by Fiona Harper
From a design perspective, too, I’m starting to get excited. Because we go after a certain type of clientele, I’m discovering they mostly want one of two looks: ‘uber bling’ or ‘faux aristocracy’. My own terms, I hasten to add. I’d never describe it that way to the clients.
The first set want everything mirrored, shiny and covered in anything that looks like diamonds and crystals. They like modern, edgy and very, very expensive, even if it is hideously ugly. The faux aristocrats want their houses to look as they’ve been born to English nobility, no matter what their original nationality. To be honest, after a year or two of doing this, I’m finding it all a bit samey, but Jasmine doesn’t want any of that, so I’m starting to get just as excited as Jude about the prospect of selling her this house.
I hang behind Jude and Jasmine, stuck looking at the most stupendous ceiling rose hanging over the top of the three-storey staircase. It’s giving me all sorts of ideas. The shapes, both abstract and floral, bound within its geometric confines, are speaking to me.
I don’t know how long I’m up there, scribbling in my big notebook, but when I return downstairs I find Jude and Jasmine in the remnant of the kitchen and he’s telling her how he can arrange for an architect to draw up plans for extending back into the garden, maybe even adding a basement. They don’t notice me enter. I stand just inside the doorway and watch them.
Jude has dropped the professional manner he always, always uses with clients, and he laughs at something she says. And it’s not just a polite, that’s-so-amusing laugh, but one that erupts right up from his belly. My eyes widen and I feel the tiniest pin-prick of jealousy.
When was the last time I made him laugh like that?
I shake the feeling off. It’s stupid, I know. It’s just that ever since that first life, when I suspected Jude let me go because of another woman, I’ve been weak in this area. I can’t erase the memory. Or maybe it’s just Becca I can hear whispering inside my head?
I tell myself there’s nothing to worry about. Jasmine isn’t flirting with him; the body language is all wrong for that. Besides, she’s not Jude’s type. Too earthy. Ambitious for her art and not for success.
Or maybe it’s just a slick manoeuvre on Jude’s part, because we leave the address with firm instructions from Jasmine to put in an offer on her behalf, and she’s excited about our ideas for both building work and interiors too. He’s happy and smiling as we leave, and I’m relieved he doesn’t mention Jasmine once on the way back to the office.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
‘That’s just typical!’ I look down at the massive ladder in my tights. It starts just above my ankle bone and runs up the side of my leg before disappearing under the hem of my knee-length skirt. I’m heading for Oxford Circus, just having just finished a meeting with prospective clients – a video production company based in Soho who want something more quirky and artsy for their new offices.
I’ve just had my second visit, the one where I show them my vision for their space. When I mentioned reclaimed, velvet-covered, theatre seats for the waiting area, I knew they were sold. I was flying inside as they gave me a guided tour, asking me for ideas for some of the other spaces they hadn’t mentioned before, but somehow in the midst of negotiating cables and big black boxes with metal edges and big clips on the side, I must have snagged my tights.
I look around. I’m approaching the entrance to Oxford Circus tube station now. It’s nearing five o’clock and a relentless tide of commuters is making its reverse journey out of the city centre. It threatens to sweep me along with it if I don’t conform and join the flow, but I manage to slip around it.
I thought I would have time to go home and change before meeting Jude for a dinner date at six-thirty but I don’t think I have time now. I’m staring down the street, wondering what to do, when I spot the reassuring concrete bulk of John Lewis a short walk away, and I cross the road and head in that direction.
I stride down the street, smiling to myself. I feel buoyant, confident. We’re in the new millennium now and, despite the ladder in my tights, I love my life. I love being someone who other people listen to, who they think is an expert on something. I love being someone with talent instead of regrets.
I smile at a lady coming the other way as I head into John Lewis and hold the door open for her, and after she’s thanked me and the door has closed behind me, cutting out the chilly autumn evening, I realise that what I love most about this life is that now I am a perfect fit. I’m no longer an imposter in my own shoes.
