Charlotte Street (31 page)

Outside, by the bins, I sat and toyed with my phone.

I was fine, really. I just needed a moment. To be confronted with the truth of it all – that I’d stayed where I was when where I was wasn’t all that great, while others had moved on – was hard enough. When they’d moved on so well, it was a quiet moment of torture.

And then Sarah came out and sat down next to me.

‘It was good of you to come, Jason.’

A pause. A silent nod from us both. I stared straight ahead while she clinked the ice around in her glass, the noise somehow louder than the buses and cars and bikes of London.

‘I’m being a dick,’ I said, powerless to come up with anything more convincing than the truth. ‘I just needed a moment. It was hot in there and—’

‘The thing you need to remember,’ she said, ‘is that you didn’t want any of this. So don’t mourn it.’

‘I’m not mourning it. I’m celebrating it, not mourning it.’

Actually, I was mourning it. But that’s what the selfish do. We mourn what we have, and we mourn what we lose when we realise that we’re no longer the centre of attention, or even just a part of things.

‘We’ll always sort of love each other,’ she said. ‘We were part of each other’s lives. We still can be.’

I faked a small smile. Was that true? I mean, really? Things had changed, and soon they’d change further.

‘You know I always wanted kids one day,’ she said. ‘It’s happening sooner than I’d thought, but you could always choose to be happy for me.’

‘I
am
happy for you,’ I said. ‘Honestly, Sarah.’

‘But you never wanted them.’

‘I never knew what I wanted. I’m only finding out that I do. And anyway, we never talked about it. How do you know what I wanted?’

‘I could tell. Do you think someone can’t tell if their boyfriend wants kids one day? Look … when we nearly had what we nearly had—’

This was how we’d always described it. The truth had always been too raw and too difficult to tackle head on.
When we nearly had what we nearly had
was our way of couching it in something, creating some distance between the pain and the present.

‘—well, it was pretty obvious, Jase. I could see how you felt. There was a coldness there.’

‘You never asked me.’

‘You never
told
me. You didn’t need to. And then you did what you did and everything was clear.’

And then you did what you did
. Our other pain-limiting catchphrase. Do all couples develop these? These ways of dealing with the horror of it all?

‘When I did what I did … it wasn’t because of what we nearly had. I wanted what we nearly had, too. It just took me a little time to realise.’

‘But Jason, you didn’t
not
do what you did.’

She was speaking tenderly now, like I was fragile, precious, breakable.

‘You did what you did
despite
what we nearly had. You did it despite everything we
already
had. You did it. And it broke my heart. Not for ever, but for a while, because, as obvious as it sounds, I loved you.’

I looked at her for the first time. Her eyes were pricked with tears and something jolted in my heart and I just wanted to fling my arms around her. But how would that look? The evil ex-boyfriend making one last pass at someone else’s pregnant fiancée? She knew, because she always knew, and she smiled a faint smile.

‘I’m so sorry, Sar,’ I said, and then I could feel the tears, too.

When I walked back inside, Dev was on me in an instant, pouncing like a tiger.

‘I’ve got a great name for a band!’ he said. ‘Thought of it just now. Shall we start a band?’

‘What? No,’ I said, looking over at Sarah, now back in the corner, laughing away like nothing had happened. We’d walked
in separately, for obvious reasons, and I’d grabbed the first drink I could and all but skulled it. ‘Why? What’s your great name for a band?’

‘It’s “Great Name for a Band”! That way, we could shout, “We’ve been Great Name for a Band”, and everyone would be, like, “That’s a
great
name for a band!”.’

‘Yeah, okay, sure, let’s start a band.’

‘Who’s starting a band?’ said Abbey, suddenly there.

‘Me and Jason,’ said Dev, proudly. ‘Do you want to be in it?’

‘Me? God, no. I have little to no talent.’

I blinked and remembered last night. The CD poking slyly out of her bag.
Abbey’s Songs
.

‘Where’ve you been?’ asked Dev. ‘I was stuck here this whole time talking to that thin man.’

‘I was talking to Gary,’ she said, turning to me and smiling, broadly. ‘And also to Anna.’

Her smile didn’t leave her face. I wasn’t sure what to say. But it was clear she wanted me to say something.

‘And … was that nice?’ I tried.

She just kept smiling.

