16 February
Laurie
‘I made us some sandwiches.’
It’s been a week since the night of the party. Since Oscar proposed, and Sarah and Jack split up.
The party was a roaring success, much aided by Sarah’s punch of course. Even Fliss had a cup for the birthday toast, then half an hour later she shook her hair out of its neat chignon and asked if anyone had a cigarette. Gerry almost broke his leg in his haste to fetch her another cup of punch. I hadn’t intended to tell everyone about our engagement until we’d told our parents, but as soon as we stepped out of the bedroom, someone called ‘We know what you’ve been doing!’ and Oscar couldn’t hold it in. ‘Yes. Proposing!’ he shouted, and everyone clapped and kissed us.
Sarah was the first person I wanted to tell, of course. She cried; at the time I thought they were happy tears, punch-induced emotion. Even the fact that Jack had left the party early wasn’t alarm bell enough, probably because I was too caught up in my own happy bubble to realize the devastation that had occurred out in the garden. Heroically, Sarah didn’t mention that she had some big, devastating news of her own. In fact, she didn’t tell me at all. Jack did. He called me yesterday to find out how she was because she hadn’t been answering his calls and when I asked why he had to tell me. I waited for her until she stumbled out of work, brought her home with me, and now she’s here huddled on our sofa under a blanket.
‘Delancey Street Special,’ I say, handing her the plate of sandwiches while I slide under the blanket next to her. Oscar has tactfully made himself scarce for the weekend, leaving us free to watch rubbish movies, drink restorative red wine and talk, if she wants to. She looked as if she’d barely eaten all week when she came out of work yesterday; a ghost Sarah.
‘It’s been a long time since we had these.’
‘Years,’ I say. She’s right. All our dates in London seem to have been rushed meetings in fancy restaurants or cocktail bars – I miss our cosy nights in. ‘I haven’t forgotten how to make them though.’
She opens one and peers inside. ‘You remembered the mayo,’ she says in a small voice. I wish she’d pick one up to eat. ‘Jack never really liked them. Not a blue cheese fan.’
I nod, unsure what to say because I’m more than a tiny bit furious with Jack O’Mara. He didn’t make a great job of explaining to me what happened with Sarah, something about realizing that good enough is not enough, that they were each other’s ninety per cent. I was probably sharper than I should have been; I said that holding out for one hundred per cent was unrealistic, a dangerous and childish experiment which was highly likely to result in a lifetime of meal deals for one. Sarah still hasn’t told me exactly what happened, but I’m trying to let her tell me in her own time.
‘All the more for us.’ I take the plate from her, but hold it towards her so she can help herself before I do the same and put it down on the sofa next to me. She slants me a ‘don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing’ look.
‘I’m not going to stop eating and wither away,’ she says, even though she doesn’t take a bite. ‘You don’t need to worry about me.’
‘You know that’s one of the dumbest things you’ve ever said, right?’ I eat and nod towards her sandwich that she should too. She rolls her eyes like a teenager, but obliges me all the same by taking a tiny bite.
‘There. Happy now?’
I sigh and give up on the sandwiches in favour of wine. Alcohol is more useful than cheese in a situation like this anyway.
‘You should probably speak to Jack. Or text him at least,’ I say, because for the past hour he’s been lighting my phone up with endless messages to see if she’s okay. ‘I’ve told him you’re with me. He’s worried about you.’
‘I don’t know what to say to him.’ She puts her head back against the sofa and tucks the blanket underneath her armpits as if she’s in bed. Given that Oscar’s sofas are the reclining type and we’re close to full tilt, we pretty much are. ‘More than three years together, and I have no clue what to say.’
‘You don’t have to talk to him. Just text him. Let him know you’re okay.’ Though I realize I don’t know the full story yet; he might deserve to wallow in it instead.
‘I will,’ she says. ‘I’ll do it later.’ She sighs, then asks me how he seemed.
‘Worried?’ I say. ‘He didn’t tell me very much, probably thought it was up to you.’
‘I don’t want you to feel stuck in the middle, Lu. You don’t have to cut him out of your life too.’
The irony of her words isn’t lost on me. I’ve been stuck in the middle of Sarah and Jack for years.
‘Are you going to cut him out?’
