‘I was. We were.’
‘What did she mean about building a life?’
‘Oh, right, that. Yeah, two days ago we decided to make a proper go of it. We were watching a movie in here, and she just said, yeah, okay, let’s do this. And I was going to do it. Anything it took. Anything at all, for her to be here.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ she says. Her eyes are sad. She chews her lip.
‘Yup, thanks,’ I say, but suddenly I’m exhausted.
‘For what it’s worth, we really liked her.’
‘Yeah,’ I say, kicking off my shoes, ‘I knew you would.’
‘Brandon and I thought we might stick around a while. Just for a couple of days.’
‘You don’t have to do that. I’ll be okay.’
She looks at me. She doesn’t believe me. I don’t believe me either. ‘Well, we are. Do you need anything? You didn’t eat. There’s lasagna.’
‘No. Thank you, though. Look, I’m pretty tired. Think I’m going to just turn in.’
‘Alright,’ she says. She pulls her arm from around my shoulder and swings her legs over the side of the bed. She clicks the door shut on the way out and I roll onto my side. There’s a black tank top sticking out from under a pillow. Cassie wore it to sleep in most nights she was here. What is it about women leaving clothes they slept in here? Now she’s at LAX, possibly already in the air. And wherever she is, it isn’t here, and already things feel different.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Cassie
I’m standing outside LAX, case in hand, hand luggage thrown over my shoulder, watching as the taxi drives away. I had arrived here less than two weeks ago so excited, so happy, so smitten. I hadn’t given any thought to leaving but if I had, this would categorically not have been how I’d have imagined it. I wonder what he’s doing now. I wonder what he said when he went back inside. How Travis and Holly reacted to my leaving. I hope they all rallied around. Despite the fact he’s broken me with the potential paternity he absolutely knew about and made the conscious decision to keep from me, I hope they are kind to him. I think back to how shocked he looked when he saw my luggage and clocked that I was off and momentarily, I feel awful.
Then I remember the reason I left, and the feeling of awfulness intensifies until I think my chest might collapse. It’s a different kind of awful, though; it’s a lonely, stupid, self-loathing kind of awful. Of course it was too good to be true. Of course he was never really mine. He’s Jesse Franklin, my teenage crush, and I’m just Cassie from Amersham. No one gets that sort of fairytale unless their name is Kate Middleton.
I push through the door and make my way over to Virgin Atlantic.
‘I need to change my flight,’ I mumble at the lady. I hand my flight documents over to her and she looks them over.
‘I’m sorry, this ticket is non-transferable,’ she says. I stare at her.
‘Are you having me on?’ My voice is louder and more aggressive than I mean it to be. Her colleague glances over at me, and double-takes when he sees my puffy face and smudged eye make-up. What of it? I think.
‘I’m sorry, ma’am.’
‘What can I do then? I need a flight out of here. To London. As soon as possible, because I’ve just found out my boyfriend has probably fathered some other woman’s baby and I need to leave. It’s really important that I leave.’
‘Oh, honey, no!’ Ticket Lady says. She looks outraged on my behalf. ‘Kick him to the kerb.’
‘Yeah. Sucks to be me, huh?’ I mutter.
‘You’ll still need to purchase a new ticket,’ her colleague says. I wipe my eyes again and bite my lip to stop it from quivering.
‘Fine,’ I sigh. ‘I’d like a ticket to London, on the next flight out of here I can get on.’
Ticket Lady taps away at her computer and looks uncomfortable, and I know she can’t help me.
‘The next available flight is tomorrow.’
‘Well, that’s just shit,’ I sigh. She slides my travel documents back across the desk. ‘Who else can I fly with? Delta? Lufthansa? That nice Dutch one? BA?’ I reel off names of other airlines, ‘Where is British Airways?’
BA will help me, I am sure of it. They are an airline you can trust. Their motto is To Fly, To Serve. They will fly me home and serve me alcohol on the way. They won’t leave a heartbroken woman stranded in America in her time of need. Virgin Atlantic lady tells me they are based at a different terminal and says something about a shuttle bus, and my heart sinks even lower. She’s trying to be kind but this is not an easy process, and right now I need this to be easy. I pick up my useless ticket and head back towards the exit, dragging my bag behind me.
