Before I Met You

by Lisa Jewell

  ‘What was that?’ her mother asked curiously.

  ‘Nothing,’ Betty exhaled. ‘Nothing. Just a neighbour.’

  ‘Oh,’ said her mother in a tone of voice that suggested she liked the idea of a neighbour.

  Betty brought the phone call to an end, her whole body so suffused with rage and indignation that she could no longer form a proper thought.

  As she walked into her flat she felt the emptiness of it really hit her, for the first time since she’d moved in. She wished for a flatmate now, for someone to cry out to: ‘Oh my God! I cannot believe what just happened! You know that woman? The one downstairs. The one who fucks so loud that it makes my ears bleed? She just told me that my cigarette smoke gets into her flat. And that my bed squeaks. When I move. Can you believe it!’

  Betty took a bottle of cider and her tobacco pouch out on to the fire escape, where she deliberately blew her cigarette smoke through the gaps in the steps so that it would find its way into the woman’s flat. Afterwards she sat on the sofa, her head spinning with too much cider and too many cigarettes, her hair pungent with the scum of chip oil and Soho smog, the flat dark and empty around her.

  The light faded beyond the windows outside and the Soho engine started revving up for the night: streetlights warming up, pubs unlocking their doors, the market dismantling and the drinkers arriving. Still Betty sat motionless, alone, letting the solitude filter through her system. Her job at Wendy’s would pay her two hundred pounds a week. Now she had a job she could finally focus on her search for Clara Pickle. But she still had absolutely no idea where to begin.

  16

  1920

  LILIAN SEEMED TO think little of the notion of being painted by a man you’d met just once in the street. She turned the card over between her delicate fingers and said, ‘Well, why not? It’s a nice address. And he’s a Worsley. They’re a good set.’

  ‘You know his family?’

  ‘Well, I know their cousins. Or is that the Horsleys? Hmm, well, it is a good address. And just think, your portrait. How nice to have a portrait. In the year of your twenty-first. When you are the loveliest you will ever be.’

  ‘But alone?’ said Arlette, who needed no convincing of the benefits of having her portrait painted for free. ‘Surely that can’t be wise?’

  ‘Well, I shall come with you, if you’re feeling that silly about it.’

  Silly, thought Arlette, silly? Surely the person who would walk into the home of a strange man unaccompanied was the silly one. ‘Would you really?’ she asked.

  ‘Of course,’ Lilian replied flippantly. ‘Whyever not?’

  Two days later she and Lilian took a hackney carriage to a street of tall white houses by the river in Chelsea. The street number took them to the door of a small cottage painted powder blue. Arlette breathed in deeply, touching the fabric of her favourite dress, a drop-waisted chiffon affair in dark plum, which she wore under a matching coat.

  ‘Good afternoon ladies,’ said Gideon, greeting them himself at his door. He wore a white shirt, unbuttoned to a quarter of the way down his chest, and tight brown trousers, held up by elastic braces. He looked as though he were either halfway through getting dressed or halfway through getting undressed. Either way, it was a rather informal fashion in which to meet two ladies, Arlette could not help but feel, almost risqué, and she was glad for the bristling, effervescent presence of Lilian at her side.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ said Lilian, ‘you must be Mr Worsley. I am Lilian Miller. It’s very nice to meet you.’

  ‘Gideon,’ he replied expansively, ‘call me Gideon. And Miss De La Mare, how charming to see you again. As beautiful as I recall. Do come in. Please.’

  He held the door open for Lilian and Arlette, and ushered them into a small hallway piled high with coats and boots and packing crates and tea chests. ‘I would like to say that I have only just moved in, but no, sadly, I have been in the cottage for over a year and still have not found the time or the inclination to unpack my possessions. And of course, the more time that passes the more convinced I become that whatever lies within those boxes is clearly not needed and maybe I should just dump them in the river and let the dead folk pick them over.’

  Arlette noted that the house was also dirty and wondered if maybe Gideon Worsley lived without help. It seemed unlikely, but not impossible.

