The Starter Home

by Bryony Fraser

  ‘Thanks Mum, we’ll get on with digging out your hidden subtext.’ He looked at Zoe. ‘Would you really like to go to Greece?’

  ‘Yeah, I think so. I don’t know if there’s anywhere I wouldn’t like to go, to be fair. As long as it wasn’t on a Foreign Office blacklist, obviously.’

  ‘No erupting volcanoes then.’

  ‘Or actual war zones.’

  ‘Or will.i.am gigs?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Zoe giggled. ‘It’s something for the Christmas newsletter, isn’t it?’

  Linda perked up suddenly. ‘Oh, does your family do one of those too? Well, that is integration, isn’t it? I absolutely love doing them – I start drafting it in September, although Jack and Graham both rib me terribly. But I always say to them, if I don’t do it, it wouldn’t get done.’

  ‘And wouldn’t that be a shame,’ Jack said.

  ‘See what I mean, Zoe? People like it, Jack, even if you don’t. They want to know what’s happening with their friends’ children and spouses.’

  ‘Only so they can feel better about their own lives.’

  Linda tutted at Zoe. ‘They never want to know about dinner parties and Christmas cards until there are no women around to organise it all for them.’

  ‘Mum, maybe we just don’t care about those things in the exact same way you do.’

  ‘Of course you don’t, Jack. But maybe you will. Maybe you’ll care when you’re seventy-two and haven’t seen another human being for a month because your wife has died and your children don’t call and you’ve never bothered to write a Christmas card or invite someone over for a coffee. Maybe you’ll understand then how important “those things” actually are to living in a society.’

  There was a silence as Zoe looked more carefully at Linda, who was panting slightly with her strength of feeling.

  Jack picked his napkin up from the floor. ‘That escalated quickly. I was only talking about those show-off Christmas letters, Mum. I didn’t mean we should all die alone.’

  Linda picked at some imaginary fluff on one jumper sleeve. ‘Well. Maybe you don’t understand that the line between the two isn’t as black and white as you think. Maybe you don’t know everything quite yet, Jack.’

  Zoe gently touched Linda’s hand on the table. Linda jumped. Zoe said, ‘We’re all the same, aren’t we, students? Think we know everything because we’ve been to a few lectures. My mum despairs of me.’

  Linda smiled at her, a warm smile, the first Zoe had seen that evening, and put her hand on top of Zoe’s. ‘Oh, I don’t know. I think there’s hope for a few of you yet.’

  Just then, Graham shambled back from the toilets and slid into his chair.

  Linda pushed her plate back and gestured to a waiter. ‘Right. Pudding, anyone?’

  ‘Alright. Yes, I wasn’t expecting to meet your parents, but no, it wasn’t actually as disastrous as it could have been. I mean, I didn’t have my chosen Meet the Parents Outfit on—’

  ‘You have a specific outfit?’

  ‘Flowery skirt: not too short or I look like I’m the cheating type, not too long or it looks like they’ll never have grandkids. Soft jumper: wow, look how approachable I am, low key and fluffy. Wedge heels: yes, I’m into aesthetics, but not in a way that would ever get in the way of my relationship with your son.’

  Jack had his mouth open. ‘Wow, that’s … that’s awful. And brilliant. And awful.’

  ‘I know. But I just managed in this,’ Zoe said, gesturing at her jeans, t-shirt, leather jacket and battered trainers. ‘This is like the anti-Meet the Parents Outfit.’

  ‘And you still won them over.’

  ‘Did I?’ she said, with a disingenuous eyelash flutter. ‘Little old me?’

  Jack pulled her close. ‘I don’t know how you did it, but yes, you did.’

  ‘Your mum’s not so bad. I don’t think it can be easy, living with your dad like that.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘He never talks! Ever! Does he? Or was it just me? I feel like the poor woman has to keep speaking just to fill that void between them.’

  Jack stepped away. ‘Really? You think there’s a void between them?’

  Zoe took his hand, laughing. ‘I don’t know. I’ve met them once, for one fairly odd dinner. You know them better than I do.’

  ‘I’d honestly never thought about it that way before.’ He looked up at her. ‘That maybe my dad might be hard to live with. I always thought it was my mum who was the difficult one.’

