The Night That Changed Everything (12 page)

‘That
bastard
,' he mutters, grabbing one of the glasses I'd put down on the coffee table. ‘He seemed such a lovely bloke. I never had him down for a cheat. And with your best mate!'

‘Well, he didn't cheat exactly,' I admit. ‘But yes! What a bastard!'

‘What do you mean? I thought you said—'

‘I did – I said he slept with Danielle,' I say, taking a casual sip of my whisky. ‘It was before we started going out.'

He looks confused. ‘So why have you kicked him out, exactly?'

‘I only just found out.'

‘Right. But still, why have you kicked him out exactly?'

‘He never told me!'

‘I get that. But, at the risk of repeating myself: why have you—'

‘Oi, whose side are you on?' I hit him with a cushion. ‘What happened to not letting anyone hurt your sister?'

Just then the buzzer goes. ‘That'll be my curry.'

Stefan goes to the window and peers out. ‘Nope, it's a guy but he's not holding a curry.'

‘Shit.' I jump up. ‘Is it Ben?' I've been ignoring all his calls and texts – of course he'd come over to try to talk.

‘Nope, I don't think so. No, wait – it's that fit mate of yours who runs the bar.'

I run to the window and peer out to see the top of Jamie's perfectly styled messy bed-head. I buzz him in.

‘Hi, Becs.' He greets me when he reaches the top of the stairs. ‘You been avoiding me?'

‘No,' I grumble. ‘I've been avoiding your mates.'

‘Our mates,' he says, making a beeline for the decanter and slapping Stefan's bicep on the way past. ‘All right, mate? Long time no see.'

‘Hi, Jamie.'

‘Top-up, anyone?' Jamie holds out the decanter.

‘Definitely,' I say, presenting my glass. No prizes for guessing what Jamie's here to talk about.

‘Not for me, ta,' says Stefan, standing. ‘I need to go meet my friend. But will you do something about
that
?' He waves a hand in my direction. ‘It's all overreacty.'

Jamie nods. ‘That's why I'm here.'

‘I am not overreacting,' I protest.

‘You are,' says Stefan. ‘It doesn't sound like a big deal.'

‘It's really not,' agrees Jamie.

‘No offence, but you,' I point at Jamie, ‘have slept with half the women in London, and you,' I point at Stefan, ‘have slept with half the men. Of course you think it's no big deal.'

They both puff their chests out proudly.

‘Why would she think that would offend us?' Stefan asks Jamie.

‘I've no idea.'

Stefan says his farewells and I see him out, and when I get back Jamie is on the sofa, one arm sprawled along the back and his feet crossed on my coffee table, like he's modelling furniture.

‘You here to get some clothes for Ben?' I ask.

‘Nah, he looks much better in mine.' He leans forward and picks up my keys off the coffee table, twirling the tiny crisp bag in his hands with a thoughtful expression. I know he's thinking about when Danielle gave it to me, when we were all here together.

‘Don't,' I warn him when he goes to speak.

‘What?' he asks innocently. ‘I was just going to ask if you knew exactly why it shrunk.'

‘Danielle looked at it and it shrivelled up?'

Now it's his turn to say
Don't
.

‘Go on then,' I say, dropping sideways on to the sofa.

‘Well,' he says, twisting to face me. ‘The plastic is made up of long molecules called polymers – a bit like strings of beads. In crisp bags these chains of molecules are stretched out almost straight.' He looks at me to make sure I'm following. ‘Heating it in the microwave gives the molecules energy so they start to vibrate and curl up. The bag shrinks and gets stiffer because all the polymer chains have curled over each other.' He chucks me the keyring, proud of himself.

‘Amazing,' I tell him, studying the crisp bag then turning my gaze towards him. ‘Tell me, have the movie rights been snapped up yet?'

He kicks my shin playfully then takes a sip of his drink.

‘This is nice enough,' he tells me, ‘but when are we opening the thirty-year-old Glenfiddich?'

‘Told you, I'm saving it for a special occasion.'

‘How about to celebrate the moment you let Ben come home?'

‘That moment might never come.'

