by Lisa Jewell
So she’d packed a bag and she’d left.
Then she’d come back.
And now here she was, two weeks later, on Esher High Street, in the rain and back where she’d started. Nothing had changed. She was no closer to accepting invitations to parties than she’d been before she left. She was trapped, by George’s insecurities and her own weakness. And for the very first time since she’d first set eyes on George all those years ago, she stopped imagining herself as lost at sea on a runaway boat and accepted instead that this was her destiny. Being with George, living in the suburbs, working in a photo lab. No one was going to rescue her. There was no alternative, parallel existence. This was her life. This was her journey. And as she absorbed this frightening realization, she glanced around her at the people of Esher and saw two women walking towards her. They were her age, early thirties, averagely attractive, blandly dressed in Next and Debenhams, and each pushing a pram. The prams were hung with carrier bags, the babies inside obscured by rain-splattered plastic covers. She stared at the women and another realization hit her, more powerful than the first. The only way she could survive this journey, she suddenly knew, was to become one of those women. To become a mother. Because a baby was the only thing that made any sense of this scenario, of her life, of her and George. She had to have a baby.
George would respect her again. She would respect herself. She would know who she was. She wouldn’t be lost any more.
And with that thought, she turned left off the high street and headed home towards George and her destiny.
Forty-Five
Jon and Vince went to the pub together the following week. It was Jon’s idea. Jess was at yoga and it was the first Monday after the clocks went forward. Enfield Town felt vaguely exhilarated by the thrill of an extra hour of daylight. People sat outside pubs in their overcoats savouring the first tentative moments of summer. Jon and Vince went to the King’s Head by the market place and ordered pints of Heineken Export.
Jon didn’t look out of place here at all, with his shaved head, his earring and his designer street wear. He could just as easily have been one of these boisterous market traders, a silver-tongued purveyor of outsize nylon underwear, knock-off CDs or strawberries. He was, like Vince, an Enfield boy through and through, and, like Vince, he’d got out of Enfield at the first opportunity to sample life elsewhere. Unlike Vince, he’d made a career and a reputation, was respected throughout his chosen industry and probably had awards on his toilet wall to prove it. He’d lived in different countries, worked with different people, gathering momentum as he went. Vince, on the other hand, had moved to London with some vague idea of working in the media, moved back to Enfield when that didn’t work out and taken the only job he could find that made him feel even vaguely grown up. Jon was a year younger than Vince, but at least ten years older in terms of life experience and status.
‘So,’ Vince opened, ‘what’s your plan?’
‘You mean in London?’
Vince nodded.
‘None really. Just having a break.’
‘Funny,’ Vince smirked, ‘leaving a beachside house in California for a break in Enfield Town.’
‘Yeah,’ Jon nodded and smiled, ‘it’s all the wrong way round, isn’t it? But living somewhere like that, somewhere spectacular, doesn’t stop you loving the place you come from. Makes you appreciate it even more if anything.’
‘Which bit of Enfield are you from?’
‘Turkey Street.’
‘Turkey Street. Blimey,’ said Vince, an eyebrow raised in acknowledgement of one of the roughest parts of Enfield. ‘You’ve really come a long way.’
‘Yeah,’ Jon laughed. ‘Can’t say I’ve ever run into anyone from my estate on my travels.’
‘And your folks. Are they still there?’
‘Yeah. Well, my mum is. I would have gone and stayed with her, but she’s up to her neck in teenagers. Four of them, between fourteen and eighteen. In a three-bedroom flat. Can you imagine it?’ He grimaced.
‘Brothers and sisters?’
‘Yeah. Well, half-brother and half-sisters. Mum’s second time round. There was just me for the first fourteen years, then she met Richie and popped out another four pretty much one after the other. From two of us to seven of us in the space of five years. If that wasn’t an incentive to get my arse out of the flat, out of Enfield and into the big wide world, then I don’t know what was.’
‘Weird,’ said Vince. ‘Same thing happened to me, sort of. Lived with my mum for fourteen years, then she met Chris and now they’ve got two kids. They waited till after I’d left home to have theirs, though, thank God. I was twenty-three when Kyle came along.’
