I Heart London (32 page)

‘I just don’t want you to regret it, that’s all,’ I said, remembering what James had said to me. Alex didn’t respond, so I switched to savoury with a lump of cheese to keep my mouth busy. Delicious, delicious cheese. ‘I don’t want you to look back and regret anything about our wedding.’

‘Not gonna happen.’ His face recovered its soft smile. ‘Unless Jenny and Craig really do get together, and then I’m going to feel horribly responsible.’

‘Not going to happen.’ I couldn’t even bear to imagine it. Instead, I flopped back down onto my back and smiled sideways at him. ‘Thank you for taking me to the zoo. I loved it.’

‘You’re very welcome,’ he said, feeding me small chunks of bread. ‘It was the zoo or an open-top bus ride, and actually, given your fucked-up foot, maybe the bus would have been better. But I know you like zoos and shit, so. You know.’

I did also like open-top bus rides, but I kept this to myself. Besides, I definitely preferred zoos.

‘London zoo is the best.’ I said. ‘I used to come here all the time when I was little. My dad brought me every half-term.’

‘Your mom didn’t come?’

‘My mother does not care for the zoo,’ I replied. ‘If you can imagine that.’

‘I can,’ he said with a laugh. ‘I like your folks. I can see where you get it all from now.’

‘That’s such an insult,’ I said, even though really it gave me a kick to see Alex fit into my family like the perfect jigsaw piece. Mark had been a piece of the furniture, always around and so familiar, but he had never really slotted in. His colours clashed; you could always feel that he was there. I couldn’t imagine him and my dad splitting a spliff in the shed after hours. Not that I liked to imagine my dad with a spliff at all, but that was beside the point.

‘Your dad showed me a bunch of photographs from when you were a kid yesterday,’ he said. ‘You do know you were adorable, right?’

‘Yes I do, and I don’t want to know what he showed you,’ I said, burying my face in the blanket, only able to imagine what horrors he had dragged out of the family vaults. ‘Move on. Next subject. Skip.’

‘I don’t know what your problem is,’ he said, laughing loudly. ‘I thought you made a very cute Spider-Man.’

‘I was seven − it was phase,’ I almost shouted. When I got home, my dad was dead. ‘I wore that costume every day for months.’

‘And I have seen the photographic evidence to back up that fact,’ Alex agreed. ‘Seriously, though – super-cute. Almost as cute as Grace.’

I tried not to be jealous of a baby, but it was hard.

‘You’re a fan?’ I asked.

‘I’m pro-babies in general,’ he said. ‘But yeah, she’s pretty cute. I saw her at Tim’s place for a little while yesterday when I was picking up the picnic basket. He is not a man handling fatherhood well. I had to change her.’

‘And how do you know how to change a baby?’ I asked, not sure how I wanted him to answer. ‘Is there something you want to tell me?’

‘Ha-ha. I’m not Craig.’ Alex kicked off his Converse and rolled over onto his back beside me. ‘I used to change my brother when he was a baby. And I did some babysitting when I was a teenager.’

‘How new man of you. Very Athena poster.’ I couldn’t pretend the mental image of Alex up to his elbows in talcum powder didn’t hit like a kick straight to the ovaries, but it was also slightly terrifying. ‘So if the band goes down the tubes, I can hire you out as a nanny?’

‘At the very least, I can be a house husband while you go out media moguling,’ he said. ‘The Wendi Deng to your Rupert Murdoch.’

‘You’ll look nice in a Chanel suit,’ I responded quickly.

We lay on the blanket quietly for a few moments, holding hands and looking up at the clouds. I thought about the number of times I’d done the same thing with Louisa, without the hand-holding mostly; but the number of times we’d lain on our backs staring at the clouds and trying to tell our fortunes. I felt horrible about what had happened the day before. I wanted to call her. I wanted to cry. I wanted her to tell me she forgave me and that she’d be there on Saturday with bells on. And if not bells, Jimmy Choos and a Notte by Marchesa dress.

‘Angela.’ Alex was the first to break the peace. ‘You do want kids, right?’

‘Not for dinner.’ My name was Angela Clark, I tell jokes when I am nervous. Bad ones. Preferably puns where possible.

‘Seriously. I know we’ve never talked about it, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately.’

He’d been thinking about it a lot lately.

‘And you weren’t super into hanging out with Grace on Sunday.’ He picked up some momentum and carried on talking in spite of, or because of, my silence. ‘It’s probably something we should have talked about before. If you’re not into it. Because I − well, I really am.’

