Oh, don’t answer that: I know why you did it. You ‘weren’t ready’. Because, back then, you think there’s a perfect time to have a child. You think you can take all the time in the world because getting pregnant is as easy as one, two, three. You think you can pop babies out like fucking McDonald’s Drive-Thru orders, don’t you?
I thought I knew you but this shocks me.
You don’t deserve this baby.
You don’t deserve it at all.
Twenty-seven
My birthday dinner was to take place the week after we’d been to Brighton, at Sarah’s house. According to Jake, the two of them had talked through every possible restaurant option before agreeing over dessert that she would host the dinner at her house, on condition that she didn’t have to cook herself.
‘She’s far too busy,’ Jake had told me beforehand, in a way that pricked me like a heat rash. I knew I couldn’t possibly compare my rather quiet life to that of a single working mum of two kids (even if they did live mostly with her ex), but that didn’t make me feel better about the way he’d said it almost admiringly. The irony wasn’t lost on me, either, that she got a night at a restaurant with Jake in order to decide that I wouldn’t have a night out at a restaurant with him. So I suppose I start the day in the wrong frame of mind. The doorbell rings not long after Jake’s left for work.
‘Happy birthday to you! Squashed tomatoes and stew!’ Anna sings as I open the door to a cloud of coloured balloons behind which I can just about make out enough of her to identify her.
‘Aww, thank you. Come in.’ I usher her into the living room where she hands me an envelope as well as the handful of balloon strings.
‘Happy birthday!’ she says. ‘Here, let me. I thought we could…’ She pulls out a dining chair and ties the balloons to the back of it. ‘There, look: very festive. I’m sorry I didn’t bring a banner – I bought one but completely forgot to bring it.’
‘You can bring it tonight,’ I say, opening the envelope. It’s a voucher for an anti-ageing facial at the spa we went to, and a homemade voucher for one hour of babysitting from ‘Aunty Anna’.
‘Thank you so much!’ I give her a hug. ‘That’s so thoughtful of you.’
‘You’re welcome,’ she says. ‘I thought that after the baby comes you might need a pick-me-up – or before. You don’t need to use the vouchers concurrently.’
‘It’s so kind of you. Thank you. I’ll do the same for you, of course, when you’ve had yours.’
‘I’ll hold you to that,’ says Anna. She pauses, then takes a deep breath. ‘Look, by the way, there’s something I’ve got to tell you…’
She pulls an ‘awkward’ face, gritting her teeth and scrunching up her face as if she expects to be struck. I raise my eyebrows at her.
‘What’s up?’
‘I can’t make it tonight.’
‘What? How come?’ I stare at her, looking for spots on her skin or other signs of sickness. But she looks fine. Glowing, in fact.
‘Rob’s flying through London en route to the States,’ she says. ‘I’m so sorry. There’s nothing I can do about it. He’s booked the flights.’ She rolls her eyes at me. ‘He never thinks to ask if it suits me, just assumes I’m always available. He’s arranged it so he’s in a hotel overnight near Heathrow. It’s date night. I might have to put out.’ She laughs self-consciously. But I’m not laughing. Without her, my birthday evening falls as flat as the proverbial. ‘You’ll have a lovely time, though,’ Anna continues, ‘I’m sure Sarah’s arranged a fab evening. I wish I could be there…’
‘Why the States?’ I walk into the kitchen and put the kettle on to hide the disappointment that I can feel pulling at my face, making my lip wobble.
‘He’s staking out a job in Texas,’ Anna says. ‘It’d be a promotion. More money. Better package.’
My stomach drops. ‘Would you go too?’ I say with my back to her. ‘You’ve only just set up in London.’
‘I miss the States. But it’s early days. I can’t stay for coffee, by the way, if that’s what you’re doing. Lots to arrange before tonight. He’s about to board right now.’
‘So you’d move back?’ I say, switching the kettle back off and turning to face her.
‘Let him get the job first, then we’ll decide,’ she says. ‘Though we’ve lived in Texas before, so it’d be easy. Anyway, I imagine we’ll talk about it when we see each other.’ She laughs. ‘But, look – sorry about tonight, but I knew you’d understand.’
