The Rom-Com Collection: The Plus One, Something for the Weekend, A Marriage of Connivance

by Natasha West

  Better to just keep her mouth shut.

  ‘Oh, you know’, she said to Jess, ‘It just stopped feeling right.’

  Jess nodded and took a sip of her drink.

  Three hours later, Jess and Chloe were in a cab, headed for Chloe’s. They were both tipsy.

  Jess had asked Chloe if she wanted to come back to the hotel to see if the bar was still open to continue the evening. But Chloe had suggested going back to hers. She said she had a bottle of something or other they could drink.

  Jess thought ‘Why not?’

  Later, she’d find out the answer to that question.

  Sat on Chloe’s seen-better-days sofa in her cramped flat, they’d drunk the bottle far too quickly. Or rather, Chloe had. She put two thirds of the bottle away on her own. She wondered later if some unconscious part of her had done that intentionally.

  ‘Hey’, Jess said looking around, ‘I like your place.’

  ‘No, you don’t.’

  ‘I do!’ Jess protested.

  ‘It’s a shit hole.’

  ‘Is this a booze thing, you swearing? It feels like your language deteriorates the more you drink.’

  Chloe snorted. She realised she was rather drunk.

  ‘Hey’ she said, feeling dangerous ‘Wanna play a game?’

  ‘Sure’ Jess shrugged. ‘But if it’s boggle, you should know ahead of time that I will whip your arse.’

  ‘I was thinking more like ‘Truth or dare.’

  Jess made a face.

  ‘That sounds like an invitation to trouble.’

  ‘Chicken’, Chloe said with a derisive look.

  It was the perfect word choice. Because Jess, like Marty McFly before her, could not abide being called ‘chicken’. She always felt a need to prove herself. What she had to prove, she didn’t know. She just knew that she could never let that particular word go.

  ‘Right, Price. You’re on. Hit me with a dare’ she demanded.

  A slow smile crept onto Chloe’s face as she considered the possibilities.

  ‘OK… Oh, I’ve got the perfect thing’ she said with satisfaction.

  Jess felt a nervous wobble. What the hell had she done in agreeing to this? What sadistic impulse would Chloe reveal?

  ‘I want you to go next door and tell my neighbour that her dog is a yappy little sack of crap.’

  Jess’s relief was short lived as she considered the long term consequences of the dare.

  ‘A yappy little sack of crap? I don’t know if that’s wise. Firstly, that’s a tongue twister. Secondly, you’ve got to live next door to this person for the foreseeable future. Are you sure you’ve got it in you to sustain the kind of vendetta that you might be about to pull the trigger on?’

  Chloe thought about it, beginning to bite her lip. Jess could see she was having second thoughts. Even though it killed her, Jess had to refuse the dare for Chloe’s sake.

  ‘Let’s do truth instead, yeah?’ she said kindly.

  Chloe shrugged as though she were the one letting Jess off and not the other way around.

  ‘Alright then.’

  Chloe drained the remainder of her wine and plonked the glass down on the coffee table with a crack.

  ‘Last year’ she said.

  ‘Yes…’

  ‘What were you really planning to do when you opened that elevator door?’

  Jess nearly dropped her glass. She hadn’t been expecting to be asked that. Not remotely.

  But then again, Chloe hadn’t really expected to say it. It had just come out. The wine had loosened her up too much, she realised. But it was too late. It was out there. She’d said the thing that was supposed to be left unspoken, for the sake of their friendship.

  Jess was torn. Whether or not she’d entered into the sacred pact that was truth or dare, she would have been willing to break the oath of truth. If she needed to. Which she did. But somehow, she didn’t want to lie to Chloe. She didn’t want to make her feel stupid. Because they both knew what had been happening that night. Denying it would make a fool of Chloe.

  And there was something else. She wanted to talk about this, get it all out, deal with it. Not because she wanted to make anything of it. She couldn’t. Her marriage, whether it was about to implode or not, was still at the front of Jess’s mind.

  But perhaps if they just went ahead and got this out in the open, they could take the power out of it. Maybe even laugh about how silly it was.

  That’s what Jess told herself.

  ‘Chloe…’ Jess began.

  Chloe felt her heart quicken.

  ‘Do you think you could face the wall while I tell you this? I don’t think I can say it with you looking right at me.’

  It was an odd request but Chloe desperately wanted to know what Jess was going to say. She dutifully turned around, facing away from Jess. Her heart seemed to be going even faster. It felt like it was trying to climb out of her ribcage.

  She heard Jess take a deep breath and only then could she speak.

  ‘I was going to kiss you. And maybe even more than that’ Jess said with shame in her voice.

  Chloe began to turn around to respond but Jess cried out ‘Please! Don’t turn around.’

  Chloe froze for a second and then turned back, away from Jess.