‘Now that’s a bit more civilized – you can appreciate them that way when they’re not keeping you awake all night and scratching your records and throwing up on your best shirt. Jesus,’ he said, ‘it was a nightmare – nearly put me off kids for life.’
‘So you’ve never contemplated having a family of your own?’
‘Oh, God, yeah – of course I have. I’d love a family. That’s my next big plan.’
‘Oh. Right.’
‘Just haven’t met the right girl. Yet.’
‘So you and Jess never thought about it, after the – you know – the abortion?’
‘She told you about that?’
‘Yeah.’
He smiled wryly and nodded. ‘No,’ he said, ‘that was pretty much the end for us, the abortion. Jess was wild back then. She wasn’t ready to be a mother. It would have been a disaster. Half the reason she had that abortion was because she didn’t realize she was pregnant until she was ten weeks gone and the amount of drugs and booze she must have put inside herself during that time – Christ knows what harm that would have done to the baby. No. Jess was never the mothering kind. Well, until now that is.’ He raised his glass to Vince’s in a congratulatory manner. ‘I’ve got to say,’ he continued, ‘I’m pretty impressed with the way you’ve managed to tame her.’
Vince grimaced. ‘Nothing to do with me,’ he said. ‘She was like this when I met her. It was just timing.’
‘Yeah. I know what you mean. Jessie sets the pace. Always has done. Jessie’s one of those people, right, she’s like a bus driver’
What?’
‘OΚ. Let’s say that life is a trip across town. Some people are cab drivers – their destination is dictated by their passengers. But other people are bus drivers. They set the course. People can get on and off the bus, but ultimately the bus is only going in one direction and there’s nothing a passenger can do to change that. And that’s Jess.’
Vince nodded, feeling that, although Jon’s analogy was faintly ridiculous, it also rang very true.
‘But having said that, it still says a lot about you, that she’s chosen you. Having a baby – that’s a huge thing. She must think you’re pretty fucking special to want to share this leg of her journey with you.’
An alarm bell rang violently in Vince’s head. ‘Leg?’ he said.
Jon paused again. ‘Yeah,’ he said, “cause that’s the thing about Jess – and I really hope you don’t think I’m saying this because I’m jealous or anything, ‘cause really, mate, trust me, I’m not – but the thing about Jess is that if you don’t want the same things as her at the same time as her for the rest of your lives, then at some point you’ll get kicked off the bus. And if someone gets on who does want the same things – well, you know…’
Vince nodded tautly.
‘You’ve got to be prepared to play second fiddle from hereon in if you want to make it work. Jess is the boss. Accept that, accept her, accept everything she does, and you’re laughing. Otherwise, well… I suppose what I’m trying to say is just, be careful. Jess is a dangerous person to fall in love with. And I should know…’
Vince blanched slightly. He was torn between wanting to smash a glass over Jon’s head and asking him to explain further. As it was, all he could manage to do was to pick up his empty glass and ask
Jon, wanly, if he wanted another drink.
‘Sorry, Vince, I went too far, didn’t I? I talk too much. Always have done. It’s none of my business. You and Jess are great together, and you’ll have great babies and that’s all that matters. End of story.’
Vince nodded and took their empty glasses to the bar, his head full of buses and babies.
He thought back to the first time Jess had slipped into his car and introduced herself. What had she seen when she looked at Vince? Had she seen a vibrant sexy man or a sperm donor? The man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with or someone who’d give her what she wanted right now?
He thought about their life together. Was it a love affair? He loved her, he knew that without a doubt. And she acted as if she loved him. She looked after him and cared for him. She was affectionate and warm. But was she committed? Were they doing the right thing, making a baby together when they barely knew each other? Jess would be a great mother, there was no doubt in Vince’s mind about that, but would they work as a family’
He glanced at himself in the carved mirror above the bar. He looked tired. He looked old. He was old. There was no time for prevaricating. If he wanted a family, he needed to start now.