‘It’s okay,’ I say, trying to inject some sincerity into my voice. ‘So when does he land? And leave again? How long do you have together?’
‘Oh, he gets in about six in the evening, I think, and then leaves again around lunchtime tomorrow.’
‘Lovely,’ I say.
‘Yep,’ she says. ‘He’s planned it really well. We’ll go out for dinner, then have breakfast tomorrow and off he’ll go. I might tell him about the phone calls.’
‘Oh! Are you still getting them?’
‘Yeah.’
‘I’d think about it, though,’ I say. ‘You don’t want to worry him, especially when he’s not here. There’s so much I don’t tell Jake when he’s not here because I don’t want him to worry.’ I roll my eyes at Anna but she looks away. We move towards the front door. ‘Anyway, thanks for coming over. And for the balloons and present.’
Anna faces me and puts her hands on my shoulders. ‘Are you sure you’re okay? You’ll have a brilliant night. You’ll have to tell me if Simon comes… and everything that Caroline gets up to. And I want pictures. Especially of what Sarah wears. My guess is it’s going to be up to here!’ She draws a line on her upper thighs.
‘Yeah, will do,’ I say. ‘You have a great time. Enjoy “date night”.’ I can’t keep the sarcasm from coating the words but Anna’s already halfway down the front path.
‘Bye then.’ She waves as she lets herself through the front gate. ‘Have fun! Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!’
I close the door then slump onto the sofa. Fancy cancelling on the day. Of course I get it that Rob’s flying through, but of all the luck. If only he’d spoken to her, he could have flown the next day. I run my hand through my hair. For god’s sake, why me? My last birthday without a baby; my first birthday in London; my new friends… except the most important one.
I grab the iPad and open a search page. ‘Qatar to London flight timetable’, I type into the search box. Sure enough, there’s a flight listed that gets in at 5.55 p.m. Hope flares for a moment: maybe she could come for a drink at Sarah’s first, then go to the airport. It’ll take him a while to get through at Heathrow, for sure, and she’s got all night and tomorrow morning. Can’t she divide herself between both of us? I pick up the phone to call Anna then stop myself.
Instead, I click through to flight-tracking and find the flight. Anna’s right, it’s just taken off and is heading towards Iran.
‘Huh, Rob,’ I say nastily, jabbing at the little plane icon on the screen. ‘You have no idea what you’ve just done. That’s no way to treat your wife’s best buddy, is it now?’
Twenty-eight
So I admit I go to my birthday dinner in bad grace. I’m glad I go, though, because I learn something there. I learn that I’m not imagining it: Sarah really does fancy Jake. Not just a little bit, but really, really, might-do-something-about-it fancies him.
She’s ordered in something impressive from Cook for us to eat, and when we get there she’s making cocktails in the kitchen. Jake hands her the flowers he’s picked up from a trendy florist in London. I’ve already clocked how nice they are.
‘Thank you. Virgin mojitos for the birthday girl!’ Sarah says, giving me an air kiss and pointing to a small jug and a glass next to it. ‘Help yourself. I didn’t want you to feel left out. Hello, darling,’ she says to Jake, going over and offering her cheek for a kiss. She’s wearing a dress that does a very good job at hiding any extra weight she might be carrying around her middle. It skims al
l the right places, and the way the pattern’s designed makes it even more flattering. Despite Anna’s prediction, it falls nicely above the knee, showing us all that she has legs like a racehorse. Once again, I’m a blob in the ubiquitous black maternity dress, and that doesn’t help my mood, either. I still remember the way Caroline looked at me in the restaurant at The Grand and said ‘You don’t look so bad.’
Even as I stand there in Sarah’s kitchen with my little jug of virgin mojitos, I wish we weren’t here. I wish Jake and I were in a restaurant on our own, just the two of us. Or, better still, just at home, me in my pyjamas with a take-out and a movie. Jake’s leaving again in the morning and I really don’t want to share what little time I have him with Sarah, friend or no friend.
‘So did you have a good time in Brighton on your dirty little weekend with the Hughes-Smiths?’ Sarah asks us. ‘Lovely picture you posted…’ Her smile doesn’t reach her eyes and I realize that she’s jealous; that she suspects that the four of us planned to go down without her.
