‘Yes, it was great.’ He was a little awkward, but he never had been a conversationalist.
‘I spoke to Johnny. He told me you both had a wild time. Have you got any photos?’
‘Um, yeah, a few, nothing very interesting, really.’
I kicked the skirting-board, it hurt. ‘Oh, I’d love to see them and I can’t wait to meet this girl I’ve been hearing so much about.’ I couldn’t quite bring myself to use her name.
‘Yeah, of course.’
‘Are you coming to dinner? I’m really looking forward to seeing you. It’ll be fun.’ I kicked the skirting-board again.
‘OK, we’d love to.’ My heart sank when he said ‘we,’ I sank to my knees.
‘See you, then. ‘Bye, Ben.’
‘Sure, see you,’
After I came off the phone, I felt better. I saw the results of my conversation, the shredded pad, the hurt foot, but I had spoken to him, I had heard his voice and I hadn’t fallen apart. I had handled myself well. I could do this, I really could. Actually, I was already regretting this dinner but I couldn’t back down, I had to go through with it. I picked up the phone and slammed it down, just to prove a point.
The next few days were a blur. I cried a lot, but privately, and publicly I put on the in-control charade, knowing no one believed it. But I got through them and I was still going to cook dinner.
***
The dinner party was upon me. I visited Antonio the hairdresser, and the hour of telling-off he gave me for not going enough was worth it for the effect he had on my hair. I spent ages planning the menu and I had my nice dress to wear. I was ready. I was also nervous. What would she be like? I wanted her to be horrid. I so wanted to hate her. I wanted everyone to hate her.
Jess, Sarah and Sophie all helped, more than they’d ever done before. They were terrific, but I could see fear in their eyes and I knew they were right: this was too scary for all of us. Why had I done it? Because I wanted to impress him, to make him see what he was missing – my wonderful cooking, me being the perfect host. I wanted him to look at me again. I wanted him to want me. I kept busy, but the thought, I’m really going to see him, kept creeping into my mind followed by, He’ll be with her, followed by, Tonight I will die from jealousy.
I stayed sober, worried about what the drink would do. I got changed, put on some make-up and, by eight, I was as ready as I would ever be. Sarah came up to me. We hugged. She looked great: she was wearing her contact lenses, a short skirt, a little top and high heels. And she was wearing make-up. ‘You look terrific,’ I said, momentarily distracted from my imminent demise.
‘Oh, Ru, shut up.’ She blushed.
‘Thank you for helping me through this.’ She was still red, but Ben was in my head and Sarah was invisible.
The doorbell rang. Jess went to get it. She came back and I saw Thomas and Johnny, who kissed me and told me I looked great. I could see the fear in their eyes. I had scared the hell out of everyone, including me.
Then Ben arrived. At first, I didn’t even notice Sam, I was just looking at Ben, taking him in again, figuring out if he was as I remembered him. Well, he was more tanned and his hair was a little fairer from the sun but, yes, this was my Ben, in the flesh. He looked terrific. Terrific was not a word I’d ever used about Ben. What I meant was gorgeous, beautiful, lovely, but he wasn’t mine and terrific felt more detached. When I saw him, all the hurt of the past year came flooding back. It was as if it had never left me. I looked at him again and still saw him as my happiness. I looked at him some more and saw him as someone else’s happiness. I felt as if the knife was twisting in my heart again.
Then I looked at Sam, the girl who was better than me. She was pretty, but not stunning, which might have been a relief but didn’t feel like one. She was blonde and quite skinny and smiling, and she was holding his hand. My hand.
‘I can’t believe you’re back.’ Jess found her voice. She kissed the boys and shook hands with Sam. We all followed suit.
‘Johnny, you look gorgeous,’ I said. Then I kissed Ben. He smelt so good. ‘How lovely to see you,’ I managed.
‘This is Sam,’ Ben said. He looked terrified.
‘Sam, nice to meet you.’ I shook her hand. I wanted to cut it off, along with her tits, but etiquette required a shake. I tried not to stare, but it was hard.
To get through the evening, my head had broken it up into parts: the greeting, drinks, starter, main course, dessert and coffee. I would congratulate myself every time I survived a part. Well, Ruth, congratulations, you survived the first.
