Second Chance

by Jane Green

  When she met Paul, she knew he was perfect for her. After she left him on the very first day he interviewed her and well before he started pestering her about things he had forgotten to ask, she phoned her mother. ‘Mum? I’ve met the man I’m going to marry,’ she said, and her mother knew that she had, because when Anna stated something, it always happened.

  So when Anna announced they were trying for children, everyone knew that Anna would have a baby within the year. It was partly why they bought the barn: what a wonderful place for children, how perfect to spend summers out here with the kids, or come down on winter weekends for leaf-stomping, and hot chocolate in front of a roaring fire in the huge stone fireplace at one end of the enormous great room.

  Anna’s obstinacy is why they cannot give up on IVF. Why Anna refuses to believe there will be a last time. She cannot believe that this will not work when everything else in her life has gone according to plan.

  So far they’ve spent around fifty thousand pounds on IVF, a huge chunk of the savings they had put aside. The work on the barn has started. The walls that were rotten have been replaced with reclaimed barn siding they found at an auction, and the roof has been done. Kitchen and bathrooms were ordered and then cancelled. The house is half done. Piles of sawdust everywhere, dust sheets on half-sanded floors, unpainted window frames. The last time they went up to have a look, Anna burst into tears.

  ‘This was our dream,’ she said to Paul. ‘And now we cannot even afford to finish it.’

  ‘We will one day,’ Paul said, so sorry that he wasn’t able to pull out a magic wand and make it happen, so sorry that his work didn’t provide him with enough money to take over when the going got tough. ‘I promise you, one day this will be finished.’

  They left that night and stayed at a local B&B – a few hundred steps down from the Relais & Chateaux along the road where they used to stay before starting IVF, but a lot of things have changed since the treatment began.

  ‘If they could see me now,’ Anna sang, picking her way gingerly down the hallway, having run lukewarm water into a cracked bath in the bathroom at the other end of the hall, and Paul shrugged.

  ‘We have to stop the treatment, you know,’ he attempted carefully. ‘This is ridiculous that we can’t afford anything any more. We can’t keep going like this.’

  ‘Hopefully we will not have to.’ Anna squeezed his arm. ‘I have a feeling this one is going to work,’ and Paul sighed. She said that every time. But having to watch every penny was stressful, to say the least, particularly when it had never been an issue before.

  Although if you didn’t know, you’d never know. Anna still looks the part – she has to for her job, and no one is a better PR for Fashionista than Anna herself –but watch her carefully and you’ll see that she isn’t frivolous in the way she used to be.

  Her make-up is always from work. No longer does she run to Space NK to replenish the jar of Eve Lom that’s almost finished. Now, if she can’t get it sent to her through Fashionista, she’ll change brands. Her finances have dictated that her brand loyalty is no longer important.

  Her hair is no longer cut and coloured at Bumble & Bumble. For cuts she goes to the local hairdresser on the high street, and she has discovered that Sun In, thanks to her natural fair Swedish locks, does almost as good a job of highlighting her hair as Enzo used to.

  They don’t go out to the expensive restaurants any more unless it is for work and either Anna is expensing it or someone else is paying, and frankly there is always more than enough to eat and drink at the hundreds of fashion parties that are going on all around London on practically any given night.

  Not that they can’t afford to feed themselves – heavens, no! But where Anna used to absentmindedly put whatever she wanted in a shopping trolley with no thought to the price, now she will look at the price and, if it is too much, she will think about whether they really need it.

  She will no longer wander round Graham and Green on a Saturday afternoon, filling her arms with throws and candles and interesting statuettes and lovely linens that she certainly doesn’t need, just because they’re there and because she can.

  You would never know any of it. Looking at Anna right now, sitting cross-legged on the floor as Violet – who, like all children who come into contact with Anna, has fallen completely in love with her – hangs around her neck squealing, you would think that she is beautiful, poised and perfect. You would think that nothing in her life could ever go wrong.

  ‘Hi.’ Sarah’s voice is listless as she comes into the room and sits on the sofa, dark shadows under her eyes, her hair still mussed.