‘I couldn’t believe it when we bumped into them there,’ I say. ‘Very random.’
‘Bit of a coincidence, eh!’ Sarah says, narrowing her eyes as she tastes the cocktail. ‘Of all the hotels in the country and you both end up there; in the same bar at the same time! Mmm, that’s delicious, even if I do say so myself.’
‘It was a bit like that,’ I say with a shrug. ‘Is everyone here now?’
‘Ah. Anna called. She can’t make it. Apparently Rob’s on a flying visit so she’s off for some rumpy-pumpy.’ Sarah shimmies her hips. ‘Anyway, I bet you already knew that, given you two barely even breathe without tagging each other on social media. But yes, the Hughes-Smiths are in the lounge. Anyway, be a dear, why don’t you take this through while I borrow your husband for a minute?’ She puts the jug and a stack of glasses on a tray and holds it out to me. ‘Are you okay carrying it? It’s not too heavy.’
‘It’s okay,’ says Jake. ‘I’ll take it.’ Does he flash her a look, like, ‘not now’, or am I imagining it?
So he picks up the tray and we both go through to the cream-coloured living room. There’s a party-like feel to the evening: Ed Sheeran playing in the background, the scent of perfume and aftershave filling the air, and everyone dressed up. It reminds me, for some reason, of Christmas gatherings back home. Suddenly, I feel a million miles away from everyone I hold dear – except for Jake, of course: my parents, my friends, all the aunts and uncles and cousins who are part of the fabric of who I am. Six weeks ago, I didn’t know Sarah, Anna or the Hughes-Smiths. The ground almost wobbles beneath me and I hold onto Jake’s elbow for support. I could really have done with Anna here.
‘Hello, stranger,’ says Caroline, coming over to Jake and me and giving me an extravagant air kiss. ‘Twice in two weeks: what a treat. Brighton was super, wasn’t it? Just perfect. We had such a lovely time.’ She looks at Sarah, almost as if she’s goading her. ‘We’ll have to make sure that doesn’t happen again, or you’ll start to think Jake and I are hiding something!’ She tinkles a laugh and raises an eyebrow.
Her words fall into a well of silence but then the doorbell goes and, a moment later, the living-room door opens and I can’t actually believe that Simon’s come. I go to the mantelpiece and examine the framed pictures Sarah has on there. Loads of her with two boys who I presume are her sons.
‘This is Simon,’ Sarah says, leading him into the room. ‘Jake, this is who your wife spends her time with when she tells you she’s out walking. Ha!’
Jake laughs. ‘Pleased to meet you, mate,’ he says, shaking his hand, and I just know what he’s thinking: You? Have a chance with my wife? Yeah right!
I go over to shake Simon’s hand but he leans in and kisses my cheek, giving me a waft of the strange soap he uses that takes me straight back to that night on the Embankment.
‘Hello, Taylor,’ he says. ‘Happy birthday. Looking radiant, as usual.’
I give him half a smile.
‘Right, everyone – I feel I should have a gong!’ says Sarah, tinging her nail on her cocktail glass.
‘Dong, dong, dong!’ calls Jake.
‘Thank you. Right – if you wouldn’t mind, could I please ask you to take your seats? I’ve done a plan – look for your name, and no cheating!’ She looks at Caroline when she says this, and I just know that she’s going to be next to Jake, and I’m going to be tucked away down the far end of the table. And guess what? I’m absolutely right.
Twenty-nine
I learn some other things that evening, aside from the fact that Sarah fancies my husband. I learn that Toby’s an absolute gentleman. As predicted, Jake’s at the head of the table, with Sarah and Caroline next to him, and I’m down the far end, at the other head with Simon and Toby on my left and right.
I won’t bore you with the details of what we speak about. It’s enough to say that the other end of the table’s far more raucous than our end. Several times, we stop our own conversation to look quizzically at Sarah and Jake to see what they’re laughing at so riotously. For a while, Caroline tries to talk to Jake, but Sarah’s not having any of it, so she gives up and starts a spirited talk with Simon about the state of the NHS while Toby tries to engage me with a series of open-ended questions about the pregnancy, my answers to which get interrupted every time Jake or Sarah laugh and we all turn to see what was so funny. I curse Anna in my head for not coming: it irks me to be the only sober one in a group of people getting steadily drunk, and perhaps that’s why Toby lays the drinks mat carefully over the top of his wine glass after one glass of red, and smiles conspiratorially at me.
