Pillow Talk (11 page)

Chapter Twelve

What is she going to do?

What can she do with this information?

What is she going to do with her night, with her weekend, with her life, with her tomorrow?

Who can she turn to right now? No one should have to weather a trauma like this alone.

Petra Flint may be a romantic but she's also fairly sensible. She would quite like to throw up in the middle of Islington but she breathes slowly and methodically instead, to calm herself and quell the nausea. She could easily collapse into sobs at the bus stop but she bites down on her lip and decides to hail a taxi. What price the security of home?

And quickly, please. I know it's rush-hour but if you could drive like the clappers I'd be grateful.

Train to catch, love?

No. I just want to be home.

Well, it'll be sticky up the Archway, love, but it'll ease out after that.

Sticky up the Archway. Sticky up the arch way. Stick it up yer archway. To Petra, just then, it sounds bizarrely vaudevillian and she is taunted by an image of a sticky sweaty Rob pushing up into Laura.

* * *

Petra is home.

The solitude and safety of her own space render obsolete the composure she maintained so brilliantly in Islington and in the taxi. She closes her front door and presses her back hard against it. Then she doubles over, clutching her stomach. She drops to her knees and cries, No no no, hammering her knuckles against the carpet. She curls herself onto the floor just inside the door even though she's within arm's reach of the sofa. She can't cry properly and it is painful. The sobs are caught like sharp obstructions in her throat and she can no more swallow them down than she can wail them up. Her tears try to itch and ooze their way past aching eyeballs as if her tear-ducts are constipated. She is light-headed but the pit of her stomach is leaden. Her brain is having difficulty computing all the immutable information and her heart hurts. It simply hurts. From a situation so sordid, comes pain so pure. It's all unfathomable.

She woke up pleased to find herself still on the floor near the door, because such a trauma could well have had her sleepwalking way past Whetstone. Common sense told her not to mope and not to be alone and the hands of her watch said that, at just turned tomorrow, it would be breakfast-time again in Hong Kong.

‘Luce?’

‘Stay right there – I'll phone you straight back.’

The beauty of your oldest, closest friend is that, in a crisis, she has no compulsion to do anything other than come to your rescue. She puts her life on hold as she steps into your shoes to fight your corner for you. Because she can feel your pain, so she can take just a little bit of it away. She won't mince her words or indulge you, she'll talk to you straight and tell it how it is. But she'll also intersperse her constructive help to there-there you like a mother. In Petra's case, in lieu of her mother. And she'll carefully lay the foundations of her advice on a soft bed of much-needed sympathy.

So Lucy listened and gasped and squeezed her handset tight as if it was Petra's hand or Rob's sodding neck. She was livid and distressed and frustrated by the distance that separated them. She was outraged and felt Petra's pain as keenly as if it was her own. After Lucy had done listening because Petra was done talking, she soothed her with utter sympathy and a genuine croak to her own voice. Encouraging Petra to use the phone call to sob all she wanted, Lucy willed her affection and her support to traverse the Pacific or bounce off the telecommunication satellite or whichever route was the quickest to go down the phone and into Petra's soul. And only then did Lucy take charge of the situation and of her friend's immediate future.

‘This will
not
damage you, Petra, because the problem is his and not yours. It's your opportunity to wrest your life back from the hold he had over you. You are allowed to hate him. You can enjoy it. Then you might well pity him. And soon enough – I promise you – you simply won't think of him at all. If you find yourself missing him, ask yourself what it is you miss.’

‘But I worked so hard at loving him.’

‘You worked
too
hard at loving him for too little return.’

‘But he didn't love me.’

‘You are right – but that's his shortcoming, not your failure.’

‘I tried so hard.’

‘It is not your fault. He probably does love you in his own half-baked way. Love means different things to different people. It's the centre of your world – but it's on the periphery of his. But he'll probably make a play to get you back.’

‘Do you really think so?’

‘You shouldn't be sounding hopeful – you should be sounding horrified. You are better off in the long run. Please believe me. If he comes crawling and begging and dripping with diamonds please say no.’

‘It's all right for you, Luce. You're married and sorted. I'm on my own.’

‘Better to be on your own than settling for so little. You shouldn't be with Rob to make yourself feel better, because I'm telling you, Rob did not love you as you should be loved. And he won't miraculously change. You know what I think, Petra, I think deep down you were never sure about his feelings for you and that's why you tried so hard. God, it was like a full-time job – the effort you bestowed. You worked so hard at being a sexpot, a wifey, a fascinating person, an amazing girlfriend.’

‘What more could I have done? Why wasn't that enough?’

‘You are trying to measure yourself against how much affection you could inspire in him. That's why you're feeling so wretched – because you are judging yourself on how little he loved you. All you expected in return was respect, affection and fidelity – none of which he gave you. But you listen up, Petra – he didn't
not
love you because you're unlovable, my darling. He's emotionally imbecilic. You must not take this personally.’

‘How can I not?’

‘I know. I know. At this stage, that's impossible. Answer me this, though. If he came round right now and asked you to marry him, would you say yes?’

‘Yes! I would! I would say yes yes yes!’

‘Petra, if he came round right now and asked you to marry him
tomorrow
, would you say yes?’

The line went silent. ‘Petra?’

‘I …’

‘Would you? Would you marry Rob tomorrow? I'll come over – I'll go to the airport right now. Will you marry him tomorrow? Marry him tomorrow and forever?’

Silence.

‘Petra?’

‘I wouldn't marry him tomorrow. Not tomorrow. No.’