  ‘We brought some photos of Tom.’ Paul thinks about going across the room to hug her, but something about her is so shut down he knows he’ll be rejected, and he stays where he is, unsure of what to say.

  ‘I know. Maggie said so.’

  ‘Would you like to see them?’

  ‘Sure,’ she says. Paul hands them to her and she starts to sift through the photographs. A ghost of a smile hovers over her lips as she stops at a picture of Paul, Holly and Tom, all of them with braces on their teeth, at Paul’s fifteenth birthday party.

  ‘God, look at that hair!’ Sarah says. ‘I never knew Tom had long hair. He looks awful!’

  ‘We all looked awful,’ Paul says, grateful that Sarah finally seems to be engaged. ‘Look at Holly’s shocking-pink lipstick. I think she thought it was sophisticated.’

  ‘Tom was so skinny,’ Sarah muses, tracing his arm in the photo with her forefinger. ‘You’d never think he’d become so buff.’

  ‘Buff?’ Paul asks.

  ‘Fit. He was forever in the gym. He got this thing about Ironman contests. Crazy stuff where you bike 112 miles, swim 2.4 miles, then run 26.2 miles. He did one in Florida and was training for another.’ She shakes her head. ‘He was so fit. So strong. That’s what I find so hard to believe. I mean, I could understand almost anyone else not surviving, but Tom? How could Tom not have got himself out of there? How could anything take Tom down?’

  There’s an awkward silence, neither Paul nor Anna knowing what to say, and after a while Sarah turns to the next picture and bursts out laughing. ‘Tom was in the army?’ she splutters.

  ‘TA,’ Paul says sheepishly. ‘Was the thing to do at the time.’

  In the kitchen, getting a tray of tea ready to take inside, Maggie sits down heavily at the table.

  ‘Thank you,’ she looks up at a concerned Anna, ‘this is the first time Sarah has sounded anything like herself. Those photos are what she needed right now.’

  ‘What about you?’ Anna says gently. ‘What do you need right now?’

  ‘Oh I’ll be fine,’ Maggie says with a false brightness. ‘I’ll just finish making this tea and I’ll be right out. If you could just take Pippa outside to pee that would be wonderful.’

  Anna leaves, but she turns just as she reaches the doorway to see Maggie collapsing in her chair. Anna hovers, unsure of whether to go back, but she knows Maggie thinks she is alone, thinks Anna has left the room; she knows Maggie would never allow herself to drop her composure in front of anyone.

  It is absolutely quiet. There are no more tears, there surely can’t be a drop of water left in her body, but Anna watches as Maggie leans her head on her arms on the kitchen table and groans softly as she rocks back and forth.

  And Anna sees that this matriarch of what is left of her family, this strong, stoic, wonderful woman is finding the pain may be too much for a human being to bear.

  As she listens to Maggie’s quiet groans, she understands that Maggie honestly doesn’t know how she can get through the rest of her life knowing she will never see her beloved son, her firstborn, again.

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘What’s the matter with you today?’ The receptionist at the animal shelter walks into the sitting room with a sandwich at lunchtime and collapses on the sofa as Olivia looks up in surprise.

  ‘What do you mean? Nothing’s the matter. Why?’
r />   ‘You’re acting like you’ve got ants in your pants,’ Yvonne says. We think it must be a man.’

  ‘What?’ Olivia attempts a laugh, then rolls her eyes. ‘Good lord, Yvonne. I’m the bloody director – haven’t you got anything better to do than gossip about my love life?’

  Yvonne purses her lips. ‘Actually we all wish you had a love life for us to gossip about. Lovely girl like you, you deserve someone much better than that awful George.’

  Olivia’s mouth falls open. ‘But you all said you loved George.’

  ‘Yes, well. That was before he dumped you for that American bimbo.’

  ‘Yvonne! How do you know all this?’

  ‘Know what? I don’t know anything. I’m just saying. You ought to have a lovely man who makes you happy.’

  ‘I’m not going to talk about it any more,’ Olivia says, picking up her coffee and walking out through the door. ‘But just for info, I do have a date tonight,’ and as Yvonne’s face lights up and she prepares to shower Olivia with questions, Olivia shuts the door and walks off towards her office, giggling.