He pushed Jon’s comments and his own lingering doubts to the back of his mind and handed the barman a £5 note.
Forty-Six
Vince sat in his car outside 10 Ladysmith Road.
It was nine-thirty on a Saturday morning, and he was waiting for Charlene Okumbo to emerge for her driving lesson. Charlene was seventeen years old and this was her third lesson. Vince liked Charlene because she talked nonstop about herself and her friends and her life, and made him feel vaguely tuned in to the youth of today. Her mum was a teaching assistant from Perthshire and her dad was a bus driver from Ghana. She went to Enfield College where she was taking A levels in English and Business Studies, and eventually she wanted to run her own retail empire.
She was also always at least ten minutes late for her lesson, so Vince turned off his engine, pulled out his phone and called Jess.
‘Oh, hi, Jon, it’s Vince.’
‘All right, mate? How you doing?’
‘Good, thanks. Is Jess there?’
‘Yeah. I think so. Let me just see… ‘ Vince heard him calling down the hallway. ‘Hang on a sec, mate. Jess? Jess?’ It went quiet for a moment. ‘Er, Vince. It doesn’t look like she’s here.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah. Doesn’t look like she came home last night. Her bed’s not slept in.’
‘You’re’ kidding me.’
‘No. Seriously. She’s not here.’
Vince gulped. Jess had said she was going out last night with people from work. She’d said they were going to have a few drinks at their local pub, then she fancied an early night.
‘I don’t understand it,’ Jon continued. ‘When I left her she said she was just having one more drink, then she’d be leaving.’
‘Left her? What – you mean you were there?’ ‘Yes.’
‘At her work do?’
‘Yeah. I didn’t have anything on so she asked me to come along.’
‘Oh,’ said Vince, ‘right.’ He felt his gut clench with jealousy. He hadn’t had anything to do last night either, but Jess had made it very plain early on in their relationship that her work life was totally separate from her private life. He’d never met any of her colleagues from the radio station and he’d never pushed it because he thought it was fair enough – he approved of them having separate social lives, thought it was healthy and mature. Jess did lots of things without him and it didn’t bother him. But the thought of her inviting Jon along to one of her Friday nights out, while he sat in with Chris and his mum watching Friends and eating Domino’s pizzas made him want to throw something very hard against a wall.
‘Do you want me to call her?’
‘No,’ snapped Vince, ‘no. I’ll call her. Do you think I should be worried?’
‘No,’ said Jon, ‘I’m sure she’s fine. Probably just had a bit too much to drink and crashed at someone’s house.’
‘She was drinking?’
‘Yeah. She had a couple.’
‘But she’s teetotal.’
Jon laughed. ‘Last night she was drinking. Tomorrow she’ll be teetotal again. That’s the thing with Jess. She does what she wants.’
Vince bridled at yet another insight borne out of an intimacy he increasingly felt he didn’t share with his girlfriend, sighed and switched off his phone.
‘Morning, morning!’ Charlene’s beaming face appeared at his window.
Vince sighed again and conjured up a smile.
‘You all right?’
Yeah,’ he said, slipping out of the driving seat to let Charlene take over. ‘I’ve just got to make a quick call. I’m really sorry. I won’t be long.’
‘Cool with me,’ she said as she slipped into the driving seat and examined her eyeliner in the rear-view mirror.
Vince pressed his mobile tightly to his ear and listened to the ringing tone.
‘Vince! My angel boy!’
‘Hi,’ he said, feeling thrown by her exuberance. ‘Where are you?’
‘I’m at Frank’s place.’
‘Frank? Who’s Frank?’
‘Frank. Franco. He’s a chef. You know’
‘No,’ he muttered, ‘I don’t know. What the hell are you doing there?’
‘Oh, please don’t get all arsey with me, Vincent –’
‘I’m not getting arsey,’ he hissed, ‘I’m just worried about you. What happened last night? Jon said you were supposed to be coming home…’
Yeah, well. I was, but then some of the girls were going up to Eros…’
‘You went to Eros?’ Vince’s mind boggled at the thought of clean-living, miso-soup-slurping Jess getting down and dirty at Eros on a Friday night.