I browse the selection of hosiery on offer. How odd, I think, I hardly ever made it out of jeans and tracksuit bottoms in my other life. In this one tights have become part of my daily uniform. I can’t remember the last time I wore trousers.
I’m heading for the till with a pair of black fifteen denier when something makes me stop. It takes a moment to work out what it is and then I spot it. A familiar dark head browsing the lingerie.
‘Becca?’ I say, even though I’m sure it’s not her. Ever since I hopped back into this version of my life, I keep seeing Beccas everywhere. Maybe it’s because I never did hear anything back from her. I think the not knowing keeps me searching.
She turns round and I’m already forming the words, ‘Sorry, I thought you were someone else’, but they dry on my tongue.
‘Maggie?’ Her mouth drops open. I wait for her widened eyes to narrow, for the moment of surprise to wear off and her to tell me to get lost, but she just stammers, ‘Hi.’
We both start talking at once.
‘How have you – ’
‘I’m so glad we – ’
We stop and smile awkwardly and then I jump in. I’ve been waiting to speak to her for so long and I’ve got to grab my chance while I have it. ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘So sorry for walking out on you last time we met.’
Becca looks at me. I can tell my outburst has surprised her, maybe because the Maggie she’s used to is queen of letting things simmer unspoken under the surface. ‘Me too,’ she finally says and then glances in the direction of the grinding escalators that fill the centre of the building, transporting people up and down as if they’re unwitting participants in a giant game of snakes and ladders. ‘Have you got time for a coffee?’ she asks, as I remember the cafeteria on the top floor.
‘They’ll be closing soon,’ I say. ‘How about a proper drink instead? There’s a decent pub just near New Bond Street.’
She smiles. ‘Sounds like a plan.’
I brandish the pack of tights at her. ‘I just need to pay for these. Don’t want security chasing me down Oxford Street!’
She laughs. I’m not sure if it’s because she actually finds it funny or because she doesn’t want to make things any more awkward. ‘OK. I’ll wait outside. I’m supposed to be meeting – ’ she stops, considers her words and starts again ‘ – meeting my boyfriend in a couple of minutes. I’ll just send him a text, let him know he can take his time at his … thing, and where he can meet me.’
A shiver ripples through me. It didn’t escape me the way she caught herself, changed tack, and that can only mean one thing: she doesn’t want to mention his name. And that, too, can only mean one thing: Grant. I don’t react, though, too scared of fracturing our fragile truce.
By five-forty five, we’re sitting at the bar of the Duke of York. It’s a little shabby, with flock wallpaper and over-stained wood, but it’s comfortable enough and we find a couple of stools at the bar.
I decide to straight to the point. We’ve wasted too many years already. ‘Can we just wipe the slate clean, start again?’
‘I’d like that.’
We both smile at each other, not sure what to say next.
‘So …’ I eventually say, ‘what’s new?’
I’ve decided it’s better to let her talk first. That way, by the time the conversation comes around to me, and the inevitable subject of Jude, the ice will have been broken. I’m relieved when, instead of telling me all about how wonderful t
hings are with Grant, she starts on a long story about how she’s got a front of house manager position at a new theatre on the fringes of the West End. As she’s nearing the end of her story, explaining how she nearly blew her interview, she gets more passionate, more animated, and that’s when I spot a flash of something sparkly as she waves her hands around.
She catches me looking, hides the ring by putting both hands in her lap.
‘You’re engaged?’ I whisper, and all the while my stomach feels as if it’s being churned by a meat grinder. I don’t care if he’s flipping Prince Charming in this world, I’m never going to be able to believe that Grant is anything but a manipulative, sadistic pig underneath.
She nods, but she doesn’t say anything, which just confirms my fears.
I force out my congratulations, but I know I’m not ready to hear all the details yet, so I steer the subject round to me, telling her about my career change. I produce my portfolio from my bag and let her flick through it.
‘Oh, my God! These are amazing, Maggie! You’re really talented!’ Her praise warms me, but I feel a shiver too. It doesn’t take her long to spot the company logo. She looks up at me. ‘Still with him?’