  She kissed him. ‘Either way, we all survived the dinner, didn’t we? It might have been unexpected, but it wasn’t the apocalypse it could have been. Was it?’

  ‘My dad, when they left, actually said to me “She’s nice.”’

  ‘Wow, high praise.’

  ‘I don’t think you understand. That’s like Raymond Blanc saying your bouillabaisse is “quite tasty”.’

  ‘Because he’s such a connoisseur of women?’

  ‘No! It’s like Simon Cowell saying you’ve got a good voice.’

  ‘Because your dad’s made a career out of judging your girlfriends?’

  ‘No!’ Jack was laughing. ‘It just … it means he really means it. That when he says it, someone who never says much about anything, you must really have made an impression.’

  ‘A good one?’

  ‘Yes. He said you were nice, for god’s sake. Approval doesn’t come much higher than that.’

  ‘Well. I’ll make sure to put your father’s approval of me on my CV.’

  ‘And my mum’s.’

  ‘And your mum’s? Bloody hell, I did do well.’

  ‘You did indeed. But if there’s any chance you might be staying over again, please can we stop talking about my parents?’

  ‘Deal. Although now of course you’ve got to meet mine.’

  They were both laughing, but there was a fraction of a second where both their laughs froze. Are we definitely doing this? thought Zoe. Is this it, now?

  She gave Jack a kiss at the side of his mouth, and pulled out of his arms. ‘I’d love to stay another night, but I’ve got an early start in the morning. Thanks, though. I had a nice time.’

  Jack offered a wonky smile, aware too of the oddness they’d accelerated into this evening. ‘Call me?’

  ‘I will,’ she said. ‘I’ll call you tomorrow, maybe.’

  ‘If I’m lucky.’

  She opened his door. ‘Exactly.’

  After she’d pulled the door closed behind her, Jack sat down. For the first time in his life, he could see his future ahead of him. And it looked pretty good.

  On the bus home, Zoe looked at Hot Barman’s number on her phone. What was happening here? Yes, she liked him, yes, they seemed to have a nice time together, and yes, he actually seemed like a decent human being, but they’d known each other less than two weeks and she was talking about introducing him to her family? If nothing else, her sisters would eat him alive.

  She smiled at the thought: that poor boy facing her three sisters. And her parents.

  This was all too fast. She hadn’t ever felt like this with anyone else, this urge to be with them all the time, every day. She’d had the opposite – someone claiming all her time – and she didn’t want to do that to Jack. Tonight she’d had to make herself leave, despite every fibre in her body wanting to stay with him again. But she also knew that this was probably just lust, and she didn’t fancy getting burnt that way. She wouldn’t get hurt again. She was careful now. In a moment of certainty, frustrated by her urge to call him, she deleted his number from her phone: she would have to get over him now.

  Still, it had been interesting to meet his mum and dad. She believed that everyone eventually grew into their parents in some form or another, and couldn’t help wondering what any future wife of Jack would have to look forward to: an unstoppable flow of empty small talk, or an impenetrable wall of silence as he slowly became a ghost haunting their lives. She shuddered.

  It was one of the reasons she
’d always dreaded the idea of marriage: you were bound to someone forever, no matter how completely different a person they became over the decades spent living with them. Her own parents had got round it by never marrying, but living in blissful sin, as they’d say to their four daughters (who thought nothing of their parents’ sin, but who’d wince and howl at the thought of their bliss).

  Zoe quite liked it now, the bloody-mindedness of their refusal to marry in the seventies, and sticking with someone for years and years when no legal documents said you had to. It was touching in a way. But it had meant that for as long as she could remember – ever since she’d asked Mum if she could see her wedding dress, and Mum had sat her down and explained that she and Dad had never wanted to get married like everyone else – Zoe had learned that marriage wasn’t something that was for everyone. And while her head had taught her that lesson growing up, nowadays, her heart felt the same way.

