Worst Idea Ever

by Jane Fallon

  I nodded. ‘I didn’t want to tell you till I was sure. Just in case, you know, I’d got it wrong and then you thought badly of him for no reason.’

  ‘What a bastard. I can’t believe it.’

  ‘Me neither.’ I filled her in on the past few days. She reached out a hand and took one of mine. ‘Oh my God, you poor thing …’ It was such a relief to finally be able to talk to her about it. I needed her advice, her unequivocal support.

  ‘If he won’t even have the decency to admit it then … well …’ she said, filling the kettle for the third time. I felt sick from caffeine.

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I just don’t get it. If he wants to be with someone else why not just tell me? Then at least we can start to work out where to go from here.’

  ‘Let’s say for a minute you’re right … maybe he’s just too eaten up by guilt. He can’t face seeing you …’

  ‘Or he doesn’t care any more.’

  She thought about that for a second. ‘Shit. I’ll kill him. Really, though.’

  ‘I’m finding it so hard to … It’s like it’s all been a lie.’

  ‘Do you think …’ She looked at the floor as if she might find the words there or perhaps she just couldn’t look me in the eye. ‘Maybe this is him. What he does. I mean … maybe Felicity wasn’t a one-off …’

  ‘I know,’ I said quietly. ‘Could you ever have imagined him doing it again?’

  She shook her head emphatically. ‘No. I mean he’s always been a bit of a flirt but …’

  Has he? I’ve never thought of Nick as being the slightest bit flirtatious. Maybe when I wasn’t around. Maybe all my female friends have been fighting off his attentions for years, commiserating with each other about the awkward position it put them in and how sorry they felt for me. I was starting to wonder if I knew my husband at all. I said as much to Lydia.

  ‘Don’t over-analyse it,’ she said.

  I was wrestling with the idea of talking to Lou. And then, if that got me nowhere, Siobhan. Appealing to their better nature. Telling them that all I wanted was the truth; I wasn’t looking for a fight. It would be humiliating but what the hell. I never had to see either of them again.

  ‘Why would you put yourself through that?’ Lydia said when I told her. ‘Who cares which one of them it is? You’ll find out eventually. If it’s true …’ she added hastily.

  I nodded, unconvinced. ‘You’re right.’

  ‘Listen, I was thinking. Do you want me to speak to him? Maybe I can persuade him to talk to you? Or, if not, maybe he’ll tell me what he’s up to, what he’s intending to do?’

  I thought about it for a second. Lydia and Nick have always got on in a way that Dom and I just don’t. They’re similar in lots of ways: kind, fair, empathetic. Lydia still was at least.

  ‘Would you? I don’t want to put you in an awkward position.’

  She shook her head. ‘Not at all. What have you got to lose?’

  I leaned over and gave her a hug, feeling her bony ribs. ‘I love you,’ I said.

  She squeezed me back. ‘You too. It’ll be OK. If the worst comes to the worst we can be two sad old spinsters doing jigsaws together.’

  ‘Don’t knock jigsaws,’ I said, managing a half-laugh. ‘Oh,’ I added as a thought occurred to me. ‘Do you want to come to the awards with me? No way am I taking Nick along now. Not that I imagine he’d want to … I mean, I know it’s a bit of a busman’s holiday …’

  ‘No! I’ve never been to an awards do! Aldwych Press Reference Division do not get nominated for awards. Ever. And even if they did I wouldn’t get to go. Nowhere near important enough. Are you sure?’

  ‘Don’t feel you have to …’ Now I’d asked her I was wondering if it was an insensitive thing to do. Rubbing her face into it.

  ‘I want to. It’s ages since we had a proper night out. Besides, I can Instagram the shit out of it.’

  ‘That’s my girl,’ I said, giving her another hug.