‘Yeah. It was great. Haven’t been there for years. And we bumped into Franco – he’s a cook up at the hospital.’
‘Oh. Right.’ An image of a swarthy, muscle-bound Italian wearing nothing but a chef’s hat and apron flitted briefly through Vince’s mind.
‘Got chatting, had a line or two. Suddenly it was four in the morning. Couldn’t get a cab so I came back here with Frank. Bless him.’
Vince didn’t know which element of this shocking story to question first. The inviting of Jon to one of her precious work dos. The drinking of alcohol. The taking of drugs. Or the going back to a strange Italian’s flat in the early hours of the morning. His mind raced with a million grievances and concerns. ‘Christ, Jess… ‘ he managed.
‘What?’ she said. You’re not angry with me, are you?’
‘Jess,’ he said, taking a deep breath in an attempt to sound measured and reasonable, ‘I can’t talk now. I’m in the middle of a lesson. I’ll see you tonight. OK?’
‘You sound pissed off. Are you pissed off?’
‘Yes. I’m pissed off.’
‘Oh, Vince. Please don’t give me any grief. My head’s fucking pounding. I really don’t need it.’
Vince sighed again. ‘Look. I’ll see you later.’ And he hung up.
Charlene threw him a look. ‘Whoah,’ she said, her mouth an agog O, ‘that was a bit heavy’
‘Hmmm.’
‘Wanna talk about it?’
Vince glanced at his phone, then at Charlene. Yes, he thought, he did want to talk about it. ‘If you were seeing someone,’ he began, ‘and that person went out on a Friday night without you, but with their best friend of the opposite sex, then ended up in a nightclub taking drugs – while you were supposed to be trying for a baby – met up with another person of the opposite sex from work and ended up going home with that person at four o’clock in the morning, what would you do?’
Charlene popped a fruit pastille in her mouth and looked him squarely between the eyes. ‘Dump him,’ she said, simply.
Vince stared at her for a second, waiting for her to soften the bluntness of her pronouncement. She
didn’t.
He nodded slowly, and turned to find his seatbelt, feeling a strange numbness suffusing his body.
‘OK,’ he said, ‘Mirror, signal… and manoeuvre.’
Forty-Seven
Freedom came in strange forms and from unexpected directions.
The last time Joy had had a day and night to herself was two years ago when George had spent the night in hospital with an ingrown toenail – the particular little window of freedom that Joy was about to enjoy had been afforded by the fact that George had decided that he needed to kick-start his writing career with a creative writing course. He found one in Winchester that fitted the bill – mainly because it promised plenty of one-on-one meetings with top literary agents. George was convinced that all he needed to do was find someone who appreciated what he was trying to do, someone to champion his embryonic work, and success would be guaranteed. ‘Publishing – it’s all a matter of who you know,’ he explained to Joy. ‘It’s all about making contact with these people.’
Joy had nodded sagely, unsure whether his theory was right or wrong, but not wanting to do or say anything that might make him change his mind about leaving her alone for an entire weekend.
Joy could barely believe it when the door closed behind George on Friday afternoon and she watched his car pulling out on to Esher High Street. She half expected him to come back, to bowl through the door saying, ‘What was I thinking? I can’t possibly go through with it – I might have to talk to people I don’t know and you might end up having fun somewhere.’ She hadn’t moved from her position on the sofa for a full ten minutes after he left, just in case he came back and found her looking like she was up to something.
Which she wasn’t.
Not really.
She’d met Dymphna and Karen on the South Bank last night. They had a drink at the Royal Festival Hall, then headed down the river to a pizza restaurant on Gabriel’s Wharf. It was a pleasant evening, nothing special, nothing that thousands of other people in the capital weren’t doing, too, but for Joy, sitting in a restaurant with her friends on a Friday night, sharing a bottle of Pinot Grigio and not having to check her watch once all evening had felt as close to ecstasy as she’d ever been.