‘Who wants what to drink?’ Sarah said, and we could move on to the second part. Why did Ben have to look so gorgeous?
‘Aren’t you going to tell us about your trip? I don’t know, you leave us for a year, and you don’t even tell us anything about it,’ Jess teased.
‘We had a fantastic time, Jess, you’d love Australia. We went to the most beautiful places, met so many great people. It was the best,’ Johnny started.
‘Sit at the table – it’s time to eat,’ I interrupted. Johnny raised an eyebrow in surprise but they obeyed. Congratulations, you survived part two.
We started eating. Jess talked about PR and Jerry who couldn’t be with us, Sophie talked about her TV show, Sarah talked about her new job, Thomas his exams and Johnny and Ben their travels. I was silent.
‘Where are you from?’ I asked Sam, trying to be polite while imagining her engulfed in flames.
‘Sydney,’ she replied.
‘I’ve heard it’s a great city,’ I said, imagining her engulfed in flames and covered with poisonous snakes.
‘It is, but I’ve always wanted to come to London.’
‘Really? How long are you planning on staying?’ I was becoming a little territorial, Sarah held her breath, but Sam hadn’t noticed.
‘I don’t know – a couple of years. It depends on a lot of things.’ She looked at Ben, he looked at her. I wanted to spit, Jess held her breath.
‘Oh, well, I’m sure you’ll fall in love with England just as much as you fell in love with Ben,’ I said sweetly. Everybody let out their breath.
Suddenly I realised that this wasn’t about me and it wasn’t even about ‘us’ any more. It was about her, Sam, the girl he loved. I was finding it hard to understand how I had transcended, first, heartbreak about Ben, then being alone, then being over Ben or thinking I was over Ben, then hearing he was returning and feeling back at square one. Only I wasn’t at square one, I was now at a different square altogether, because any hurt I was feeling was just about her.
Jealousy is a powerful force and it hit me between the eyes so hard it knocked me down. I just had to see if I could get up again. He loved Sam, he was committed to her, and that made her more special than me. I kept looking for the magic, I listened to try to hear the magic, but I couldn’t find it. As far as I was concerned, she was an average girl with an average personality. How could he fall in love with her and not me? This was now about her and me. I wasn’t good enough, she was. I was torn between asking her and punching her in the face. I was angry. If life does not naturally provide you with opportunities to kick sand in the faces of these happy people you just have to go and find the sand yourself.
‘Ruth, what do you do?’ Sam asked.
‘Party,’ I said.
Ben looked at me, Johnny looked at me.
‘She does,’ Thomas said.
‘I work as a PA, but only so I can go out. I go out all the time, clubs, bars, parties, hectic, but lots of fun.’ I didn’t sound like me anymore, I sounded like a stranger.
‘You never used to like clubs,’ Ben said.
I felt sick. He had acknowledged our history, which was unfair, since I had kept from mentioning it to him. ‘Things change,’ I said calmly. I wanted to scream, ‘I have to go out to forget you, you destroyed me, you ruined me, you made me this way.’ But I didn’t. I survived part three and I served the main course.
I was getting more and more des
perate. Everything was going well. The food was appreciated, the drink was being drunk. Sam had started talking a lot and, in a bitch-from-hell kind of way, she was nice. There were a few too many when-Ben-and-I-did-this stories, but I had fixed a smile to my face and it was holding up. Everyone else seemed relaxed, except Sarah who was waiting for the crisis.
‘So, Sam, how did you two meet?’ I asked. Ben looked at me: he was suspicious and on edge. I wondered for a minute if Sam knew about me, or if I’d been explained as a friend.
‘In an art gallery in Sydney.’
‘Really?’ Jess said, with disbelief. Ben went bright red.
‘Yes. Ben came to see a new exhibition and I was working there. He asked me all sorts of questions about the paintings and we got talking. We ended up going for dinner that night.’ Was this Ben, or had he been kidnapped by aliens?
‘Did you go to the art gallery, Johnny?’ I asked.
‘No, I was probably in the pub.’ It was just Ben who had gone mad. I thought back to when I had asked Ben to come with me to a museum and he said, ‘What for?’ and I said, ‘Because it’s cultural,’ and he said, ‘Bollocks to culture,’ and that was that. It now transpired that he had gone to a gallery, of his own free will and he had taken a girl out to dinner. This was too much.
