8 February
Laurie
‘Are you sure the recipe said to put the whole bottle of rum in?’ I splutter a little into the glass teacup of punch Sarah has just passed me to taste. ‘I think it’s taken the roof off my mouth.’
She laughs wickedly. ‘I might have adulterated it a tiny bit.’
‘Well, at least everyone will be too pissed to notice if it’s not a very good party,’ I say, surveying the flat. Oscar has been away in Brussels for most of this week with work, which has left me free to spend my evenings getting everything surprise-birthday-party perfect. He’s twenty-nine tomorrow. I’ve carefully packed away anything of his mother’s that looks expensive or breakable, cooked and frozen Delia-worthy canapés, and Sarah and I have spent most of this afternoon rearranging the furniture to maximize on space. We’re lucky to live in the garden flat; we can always let people spill out there if it gets too full. Hopefully not though, as it’s freezing and the weather forecast mentioned the possibility of snow later.
‘It’ll be brilliant,’ she says over her shoulder as she heads for the loo. ‘You’ve bagged the coolest DJ in town, after all.’ I can’t quite tell if she’s being sarcastic or not.
It’s been three months since that hideous Saturday-morning showdown at Jack’s house, and thank God it seems as if he’s finally getting himself back on track, including agreeing to DJ at my boyfriend’s birthday party. And much more importantly than that, his old station have taken him back on, albeit in a slightly less prestigious slot than the one he had before, and Sarah mentioned earlier that he’s already scouting around for something better. I’ve only seen him once or twice since Christmas, and never alone. The first time, back in January, was incredibly awkward; despite the beautiful flowers he sent me, I hadn’t really found it in myself to properly forgive him. But when Sarah went to the loo he grabbed my hand and apologized, begged me, almost, and the intense, broken way he looked at me put a crack in my heart. I knew he meant it. He’d hurt me, but he’d hurt himself more.
I’m heartened to report that his beard has finally bitten the dust and the spark is returning to his green-gold eyes. I cannot tell you how relieved I am; for a while I wasn’t certain how he’d find the strength to pull himself back from the edge.
Sarah’s left her mobile on the kitchen work surface while she’s in the loo, and when it bleeps I look at it out of habit. The message is from Luke.
Don’t suppose you’re at a loose end tonight? Last minute plan fail, am Billy no mates. Save me, Sazzle!
I look at it for a few moments, my mind whirring, then walk away and stand gazing into the fridge. I don’t want Sarah to think I was snooping. It was an innocent-enough text; friendly, not flirty. I’ve only met Luke once when I bumped into them in a cafe close to where Sarah works, and he’s not Sarah’s usual type at all; he’s huge, all muscles and floppy surfer hair. But Sazzle? She’s told me that they’ve chatted, of course, and that he’s super-easy to talk to about things. Is there any more to it than that? I watch her out of the corner of my eye as she comes into the kitchen and picks up her phone, then laughs softly and slides it into the back pocket of her jeans without comment. It takes me by surprise, but then I don’t tell her about every text I get, either. Not to mention the other things I’ve never told her.
‘This is a long way from our Delancey Street parties, isn’t it?’ she says, pouring us both a glass of wine as we admire the smart, gleaming kitchen. ‘You’ve changed, Lu.’
I laugh at her sarcasm. ‘We both have.’
‘You know who I genuinely had a drink with last week?’ She slants her eyes at me, up to no good. ‘Amanda Holden.’
‘No!’ I clutch my stomach as if she’s stabbed me. ‘I knew it.’
She brushes her shoulders off with her fingertips and arches her eyebrows at me, then relents and starts to laugh. ‘We were in the same bar, anyway.’
I roll my eyes. ‘One day.’ And I mean it. She was promoted over New Year to a regular spot on the lunchtime news bulletin; she’s becoming someone who people know they’ve seen before but can’t think where. Give her a few years and she’ll need to wear a baseball cap and dark glasses to meet me for coffee.
‘What did you get Oscar for his birthday?’
A flicker of excitement licks through me. I can’t wait for him to see his gift. ‘I’ll show you,’ I say. ‘Come on.’ I lead her down the hallway towards our bedroom and push the door open. ‘There. What do you think?’ Hanging in pride of place over our bed is a large canvas painting. ‘Carly, one of the girls at work, painted it for me from a photograph I gave her.’
