The beginning of March
Today felt good. Berkeley had loved the screening of the completed ad campaign. Jack had even walked by my desk and said a swift, ‘Good work’. I think probably because it would have looked odd if he hadn’t.
But he had to crack and talk to me sometime – he couldn’t cut me forever. People were noticing. Three people had said, ‘What did you do to Jack?’ Of course it had to be my fault, because Jolly Jack had sun shining out of his arse.
I keyed in the code to get into the house and went to the post boxes. It was obvious I had some because the letters were only half-jammed in the slot. I opened the box with my key and pulled them out. The folded-over part that sealed two of them looked really creased and they were torn, like they’d been opened and stuck back down again. That was weird. The third one was a hand-written letter from my nan. She preferred snail mail… That envelope looked odd too. There were two creases along the top like tramlines, as though it had been opened and then resealed.
Maybe someone was checking the post for cash, or looking to steal identities.
Tomorrow I’d stick a note on the box for the postman, telling him to check the letters couldn’t be pulled back out.
‘Hello, Ivy.’ Greg. I swear the guy spent his evening looking out of the window watching for when I got home. ‘You alright? You look ruffled.’
Ruffled… ‘Why?’ Would he have?
‘You look a bit pale and confused. Has something happened?’
‘I’m okay.’ I didn’t want him to know that he’d got to me if it was him who’d opened my post.
‘Sure?’
‘Yes. I’m just tired. It’s been a long day.’
‘I keep telling you, you work too hard.’
‘Yeah.’ My voice was probably rude. I turned to go upstairs.
My hands shook. It felt creepy, like I’d been assaulted or something. Who would look at my post? What if it was the postman? How could I prevent it, then? When I got up to my flat I threw the letters on the bed and hung my bag up on the back of the door. Then stripped off my coat and shoved my hat and gloves in the pocket before I found my phone. My heart pumped like it was trying to shift an ocean around my body.
‘Hello, sweetheart. How are you?’
‘Hi, Mum. Something weird’s happened. It’s freaked me out.’
‘What’s happened?’
‘It looks like someone’s opened my letters.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes. It’s weird isn’t it?’
‘Tell the police, love. Don’t ring 999 and block the emergency number, but call 101 and tell them, and don’t touch the letters so they can take fingerprints – in case it turns into anything. Maybe it’s happening to lots of people.’
I looked at the letters. I’d already touched them. ‘Now you’re really scaring me.’
‘Then why don’t you come home tomorrow? We haven’t seen you since your birthday. You can get a train in the morning and go back Sunday evening.’
I took a breath. The idea made me homesick and there was no reason not to go home. Especially since Rick and I had begun tiptoeing our way into friendship, so it didn’t matter if I saw his parents. He and I had been out for a drink twice now. We’d talked, laughed and got along okay – as well as we used to in the beginning, when we’d just been friends.
‘Alright, I’ll try and get there for midday.’
‘That would be lovely, sweetheart. We’ll look forward to seeing you. But on Monday you’re to take those letters into a police station.’
‘Yes okay, Mum. I’ll see you tomorrow. I’ll text you when the train leaves London.’
‘Bye, darling.’
I hung up and put the TV on – on the news. Then looked at what food I had in the cupboard. But I wasn’t really that hungry after the thing with the post. My stomach was an upside-down mess. I pulled out a can of baked beans and put a slice of bread into the toaster. I ate sitting on the bed. I didn’t have a table or even a chair; just the bed, my tiny kitchenette, the TV and me.
The intercom buzzed as I finished eating and Emmerdale came on. I jumped. Shit. Who…? No one ever called on me. I always went to other people’s.
I put my plate in the sink, then went over to the intercom and pressed the button. ‘Who is it?’ I listened to the crackle from the speaker, as though this was a horror movie, expecting some crazy person to answer with a deep laugh.
‘It’s Jack. Can I come up?’
‘Why?’ If I sounded defensive, it was because I was defensive. What the fuck was he here for? He had control of my life in the office, but I wasn’t going to let him start playing his Captain Control games with me at home. He couldn’t suddenly turn up. But he had… It was Jack playing everything his way again.
‘Because we need to talk.’
‘We don’t. We’ve had plenty of opportunity to talk at work. You chose not to speak to me. So, no, I don’t want you to come up here and talk. Go away. I’ll see you at work on Monday.’
I lifted my hand off the sound. The intercom buzzed again. I ignored it. My phone rang. I didn’t answer it. It buzzed with a message.
‘Come on, Ivy. You know I can’t talk to you about personal stuff in the office. Don’t leave me standing out here like an idiot.’
‘Maybe you are an idiot. You’ve acted like one since New Year.’
‘Look, hey, calm down. I didn’t know you were so pissed off about it, otherwise I’d have come over sooner. You never said.’
‘You don’t speak to me, so when was I meant to say?’
There was no reply.