  She is meeting Fred tonight. He is finally here. She shouldn’t be excited, sees no reason to be excited, particularly given that this is a five-day business trip, and she’ll probably hate him once she meets him anyway, but this is the first time she has felt there is something to look forward to. She has arranged to pick him up from the Dorchester at seven o’clock.

  At three, she does something she never does. Pulls on her coat, picks up her bag, and announces to Sophie, her assistant, that if there’s anything urgent, she’ll be on her mobile. ‘But only call if it’s an emergency,’ she says, and Sophie, who has inadvertently seen a couple of emails from Fred, winks her approval and shoos her away, knowing that nothing, bar the shelter burning down, would cause her to interrupt Olivia on her date.

  Her first stop is the hairdresser. ‘I need to cover the grey,’ she tells Rob the colourist, ‘and then I need a trim.’

  Rob purses his lips as he examines Olivia’s never-been-touched hair. ‘God, you’ve got a lot of grey,’ he murmurs, almost to himself as he picks up her hair. ‘Natural colour, or can I throw in a few lowlights just to add a bit of depth?’

  ‘Whatever you want.’ Olivia shrugs. ‘I’m in your hands now. Knock yourself out.’

  Two hours later, Olivia stares at herself in the mirror in awe. Chestnut and copper streak her hair; and Kim, the junior stylist, has cut long layers into her bob that sweep her cheeks and make her look years younger.

  Kim and Rob stand behind her, arms crossed, waiting for Olivia’s reaction. They have dealt with women like her before – women who come in wearing jeans and boots, who don’t possess a scrap of make-up, and believe that natural is better. They have performed makeovers on these women before, and are never quite sure what the outcome will be. Some have cried with joy at how much younger, how much better they look; and others have spat in fury and refused to pay, demanding they strip the colour off the hair immediately, somehow put it back the way it was.

  Olivia, thank God, is one of the good ones. She started smiling halfway through the blow-dry when her new colour emerged, and is now clearly delighted.

  ‘I love it,’ she squeals. ‘I love, love, love it,’ and they hand her a mirror to see the back, laughing as she stares with obvious delight at herself and her new swinging, shiny hair.

  ‘Now just remember what I said,’ Rob says as he walks her to reception to pay. ‘Lipstick and blush, little black dress and a lot of confidence.’

  Olivia turns to him. ‘Thank you so much,’ she says, spontaneously reaching out and giving him a hug. ‘Wish me luck!’ And with that she’s off.

  Her Beetle zips through the London traffic, and at every traffic light Olivia stretches up and checks herself in the rear-view mirror. It’s not that she’s vain, it’s that she can’t believe how different she looks. She is, just as Rob suggested, wearing a black wrap-dress that she got on sale last winter and wore to George’s office Christmas bash. She felt beautiful that night and loved feeling George’s pride as he introduced her to his colleagues at work. She tried not to think about it tonight as she pulled the dress from the back of the wardrobe, tried not to think how that pride and love that she was so sure was in his eyes could turn so quickly to dust.

  The dress should have swamped her, given how much weight she has lost, but she merely wraps it tighter and it’s perfect. She has added black tights, low kitten heels, and a chunky amber necklace that used to be her mother’s, and resisted the urge to pull everything off and start again with her usual comfortable uniform of jeans and boots.

  In the old days, she would have phoned Tom and they would have laughed about it together. Wear the black dress, for God’s sake,’ he would have said. ‘Make an effort. Show him what great legs you’ve got.’

  ‘I hope you’re watching, Tom.’ She had looked up at the sky just before she climbed into the car. ‘And I hope you like the outfit.’ Olivia had performed a small twirl in the driveway of her house and had blown a kiss towards the sky. ‘Wish me luck,’ she’d whispered, and then she was off, navigating the Edgware Road once more.

  There are pools of men huddled at the bar, and Olivia’s first instinct is to turn around and run home. She can’t do this. Has never been any good at this. Admittedly she became well versed in navigating blind dates pre-George, but she was so much younger and had so much more confidence.

