by Holly Seddon
“I’m Alex Dale and I’m here to see Melissa Craw,” she’d said, swapping her clippings folder to the crook of her other arm.
“Melissa Craw?” The receptionist had frowned a little and glanced across at the security guard, who looked entirely disinterested.
“Yes,” Alex said, sharply.
“Melissa left Grazia a little while back. Has she arranged to meet you here?”
“Oh. No, not exactly.”
“Do you have an appointment with the Grazia team? Perhaps I could call one of them?”
“Who is Melissa’s replacement?” Alex had asked, shifting the weight from one leg to the other and feeling incredibly angry and betrayed but she couldn’t work out why and by whom.
“Who do you have an appointment with?” the receptionist had asked, with an urgency that bordered on irritation.
“I was offered a job here,” Alex had said a little louder than intended as she leaned into the desk. The security guard had finally taken his eyes off whatever was distracting him outside and he looked Alex up and down.
“I was offered a job and I turned it down but that was,” Alex had laughed and leaned further over the desk, trying to draw the receptionist in conspiratorially, “that was a mistake, as it turns out. I’d meant to accept the job, and I very much do accept the job and I just need to do the decent thing and let them know in person.”
The receptionist had smiled but looked uneasily at the guard.
Eventually, the receptionist had picked up the phone and jabbed a couple of buttons.
“Hi, Debbie, is Annabelle with anyone at the moment? Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Okay, I have a…” She’d clasped her hand over the receiver. “Sorry, what was your name again?”
“Alex Dale,” Alex had whispered back.
“I have an Alex Dale down here, she had—yes, that’s right, Alex Dale. She had asked to see Melissa so I’ve explained that Melissa has left, but she says she’s here to accept a job? Does that sound—yes, yes, okay. Thanks, Debbie.”
The receiver had clicked back into place.
“I just spoke with the editor’s PA and she’s going to speak to the editor now and give me a call back. Could you wait over there, please?”
Alex had shuffled into one of the plush seats in the window, and studiously checked her phone. No new text messages. She’d used the screen’s reflection to wipe away the grit of makeup that had made its way back under her eyes during the drive.
She could hear horns from outside and rolled her eyes at the clamor. London.
After a short time, the receptionist had been back on the phone, her eyes darting between Alex and the security guard.
“You need to leave now,” the guard had said.
“I’m still waiting for someone to have the decency to come and see me,” Alex had said, fighting back tears and crossing her arms over the binder in her lap.
“Miss,” the guard had said, leaning in so his nose nearly touched hers, and without a scrap of kindness. “You need to leave now.”
“But you don’t understand!” Alex had yelled as the security guard pulled her arm up like a toddler mid-tantrum.
“You’re making a huge mistake, you all are. God, this is so embarrassing!” she’d screeched as the guard pushed through the doors and deposited her firmly outside.
She’d fumbled in her bag for her keys, spotting a small crowd standing around her car, which, she realized, had slightly kissed the fence at the side of the pedestrian crossing.
“Is this your car?” the security guard had asked, eyebrows to the sky.
“Well, that’s none of your business now. After you’ve been so rude to me!” Alex had yelled.
Tears and snot were smeared into Alex’s blusher and she’d really felt that she deserved the dignity of leaving without further interrogation.
“You’re hammered, darling, I can smell it from here.”
That’s when Alex had spotted the traffic warden circling her car and flipping his pad open. His too-big puffa jacket and cap had drowned him like a new school uniform.
Alex had wiped her face and slinked around to lean on the driver’s door.
“There’s no need for that,” she’d cooed at the expressionless warden. His high cheekbones, almond eyes and deep black skin giving nothing away.
“How about this? You don’t write that out and I just go on my way. No harm done.” She’d smiled, running her hand down the zip of his jacket. His face had been overrun with horror then.
Popping the door handle, Alex had licked her lips. “Why don’t I make it worth your while? Mmm? Why don’t you get in the other side and we go somewhere and I make it worth your while?”