I tossed my phone down, realising that after weeks of being brilliantly cool, calm and professional, and acting like I hadn’t been bothered, I’d blown it all and given myself away. Bum. I’d sounded as pathetic as Rick last year. I should have let Jack talk and looked bored. Or made him talk through the intercom and laughed.
Footsteps struck the stairs outside and then someone knocked on my door.
‘Ivy?’
Shit, someone had let him in. What the fuck was a security system for, for God sake? That was probably how whoever had tampered with my post got in.
I got up and reached out, grasping the door handle, so if he tried to turn it I could stop him getting in. But he couldn’t get in unless I opened the lock anyway. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I want to spend the weekend with you.’
What a prick! I opened the door. ‘Fuck off. I’m not having sex with you, Jack.’
‘What’s wrong with you?’
‘What do you think? You haven’t spoken to me as an individual since you were last in this room. You can’t come up here expecting sex. What’s wrong with you?’
‘Let me come in, so we can talk?’
‘So you can run your sales pitch and twist everything out of shape, so it turns out your way, like it did before. No. Please? Go away.’
His arm lifted and his elbow rested on the doorjamb by my head. It meant I couldn’t shut the door. It was an arrogant, domineering gesture – completely alpha-male and completely Jack – and, annoyingly, it twisted something in my stomach and thrust a memory of having sex with him into my head. A memory of the last night in the big house. ‘Go away. I don’t want to talk to you if you can’t talk to me at work. Oh, no, I forgot, there was one time you spoke to me, when you wanted sex and I was working late and there was your good work comment today.’
‘I’ve been busy.’
Too busy to even text after having left me in bed… I didn’t say that, it sounded petulant, like Rick had been with me. I needed Jack to think that it didn’t matter. ‘I don’t really care, Jack.’
His arm dropped and then his hands slid into the pockets of his leather jacket. He wanted sex, that was all. Maybe that was even the reason he’d complimented my success at work. That was a shitty thought. Everything he’d done since Christmas kept spoiling my memories of Christmas.
‘I couldn’t see you; Sharon’s lawyer has a private detective watching me and I’ve been fighting for a legal agreement to see Daisy, so I didn’t want to mess it up. But I‘ve been seeing Daisy every Sunday for a couple of hours since the New Year and now I have a legal agreement. I get her every other weekend. So this weekend I’m free, before the new arrangement starts.’
And you want sex. I stepped back and sat on the bed. I didn’t like his excuses. Excuses were a sales pitch in the opposite form – reasons to forgive me, one, two, three. ‘I’m not free anyway.’
‘Why?’
‘I’m going to see my parents.’
Jack had stepped into the room. He leaned against the wall behind him. ‘I was going to take you somewhere on the bike.’
‘No thanks.’
‘Why are you being awkward? This isn’t just about sex, Ivy.’
‘I’m not being awkward. You’re being controlling. Everything gets played your way, come to my cottage, come into the office and celebrate New Year with me… Don’t text me, people might know—’
‘I only said don’t text me at work. You could have contacted me in the evening, but you didn’t.’
‘I wasn’t the one who said ‘don’t text’. I said something; you shut me down. The next move was yours. But anyway, I don’t want to know what you have to say, I don’t care. I have stuff going on in my life too. I’d rather you left.’
His brow furrowed. Had he really thought I’d agree to go away with him?
Maybe he had, because he was a control freak.
‘I didn’t know I’d done anything that wrong. I was playing it cool, as we’d agreed. I thought you might have moved on but…’
‘You haven’t even looked at me at work; you asked Phil to work with me so you didn’t have to. Yes, that was really cool. Thanks. And everyone’s assumed it’s my fault. They all think I’ve insulted you somehow.’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I can’t deal with you, that’s all—’
‘Deal with me… You don’t need to. I can—’
‘I keep saying the wrong thing. I knew I would. That’s why I haven’t tried talking to you in the office. I can’t deal with what I think about you, that’s what I mean. I think about us having sex. I can’t be professional with you. So it was easier to not work with you, sorry. You’ve still done well.’
‘Like I said. Thank you.’
His hands slipped out of his pockets, then he picked up the post and moved it so he could sit next to me on the bed, uninvited. His elbows rested on his knees, but he didn’t look at me, he looked at the floor. I noticed his heel tapping. I wondered if he’d had a joint since leaving work. He was still wound up.
‘I’m sorry I’ve upset you. I’m not good at chasing women. I don’t usually have to chase them. But we got on at Christmas. I enjoyed your company. Now I have a weekend free… I’ve been debating with myself all week how to approach you, and I didn’t want to text. So I’m here.’ His head turned to look at me, but he didn’t straighten up. ‘I’d like to see you again. I’d like to see you for more than one weekend. We could spend every other weekend together if you want—’
‘Not if you’re going to treat me like shit at work, and not if all you want is sex. I’m not into being used like that.’
