by Fiona Harper
And I reckon that’s OK. I’ve managed to shelve away the part of me that feels guilty about Jude. After all, I didn’t choose this, and I certainly don’t seem to have any control over it. I may as well try to live whatever life I find myself in as well as I can. There’s no point in sulking and making both of us miserable.
Dan sighs. ‘Back to reality in six days.’
Which one? I think silently. I could be here, or I could wake up tomorrow and find myself back with Jude in London. It’s making it very hard to care too hard about what’s in my immediate future, because as soon as I get invested in what’s going on I jump again. However, I know that attitude is dangerous. I’ve been given this second chance and I need to get in the driving seat of my life, not take the easy path of being the perpetual passenger.
I kiss Dan’s cheek. ‘We can’t stay on honeymoon forever.’
He lets out a heavy breath and we both turn to look at the amazing vista in front of us. Clouds are queueing up to roll across the sun, grey and vengeful, and the landscape below is carved into uneven chunks of bright sunshine and dark shadow.
‘I know,’ he says. ‘We’re grown-ups now. No more mooching off our parents. No more getting someone else to do our washing. We’ll have rent and bills to pay – flipping Poll Tax, for goodness’ sake!’
Dan’s sudden melancholy is starting to affect me too. ‘Ugh.’ I’m thinking of the amount of laundry I’ve done between leaving college and my forty-sixth birthday. Now I’ve got to do it all over again. ‘Being grown up is overrated,’ I mutter.
Dan slides his hand under the hem of my T-shirt and his fingers start an upward journey. ‘Really?’
I roll my eyes. ‘OK, maybe there are some perks …’
He kisses me but breaks off after a short while and his hands leave the bare skin of my torso. He pulls them away to put them on my shoulders as he looks into my eyes, suddenly very solemn. ‘Are you scared?’
‘Of being a grown-up?’
He nods. ‘Of our future. It starts now. No more putting it off with endless education.’
He stares so seriously off into the distance that I almost let him get away with that, but then I start laughing. ‘What do you mean? You’re going back to college to do your PGCE, aren’t you? What’s that if it’s not more education?’
He shrugs. ‘Somehow this feels different. I’ll be working too. Cementing myself into a choice of career. Everything feels so set in stone.’
‘I thought this is what you wanted.’
‘It is …’ Dan shakes his head and smiles. ‘Don’t mind me. I’m just being silly. Pipe dreams …’
I realise I’d have quite happily taken Dan at his word first time around. I’d have put that little sigh he just made out of my mind and wouldn’t have given it another thought. This time I find I want to excavate.
‘What dreams?’
He smiles again, more sheepishly this time. ‘You’ll think I’m silly.’
‘You’ve got to stop saying that,’ I reply, half scolding him. ‘Did I laugh last time? I mean, properly laugh?’
He shakes his head.
‘Then tell me?’
He stares out at the changing landscape for a few moments, watching the strong wind push the clouds out of the way of the sun so we’re bathed in golden warmth again and the threat of rain is something only the people of nearby Loch Gilphead need to worry about. ‘I don’t want to just teach. I want to do.’
I start to wonder how Dan is going to ‘do’ English, and then I think of what he told me on our wedding night. ‘You want to write?’
He nods. ‘Don’t worry. I know it’s a stupid idea, that we won’t be able to pay the bills if I hole myself up in the spare bedroom with a typewriter. Mum and Dad drilled that into me endlessly from about the age of thirteen. But I can’t help feeling it’s the safe option, that I’m not just settling down but settling.’
I wish I could tell him to go for it, and part of me really wants to, but I know how hard it was financially for us in the early days, how we became experts at turning soya mince, padded out with lots of cheap vegetables, into any type of cuisine, just by varying the spices we flung into it. How my entire clothing budget for the first year of our marriage was a tenner and how I once had to scrape together pennies and halfpennies just to buy a bottle of shampoo in Superdrug. I remember being so embarrassed handing it over to the cashier.