“This is entirely inappropriate,” the warden had said in a crisp but shaking voice that gave away his young age.
“Don’t be a spoilsport,” Alex had purred, blowing a light burp away from the corner of her mouth.
The warden had backed away for a moment, heading over to talk to the security guard, who was shaking his head and staring at the car.
Then Alex had done the only thing she could think of and jumped into the driver’s seat, jammed the key in the ignition, freed herself from the barrier and thundered down the bus lane.
She’d woken early the next day with absolutely no memory of the journey home. She had still been in her black dress-to-impress dress, her handbag spewing its contents all up the stairs. She’d trodden carefully, making her way outside to inspect her car, barefoot. The dents haunted her until the next drink, a few hours later.
She’d drank the house dry.
When she finally came to from that blackout, she’d lost a couple of days and a lot of money. Nauseated and drenched in sweat, she’d started sending pitches to everyone she could think of, only stopping when the sickness got too much and she had to vomit.
Jacob rested his leg under Amy’s hospital bed and leaned back in his chair. He said nothing and didn’t pick up her hand. He rubbed his eyes deeply, grinding his knuckles into the sockets until they hurt.
He’d accepted a lift from his mother, who believed that he was going for a checkup on his leg and had tried her damnedest to accompany him inside. In the years since he’d left home, the memories had dulled but now he remembered vividly how his mother had accompanied him everywhere, insisted on being designated driver right up until he left home. It was out of care, protection, but it could feel like hands on his neck at times.
She’d been the same with Tom, probably Simon too when he’d been young, although he was often off in their father’s car going to the court or on this mission or that.
Amy’s breathing was so quiet that you had to strain to hear it, like trying to pick up a tiny thread from a thick carpet.
Jacob tried to shut the noise of his thoughts out. He looked at Amy, oblivious Amy. Her skin almost translucent, her head suspended on the plasticky pillow, in the kind of deep sleep Jacob could only daydream about.
After languishing in his own arrested development for so many years, how had things unraveled so quickly over the last few weeks? Was this always in the cards, Jacob wondered. It’s not like he’d ever really given marriage his all, not if he was brutally honest.
He’d always prided himself on being A Nice Guy. A decent bloke who would do the right thing, put the right people first and stay loyal. To the bitter end. He’d told himself that for years. Would Fiona describe him as a nice guy? Would his child think he was putting the right people first?
The more important she should have become, the further down the priorities Fiona had slipped. Fiona, who was out there, walking, talking and living. Who was carrying his child and had treated him like the man he is and not the boy he was.
He looked at Amy, eyes open and hair freshly brushed. Her skin was as milky and smooth as a child’s, no ravages of time played out on this face. Amy was like a doll, like a photograph. A different beauty to Fiona.
When Jacob had looked in the mirror after his uncomfortable propped-up shower that morning, h
e’d seen some cartoonified old guy emerging through the steam. An approximation of him. Saggier, grayer, sadder. When he sat with Amy he felt fifteen again, but if she’d opened her eyes then and there, she wouldn’t have recognized him.
None of this stuff touched Amy. He could dress it up and say he knew, he just knew, that she benefited from his visits. That his dogged determination to just keep plodding on was having some positive effect. He had believed that at first, before years passed without any obvious change for the better. Whereas his sneaking around and inside-out priorities had held his own life underwater. No wonder Fiona had changed.
Fiona had been so cool at first. Not cool in the hip way she tried to be with her band T-shirts and art student hair, but cool in the way she’d never tried to change him. Yes, she pushed for things they didn’t need and she was bossy about housework. But she hadn’t pushed for him to be anyone but himself and to spend time with her. She’d always wanted to spend time with him, until now.
Jacob took one last long look at the bed and left without sitting in any other cubicles, swinging his crutches as quietly as he could.
As promised, his mum was waiting in the car park. No radio on, just sitting and waiting, deep in thought.