British Airways do help me, and relieve me of over a thousand pounds for the privilege. I have less than an hour before I fly and I head through security in a daze, then wander aimlessly around the departure lounge, not knowing quite what to do with myself. I can’t eat anything because I don’t think my stomach could handle it. I don’t want to buy anything. I’ve finished my book, not that I could have concentrated on it even if I hadn’t. I text Rachel, and I can’t quite believe the words my fingers are tapping out. I have to read them over and over to convince myself of what has happened.
It’s all gone so terribly wrong. I’m coming home right now. Please please meet me at Heathrow, I can’t face going home alone. 4pm (Sunday), BA268, T5 xx
My seat on the plane is on the aisle and I’ve never been more grateful. The last thing I need to see are the bright lights of LA at night. We were going to go out tomorrow night. We were going to go to Malibu for dinner. I was going to see it all from the ground. I can’t bear to see it from the air.
Once the seatbelt signs have been switched off, the flight attendant comes round with drinks and snacks. I ask for a vodka and drink it neat. It’s rough and it burns my throat but I don’t care. I just want it to numb everything so I don’t have to face up to what has happened. On her way back, I get a gin and tonic, and slam that, too. The man sitting next to me shifts. I glare at him. I recline my seat as much as possible, not giving a shit that I’ve blocked in the person behind me, and put on an eye mask to encourage people to leave me alone. I don’t want the chicken, or the beef.
Eventually, I fall asleep and I dream about Jesse. We are hanging out at his house. We are sitting outside on the deck with drinks and nachos, in the sunshine. We are eating big slices of cheesy pizza in the living room. We are walking on the beach, hand in hand. We are doing all the things we did. The scenes flick through my mind like old grainy home videos, and it’s all so realistic, except that I can’t touch him. Whenever I try, he moves out of the way. I open my eyes and push the eye mask up on to my forehead. In front of me is a small screen mounted onto a rim of grey plastic. Next to me is a man who is not Jesse. I’m no longer in his house on the beach. I’m tens of thousands of feet up in the air, somewhere over Canada. The plane rattles with turbulence and for a few seconds I hope we fall out of the sky. My heart breaks all over again.
* * *
It’s a real howler of a day when we land in England. Rain falls in sheets across the tarmac and drips down the windows.
The queue at customs is long and I haven’t switched my phone back on, so I don’t know if Rachel is going to be there to meet me. Perhaps I should have asked Dad instead, but she was the first person I thought of. And maybe ruining one of the last Sundays before her wedding wasn’t the most considerate thing I could have done, but I’m scared to check my phone in case Jesse has messaged me, or tried to call.
At baggage reclaim, the man I was sitting next to on the plane is staring at me across the carousel, probably wondering why I am such a mess. I catch his eye and he looks away. Cases trundle rhythmically around the belt. I grab mine and head off.
I shuffle through to arrivals and finally I’m free. Officially back in the UK. California feels like a surreal dream.
It’s busy. Stacks of people are waiting to pick up friends and loved ones. There are smiling faces
everywhere and that just makes this whole thing even worse. A small child ducks under the barrier and runs to his father, his mother waiting patiently behind. The child is scooped up and Dad is showered with toddler kisses. He makes his way over to his wife and they kiss. She rubs his back and they walk off. It’s Jesse and Nicole and their kid, a couple of years from now. An older couple are greeted by grown up children.
‘How was the flight, Ma?’ their daughter asks. I don’t hear the response.
Rachel is standing there, her lovely face contorted with worry and concern. Her hair is scraped back in a ponytail and strands fall around her face. She’s carrying a cardboard coffee cup. Like the little boy, she ducks under the barrier and walks up to me. I drop my case. She envelopes me in a hug. Neither of us say anything. She strokes my hair. I crumple. My sobs echo around the arrivals hall.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Cassie
‘George is in the car,’ Rachel says gently, ‘I hope you don’t mind that he’s here. I didn’t think you’d fancy the tube.’ Rachel can’t drive, so of course George is here. I sniff. She hands me the coffee.
‘Got anything stronger?’ I ask.
‘Fraid not, babe.’ She links her arm through mine and takes my case. We walk to the car park.
‘Can I stay with you tonight?’ I ask. ‘I can’t go home and be alone, I just can’t. You won’t even know I’m there. I’ll kip on the sofa.’