  Once she left – when I insisted I’d be fine and she needed some time for herself to get ready for work the next day – I sat down and weighed up the evidence. Lydia’s comment about Nick being a flirt, being a different person when I wasn’t around, had thrown me. Did I not know him at all, even after all these years? Had he been fooling me all this time? I made a list. What did I actually know? That someone he worked with had told Lydia he was having an affair with a co-worker. Could they be mistaken? Vindictive? There was the trip to Inverness. Obviously he has to visit all the sites all the time, but almost never overnight. Could you go all the way to Inverness for a day of meetings and make it home that night though? It’s a long way. Not a straightforward journey. Why didn’t he tell me who else was at the dinner? And why did he not text me back till the middle of the night? Why was he up so late in the first place? None of it was exactly a smoking gun, I had to admit. Laid out on the table it didn’t sound like it added up to much. Except that I’d been told it was true by someone who knew. I didn’t have much proof and some of it was pretty circumstantial, but that one point was incontrovertible.

  I couldn’t stop myself checking Patricia’s messages every few minutes. Sure enough, at about nine o’clock, just as I was pouring myself a glass of wine, there was Lydia.

  Oh Patricia! Georgia has found out about Nick somehow and they’ve had a huge fight. He’s refusing to admit it and he’s gone to stay somewhere else!! I feel so awful!!

  Despite everything it made me feel better to see how upset she was for me. But I didn’t want her feeling as if she had any responsibility for any of this.

  Oh no, I’m so sorry. Don’t be too hard on yourself though. There’s nothing you could have done. If you’d told her what you’d heard the outcome would have been the same.

  I know, you’re right. But it breaks my heart!! She’s so upset. What a bastard!!! I’m going to speak to him. Make him tell me exactly what he’s up to. She deserves to know the truth at least!!!

  She’s lucky she has you, Patricia wrote. I wanted her to realize how much her friendship meant to me. I wanted to make her feel good about herself. That was what Patricia was supposed to be for, after all.

  Bibi is still expounding on her theme. I know I should fight my corner, plead for Wilbur’s integrity, but all I can come up with is ‘The thing is, he’s a 2014 kind of a wallaby …’

  ‘Exactly!’ She seizes on this, and I know I’ve said the wrong thing. ‘And we need to bring him into the 2020s.’

  ‘I like him as he is,’ I say. The most pointless argument ever. ‘Besides, he’s a boy and he has a pouch. That’s pretty diverse in my eyes.’

  ‘But you’re not our target audience.’

  ‘I’m not four years old, no …’

  Bibi’s voice takes on a supercilious tone. ‘Our target audience is the mums, Georgia.’

  ‘Not the mums and dads? That’s a bit discriminatory,’ I say facetiously. I can’t help it. She brings out the worst in me. I should just shut up and get out of here. Go home and check if my dog has wrecked the house. Talk to my agent. ‘Let me have a think about it,’ I say in an effort to be conciliatory.

  ‘Wonderful. That’s all I ask,’ she says, not meaning it for a second. ‘And maybe think about making the rhymes a bit more sophisticated. Children are much more advanced these days,’ she adds as I’m about to walk out of the door.

  What, like ‘are you having me on’ and ‘you trust-fund moron’, I think but don’t say. Luckily. Because then I remember what else I have to do. I fish around in my bag, produce the copy of Lydia’s manuscript that she left at my house once. I may as well at least do my good deed for the day.

  ‘Could someone look at this … It’s my friend, she’s an illustrator too. She’s looking for a publisher.’

  There’s an awkward silence. It’s not really the done thing to foist someone’s work on your editor unsolicited. And it’s not as if Bibi and I have the kind of relationship where we trade favours. Eventually, ever polite, Bibi stands up and takes it
from me. ‘Of course. Leave it with me.’

  On the way home in a taxi I turn on my phone. It’s the first time Igor’s been left home alone and I installed a Ring camera in the kitchen this morning so I could check up on him if I felt I needed to. I figured he was most likely to be near to his food bowl at all times. There are 489 notifications. I watch the first three: he walks one way, he walks the other way, he walks back again. I don’t have the stomach for 486 more. I skip to the most recent. He walks past, tail wagging. I delete the app.

  I send Nick a message. Are you still staying at Dom’s?

  I wait for what seems like an age.

  Yes, is the only response he sends.