“That was quick,” she said as Jacob popped the passenger-door handle.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’m healing fine.”
Sue started the car but took her hands back off the wheel and turned to him.
“We should pop in to see Fiona while we’re here.”
“I don’t think so, Mum.”
“We love having you to stay but you’ve got to sort this out before the baby comes.”
“I know, Mum.”
“Jacob, whatever the problem is, it can be overcome. If there are kids involved, you’d be surprised what horrors you can put behind you. But you have to show up.”
It had been a long time since Jacob had heard his mother talk with anything other than crippling acceptance. The disapproval cut him.
“You don’t understand, I tried to talk to her the other day and she didn’t want to know.”
“You’re right, I don’t understand. You’ve got a wonderful woman you loved enough to marry and a precious baby on the way. Nothing is more important than that. I know Fiona is a firecracker at the moment, but she’s heavily pregnant. Not to mention tired, hormonal and in need of support. Even—Jacob look at me—even if she says she doesn’t need you, she does. And you need to be there when she realizes that. Darling, nothing is unfixable. You just need to be a man about this.”
After a stunned silence, Jacob said carefully: “I guess we could see if she’s in. Right now she doesn’t want to know me, and I said some things I didn’t mean that haven’t helped. But I should try to talk to her again, you’re right.”
“For goodness sake, Jacob, stop being so wishy-washy. You have a baby to think about. It’s not about whether you make each other happy, it’s about putting things right for your child.”
“Let me call her first. She hates people turning up unannounced.”
“You’re not people, you’re her husband, and it’s your house too. Problems need fixing, by hook or by crook. It sounds like you’re putting this off because it’s hard.”
“You have to let me do things my way, Mum.”
“Apparently so.”
—
“Fiona, I’m just around the corner and we really need to talk.”
“No. I can’t handle this right now.”
Jacob cupped his hand around the phone, wishing he’d hobbled out of the car to make the call.
“Look, we both said some things we didn’t mean—”
“I meant them. I wish I hadn’t, but I did.”
“Well, I meant them too, at the time.”
“Did you just phone up to start a row with me?”
“No, that’s not what I want at all. Look, let me come round and let’s just talk. We really need to get everything out in the open. I know I’ve not been open enough with you.” Jacob side-eyed his mother and stopped talking.
“You haven’t been remotely open with me, J. I think the first honest thing you said to me was that you wanted to break up.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“Well, that’s what I heard. So what’s the problem, you thought you had somewhere to go but she’s turned you down?”
“No!” Jacob turned awkwardly in the passenger seat to face out of the window. “For the millionth time, I’m not having an affair.” He lowered his voice. “I’ve never cheated on you, I never would.”
As he spoke, his mother unbuckled her seatbelt and opened the door to get out.
“I’ll be right here,” she said as Jacob cringed.
“Who was that? Are you there with her?”
“It was just Mum.”
“Your mother was listening to this? What the fuck is wrong with you lot?”
“She gave me a lift and we were in the car, she wasn’t really listening.”
“Have you heard yourself, Jacob?” Fiona sighed. “We do have things to sort out. We have the baby to make arrangements for, there’s house stuff to talk through and things like maintenance money. I’ll talk about that with you. But until you’re ready to tell me the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the bloody truth, you don’t get to talk to me about anything else. Goodbye.”
Jacob waved for his mum to get back in the car. “It didn’t go well,” he said, without looking up.
“You just have to keep trying. Jacob, if you only knew the problems I’ve had to fix in my time. This is nothing.”
“Problems with Dad?”
“Nothing you need to worry about. Just believe me that when you become a parent, you need to be willing to confront anything, to clean up any mess and keep on smiling while you do it.”
Sue started the car again.
“Mum, could you drop me at a friend’s house, it’s just around the corner?”
“Which friend?”
“A woman called Alex. We’re helping each other with something.”
