‘I bet he didn’t,’ I said. ‘But I suppose he’s got loads of money now.’
‘Loads,’ she confirmed. ‘But, to be fair, he did build the business up from nothing. It’s only right that he should be compensated for that.’
‘I suppose. But what will he do? There’s nothing to stop him starting up again, is there?’
‘Well, there kind of is.’ Felicity talked for a bit about the restraint of trade clause in the final contract, which meant that Barri was legally prevented from launching another start-up in the same field for five years. It was something, I guessed. Maybe he’d take himself off to a Caribbean island and retire. Maybe he’d get a lucrative consultancy role somewhere. It was a shame he wouldn’t live out his days in poverty and disgrace, but you couldn’t have everything, I supposed.
At least I didn’t have to work for him any more – none of us did. At least the threat to Chelsea’s business was negated – unless she became successful enough that knock-offs of her designs were appearing all over the place, in which case she’d be so successful that it wouldn’t really matter any more.
‘We’re off to the pub to carry on the party,’ Kris said, when half past five came and people began picking up their bags and moving towards the lift. ‘Coming?’
‘For sure,’ Felicity replied. ‘Tansy?’
‘Good plan, I’ll just get my stuff, and…’
I picked up my bag, and was about to tuck my phone in it without bothering to check it – no one was likely to have tried to call me. But then it vibrated in my hand with an incoming call, and I saw that I’d missed three others, all from Adam.
Twenty-Seven
Ten minutes later, I was standing on a packed Tube, my head spinning not only from the champagne I’d drunk but from what Adam had said. Not that he’d been particularly clear about what was going on; Adam hardly ever sounded flustered, but he had then.
‘Tansy, there’s a problem. You need to leave work now.’
‘What’s the matter? Are you okay? Is it Freezer?’
‘No! I mean, not as far as I know. He’s fine. At least, he was when I left this morning.’
‘So what…?’ I was already hurrying towards the lift.
‘It’s Renzo. Tans, you need to get to his flat. Quick as you can.’
I stopped. I didn’t want to go to Renzo’s flat. I didn’t want to see him again. My dream of being able to have him back had come true, only I’d said no to him and to our relationship, and I wanted to keep it that way.
‘But, Adam, I—’
‘Tansy, just go. Please?’
‘But why? You can’t just ask me to go and not say what’s happening.’
‘He called in sick this morning. He’s got flu. Apparently he sounded awful.’
‘So? I’m not a doctor. And if I was, I’d tell him to stay in bed, take paracetamol and drink plenty of fluids.’
‘No, but Tansy,’ Adam carried on, sounding almost frantic. ‘He just rang me on my mobile. He sounded delirious. He was asking for you.’
‘Adam! Come on. I don’t want to see him. It’s over between us. If he sounded so ill, why don’t you phone for an ambulance?’
‘Come on, Tans. The poor bloke. He said he needs you. Have you no compassion?’
I opened my mouth to say that if Renzo was that ill, he needed medical help and not compassion, and then remembered that my battery was on its last ten per cent. With Adam in this mood, there was no point trying to argue with him – he could go on for hours. And besides, what if Renzo really was ill, and maybe too weak to make another call? If he ended up in hospital or something, and it was my fault, I’d feel terrible.
Adam had no reason to exaggerate or invent a cry for help from Renzo. He didn’t like him – he didn’t want us to be together. He’d only gone along with all my elaborate schemes on sufferance; there was no way he’d want to manufacture some touching sickbed reunion. And he had sounded genuinely concerned. Even though he and Renzo weren’t close, perhaps someone in HR had made the connection between Adam sharing a house with me, and me being Renzo’s ex, and given Renzo Adam’s mobile number because they were worried… and to do something so random, flying in the face of all I knew about data protection, they must have been very worried indeed.
So, reluctantly at first and then increasingly hastily as my mind conjured up horrible scenarios of Renzo passing out in the bath, or trying to get to A&E and not making it, I got the Tube the three stops from work to his flat.