So I looked over at Gary. Now
he
was talking to that thin man, and balancing a little paper plate on his wrist. So far so normal.

And then I went a little white.

‘What the fuck did you do?’ I said, quickly, and her smile only broadened, delighted I’d noticed. ‘Oh, God, Abbey, what?’

I broke away from them and started to pace towards Gary. I could see Sarah in the corner of my eye looking over concerned, like she thought she’d dealt with me but now here I was, determined to cause a scene. I slowed down, instinctively, but as I got closer …

‘Now that’s a cake,’ said Gary. ‘Wotcha, Jason.’

‘Wotcha,’ I said, which I won’t be trying again. ‘What, um … so, what are you eating there?’

Over his shoulder I saw Anna. She had one, too. She was staring at hers like she didn’t like it much, but was munching it down nevertheless.

I felt a little tug on the back of my shirt and I turned to look at Abbey, shocked.

She was smiling in anticipation, her eyes sparkling like she was getting ready to cry laughing, Dev next to her, looking confused.

I turned back, slowly.

‘Teacake, I think,’ said Gary. ‘Bit dry. But
delicious
, too.’

Oh dear God.

I grabbed Abbey, moved her to one side, as Gary asked Dev how ‘the good ship Nissan Cherry’ was doing.

‘What have you done?’ I said, and that was when she cracked. And a second after she cracked, the dam burst.

She laughed, and laughed, and she had to grab a six-foot dragon plant to steady herself, but when that rocked about, she just laughed even more.

I moved her into the hallway.

‘Are you high?’ I said, my teacher voice suddenly back in play from who knows where.

‘No!’ she spluttered, and laughed even more.

‘What the fuck have you done?’ I asked, and she might as well have exploded at that point. ‘Do you know how dangerous that is? Do you realise how
irresponsible
you’ve been?’

‘Come on!’ she said, between breaths. ‘This is funny. This is funny. You’re at your ex’s engagement party with some of the most boring and sullen people on earth, one of whom thinks you have a drink problem and the other who just patronises you all the time. How else were you going to enjoy it?’

‘I didn’t come here to enjoy it! I came here to show how mature I am! And now you’ve given Gary and Anna some spacecakes.’

Abbey took that in. Thought again of what had happened and who they’d blame, and exploded again.

‘Jason, if you and Svetlana are ready,’ said a stern Anna, leaning through the doorway, all judgement and scorn, ‘we’d like to begin the speeches. But take your time. This is your day, after all.’

I looked again at Abbey, shook my head the way I’d done countless times as a teacher, took a breath, and strode back into the room.

Oh, God, this was horrible.

This was like a time bomb. A really formal time bomb where you’re not allowed to mention the time bomb.

Twenty minutes later, I was standing between Dev and Abbey in this crowd of maybe forty people and my nerves were wracked.

Please let it have been weak stuff, I kept thinking. Please don’t let there be any noticeable effects. Please let Abbey have been terribly ripped off, or incapable of basic cookery, or just plain wrong.

I was sweating. Dev was oblivious. Abbey kept shaking slightly as she stifled her laughter, and leaning into me to steady herself.

I felt sick.

Sarah was up first. Start the speeches, I kept thinking. Or cancel them! Cancel the speeches!

I looked over at Gary, but all I could see was the top of his head, and Anna was leaning against a wall. Is that what people do? I thought, panicked. Is leaning against a wall the first sign of spacecakes?

‘Just to say, thanks so much for coming,’ said Sarah. ‘It means the world to both Gary and myself. God, I should start calling him my fiancé!’

Polite, well-meaning laughter. That was my chance to look around.

Anna was on her third cake.

‘Anna’s had
three
,’ I hissed, desperately, and Abbey burst out laughing. ‘How many did you give her?’

‘Three. Don’t worry, that’s it now. I said my nan made them. She said “how lovely” but then looked at me like I couldn’t afford Waitrose ones or something, so I felt like giving her more.’

‘DON’T!’
I said, as loudly as you’d imagine. I made an apologetic face to the dozen or so people who turned to stare at us. Sarah carried on.

‘Christ, Abbey.’ I whispered. ‘I’m all for free spirits, so long as there are sensible limits in place. There need to be
rules
for free spirits.’