  Some of the men turn and look at her, a couple of them approvingly, and she takes a deep breath and looks around, hoping to see Fred, hoping to know instantly which one he is. Sitting at a table in the corner is a man reading the Financial Times. Olivia squints at him as he looks up and catches her eye, his face breaking into a huge grin.

  Please, God, she whispers a silent prayer in her mind as this tall, broad-shouldered athlete of a man comes over displaying a perfect American smile – huge white teeth, and boy-next-door good looks. Please, God, she whispers, let this be him, because God knows they don’t make them like that over here.

  ‘Olivia!’ There’s no question in his voice but, of course, she had sent him a picture of herself, of course he would know what she looks like.

  ‘Hi!’ she says shyly, gratitude and delight in her eyes as he envelops her in a bear hug, making her feel very small and delicate and feminine. How ridiculous, she tells herself, turning her head to the side and resting it for a second against a muscled shoulder. How silly I am being, but oh how lovely, what a spectacular specimen of a man. Fred steps back to grin at her, then ushers her over, a large, strong hand resting in the small of her back as he guides her to her chair.

  ‘Wow!’ he says, holding out the chair for her to sit down. ‘You look great,’ and as he looks around for a waiter to take their order for drinks, Olivia finds herself smiling. This is going to be a good evening after all.

  ‘Tom was right,’ Fred says, as the waiter places one Cosmopolitan and one vodka martini on the table.

  ‘Right about what?’

  ‘Right about the fact that I should meet you.’ He smiles, raising his glass for a toast. ‘To new friendships, and to Tom, wherever he may be.’

  Olivia smiles even as the tears well up in her eyes. ‘To Tom,’ she echoes, and Fred passes her a napkin, which she dabs against her eyes, looking up and blinking furiously until the tears go away.

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ She smiles again. ‘It still gets me at the most unexpected times.’

  ‘Of course it does,’ Fred says. ‘It gets me too, and I was just a work colleague. I know how hard it must be for his friends.’

  ‘So hard.’ Olivia nods. ‘You think that time must be the great healer, that people wouldn’t say it all the time if it weren’t true, but I’m still waiting for time to kick in.’

  ‘You know, when it happened, it was all I could think about for days. I became, like, addicted to the news. I’m serious! I was watching everything, reading everything about the attacks, the survivors, the families of those w
ho had been lost, and still now I think about it every day, but not all day, not the way I did, like, immediately afterwards.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Olivia says. ‘I do think about it too, but not all day, not any more. Still, Tom wouldn’t want us to sit here and cry over him, so let’s talk about dinner. What do you feel like eating? There’s a wonderful restaurant here in the hotel.’

  ‘I know, I already checked it out, but I feel like something more fun, something different. Apparently there’s a great noodle place round the corner, which sounds great.’

  Olivia grins. ‘Wagamama. It’s one of my favourites, and much more my speed. Let’s go,’ and with that they drink up and leave.

  As soon as they walk in Olivia feels at home. All dressed up in the bar of the Dorchester is about as far removed from Olivia’s life as you can get. Not that those places are altogether unfamiliar to her – a large part of her childhood was spent in the smartest of London restaurants – but she had never felt entirely comfortable as a child, and was relieved, upon reaching adulthood, that she actually had a choice and didn’t have to frequent those places unless absolutely necessary.

  She realizes as she sinks down on the bench opposite Fred, squeezed between strangers busy slurping noodles, that she has been playing a role tonight, something she is never comfortable doing.

  ‘You know what?’ Fred looks around the room, taking it all in. ‘I wish I wasn’t in this damn suit. I’d much rather be in jeans and sneakers.’

  Olivia starts to laugh. ‘Thank you for saying that. I was just thinking I wish I was in my jeans and boots. When I’m all dressed up, I feel like I act differently, that I’m more formal and trying to be someone I’m not.’

  Fred grins at her. ‘Same here. Tell you what,’ he looks at his watch, ‘how long would it take you to run home and throw on jeans, then get back here?’

  ‘About half an hour if I rush.’ Olivia smiles.