I get up to refill our drinks.

‘Don't say that.' Jamie rubs the scar above his left eyebrow he got when he was run over as a kid. That small gesture is the only way you'll ever tell if Jamie's feeling distressed. ‘I feel like my parents might be getting a divorce.' He laughs humourlessly. ‘In fact, that would have far less of an impact on my life.'

‘As long as you know, it's nothing that you did. We both still love you very much.'

‘Seriously, though,' he continues, ‘I get why you're upset. It must have come as a shock. But you and Ben hadn't even started seeing each other then. You can't be mad at something he did before you were together.'

‘It's not about the fact they slept together,' I explain. It kind of is, but I realize that's irrational. ‘It's about the lies.'

And I don't just mean about him lying by omission by not volunteering the information. On the night we met, he told me outright that he didn't fancy her. Yet he'd already slept with her. He acted like I was the only girl in the room, but it was utter bollocks.

‘What if he still likes her?' I ask weakly. ‘You know Ben. He's not exactly a one-night-stand sort of guy. That's your forte. And Danielle's. He was obviously interested, and you can't just turn that off because the other person's not.'

Jamie laughs. ‘This is Ben we're talking about – of course he can lose interest in an instant. Remember astronomy? Rock climbing? Cycling?' Jamie waves a hand in the general direction of the hall, where Ben's seldom-used bike still sits. ‘Buddhism? Jeez, think about it, Becs – they're fleeting fixations. Learning Mandarin? Photography? Is he the new Chinese-speaking David Bailey? No – he lost interest as quickly as he took it up. You know what he's never lost interest in, though? You.'

‘Yes, but what if liking Danielle didn't go away?' I demand, agitated that Jamie is sticking up for Ben. ‘What if the only reason he gave up on it was because she wasn't interested. Jamie, HE FUCKED HER.'

‘Stop shouting.'

‘I'M NOT SHOUTING,' I shout. ‘Look,' I continue with forced control, ‘I know you thought you were certain about mine and Ben's future. I felt certain about it too. But I also felt certain about our past. That we met and we instantly connected and it was meant to be and blah blah blah.' I take a deep breath, trying to steady my voice. ‘Ben can sit there and say that's all in the past, but he's the one that's always banging on about how important history is. This
changes
our history.'

‘I'm just saying, cut him some slack,' Jamie says gently. ‘Let's say you and I had slept with each other before you two got together . . .'

I cackle then see Jamie's mouth form into a pout.

‘Sorry,' I say. ‘Carry on.'

‘Say we slept together, and it didn't mean anything, and then you and Ben got it on, and you knew that telling him about me would put him off, would you tell him?'

‘Yes.'

‘Really?'

‘Well, maybe not right away, but I would eventually.'

‘When? There's never a good time to drop into conversation something you think is going to hurt someone.'

‘That doesn't excuse him keeping secrets from me.'

‘Doesn't it?' he challenges. ‘Look, whether or not keeping it from you was the right thing to do isn't for me to say. But you can't argue that the reasons behind it were good ones. Ben didn't want to hurt you. He didn't want to damage your relationship with Danielle. And most of all, he didn't want to give you a reason not to be with him. He's crazy about you.' He sighs. ‘More than I think you realize.'

I think about what he's saying because it's Jamie, and he's rarely wrong about stuff. Would I have gone out with Ben if I'd known he'd already slept with Danielle? Hell, no. Has there ever been a time when he could have told me and I wouldn't have been upset? Probably not. My life was better when I didn't know that Ben has seen Danielle naked.

‘You've always said he makes you feel special,' Jamie reminds me. ‘Think about the things that happened since you got together, not the things that happened before it.'

I close my eyes and think of Beachy Head, and how perfect it was.

‘OK, fine,' I mutter eventually.

‘OK, fine, you'll let Ben come home?'

‘OK, fine, I'll talk to him.'

‘It's a start.' Jamie grins, patting my shoulder. ‘By the way,' he adds, folding an arm behind his head and leaning back into the sofa, ‘you would be lucky to sleep with me. I'm incredible.'