‘So, you went to an art gallery, did you like it?’ I asked him.
‘Yes,’ Ben replied.
‘Unlike you, isn’t it? Normally you’d have been in the pub with Johnny.’ I almost said it as an accusation – why weren’t you in the pub, you should have been in the pub. Sarah kicked me under the table.
Sam went on, ‘So, we went to dinner that night and we’ve been together ever since. When it was almost time for Ben to leave, I was so upset. When he asked me to come with him, I just had to. I couldn’t bear to be apart from him.’ She gazed at him again. He looked embarrassed Was she telling me ‘I love him, he loves me, there is no you?’ I don’t know, but if I’d been her that’s what I would have been doing.
My whole world crashed again. It wasn’t that I wanted him: I had accepted it was over. But Sam had brought a new ball into the game. He was different, he was nicer, he was in love. I couldn’t bear that he had never looked at me the way he looked at her. I hated her and I hated him.
‘So, what now?’ I asked.
‘We’re going to get a flat in London. Ben’s going to do his law finals. Sarah, I hear you’re in recruitment, do you think you could help me get a job?’
Sam was living my life! This was supposed to have been my life! I had to stop myself jumping up on the table and shouting out.
‘Sure,’ Sarah said. She looked at me apologetically. I smiled – I didn’t want to make it awful for her. But I couldn’t bear it. It should have been me.
‘It’s all planned,’ Sam said.
‘Ben, it’s unlike you to make plans,’ I said. He turned red. Sophie gave me The Look.
‘It was Ben’s idea,’ Sam said. I couldn’t work out if she was genuinely nice or a smug bitch. I decided to go with smug bitch.
‘Isn’t Ben the changed man? Oh, Sam, if only you’d known him at university, he was so different. Next you’ll be telling me he does his own laundry.’
‘He does his own laundry and he cooks,’ Sam said.
We were all dumbfounded.
‘It’s nice that you’ve moved into the twenty-first century, Ben.’ He was still red and he looked at me pleadingly, but I was on a roll. ‘In fact, all Ben used to do was drink and play hockey so I guess he must have expanded his horizons since then. Did you know he used to eat so many kebabs – don’t let him drag you into the kebab shop late at night – he always used to order so much chilli sauce and well, it wasn’t nice. If it wasn’t a kebab it was curry, which more often than not he used to fall asleep in. It was so funny.’ Ben looked angry, I had done the bad thing, I had brought myself into the equation. Not that it upset Sam.
‘Oh, God, I can’t imagine that, Ben. No, we do really interesting things together, galleries, museums. We also both play tennis. I know all about his hockey days – he sounded like such a lad then,’ Sam laughed.
This was too much. When he had been with me he was a stupid immature lad, now he had fallen in love and grown up. Ben was different, Ben wasn’t my Ben, Ben had been playing when he was with me. Now he was having a relationship. I couldn’t stand the battering all this was giving me: I was being deflated. And everyone knew. The air was tense. Everyone was drinking a lot and looking at me. I felt as if I was Ben’s inflatable ex-girlfriend. When he left me, he let a little air out of me and now he was back he was letting out the rest. Sam and Ben were taking me apart so they could flatten me and put me in a box, where I would be forgotten about.
‘Of course, Josh is very much the modern man.’ Sarah choked on her wine, Jess, Sophie and Thomas looked at me.
‘Who’s Josh?’ Sam asked.
‘My boyfriend.’ Everyone went quiet.
‘I didn’t know you were seeing anyone,’ Johnny said quietly.
‘Oh, God, yes, have been for ages. I thought Thomas would have told you. He’s in business, very successful, and he’s lovely. He couldn’t come tonight – he’s in Brussels. He works too hard, that’s his only fault. But he’s very “new man” and very thoughtful, although he doesn’t do his own laundry, he has a cleaner.’ Thomas looked as if he wanted to kill me. Ben looked at me full of confusion. I think he knew I was playing a game, but he didn’t know the rules. Come to think of it, neither did I.
‘Oh, perhaps I can meet him some other time – we could all go out,’ Sam suggested.
Then, on cue, the phone rang. As I was trained, I ran to answer it. Now, perhaps it was the wine or that I had just told the most stupid lie, but a plan came to me on the way.