‘OK, you’re right,’ I say. ‘It’s definitely the practical option. I mean, no one’s going to pay you to sit at home and write but that doesn’t mean you can’t sit at home and write in the evenings after someone’s paid you to do something else.’
Dan doesn’t say anything but he picks me up and swings me round then kisses me with an intensity that steals my breath away. ‘I love you so much,’ he whispers into my ear before kissing me again.
And, as much as I’m telling myself this life, this reality, is all about putting right past wrongs, about friendship and closure, my mind whispers I love you too before I can stop it. This Dan is different, more open, more dynamic, and I have a feeling it’s because I’m letting him be that way. I try to think of Jude as I kiss Dan back, try to keep him in focus in my heart, but new Dan is making it unexpectedly hard to do.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I can hear fire engines. They’re coming this way. Louder … louder … they’re almost deafening now. Oh, my God! The house must be on fire. My house is on fire. But I can’t seem to move. I can’t seem to run …
I sit up and open my eyes, dragging in breath. The room is light, quiet, except for the police siren disappearing down the road outside. I am clammy with sweat and I push the duvet off myself and relish the sensation of cold air hitting my damp skin. It wakes me up properly, and my heart, which had just started to slow a little after the nightmare, starts to speed up again.
I don’t know where I am.
Last thing I knew I was preparing for my first Christmas with Dan, but I can tell just by the quality of light behind the white roller blinds that this isn’t December in Swanham. The light is too warm, too yellow.
Where am I? I don’t recognise this place. It isn’t the Lewisham flat and it isn’t my parents’ house in Bournemouth. I push the duvet back and stand up. Wherever it is, it’s very stylish. None of the dado rails and Changing Rooms garish colours of the early nineties. It’s all white walls and bluish-grey carpet. The armchair in the corner is soft grey too, and the lampshades on the bedside tables are the same colour as the carpet, with large stylised dragonflies on them.
I spot an old-fashioned alarm clock on the bedside table. It tells me it’s 2pm. Two in the afternoon? Why aren’t I up at two in the afternoon? Am I ill?
After taking a quick physical inventory, where everything seems to be working fine, and nose and throat are snot and cough-free, I walk out of the bedroom, down a short corridor and into a spacious living room. There’s a bay window that looks out onto a leafy street. The walls are white here too and there’s a sectional couch. In the corner is one of those modernist chairs that’s all chrome tubes and black leather straps, the kind that look great but are horrendously uncomfortable to sit in.
I start to shiver. I look down and realise that I’m wearing my ‘Choose Life’ T-shirt and relief and affection for it swell in my chest. At least I have that one thing to hang onto.
There’s no Dan in this place. No Jude. Is this somewhere else? Some new reality with a man I don’t even know yet? The thought makes me want to crawl back under the covers and hide.
But then I spot a photo frame on a bookshelf. Black and white. Me and Jude. I start to laugh. I’m back! I’m really back! I spin around with my arms stretched out, needing to do something to release the joy surging up from within me, but it isn’t long before I slow again and then I stop.
How much time has passed? I swallow as I realise it might be more than a year. Our lease on the other flat was that long and we’d been there less than a month when I jumped.
I
explore further, looking for clues. The more I can work out before I see Jude again, the less crazy I will seem as I try to stumble my way through this time, this future. I find toiletries in the brands I use in the bathroom and the vase my grandmother gave me is in the kitchen, filled with white daisies, my favourite flowers. I open the wardrobe in the bedroom and find my clothes hanging there – well, at least a few I recognise, anyway, and plenty more I don’t.
As I’m assimilating the fact I really do live here the phone rings, making me jump. It’s one of those corded ones with the little oval buttons and a clear plastic insert covering a square of card where you can write your favourite numbers. I stare at it for a few seconds, almost fearful of touching it, and then I make myself reach out and pick it up.
‘Hey, sleepyhead. I didn’t wake you up, did I? You were out for the count when I left.’ The voice is soft and warm and full of love.
‘Jude …’ I start to say, but then I choke back a sob.
