Nine Uses For An Ex-Boyfriend (44 page)

‘If you say so.’

The ground was glittering with the promise of frost and she really, really didn’t want haemorrhoids either, but Hope sat down next to Jack and put her arm around him. ‘I do say so. It’s like when you hurt yourself and as the wound is healing, it itches something terrible. I guess our souls or our hearts are itching, or whatever.’

‘I can’t do anything right,’ Jack mumbled. ‘Even when I
think
I’ve done the decent thing, it turns out I haven’t.’

Hope wasn’t sure exactly which of his women Jack was talking about – her or Susie – and she also wasn’t sure that she really wanted to know. ‘I thought we had a rule that what happened in therapy, stayed in therapy?’ she asked teasingly, even though she thought it was a stupid rule and yet another avoidance tactic on Jack’s part. ‘We’ve been out of therapy for ten minutes and, technically, you’re still psycho babbling.’

‘I am
not
! I don’t do psychobabble,’ Jack said but he lifted his head and smiled weakly as if he was up for Hope trying to jolly him out of his existential despair. ‘Well, I try not to.’

‘We can talk about it next week with Angela,’ Hope said firmly, because she was bloody sure it was going to be the very first thing they talked about as soon as they plopped their arses down on her sofa. ‘I mean, this business with Susie, but until then we won’t worry about it.’

Unless she keeps calling
, Hope thought, but she’d cross that bridge when she came to it, and hopefully she’d cross it calmly without losing her temper. Anyway, it seemed to have Jack’s vote and he was looking happier.

‘Well, at least we only have two more sessions to go,’ he said brightly and with evident relief, though Hope wasn’t sure that he was any closer to reaching a decision on whether he should stay or go. Therapy didn’t seem to be helping – Jack regarded it in the same way as the Delafields’ cat, Charlton, regarded a trip to the vet to get shots and a thermometer shoved up his fundament.

It was getting to the stage where Hope knew she couldn’t delude herself for much longer. The odds were stacked against her. Jack was with her in body, but his heart was somewhere else, about three miles away in Highgate by her reckoning, and she wondered what would happen if she called his bluff, because she didn’t know how much longer she could put up with Jack’s prevarication, especially as his prevarication was beginning to look a lot like cowardice. If
she
said, ‘Fine, I give in. Go to her. I just don’t care any more,’ would Jack be gone faster than she could blink?

But Hope wasn’t that brave, and, God help her, she did care. ‘Come on, you’re not a bad person. You’ve made bad decisions and you’ve acted like a dick, sure, but you haven’t done anything so terrible that it’s killed my love for you,’ she said. ‘I’m not even saying that as yet another ploy to get you to choose me, I’m just stating it for the record.’

Jack glanced over at her with a look so tender it made Hope wish that she didn’t love him as much as she did, because these days that love was more pain than pleasure. ‘I don’t deserve you,’ he said.

‘No, you really don’t, but you’ve got me,’ she said, and Jack was still gazing at her like his eyes could say all the things that he refused to, and panic swept over Hope in an icy, shuddering wave, because it felt as if that soft, penetrating look might be the warm-up before Jack told her that Susie
did
deserve him. Hope stood up so quickly that she got a headrush. ‘This is silly, just sitting here like this. Your arse must have gone numb by now. I think your penance for psychobabbling should be paying for dinner at the cheesy Italian in Camden. No splitting the bill.’

Going to the cheesy Italian in Camden for a debrief on Angela’s thrilling choice of one taupe ensemble after another, and to speculate on her private life, had become a tradition.

Jack staggered to his feet and stamped up and down to try and coax the feeling back in his legs. ‘You know what?’

‘What?’

‘Just because it’s you, and I kinda love you, I’ll even throw in a slice of tiramisu,’ he said, his arm settling around her shoulders like it belonged there again.

‘Are you feeling all right now?’ Hope asked, as they once again set off for Finchley Road.

Jack didn’t answer at first, and just as Hope was about to repeat the question, he nodded. ‘I know I’m being a total
pain
in the arse right now. In fact, I’ve been a total pain in the arse for months, but I’m starting to feel all right. And, I’m beginning to think you and me are going to be all right, too. Better than all right. I think we’re going to be just fine, Hopita.’

JACK HAD BEEN
an absolute textbook boyfriend for the rest of the evening, telling Hope scurrilous stories about celebrities that
Skirt
had shot recently, and even asking the waiter for a doggy bag because her stomach was still tied up in knots and she could only manage half her lasagne, though normally he hated to do that. Then when they’d got home, and she’d realised that she’d come on, he’d given her a back rub and made her up a hot-water bottle, without even being asked.

These were all splendid acts of boyfriendliness, but now it was Saturday morning and Hope wondered what kind of mood Jack would be in today. She rolled over with a groan because she had cramps and a nagging ache in her lower back, and saw that it was an unbelievable ten thirty. She’d set the alarm for nine, which counted as a decadent lie-in, so she could go to the gym. Though she hated to admit that Miss Hill, her old PE teacher, had been right, Hope found that exercise really was the best thing for period pain. Once she could actually will her body out of bed.

If she got a wiggle on, she could still make the spinning class at noon, Hope thought, as she made no effort to even sit up. She was just
thinking
of maybe at least pushing her hair out of her face because it was tickling her when the bedroom door was gently nudged open and Jack walked in with a laden tray.

‘Happy thirteenth anniversary, sleepyhead,’ he said
cheerfully
and a little smugly, as Hope finally sat up and pushed her hair out of her eyes.