‘I’m not not into it.’ I fumbled with the most grammatically incorrect sentence that had ever spilled from my lips. ‘It’s just not at the top of my list right now.’

‘But you do want kids?’ he asked.

I really wanted him to take off those sunglasses. It wasn’t fair that he should have armour when I didn’t.

‘I’ve never thought I wouldn’t have kids,’ I explained, trying to work out how I felt while I spoke. ‘But I’ve never been the girl with a timeline. I’ve never been the girl with the plan. That was always Louisa. I just went along from one thing to the next. But when I think about life now, with you, in the future, yes. There are kids.’

Alex didn’t smile. He didn’t frown. He didn’t really do anything.

‘If I were to push you on a timeline, when do you think you’d be ready to think about it?’

‘Where is this coming from?’ I sat up and took the sunglasses off his face. ‘Has my mother been brainwashing you? Has something happened?’

‘No.’ He looked away. Something had totally happened. ‘I’ve just been thinking about the future. Weddings do that, you know? And you’re almost thirty, I’m almost thirty-one. After this album I’m gonna have a little bit of time off maybe, and once you’ve got the magazine up and running, don’t you think it would be a good time to think about it?’

‘What’s there to think about?’ I was starting to feel flustered. One minute I thought I was dragging him down the aisle, and now he was carting me off to the maternity ward. ‘We carry on as normal, one day I eat a bad curry, puke, and the next thing you know, we’re knocked-up. It’s really as easy at that. According to everyone I ever went to school with.’

‘You’re hilarious.’ He sat up, took back his sunglasses and dropped them into the picnic basket. I noticed we hadn’t popped the champagne yet and this was not a conversation I wished to have sober, so I took matters into my own hands. ‘There would be heaps to think about,’ he continued. ‘We’d have to move. We’d have to get better health insurance. I don’t know, maybe we’d even think about having the kid over here?’

‘Now I know my mother has been brainwashing you,’ I said, struggling with the metal cover on the cork. Never had I wanted a drink more in my life. ‘Seriously, if you don’t tell me what’s brought this on, I’m going to crack this bottle over your head.’

Alex utched away from me slightly and took hold of the two champagne glasses. If it came to a fight, I was worried he would break them and try to glass me. Much more manageable than bludgeoning someone to death with a champagne bottle. He was wily.

‘Don’t freak out, because I’ve been thinking about this for a while, before I found this out, but I know if I don’t tell you, you’ll find out and make a way bigger deal of this than it is because I’m really, really not interested.’ He took a deep breath and gripped the glasses a little tighter. ‘My friend Steven is still pretty good friends with the gang in Paris, and he mentioned that Solene is pregnant.’

The champagne cork popped and fizzy white bubbles spurted all over my hands.

‘Congratulations, Solene,’ I said flatly and swigged straight from the bottle. So Alex’s Parisian ex was up the stick and suddenly he wanted me barefoot and pregnant and relocated to London? Of course the two things weren’t related.

‘Don’t.’ Alex waited for me to finish drinking. And waited. And waited. And eventually took the bottle from me. ‘You shouldn’t be drinking on those painkillers.’

‘You shouldn’t be talking shit about us having a baby just because your ex is knocked-up,’ I retaliated. ‘Is that what this is all about?’

‘No.’ He put the glasses down and took his own glug from the bottle. I knew I wasn’t picnic basket people. ‘You know we have to talk about these things before we get married. It’s just a coincidence.’

‘I know you’ve never mentioned it before.’ I was furious. And slightly woozy. ‘Is that what all of this is about? Is this why you were so keen to go along with the wedding in the first place? Trying to beat her down the aisle?’

‘She’s already married,’ he said quietly.

‘Well, fuck a duck.’ My voice was far too loud for my choice of words. ‘I’m sorry you’re coming in second. Maybe you should have married her in the first place. Oh wait − she said no.’

‘Angela, you’re overreacting.’ Alex placed the champagne bottle way out of my reach. ‘All I wanted to do was have a conversation about having kids. It’s something important to me. You’re the one who keeps wanting to have the family-oriented deep and meaningfuls.’

‘Yeah, about why you’re being such a creepy weirdo about not wanting your parents at our wedding.’ I really wanted that champagne. ‘Not about trying to get knocked-up so I can win in some pissing contest against my ex.’

‘OK, I’m not talking about this.’ He lay back down and closed his eyes. ‘This isn’t happening.’