‘Hello.’
‘Hi, it’s Jerry.’
I put on my loudest voice. ‘Josh, is that you? Gosh, you sound so faint.’
‘No, it’s Jerry. Can I speak to Jess?’
‘You’re so thoughtful, but you know I’m in the middle of a dinner party.’ I giggled.
‘Ruth, is that you? Can I speak to Jess?’
‘I know, darling, and I miss you, but you’re back tomorrow, aren’t you?’
‘Ruth, are you all right? Are you mad? Who’s Josh?’
‘OK, honey, I’ll see you then. Take care, love you.’
‘Ruth, what’s going on? Can I speak to Jess?’
‘Bye, sweet dreams.’ I hung up.
I knew, because I’d been shouting, that they had heard every word. I walked back in, smiling. My friends were looking astounded and Sam was smiling.
‘Dessert, Ru.’ Jess dragged me into the kitchen. ‘What are you playing at?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know. I, well, I just couldn’t stand any more happy families. I needed to balance myself,’ I pleaded.
‘Don’t you think that if you were going to lie you should have warned us? All of a sudden in the middle of dinner you have a Josh. Thomas told both Johnny and Ben you were single, and you’ve never had a Josh. How stupid have you made us look, especially Thomas? And what about the phone call? Who the hell was it?’
‘Jerry. I’m sorry. I couldn’t cope. That girl has my life. I had to have a Josh, just for tonight. I’m sorry, it’s so awful seeing him with her. Then when the phone rang, well, I guess I was out of control.’ I was on the brink of tears.
‘Ru, I know it’s horrid, we knew it would be. Why do you think we tried so hard to talk you out of it? But you’ve been brilliant. You’ve cooked a fantastic meal, been the perfect hostess. You’ve held it together better than anyone thought you would. You shouldn’t have to make up Josh because it’s clear you’re all right. What did Jerry say?’
‘Oh, I think he’s a bit confused, you should call him straight back.’
‘In a minute. Why did you have to do that, Ru?’
‘I just felt so unwanted. I mean, did you hear me? I kept going on about how Ben used to be.’
&nb
sp; ‘He deserved that.’
‘But Sam?’
‘I don’t think she really noticed.’
‘Oh, Jess, why have I wasted so long on him?’
‘I haven’t got a clue, honey. I always hoped he was dynamite in bed.’ We laughed.
‘I’m sorry, apologise to Jerry for me.’
‘Jerry will understand.’ Jess hugged me, and I took out the crème brûlée.
I relaxed a little and let the conversation flow around me. I’d said enough. Ben looked at me with embarrassment. I guess I had annoyed him a bit. Or a lot. It was like old times, except I wasn’t here: my place had been taken. I was just watching again. The Ben Sam was talking about wasn’t my Ben. He was kind and funny and considerate and romantic. He was the Ben I had wanted, but not the Ben I loved. She had the relationship I wanted with the man I used to have.
My ego had taken a huge bashing. It was one thing for Ben not to love me, but quite another for him to be happy with a blonde Australian. I was hurt and angry. I drank and let everything wash over me. I concentrated on the fact that it would be over soon and that I could avoid seeing them again.
Eventually they thanked me for dinner and left. Sam said it had been wonderful meeting me, I said the same. Ben kissed my cheek awkwardly. I kissed Johnny and Thomas, although they didn’t leave. When Ben and Sam had gone, I went to my room without a word.
***
It was quiet outside; I could hear them talking in whispers. In my room I tried to think about what to do. Should I cry? Should I laugh? Should I just die from embarrassment? Can you die from embarrassment? Should I just climb into a big hole? I lay down. I felt sober although I had been drunk a minute ago. Then the door opened and the light was switched on.
It was Thomas. ‘Hi,’ he said.
‘I didn’t mean to make myself look stupid.’
‘I know.’
‘But I did, didn’t I?’
‘Sort of.’ Thomas sat on the bed.
‘But, well, I knew no one would believe I had a Josh, would they?’
‘Sam believed it, but I’d told Ben and Johnny you were single and having fun. But I could tell Ben I lied to him to spare his feelings. I mean, it’ll make me look like a total tosser but that’s better than you being upset, isn’t it?’
Rubber Gloves or Jimmy Choos? Page 32