with the rest of the clearing up. We picked some lavender for me to take back. We persuaded Tom to leave after lunch. Mum did some more packing and unpacking – the film crew were coming in ten days’ time, meaning some nifty forward planning was called for in terms of what Mum and Dad would need over the next few days. Dad and Mike set up the barbecue, amid much arguing and abuse, and did the leftover sausages from the wedding breakfast. Kate appeared, with a potato salad and some ice-cream. We sat about, drinking beer and eating. The sun shone. Mike put a hanky over his head and went to sleep. Our cat, Collins, rolled around on his back on the lawn. I could smell lavender on my fingers every time I took a bite of my sausage sandwich. The barbecue and the flowers, an insect droning nearby – I felt calm for the first time in I didn’t know how long.
As the first summer’s haze hung over the garden, and evening approached, Tom, Jess and I stuffed our bags into the boot of Tom’s little car, with the others gathered round. The sun was sinking, and in the east the sky was a deep blue. A couple of early stars had appeared.
‘Goodbye, darling,’ Kate said, hugging Tom. ‘See you next week.’
‘’Bye, you two,’ Mike said, enfolding me and Jess in a hug. ‘We might catch you up on the motorway.’
‘Stonehenge, remember, Mikey,’ Rosalie said, behind him.
‘Yes, of course. Sorry. We won’t catch you up on the motorway, a
s we’ll be on a completely different one, dawdling around some bloody stones,’ Mike said amiably. ‘See you at Christmas, girls. Or come and stay. We’d love to have you, wouldn’t we?’
‘God, yes. Now everything’s…’ Rosalie trailed off. ‘Well, we’d love it. Think about it, won’t you?’
‘Thanks,’ we said.
‘ ‘Bye, Lizzy,’ Dad said, as Mum was kissing Jess. ‘We’ll see you soon. Let us know when you’ll be down next, won’t you?’
‘Of course. ‘Bye, Dad. Thanks. ‘Bye, Mum,’ I said, turning to her.
She hugged me, hard. ‘Think about what I said,’ she whispered. ‘Look at things clearly. I’m so proud of you, Lizzy. So proud of you.’
‘Why—’ I began, but Tom pulled me away, pushed me and my sister into the car. Before we knew it the engine had started, the others were standing in the road, waving madly, and we were flying down the lane in the twilight, away from our home, and back to London, back to normality. I turned in my seat as we raced away, and watched them all, waving and smiling. They disappeared around the corner as the sky in front of us changed, becoming indigo, then an inky blue. We sat in happy silence as Tom let the roof down, feeling the rush of warm summer air on our arms and faces.
THIRTY-FIVE
Going into work on the Monday after a big weekend is always strange, but much more so when during that stage you have undergone a sea change. By Monday morning I was feeling better, but I still had a vaguely weird feeling, not exactly a headache, but the sensation that a headache might start at any moment.
Being on the top floor, my flat is always sunny and bright in summer. I woke early on Monday morning, before six, and did unlikely things like squeezing myself some fresh orange juice and putting my shoes back in their boxes. I even labelled them. I ironed all my summer clothes, which had lain in a crumpled pile since last September, finding something therapeutically about the smooth crunch of the steam and metal on fabric.
It was already hot when I left for work and it was a relief to come out of the Tube, stuffy even at eight thirty, and turn into the cool, shadowy streets behind Oxford Circus. There weren’t many people about. As I crossed the road I walked through a shaft of sunlight and shivered in the sudden flash of heat. It felt as if the pavements were warming up, the city was shedding its usual Edwardian grey feeling and turning Bolognese, Sevillian, Parisian. The baker was opening, and in the little French bistro a waiter was tying his apron round his waist as he stood in the doorway with his face to the sun. Across the road someone was rolling up the blinds in Luigi’s and Luigi was putting a blackboard out on the street, with the legend ‘Special Summer Salads’ chalked in red and green. I waved at him, and clattered up the tiled stairs that led to Monumental’s front door, leaning against the swipecard lock to let myself into the air-conditioned lobby.
‘Woah!’ Ash said, as he slid into my room. ‘Eow! It’s Lady Elizabeth of the grand stately home! Good morning, Your Highness. Can I get you some emeralds while the ghastly film crew runs amok in your beautiful house?’
‘Shut up, Ash,’ I said automatically, depositing my bag on my keyboard. ‘Did you know about it?’
‘No idea,’ Ash said, handing me a coffee (we took it in turns to go to Prêt each morning). ‘Only found out on Friday. So did Lily. It’s not my project, is it?’
I crouched under my desk to turn on my computer.
‘So,’ Ash continued, sitting down in my chair, ‘you live in some big mansion, then?’
‘No, I bloody don’t,’ I said.
‘Liar,’ he said. ‘I always thought you were a nice normal girl, and now I find out you’re some posh bird with a butler and a swimming-pool.’
‘I am none of those things,’ I said. ‘I mean, I don’t have a butler or a swimming-pool. It’s just an old house. And we don’t have to sell it now.’
‘That’s great,’ said Ash. ‘Really pleased for you, ma’am. We should go out for drinks tonight to celebrate.’
‘I’m meeting Georgy, I can’t,’ I said.
‘I know,’ Ash said. ‘I saw her on Saturday.’
‘No!’ I said, impressed. ‘I thought she’d threatened to call the police if you carried on bothering her?’
‘I wore her down,’ Ash said.