‘What’s this?’ she gasped, though she could see what this was. On the tray was her favourite breakfast of a lightly toasted bagel with softly scrambled eggs and smoked salmon. There was a glass of orange juice, and her nose twitched before she even took note of the cafetière, because Jack had made proper coffee, even though they both agreed that it was usually too much of a faff and made do with bulk-buying when it was on special offer.

It was unexpected and thoughtful and unutterably lovely, but what made a tear leak out of one sleep-encrusted eye was the single white rose, bobbing gently in a plastic champagne flute.

Hope opened her mouth to speak but all that came out was a very ineffectual, ‘Oh, Jack …’

Jack carefully placed the tray on her knees and sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘I realised that I’d been rubbish at our anniversary for the last twelve years, what with not knowing that it really was our anniversary.’

‘It must have taken you
hours
…’

‘I had to get up at eight on a Saturday to go to Waitrose. There’s proof right there that I love you,’ Jack sniffed. ‘I don’t get up eight on a Saturday for just anyone and I remembered to turn off your alarm …’

‘This is the sweetest thing that anyone has ever done for me,’ Hope said truthfully. She looked down at the tray with a face full of shame. ‘I haven’t got you anything. Everything’s been so up in the air, and you always say that anniversaries don’t count unless you’re married.’

For one giddy, head-spinning moment she wondered if Jack might have reached a decision that weighed heavily in her favour and bought her an engagement ring on his way back from Waitrose, though his options would have been severely limited and it would probably have had to come from Argos. And Jack
was
pulling something from the
pocket
of his jeans, and giddy and head-spinning were replaced by panic and a dry mouth.

‘Well, it is our thirteenth anniversary, which could be unlucky, but I think we should reclaim thirteen as our lucky number, make it feel special, the way I want you to feel special,’ Jack said, his hand closed around something that Hope couldn’t see.

And if Jack did love her, really loved her, then yes, actually, he needed to put a ring on it, and now Hope was calm and ready to meet her destiny – and also curious to see if Argos did anything tasteful in the way of princess-cut diamonds in a white-gold setting. ‘Well, I feel pretty special,’ Hope murmured, and she’d have sworn that all she wanted was to be properly engaged, just that, but she could already see herself dieted to the bone and willow-thin as she gracefully glided up the aisle in a bias-cut, 1930s-style ivory wedding dress, her father smiling proudly down at her as he patted her hand …

‘Aw, Hopey, I know you feel rotten because the only special thing going on is your special lady-time, so I got you this,’ Jack said as he placed a box of Feminax on the tray next to her white rose. ‘I even remembered to get you some raspberry-leaf tea.’

Hope wasn’t quite prepared for the crushing tsunami of disappointment that engulfed her. If Jack was going to propose, then this would have been the perfect time to do it, what with the talk they’d had on the icy pavement last night, and the hand-holding between courses at the Italian restaurant, and even letting her have the bed, though it was her turn to sleep on the sofa. Maybe she was getting ahead of herself, though. ‘We’re going to be fine’ didn’t necessarily translate as ‘Let’s make things official’ – they did still have to sort out the small print, and right now with her tummy cramping and her back aching, she needed Feminax more than she needed a solitaire on the third finger of her left hand. ‘I think this has to be the best thirteenth
anniversary
anyone has ever had,’ she said effusively, leaning forward carefully so she could kiss Jack’s cheek. ‘And I’m making your absolute favourite tea tonight, and I’ll even tidy up as I go along.’

Despite the almost crippling period pain, their thirteenth anniversary was a rousing success. It was one of those December days when the clear blue skies made up for the fact that it was so cold that even though she was wearing a pair of fleece-lined gloves, and thick socks with her Uggs, Hope was losing all sensation in her fingers and toes as she and Jack embarked on a mammoth walk.

If they weren’t in North London and taking regular rest breaks in chichi coffee shops, it might even have been a trek. They walked up the massive hill to Highgate Village to browse the bookshops, then they walked down a massive hill to Parliament Hill Fields, walked across the Heath to Hampstead, pausing to stare in shop windows at things they couldn’t afford, then walked down another steep hill to Camden and the huge Sainsbury’s where Hope bought the ingredients for her famous three-hour chilli.

Hope couldn’t remember the last time she and Jack had spent so many hours in each other’s company. The conversation was easy and relaxed in a way that it hadn’t been since the summer. Or maybe even before then, because things had already been going horribly wrong with them last summer, though Hope hadn’t known it at the time.

It certainly felt like everything was different now. They teased each other, without taking offence, and they talked about the future. A vague, blurry future, but Jack was happy to ask Hope where she’d like to go if they could manage a mini-break during spring half-term, and they played their favourite game, where they both got significant pay rises and five numbers and the bonus ball on the lottery (they both agreed that getting all six numbers showed a lack of imagination) and they could move into a proper house. ‘In Muswell Hill,’ Hope insisted, because she could get the
43
bus into work and there was a Whistles, a Space NK and more cake shops per head of the population than any place she’d ever been to.

Jack was more inclined towards Stoke Newington, but they agreed to compromise by moving to Primrose Hill instead.

‘When we’re living in Primrose Hill, you could convert one of the spare bedrooms into a studio,’ Hope said, when they were finally home and she was slowly pouring a whole bottle of Barolo into her chilli. ‘You always used to sketch and paint. Don’t you miss it?’

Jack was about to open the second of the three bottles of Barolo they’d bought, but he looked up in surprise. ‘Well, I suppose,’ he said. ‘I’ve been mucking around a bit on the computer with this illustration program I’ve got. Never seems to be much time for that kind of thing.’