He starts to sound worried. ‘Meg? Are you OK?’
I smile through the tears. ‘I’m wonderful,’ I say. Just stupidly happy to hear his voice. I’ve missed him so much. ‘Just need to blow my nose …’ Which is true, despite my earlier snot-free status. ‘Hang on a sec,’ I say and put the phone down so I can run to the bathroom, grab a wad of toilet paper and tidy myself up. When I return, I take a breath and steady myself before picking the receiver up again. ‘I’m back.’
‘Don’t you want to know why I’m ringing?’
‘Of course I do!’
‘It’s finished.’ He pauses for a moment. I can tell he’s smiling. Grinning, even. His voice is full of pride and accomplishment. The only problem is I have no idea what he’s talking about.
‘That’s wonderful!’ I say.
‘Do you want to see it?’
Even though I have no idea what I’m agreeing to I say yes. It’s Jude, after all. Of course anything he’s done is going to be wonderful.
‘Then you’ll need to get a move on,’ he says, sounding a tad more serious. ‘I’ve got a viewing at four, but you can sneak a look before then.’ I hear him sigh deeply, as if he’s looking at something that has him awestruck. ‘Meg …? It’s pretty impressive, even if I do say so myself.’
‘I always knew you could do it,’ I tell him. I don’t know what it is, or exactly how impressive it is, but I do know that I always knew Jude was going to go places, do things that other people only dream about doing. That’s why I picked him.
‘Well, my dad didn’t,’ he says, and I can hear the resentment in his tone. ‘When I told him I wanted to bid for this project he told me I was getting above myself. I think he sees it as a personal insult that I wanted to do this. Thank God Cam’s old man felt differently and stumped up the cash.’ He lets out a gruff laugh. ‘I don’t think Dad’s going to argue about the bank balance once this one is sold, though. If that doesn’t convince him I shouldn’t start concentrating my efforts on this instead of the regular building work, I don’t know what will.’
‘Give your dad a break, won’t you?’ I ask softly. ‘ Underneath all that gruff bluster, he really loves you. I just think he had these grand ideas of retiring and seeing you carry on Hansen and Son the way he always had.’
Jude goes quiet and then he says, ‘It should only take you about half an hour to get here if you catch the trains right.’ I can hear in his voice that his attention has been caught by something in the room with him, that he’s moving onto the next thing. ‘So I’ll see you around two-thirty?’
‘I’ve only just stumbled out of bed! Give a girl time to get dressed, will you?’
He gives an indulgent chuckle. ‘OK. Two forty-five. I’ll see you then. Gotta go. Love you.’
‘I can’t wait,’ I whisper into the phone, but I’m talking to the dial tone. I don’t mind, though – Jude’s drive, his passion for what he does, is why I love him. I run into the bedroom, throw open the wardrobe and wonder what to wear. I end up picking navy trousers and a cute little cream blouse. Not too dressy, not too casual. Hopefully, it’ll do, seeing as I have no idea where I’m going.
I have no idea where I’m going.
Oh, hell. And I’ve told Jude I’ll be there in under an hour, wherever ‘there’ is. I run into the living room and start searching for clues.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
I blink as I run out of Notting Hill Gate Tube station into the glaring sunshine. I’m too tired to run, but I do it anyway. I race off again down Holland Park Avenue. It took me a good half hour to work out where I was supposed to be going. I eventually found some papers in a neat stack on a desk in a tiny second bedroom I hadn’t realised was there, one we’re obviously using as a home office.
I also found a computer on a second desk full of clutter that bears the hallmark of my disorganisation when I’m working on a project. By the row of coffee cups places strategically amongst the sketches and notes, I’d say the reason I was asleep at two in the afternoon is because I’d just pulled an all-nighter to get a job in on time.
The letterhead on the correspondence found on Jude’s desk told me he was still working for his dad’s firm, but it seemed he’s branched out into buying wrecks cheap, doing them up and then selling them on.