‘Wow.’ Sarah’s soft exclamation tells me that she’s as blown away as I am by the way Carly has managed to capture so much more than just the dawn colours and the dimensions of our little shack on the beach in Thailand. The painting vibrates with life and serenity; as I look at it I can almost hear the gentle rush of the sea and smell the strong-but-sweet black coffee as we sit on the front step and watch the sun come up. I nearly cried the first time I saw it.
‘I know,’ I say, not wanting to take my eyes away from it. ‘God knows why she works at the magazine. People would queue round the block if they knew how good she is.’
‘I wish I had a talent like that,’ Sarah sighs.
‘You’re kidding me, right?’ I say, ushering her from the bedroom and clicking the door closed. ‘I have to shade my eyes when you’re on TV.’
‘Piss off,’ she says, but I can hear in her voice that she’s bolstered by my words. Sarah’s always been a funny mix of brilliant and insecure; one second she’ll be prancing around the room like an overexcited show horse and the next she’ll be agonizing over a word she got wrong in her last broadcast.
‘What time is Oscar coming home?’
I look at the clock, working out how long I have to get everything and everyone in place. ‘His plane touches down just after six,’ I say. ‘So around half seven? I’ve asked everyone to be here for seven just to be sure.’
She grimaces. ‘I really hope Jack remembers.’
She doesn’t add ‘this time’. But I think both of our thoughts turn back to that other night a few months back, and I send up a silent hope that tonight will be memorable for all the right reasons.
Jack
I’m pretty sure Sarah is expecting me to be late. I can’t seem to win with her any more, despite my almost-constant apologies. She banged on and on about me finding a job, and now I have one again she’s on at me because I’m always at work. It’s not as if it matters whether or not I’m there for the big jazz-hands surprise when Oscar arrives at his party. Who has those anyway? I thought they were the domain of American sit-coms. Sarah’s perfectly able to manage the Spotify playlist without me, and I’m pretty certain I don’t feature on Oscar’s ‘it’s not a party until you’re here’ list. That’s okay. He wouldn’t feature on mine, either.
But despite all that, for some reason I’m here just about on time. I can see the gracious terraced house they live in as I turn the corner on to their road. My breath mists on the cold air in front of me, but still I drag my feet to make the most of the last few minutes before I have to go inside and pretend to like his braying friends. Or their braying friends, I suppose I should call them, seeing as he and Laurie are joined at the hip these days. I sometimes think she would have been better off hooking up with Billy. At least he’s a laugh, and he doesn’t pretend to be something he’s not. Every now and then Sarah and Laurie drag us into the hell of a double date, where they laugh like sisters and we make civil chat like neighbours who don’t especially care for each other. Not that we could ever be neighbours, because he lives in Wankerville and I live in Stockwell. And whatever world we live in, we’re just not similar enough to be friends. The only thing we have in common is Laurie, and she’s becoming more like him and less like us by the day.
I’m outside the house now. I consider walking straight past, but Laurie is framed in the open doorway welcoming someone I don’t recognize, and she spots me and half raises her hand in greeting. I loiter until her guest’s gone inside, then I saunter up and try for a grin.
‘Lu.’
‘Jack. You made it.’
She heroically resists looking at her watch, and I try, and fail, not to look at the starfish nestled between her collarbones. Her fingers move to cover it, as if she fears I might fly into a hulk-rage and rip it from her neck again.
‘You look nice,’ I say.
She glances down at her dress as if she hasn’t seen it before. It’s an unusual style on her; black and vintage-looking with blue piping and a skirt that flips around her knees. It takes me back to Barnes Common, to drinking beer in the sunshine and riding the Ferris wheel.
‘Thank you,’ she says, a wavering, uncertain smile on her lips as she brushes a kiss against my cheek. ‘Come through. Sarah’s in the kitchen.’ She leads me across the tiled lobby to their door. ‘She’s made rum punch.’
‘Has she put too much rum in?’
Her laughter over her shoulder jolts me; it’s the first time she has genuinely laughed at anything I’ve said in a long time. ‘Of course she has.’
We pass through groups of people I mostly don’t recognize and a few I do, including Oscar’s florid brother, who’s name escapes me, and his wife, who looks like she sucks whole lemons for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Sarah and I met them on Boxing Day at a pub not far from here. True to form, Oscar had hired a room for a Christmas get-together – because why mix with the riff-raff in the bar when you can kill the mood by putting too few people in too large a room?