She picks at a loose thread of cotton on the blanket. ‘I think I have to. For a while, at least. I don’t know how to be with him as anything other than us, you know? I seem to have spent the last twelve months resenting him for one thing or another, and now I don’t have to do that any more and I don’t know what to do with myself.’
‘Twelve months is a long time to be miserable,’ I say, surprised that she’s been unhappy for a whole year without me realizing. I mean, I knew they were both busy and stressed before Jack’s accident, and that Jack had been a jerk at times, but don’t all couples go through a bad patch? I feel like a crappy friend, floating around obliviously in my own love bubble.
‘I’ve blamed him in my head for everything that’s gone wrong, Lu. For the fact that we saw less and less of each other, for how much we’d grown apart or been pushed apart by our different lives, perhaps. The accident should have been a wake-up call, but it just made everything worse. And then I blamed him for that too – for wallowing, for not bouncing back.’ She looks so downcast. ‘Easier than blaming myself, I guess. But I’ve hardly been around much either. I wish I’d tried harder to get through to him.’
I realize I’ve lumped the blame squarely on Jack’s shoulders myself since he called; he said nothing to suggest the break-up was in any way Sarah’s choice. I mean, I know these things are never black and white, but he left me with the impression that he’d called time because she didn’t quite measure up to his mythical one hundred per cent. I’m both relieved and disquieted to know it wasn’t exactly like that.
‘I don’t suppose blame is really what’s needed right now,’ I say. ‘You just need to look after yourself, make sure you’re okay.’
‘I miss him already.’
I nod and swallow, because I miss him too. It’s odd because I don’t see him all that much these days, but he’s always been there in the background. Sarah and Jack. Jack and Sarah. It’s become part of my vocabulary, forced at first, inevitable in the end. And now it’s just Sarah or Jack. The idea of him drifting away now they are no longer together makes me sadder than I know how to articulate.
‘Maybe after a while you’ll both feel differently? Maybe you just need a bit of a break?’ I say, feeling like a kid whose parents are divorcing.
She half smiles, far away, as if she knows it’s fanciful. ‘We won’t. Or I won’t, anyway.’ She swirls her wine before drinking some. ‘Do you know how I know?’
I shake my head. ‘No.’
‘Because there’s a part of me that’s relieved.’ She doesn’t look relieved. She looks more bereft than I’ve ever seen her. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I feel as if someone literally cut my heart out of my body. I don’t even know how life works without Jack in it, but there’s this bit of me –’ she breaks off and looks at her hands – ‘this bit of me that feels relieved. Relieved, because being in love with Jack has always been, to one degree or another, bloody hard work.’
I don’t know what to say, so I just let her talk.
‘Oh, he’s so lovely and, God, he’s good-looking, but when I think back our entire relationship has been a million tiny compromises, his or mine, so our differences weren’t big enough to pull us apart. It’s been a constant effort, and I don’t know if love should feel like that, you know? I don’t mean making an effort for each other … I mean making an effort to be someone ever so slightly different to who we really are. I watch you and Oscar together, and it seems to come so naturally to you both, as if you don’t have to try because you just fit.’
It’s in that moment I know there’s no going back for Jack and Sarah. I never realized – they made their love look so easy. And I’m quietly devastated; for them, mostly, but for me too. It feels as if part of my life is splintering away, floating off into space.
‘What can I do?’ I ask her.
Her eyes fill with tears. ‘I don’t know.’
I wait and let her cry it out on my shoulder, stroking her hair.
‘You c-could d-do one thing.’
‘Yes, anything.’ I’m desperate to do anything I can; I hate this feeling of powerlessness.
‘Will you still be his friend, Lu? Please? I’m scared he’s going to shut everyone out again.’
‘Of course,’ I say. ‘You’re my best friend, but I care for him too. I’ll keep an eye on him. If that’s what you want.’
I put my arms round her and she rests her head on my shoulder. I hear her breathing slow as she falls asleep. As I close my eyes too, I remember the first day I met Sarah, and the first time I saw Jack, and how very tangled and complicated our lives have become over the years. We are a triangle, but our sides have kept changing length. Nothing has ever quite been equal. Perhaps it’s time to learn how to stand on our own, rather than lean on each other.