  CHAPTER 20

  I try to distract myself with work. I know I’ve messed up with Bibi and I need to put it right. I can’t afford for her to decide I’m too difficult to work with to be worth it. I know that Lydia is meeting Nick at half past six, though, and it’s all I can do to keep from calling her to check she’s on her way. Apparently he agreed readily when she sent him a text. I can’t decide how to interpret that. That he wants some kind of absolution? That he wants to reinforce his lies?

  I pour myself a glass of wine and at least turn my mind to coming up with more complicated rhymes so I can look as if I’m making an effort, but I get stuck on ‘a set of mugs and some big butt plugs’ which I’m not sure is entirely appropriate for four-year-olds, however sophisticated Bibi might think they are. Maybe I should write an adult Wilbur. Take him out in a blaze of glory buying guns and ketamine and having a three-way with his marsupial friends Olga and Walter. Blow up my whole career before it dies a slow death on its own. I down my wine, pour another. Lydia promised to phone as soon as she leaves the pub. I check my mobile. Twenty to seven. It won’t be for ages yet. She’s barely just arrived. I picture her confronting him. No, not confronting, that’s not a Lydia move. Calmly putting the case for the prosecution and then stubbornly refusing to accept his woolly answers. Lydia is a quiet powerhouse. He won’t see her coming.

  Five minutes later my mobile bursts into life. I yelp with surprise; Igor howls. I grab it up only to see it’s Anne Marie. I think about not answering: I don’t want to be engaged when Lydia calls. But I could use the distraction. And besides, I haven’t spoken to her for a couple of days so I may as well update her on what’s going on.

  ‘Nick’s moved out?’ she says as soon as I say hello. Clearly she doesn’t need much updating.

  ‘He’s staying at Dom’s. How did you know?’

  ‘Harry called him this afternoon. Has it got that bad? What’s happened?’

  ‘What did he tell Harry?’

  ‘That you were having a few problems. No details. Has he admitted it then?’

  ‘No.’ I talk her through it, repetitively stroking Igor’s ears – my furry stress balls – as I talk.

  ‘Oh, Georgia,’ she says sadly once I finish. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘It’s …’ I say. ‘I don’t understand it. How we’ve got to this …’

  ‘It’s interesting that he’s at Dom’s and not at hers. Maybe she’s already living with someone.’

  I’ve thought about this, but then why – if Lou or Siobhan were married or whatever – would she be telling her colleagues about her new relationship? ‘Maybe. Or maybe it’s not even serious. Maybe he’s willing to lose everything for someone he doesn’t even want to take it further with. God, that’s even more depressing.’

  ‘The grass isn’t always greener … Harry said he seemed miserable.’

  ‘Good,’ I say. ‘That makes two of us.’

  ‘Lydia will get it out of him,’ Anne Marie says. She and Lyds are so different on the surface but they have the same values underneath. The same bullshit detectors built in.

  I nod. ‘I hope so. She’s my last resort.’

  CHAPTER 21

  Lydia pats down her hair, using the screen of her phone as a mirror. The snow has melted, replaced by biting rain, and she got soaked walking the ten steps from the cab to the front door of the pub. She thought about going to the toilets and giving herself a proper once-over but she’s already nabbed the best table – in the corner by the window, a two so no one could join them. Near enough to the roaring fire for it to be warming, but not so near that after the first few minutes of relief you started to feel as if your face was melting. She hadn’t even paused to buy a drink once she spotted it, just in case someone else snatched it as she waited – the pub was crowded with after-work drinkers – and now she doesn’t want to risk either losing it again or having whatever she left as a placeholder (her coat? A scarf could be ignored or tossed aside) stolen, so that would have to wait. Hopefully he’ll be here soon.

  She’d been surprised that Nick had agreed to come so readily. They’d been friends for over twenty years, of course, but never outside of the axis of him and Georgia. She could count the number of occasions she had spent time alone with him on one hand, although they had all holidayed together often in the early days. Even after the kids came along they had still always invited her but she hadn’t wanted to end up as ‘poor Auntie Lydia’ tagging along like a spare part, so she’d started to make excuses. But he’d said yes immediately. Offered to leave work pretty much straightaway and meet her wherever. She’d picked a pub where she thought no one would know them. They needed the chance to talk undisturbed.

