She sounds surprised. ‘I’ve got a lawyer. Daddy set me up with him.’
Oh. ‘Well, that’s brilliant.’ Simply fucking brilliant.
105
Tuesday, 31 January
Josh says slowly, ‘Marcia found the book … The one you gave me for Christmas.’
I’m waiting. I didn’t do anything stupid like inscribe it, there’s nothing incriminating, no story here.
‘She had a go at me for spending money.’
Okay. Not the worst outcome.
‘But I told her it was a gift.’
What?
‘From a woman.’
Oh, my God, he’s a total asshole.
‘She went apeshit.’
‘Of course she did! Josh, where was it when she found it?’
‘On my bedside locker. Hiding in plain sight, like.’
‘Or right in Marcia’s face. Like.’
‘What’re you saying?’
‘You’re …’ I’m trying to formulate my thoughts. ‘You want to bring something to a head with Marcia? What did she say to you?’
‘She told me to end it with whoever the woman is. I said I’d think about it. But, Sackcloth, no way am I going to.’
‘Josh. What are you thinking?’
‘Marriages run their course. I think mine is done.’
This has suddenly got too big, too serious, too life-changing, and I don’t want to be part of it.
And there’s something else: I’m not convinced that Josh is sincere. Something is telling me this is a well-worn pattern with him and his wife. ‘Josh? Be honest. Am I part of some game you’re playing with Marcia?’
‘What? How can you even –? No, I’m serious about this. About you.’
I don’t know what to think. I’m confused, suspicious and very afraid. If he’s not playing games with Marcia, then the alternative is actually worse.
Sulkily Josh says, ‘I want to tell her about you –’
‘No!’
‘– how sweet you are, how different you are to her.’
‘Josh! Stop! Please! What would be the point? Our lives are in separate countries.’
‘They don’t have to be.’
I feel as if I’ve fallen into a deep, narrow well.
‘Seriously, Amy,’ he says. ‘You could live in London. With me. I’ve been thinking about nothing else. You could get a job here.’
It’s hard to know which objection to mention first. ‘I have three kids.’
‘They’re nearly adults. And they all have dads. Klara could live with Hugh.’
‘Do you mean Kiara?’
‘Yeah, Kiara. I meant, sorry, Kiara. And Sofie too.’
‘And Neeve?’
‘She’s twenty-six. She’s not your responsibility.’
‘She’s only twenty-two.’
‘Same difference.’ He’s exasperated.
This is whirling way out of control.
‘Anyway, what about you?’ Suddenly I need to hear about his future ‘plans’.
‘Marcia and I split up, sell the house. The kids stay with her –’
‘What if she doesn’t want that?’ Because I wouldn’t want to end up living with two traumatized pre-pubescent boys.
‘Okay, we can share their care, fifty-fifty.’
‘What about Yvonne and Buddy?’ The dogs.
‘I want the dogs.’ He’s emphatic about that.
I’ve never had a dog, they seem lovely, people get so much happiness from them, but aren’t they a lot of work? ‘And where would we live, you and I?’ My questions are purely theoretical, there’s no way this is actually happening.
‘We’d buy a place. Marcia and I would split whatever we’d get for the house, and you’d put in your share from your house.’
‘We hardly know each other, Josh. This is madness. All of this talk is madness.’
‘I know what I want. And I want you.’
But I don’t want you. This hits me like a blow to the heart, and I think I’m the most terrible person alive. I wanted him when it was passion and fun, and when I thought that was all he wanted from me. ‘Josh, please …’ I say haltingly. ‘This is insane. I don’t want to move to London.’
‘Okay, I’ll get a job in Dublin.’
My surge of horror shocks me. ‘Josh, you don’t want to split up with Marcia.’
‘Aye, I do. I’ve wanted to for a long time. We make each other miserable.’
That may be true. But … ‘If you and Marcia split up, don’t do it to be with me.’
His exasperation vanishes and he’s icy. ‘What the fuck does that mean? You’re bailing?’
‘I mean …’ Christ, I’m nervous. ‘You and your wife, you need to sort your stuff out. Just between the two of you.’
‘Are you breaking up with me?’
Am I? It hadn’t been my plan. But the sudden swerve into life-altering territory has scared me rigid. Certainly scared the lust out of me. Fabulous secret sex once every seven days is a totally different thing from moving home, moving job, moving country … I fancy him. But not enough to do those things.
‘Josh …’ I pick my words carefully ‘… this is big stuff. Huge. We’ll see each other next Tuesday. Let’s use that week to think about what we really want from each other.’
‘Are you breaking up with me?’ he repeats.
‘I’m not, I’m truly not.’ I don’t want this to end. But I have to admit that it’s veered way off course from what it originally was.
‘It’s because your husband is back. I knew it, I fucking knew it.’
I can hardly speak for exasperation. ‘I miss the family that Hugh and I made, but me and Hugh, it’s gone for ever.’
He stares me down. ‘You are so cold.’
Christ, you can’t win. ‘Look.’ My tone is placatory. ‘Let’s both have a think about what this means to us and we’ll talk about it next week. Okay?’
‘I don’t need to think. I know what I want. And I want you.’
106
Friday, 3 February
Steevie and I haven’t had any contact since the night of her surprise visit – our friendship is probably over. After thirty years, that’s a weird one.
The ending feels ragged and unpleasant, and I know if I bump into her, it’ll be awkward as hell. Our stumbling block was that we didn’t – couldn’t – see eye to eye on the issue of cheating husbands. Steevie has her set of rules: after inflicting some pain, she’d have taken back Lee, if he was keen. But my rule – which I didn’t even know I had until I was in the situation – is that I can’t give Hugh another chance. I didn’t ‘decide’ to be this way, it’s just the way I seem to be.
I wish Steevie could have accepted that. I’m hurt and resentful that she didn’t. But at least I’m sticking to my guns. There’s a certain comfort in that.
Although I’m down a second important relationship – first Hugh, then Steevie – I have no belief whatsoever in astrology: I wouldn’t even glance at my horoscope but might there be something in my planetary chart that indicates this is a time of endings?
Speaking of endings, my phone beeps with a text. One word. Kabul?
Since Tuesday night, Josh has been texting me mini-break location suggestions, each appropriately grim for my sackcloth sensibilities. He’s probably trying to be funny, but his tone is more passive-aggressive than good-humoured.
Alastair looks up from his screen. ‘You okay?’
‘Another suggestion from Josh for the Valentine weekend that’s not going to happen.’
‘Let me guess? Aleppo?’
‘Close. Kabul.’
‘Christ, he’s gas. Today’s, what, February the third? He’d want to get on to lastminute.com fairly sharpish. I booked my mini-break to Nice weeks ago and I don’t even have a girlfriend.’
‘Please shut up,’ I murmur. Then, ‘Sorry.’
‘No need to apologize,’ he says cheerily. ‘You’re in the anger phase of your grief.’
I wish he’d stop telling me this.
‘You’ve done denial and bargaining. All you need now is to get through depression, then you’ll be into acceptance.’
‘That’s not how it works and everyone knows it. You hop from phase to phase at random. I’ll be hopping for years. I can’t imagine feeling okay ever again.’
‘You will. Grief is a process.’
At the moment it’s hard to have faith. ‘The only thing that made me happy was Josh,’ I admit. ‘And now even that’s gone weird. Him talking about leaving Marcia and me living in London. It’s insane.’
‘But what did you think was going to happen? Was it just going to continue like this, every Tuesday, for years and years?’
‘No. Sooner or later we were going to run out of road.’