The Other Us

by Fiona Harper

  ‘I’m his fiancée.’

  Jude pauses, sends a knowing look towards Patrick. ‘I do apologise,’ he says smoothly. ‘What I was trying to say is that the people around you always think what you do is wonderful, don’t they? I was wondering if you’ve had any success with someone in the profession, someone who knows what they’re talking about?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter if you haven’t yet,’ I cut in, earning myself a look from Jude. ‘I mean, everyone’s got to start somewhere.’

  ‘Actually, there’s an agent who’s interested in seeing the book once it’s finished,’ Becca chimes in, her smile more than a little triumphant.

  ‘How wonderful,’ Flora says, managing to sound much more genuine than her husband. ‘What sort of book is it?’

  Dan turns his attention to her, ignoring the men at the table. ‘It’s an adventure story for eight-to eleven-year-olds. Aimed at boys, really. I’ve always been saddened by how many lads don’t read regularly by the time they get into my class, and this one here – ’ he jerks a thumb at Becca and gives her an affectionate smile ‘ – told me I should stop moaning and do something about it.’

  ‘We weren’t together, then,’ Becca adds, smiling back at him. ‘Just good friends.’

  ‘Anyway, I listened. I’ve always liked writing, but I’d never thought of writing anything for kids, but the more I chewed over what Becca had said, the more the idea grew on me.’

  ‘And what sort of adventure story is it?’ Flora asks, clearly much more enthralled with all this creative genius than she had been the talk of load-bearing walls and foundations we had all through the first course. ‘Does it have treasure in it? I do love a good treasure-hunting story.’

  ‘Sort of,’ Dan says. It’s about a group of kids who accidentally fall through a rip in the fabric of time, and then they get catapulted from place to place, time to time, searching for the magical item that’ll send them back home. This one mainly deals with World War Two and Victorian times, but I’m thinking it could be a series …’

  Dan carried on talking but the words melt together around me. I can stop staring at him. How did he pick that storyline? Could he know something? About me? About my … situation?

  Jude’s voice cuts through my questions. ‘Isn’t time travel a bit old hat nowadays, a bit too Doctor Who or something?’

  I realise he has no way of knowing that in a few short years ‘the Doctor’ will be all nine-year-old boys want to talk about.

  He laughs and looks round the table, subtly asking his friends to back him up. Patrick and Andrew join in, but Cam, bless his dear little heart, just smiles awkwardly and looks uncomfortable.

  Dan isn’t cowed and I’m suddenly very proud of him. The Dan I live with would have sulked or got defensive; this one is more confident. He used to be this way, I realise. Before I married him.

  ‘Dinosaurs were completely out of fashion until Jurassic Park hit,’ he says. ‘Like Jasmine says, sometimes you’ve just got to follow your passion, go where your heart and muse take you.’

  ‘Bravo!’ Jasmine says, and then the conversation shifts and turns to favourite books people read as kids, and whether anyone else has ever heard of The Tree That Sat Down or read Enid Blyton’s Adventure Series, which nobody remembers because they were all too busy talking about the Famous Five.

  I realise I’m feeling very clammy, that I suddenly need some air, so I excuse myself and head for the bathroom. I decide to go upstairs to my en-suite, where it’s quieter and more insulated from the action, and when I get there I stare at myself in the mirror.

  It’s just coincidence, I tell myself. Time travel, aliens and dinosaurs, they’re all staples of boys’ adventures. The fact Dan picked that doesn’t mean anything. Still, his speech has left me with an idea. Is there something, some object or incantation or guru who could get me home again? I’d given up hope but maybe I shouldn’t have. But if there is some magical object that could help me get home, there’s one more question I need to answer: would I really want to go back to that original life?

  OK, Jude has gone all alpha this evening and really isn’t on top form, but would I really want to swap him for the ‘other’ Dan, who’d given up on me so much he’d found someone else?

  No. I think firmly inside my head. Definitely not. I breathe out.

  I feel better now. More sorted in my head. More tethered to this reality. It’s just been strange having the two men in my life in the same space. I should probably avoid it from now on.

