Got You Back (12 page)

But Richard, damn him, had laughed that annoying braying laugh of his and said he had seen whole meals being sold ready-prepared in Le Joli Poulet and had James
really been fooling them all along? He had had no choice but to come clean.

His guests had been very sweet — after all, he hadn't killed anyone or done anything illegal — but it was the polite understanding of their words that had floored him. He knew they were all thinking he was a bit sad, a bit untrustworthy, that the whole thing wasn't cricket. No one was ever going to say anything damning to his face, but the minute they left he knew they would all go on somewhere else — Sam and Geoff's house maybe, that was nearby — and dissect his character over brandy. They would throw in anecdotes of times when they thought he had behaved oddly or said something embarrassing. The bond between the six of them would grow stronger as they united in laughing at him. He knew, without it ever needing to be said, that their little dinner-party circle was over. They would claim diary clashes or family commitments, and the weeks would go by until they stopped even trying to find a date. Maybe the six of them would go on meeting up regularly without him and Katie, chuckling over his ridiculousness as they ate burned duck and soapy potatoes.

He gulped heavily from the glass of water Katie had left by the bed. He remembered now that after they had gone he and Katie had had a huge row because he had somehow felt the need to blame anyone but himself for the débâcle. Then he had downed most of a bottle of whisky before finally coming to bed in the small hours.

He groaned audibly. He felt like the worst kind of fool.

Why had he allowed himself to get into this position in the first place? None of the others could cook and that
had never seemed to matter. He should have just owned up that first time. The minute they had started praising his food he should have said, ‘Actually, I bought it all, I'm a useless chef,’ and they would have laughed and that would have been that. But he'd enjoyed the attention. He'd always felt intimidated by ‘posh people’, as his mother would have called them. Always felt a bit resentful about his comprehensive-school background and his lack of an inheritance. Always secretly wanted to be considered one of them. As the local vet he had managed to ingratiate himself into the community, make himself feel like an integral and indispensable part of it, but he also liked to feel he was important. Forging friendships with the local bigwigs had fed his need for status. He was ridiculous.

The first thing he had to do was to make it up with Katie. None of this was her fault and, what was more, he had put her in the awkward position of having to go along with his pretence for all these months. God, she must think he was an idiot. He slid out of bed, feeling a jolt as his feet touched the floor and he tried to stand upright. He might just have to go and be sick first.

Ten minutes later, after he'd brushed his teeth and splashed cold water on his face, he made his way gingerly down to the kitchen where Katie was scrubbing down the granite surfaces. He felt her stiffen as he slid his arms round her from behind.

‘Sorry, sorry,’ he said, nuzzling into her neck. ‘I shouldn't have taken it out on you.’

‘That's OK,’ Katie said kindly. ‘I understand.’

Katie, bless her, had called Malcolm and told him that James would not be at work today because he was unwell.

She had thrown away all evidence of the disastrous meal, all the leftovers and the empty bottles and the clam shells had already gone into the bin outside and been taken away by the refuse collectors. She seemed happy to pretend that nothing had happened and fussed around him as usual, making him coffee and offering him toast, which made him gag.

James felt like he needed a debrief, though, a trawl through the evening's horrors to confront head on what the worst-case scenario might be. But that, he knew, was pointless. If he tried to talk about what had happened Katie would just insist that everything was fine and that it was unhealthy to dwell on negative things that had happened in the past, even if the past was only last night.

Stephanie would have indulged him, he thought. Indeed, Stephanie would have been only too happy to pick over the excruciating details. Somehow they would have found something funny in the retelling — the look on Sam's face, lipstick askew, as she'd read the receipt; how slow Hugh had been to catch on, the extent to which Alison had had to spell it out to him (‘James has been buying the food all this time, dear, not cooking it himself. That was a lie’), so that eventually they would have found themselves helpless with laughter and that would have made the whole thing so much easier to bear. He thought about reminding Katie about the way Sam had tripped over the front step in her haste to get away from the source of the embarrassment and her skirt had ridden up to reveal hairy legs and alarmingly skimpy underwear, but he knew she wouldn't crack a smile. Instead she would
probably say something like ‘Oh, poor Sam. Well, it's all forgotten now,’ so he decided to go back to bed instead.