Oscar’s brother pumps my hand as I pass. ‘Good to see you looking well, fella,’ he says, and to give him his due I recall that he’s not all that grim. I can’t say the same for his wife. She looks as if her pencil-thin smile actually hurts her face and her narrowed eyes tell me to keep on moving along. Fine. I wasn’t planning on talking to her anyway; I don’t know anything about quinoa or how to perfectly poach a quail’s egg.
‘Jack, in here.’
Sarah. My saviour. Perhaps she’ll be nice to me now we’re in company. Laurie lays her hand on my arm and excuses herself, and I head into the relative safety of the kitchen. Sarah looks her usual knockout self in a dress I haven’t seen before; it’s yellow and tight and contrasts with her hair.
‘What happened to the music?’ I say, cocking my head to listen as she hands me a beer from the fridge. This definitely isn’t the playlist I painstakingly curated.
‘One of Oscar’s friends has commandeered my phone.’ She grimaces, just as an Oscar lookalike swaggers in. ‘This one.’
‘Boyf’s messaging you again,’ he says, holding her phone out.
Boyf? I reach out and intercept it. ‘Cheers, mate. I’ll sort the music from here.’
The lookalike glances at Sarah, and she takes his empty glass and ladles punch into it. ‘He’s in charge now,’ she says, smiling to remove the sting as she nods in my direction.
I shake his hand because it’s dangling limply in the air between us, but behind him Sarah looks panicked.
‘Boyf?’ I say quietly, passing her phone back when we’re alone. There’s a message lighting up the screen. It’s from Luke.
‘He wants you to know he wishes he could see you tonight.’
She meets my eyes and opens her mouth to answer just as Laurie claps and calls everyone through. Apparently Oscar has been sighted getting out of a cab.
‘We should …’ Sarah looks towards the kitchen doorway, apologetic.
Someone reaches a hand round the door frame and flicks the light off, plunging the kitchen into darkness, and she slips from the room. I stay where I am, processing what just happened.
Laurie
‘Surprise!’
We all wave and clap as Oscar comes through the front door and switches the light on. His expression goes from concerned to shocked to incredulous as he looks around at the unexpected collection of people in his lounge. Everyone crowds in to wish him many happy returns, but I hang back and watch, smiling as he starts hugging his friends and air-kissing their girlfriends. Keeping a surprise party a surprise is no mean feat these days, what with mobile phones and emails ready to trip you up at any moment. He’d have been within his rights to wonder if I was having an affair over the last few weeks; I’ve been jumpy and grabbing for my phone every time the message alert has gone off. I have his trusting nature to thank for the fact that he hasn’t thought to question me, and I’m glad of it tonight because it’s allowed me to pull off this surprise. He’s so very good to me; unstintingly generous and thoughtful. I can’t repay him with expensive gifts, but I hope that gathering together people he’s fond of to help kick off his birthday weekend in style goes some way towards showing him how much I appreciate him.
‘Is this your doing?’ he says laughingly, when he finally makes it out the other side of the scrum.
‘Might be,’ I grin, standing on tiptoe to kiss him. ‘Did we surprise you?’
He nods, surveying our crowded living room. ‘You certainly did.’
‘Punch?’ Sarah asks, appearing beside us with two brimming cups. Oscar kisses her cheek and relieves her of one of the glasses.
‘I’m guessing you made this?’ he says, sniffing it.
‘It’s a special gift from me to you.’
She gestures for him to drink up, and to his credit he does, opening his eyes wide and nodding.
‘It’s, er, certainly punchy,’ he says, amused. I sip mine and wonder how anyone is going to be able to walk out of here later if they have more than two cups of it.
‘I might just go and get out of this. I feel like a stuffed shirt amongst you all.’ He looks down at his business suit. I hang on to his hand; I hadn’t thought about the fact that he’d want to get changed. He’ll see the new painting as soon as he goes in the bedroom.
‘I’ll come with you,’ I say, catching Sarah’s eye, feeling flustered.
He looks down at me, surprised. ‘Saucy.’ He squeezes my waist. ‘You should probably stay out here though, hostess with the mostest and all that.’
Sarah wades in to help, on the ball as ever. ‘You two sneak off for five minutes, no one’ll notice. I’ll create a punch-related diversion if anyone asks where you are.’
I don’t give Oscar time to say anything else, just tug him round the edge of the room and into the hallway. Before I open the door I whisper, ‘Close your eyes.’ Heroically, he just goes with it, probably expecting some kind of sultry surprise. I lead him by the hand into the bedroom. ‘Keep them closed,’ I warn, shutting the door and edging round him so I can see his face when he opens his eyes. ‘Okay, you can open them now.’