‘Yes. Almost eight years now. And he hasn’t left me, hasn’t cheated on me.’ I sigh. ‘I really wish you’d give him the benefit of the doubt now, Becca.’
She doesn’t say anything at first, just stares at me, and then her head makes one curt bobbing motion. ‘OK.’
I’m surprised how relieved I am at her words. I find myself exhaling my thanks on a hushed breath. She smiles weakly back at me.
We exchange addresses, me filing hers away in my trusty Filofax, her scribbling mine down on the back of a receipt she dug out of her handbag, and then, because something has now broken, swept the shards of the last few years away, we dive headlong into one of those chats we always used to have, laughing, sighing, talking about anything and everything, although we’re careful to tread lightly round the subject of the men in our lives. I’m shocked when I look down at my watch and discover it’s twenty to seven. Jude will be waiting for me. I start to gather my belongings back into my briefcase. ‘I’m so sorry! I’m really going to have to go,’ I say. Becca looks at her watch and her eyes widen.
‘Me too! I’m supposed to be meeting – ’
Her words are cut short as a masculine hand clamps down on her shoulder. ‘Thought I’d better come and drag you out of here, you lush!’ he says with a laugh and bends to kiss her on the cheek.
He might not have done that if he’d seen me, if he’d realised who she’s with. Because it’s not Grant’s well-manicured, long fingers that are resting on my best friend’s shoulder, declaring ownership, declaring intimacy. They’re Dan’s.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
I’m stuck looking at Dan, can’t tear my eyes away, yet all the time inside my head I’m re-computing, trying to add up the elements of our conversation, the events of the last couple of years, trying to reconfigure everything so the answer I come up with is … this.
I can’t seem to do it.
‘Hi,’ he says now awkwardly. He and Becca exchange a look, the kind that only people who have been together long enough to half-read each other’s minds can trade. My stomach rolls.
‘Hi,’ I croak back. It’s odd. This Dan is only a year older than the one in the life I left behind, but he looks different. Younger. Dare I say it, more handsome.
‘I’m sorry,’ Becca says quickly, breaking the weird, time-slowing spell that has woven itself around us. ‘I should have said. I just didn’t know how you’d … you know … take it.’
I blink. ‘I’m taking it fine,’ I say. After all, why shouldn’t I? I’ve just been telling Becca how happy I am with Jude. ‘I’m just a bit … surprised. I suppose I never really thought …’
I trail off as a myriad memories, some from this life, some from the others, hurry through my brain like the pages of one of those flick books. The image I end up on is one of Becca the morning after the May ball. Her mouth is moving. I can hear her saying my man is gold dust, that I’m lucky to have him.
She always did have a soft spot for him, didn’t she? I just hadn’t ever thought it went anything beyond being mates. Well, that’s not true, really. I don’t think I’d ever even thought about it at all. I’d just accepted that as truth. Because Dan had been mine.
‘How …?’ I begin, but I don’t manage to get the rest of my sentence out, mainly because I don’t think I have one. It’s just a general expression of bewilderment.
‘We’ve always kept in touch, haven’t we?’ Becca says, glancing at Dan. There’s that look again. That sense of them being a unit I’m not part of. ‘Always stayed friends … And then, well, about eighteen months ago, it just became something more.’ She looks at me, asking me to understand, asking me for my blessing.
‘Well, that’s wonderful,’ I say, smiling at each in turn, but, the truth is, I don’t know how I feel about it. I still haven’t even begun to process it. I slide down off my bar stool and offer it to Dan. ‘It really is …’ I pick up my briefcase. ‘I can’t think of two nicer people …’
I look at my watch, even though I already know what time it is, because there’s a clock with oversized Roman numerals behind the bar. ‘But I’ve got to shoot off. I was supposed to meet Jude almost fifteen minutes ago.’
This time, I observe Dan’s jaw harden at the mention of his name. Still doesn’t like him, eh? For some reason, I feel as if I’ve scored a point, but then I keep seeing the way Dan’s hand slid easily around Becca’s waist as he leaned in for that kiss. It plays over and over again in my head on a loop.