“Oh Jacob, don’t tell me Fiona’s right.”
“No, Mum.” Jacob frowned. “I’d never cheat on Fiona, I’d never cheat on anyone. I just need to put some old stuff to bed that needs to be put to bed.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about but I can tell you this: no good comes from wallowing in the past. You need to accept that what’s happened has happened, box it up, bury it and don’t look back.”
A sharp knock came from the front door.
“Oh hi,” Alex said.
“Hi.”
“Come in. Let me help you.”
“I’m sorry to come here like this but I don’t know what to do. Everything’s a mess.”
“Has something happened?”
“Nothing new. My wife thinks I’m having an affair and I can’t bear being in Edenbridge.”
“I’m sorry,” Alex said, patting Jacob’s arm uneasily.
“I thought that perhaps I might be able to help you some more, while I still have a couple of days off work,” Jacob added. “Maybe I could work some of this stuff out and then, I don’t know, put it to bed and move on. I need to come clean to Fiona and I need to be fully hers—‘fully present,’ she calls it. To be fully there for Fiona, I need to say goodbye to Amy, but I can’t when I still don’t have any answers. I know I can’t because I’ve tried and failed before.”
Alex helped him into the living room.
“My baby’s due soon. I can’t be separated from my wife, that’s not how this is supposed to go. No matter how badly we’re getting on.”
“How long does she have left?”
“It really could be any day now.”
Alex tried to forget the smile that had spread through Matt’s face as he digested what she’d told him. “We’re going to have a baby?” he’d said, eyes wide. “Really?”
“Yes, really,” she’d nodded, smiling with relief at his reaction.
He�
��d grabbed her hands in his, stared wide-eyed at her and drank in the news. Good news, finally. Weeks after losing her mother. And he’d squeezed her, wringing out every drop of what she’d just told him. A secret she’d held for many weeks.
Then she’d handed him a glass of Champagne, offered her own glass to toast.
“It’s fine in moderation,” she’d protested. “The French…”
“You’re not fucking French, Alex.”
She really did scale it back then, to moderation. Or somewhere near.
Maybe Matt’s new baby had been born already. She’d tried not to think about it and hadn’t asked. Babies stopped things dead.
“I was going to call you later anyway,” Alex told Jacob.
She’d been mulling over whether to share her concerns about Paul with him. In many ways it was too soon, it was just a theory and not a watertight one. But it didn’t feel right withholding anything, and Paul had originally crossed her desk because of Jacob.
Alex waited for him to settle, a look of disquiet creeping over his face. She wished she could offer him a drink, and throw one back herself, but she only had a few servings on the plan for the day and not for many, many hours.
“What is it? You’re worrying me.”
Alex took a deep breath. “It might be nothing. But some stuff has come to light and there’s a slim chance we might know who did it and why.”
“Shit, really?”
“Yeah, maybe. But it’s only a maybe.”
“Who?” Jacob stared expectantly.
“Paul. Paul Wheeler.”
“Paul Wheeler?” Jacob sat back for a moment then sprang forward in his seat. “Seriously? You really think he’s capable of that? Why? You didn’t think that the other day.” Jacob looked absolutely horrified. Sweat collected on his temples and his eyes were wild. Alex wondered how on earth to tell him the possible motive.
I had the dream again. I don’t think it can technically be called a nightmare because it starts so nicely, but it is “nightmarish” by the end.
In the dream, it’s finally happening. I’m lying flat on my back and I’m trying to remember the bit in Forever by Judy Blume where Katherine has sex with Michael for the first time. He’s done it before but she hasn’t. And I’m trying to remember the details and how she got through it but I can’t because all I can think about is how much it hurts. I can’t feel any other part of my body except where it hurts, and the pain is radiating through the rest of me with every heartbeat. In the dream, he seems to get heavier with every move of his hips. And he doesn’t seem to notice, or maybe doesn’t care, that I’m holding my breath and screwing my eyes shut.