The buzzer goes. ‘That
better
be my frigging curry,' I groan, running for the door.

Friday, 7 November

The Tube brakes abruptly between Green Park and Hyde Park Corner, where I get off for work. I'm standing in the rush-hour crush, and the momentum sends the dotty-looking woman next to me chest-first into a man with bushy sideburns. She apologizes but Sideburns doesn't acknowledge it.

I figure we must be waiting for a signal to change or something but a couple of minutes later we still haven't moved. People start to look up from their phones and huff, and Dotty Woman is peering around the carriage through her oversized glasses as though looking for some kind of explanation.

When she turns my way I see she is chewing her lips and has gone white.

‘You OK?' I ask her.

‘Just a bit claustrophobic,' she says, eyes flicking to somewhere over my shoulder. ‘I have this recurring dream where I'm trapped in one of these things, and when I ask people how we're going to get out they ignore me.'

‘I'm sure we'll get going again in a minute.'

She looks around the carriage again, pulling at the ends of her plaited hair.

‘There's a disused station just the other side of these walls,' I tell her. ‘It's called Down Street. Churchill used it for secret meetings during the war. It'd take us about a minute to walk to, and we could go up to street level from there.'

The woman looks at me properly for the first time. ‘If it's disused won't it be locked up?'

‘Yeah, I guess so.'

‘And dark?'

‘I hadn't thought of that.'

‘Perfect conditions for someone with claustrophobia, then.'

I go to apologize but she smiles to let me know she's only teasing. She introduces herself as Sandra just as the train starts moving again, and we're still chatting when we reach Hyde Park Corner. The whole exchange has me smiling up the escalators, and I make a mental note to tell Rebecca about it next time she moans about the—

Then I remember: the way things are going, I may never get to hear her whinge about the Tube, or anything, again. And the thought wipes the smile right off my face.

‘How did your pre-date phone call go, by the way?' I ask Russ, because if anyone can make me feel better about my present situation, Russ can.

‘I don't want to talk about it.'

There, easy.

I get on with my report on ticket office closures. I'm boring myself with the details of a required ninety-day consultation period when Russ pops up like a meerkat.

‘Why is dating so difficult?'

‘I thought you didn't want to talk about it?'

I stop what I'm doing and lean back in my chair.

‘You reckon it's difficult these days?' I say. ‘You're lucky you never lived in medieval times. Back then, if you fancied a girl you'd have to write her a poem.'

‘Is that how you wooed Avril, Tom?' says Russ.

Tom tears off a piece of his chickpea sandwich with his spindly fingers and places it into his mouth.

‘Actually, I drew a picture of her.'

I bloody love Tom.

‘What did she think?' I ask.

I mean, here's me, always saying HR is a stopgap without really knowing what I might do next, but Tom is an artist, with actual talent, and I know he'll be out of here as soon as he catches a break.

‘She said I got her nose wrong.'

Russ and I laugh, but then an email appears at the bottom right of my screen that steals my attention. Seeing the name, I lean into the desk, excited, but the small bit of movement causes my faulty screen to flicker.

‘Bloody monitor!' I say, losing the cursor just as I was about to open the email.

‘Language!' says Russ. ‘There are ladies around.'

He gestures towards Tom while I stand on tiptoes, leaning over the screen to try to tighten the wires. Russ comes round.

‘Let me,' he says, whacking the side of the monitor so that the flickering stops. ‘
Voilá
!'

I pull myself back towards the desk, gently this time, even though the techno beat is going again inside my chest.

‘Do you want to piss off now?' I tell Russ, who's just standing there.

He ignores me, squinting to try to read the email. I put my hand over the screen.

‘You should be pleased,' he says, returning to his own desk. ‘Sounds like she wants to meet.'

I read the email for myself.

Are you free for a chat tonight? 6 pm at the flat?

Finally! I hit reply.

I'll be there. I love you. Bx

Immediately my imagination starts to write a script of how the evening is going to play out, and it ends with me enveloping Rebecca in my arms, immersing myself in the scent of her, and whispering how sorry I am, and then, as she's just about to tell me that all is forgiven, I hear a forced cough behind me.