‘That's perfect,’ Meredith announced, via her reflection in the mirror, and Stephanie wondered whether she shouldn't give up altogether. Meredith was wearing an emerald-green creation that looked like something a Disney princess might aspire to. The plunging neckline showed off her crêpy cleavage, while the low waist made her broad hips seem even more substantial. They were in the changing rooms at Selfridges, and Stephanie had only allowed her to try on the dress to prove a point about how bad it would look.

‘Meredith, it really does nothing for your figure,’ she said now, as diplomatically as she could. ‘Does it?’ she added, looking piercingly at Natasha for support.

‘Er, no, not really,’ Natasha said. Natasha was terrified of Meredith.

‘This is the one I feel comfortable in, and as you have failed so far to come up with anything better, then this is the one it shall be.’

Stephanie flinched at the insult in Meredith's comment. ‘I think you should wait. We still have a few weeks to go and we're bound to find something we can all agree on.’

‘And what if this one's sold out by then? What if you haven't managed to show me anything else I like and this one's no longer available?’

Stephanie looked at the shiny pea-coloured monstrosity. It was hard to imagine there would be a rush on bright green flouncy dresses. ‘Tell you what,’ she said,
‘we'll buy this anyway and bring it back when we find something better.’

‘
If
you find something better,’ Meredith said frostily.

‘Yes, of course, if,’ Stephanie managed an insincere smile.

She glanced at her watch when Meredith wasn't looking. She was both looking forward to and dreading having to go home this evening. James was due back and Stephanie would get to see how their first tiny arrow had wounded him. Of course he wouldn't be able to tell her about his trauma, but Katie had said enough for her to know that he must be feeling humiliated and more than a bit foolish. Apparently he had gone back to work yesterday and had come home fuming because Malcolm had been called out to see Richard and Simone's retriever, which had an ear infection, and Simone had told him the whole story. In turn, Malcolm had told Simon and Sally, and James had been subjected to merciless — but, Katie had said she was sure, affectionate — teasing for the rest of the day.

‘He's furious with Simone,’ Katie had said. ‘Which is hilarious because I think he always thought she fancied him.’

‘Didn't she?’ Stephanie interrupted, laughing.

‘No, I don't think so. Richard's gorgeous and he dotes on her. I think she was just being polite.’

‘And,’ Stephanie said, ‘how do you feel?’

‘I know it's awful to admit it but I actually feel good. Serves him right,’ Katie said, with conviction.

Stephanie wondered whether James was looking forward more than usual to his few days in London because
he hadn't made an idiot of himself in front of anyone down there. She was planning to be extra nice to him this evening, the calm before the storm as it were, while she and Katie tried to decide what their next move should be.

By five to five she and Natasha were heading north in a cab, the hideous green creation in the distinctive yellow carrier-bag between them. Katie had told her that James usually left for London at about one but, Stephanie had said, he never arrived home until gone five thirty or so. Neither of them had any idea why his journey seemed to take so long.

‘Remember,’ Natasha said, hugging her as the cab turned the corner into Belsize Avenue, ‘just grit your teeth and smile.’

James's car was parked in the street, she noticed, as the cab pulled up. He was early. Stephanie smiled to herself. They'd rattled him.

‘Hi,’ she called, as she opened the front door. Finn dived on her from out of nowhere and then James appeared from the living room and swept her up in a bear-hug. ‘You're earlier than usual,’ she said breathlessly, when he'd put her down.

‘I wanted to get home. I missed you both.’

‘Excellent.’ Stephanie prised his arms off her. ‘You can help Finn with his homework.’

‘So’, she said, once they were sitting down to dinner, ‘how was your week?’

‘Yes, good, fine,’ he said, giving nothing away. ‘How about you? Meredith still being a nightmare?’