‘Good girl. You will see that actually, it's nothing to do with the love, or lack of, that he had for you. Ultimately, you'll see that you didn't really love him enough to be with him for good anyway. The more you doubt someone's love for you, the harder you work at trying to secure it. It's bizarre. Perhaps you set out to see if you could be the one for him without stopping to truly consider whether he was the one for you?’

‘Oh, Luce.’

‘He's not worth your tears, my darling. And the person worthy of you won't make you cry like this. I promise. Phone Eric first thing because you'll feel very unsure again when you wake up. So phone him. OK?’

‘OK.’

‘And Petra?’ Lucy paused. ‘You're beautiful and gorgeous and it would be wrong to settle for anyone less than a man who adores you.’

‘OK.’

‘And Petra? Double-lock your door tonight. Hide the key in the coffee jar right now and put the coffee jar at the back of your cupboard and balance something like a shoe on top of the cupboard door so it will clonk you if you open it. Go on. Just in case. You know how trauma can set you off.’

‘OK. But I wish you were here, Luce,
really
here. Round the corner, like you used to be.’

‘We'll be back later in the year. We'll be back for good in a couple of years' time.’

‘OK. But please don't hang up yet.’

Petra didn't sleepwalk, she didn't have nightmares, she didn't even dream. She slept without knowing she slept; hours of uninterrupted nothingness making time pass, giving the brain a rest, allowing the heart to beat a little more calmly. And when she awoke, she was momentarily tricked by the charm of those first gentle minutes of reverie, by sunlight seeping in through the gap in the curtains promising a fair spring day. It was only when her slumbery focus sharpened to settle on the strange sight of her Birkenstock sandal perched on top of her ajar cupboard door, that she recalled what had caused her to sleep to such numb depths.

Sandals.
    Cupboard.
    Coffee jar.
    Door keys.
    Sleepwalk.
    Lucy.
    Rob.
    Birthday.
    And Laura.
    And not me.

Her spirits tumbled with the thudding realization of the horrible truth. She closed her eyes though she knew it was pointless – there would be no sleep while her heart was busy beating double time and the cogs of her brain were in over-drive. And closing her eyes didn't stop her tears and it didn't prevent her from staring straight into the bare facts of the situation.

Yet looking around her room, she suddenly hated every inch of it. She hated the trickery of the sunshine. It was all a lie. It wasn't a nice spring day at all. How could it be. She was waking up very alone, and for Petra that was a terrible place to be. A whole day – more, an entire weekend – stretched ahead of her as one long enervating slog.

I've spent my adult life avoiding weekends on my own.

Petra stumbled from bed and hurried to phone Eric.

‘He's been shagging someone else.’

‘I'll bring wine I'll bring fags I'll bring chocolate I'll bring scented candles I'll bring
Jerry Maguire
I'll bring my Eve Lom stuff and give you a facial that'll make the world seem all right again. I'll bring all this stuff with me – and much much more. I'll be over at lunch-time.’

Petra clung to the phone and loved Eric very much just then.

He brought a carpet picnic fit for a queen.

‘I haven't heard a word from him,’ Petra said quietly, having eaten her fill.

‘He was shagging someone else! There is no explanation!’ Eric protested. ‘You deserve so much more. It's shitty and it hurts – but it's for the best. He was no good for you, the tosser. I never much liked him. None of us did. He's not your type – and you're not his.’

Petra ruminated over this. ‘But why didn't you say something sooner?’

‘We did try but you were so full of how much you loved him. Note –
you
loved
him.
You were very happy to love him, too. You wouldn't have heard me. Anyway, you wouldn't have listened.’

‘He didn't love me,’ said Petra, her strength rapidly sapping. ‘I tried so hard.’

‘Love should never be such a one-sided effort. Anyway, do you know what I think? I think he's a sad fat fuck, that's what. He probably did love you in his own way, to his own inadequate limit.’

‘That's what Lucy says.’

‘Petra, much better to have your propensity for great love – big generous sexy caring love – than his limit for only so much lukewarm love. You'll be able to bestow it on a very lucky chap – and next time, it'll be reciprocated.’

‘I don't want to be alone. I don't want to be on my own.’

‘That's why you worked so hard on Rob. Not because he was worth it but because you didn't want to be on your own.’

Early evening, a text message bleeped through to her phone and in the instant she prayed it would be from Rob, Eric prayed it would be from Lucy. Petra's prayer, it seemed, was heard first.

u ok? I can xplain!! plus jamais!! promise!! xxx

‘Christ,’ Eric muttered, ‘if ever there was a time to go easy on exclamation marks.’ But he felt bad when he saw how his cynicism, however reasonable, had swiftly stripped the hope and joy from Petra's face.

‘Three kisses, Eric – he never usually does kisses at all.’

Eric decided not to comment but to give Petra a look instead which said, I've known you for over fifteen years – will you please just trust me.

‘But maybe it's only now that he realizes that he does really love me,’ Petra said, ‘and he's come to his senses.’

Eric gave Petra the look again. He thought how if Kitty was here she'd be yelling at Petra and physically shaking her. Or if Rob were here then yelling at him and physically shaking him too. But harder.

‘Are you going to forgive him?’ Eric asked, feigning nonchalance by laying out his jars of Eve Lom facial products like a chef preparing to cook up a treat.

‘I read somewhere that we all make mistakes but it's how we make amends that defines us.’

‘Petra, it's easy enough to think, Ooh, desolate text message! Ooh, three Xs. But are you intending to forgive a man who didn't bother with kisses until now – and, more to the point, who's been fucking someone else behind your back but claims it's readily explainable?’