  ‘I am terribly excited,’ he continued, leading them through to a small sitting room furnished with three ancient armchairs, a brass-topped table, a credenza full of books and a statue of a naked woman carved out of old stone. The naked woman was dressed in silk lingerie and a hat. And there was indeed a cat, a Persian, extravagantly, dreadfully furry and in dire need of grooming, who sat on a cushion in the window watching them suspiciously. ‘I’ve been brooding over the memory of your face for ten long days. And now, finally, you are here! Now,’ said Gideon. ‘Tea. Stay here and I’ll bring it through.’

  Arlette nodded uncomfortably. She had never before been brought tea by a host. She could not imagine how he would possibly be capable of doing such a thing.

  ‘Bohemian,’ whispered Lilian when he’d left the room.

  ‘Well, yes, I did warn you.’

  ‘Strange, though, he has no housemaid, or so it seems. He is clearly a man of substance and this house is in a very desirable area.’

  Arlette surveyed the room again. On the brass-topped table sat a tray full of half-smoked cigars and cigarillos, and on a silver tray sat three cut-glass tumblers, sticky with the residue of Calvados poured from the bottle next to them. The air smelled sour and rancid, like the air that blew from the public houses that Arlette passed on her way to and from work. It did not smell like a home should smell, of wood-smoke and beeswax and dust. It had no order, no method. It both appalled and excited Arlette in equal measure.

  Lilian was agog. ‘Well,’ she continued in her stage whisper, ‘it is entirely what one would imagine the home of a reckless artist to be, I suppose. And do you think he covered over the lady purposely, to spare our blushes?’ She nodded at the scantily clad statue and giggled. ‘As though we haven’t seen a naked woman before,’ she laughed breezily.

  Arlette laughed breezily, too, although she had never in her life seen a naked woman. Not once. The only possible notion she had of how a woman appeared underneath her clothes was the one she saw reflected in her bedroom mirror. She assumed that she was not unique in her arrangement of dips and peaks. She had spent a week in hospital two years earlier when she’d been struck down with the Spanish ’flu, and had been examined in most every respect from ankle to neck, and no one had at any point ventured the suggestion that there was anything unconventional about her physiology. She wondered for a moment how Lilian, a girl of just eighteen, had had the opportunity to see a naked woman, but assumed it was just another example of the yawning gulf between their upbringings.

  ‘Here,’ said Gideon, returning with a paint-splattered wooden butler’s tray bearing a pot and three cups and a small jar of sugar cubes. ‘I’m afraid there was no milk. Or at least what milk there was seems to have given itself over to a terrible attack of the lumps. So I hope you will forgive me and drink it black?’

  ‘Oh, I prefer it black,’ Lilian offered overfervently. ‘Thank you.’ She took a cup from his outstretched hand and perched herself on the edge of an armchair.

  ‘So, you’re here to ensure that nothing unseemly happens to your friend, is that correct?’ he asked Lilian.

  ‘Yes, indeed.’ Lilian smiled and smoothed down the skirt of her dress. ‘She is three years older than me but has had a rather sheltered upbringing. On an island.’

  ‘Ssh,’ Gideon put his finger to his lips dramatically. ‘I have promised Miss De La Mare that I will be able to divine her provenance using instinct alone. So no clues, please,’ he smiled. His teeth were not good, not for a man of his standing, but this did not detract from his general air of raffish handsomeness, and, despite the near-squalor of his home, Arlette couldn’t help but notic
e how nice he smelled, of a scent, rather than of himself, of something to do with cloves and peppermint.

  Lilian and Gideon chattered for a while, trying to find some common ground, and failing. The closest they got was a girl called Millie who’d possibly gone to the same school as his sister, but for only two terms. Arlette sipped her tea, clearly an expensive blend, served in cups that were also of a very good quality. She looked for clues as to the direction this experience might take.

  ‘Well,’ said Gideon, after a few more moments, placing his empty cup onto the brass-topped table, ‘I think, if it’s agreeable with you, Miss Miller, I would like to take Miss De La Mare up to my studio now.’

  Arlette felt her stomach wobble. She wanted, she suddenly knew without a doubt, to do this alone, yet she could not judge the wisdom of this idea. She looked at Lilian for reassurance, trusting, for some reason, that this headstrong eighteen-year-old girl would know better than her whether this man with his half unbuttoned shirt had good intentions or bad.