  FIVE

  Now

  Since I’d got back to work after our wedding, school had been frantic. Yet another education rejig was on the cards, which meant our latest student reports had to be rewritten, handed to the pupils, then re-rewritten with their feedback taken into consideration – I’d been in school until ten every night that week. I was looking forward to Friday night in front of the TV, inhaling burritos under a blanket with Jack.When I saw him on Friday morning, I asked him if he fancied the burritos, or something else – my treat, I’d pick it up on the way home.

  ‘Zo, it’s the Henderson party tonight. At the shop? God, we really need to get a calendar up in here.’

  Oh no. I loved Jack’s shop, loved hanging out there with him, looking at his gorgeous shoes and wondering if I could get Dad into any of them. But his staff were another matter. Paisley, Agatha, Jonjo, Gabben, Mint: Mint was the worst, always trying to touch my hair and saying how amazing my skin was. Nooope, no, thank you. I did everything I could to support Jack in his career, but a Henderson party after the week I’d had? To make matters worse, I had a sneaking suspicion that Jessica would be there too. Jessica, the Chief Financial Officer of Gillett – the company which had bought Henderson a few years ago – seemed constantly to watch Jack like he was the last cheeseburger on the grill and she hadn’t eaten in days.

  ‘I’m so sorry – please can I skip this one? It’s been such late nights all this week.’

  Jack looked disappointed. ‘Are you sure you can’t come? Even for a little while?’

  ‘What about if I say I’ll try?’

  ‘That’s a no then.’

  I stepped into him and tried to wrap his arms around me. ‘I said I’ll try.’

  He stepped away. ‘And I know that that means you won’t be there.’

  ‘I don’t know what else you want me to do!’

  ‘You could try actually turning up?’

  ‘Jack!’ I stepped back too, acres of dangerous space opening between us. ‘I’ve had the week from hell. I’m cross-eyed with tiredness. I just want to hang out with you, not your staff with their names and their agendas and their conversation.’

  ‘I’m sorry I’m asking you to hang out with people who have names, Zoe. I’ll be careful to only introduce you to abstract concepts from now on.’ He turned away, heading out of the kitchen.

  ‘I’ll see you later?’ I called after him.

  He opened the front door. ‘I won’t hold my breath.’

  I’d fallen asleep by the time Jack got back that night. After a tense weekend with him, both of us stepping around each other to nip any potential argument in the bud, Benni’s cheerful smile was a welcome sight on Monday morning. Miks, however, gave her a suspicious look. ‘That never bodes well, does it?’ he muttered.

  Benni arrived at my desk. ‘Ah, Zoe, that lab order form you were waiting for has come in. If you’d just like to follow me to my office.’

  Miks lowered his head onto his arms, and in muffled tones, said, ‘You’re so unconvincing. It’s actually depressing.’

  Once I’d closed Benni’s door, I said, ‘Is Miks alright?’

  ‘He’s fine, darling, but I think he and his girlfriend are splitting up. It’s fine, though, he’ll be fine.’

  ‘Mmm. If you say so. What’s this order form I’m meant to ask for?’

  ‘Darling.’ She frowned at me. ‘Now, how much did you mean it when you said marriage wouldn’t change you?’

  ‘This is a really worrying conversation, Benni. A hundred per cent?’

  ‘I’m glad you said that.’ She smiled at me and pushed her computer around so I could see the screen. ‘Check out the Physics teacher who’ll be visiting us from our sister school in Manchester. Part time, but still …’

  On the ‘Our Staff’ page of our Manchester school’s website was the most handsome Physics teacher I had ever laid eyes on. I loved Jack completely, from his wonky toenails to the tip of his sandy beard, but my god: this guy looked like he’d been created in a lab. A lab I would definitely like to experiment in, if things were different. If I was single. He was a young Idris Elba genetically spliced with a sexy librarian.

  ‘I know, right?’ Benni smiled at me.

  I realised I was fanning myself. ‘He is … very refreshing,’ I said, nodding at the screen, my eyes drawn back to him. ‘Not your usual type, though. And I’m a married woman, might I add.’

  ‘He might not be my preferred gender, but I’m not blind. It’s always nice to browse the gallery, even if you aren’t in the market for a painting.’

  ‘You perv.’ I looked at him again. ‘How did you discover him?’