What I will say, though, is that as I sit there, eating my way through roasted salmon and potatoes and green beans, I watch Sarah lay a hand on Jake’s arm. Then I watch him reciprocate as he makes a joke. And then I watch her start to touch him almost every time she addresses him – which is all the time. She touches his arm, then his hand, and gives him a playful punch on the shoulder. It’s as if the conversation they’re having is 20 per cent verbal and 80 per cent tactile and, all the while, Jake’s refilling her glass and her smile’s getting bigger and brighter. At one point, to my utter disbelief, she takes his hand and traces the lines on his palm with her blood-red nail, so she can ‘read his fortune’.
‘You’re going to become a father soon,’ she says, biting her lip, and I’m honestly embarrassed for her. She looks dreamily at Jake. ‘You’re going to be a wonderful father. I can just see it.’
I give Toby a very slight eye roll and he shakes his head almost imperceptibly. Simon’s looking down, checking something on his multifunction watch, clearly embarrassed too. We can all see how drunk Sarah’s getting and how, with each sip of wine, she loses a little more self-restraint.
It’s Simon who finally breaks it up. He stands rather suddenly, as if he’s simply had enough, and starts clearing the plates. Jake jumps up to help, while Sarah leans back in her chair and beams at us all.
‘What a brilliant evening! We should start a dinner club so we can do this every month,’ she says.
‘What a wonderful idea,’ Caroline says smoothly. ‘I can’t think of anything more fun,’ and, for once, I welcome her sarcasm.
‘Definitely, let’s plan it! Let’s make it happen, guys!’ Sarah says. She stands up, staggers slightly, and steadies herself on Jake, then slides her arm around his waist and squeezes him against her.
‘Tell you what, Taylor, if anything ever happens to you, you don’t need to worry: I’ll look after this one and the baby. They’re the perfect package!’ Nobody answers. ‘Oops!’ she garbles, disentangling herself. ‘Right. I’m off to get the you-know-what!’ She lurches out of the room, Jake following with a stack of plates. I re-fold my napkin and look around the table.
‘That was lovely, wasn’t it?’ says Toby. ‘The salmon was delicious.’
‘The joy of buying in,’ says Caroline. ‘You can’t really go wrong.’
‘She’s very busy…’ I say without m
uch conviction.
‘Flirting with your husband,’ says Caroline.
No one replies.
‘Oh, come on! You’d have to be sitting under the fucking table to miss it,’ says Caroline smoothly, refilling her own wine glass. ‘Mind you, maybe not even then. Could have been worse under there.’ She laughs a rich, throaty laugh that implies way more than her words.
‘She’s just drunk,’ says Toby. ‘She doesn’t mean anything by it. Ignore it, Taylor. You have bigger things on your plate.’ He touches my hand, then withdraws it again.
‘Exactly,’ says Simon, ‘but even so.’
‘For fuck’s sake, what are they doing out there?’ Caroline asks as I realize it’s gone very quiet in the kitchen, but then we hear giggles, the door opens and Jake comes in carrying a cake alight with candles, Sarah in his wake clutching a gas lighter. Her lipstick’s long gone. Jake places the cake carefully on the table and Sarah starts to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ while pretending to conduct us. Jake and Simon join in; Toby mumbles the words, and Caroline just shakes her head.
When we leave, as soon as possible after the cake, Simon catches my eye, then, in a flash when no one’s looking, he winks. I look away.
I know your husband’s going to miss the birth
I don’t need to be a clairvoyant to predict this. I don’t need a crystal ball or a pack of tarot cards to know that, when push literally comes to shove, he won’t be in that birthing room with you. I’d put money on it.
How can I be so sure? Any fool can see. It’s not rocket science, sweetie-pie. Do you remember that book He’s Just Not That Into You? The one that was made into that film with Jennifer Aniston and Ben Affleck? Yeah, I didn’t watch it either, but maybe you should. There’s a lot to be said for the title. Have you ever sat and thought about what it actually means?
I Know You Page 15