I looked out at the children in the playground below my window: they were running around yelling in the sunshine, and I reflected on how blokes always get the women they want by chasing them until they give in. I’m always amazed that so many men – usually the ugly ones – are convinced they could pull Claudia Schiffer if they were given the chance, while someone gorgeous, like my friend Victoria, is always convinced blokes don’t fancy her. It rarely happens the other way round.
‘You and Georgy, eh?’ I said. ‘Well, that’s great.’
‘It is,’ Ash said. ‘This weekend, man. It was amazing. She…’ He was lost in a reverie.
I wasn’t in the mood to discuss the first flush of young love, so I changed the subject, while Ash played with his shirt cuffs, a memory-laden smile playing about his lips in a smug, annoying way.
‘So,’ he said finally, looking lasciviously at me, ‘how’s love’s young dream? And his brother?’
‘If you mean Miles and me, it’s all off,’ I said. I pushed him out of my chair, sat down and started scrolling through my inbox. ‘One hundred and four emails. How can I possibly have that many? I don’t even know a hundred and four people,’ I said, pressing the delete button smartly.
‘What do you mean, off?’ Ash said, sitting on my desk. ‘You and Miles have split up?’
‘Yup,’ I said, and carried on deleting.
‘Oh, Lizzy,’ Ash said, with feeling. ‘That’s awful. I’m so sorry. When did he do it? I mean, how did it happen?’
I stopped clicking. ‘Why are you assuming he dumped me?’ I said.
‘I didn’t. I just thought…’ Ash trailed off. ‘Well, good, if you ended it,’ he said firmly. ‘Or not. What happened? Spill the beans.’ He shuffled about on the end of the desk to make himself comfortable, and settled in for the long haul.
‘Oh, God, I’ve been such an idiot,’ I said, getting ready to launch into the story. And then I stopped. Before I do this, I thought, I need to think it all through. The trouble with a big story that you have to retell many times is that after a while you reel it off so glibly you forget what actually happened. You lose the truth of it, the essence, somewhere along the line. It becomes The Story. All right, it was over, once and for all, but while I could keep what he’d said close to me I stood a chance some day of being able to rationalize it. I didn’t want it to become part of my past. I knew it was, but I wanted to keep it to myself for the moment.
Lily walked past, and looked briefly into the office, recalling me to my senses. ‘’Lo, Lizzy,’ she said. ‘I’m coming back in a minute. Great news about the house. We need to talk about Dreams when you’ve got a moment.’
‘Sure,’ I said.
‘So?’ Ash pressed. ‘What happened?’
‘Who told you about it?’ I said, taking a sip of my coffee.
‘What?’ Ash was still caught in a moment.
‘About the house, I mean that Mary Chartley was being shot there.’
‘Oh.’ Ash nodded briefly. ‘Jaden.’
‘What?’ I said. ‘He called you?’
‘No,’ Ash said casually. ‘He’s here again. Oh, here he is.’
And into the sunlit room strolled the man himself, grinning from ear to ear and looking even more like a catalogue model than he usually did. I jumped up, ran over to him and flung my arms round him. I wanted to cry, but I settled for shouting, ‘Jaden! Jaden!’
Jaden is a great hugger. He held me tight, then pulled back and looked at me, smiling. ‘You look great, Lizzy,’ he said, kissing me again. He smelt of citrus and fresh laundry.
‘So do you,’ I said. ‘What are you doing here? This is such a lovely surprise.’
‘I’m over for some meetings about Dreams Can Come True.’
‘Oh,’ I said, trying not to show I was miffed to have known nothing about it.
‘It all happened on Thursday,’ Ash interjected, standing by the door to which he had slunk, smirking, as Jaden entered. ‘Paul doesn’t like the Iranian boy. He thinks he should be a cute Irish kid instead. Well, you’ve got lots to discuss, so I’ll leave you alone.’ He resumed slinking and slunk off. I could tell he was already thinking, in his simplistic, any-relationship-is-better-than-none way, Fantastic, that’s those two sorted. She’s warm for his form and he for hers.
‘No big deal,’ Jaden said. ‘He’ll change his mind back, I promise. Paul’s just been a nightmare since he got out of rehab. Keeps altering things for the sake of it. The yoga-instructor thing hit him real hard.’
‘Idiot,’ I muttered. ‘Get over it.’
‘Hey, Lizzy,’ Jaden said. ‘What’s this I’m getting from you?’
‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘All back to normal. It’s nice to see you, it really is. I can’t believe it’s only been six weeks. It feels…well, it feels like ages.’
‘How’s that Miles guy?’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Actually, we split up. On Saturday.’
‘Seriously?’ Jaden said, his forehead puckering.
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘He dumped you?’
‘No, he bloody did not,’ I said heatedly.
Jaden nodded. ‘So you’re single again?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ I repeated.
Jaden looked at me as if he would say more. I tensed, waiting for the onslaught of milk-thistle tea recipes. Then he rocked on the balls of his feet. ‘What are you doing for lunch?’ he said, quietly.
‘Nothing,’ I said.
‘I’ll take you out. We can talk about the film and catch up. There’s things we need to discuss.’
Outside, the whistle for the playground blew. ‘That’d be lovely,’ I said. ‘Listen, Jaden, I’ve got loads to do…I’ll see you later, OK? Meet you outside at one?’
‘Sure,’ Jaden said, and he left with a smile as my phone rang.
‘Lizzy? Is it true? Have you and Miles split up?’
‘Hello, Georgy,’ I said, watching Jaden’s retreating form. ‘That was quick. You’ve spoken to Ash.’
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