Afterwife (23 page)

Jenny tensed. Was that what he really thought? There was
something hard in those blue eyes that suggested he wasn’t entirely joking.

“So now you see,” said Liz, unruffled. “It’s quite the den of iniquity. Have you found the lover?”

“Oh, I will.” He smiled, giving Jenny a mock steely glance that made the hairs on her arms stand to attention.

Liz glanced quickly at Jenny as if to check her reaction, as if sensing the tension. “You never know, Sam, you may end up moving up here yet.”

Thank goodness Liz was more than a match for Sam at his most laconic. She wanted Sam to understand that he couldn’t just write these mothers off as bovine suburbanites. That he’d got them all wrong. They were great!

“Oh, God, it’d be totally wonderful to have Jenny up here,” gushed Suze, slouching forward toward Sam drunkenly. “Do you really think you might—”

“Hate to disappoint you, ladies,” Sam corrected, shooting the idea dead in its tracks and edging back from Suze’s fro. “More chance of us moving to Kabul.”

“That’s what they all say,” said Liz, eyeing him somewhat combatively from behind her wineglass. She nudged Jenny gently in the ribs. “Then you have kids.”

Sam looked away into the party. “Guys, you’re really selling it to me.”

Jenny felt a wave of indignation. Why couldn’t he just play along? Why did he have to be so…so bloody
superior
, all the time? She’d had to socialize with some of the dullest human beings on the planet at some of his friends’ parties. She never complained. She smiled, she laughed, she did what partners are
supposed
to do.

“Oh. My. God. Congratulations!” squeaked Lydia, seizing the mention of kids as the logical entrée to the next step of conversation.
“How are the wedding plans? Tell us everything. I am a wedding fiend. Love it, love it, love it!”

Jenny studied the floor, remembering the awful, brittle conversation they’d had with Penelope this afternoon about her wedding dress, or lack of one.

“Coming along, coming along nicely,” said Sam, lifting himself off his toes for a moment in the manner of a TV policeman. “Yeah, cool.”

Jenny felt relieved. She didn’t want to wash their dirty linen in public either. “Fine” was all she added.

Lydia grabbed Jenny’s hand. “The dress!” She lowered her voice to a stagey whisper. “Have you found
the
dress? Close your ears, Sam! Close your ears.”

Oh, God. She would have to bring it up. “Yeah, well, almost.”

Sam shot her a dark look.

“Well, I want to be the first to know when you do.” She let out a loud, wine-fumed sigh. “This is all
so
romantic, Sam. None of us can quite get over it.” Her eyes started watering ominously.

Oh, no, thought Jenny, looking helplessly at Liz. They both knew what the other was thinking. She’s going to cry. Make her stop!

“Right,” said Sam, his eyes wandering around the room over Lydia’s shoulder while somehow still keeping her as the focus of his attention. It was a look he’d perfected at industry dos, he’d once explained to Jenny, where over-shoulder scanning was necessary if one wasn’t to expire of boredom before ten p.m. She wished he’d bloody well stop it.

“But a wedding between a divorce lawyer and a copy editor.” Suze grinned, pushing the fro off her face with her wineglass. “I’ll be looking out for the spelling mistakes in the order of service. And speeches lifted from the Net that might infringe copyright law.”

Sam laughed, properly now, the beer having finally loosened him.
Jenny noticed his eyes alight on someone or something in the crowd. He shuffled his body, widened his chest, moved his legs further apart like compass points. Following his sight line over Lydia’s shoulder, Jenny saw Tash trailing through the crowds in a long, gauzy leopard print dress with a neckline cut so far south it should come with its own passport, licorice hair swooshing around her shoulders, tanned legs appearing in tantalizing slithers through the slit in her dress. To Jenny, used to the little black high street dress and smudged-mascara-behind-specs look of her nice little publishing parties, Tash’s glamour was alien and dazzlingly retro, Ferrero Rocher to her own comforting Dairy Milk.

“Hey, Jenny,” said Tash, almost bashful as she glanced at Jenny, as if unable to decide on how much to give away by her greeting. Yes, thought Jenny, actually I
do
know you had lunch with my fiancé. You should have mentioned it.

“Hello.” Sam became aware of the others studying him, waiting for an explanation of why an introduction wasn’t necessary. “We’ve met,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Really?”
exclaimed Suze, frowning, trying to work out how this extraordinary detail had escaped her. “You’ve met? You and Tash?”