  ‘Well,’ Arlette said, ‘shall I stay on, alone?’

  ‘Oh, yes!’ said Lilian, springing to her feet, ‘I absolutely don’t want to hang around here, disturbing your artistic juices, not to mention your attempts to work out where the mysterious Miss De La Mare might have sprung from. I will leave you both to your afternoon and, Arlette, I will see you at home. If you’re not back by six o’clock, I will send out a search party.’ She laughed and pulled on her coat. Gideon saw her to the door and then he reappeared, looking, now that Lilian was gone, suddenly threatening and rather obscene.

  ‘Come,’ he said, cupping his large hands together, ‘come up. Let’s get started.’

  Arlette placed her cup carefully upon the table, smiled the best smile she could find, and followed this strange man up uncarpeted stairs towards who knew where.

  17

  1995

  THE NEW DAWN brought the dreadful realisation that Betty had slept through until 9.05 a.m. Her shift at Wendy’s was due to begin at 9.00 a.m. and, to save time, Betty jumped, unwashed, straight into her uniform, brushed her teeth perfunctorily, glanced in the mirror and wished she had washed her hair the previous night, thought about applying some make-up, looked at the time and decided against it, forced down a mouthful of dry cornflakes, leaped out of the front door onto the street and straight into the path of Dom Jones.

  ‘Whoa,’ he said, putting out his hands to protect himself from her.

  Betty gazed at him in shock and awe. ‘Shit,’ she said, ‘sorry.’

  He looked at her, half amused, half appalled, taking in the crumpled polo shirt and the nylon trousers and the baseball cap in her hand.

  He said nothing for a moment, looked as though he were about to walk away. Then he looked back at her briefly. ‘You’re the girl,’ he said, in his pop star voice, ‘the one from over there.’ He pointed behind him. ‘On the fire escape.’

  She nodded, not wanting to say anything, aware of cornflakes between her teeth and the fact that she had not brushed her teeth for long enough to take away the staleness of sleep.

  He appraised her again. Even from here, at such close range, on this muted May morning, dressed down in a nondescript T-shirt, unshaven and puffy-eyed, it was clear that this man was a somebody.

  Dom Jones nodded at her and then walked away, a slight smile playing around his lips.

  Betty rocked back on to her heels, as though he had created a small hurricane in his wake. She gulped. And then she smiled.

  Dom Jones.

  He’d seen her.

  He’d talked to her.

  He’d recognised her.

  She was on his radar.

  And then, very suddenly, she stopped smiling.

  She was wearing her Wendy’s uniform.

  She thought of every single time she had stepped onto this street from her flat in nice clothes. She thought of the cool T-shirts and the denim minis, she thought of the days her hair had gleamed in the sunlight and smelled like dewdrops, the slicks of red lipstick and the flourishes of liquid liner that had rendered her hard to resist. She thought of every single time that Dom Jones could have bumped into her outside her flat and threw down curses upon the gods of chance and timing.

  Not that she wanted Dom Jones to fancy her. Particularly. He was a cheating scumbag and far from being the best-looking member of Wall.

  But still.

  Dom Jones.

  She shivered away the memory of their encounter and walked very, very quickly to work.

  Betty saw John Brightly, as she turned the corner a couple of days later. He was leaning against the wall of her house, smoking a cigarette. She wanted to talk to him. But she had no idea whether or not the wall John Brightly built around himself could be dissembled at all by the use of charm and familiarity, or if she was in fact putting up an even bigger barrier every time she tried to engage with him.

  ‘How’s your sister?’ she asked, rather desperately.

  He turned and grimaced at her. ‘No idea,’ he said.

  She smiled tightly as another row of metaphorical bricks landed on the wall between them.

  ‘Seen anything of Dom Jones lately?’ she offered, as a last-ditch effort.

  He shook his head. ‘Not really.’

  Not really? Not really? What did ‘not really’ mean? He either had, or he hadn’t. She sighed, and was about to head back into the flat when he turned again and smiled and said, ‘He was asking after you.’

  She spun round and stared at him. ‘What?’