‘It also means the world that not only do we have some of our newer friends here – friends we made as a couple – but that there are people here who’ve been part of our lives for considerably longer …’

That was me. Sarah was talking about me. I felt my face flush.

‘… like our families,’

Oh.

‘And others.’

She glanced over, gave me a half-smile, long enough to mean it but short enough not to be disrespectful to Gary.

‘Often in life, we move on. It’s natural. But you can’t delete a real friend.’

Someone in the crowd said ‘aw’.

‘And on that note, over to my fiancé!’

Everyone started clapping. I took my chance to whisper, ‘We
could go now, we should go now’, but Dev said, ‘Speeches are the best bit!’ and stayed put.

The clapping petered out, and there were more good-natured chuckles, as Gary was nowhere to be seen. Oh,
fuck
. Sarah stepped back to the centre of the room.

‘Er, I’ll do that again! Over to my fiancé!’

More chuckles. But still no Gary.

Then, from someone at the back: ‘Gary! You’re on!’

Gary emerged carrying a small plate stacked with food. It was like he was trying to play Jenga with it.

‘Fooood!’ he said. ‘Dig in! Dig in! Food is, yes, lots of it.’

He put the plate down on the table next to him, and then picked it up again.

‘So! Absolutely. Let me see.’

He tried to get his piece of paper out of his pocket but seemed unwilling to put his plate down.

I looked at Abbey. She was watching, open-mouthed, wide-eyed, loving it.

‘So!’ he said, again, trying to unfold the paper, putting his plate down, failing to unfold it again, picking his plate up, abandoning the paper, and saying instead, ‘I’ll just speak from the heart.’

This is not good. This is
not good
.

‘Friends!’ he started. ‘Are like flowers!’

That same woman said ‘aw’ again.

‘You must water flowers! But also give them sunshine!’

I am not overusing the exclamation marks here. He was doing a lot of exclaiming.

‘You are our flowers! And we are watering you.’

‘Here, here!’ yelled a bawdy man, raising his pint glass. His wife shushed him and made him put his hand down again.

‘Ahaha!’ said Gary. ‘Here, here, indeed. Here … here, there and everywhere. Are friends!’

He seemed finished. One lady, who seemed to think this was some kind of haiku, attempted to start the applause. But Gary was far from finished.

‘He’s quite poetic, Gary. Isn’t he?’ whispered Dev, as I stared, blankly, ahead of me.

Abbey kept nudging me. I could feel her shaking. I looked around the room. Most people seemed confused. One or two seemed to be getting really into it. I caught sight of Sarah, studying her feet, her hand covering her eyes.

And then I saw Anna.

Anna was grinning and clicking her fingers, trying to find the rhythm in Gary’s words.

‘It might be time to go,’ I said, snapping out of it.

‘This is all very unusual,’ said Dev.

Abbey wiped the tears from her eyes.

We snuck away, as Gary moved on to reason two of six of why he chose the Lexus over the Porsche Cayenne.

‘What just happened?’ asked Dev, as Abbey broke down into fits outside. ‘What just happened there?’

‘Jason, you don’t need those people,’ said Abbey, calming down. ‘You’ve got nothing to prove to them. I don’t know why you were so nervous. When I walked in, I thought, These?
These
are the people he’s scared of? Who
cares
what they think?’

‘We could literally go to prison, Abbey,’ I said, but as I looked at her, there was that glint of cheekiness, of impishness, the life-affirming, soul-enhancing
who-cares?
of it all, and though I wanted to be stern and prim and teacherly, I just couldn’t anymore. She caught the faintest glimpse of a smirk.

And that was when she really lost it. Howlingly, tearfully lost it.

And that was when I gave up and let the laughter in, too.

I laughed, because laughing was so much easier than crying, and out it all came, all the emotion, the turmoil, the nerves, the anger, the loneliness, the despair, the sweet relief that it was over.

And when the laughter subsided, and we collapsed on a bench, drained and in pain, tears dried on our cheeks, Dev held out the disposable at arm’s length and said, ‘Smile!’

Only an hour later, with guilt still many miles away, did I think to look at my phone. I’d had an email.

‘This could be the chance!’ said Abbey, a little later still, at the coach station. ‘You’re narrowing down the odds! Achieving your ambition!’

‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘Maybe.’

‘Just got to get me some now!’