“We’ve met,” Tash confirmed breezily, kissing Sam on the cheek. Jenny stiffened.

“So how’s it all going, Natasha?” Sam asked in a businesslike manner, designed to quell the palpable waves of intrigue radiating from Suze, Lydia and Liz.

It didn’t quell anything. He’d called her Natasha now. Most interesting.

“Can I thank you for lending me your clever legal head fiancé, Jenny?” said Tash, resting her hand lightly on her arm.

“Anytime,” said Jenny, not intending to sound so clipped. She suddenly wished she’d worn something racier, rather than the navy
shift. Sophie would have got her to wear the sequin dress. Or something with a slit. Yes, she would buy a dress with a slit.

Tash surveyed the room and frowned. “No Ollie, then?”

“Not yet, no,” said Liz. “Sadly.”

“Told you he wouldn’t come.”

“Give him time, give him time,” slurred Suze.

“Cecille’s probably grounded him,” quipped Liz.

“Ladies, ladies.” A man appeared dressed in high-waisted jeans and a black blazer. He put his arms around Lydia’s waist. “This is my husband, George,” said Lydia wearyingly, as if referring to a pesky child who should be in bed. “George, this is the wonderful Jenny. Soph’s best mate. And Sam, her fiancé.”

George nodded, displaying a shopfront of bad dentistry. “Good to put faces to the names at last.” He turned to Suze. “Trust you’re not getting Lydia waywardly drunk again? You must bust your annual alcohol units each time you meet to debate who’s going to feed Ollie’s cat.”

“George!”
hissed Lydia, giving him a sharp look. “Sorry, ladies.”

“Evidently you lot need to find yourself a new widower and fast,” quipped Sam. George roared with laughter, making his belly wobble above his brown leather belt.

“So cynical, Sam,” purred Tash, looking at him indulgently. “Even for a lawyer.”

George turned to Sam. “You realize, don’t you…” There was a moment of awkwardness when it became clear that George had forgotten his name already.

“Sam,” Sam said, picking up on it. “Jenny’s sidekick.”

“That we have no hope of competing with a young, handsome widower, Sam.”

Sam grinned, clearly warming to the bumptious George. “I do realize this, George, yes.”

Jenny frowned. She hoped Sam wasn’t going to run with this one—he enjoyed running with anything with the whiff of bad taste. He could be a liability at a party.

“How can you two joke so lightly about something so
tragic
?” blurted Lydia, all her anger directed at her husband.

There was a moment’s uncomfortable silence in which everyone cleared their throats. “Well, you gotta laugh or cry, eh?” George said, putting an arm over Lydia’s shoulder. “I know what Sophie would have preferred.”

Lydia shrugged the arm off, picked a half-full bottle of wine off the sideboard and sloppily poured herself a glass so that it spilled over the sides of the glass onto the wooden floor.

“Easy, sweetheart,” George muttered under his breath.

“It’s a fucking party,” Lydia replied through teeth so close she looked like a ventriloquist. “Piss off.”

George switched his attention from his wife to Sam. “I haven’t seen you around, mate. Are you a member of the 2B mafia? Do you have kids at the school too?”

“No, no kids,” said Sam with a tight smile.

Jenny looked away. Why was she finding it harder and harder trying to imagine them with kids? Sam bottle-feeding the baby, changing its nappy, the muddy Wellie boots and scooters in their pristine hall. No, impossible to visualize.

“But they’re getting married this summer,” said Suze, as if to explain the improbable scenario of her guests being childless. “The patter of tiny feet can’t be far off.”

“I fully recommend just the one,” George said.

Lydia shot him a gladiatorial glare. Clearly she didn’t see the joke.

“No more?” Suze smiled, not picking up on the hissing signals of impending marital implosion. “Go on, just one more, Lydia.”

“I would,” Lydia said murderously in a voice so low it was barely audible. “George isn’t so keen.”

“I’m too old for this game. We’ve been tired since 2004, haven’t we, Lyds?” said George affectionately.

“God, that’s nothing. I’ve been tired since 2003,” said Liz cheerfully, gulping back her wine. “You get used to it after a while. It becomes the norm. In fact I think I’d feel weird if I wasn’t tired.”

“True, true. It’s a question of surrender. You know what? I realized the other day that I haven’t actually bought a CD since I had my first,” marveled Suze, as if this was something to be proud. “I’ve never downloaded anything from iTunes. And, excuse me, but what the hell is an
app
? Is it a new erogenous zone?” She howled with laughter. “Check out the app on me.”