He blinks, looking at me first, shocked perhaps that I’m still fully clothed. God, I hope he’s not disappointed. I smooth my hands down my heavy skirt. I fell in love at first sight with this dress, it makes me feel like Audrey Hepburn.
‘Not me,’ I say, nodding my head towards the painting as he starts pulling off his tie. ‘That.’
He turns to stand at the end of the bed and his eyes settle on the vivid scene in pride of place. It’s like looking through a window to the other side of the world, and for a few seconds we stand together, hand in hand, and gaze at it. He squeezes my fingers, and then he climbs on to the bed so he can study it closer.
‘Who did this?’ he asks.
‘A friend.’ I kneel alongside him. ‘Do you like it?’
He doesn’t answer me straight away, just stares at the painting, then runs his fingertip over the raised oils.
‘Let’s go back,’ he whispers.
‘Okay.’ I smile, wistful. ‘We could be there by this time tomorrow.’
I slide my hand inside his unbuttoned shirt and lay it flat over his heart. ‘You make me so happy, Oscar,’ I tell him, and he puts his arm round my shoulders and kisses my hair.
‘I mean to,’ he says. ‘This is the second-best gift you could ever have given me.’
I look up at him. ‘What’s the first?’ Maybe I should have gone for racy underwear instead.
He puffs a breath out, and out of nowhere I feel nervous, because his eyes are intense and he’s moved from kneeling beside me to facing me.
‘I know I’ve asked you this a hundred times before, Laurie, but this time I’m not joking or laughing or messing around.’ His dark eyes are damp as he holds my hands. ‘I want to take you back there. But this time I want it to be with you as my wife. I don’t want to wait any longer. I love you and I want you with me for ever. Will you marry me?’
‘Oscar …’ I’m reeling. He kisses the backs of my hands and then looks at me fearfully.
‘Say yes, Laurie. Please say yes.’
I look at him, and there in front of me, on his knees, I see my next stepping stone. Oscar Ogilvy-Black, my husband-to-be.
‘Yes. I say yes.’
Jack
‘Why did he think Luke was your “boyf”?’ I make twatty air quotes round the last word, my back against the fridge.
Sarah shrugs it off. ‘I don’t know. It was just a mistake, Jack. Forget it.’
I look away from her, nodding. ‘Maybe it was. But let’s face it, Sarah, you and my Aussie hero have become pretty pally of late, haven’t you?’
She sighs and looks at the floor. ‘Not now, okay?’
‘Not now?’ I half laugh as I parrot her words, turning them over out loud for consideration. ‘What not now, Sarah? Let’s not argue at Oscar’s party or let’s not talk about the fact that you’re spending so much time with some random bloke who picked my phone up while I was unconscious?’
I’m not proud of how ungrateful that made me sound or how seedy it probably made Sarah feel.
‘I’m not.’ Her chin comes up, but her eyes tell me she’s not being completely honest, with me or with herself. ‘Get down off your high horse, will you?’ she says. ‘I haven’t done anything with Luke or with anyone else and you damn well know it. I wouldn’t do that to you. But, Jack …’ Her eyes fill suddenly, unexpectedly, with tears. ‘This isn’t the time or place for this conversation. It’s too important.’
‘Sure,’ I say, but I’m not ready to let it go, because that text did not sound innocent. ‘Would you like me to leave the room so you can reply?’
I know I should leave it, but we’ve been tip-toeing around the truth for a long time now and, for whatever reason, tonight seems to be the moment it’s finally going to trip us up. It’s not just about the text, it’s everything.
‘You know something, Jack? I will reply to him. I’ll reply because, unlike you, he actually takes the time to message me.’
‘I message you,’ I say, although I know I’m on shaky ground.
‘Once in a blue moon if you want a shag or you’ve forgotten something at work,’ she says.
‘What do you expect, love notes?’
I know I sound like a cock, but surely she realizes I don’t have time at the moment? She’s hardly much better.
‘You know what? Fine. You want me to be honest, I’ll be honest. I’ve thought about it, about Luke, in that way. He makes me laugh and he listens to me. He notices me, Jack. You don’t, and you haven’t for a long time now. All you notice is yourself.’
Luke’s a fucking hyena, I want to say, waiting to pick over the bones of our relationship.