  I’m just about to make my way back downstairs when I hear voices. Someone has just flushed the downstairs loo and they’ve opened the door and met someone in the hall. A man and a woman.

  For a horrible second I think it might be Jude and Jasmine, although I don’t know why that’s where my brain went first, but then I realise it’s Dan and Becca.

  ‘You doing OK?’ I hear Dan ask. ‘It’s a rough crowd.’

  Becca sighs then chuckles. ‘Yeah … I could do with less of the male posturing.’

  ‘Sorry,’ he mutters. ‘Jude always used to try and make me feel small at uni, especially after I started seeing Maggie. I mean, Meg. Can’t get used to that …’ I imagine him shaking his head. ‘Anyway, I used to let him get away with it back then but there’s no way I’m going to let him do it now.’

  ‘Not you!’ Becca says, laughing. ‘I meant Mr Peacock. He might as well just pee round the perimeter of the dining table.’ She sighs. ‘I don’t like him, never have. There’s things about him she doesn’t know … but he’s her choice. I don’t want to lose her friendship again, so that means I’ve got to support it.’

  I smile, hidden away on the top landing, standing just far back enough that they can’t hear me. I know I should probably make a noise, warn them I’m there and come down the stairs, but I’m too busy feeling warm all over from Becca’s words. I’m not sure she’d ever say that to me out loud but I’m glad I heard it. I’m just about to lean back and close the bedroom door deliberately loudly when Dan speaks again.

  ‘You know it’s not about her, don’t you?’ he says softly. ‘He won. A long time ago. I’ve moved on.’ They stop talking, but I can hear a faint rustle of clothing. I suspect they’re kissing.

  It makes me feel strange. Not because I want Dan in this reality, no matter how much more he’s like the man I always wanted him to be, but because for fifty per cent of my crazy life he is mine. I can’t just seem to switch that off.

  ‘It’s you I love,’ Dan says.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘She never believed in me the way you do and I’m not angry with her any more, or hurt. I really ought to thank her, although I probably never will. To be honest, I think I dodged a bullet there.’

  His words spear me, even though he’s not the one I really want. I wonder why I bother trying in my other life, if we’re both so toxic for each other. Maybe, even taking Billy into account, we’d be better off apart in that one too.

  ‘I hate to say this,’ Becca begins, and I really wish I’d taken the opportunity to sneak off when I’d had the chance, ‘and it’s not because I hold anything against her. She was right about Grant, after all. God, I dodged a bullet there too … thank goodness you came along to pick up the broken pieces and mend my heart.’

  I’ve never heard Becca be so gushy about a guy. Even though I know they’ve been together a long while, that Dan’s ring is on her finger, this is when it becomes real to me. They really are in love.

  ‘I don’t think Jude is good for her,’ Becca continues. ‘I never did. He’s got all this strength and energy she admires, but she’s not his equal.’

  Not his equal! Is that what my best friend really thinks about me? But then she carries on …

  ‘She doesn’t stand up for herself with him, and I think he likes it that way. To be honest, I’m sad. I think she deserves better.’

  Dan makes a soft snorting sound. ‘I might be over her, but I’m not feeling that generous. She made her choice, now she’
s got to live with it. After all, she had “better” and she threw it away.’

  Becca laughs softly. ‘For which I am eternally grateful …’

  It’s at that point I decide I can’t listen any more. I also can’t ‘fake’ coming down the stairs. I don’t want to see them. I don’t want to see them looking at me after what they’ve just been saying. I creep back to the bedroom, close the door softly behind me and sit on the end of the bed.

  After ten minutes, I rejoin the party. Jude raises his eyebrows as I slide into my seat, asking if everything is OK and I make an imperceptible nod. I’ve decided I’m not doing this now. I’m blocking it out.

  The rest of the dinner goes well, I think. The guests rave about dessert, just as I thought they would, and the vino flows. I was feeling so great, so at home in my life, before I heard that conversation between Dan and Becca, but now I’m second-guessing everything and it’s paralysing me. Thankfully, with nine other people at the table, and three or four of them big personalities, no one notices I’m quieter than before and when Jasmine launches into one of her long stories of artistic endeavour, I’m actually grateful.