It was only when I emerged from the station that I realised the long dry spell was over. The drought had broken and rain was coming down in sheets, soaking the pavement and rushing into the gutters. All around me, commuters and tourists, taken by surprise without umbrellas, like me, were dashing blindly through the deluge, holding newspapers or carrier bags over their heads in an unsuccessful attempt to stay dry.
But I didn’t mind if I got soaked. I walked as quickly as I could, barely noticing that my shoes were squelching and my thin summer dress was sticking to me and had gone almost see-through. Mascara stung my eyes as the rain washed my make-up off, and my hair hung wringing wet down my back.
I was almost blinded by the water in my eyes, and almost deafened by the sound of it drumming on the pavement, when at last I arrived at the block of flats where Renzo lived, where I’d spent so many hours, believing that I’d found happiness at last.
I sheltered under the porch and took a deep breath before I pressed the buzzer for number thirty-one. I’d never had my own key – him giving me one was one of the things I’d longed for, one of the signs I hoped would mean our relationship was moving to the next level. But he’d never suggested it, and I’d never asked.
I waited for an answer, but there wasn’t one. I buzzed again; still nothing.
Shit. What do I do now? I could call Adam again and tell him Renzo wasn’t in – or if he was, he wouldn’t or couldn’t answer. I could wait for a neighbour to come and see if I could persuade them to let me in. I could call the emergency services. I could… But when I took my phone out of my bag, I saw the red battery icon for just a second before it died.
This time, I swore out loud. There was nothing I could do – I was completely helpless. I dithered for a second, then made up my mind: I’d have to go back to the office, let myself in and then call for help. I’d turned and was starting to hurry through the pelting rain back towards the station, when I heard a familiar sound: the roar of a car engine being revved to its powerful maximum. Seconds later, Renzo’s green Lamborghini swooshed past me, its tyres sending up a wave of water that would have soaked me if I wasn’t already soaking.
I turned around again and started back towards the building, but he was driving fast and I was well behind him. I wouldn’t be able to catch him up before he’d driven into the underground parking, and from there I knew he would get the lift straight up to his flat. I’d have to wait, and then buzz again.
But he didn’t turn into the car park. He swung the car right up to the entrance where I’d been waiting, sprang out, leaving the engine running, hurried round and opened the passenger door.
Even in those few seconds, I noticed something. This wasn’t a man flattened by a bad case of flu. He was practically luminous with health and vigour. He was laughing as the rain beat down on his dark hair and dark-suited shoulders. He almost skipped around the back of the car. He opened the door with a flourish and a grin.
And a tall, red-haired woman in a bright yellow summer dress stepped out, kissed him briefly on the mouth and let herself into the building with her key.
I stood there, staring, the rain forgotten. Renzo was fine. There was nothing the matter with him. He had a new girlfriend. Already. I’d process my feelings about that as soon as I was capable of processing any sensible thought, but I hadn’t experienced any of the hollow sense of loss I’d felt when I learned he and Felicity were an item.
All I felt was relief – relief and confusion. How had Adam made such a massive mistake? Why
had he told me to come here? What the hell was going on?
I’d got so used to the water pouring down over me that I jumped with alarm when it suddenly stopped, and then let out a little yelp of fright when a warm, dry hand touched my shoulder.
‘Tansy? Are you okay?’
It was Josh. Josh, carrying a massive umbrella, its segments each a different colour of the rainbow. He was holding it over us both, and I noticed that he was quite dry.
‘I’m fine. What the hell are you doing here?’
‘Adam told me you’d be here. He told me I needed to get here and find you.’
‘What?’
We looked at each other, both equally perplexed.
‘Look, you’re soaked. You must be freezing. Come on, I’ll call an Uber and get us home.’
In the cab, I bewilderedly told Josh how Adam had sent me to Renzo’s flat, claiming to be concerned about his health. Josh told me how Adam had sent him there on the pretext that I’d told him I was going to make one last-ditch attempt to persuade Renzo to take me back, and that he was already seeing someone else and it was bound to end in disaster.