  She looks up just as he walks in. He looks pale, as if he hasn’t been sleeping. Which, presumably, he hasn’t, given his life is falling apart. As if he’s lost weight. It suits him in that annoying way that some people look better when misery has rubbed off their perfectly smooth edges. He’s wearing a coat totally unsuited to the rain. Wool. No umbrella. She watches as he runs a hand backwards through his thick hair, flicking off the drops. Looks around. Smiles hesitantly when he sees her.

  She stands up and offers him a hug. Doesn’t even care that his coat soaks her top.

  ‘How are you doing?’ she says. ‘Actually, let me get us a drink first. Lager?’

  He nods. ‘Thanks.’

  He slides into the seat opposite hers and she pats his shoulder lightly as she passes. It takes an age to get served. She feels invisible next to the pushy young men and flirtatious young women jostling for the barman’s attention. She looks over to where Nick is sitting, head low, staring at something on his phone.

  ‘I was next,’ she says forcefully as soon as the barman hands a tall lad his change. She’s usually the last person to be pushy. She’s all passive aggression and simmering grudges. Her lack of assertiveness has always annoyed her. She’s full of opinions and ideas but most of the time too intimidated to express them out loud. Which is odd because she finds it easy to make connections with people, to strike up acquaintances. She’d thought about going on a seminar once – ‘Claim Your Place in the World’ – but when she’d looked more closely at the literature she’d worried it might be the gateway to a cult. Lately, though, she’s started to feel as if life has begun to pass her by and she hasn’t achieved any of the things she set out to achieve. It’s time to stand up and take what she wants.

  To her surprise it works and she’s served next, much to the – loudly expressed – disgust of a woman a few feet along the bar who was definitely there first. Lydia gives her order and then looks down, avoiding making eye contact with the irate woman. Being more assertive is one thing. Getting into a fist fight in order to get your alcohol three minutes sooner is quite another.

  ‘God, I didn’t think it would be this rammed,’ she says as she places Nick’s beer in front of him.

  ‘It’s fine,’ he says. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘So,’ she says. Here goes. ‘Tell me what’s going on.’

  ‘I was hoping you might be able to tell me,’ Nick says, drawing circles on the table with his finger. ‘Where has this even come from?’

  Lydia lets out a long sigh. ‘I have no idea.’

  He looks up at her, eyes pleading. ‘You believe me, don’t you?’


  She hesitates. She wants him to hear what she’s saying. Really hear it. ‘Of course,’ she says gently. ‘Of course I do. I keep telling her she’s crazy. That there’s no way … but she’s convinced …’

  He sighs, clearly relieved. ‘I don’t even know where she got the idea from. It’s not like I’ve done anything different – started going away more or drinking after work. None of that.’

  Lydia considers this for a minute although she already knows exactly what she’s going to say. ‘She told me there are rumours. Someone said something—’

  He interrupts. ‘And she’s willing to blow up our marriage because of a rumour? What happened to trusting me and believing me when I tell her it isn’t true?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve tried to tell her …’

  He lifts up his glass. Puts it down again without taking a sip. ‘If someone told me something about her and she said it wasn’t true I’d believe her. No questions asked.’

  ‘It might just be a kneejerk overreaction. Because of, you know …’

  Nick shakes his head. ‘It’s been years. Six years. We’re over it.’

  ‘Do you ever really get past something like that, though? I mean, I’m not trying to make you feel bad …’

  He sighs loudly. ‘She’s decided it’s true. She won’t even hear me out.’

  ‘Like I said, I’ve tried to make her see sense …’ The rain starts lashing at the window outside. It makes the pub feel even more cosy, more of a haven.

  ‘Who’s even telling her this crap in the first place?’ he says, angry suddenly.

  Lydia sighs. ‘Probably someone with an axe to grind. There’s no point worrying about who it is, you’ll drive yourself mad.’

  ‘It must be someone … Oh, she was talking about you knowing one of my colleagues. Did you introduce her to someone I work with? Maybe it’s them. Maybe they told her some made-up story …’ He runs out of steam.

  She arranges her face carefully. She’s been waiting for this. ‘At Diamond Leisure? I don’t think I know anyone …’