The Perfect Life

by Nuala Ellwood

  12. Then

  January 2018

  ‘Vanessa. Dinner’s ready.’

  I grab my phone from the bathroom floor and look at the time. Eight p.m. on the dot. Sinking back into the warm bathwater, I wish that just for once Connor and I could have a takeaway or dinner in front of the TV. It’s been a really tough week at work. The campaign for Mulberry Moment, the new Luna London lip shade for winter, is in full swing and my days have been wall-to-wall meetings from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.

  Tonight is Friday night and all I want to do, when I get out of this bath, is curl up on the sofa with something trashy on the TV and something equally junk-like on my plate: a slice of cheese on toast or a bowl of Frosties with milk. However, I know that won’t happen as Connor is a stickler for both routine and for sitting round the table to eat. At 8 p.m. Every evening.

  This is one of the things I have learned about him since moving in, along with the fact that he is obsessively clean, with a box and a label and a place for everything. No more throwing my clothes on to the bedroom floor or letting the laundry basket overflow. I found in the first couple of weeks that when I did that, the item in question would be magically put on a hanger and the washing machine would be on overdrive until the laundry basket emptied.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Connor had said, when I caught him putting my trainers neatly away on the shoe rack one morning. ‘I know I’m a bit anal but it’s just the way I was brought up. When Dad left, Mum made sure I did my share of the housework.’

  It had made me feel bad when I saw him folding up my clothes and putting my paperwork into neat piles. I’d worried that he would regret my moving in with him, that I had somehow intruded on his nicely ordered flat, trailing mess and chaos in my wake. But after a few weeks I started to take on some of his habits too. I like the fact that if I choose which outfit to wear for work the next day and lay it out the night before, then I will have more time to spend in bed with Connor in the morning, rather than rushing around like a headless chicken, looking for my shoes and bag and phone. I feel more composed, more in control. He’s made me become a better version of myself.

  ‘Vanessa, it’s getting cold.’

  Connor’s voice trails up the passageway. With some reluctance, I get out of the bath and dry myself with a soft white towel.

  ‘I’ll be two minutes,’ I call as I head into the bedroom.

  I open the wardrobe to see what I can wear. My tired body wants nothing more than to sink into a pair of cosy pyjamas but Connor doesn’t think wearing pyjamas for dinner is proper. And there is something quite fun about dressing up for each other. I pull out a black silk pleated maxi skirt. It has an elasticated waist and will be comfortable enough. I team it with the green cashmere jumper Connor got me for Christmas and slip a pair of loafers on my feet. Running my fingers through my hair to tidy it, I hurry along the passageway towards the kitchen.

  ‘You look nice and relaxed,’ says Connor, appearing at the open door. ‘Dinner’s ready and I’ve got the outdoor heater on.’

  I step out on to the roof terrace which, weather permitting, has become our dining room. Connor prefers the space outside, because it feels less claustrophobic than sitting at the small table in the living room. And it is nice, eating under the stars – certainly more romantic than a greasy takeaway on the sofa. Still, I’m thankful for the outdoor heater, particularly on a chilly January night like this.

  ‘I got some cod from the fishmonger’s on Northcote Road,’ he says, sitting down at the table next to me. ‘So I thought I’d make a fish pie. Tuck in.’

  I smile as I take a mouthful of the pie. It is rich and creamy and feels like a warm hug. Despite my initial desire to lounge on the sofa with junk food, this is exactly what I need.

  ‘It’s delicious,’ I say, taking a sip of cold white wine. ‘Where did you get the recipe?’

  ‘From Mum,’ he says wistfully. ‘She used to make it all the time when I was a kid. Mums make the best meals, don’t they? Oh God, sorry, that was insensitive of me.’

  He squeezes my hand and smiles.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ I say, feeling the warmth of his skin next to mine. ‘You know I’m fine with you mentioning your mum. I was lucky that my mum was a great cook too. She made everything from scratch. No microwave meals, no jars of pasta sauce, no takeaways. She loved cooking and she loved her family.’

  ‘That’s what home is all about,’ he says. ‘Warmth and love and food. Sitting round a table. I missed all that when I moved into this place.’