  I notice that she argues with Jude when he says something facetious, that she stands her ground. But he’s not dismissive with her, the way he often is with me when I voice an alternative opinion – charmingly dismissive, to be sure, but dismissive all the same. When Jasmine challenges him, he seems to enjoy it.

  Why don’t I do that? I think. And the only answer I can come up with is that she doesn’t love Jude, which means the stakes are low. If they fall out, they fall out, and they don’t have to see each other again. It’s not the same for me. I don’t want to lose him.

  But seeing the way he is with Jasmine, more animated than I’ve seen him in months, because he’s always so tired from working every hour God sends to build the business, make it bigger, better, stronger, more profitable, I realise that we’ve lost a bit of that. He’s not flirting with Jasmine, just bantering, but I see the spark of interest there. I don’t believe he’s going to do anything about it, I don’t think he’s going to stray with her or anyone, but if I want to make sure of that in the coming years, maybe I need to up my game. Maybe I need to do what Becca said and become his equal.

  Unsurprisingly, she and Dan are the first to leave, citing their need to catch the last train. Most of the others follow within the half-hour, but Patrick and Flora linger on. The boys drink too much whisky and get louder and more arrogant. I chat with Flora in the now-deserted kitchen, pretending to tidy what has already been tidied and tiptoeing around the subject of babies.

  When they go home Jude and I go to bed. I’m not really in the mood for sex, to be honest, but maybe I’m more like him than I realise because I feel a need to stamp my presence on him in the most primal way, just so I’m sure I’ve erased any thoughts of how clever and interesting Jasmine was tonight, because in my book that makes her very, very sexy.

  I lie there afterwards, staring at the crease of orange light slicing through the gap in the curtains and creating a luminous gash on the opposite wall. My thoughts turn to Dan.

  Why are the two versions of him so different? One sure of himself, ready to reach out and pursue his dreams, and the other one lacklustre and apathetic?

  I start to wonder if it has anything to do with finding the right person. I mean, my relationship with Jude isn’t perfect, but it is a heck of a lot better than my marriage to Dan, no matter Becca’s opinion on it, and it makes sense that even if you find that perfect person that a lifelong relationship is going to involve some work, some challenges. So maybe Becca is Dan’s right person. His soul mate.

  Those words echo inside my head and I roll over and close my eyes, happy to go to sleep now I’ve wrapped all my doubts about my first life and tied them in a neat bow.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  The phone wakes me up. I roll over to reach for the handset on the bedside table, but somehow I end up tumbling onto the floor. I land smack on the carpet and, as I open my eyes and try to work out what the heck happened, I notice it’s daytime, and then I realise I’m lying on an Ikea rug, not a hardwood floor. A moment later, a little boy runs into the room holding a toy car in one hand and a plastic wheel in the other. ‘It fell off, Mummy!’ he says shoving them towards me.

  My mouth drops open. Billy?

  I can hardly believe it. He’s so tall! He must be three now, maybe even four.

  I’m so stunned I just do what he’s asked and take both car and wheel from him and click them back together. He goes to grab for them, but I hold fast, my wits starting to kick in. ‘Give mummy a kiss first,’ I say.

  ‘No,’ he says, stubbornly, pointing at the car. ‘I need my car.’

  I grin back at him. He’s talking in whole sentences. My son is a freaking genius! I’m so overjoyed at his prodigy that I haven’t got time to be sad about all the things I’ve missed. ‘No,’ I say, hiding it behind my back. ‘Not until mummy gets a kiss, and if I don’t get a kiss I’m going to … tickle you!’

  For a moment he looks worried, but then a glint of mischief appears in his eyes. That’s all the encouragement I need. I drop the car and start crawling towards him. He screams and runs out the room, giggling, shouting, ‘Urgh! No kissing, Mummy! No kissing!’ However, if I get too far behind, he slows down and waits for me, still making sure he’s just out of grabbing distance.

  I finally capture him at the bottom of the stairs. I tickle and kiss him at the same time until he’s almost sick with laughter, and then we go back into the living room to retrieve the car. It’s only then I notice the red light flashing on the answerphone and remember it was the phone that woke me up in the first place.