Jenny could sense Sam stiffening. Poor Sam. The evening was all turning out exactly as he’d feared. She felt a wave of affection and sympathy for him. A fish out of water, what on earth was she thinking dragging him up here?

Tash glanced at her watch. “I wonder if I should call Ollie?”

“No need! Look!” Suze let out a joyful yelp, grabbed Jenny’s arm and pointed to a shadow behind the bay window. “I told you he wouldn’t flake it!”

I
escort Ollie to Suze’s front door, what remains of me wound tight around his left wrist like a watch strap, as needy and nervous as a mother taking her son to a first playdate. This is the first party he’s been to since I died. Dead proud, I am.

If I’d been widowed I’d have a face like Keith Richards sucking a hornet, but Ollie’s just slimmer and hairier and grayer. Nothing diminishes his cuteness. Tonight he’s wearing the shoes I bought him for his birthday last year, chunky brogue boots hiding an endearing odd match of socks. His white (ironed) boxers peek over the top of his belted jeans when he bends over to tie a loose lace. He’s still the got the world’s sexist ass.

The door blasts open. It is Posh Brigid, barefoot in a fluoro lime green dress. She is squealing. “Ollie!” She thrusts his head down on her glitter-dusted décolletage. Then, gripping his hand as if he were a little boy that might just run off in the other direction if she didn’t, which he might well do, she parades Ollie into the thrum of the party.

Inside the house we hit a bank of alcohol fumes and noise—voices, glasses, music. Then Ollie is spotted. There’s an immediate deathly hush.

Panic streaks across Ollie’s dark, beautiful eyes. Spotting Jenny and Suze, he staggers through the crowd toward them, leaving a disappointed, openmouthed Brigid in his wake. As he moves through the party the crowd parts. A laying on of hands. Men reach out to touch his arm lightly in a brotherly, supportive way, while women go straight for the exposed flesh: fingers or cheek. Ollie finally arrives at his destination. Sam claps him on the back. He does it with too much force. Sam gabbles a sheepish apology for not visiting and Ollie tells him not to worry about it. Apology and forgiveness out of the way, Sam hands Ollie a beer. Ollie drinks. He finishes the beer in minutes, doing his best to appear cheerful, as if cheerfulness itself is a defense against the grief pickers, the people who will ask any question just to sample the pitch of grief’s rawest notes.

I use the opportunity of being this close to Sam to try to read him. I buzz around his smooth-shaven head. I peek down into the glacial blue eyes but see nothing but a small white ring of what could be a cholesterol deposit. He is looking at Sam. He is looking at Tash. He is not looking at Jenny. Has he not actually noticed how hot-damn gorgeous Jenny looks tonight?

Her hair is lovely. I like it piled retro like that. Those green cone heels rock. The navy dress is, well, navy—should have worn the sequin one—but she looks so very pretty, even if there is a microscopic muscle on her left eyelid flickering in spasm.

I shift my attentions to my beloved. He’s on white wine now, always a bad idea. And he gets more moody looking with every refill. Is he really ready for his first party? Suddenly not sure now, not sure at all. I’m worried.

Someone else is drinking too much as well, I see. Lydia. Swaying beneath a potted palm like a woman on an inflatable boat. And she
is staring at Ollie so intensely that even Ollie has noticed. Just as well that George is in the kitchen debating whether Woody Allen has lost his sense of humor with a drunk Danish man wearing a trilby.

Oh, no, here comes dear old George, looking for the wife. His belly arrives ahead of him, obliviously bumping into people like someone carrying a rucksack on a crowded Tube.

“You okay?” He slides his hand around Lydia’s slim waist.

She steps aside and the hand slips down to the small of her back, then off.

“What the matter?”

Lydia sways on her heels. “Nuffink.”

“You must be dead tired from Flora waking up last night.” He strokes her cheek. “Darling, she’s got to learn to take herself to the toilet. You can’t be getting up night after night.”

“It’s not that.” Her bleary eyes are still focused on one person and one person only and it’s not her husband. George follows her gaze.

“Why are you staring like that?” Insecurity makes George’s voice higher than normal. A muscle clenches in his jaw.

Lydia continues staring with what can only be described as longing at Ollie, who is chatting to Tash and Jenny now and refusing the figs wrapped in Parma ham. He’s never going to be a canapé kind of man.