‘For fuck’s sake,’ Cassie whispers under her breath as she deletes Nicky’s unread message. Her mother-in-law hasn’t seemed to notice how forced and unnatural things are between her and Jack. She turns in her seat to look at Cassie, frowning slightly at Cassie’s swearing.
‘What a treat to be out with my two favourite women,’ Jack says, leaning over to pat Cassie’s knee, in a strange matey way, but Charlotte doesn’t notice. In the wing mirror, Cassie sees her smile at her son again.
Cassie imagines what she’d say if her mother-in-law wasn’t in the car with them. Maybe: ‘Oh, we’re your favourites tonight, are we?’, or, ‘Where does Nicky rank?’, or similar. Instead, she moves her knee away from Jack’s hand and, the taxi driver says, ‘Off we go’ and as they start to pull away, a premature firework bangs and Cassie’s heart tenses as she hears Maisie bark in alarm from inside the cottage.
The Clarks’ farm is arranged around a flagstone yard, the huge tiles uneven as bad teeth. The family gave up rearing livestock over a decade ago and have since turned the old barn into a bed and breakfast. Many layers of pastel paint haven’t been able to cover the rust-and-silo smell that seems to flow through the arteries of the old farmhouse. By the back door there’s a huge collection of muddy welly boots, and also a stack of old newspapers, Cassie has no idea what for. She doesn’t recognise the dozen or so guests who have congregated in the kitchen glinting in cheap art deco headdresses and hastily bought stick-on moustaches. They look like they’ve arrived at the wrong party next to the decades-worn pine table and farmhouse dresser.
Jack and Cassie are each handed a glass of sparkling wine by the flustered hostess who has forgotten they came last year, just back from their honeymoon. She points them towards the door through to the barn before she turns to show a young man dressed as a sailor the way to the toilet. The atmosphere is charged, as if everyone has been shaken up like Coke in a can over Christmas, and, tonight, the final festive night, the metal ring is being pulled slowly back.
Couples and families, bloated and wired by togetherness, look at Jack and Cassie as they walk into the main barn with a blend of recognition and solidarity.
God, is that us? Cassie wonders. Do we look like that to them?
She takes a sip of sparkling wine and thinks they probably look worse.
A couple’s loneliness together is vivid. It screams, especially loud to those who know it themselves. Cassie knows that now. Fast jazz vibrates out of huge black speakers. Cassie feels the hairs on her arm rise as the music sends jarring vibrations through her skin. She’s always hated jazz; it makes her feel edgy.
Jack finishes his sparkling wine in just a few gulps. Cassie watches his brow soften as she hands him her glass, pretending it’s too sweet for her. She knows he’ll take it as a good sign, that things may finally be thawing between them.
He turns to her, holds her wrist.
‘Cassie,’ he whispers, ‘I just want to say that I really appreciate you coming tonight. I want more than ever to make a fresh start. I promise I’ll make everything up to you.’
‘The lovely Jensens!’
They both turn to face Martha, an old friend of Jack’s who grew up just outside Buscombe, and her husband Paul. Cassie wiggles her wrist out of Jack’s grip. Martha’s broad shoulders are draped in a black silk shawl with a long fringe, and Paul is wearing a monocle that falls off as he politely kisses Cassie’s cheek.
Cassie has bumped into Martha a couple of times over the last year and realises now, with a small slap of shame, that she never replied to Martha’s text asking Cassie for a drink. Should she apologise now? Or just act like she never got the text? She feels out of her depth, as though the last few weeks have wiped the rules of social interaction from her memory.
Martha, as if sensing Cassie’s discomfort, doesn’t try and talk to her, and instead jokes with Paul and Jack, and Cassie is left marooned on the edge of their little conference, her wax jacket hot over her arm. None of them seem to notice as she walks away, towards the drinks table; her throat immediately feels freer. She picks up an orange juice.
At the drinks tables she bumps into Maggie, the local hairdresser, breasts jostling for space in a tight purple dress at least five decades later than the party theme. Maggie natters away about how bad the roadworks in the village have been for business. Cassie grinds her feet into the floor to keep from running away as Maggie lifts a corner of Cassie’s hair between her fingers as though she’s picking up someone else’s rubbish, and tells Cassie with a little sigh of forced patience that she still needs to trim even if she’s growing her hair long again. An older woman takes Maggie’s hand and Cassie stands back as the two of them start talking simultaneously at the same high pitch over each other.
A saxophone screams through the speakers.
Cassie looks over to Jack. Paul’s disappeared, but Martha’s nodding and smiling as Jack whispers in her ear. It looks like a secret. What’s he saying?
The orange juice burns her stomach like acid.
This isn’t her place; she shouldn’t be here. She feels like she’s woken up in someone else’s life.
Behind her she hears two men laugh like honking geese at each other. It sounds forced, mirthless.
Jack’s right; she does need to start again, but she’s starting to think she needs to do it alone, ball up this life like a scrap piece of paper, chuck it away and start again.
She scans the room. Where’s Jonny? she wonders. He was with his mum in Edinburgh for two weeks over Christmas. She won’t survive unless she sees one friendly face tonight, but all she can see are raised eyebrows, lips curling into unkind smiles. She feels exposed, naked, as though everyone knows her husband cheated on her with her best friend. Ha! And she’s pregnant and doesn’t know what the fuck to do. Ha, ha ha!
Underneath her jacket she clenches her fists so her nails bite into her palms; the pain steadies her and she keeps her eyes fixed on the door as she walks towards it, turning sideways to squeeze past bloated bodies. She wades through the noise of the party, so loud it’s almost physical, like a jelly, the hot wine breath, the laughter, the clashing music.
She opens the door and the last few minutes of the year seem to open up to her like a cave. She takes in big greedy mouthfuls of freezing air. The lawn is a modest little rectangle, raised slightly from the house, and, at the far end, Cassie sees Jonny smoking in jeans and a white T-shirt, talking to an older, whiskery-looking man who holds a cigar like a pen. They look like the only two who have completely ignored the dress code.
Cassie breathes out a long white cloud of relief. She’s about to call Jonny’s name when a hand on her shoulder stops her. She turns and sees Charlotte, whose eyes have the same questioning, unsettled look they had in the car on the way over.
‘Cassie, are you feeling OK?’ she asks, her head falling slightly to one side.