  Since Billy is now engrossed with his car, running it along the arms of the armchair and down onto the floor, I pick the handset up. This isn’t the house phone I remember, so it takes a little bit of guesswork to find how to listen to messages, but I manage to work it out in the end. I use speed dial to call Becca back.

  ‘Hey!’ she says when she picks up. ‘I was just trying to call you!’

  The familiarity of her voice is just what I need right now. ‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘Must have dozed off on the sofa. What’s up?’

  She chuckles. ‘What a fabulously exciting life you live!’

  I look at Billy, his dark head bent over in concentration as he drives his car up the side of the TV cabinet. I’ve lived an exciting life. I own a fabulous house in Notting Hill, had luxury holidays in the best resorts in Europe and I’m no stranger to Michelin-starred restaurants, but I’m glad I’ve swapped every single one of those experiences for this moment. ‘Too right,’ I say.

  ‘I’m inviting myself round to dinner tonight,’ Becca informs me.

  I laugh. ‘Oh, you are, are you?’

  ‘Yep. I’ve got something I need to talk to you about. You provide the chilli con carne and I’ll provide the booze.’

  I frown. ‘How do you know we’re having chilli tonight?’

  Now it’s her turn to laugh. ‘You always do chilli on a Monday!’

  I’m stunned into silence. Have I really become my mother, rotating dishes on a weekly basis until Tuesday seems wrong without bangers and mash and Sunday without a roast? The thought makes me feel slightly queasy.

  ‘I’ll make sure I bring a nice red!’ Becca adds, taking my silence as acceptance. ‘See you later!’ And she rings off before I can say anything else.

  After a quick trip to the supermarket, I don’t do anything all day but play with Billy. I intend to go and make myself a cup of tea and then get some housework done while he’s quietly absorbed in kids’ TV, but I end up taking my mug back to the living room and watching him sing and dance along to The Tweenies. I get this feeling, that’s both wonderful and horrible at the same time, that I’m only visiting. I don’t want to miss a second.

  When Dan comes home, he finds Billy and me crawling round and round the living room, in and out of his pop-up tunnel. Dan stands at the door, wit
h his coat still on and his messenger bag clutched to his chest and watches us. When I’ve finished one more circuit, I sit back on my haunches and smile at him. ‘Hi. How did your day go?’

  ‘Hi,’ he says back but he doesn’t smile. In fact, he looks rather confused, as if this is an unusual question for me to ask.

  Billy races to him and grabs his trousers. It’s only when Dan’s scooped his son up and has held him upside down until he’s giggling so much I think he’s going to choke that the wary expression melts off of his features and he smiles.

  ‘Becca’s coming for dinner,’ I tell him.

  ‘She might as well move in and pay us rent for the amount of time she eats here!’ he says as he heads off to the kitchen to put the kettle on, but there’s no trace of irritation in his tone. I follow him in there a few minutes later and find him frowning as he stirs his usual two sugars into his tea. ‘No chilli tonight?’ he asks.

  ‘Nope,’ I say. ‘Thought we’d have a change: Thai Green Curry.’ And as I walk past him to the fridge to get the ingredients, I give him a kiss on the cheek.

  ‘You’re acting weird,’ he says, not taking his eyes off me. He’s acting as if it’s a complete stranger making herself at home in his kitchen and he’s not quite sure what to do about it.

  And maybe he should do something about it, because I’m not entirely sure he’s wrong. I don’t feel like the Maggie who left here when she had her last jump. I don’t feel like her at all.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Becca arrives just as I’m dishing up. I’ve been so obsessed with Billy today that I’ve forgotten that last time I saw her I was begging her to kick scumbag Grant to the curb. The fact I’ve seen her so happy in my other life only makes me want to see that happen in this one too. I’m going to have to do some careful digging to find out how the land lies.

  It seems like a normal night with the three of us, how it used to be. With Becca as a buffer, Dan has finally unclenched and is actually laughing and joking. I try to look beneath the surface, beneath what I always assume I see when them together. Is there a spark between them?