And, for both of us at once, just as the car pulled up outside our house, everything clicked into place. We were both laughing helplessly as we let ourselves in.
‘Go and get into some dry clothes,’ Josh said. ‘I don’t think our resident Cupid is in right now, but when he gets back I’m going to tell him what I think about him pissing us around like that. In the meantime, I’ll put the kettle on.’
When I came downstairs ten minutes later, he was sitting at the kitchen table, a pot of tea and a plate of flapjacks in front of him.
‘I got these at the farmers’ market,’ he said. ‘Dig in.’
Suddenly, the miniature burgers and smoked salmon blinis I’d eaten at the office seemed like a very long time ago. I had the beginnings of a headache from all the champagne, and a mug of hot tea and some biscuits sounded like an even better idea than getting into dry clothes had been.
I sat down, and Josh poured me some tea.
‘I suppose I should explain,’ I said. ‘About me and Renzo, and what happened.’
‘You don’t have to,’ Josh replied calmly. ‘I already know. Adam told me.’
‘Adam did?’ I felt a flash of annoyance, then remembered the elaborate plan Adam had just concocted to try to reconcile me and Josh, and my anger melted away.
‘Maybe he shouldn’t have,’ Josh said. ‘But to be fair, he was trying to help. I was basically crying into my beer about how badly you’d treated me, and he felt bad because he’d been part of it, and he felt I was owed an explanation. So he told me what happened with you and Renzo, how you were in a fix financially because you’d been sending money to your folks, and what you’d done in order to be able to help them.’
‘Oh.’ I looked down into my mug, feeling the hot steam on my face, but there was no accompanying flush of embarrassment. If Josh was going to judge me and tell me he thought less of me, so be it. It wouldn’t be anything I hadn’t heard before.
But he didn’t. He said, ‘To be totally honest, I think Adam thought that if I understood, there was more of a chance of us getting together for real. But I guess that isn’t going to happen, because I know how you feel about your ex.’
‘But I don’t feel that way about him any more,’ I said. ‘I met him for a drink and he said he wanted to try again, and I told him I didn’t. Tonight just reinforced that. I was worried about him, I wanted to help if I could, but I didn’t feel – you know. There are some things you just can’t get past. I’d had a chance to think about them, and I realised… I realised I’d been making a massive mistake. Not just because of how he reacted when he found out about the…’
I stopped. Even though Josh knew, I found it hard to say. But I forced myself to carry on.
‘When he found out I’d done webcam work. But other things, too. I think he doesn’t like women very much. I don’t think he’d ever have truly respected me, or treated me as his equal, or even really seen me as a person. And I’m worth more than that.’
‘Yes, you are,’ Josh said. ‘I mean, everyone is, obviously. But you’re amazing. You’re worth a whole lot more than that.’
‘Thank you.’ I looked up now, and met his eyes. He was smiling, but only slightly, not the broad grin I was used to seeing, that was like the sun coming out.
‘I just wanted you to know,’ he said, ‘you have nothing to be ashamed of. I don’t know what exactly that kind of work involves – I’m not some sleaze who gets off on paying women to do stuff they wouldn’t do of their own free will. But I know for sure that you did it because it’s what you felt you needed to do at the time. It can’t have been easy.’
I remembered how I’d felt that first night, sitting in my bedroom with the camera pointing at me, the three glasses of wine I’d had to down before I could bring myself to switch it on, the sick, churning shame I’d felt at the end of the night, mingled with dizzy relief that it was over, I’d made some money to send to Mum, and next time would surely be easier. Newsflash: it wasn’t.
‘It was fucking brave of you,’ Josh went on. ‘You’ve no need to feel embarrassed about a single thing.’
‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘But I guess I won’t be putting it on my LinkedIn profile just yet.’
Josh laughed, and the familiar smile was back.
‘Friends?’ he asked.