I’ve also discovered that we live in a garden flat in Nunhead, on a hill populated by orderly rows of red-brick Victorian houses with white-painted masonry and large sash windows. It’s certainly a step up from the Lewisham digs. This flat makes a statement. I am no longer living like a student, it says, happy to have pizza boxes stacked up near the kitchen bin, a collection of empty beer cans on the mantelpiece and Ikea flatpack furniture that has been assembled so badly it’s barely standing. I have grown up, it says. I am on my way. Even though, in my head, I’m in my forties, I’m still not sure I feel grown up enough for it.
As I turn into Campden Hill Square, I belatedly realise Holland Park Tube might have been closer. However, without the benefit of a handy London travel app – I don’t think 1990s Maggie even owns a mobile phone yet – I had to do my best the old-fashioned way with an A–Z clutched in my hand. As I stride down the road I read the house numbers on the three-storey Georgian buildings, mentally ticking them off until I reach the right one.
It’s not quite as grand as the houses with the pillared porches on Ladbroke Square, but it’s still impressive. It sits one house away from the corner and it has a bright-blue door and stairs leading down to a basement kitchen. I sigh out loud. I always wanted a basement kitchen.
And then I see Jude swing open the heavy front door in an expensive-looking grey suit, not the usual builders’ attire I’d expect, and I can’t help it. I rush towards him and nearly knock him over as I wrap my arms round his neck and hold him tight.
He laughs. ‘That’s one of the things I love about you, Meg. You don’t hold back.’
I close my eyes and try to absorb the feel, the smell of him, through my pores and into my skin. I’ve missed him so much. I’m not ready to let him go when he pulls away, eager to show me his finished work, but I do.
He takes me by the hand and I can’t stop smiling as he points out the beautiful original mahogany staircase, with polished turned rails and glossy white balusters. I’m not taking any of the information in that he’s spouting at me, but I don’t care. I can feel his hand warm in mine. I’m back. That’s all that matters.
As the tour continues, though, I can’t help but pay attention. This house is gorgeous. Even though it’s obvious it’s been recently decorated, it looks dated to me. Victorian flourishes and too much terracotta make it seem a bit fuddy-duddy compared to the sleek minimalist look it would have been given in the twenty-first century, but it’s still a stunning home. The orangery Jude has built to extend the kitchen is a work of art.
We wander upstairs and take in the high ceilings of the drawing room with its fold-away wooden shutters that sink into the wood panelling like secrets, and then he shows me the balcony of the master bedroom that overlooks t
he garden in the centre of the square. I place my hands flat on the stone balustrade, close my eyes and feel the sun on my face.
‘Imagine being able to drink your morning coffee out here,’ I say without opening my eyes. ‘I can’t think of anything more perfect.’
Jude slides in behind me and snakes his arms round my waist, just as I knew he would. He kisses the tingly spot just below my right ear. ‘Then one day I will make sure you have a house of your own, just like this one, with a balcony outside every window if you like!’
I turn and look at him. Laugh. ‘If only in our dreams …’
But Jude’s not laughing. ‘I’m serious, Meg. I want to give this to you. I don’t want to just renovate houses like this – I want to live in one. And one day I’m going to do it.’
I look back at him, looping my arms around his neck. ‘I know you will,’ I say, because this man has a strange ability to bend his future to his wishes. He has a gift for that, and I’m so glad I’m with him, that my life is meshed with his and he’s talking about owning property with me years from now, that I kiss him the way I’ve wanted to since the moment I saw him opening that blue front door.
We stumble back into the bedroom. The rooms are all sparsely decorated, only a few pieces of furniture in each. I’m not really paying attention to them at the moment, though, because all I can think of is Jude, wishing I knew how to make this reality stick for good.
At first I think he’s going to laugh and disentangle himself from me – after all, this is hardly the time or the place – but then his hands slide around my waist, under my blouse, and his fingers start to explore. He glances towards the bed, it’s blue-and-white floral duvet cover crisp and inviting, and I know what he’s thinking.