See you in the morning, I replied. I had a brief moment of misgiving – what had I just signed up for? – then had a stern word with myself, and fell heavily to sleep.
That night I dreamt of Will. I dreamt of him rarely – a source of some sadness to me in the early days when I had missed him so much that I felt as if someone had blasted a hole straight through me. The dreams had stopped when I met Sam. But there he was again, in the small hours, as vivid as if he were standing before me. He was in the back seat of a car, an expensive black limousine, like Mr Gopnik’s, and I saw him from across a street. I was instantly relieved that he was not dead, not gone after all, and knew instinctively that he should not go wherever he was headed. It was my job to stop him. But every time I tried to cross the busy road an extra lane of cars seemed to appear in front of me, roaring past so that I couldn’t get to him, the sound of the engines drowning my shouting of his name. There he was, just out of reach, his skin that smooth caramel colour, his faint smile playing around the edges of his mouth, saying something to the driver that I couldn’t hear. At the last minute he caught my eye – his eyes widened just a little – and I woke, sweating, the duvet knotted around my legs.
3
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Writing this in haste – Mrs G is having her piano lesson – but I’m going to try and email you every day so that at least I can feel like we’re chatting. I miss you. Please write back. I know you said you hate emails but just for me. Pleeeease. (You have to imagine my pleading face here.) Or, you know, LETTERS! Love you, Lxxxxxx
‘Well, good morning!’
A very large African American man in very tight scarlet Lycra stood in front of me, his hands on his hips. I froze, blinking, in the kitchen doorway in my T-shirt and knickers, wondering if I was dreaming and whether if I closed the door and opened it again he would still be there.
‘You must be Miss Louisa?’ A huge hand reached out and took mine, pumping it so enthusiastically that I bobbed up and down involuntarily. I checked my watch. No, it really was a quarter past six.
‘I’m George. Mrs Gopnik’s trainer. I hear you’re coming out with us. Looking forward to it!’
I had woken after a fitful few hours, struggling to shake off the tangled dreams that had woven themselves through my sleep, and stumbled down the corridor on automatic pilot, a caffeine-seeking zombie.
‘Okay, Louisa! Gotta stay hydrated!’ He picked up two water bottles from the side. And he was gone, jogging lightly down the corridor.
I poured myself a coffee, and as I stood there sipping it, Nathan walked in, dressed and scented with aftershave. He gazed at my bare legs.
‘I just met George,’ I said.
‘Nothing he can’t teach you about glutes. You got your running shoes, right?’
‘Hah!’ I took a sip of my coffee but Nathan was looking at me expectantly. ‘Nathan, nobody said anything about running. I’m not a runner. I mean, I am the anti-sport, the sofa-dweller. You know that.’
Nathan poured himself a black coffee and replaced the jug in the machine.
‘Plus I fell off a building earlier this year. Remember? Lots of bits of me went crack.’ I could joke about that night now when, still grieving Will, I had drunkenly slipped from the parapet of my London home. But the twinges in my hip were a constant reminder.
‘You’re fine. And you’re Mrs G’s assistant. Your job is to be at her side at all times, mate. If she wants you to go running, then you’re running.’ He took a sip of his coffee. ‘Ah, don’t look so panicked. You’ll love it. You’ll be fit as a butcher’s dog within a few weeks. Everyone here does it.’
‘It’s a quarter past six in the morning.’
‘Mr Gopnik starts at five. We’ve just finished his physio. Mrs G likes a bit of a lie-in.’
‘So we run at what time?’
‘Twenty to seven. Meet them in the main hallway. See you later!’ He lifted a hand, and was gone.
Agnes, of course, was one of those women who looked even better in the mornings: naked of face, a little blurred at the edges, but in a sexy Vaseline-on-the-lens way. Her hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail and her fitted top and jogging pants made her seem casual in the same way that off-duty supermodels do. She loped down the corridor, like a Palomino racehorse in sunglasses, and lifted an elegant hand in greeting, as if it were simply too early for speech. I had only a pair of shorts and a sleeveless T-shirt with me, which, I suspected, made me look like a plump labourer. I was slightly anxious that I hadn’t shaved my armpits and clamped my elbows to my sides.
‘Good morning, Mrs G!’ George appeared beside us and handed Agnes a bottle of water. ‘You all set?’
She nodded.
‘You ready, Miss Louisa? We’re just doing the four miles today. Mrs G wants to do extra abdominal work. You’ve done your stretches, right?’
‘Um, I …’ I had no water and no bottle. But we were off.
I had heard the expression ‘hit the ground running’ but until George I had never truly understood what it meant. He set off down the corridor at what felt like forty miles an hour, and just when I thought we would at least slow for the lift, he held open the double doors at the end so that we could sprint down the stairs that took us to the ground floor. We were out through the lobby and past Ashok in a blur, me just able to catch his muffled greeting.
Dear God, but it was too early for this. I followed the two of them, jogging effortlessly like a pair of carriage horses, while I sprinted behind, my shorter stride failing to match theirs, my bones jarring with the impact of each footfall, muttering my apologies as I swerved between the kamikaze pedestrians who walked into my path. Running had been my ex Patrick’s thing. It was like kale – one of those things you know exists and is possibly good for you but, frankly, life is always going to be too short to get stuck in.
Oh, come on, you can do this, I told myself. This is your first say yes! moment. You are jogging in New York! This is a whole new you! For a few glorious strides I almost believed it. The traffic stopped, the crossing light changed, and we paused at the kerbside, George and Agnes bouncing lightly on their toes, me unseen behind them. Then we were across and into Central Park, the path disappearing beneath our feet, the sounds of the traffic fading as we entered the green oasis at the heart of the city.
We were barely a mile in when I realized this was not a good idea. Even though I was now walking as much as running, my breath was already coming in gasps, my hip protesting all-too-recent injuries. The furthest I had run in years was fifteen yards for a slowing bus, and I’d missed that. I glanced up to see that George and Agnes were talking while they jogged. I couldn’t breathe, and they were holding an honest-to-God conversation.
I thought about a friend of Dad’s who had had a heart attack while running. Dad had always used it as a clear illustration of why sport was bad for you. Why had I not explained my injuries? Was I going to cough a lung out right here in the middle of the park?
‘You okay back there, Miss Louisa?’ George turned so that he was jogging backwards.
‘Fine!’ I gave him a cheery thumbs-up.
I had always wanted to see Central Park. But not this way. I wondered what would happen if I keeled over and died on my first day in the job. How would they get my body home? I swerved to avoid a woman with three identical meandering toddlers. Please, God, I willed the two people running effortlessly in front of me, silently. Just one of you fall over. Not to break a leg exactly, just a little sprain. One of those things that lasts twenty-four hours and requires lying on a sofa with your leg up watching daytime telly.