He straightened up, his hands falling on to his thighs. ‘If I promise to be more relaxed at work, will you come out with me? No sex required.’
My innards jumped, back-flipping at the chance of being with Jack again, even after all these weeks of being ignored. It made me loathe my bad side. But I wasn’t going to forgive him just like that, or let him think he could come and pick me up, like a takeaway order, whenever he wanted. ‘I told you I’m busy this weekend. Maybe in a fortnight, when I can see whether you’re really sorry.’ I lifted my eyebrows at him.
‘And now?’
‘You can go.’
‘Really…’
I bet no other woman had told him, and all his raunchy, bossy, masculine energy, to fuck off. ‘You can’t order me in when you want, Jack, just because you have a weekend free. Not like New Year’s Eve. The way you treated me then was mean. I’m not the type you’re used to.’ A prostitute.
He stood up. ‘I know. So what is this? Am I on probation?’
‘You have to earn the opportunity to be on probation. Pass the test in the next two weeks and I might believe you and put you on probation and try you out.’
He smiled. ‘That’s fair, if I get a chance. I’ll see you at work, then.’
‘You might, if you bother looking at me.’
‘I’ll see you at work, Ivy.’
When I shut the door behind him, I pressed my forehead against it, my hand on the handle again. I couldn’t believe he’d come over. I really didn’t need the complication of Jack playing with me again. I’d got over that. But my tummy was turning a dozen somersaults with stupid, blind excitement, from the adrenaline rush Jack always brought with him.
My phone rang.
Jeez, I was Miss Popular tonight.
I picked up my phone and touched the answer icon. ‘Hi, Rick.’
‘You okay? You sound pissed off.’
‘I’m alright. Bad day at work and a bad day with the post. Why did you call? How are you? Mum was telling me this week you’ve had some time off work, are you alright?’
‘I’m fine. The doctor signed me off with stress, that’s all. Work’s been too busy. It was getting to me. I’m only off for a couple of weeks ‘til I get myself sorted. I wondered if you wanted to go for a drink tonight.’
‘I was going to go and see Milly.’ I hadn’t planned it, but after the post and Jack’s visit, I needed to talk to her. ‘Are you feeling really down?’
‘I’ll survive. Sure you don’t want to get together? What about tomorrow?’
‘I’m going home tomorrow. Sorry. Maybe next week.’
‘Okay, let’s make a date for next Friday. I could meet you outside work and we could go out for dinner if you want?’
‘Friday sounds cool, but pick me up here so I can change before we go out and text me and let me know what time.’
‘Okay. I’ll look forward to it. Bye.’
‘See you later.’
I touched the icon to end the call.
Rick and I had become grown up about our breakup, and now Jack and I had become childish.
I sighed. But as I did I looked up Milly’s number, then rang her. ‘Hi. What are you up to?’
‘Steve and I are curled up watching TV and eating Chinese. Why?’
‘Can I come over? I want to talk to you, but if I do, you have to swear not to tell Steve?’
‘Why?’
‘Because it’s about my hot guy from Christmas and Steve might mention it to Rick and that’s not fair on Rick.’
‘Okay, I promise. Come over, we’ll talk in the kitchen, and I’ll turn the TV up so Steve can’t hear.’ She laughed as I heard Steve say something in the background. ‘But give us half an hour to finish eating and then come over.’
‘See you later.’
‘See you in a bit.’
I threw my phone on the bed, had a shower and then dressed up, purely to feel better.
I slipped my coat back on, wrapped a scarf around my neck and put the hat Jack had bought me on. Then went out and locked up. I’d left my bag. I just had my phone and purse in my pockets. I preferred not to carry a bag at night when I was walking alone. To be safer. I still had loads of Rick-like risk-averse habits.
My black-heeled boots clicked on the pavement as I walked along the path. Milly and Steve lived one stop along on the underground. I could walk it but at night I preferred to use the tube. The sound of my heels on the pavement echoed along the quiet street, dancing about the trees, which ran the length of it. My breath steamed in the air.
I heard a noise behind me and looked back. It sounded like someone else walking, but no one was there.
Maybe a cat or a fox had knocked something over.
When I got to the end of the road and turned the corner, I still had a feeling someone was there. I glanced back again. But the street looked empty.
My hands in my pockets, I carried on until I reached the tube station. But I kept looking over my shoulder as I rode the escalator down. I still had the sense that someone was following me. There were about ten people on the escalator; it could be any one of them – there was no one I recognised. But no one seemed to care what I was doing.
Maybe I was jittery because of the thing with the post.
I sat in the tube carriage looking around at everyone. No one was looking at me and yet I still had the sensation when I walked to Milly and Steve’s that someone was behind me.
When I left Milly’s I got Steve to run me home in the car and when I went to the railway station the next day to get to Mum and Dad’s I splashed out on a cab.