  ‘I’d like to meet your mum,’ I say. ‘We should plan a little trip.’

  ‘Yep,’ he says, clearing his throat. ‘We should. She’s been really busy with work but she’s dying to meet you. The divorce hit her pretty hard, which is why she threw herself into work. Coming home to an empty house must be tough for her. I never want to end up like that. Having you here, seeing your face next to me at the table, it’s everything to me. I realized the other day when I was watching you sleeping that you’re my family now.’

  I smile. I feel the same way. Connor is my family and the next step should be to find somewhere we can grow.

  Ever since I viewed the garden flat, my need to find a home has taken on more urgency. Connor doesn’t understand this urge and constantly tells me that the rented flat we’re living in is good enough for now and that we should concentrate on working hard to build up a solid deposit. I’d brought up the subject of the money my mother had left me again and he’d snapped at me and told me that he would not be using someone else’s money and that was the end of it.

  But it’s not the end of it as far as I’m concerned, not by a long shot. I realize that I have wasted a huge chunk of my life just coasting along. Now that doesn’t feel good enough. I think about Anne with her beautiful house in Muswell Hill, which she opens up for staff parties and get-togethers. That house is a solid symbol of all the hard work she has poured into her career. I want to have that too and I don’t think it’s a crime to go after what you want.

  Since the viewing I have signed up for every property website I can find, entering my details, my budget, my search radius, what kind of property I’m looking for, etc. I’ve also become addicted to the interior design pages on Instagram and have started to follow hashtags such as #periodproperty #mydreamhouse #cosyhome #vintageterrace. Each page takes me further and further into a dream world but, unlike a story, these worlds are attainable.

  Later that evening, when Connor is washing up the dishes, I sit, glass of wine in hand, and click on to Instagram. One of the hashtags leads me to a page called Dream Properties. Most of the ‘dream properties’ are in the million-pound-plus bracket. Still, it is nice to dream.

  I scroll through the listings, which are mostly mock-Tudor houses and penthouse apartments. Nothing catches my eye. I hear Connor go into the bathroom and I’m about to click off when I see a house so beautiful it takes my breath away. It’s described as an early Regency gem in the heart of Surrey. A red-brick building with a pillared porch and wisteria creeping round the door. Inside, it has retained its original features with stone floors throughout, sage-green panelled walls and a mulberry-painted music room complete with grand piano. To the rear is a sweeping terrace and, hidden away at the end of the grounds, a walled herb garden with a twisted willow pergola running down the middle.

  It might be the wine but I decide to make an appointment to view the house. It is, of course, completely out of my budget, at £1.5 million, but I reason that if I go to see this house it will motivate me, give me a solid sense of what I can achieve if I carry on working hard. Also, I feel an urge to get out of London this weekend. Connor has forewarned me that he’ll be working most of it as he has the branding for a big sports campaign to finish by the end of next week.

  I bring up the ‘Book an appointment’ box on the website and I’m about to enter my name when I stop myself. As this property is well out of my price range, it feels silly to use my real name to view it. It would make more sense
to come up with a pseudonym. But who can I be? I go back into the kitchen and refill my wine. As I make my way back to the sofa I’ve already come up with a name.

  ‘Tabitha Richardson’, I type into the form. Just the sort of person who would view this kind of house. I am so absorbed with Tabitha that by the time Connor comes back into the room to tell me it’s time for bed, not only am I quite tipsy but I also have a fully formed backstory for Ms Richardson which sounds so plausible I almost believe it myself.

  Two days later

  Sitting on the 10.35 from Victoria to Epsom, I practise my introduction.

  ‘Hellay, sooo pleased to meet you,’ I drawl to myself as the train departs. ‘My name is Tabitha Richardson. I’m here to view the Regency house.’

  I repeat the lines over and over, easing my tongue across the words until they become part of me. Then, as we head into open countryside, I smile. I am no longer Vanessa. I have become someone else.

  I have become Tabitha.