  ‘You want to talk like this?’ she asked.

  ‘If you wouldn’t mind, yes. It makes it easier somehow. Less wrong.’

  ‘It’s wrong to talk about this?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You know why. Because I’m married.’

  Chloe paused.

  ‘But you’re not happy.’

  ‘That’s not the point.’

  ‘How is that not the point?’

  ‘Because I made a commitment.’

  ‘She’s cheating on you!’ Chloe cried out, surprised at her own sudden passion.

  Jess felt herself start to go a little nuclear.

  ‘She might be cheating on me. I don’t know for sure. But that’s no excuse to go having these kind of ‘conversations’ with someone I’m attracted to!’

  Jess hadn’t meant to say that last part.

  ‘You’re attracted to me? Still?’ Chloe asked nervously.

  ‘I think we should stop now’ Jess said.

  But Chloe had to keep going. It was too late to go back, after all.

  ‘I feel the same. I’ve wanted you for a long time, I think’ Chloe said tremulously, still not looking at Jess. ‘That’s the real reason I didn’t come to your wedding. I didn’t care about Freya’s art show. I was just afraid it would hurt too much to watch you get married.’

  Jess put her head in her hands. This was it. The thing they couldn’t go back from. Jess had known it was a risk to have this talk. And it had blown up in their faces.

  ‘I’ve got to go.’

  Chloe span around to look at Jess.

  ‘No! Please don’t. You’re my friend, and I can’t lose you-’

  ‘We’re not friends. I wanted to be, but this means we’re not. And we probably won’t ever be.’

  Chloe felt a tear roll down her cheek at Jess’s terrible words. They hurt because they were true.

  Jess saw the tear, felt a desire to comfort Chloe but she knew she couldn’t. She had to leave right this second. She didn’t have the strength it would take to stay and not do something she’d regret.

  ‘I’m sorry, Chloe’ Jess said and fled the flat, leaving the door wide open.

  Chloe sat for a moment, looking at the open door. Then she stood and closed it quietly.

  The rest of the conference passed quietly. Jess and Chloe stayed on opposite ends of whatever room they both happened to be in. It wasn’t too difficult because they both knew they had to.

  The friendship was officially over. The attraction between them had consumed it utterly.

  Year Ten

  July 2015 – The Globe Inn (Leeds)

  Chloe walked into the hotel with a straight back and a firm gate. She wa
s not the girl she’d been the last time she’d come to this very hotel ten years ago. The last few years had been hard on her, but they’d made something stronger of her too. She felt made of steel these days.

  She swore to herself one thing as she stepped over the threshold of the overly beige Globe Hotel. She was done with drama. Every year, she came to this conference and it got weird. She was done with it.

  Jess had called time on the friendship. And Chloe had spent a year coming to an acceptance of that. Because she knew Jess was right. They’d never really been friends. They’d been two people who were too stupid to know the difference between friendship and the other thing.

  Chloe felt angry with herself when she thought about it. At thirty-two, she finally knew enough to know what a ridiculous waste it had all been. She’d spent the better part of a decade pretending not to pine for someone she couldn’t have.

  Enough was enough.

  She was prepared to see Jess. And she thought it would be OK. She’d moved on, been on a few dates, moved to a nicer place. And the best thing was that Freya had left the school. She’d gotten a big art prize and that had been it for her and teaching. She was off somewhere now, moving in the circles she’d always wanted to, probably having people tell her how talented she was, puckering up and kissing her arse. Chloe distantly wished her the best. She deserved to be happy.

  And Chloe thought she deserved a little happiness now too. She’d done a bad thing and she’d paid for it. She now considered the bill paid in full. The school’s inhabitants seemed to have forgotten all about her little disgrace and things were returning to normal. All was right in Chloe’s little world.

  She wondered how Jess was doing sometimes but she never reached out. She would have liked to know that she was doing OK. At times, more than anything. But they had to let go now. It was the only way.

  And when she saw her today, she’d be polite but distant. She had a feeling that Jess would be the same.

  She sat in the drafty function hall and listened to the commencement speaker, half asleep. She couldn’t spot Jess.

  Later, she was at the buffet, making chit chat and eating dry sandwiches. Still no sign of Jess. It was odd, she was always here, no matter what.

  Saturday came and went. No Jess. Chloe wasn’t sure how to feel. The whole day passed vaguely wondering where she was, if she was alright. But maybe she’d never find out. Maybe she’d have to get OK with not knowing anything about Jess ever again.

  It was a sad thought. Chloe knew they couldn’t be in each other’s lives and she’d made a certain amount of peace with that. But she’d been expecting to at least see Jess across the conference room, talking, arguing, eating, existing. There was something comforting in that.

  But apparently, that comfort was not to be had.

  And then it was Sunday. Chloe went to get breakfast before she headed out.