Stephanie wondered if she'd heard correctly. James never asked about her work. Never. The fact that he even remembered that she had a client called Meredith was an event in itself.

‘Don't get me started on Meredith.’

James smiled. ‘No, go on, I want to hear about her. Has she made a pass at you yet?’

God, Stephanie thought, he must be really desperate to keep the conversation away from himself.

So, she told him about the green dress — even producing it from its carrier-bag to illustrate her point — and he laughed and said that Meredith must look like a small hillock in it. For a split second Stephanie had forgotten what was happening to them, and then she was stung with the realization of how easy it seemed to be for him to pretend that everything was normal, that they were a happy couple relaxing after a day at work, that he didn't, in fact, have a mistress squirrelled away in the countryside, that his whole existence wasn't a lie.

‘Well, anyway,’ she said, putting the dress back in its bag, ‘I'd better not get it creased in case I have to take it back.’

18

Katie was having a good day.

It had started off badly. She had been buoyed up by the events at the dinner party, which had gone like a dream. Seeing James upset and embarrassed had given her an unexpected rush of pleasure, which had made her feel both guilty and elated. She had thought that maybe she would feel sorry for him or be tempted to own up to her part in his tragi-comic humiliation, but she had discovered a well-hidden core of steel inside her when it came to it, and she had watched him, moping about miserably, unmoved. This morning, though, as they had said goodbye for another three days, the reality that her relationship — which up until a couple of weeks ago, she had thought was perfect — was over had hit her full on. She had found herself crying on his shoulder and he, stupid man, had thought it was because she was going to miss him, although in a roundabout way maybe it was.

He had kissed the top of her head. ‘I'll be back on Sunday, silly girl,’ he'd said, and Katie had thought how patronizing he sounded and that had made her stop crying and remember what she was doing and why.

Once he'd gone, she had flicked half-heartedly through the post, which contained cards from Hugh and Alison (‘What a lovely evening. Do let's do it again soon’) and
Sam and Geoff (‘Thanks muchly as always!’). Neither of them made any mention of the awkward end to the dinner and she knew that none of their friends ever would. They would just fade into the distance and eventually include some other poor couple in their exclusive dinner-party circle. With luck she'd never have to bother trying to make polite conversation with any of them again, beyond a hello in the post office.

She would miss Richard and Simone more — at least they were nearer her age and they had things in common — but then they would probably have thought the whole thing was hilarious and Katie was sure that if she rang Simone up and asked her if she wanted to go for a drink, once this was all over, she would say yes. Meanwhile she had no intention of making contact now because she knew James would be too embarrassed to make the first move and she wanted him to have to suffer the loss of his friends.

She looked round her little cottage and thought how nice it would be to reclaim it as her own. She could get some lilac paint or a pale pink, maybe, and freshen up the living room by painting one wall in a colour James would never have put up with. She could burn candles all day if she wanted to, without him commenting that the place smelt like a church. Stanley would be allowed to sit on the sofa. By the time her doorbell rang, a couple of minutes before ten, she had mentally redecorated the whole house and had forgotten all about Owen's appointment again.

She was going through the motions (‘How are you sleeping’, ‘Can I look at your tongue?’), dreading the hour
ahead listening to Owen rehash the same old story, when he surprised her. ‘I'm moving,’ he said, out of nowhere.

‘Really? Good for you.’ Owen had always been so adamant that he wouldn't be driven out of his home despite the impossibility of the situation.

‘I've got a little house on Springfield Lane. Only renting but it's a start.’

‘What's brought this on?’ Katie asked.

‘What you said to me last week. About negative energy destroying you if you're not careful.’

‘I've been saying that to you for months.’

Owen ran a hand through his hair. ‘I think I just started listening. Anyway, I should thank you. As soon as I made the decision I started to feel much more positive. Just like you said I would. Like I was taking control.’

Katie felt like she imagined a proud mother must feel watching her infant cycling without the training wheels on for the first time. ‘Gosh,’ she said. ‘Well done.’ It was amazing to think she might have made a difference to someone's life, however small.