‘I notice you.’ I’m suddenly breathless, because one careless comment from a stranger at a party has turned out to be the lit flame to the last thread tethering us together. Slow, threatening slicks of realization that this is it slide through the soles of my boots, up my legs, into my body, freezing me to the spot when I know I should reach out and hold her. This has been coming for a long time, hovering on the seat beside us when we watch a movie, at an empty chair at the next table when we go out for dinner, standing in the corner of the bedroom as we sleep.
‘You need to actually be there, to listen,’ she says. ‘You haven’t been there for a long time, Jack. Not before the accident, and certainly not after.’
We stare at each other across Oscar’s fancy kitchen, afraid of what happens next, and then Oscar’s brother rolls in waving his empty punch cup in Sarah’s direction.
Ever the trained professional, she switches her smile on and says something chirpy to him as she reaches for the ladle. I press pause, watch her in action, and then let myself out into the garden for some air.
‘You shouldn’t be out here without a coat.’
Sarah sits down beside me on the garden bench ten minutes later and hands me a beer. She’s right. It’s bitter tonight and I’ll know about it in my shoulder tomorrow, but right now it’s preferable to the heat and forced bonhomie inside the flat.
‘We could just forget all about our conversation back there,’ she says, her knee touching mine on the bench as she sips her red wine. That’s my girl. She might be plying everyone else with punch, but she’s sticking to the good stuff. She’s one of the most stylish women I’ve ever known, and one of the very, very best.
‘But do you want to, Sar?’ I ask her. Something in me can’t help it. I don’t want to ask her – and yet I have to. ‘Do you want to pretend?’
She stays silent for a while, looking into her wine glass. Then she closes her eyes and I study her profile; so dear to me, so familiar. Tears glitter on her lashes.
‘Sarah, it’s okay to say it,’ I say, gentle now because this is going to hurt us both. You don’t throw yourself over a cliff and walk away uninjured.
‘How will it ever be okay?’ she says. She sounds about twelve years old. I put my beer down on the floor and turn to face her.
‘Because you’re you.’ Her hair falls over her face and I smooth it back behind her ear. ‘You’re marvellous, beautiful you.’
Tears run down her face. ‘And you’re you. Stubborn, gorgeous you.’
For a long time now I haven’t felt like a good man; this might be the most decent thing I’ve done for Sarah in months. I just wish it didn’t hurt so damn much.
‘We were good though, weren’t we?’ She reaches out for my hand, her cold fingers wrapped round mine.
I can see her now, leaning on that stop button in the lift until I’d agreed to ask her out to lunch.
‘Really good, Sar. Close to perfect, for a while.’
‘Close is enough for some people,’ she says, ‘for a lot of people. The world is full of close-to-perfect couples.’ She’s wavering, searching my face. I get that. I’m wavering too. I can’t imagine what my life will be like without her in it. Who I will be.
‘Is it enough for you?’ I ask, and I swear if she says yes then I’m going to take her home, take her to bed and let it be enough for me too.
She can’t answer me. Not because she doesn’t know what to say, but because she knows that once the words are out there they can’t be unsaid.
She leans against me and rests her head on my shoulder. ‘I always thought we’d love each other for ever, Jack.’
‘We will,’ I tell her, and I feel her nod.
‘I don’t want to say goodbye,’ she whispers.
‘Let’s not do it yet,’ I say. ‘Just sit here with me for a bit longer.’ I hold her for the last time. ‘I’ll always be proud of you, Sar. I’ll see you on the news, and I’ll think there she is, that dazzling girl who changed my life.’ I’m not too proud to say I’m crying too.
‘And I’ll hear you talking on the radio, and I’ll think there he is again, that brilliant man who changed my life,’ she says.
‘See?’ I wipe her eyes with my thumb. ‘We can’t leave each other, not even if we try. I’ll always be in the background of your life, and you’ll always be in mine. We’ve been friends for too long to stop now.’
We sit there for a while longer, huddled together, watching as the first flakes of snow drift down from the midnight sky. There are no rings to give back, no possessions to tussle over, no kids to hand over in blustery car parks. Just two people, about to part ways.
One of us has to be the one to do it – be the one who gets up and leaves – and I know it needs to be me. She’s been the strong one for too long; I have to leave her here under Laurie’s protection. For a second I hug her to me, feeling the absolute impossibility of it. Every part of my body wants to stay here. Then I kiss her hair, and I get up and walk away.