‘You’ll kip in the spare room and you’ll stay as long as you need,’ Rachel says, opening the car door. I get into the back. George looks over from the driver’s seat. His left arm is gripping the headrest of the passenger seat.
‘Hi, mate,’ he says, sympathetically. He knows. Of course he knows. Rachel wouldn’t have said they were driving to Heathrow for a fun afternoon out. Nobody drives to Heathrow for a fun afternoon out.
‘Hi, George,’ I say, glumly.
‘She’s had a shock,’ Rachel explains and I nod. A shock isn’t even the half of it. George gets on the motorway and everything is grey. Rain beats a tinny rhythm on the roof of the car. The clouds are grey, George’s car is grey. Almost black, actually. Everything in my life is grey when just yesterday it had been in vibrant technicolor. I lean my head on the window and soon we are back in Crouch End. Rachel makes up the spare bed, and I crash.
‘I’ll just stay tonight,’ I tell her, ‘I’m sure you’ve got wedding stuff to do, and, no offence, but I can’t help you with that right now.’
‘It’s fine,’ she soothes, stroking my forehead. ‘Shall we get a takeaway tonight?’
‘Yes, but not a Chinese,’ I tell her, remembering the first dinner Jesse and I ate together in California. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to look at a spring roll again.
‘Okay. I’ll put away the bottle of Californian red I was going to open, shall I?’
I roll over and bury my face in the pillow. ‘Too soon,’ I wail. It sounds muffled.
‘Cassie, you haven’t told me what happened out there? I mean, we were just talking online about you running off into the sunset and shacking up with this guy, and the next thing I know I look at my phone and there is this text asking me to come and get you. I get it if you’re not ready to talk about it, but when you are, what happened?’
I sit up and take a deep breath. Despite having what felt like endless hours on the plane to process everything, I’d tried to numb it all with sleep and booze whilst hiding under an eye mask.
‘There’s a baby,’ I say. ‘His ex girlfriend’s about to drop a sprog and apparently they only broke up in January. It’s probably his, given the time frame.’
Rachel’s eyes widen. ‘Holy plot twist, Batman,’ she says. ‘Is this the ex who moved to New York?’
‘Yeah,’ I say, grimly. ‘So that happened.’
‘When did he tell you this?’
‘Ha!’ I say. ‘He didn’t. He didn’t think it was important. Holly did.’
‘Who’s Holly?’
‘Travis’ wife.’
‘How does she know?
‘Rachel. They all knew. Apart from Lainey, I think.’
‘And Lainey is?’
‘Brandon’s wife. We saw her on Jesse’s Facebook that time. Nice woman, actually. I liked her.’
‘Gotcha. I have to say I’m very disappointed. Especially in Travis. I thought better of him.’ She tuts and shakes her head. ‘I mean, obviously that’s unforgivable of Jesse too. Lay it out for me, how did all this go down?’
All of a sudden, my eyes feel leaky again. I think back to what happened and I know I’m not going to get through the next bit without crying. My mouth twists into an ugly grimace. My chest heaves. Rachel pats my hand.
‘So we’re all outside, about to have lunch, but then Holly turns to Lainey and asks how far along she is, and then makes a huge deal of the fact that… the fact that Nicole is… is further along.’
I’m off again. Wailing. Splashy tears fall on Rachel’s mauve satin bedspread. Why has she put a mauve satin bedspread on the bed of a heartbroken woman who is definitely going to weep all over it? Those tears are going to leave stains.
‘And I was desperate for an explanation that would make it all okay, but he didn’t have one. You could see the fear in his eyes. He was absolutely shitting himself, Rach. He couldn’t tell me either way.’
‘Bastard!’ she says, and her eyes are mad. ‘Prick!’
‘After that, I obviously couldn’t stay. So I packed up my stuff and I left. When I sent that text I was waiting to get on the plane.’
‘Had everyone gone?’
‘No. It all unfolded so fast and I had to get out. Didn’t really think about it.’
‘You just left? In the middle of everything? Dramatic!’
‘Yep. How could I stay after that? I could hardly even look at him.’
‘And what did he have to say for himself?’
‘He asked me not to go. He actually got really upset, and I think he was crying a bit.’ I remember how he looked just before I got in the car and before that, even, by the front door and I shudder.