  Tabitha Richardson is thirty-five years old, a little older than me, and a widow. Mother to two children, Bertie and Amelia. Tabitha’s husband, a hedge-fund manager, tragically died in a skiing accident two years ago. ‘It’s been such a terrible time,’ I mutter to myself as the train goes under a bridge. ‘But now we’re ready to move on. To sell the house in Chelsea and head to the country. It’s going to be a fresh start for us. A chance to start again.’

  Don’t overdo it, I tell myself as the train pulls into Epsom station. Just keep it simple.

  As I approach the door of Fairfax and Latimer Estate Agents, I practise my intro one last time, under my breath. ‘Hellay, my name is Tabitha Richardson. I’ve come to view … My name is Tabitha Richardson … Oh, hello … er … hellay. My name is …’

  But as I walk into the office and see their faces my mind goes blank and I stand limply in the centre of the room, the eyes of half-a-dozen women fixed on me.

  ‘Er … hi, my name is …’ I begin. ‘I’ve got an … an appointment at 11.30.’

  ‘Oh, you must be Mrs Richardson?’ says a smiling blonde woman who looks to be in her early sixties. ‘You’ve come to view Rosedale Manor?’

  There is a hushed silence as she gets up from her desk and comes towards me, her hand outstretched.

  ‘I’m Jane Treadwell,’ she says warmly. ‘Lovely to meet you.’

  I nod my head but my mouth is dry as I shake hands with Jane, aware of the other women looking at me. Do they know what I’m doing? Can they tell it’s a lie?

  ‘Yes, I’m Tabitha,’ I say finally as Jane Treadwell grips my hand. ‘It’s so good to meet you.’

  I wonder if I should start with the bio now, tell Jane Treadwell a little more about myself, or rather Tabitha, but before I can say anything she has swept me out of the office and into the passenger seat of her car, a large, silver 4x4, and as we make our way along the narrow country lanes, she takes the opportunity to quiz me about my situation.

  ‘You said in your email that you had been recently widowed, dear,’ she says, raising her voice over the hum of Radio 4. ‘A skiing accident. How awful for you.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I reply, speaking slowly and carefully. ‘It was such an awful shock for me and the kids, er, sorry, the children, but we’re finding our feet now.’

  ‘And you’re moving from London?’ asks Jane, slowing down to let an elderly man cross the road. He’s carrying a King Charles spaniel in his arms. ‘Chelsea, you said?’

  ‘That’s right,’ I say, watching as the man reaches the other side of the road and gently puts the dog on to the grass. ‘London is just too much for us right now. There are too many painful memories.’

  ‘I completely understand,’ says Jane, nodding her head. ‘I lost my husband five years ago. It was cancer, in his case, so we had time to prepare for it, unlike you, poor thing, but when he passed I knew I would have to sell up and find somewhere else. He loved to garden and seeing the empty greenhouses each morning was just too much to bear.’

  ‘I know what you mean,’ I say, relaxing a little in the wake of Jane’s honesty. ‘They say it’s just bricks and mortar but houses are so much more than that, aren’t they? They contain a whole lifetime of memories and stories. Oliver, my late husband, was so much a part of the Chelsea house. I can still see him sitting at the kitchen table when I come downstairs. It’s like he never left.’

  Beside me, Jane Treadwell nods her head.

  ‘But after he died I remembered a conversation we had when we’d just got married,’ I say, my chest tightening as the sign for Rosedale Manor comes into view. ‘He knew how much I loved the countryside and that I’d compromised a bit by deciding to live in London with him. So he made me promise that if he died before me I would go and find my rural idyll.’

  I feel terrible for lying to her but part of it is true. I think of my mother. She would want me to work hard and, one day, to have the chance to own a house like Rosedale Manor. My dream house.

  ‘Oh, that is lovely,’ says Jane as we sweep into the grandest driveway I have ever seen. ‘Now let’s hope Rosedale Manor is the one.’

  She stops the car in front of the house and I have to restrain myself from gasping. The photographs had been impressive enough but in real life the house is magnificent.

  ‘It’s Grade II listed,’ says Jane, taking a set of keys from her bag to open the door. ‘So there’d be limits to what you could do to it.’