  ‘I didn’t – the Head told me about him. He’s on some kind of fast-track course, to extend his teaching skills. Part of some new initiative. They want to reshuffle all the core subjects and staff around a bit, have some of the Maths, English and Science teachers swap schools.’ She waved her hand, unconcerned about the details. ‘And …’ Benni was almost singing now. ‘Guess who’ll be sitting in on some of your lessons?’

  I coughed a little. ‘I am a …’ I swallowed and looked at the screen again. ‘A happily … married woman?’

  ‘In which case none of us have anything to worry about, do we?’ Her smile had turned slightly wicked, but it melted away. ‘Oh, Zo, darling, I’m only joking. I know you’d never look at another man while you’re with Jack.’

  ‘Which, lest we forget those vows, is for the rest of our lives.’

  ‘Yes, yes, but it doesn’t hurt to look, does it?’

  I looked at the screen one more time before I left the office, and thought, Just looking. Just looking.

  Coming through the door from the supermarket early evening on Saturday, I saw Jack lying on the sofa, pizza box on his stomach.

  ‘Hey! What’s this?’

  ‘Don’t worry – there’s another one in the kitchen for you.’

  ‘No, Jack, we’re going out with Liz tonight.’

  ‘Oh god, really? Please can you invent an illness for me, I really don’t fancy it.’

  ‘Just one of the many blessings marriage conveys. We’re stuck with each other’s friends, I’m afraid. Just jump in the shower and you’ll be fine, come on.’

  ‘No, I’m serious, Zo. Please can you just tell her I couldn’t make it tonight? I’ve already eaten, anyway.’ He gestured at the half-empty pizza box.

  I gaped at him. ‘Jack, we haven’t all been out together since the wedding. Can’t we please just try and look semi-convincing that we can bear to still be in each other’s company?’

  ‘I know we’re married, but we don’t have to live in each other’s pockets. You don’t want to be one of those couples, do you?’

  ‘Which I’m sure you’d be saying if the boot was on the other foot. We just had lunch with Iffy, didn’t we? If we were meeting one of your friends, I’d never flake out on a plan.’

  ‘Like the Henderson’s party?’ Jack sighed. ‘We saw her at the wedding; that was only a few weeks ago. I’m sure she can’t miss me that much. You go and have a nice time with
out me.’

  ‘It’s not about whether Liz misses you, it’s about whether I do.’

  ‘Zoe, this is one evening!’

  ‘Maybe it’s not,’ I shouted, then took a deep breath. I dropped my bag on the table, put my keys in the bowl, and held my head in my hands. ‘I don’t understand what you want, Jack.’

  ‘I don’t understand either,’ he said, looking baffled. ‘I thought I was just asking for an evening to myself.’

  We both waited, feeling winded. I thought of all our recent arguments, the tension. I thought of our wedding day.

  ‘I think … I think this was a mistake,’ I said.

  ‘You think … what was a mistake? This fight?’

  ‘Jack,’ I said. ‘All of this.’ He looked at me, his mouth dropping a little.

  ‘Are you kidding me?’

  ‘No. Is it really that much of a surprise? Have you never thought that?’

  ‘What, in the month since we’ve been married?’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, Zo, everyone feels like that.’ He lifted his hands, then dropped them in exasperation. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘No, everyone feels like that at some point in their married life, but not in the first four weeks,’ I said. ‘Not on their honeymoon. Not on the way to the register office.’

  Jack gaped at me again, then stood up, stormed into the bedroom and slammed the door closed. There’d been a lot of that recently. Soon Upstairs Jan would be as pleased to see us as those voyeurs opposite.

  I met Liz at the bar, where she and her new squeeze Henry were waiting, drinks in hand. Liz had mentioned him for the first time when we’d confirmed plans that afternoon, but she’d also said I wasn’t to ask anything until I’d met him. I could see why – Henry sported his sunglasses on the top of his head, just in case I hadn’t got the message clearly enough from his chinos and pink shirt. What wasn’t clear was why she was with him in the first place. Liz hugged me, then he leant in, as if for a kiss, despite the fact I’d never met him before in my life and didn’t particularly fancy pressing my face against his. Before he could make contact, I pretended to look in my bag for my phone; by the time I looked up again he’d leant back, his face slightly mottled with indignation.