‘It’s been lovely to see you,’ I say smiling brightly as I give them both a peck on the cheek. Dan’s aftershave is different. Nicer. I direct the last line to Becca. ‘And we’ll have to keep in touch …’
She nods enthusiastically. I can see the doubt in her eyes, though. She knows this has been a shock for me. I suspect she thinks it might be years before we see each other again. I’ve tried to contact her a number of times since that first phone call and it occurs to me that maybe this is the reason she hasn’t responded to any of my messages. Maybe she thought it would be awkward.
I hear a harsh, barking laugh inside my head.
And then I glide gracefully from the bar, suddenly glad of my well-cut clothes, my expensive shoes, the fact I know I look business-like and competent. Together. But inside I’m not together at all. I’m all spaghetti and tangled knots, because as I emerge from the smoky haze of the pub into the fresh air of the street, all I can think about is my original life, about Dan’s Thursday nights, the woman he was seeing behind my back.
And Becca’s mystery man.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
I meet up with Becca one afternoon in the West End before she starts an evening shift at Her Majesty’s Theatre, her new place of work. I drag her to a newly opened Starbucks. They’re starting to pop up all over the capital, and I have a weird feeling of reverse déjà vu when I spy the familiar green sign and dark-wood decor.
I can’t stop looking at her as we chat about our lives, our news, because I have the strangest feeling this is someone who looks like Becca but isn’t Becca. I’ve felt that way ever since I learned about her and Dan.
She can’t have been Dan’s Thursday-night woman. I can’t believe that. There’s no way that Becca, in any of the three lives I’ve known her, would do that to me.
But then there’s a niggling little memory of how wounded and broken she was after Grant had finished with her that first time, how she’d hung around at our house a lot, how patient and sympathetic Dan had been with her.
I’d always seen them as surrogate brother and sister for each other, but …
No. I can’t go down that route. I won’t. I don’t want to believe it. So we chat as if none of these thoughts are going through my head. ‘When’s the wedding?’
Becca blushes, actually blushes, and looks down at the
rim of her coffee cup. ‘July. We were just getting ready to send out the invitations.’ She looks up again. ‘I really like it if you’d come, Maggie, but I totally understand if you’d rather give it a miss.’
‘Don’t be silly. Of course I’ll come.’
‘Really?’
I nod.
‘Then I have something else to ask … I don’t know if this will be too weird, but …’
Oh, hell, I think. I know what’s coming. And there’s no escape.
‘Well, it’s just that we always said we’d be each other’s maid of honour.’ Her voice gets quieter towards the end of the sentence, as if she’s ashamed of bringing it up. ‘Would you consider …?’ Her eyes plead with me.
‘I think I need to think about it,’ I tell her, and she nods. I guess that is good enough for now. For both of us.
‘Anyway,’ I say, moving the conversation swiftly on, ‘tell me more about your plans. Are you going to live in Sidcup or Swanham?’
‘Swanham,’ Becca says firmly. ‘I can commute just as easily from there, and Dan has a new job lined up there for next term. He’s switching to a different school, going part-time. He wants to write.’ She looks at me questioningly. ‘Did you know he likes to write? He kept that light under a bushel for quite a long time …’
‘Yes, I know all about his writing,’ I say wearily. Poor Becca. ‘Timing was never his strong suit,’ I add. ‘It’s going to be tough for you with a wedding to pay for, too. You didn’t manage to talk him out of it?’
Becca blinks. She puts her mug down and frowns. ‘Why would I want to do that?’
‘Because it’s … because you …’ The look of confusion on her face stops me. She really hasn’t considered that at all.
‘He’s good, Mags,’ she says, leaning forward. ‘But you must know that if you’ve read his stuff?’
I nod, even though it’s a lie. Aside from that one poem – and that was in another life – I realise Dan has never once let me see anything he’d written. He’s guarded it closely from me.