  I wouldn’t want to change a thing, I think to myself as we step into a circular entrance hall. The walls are painted sage green, in keeping with the Regency style, and there is a highly polished table in the centre with a tall glass vase of lilies on top.

  ‘Rosedale Manor was built in 1820 and was home to four generations of the Hipsley family until 1910 when it was sold to Anglo-Irish politician J. P. Mulvey.’

  I pretend to listen as Jane tells me the history of the house, but my eye is drawn to a framed picture sitting on the table next to the vase of lilies. The picture, a black-and-white photograph, shows a dark-haired woman with sparkling eyes and white teeth, her arms draped around a handsome man with cropped greying hair. In the forefront, nestled in their daddy’s arms, are an impossibly cute little girl in a floral dress, her hair tied in sweet bunches, and an older boy, around eight or nine, looking smart in his school uniform. I can’t take my eyes off that family. It’s as though they have stepped right out of my fantasy: a loved-up couple, two children healthy and thriving. It’s a happy scene but the photo fills me with a sadness I can’t quite put my finger on. It’s the same sense of time running out I had when I viewed the garden flat in Battersea. I back away from the photo and go to find Jane, who is standing in the drawing room looking out at the sweeping countryside.

  ‘Impressive, isn’t it?’ she says to me, her eyes gleaming. ‘Just under eight acres of land. And it could all be yours.’

  I smile but my initial enthusiasm has gone, the excitement drained away. I should go but, first, I really need to use the loo.

  ‘Er, sorry, Jane,’ I say, putting my hand on the woman’s arm. ‘I’m afraid I’m having trouble concentrating because I’m desperate for the loo. I don’t suppose you could tell me where it is?’

  ‘Oh, gosh, dear, of course,’ she says, guiding me back into the hallway. ‘I’m the same after a coffee or two. There’s a bathroom at the top of the stairs to the left.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I reply. ‘I won’t be a sec.’

  The bathroom is light and vast. A huge roll-top bath sits on clawed feet in the centre of the room and the casement window looks out on to landscaped gardens. There is a large vase of white hydrangeas on the window ledge. They were my mother’s favourite flower. The sight of them makes me smile. I go across to the window. Leaning forward, I pluck a large sprig of hydrangea. Holding it to my nose, I take a deep breath of its soft scent and whisper a silent wish to my mother. Then, tucking it into my bag, I head back out on to the landing.

  ‘Does that feel better, dear?’ says Jane,
smiling warmly as I walk down the stairs towards her.

  ‘Yes,’ I reply serenely. ‘That feels much better.’

  When I get back to the flat I hear the shower running. Connor must have decided to work from home rather than go into the office. I slump down on the sofa, the euphoria of the house viewing still making me tingle. I’m about to get up and make a coffee when I hear a beep. I look down and see Connor’s phone on the coffee table in front of me. Its screen is lit up and I can’t help but see the text message displayed.

  From: Sara

  Sterling work, darling! Loads of love xxx

  Just then Connor comes into the room. His hair is wet and he’s wearing a hoodie and sweatpants.

  ‘How was Georgie?’ he says, sitting next to me. ‘Nice lunch?’

  ‘Yeah, it was lovely,’ I say, any guilt I was feeling about lying to him over where I’d been now cancelled out by the arrival of that message. ‘Your phone was beeping.’

  ‘Ah,’ he says, reaching out to pick it up.

  I watch him as he reads it, though his face remains expressionless. He places the phone back on the table then jumps to his feet.

  ‘Fancy a coffee?’ he says, heading for the kitchen.

  ‘Er, who is Sara?’ I say, following him out of the room.

  He turns and looks at me, shaking his head.

  ‘Sara is my work colleague. She’s the senior art director, been there for donkey’s years. And she’s gay. Christ, she calls everyone “darling”.’

  He laughs dismissively and heads into the kitchen.

  ‘Right, let’s have a STRONG coffee, shall we?’

  Later that evening, I lie in bed feeling deflated. Connor spent the whole evening working while I sat by myself on the roof terrace drinking wine. Eventually, I gave up and went to bed. When Connor came in I pretended to be asleep but now, as he lies snoring beside me, no sleep will come. I feel prickly and on edge.