‘Friends,’ I agreed.
And I supposed that was as good as it was going to get.
Twenty-Eight
I slept horribly that night. Actually, I don’t think I slept at all. I lay awake, too hot underneath my duvet but too cold if I moved it, feeling like the weight of the night was pressing down onto my eyes whether they were open or closed, every noise making me jump. I heard Adam come home, unusually late for him, and the murmur of his and Josh’s voices before they both came upstairs and went into their rooms. Even later, I heard Luke open and close the neighbouring house’s front door.
I heard the bloody birds starting up their cheery dawn chorus at half past three in the morning.
The day dragged horribly. The sense of giddy optimism in the office should have rubbed off on me, but it didn’t. Felicity asked if I was okay, and when I told her I had a hangover from her mum’s champagne, she tutted sympathetically and went out and bought me an Egg McMuffin and a full-fat Coke, which was so kind it almost made me cry. When Kris came back from lunch and gave me a pale pink Essie nail varnish he’d got as a gift-with-purchase at Boots, saying the colour didn’t suit him, I actually did cry. And when Sally came into the ladies’ as I was wiping my eyes and asked me what was wrong, I had to say I just had PMS. I should be feeling elated, I knew, that my job was safe and so was Chelsea’s collection. But I wasn’t. I was feeling a flat sense of anticlimax, that even though I didn’t have to worry about those things any more, there was so much else in my life that wasn’t going right. I might not need to worry about finding money to send to Mum any longer, but I did worry. I worried all the time about how she would manage, and whether she’d ever talk to me again. The goal of getting Renzo back, which had carried me through the past months, was gone now, and I could see how foolish it had been. The thing, whatever it had been, that I’d had with Josh was well and truly over before it had even properly begun, and I blamed myself for it.
I’d been single before – single for ages. And I didn’t think it mattered. I could go on Tinder dates, I could see friends – and, after the outpouring of warmth I’d felt at my birthday party, I resolved to do that much more than I had. I could have fun. Life would go on.
So why did I feel so hollow and lost?
All in all, not the most productive day ever. At five thirty on the dot, I picked up my bag and left, praying that my motivation would return after a decent night’s rest, but at the same time wondering if I’d ever sleep again.
The Tube – especially the Tube at rush hour in summer – isn’t exactly the best place for thin
king. Around me, people were determinedly staring at their phones, reading newspapers with their elbows pressed tight against their sides so as not to encroach on the space of the person next to them and get passive-aggressively tutted at, or gazing blankly into space, lost in whatever was playing on their headphones.
Everyone was carefully ignoring the man at the end of the carriage who was tunelessly warbling “Let It Go” from Frozen. I could feel the thoughts of my fellow commuters rippling through the carriage: I don’t know if you’re drunk, or high, or just like singing, but please, please don’t talk to me.
Still, even in the pressure cooker of that train, I managed to think. In fact, I couldn’t not think. I thought about the determination with which I’d pursued Renzo, the daft scheme I’d come up with to get him back. It hadn’t worked – in the end, it was he who’d decided that I could have him if I wanted, but I hadn’t any more.
I’d changed my mind. I’d changed – not much, but enough to know that he wasn’t the answer for me. But what if I could take that determination, that willingness to pursue happiness, whatever it took, and use it in a way that really would make me happy?
When I got home, Josh was sitting out in the garden with a bottle of cold rosé. Freezer was perched up on the fence, where he had a view of both Josh and his owners, so he could hop down on whichever side looked more likely to provide treats.
Josh had kicked off his flip-flops and stretched out his long legs, resting his feet on the edge of the brick planter where once, Charlotte had told me, Maddy and Henry had started a herb garden. Now, it was choked with weeds, but maybe there would be herbs again there some day, or even roses.
‘Mind if I join you?’ I asked.
‘Funnily enough,’ Josh said, ‘I brought two glasses out. Just, you know, in case.’
It's Not You It's Him: An absolutely hilarious and feel-good romantic comedy Page 31