‘I don’t know why you even told me,’ I said, barely able to form words, my lip was sticking out so far. ‘You couldn’t have just let me think you were on some weird broody-boy kick?’

‘Remember that whole thing where we promised to tell each other everything?’ Alex snapped from across the blanket. ‘Full disclosure?’

‘Yeah, but that doesn’t count when it’s stuff that would just piss off the other one,’ I ranted. ‘Like, I didn’t tell you when Mark tried to kiss me because there was no point.’

Oops. I cut myself off abruptly. The most important part of not telling the other person things that would hurt them was the not telling them later. Otherwise it tended to be ever so slightly more hurtful than it would be in the first place.

Alex didn’t say anything. I waited as long as I could for him to speak, for him to get up and walk away, for him to do something, anything. But he didn’t.

‘Alex?’

‘He tried to kiss you?’

‘Yes.’ My voice was considerably quieter than it had been five minutes ago. ‘But I didn’t let him. I hit him with my handbag.’

‘Sounds about right.’ His voice was completely level. ‘And was this before or after you invited him to the wedding?’

‘Before?’

‘Right.’

Another minute of silence.

‘So I figure you leave all your Solene shit here and I do the same with your ex, OK?’ he said, still flat on his back. Still not looking at me.

‘That seems fair,’ I agreed, trying to stealthily grab the rest of the half-eaten cookie. I didn’t actually think it was fair, but wasn’t marriage all about compromise? Alex getting on my case about spurting out a baby just because his ex had spawned was hardly the same as me accidentally getting into a lip-lock against my will.

But the ability to move on after an argument was another important factor in a successful relationship, so I let him sulk in silence for a few minutes before cutting off a piece of baguette, smothering it in blue cheese and handing it across the blanket. Alex took it and traded me the champagne bottle and all was right with the world again. Sort of.

Alex dropped me off at Louisa’s place later that evening, empty picnic basket in my arms and a huge apology in my pocket. The rest of the afternoon had been a little strained, but we’d made our peace. I hadn’t mentioned Solene and he hadn’t mentioned my inability not to cock things up, and it ended up being a very nice afternoon, all in all. Much nicer than the next hour was likely to be, anyway.

Tim answered the door with his usual trepidation and pointed me towards the back garden, hovering around the door and then racing upstairs to avoid the fallout. I tiptoed through the toy-strewn kitchen and out into the garden, wondering whether or not I should have kept the bottle of champagne with me as a weapon.

‘Hey.’ I raised a cautious hand and waved. Louisa raised a glass of wine instead and ignored me. Damnit, she had a bottle! I only had my bag, although that had proved to be a pretty handy weapon to date. ‘Do you hate me?’

‘Yes,’ she replied, rocking Grace’s cradle with her foot. She was fast asleep on the floor, covered in soft, pink blankets. I peered inside the cradle and tried to imagine having one of my own. Couldn’t do it.

‘Can I sit down anyway?’ I asked.

‘Do you need to ask Jenny’s permission first?’ she replied curtly.

‘Touché,’ I answered, pulling out one of the metal chairs and putting my bum down before I caused any more trouble. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Yeah, that’s what I hear.’ She leaned around the table to look at my ankle. ‘Jenny said you knackered your foot up pretty well.’

‘You spoke to Jenny?’ I had to admit it was a surprise. Sure, Jenny had said she was sorry for what she’d said to Louisa, but I had assumed I’d have to pull some sort of romcom-worthy stunt, sending them both texts asking them to meet me in my mum’s bathroom before locking them in there until they had a deep and meaningful talk and realized they both wanted the best for me.

‘She came by earlier,’ Louisa nodded. ‘We talked it out. There was hugging. She cried. The whole thing was very awkward.’

‘I can imagine,’ I gasped. Hugging? Crying? Oh my. ‘I’m so sorry.’

‘It wasn’t as horrible as it could have been,’ she admitted, passing me the wine. Apparently I just drank right out of the bottle now. But just a sip. ‘I don’t know how you put up with her day in and day out, but her heart’s in the right place.’

I nodded. The irony of the fact that I was sitting in front of a baby drinking out of a bottle was not lost on me.

‘And she wants Saturday to go off without a hitch. Pardon my pun.’

‘I’m not worried about her side of things.’ I put the bottle down and wiped my hand with my mouth. ‘Once Jenny has decided something, it happens. Doesn’t matter whether it’s a good idea or a bad one, as you’ve probably noticed − it just happens. I’m more concerned that I’m the one messing up.’