‘Oscar-worthy,’ she says, clapping her hands, ‘I think you belong in LA. The pair of you.’
‘Well apparently I don’t,’ I sniff.
‘Cass,’ she says, taking my hand. ‘Do you want me to contact him? I will absolutely tear him to shreds on your say so.’
I consider what she’s said. Replay everything that’s happened in the last two days in my head. From when everything was perfect, sitting on the pier with Jesse as the sun went down, curled into him, telling him I love him; to later that night, agreeing to give up everything for him, and knowing in the very core of me that I’ve never meant anything so much in my life. And then the horror that unfolded over drinks and olives and the best almonds I’ve ever eaten in my life, and the look on Holly’s face, almost gleeful in the destruction she engineered. And finally, the look on Jesse’s face when he couldn’t categorically tell me for certain that Nicole’s baby isn’t his, because at the end of the day, he didn’t know himself. And that’s a bit of a deal-breaker isn’t it? What kind of masochist would I have been to stay when he could at any point decide to give things another go with the mother of his child? That and the blatant withholding of the truth would have marred the whole thing. Cast a shadow on the rest of the trip, and that shadow would have followed me everywhere, and if the kid is his, he’d never really be mine.
‘No,’ I say firmly. ‘But thank you.’
‘I’m so angry with him.’
‘I’m just empty,’ I say. ‘Still can’t believe it.’
‘I can’t believe it’s happened again. I’m so sorry.’
‘Rach, let’s not go there,’ I say, sadly. ‘I want to believe it’s different. I can’t let myself think he’s like Jack.’
‘Alright.’ She pats my knee.
‘Think I’m just going to lie here for a bit.’
‘That’s cool,’ she says. ‘Whatever you need.’ She stands up and turns
to leave.
‘Hey, Rach?’ I say. She stops at the door. ‘Tell me something about your wedding that I don’t know?’
She smiles at me. It’s the first time I’ve asked about her for weeks. I’m a terrible friend. I’m selfish as well as stupid and heartbroken.
‘We’re having a ukulele group,’ she says. ‘They are called The Highly Strung.’
‘That’s adorable,’ I tell her.
* * *
I am exhausted and I sleep until after Rachel and George have both left for work the next day. I miss dinner but the oil-stained paper bag and the faint whiff of jalfrezi tells me they got a curry. Rachel has scrawled a note letting me know they have saved some for me and it’s in the fridge. I pick at the turmeric-yellow rice and the leathery naan bread, staring out of the window at everyone going about their business. I shouldn’t be in Crouch End. I should be in California. I take a shower, the first since before I left America, and catch the bus home, lugging my suitcase behind me. It’s overcrowded and smelly and I don’t get a seat. Someone is drinking an energy drink and eating a McDonald’s breakfast and the vaguely sweet smell makes me feel nauseous. An old lady tuts at me because my case is ever so slightly in her way. Oh piss off, I think, you intolerant old hag. The lady on the beach wouldn’t have tutted.
There is no one at home when I let myself in. Someone has piled my post up on the radiator cover in the hallway. It was undoubtedly Jon. It’s all in order of envelope size. I ignore it. There’s a rip in the wallpaper I haven’t seen before, exposing a crack in the plaster underneath. Sara’s washing hangs on an airer in the living room. There’s a lot of tie dye. The house is eerily quiet and floorboards creak under my feet. I haul my case upstairs and into my room at the front of the house. No one has been in here for days and it’s stale. I heave open the sash window and my curtains billow in the breeze. I don’t want to unpack because once I’ve done that my trip really is over. But I don’t want to think about Jesse either, and putting on a wash seems like a welcome distraction. I unzip my case and crammed-in clothes and shoes burst out over the sides; balled up t-shirts, creased sundresses, underwear that’s wrapped itself around the heels of shoes. I’ve probably left things there but that’s just too bad. I methodically put away my shoes and I notice my sandals still have sand in the seams. Two of my t-shirts have a slight Jesse smell from where we’d slept pressed up against each other. I put them under my pillow. I’m not ready to lose that yet. Even after everything, I still want a reminder that most of the time we were brilliant. The day passes glacially, with coffee I make but don’t drink, a knock on the door that I don’t answer, my laundry, sitting wet in the machine, and shadows that creep across the room.
Call Me, Maybe Page 23