  She was waiting in line for tea at the enormous dispenser when she noticed something. There was a man in front of her, a guy with a moustache who was on his mobile phone.

  ‘I’m no more pleased about it than you are, Steve. But what was I supposed to do? Somebody had to fill in and she’s done a lot for me. And anyway, I’m back in a few hours and then you can leave me with the dogs and go on your precious bloody fishing trip.’

  Chloe wasn’t one to earwig, but something about the man rang a distant bell. It was the moustache. The bad moustache. The guy’s name was… Greg. He worked with Jess. He was the one she’d managed to help out with his evil boss, she recalled.

  Once he’d put the phone down, she coughed gently to get his attention. But he was squeezing a teabag in his cup with a spoon, caught up in the task. He didn’t get the hint. Chloe was going to have to speak up.

  ‘Hey, it’s Greg, isn’t it?’ Chloe said, unsure of what she was going to say once she got his ear.

  Greg turned.

  ‘Yeah?’ he said suspiciously.

  ‘You work with Jess Cooper, don’t you?’

  Greg’s suspicious look dropped away at Jess’s name.

  ‘Yeah, I work with Jess’ he said fondly. ‘You know her?’

  ‘Yeah, we… err, I see her here every year. Is she not coming this time?’

  ‘No, she’s had a death in the family, couldn’t make it.’

  Chloe felt her breath catch in her throat.

  ‘Who was it? Did she say?’

  Greg thought for a second and said ‘Err… I think she said it was her Gran.’

  It was like a stone dropped into Chloe’s stomach. Jess’s Gran. The Gran she’d mentioned more than any other relative, including her mother. The Gran she’d risked her marriage to look after.

  She pulled out her phone and began to ring Jess. And then she wondered if she should. They weren’t really friends anymore. But Jess must be in such pain right now, it felt wrong not to reach out.

  She dialled Jess’s number. A few beeps indicated that Jess’s phone wasn’t accepting calls. She’d probably turned it off because she didn’t want to speak to anyone.

  And that could have been it. Chloe could have left Jess to her grief. But something in her couldn’t leave it alone. Couldn’t leave Jess alone.

  She began to google Manchester obituaries, hoping against hope that she would find the announcement. She trawled through various names and death dates, each passing minute making it seem more hopeless.

  And then she found it, on a local Manchester newspaper’s website.

  Hazel Cooper passed away July 2nd 2015. Funeral to be held at St Michael’s Church, Salford, Manchester on Sunday 17th July at 14.00.

  That was three hours from now, Chloe realised.

  She didn’t really think about what to do with the information. She didn’t consider propriety. She simply grabbed her bag, ran out of the hotel and hailed down a cab, asking the driver to get her to the train station as fast as he could.

  On the two-hour train journey to Manchester, Chloe had time to wonder what she was doing. She hadn’t spoken to Jess in a year. Even now, with this death, Jess had not reached out to her. She likely didn’t need her. She had her parents and Claire.

  But here she was, rushing to Manchester, to crash the funeral of a woman she’d never met.

  At St Michael’s church Jess was standing in the church yard, looking out at the headstones. Her Gran’s wasn’t up yet. Apparently that didn’t happen straight away. They buried you first and the stone came later.

  It had happened suddenly. The health scare that her Gran had a few years ago had seemed to be a blip. She’d been in rude health the last few years, right up till the end. The day before she died, Jess had been with her, helping in her garden, her pride and joy. She’d been telling Jess about when she had been younger and had been ‘courting’ her first husband, Derick. He’d been due to be sent overseas with the army to fight in the Second World War, much to his horror. And Jess’s Gran, then a young woman who’d known him barely a month, hadn’t wanted to get too attached to him because she’d had no idea if he’d come back. Then he’d asked her to marry him.

  ‘And what could I say?’ she explained ‘He was scared and I wanted to make him feel better. So I married him the day before he was shipped off. I barely knew him but he was a sweet boy. So I took the chance that he’d make it back and that it would work out. And there I was, only eighteen, waiting for a stranger to come home so we could live together as man and wife. In those days, that sort of thing happened all the time. It was like the end of the world was coming, everyone rushing into marriages without a thought. But your grandad did come home, of course. And then he turned out to be the best husband I ever had. Until he died at thirty when that bloody articulated lorry hit him. But the twelve years we had were better than the ones I had with the husbands I thought I knew. I took a chance and it worked out better than the thought through decisions. Which just shows you what a bloody lottery the world is.’

  Jess had listened carefully to that story. She really didn’t know what to make of it
but she liked to hear her Gran tell it anyway. It wasn’t the first time she’d heard it and she’d assumed it wouldn’t be the last.

  But a day later, she’d had a call from her sobbing mother, explaining that she’d gone to drop some food off and had found her in her chair, apparently asleep. But she hadn’t been able to wake her.