She hesitates. ‘We’ve also been invited to his wife, Jo’s, 45th party at their house in a couple of weeks. I mean, we see them at lots of things and we’re part of the same group, so maybe she felt like they ought to invite us, I don’t know, but anyway… Ben said to say hi when I next spoke to you. And that he’d been thinking of you. Bless him,’ Laurel sighs. ‘Bless you and Beth too.’ She pauses, before continuing: ‘I’m sorry. I interrupted you. You were saying did I remember that day before you left—’
‘Which was also the last time I saw Louise, Simon’s wife. Well, Ed and I went to view a house today, here in Tunbridge Wells, and not only did it turn out to belong to Louise and Simon—’
Laurel gasps.
‘She was actually there. I have been unwittingly living in the same town as them for the last nine years.’
‘Oh, Jessica!’
‘I know. All this time I’ve imagined Simon miles away, and they’ve been on my doorstep – only for me to wind up on theirs today. Worse still, they’re getting divorced – which is why they’re selling up – and she suddenly appeared in the hallway when I was looking round, told me she knew I was the reason Simon had suddenly decided it was over, then she went for me.’
‘What, physically?’ Laurel is appalled.
‘Yup. Came tearing down the hallway like some sort of banshee, shrieking and poking at me, then started hitting me. The estate agent had to pull her off.’ I try to laugh, but realise there are actually tears in my eyes.
‘Oh, Jess! That’s so horrible. Where was Ed when this was happening?’
‘Changing James’s nappy in the car. He appeared just after the estate agent had stepped in – at which point, Louise, thinking he was Ben, immediately asked him if he knew I’d shagged her husband.’
‘Oh, Jesus…’
‘I know. Thank GOD I’d already told him.’ And told him all of it, I think, privately, to myself.
‘She’s still holding onto it after all this time?’ Laurel is incredulous. ‘I mean, OK, I get it – you’re probably not the first person she’d want to invite into her house, but it was years ago!’
‘I don’t think she was in her right mind. She looked terrible; her eyes were all yellow and she smelt horribly hung-over. I couldn’t believe how much she’d aged.’
‘He wasn’t there? Simon, I mean?’
‘No, thank God,’ I say. ‘Nor was their daughter. Just Louise. It completely freaked Ed out, though. He asked me in the car afterwards if I’d been in contact with Simon again as it was a pretty big coincidence that we wound up in their house, of all people.’
There’s a moment’s silence. ‘But it was just a coincidence?’
‘Laurel! Of course it was!’
‘Sorry – I don’t know why I said that. Well, maybe it’s time to think about moving further afield after all, then? You don’t want to be looking over your shoulder for old loony pants Louise every time you’re out and about, especially now you know she lives in the same town as you.’
‘True. But then on the flip side, I haven’t seen them once in the last nine years, so there’s no reason why I should now. I know where she lives, but she doesn’t know where I live. Shit!’ I jump, before the words are barely out of my mouth, and turn around in my seat to look up the dark hallway. ‘Just as I said that, someone knocked on the front door.’
‘Yikes. Maybe don’t open it?’ Laurel jokes drily.
‘Ha ha. It’ll just be Ed with his arms full of food, hang on.’ I pad up the hall and, still holding the phone with one hand, release the catch with the other and swing the door wide open with a smile.
But the person stood in front of me is not Ed. The phone almost slips from my fingers in shock and I feel the blood run from my face. I hang up wordlessly and just stand there for a moment. ‘It’s you,’ I say stupidly.
‘Hello, Jess,’ says Simon, holding out a huge bunch of flowers. ‘Long time no see.’
Chapter Twelve
His blond hair is now silver, and his eyes crinkle at the corners as he smiles sadly – Beth’s bright blue eyes staring back at me. He’s no longer wearing glasses and he certainly doesn’t look his 52 years. He’s been taking care of himself: there’s not a hint of baggy fat straining at the front of his crisp white shirt, or over the waistband of his expensively cut suit trousers. I always did like him in a suit – a fact he well knows. If he was balder, more jowly and plumper perhaps, maybe I’d be disappointed and working a little harder to see if the man I’d once found so hypnotic is still there, but as Simon has only improved with age, it’s even more of a surprise to discover I don’t find him in the least attractive. I don’t feel anything at all – except appalled that he’s stood right in front of me.
‘What are you doing here?’ I whisper.
‘It’s OK.’ He holds up a hand, mistaking my shock for subterfuge. ‘I’m going again straight away. I’ve only come to apologise. I managed to persuade the estate agent to give me your address. I’m so sorry, Jessica. To say that I couldn’t believe it when they told me what Louise did this morning…’ he trails off, and shakes his head. ‘I thought she was having one of her epic moments when I got home and she started ranting at me about you – although she didn’t say you’d been to the house – but when the agent called and talked me through the actual events… what it must have been like for you and your husband… and even your son too, I believe?’ He smiles painfully. ‘I really am so very sorry. Louise is not herself at the moment. Well, she hasn’t been for a long time, if truth be told.’
I hesitate. ‘No, she didn’t appear as I remembered her, at all.’
‘She’s got severe alcohol issues, as I’m sure you realised. She doesn’t normally get drunk, as it were – she’s a top-up drinker. It’s always in her system. That’s why she behaves the way she does. Why she behaved as she did today.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’
He shrugs tiredly. ‘It’s also the reason we’re finally divorcing, and selling up. Cara recently left home, so… Anyway, you don’t need to hear all of this. Here—’ He passes me the flowers, which I take automatically, before he takes a step back. ‘Do please pass my apologies on to Ben as well. I have to confess I pulled up just as he was getting in the car to leave, and I hope it’s OK that I left it five minutes or so, to make sure he’d definitely gone. It wasn’t me being a coward as such – although I wasn’t particularly keen to get a punch in the face – more just that I didn’t want to upset him further. He knows about me now, I gather? Well, us. And my relationship to Beth.’
A punch in the face? I stare at him, and then at the flashy flowers in my arms. I think about the single rose in the kitchen behind me and some instinct makes me stay quiet about Ed’s real identity. ‘Yes, he knows everything.’
‘I’m very pleased you obviously managed to get things back on the right track, despite you leaving him all those years ago. One thing though: your surname is Davies. The agent told me you were Mr and Mrs Casson?’
‘Really?’ I pretend to be confused. ‘How strange!’
He looks at me. ‘Perhaps I misheard. Well, apologies again, and if—’
‘Simon, I can’t take these,’ I interrupt, holding the flowers out to him. ‘I’ll have to explain them otherwise when my husband gets back in a minute, and he won’t be OK with you coming here like this. It’s better that you just take them away with you. I’m sorry.’
‘I didn’t really think about that.’ He stares at the flowers.
‘Take them home for Louise.’
He looks up at me bleakly. ‘You’re kidding, right?’
‘I wasn’t actually, no.’
‘Well, that’s generous of you, considering everything she said to you today.’
‘It could have been worse; at least she didn’t have a knife in her pocket this time.’ I say it without thinking.
‘Sorry?’ he says immediately. ‘When did she have a knife in her pocket?’
There is an ugly silence.
‘Let’s just leave it, Simon,’ I try. ‘It was all a long time ago, and—’
‘No, hang on. Louise threatened you with a knife?’
I hesitate. ‘That day I met you in the pub and said I was leaving, she’d been to see me at home, earlier. She told me she wanted to kill me; she had a blade in her coat pocket and made me promise to move away and have nothing more to do with you, or she’d tell Ben about us – about Beth not being Ben’s daughter. You know all of this by now though, surely?’