  ‘Dom Jones. A couple of days back. He was at my stall, looking at my stuff. He said, “Who’s the blond in the Wendy’s uniform?”’

  ‘Oh my God! What did you say?’

  ‘Nothing much,’ he shrugged. ‘I said you’d just moved in. That you lived on the second floor.’ He shrugged again.

  ‘Oh my God! Did you tell him my name?’

  He grimaced at her again. ‘Well, I’m not sure how I could have told him your name when I don’t know what it is myself.’

  ‘Betty!’ she almost shrieked. ‘My name is Betty.’

  He nodded knowingly.

  ‘Oh God. What else did he say?’

  ‘Nothing much. Just that. Who’s the blond.’

  Betty blinked and tried to stop a huge stupid smile take over her face. ‘Wow,’ she said. ‘I can’t believe it!’

  John Brightly looked at her then as though she had just plummeted to even lower depths of stupidity.

  ‘Did he buy anything?’ she asked.

  ‘What?’

  ‘From you? Did he buy anything?’

  ‘Nah. He was looking at a rare Dylan, but he didn’t buy it.’

  She nodded encouragingly, paused for a moment wishing she could think of something salient to say on the subject of rare Dylans and then she went indoors.

  Ten days into her career at Wendy’s Betty had already gained enough weight to subtly change the contours of her face: her cheekbones were less pronounced, her jaw less defined. The hours spent on her feet had done nothing to counterbalance the deleterious effects of two free Wendy’s meals a day, and she could feel the waistband of her size eight denim skirt beginning to dig into her flesh. Her complexion, too, was starting to suffer. It had lost its petal-like gloss and she even had a few spots here and there. And then, two nights ago, unable to justify a visit to the hairdresser’s on financial grounds, and with roots so grown out that they were now longer than the bleached bits of her hair, she had smeared a tube of something by Wella described as ‘Deep Caramel’ through her hair and turned herself inadvertently into a kind of low-rent, two-tone, washed-out brunette. She hadn’t realised it until that very moment, but the colour, really, virulently, did not suit her in the slightest. In an attempt to get rid of the colour she had now shampooed her hair five times. The only effect that this had had was to turn her hair a kind of mouldy shade of green.

  She thought of ‘the blond’, the elfin, fresh-faced girl that Dom Jones had bumped into ten days ago
outside the flat and wondered if he would even recognise her any more. She applied some eyeliner and some pinkish blusher from a tube. Then she scraped her cheap greeny-brown hair back into a stubby ponytail and sucked in her stomach.

  She had invited Joe Joe back to her flat after work, after he’d pleaded with her to let him see it, and he was now standing at her kitchen window saying, ‘Wow, I can’t believe you live here. This is the best flat ever!’

  ‘I’m going outside for a smoke,’ she said, waving her roll-up at him.

  ‘Can I come, too?’

  She shrugged. ‘Sure.’

  ‘Maybe I should start to smoke,’ he said a moment later, dangling his feet over the edge of the fire escape. ‘I always feel so left out when everyone else is smoking. All those little gangs, puffing away together, puff puff, chat chat.’

  ‘Don’t start smoking,’ said Betty. ‘That would be a really stupid thing to do at ... how old are you?’

  ‘Twenty-four.’

  She threw him a look of surprise.

  ‘You thought I was younger than this? Yes, I know. I look very young. Everyone always says this about me. I think it is my freckles. And my cheeky, cheeky smile.’ He demonstrated his cheeky, cheeky smile and she laughed.

  ‘So where does it come from, your colouring, your hair?’

  ‘Ha,’ he laughed. ‘I am like a stray dog, you know, with many, many genes. I have some Mexican, some Jamaican, some Argentinian, of course, and also, going back, like, a hundred years, so far back that no-one really knows, there was an Irishman. And his genes, they are like the genes of a god. Just in my generation, of thirty cousins, there are seven of us with this red hair and this white skin. Seven, in thirty. It is amazing.’

  Betty stared at the wild amber afro and nodded her agreement.

  ‘What about you, what is on your genes?’

  She smiled. ‘Nothing much,’ she replied. ‘Bit of English. Bit of Welsh. Some German.’