The First Husband (23 page)

And thankfully, as we walked into my new flat together—each carrying a suitcase—I didn’t have to try so hard anymore to believe it. It was, hands down, the single most charming apartment I’d ever seen. It looked like a carriage house, with large windows and tall, white pillars, an old-fashioned kitchen (complete with a farmer’s sink), and rustic wood furniture running through the hallways and leading up a tiny staircase to the loveliest bedroom. The river just outside every window, endless, and glowing.

“Quite the digs they’ve handed you here,” Thomas said, as we stood by the living room windows, filling out the paperwork he needed completed.

“It’s like a ready-made life,” he said.

I looked up at him, that phrase catching me.
A ready-made life.

Then I forced a smile. And followed his eyes outside. First toward the river, then toward what was across it: Battersea. My supposed-to-be home was over there, somewhere, the one I’d picked out for Nick and me. And there I was—able to look straight at it, from a short distance. Just a few months later than planned. Didn’t that mean something? That, after everything, this was where I was supposed to be?

I quickly signed along the necessary
X’
s.

“You should count yourself as lucky. I’ve seen some of the other places they put the newbies to stay,” Thomas said. “You must be good at writing about dead people.”

“Very,” I heard someone say.

We turned to find Peter in the kitchen doorway, holding a bottle of Dom Perignon and two champagne flutes.

“Peter!” I said. “How did you get in here?”

“I hid in the kitchen pantry,” he said. “A woman living alone? You really should check all doors upon entering.”

I ran over to him, giving him a hug. And holding on, probably for a little too long. Okay, definitely for too long, Peter utilizing the expensive champagne bottle to separate us.

“Hold it together, my love,” he said.

“I just can’t believe it’s you,” I said. “What are you even doing here?”

“I told you they were sending me over here for a spell. So here I am to greet you . . .” he said. “Midspell.”

I gave him a big smile. “I’m so glad to see you,” I said. “I’m just so, so glad.”

As I went in for another hug, tears springing to my eyes, he handed me my champagne flute.

“I thought we just decided you were going to hold it together,” he said. “Let’s go ahead and stick to the plan.”

 

That night, wine gift in hand, Peter and I went to a cocktail party in South Kensington at the house of my new boss, Melinda Beckett Martin.

Peter had told me only a few details about Melinda, which was why I wasn’t sure what to expect upon meeting her. She was
just
your typical, major success: in her midthirties, married to an Oxford professor, and
an integral part of Beckett Media
, as Peter explained, having run television programming for the company in Australia and Asia, and sending profits through the roof in both places.

But even if Peter had provided all possible details about Melinda, I’m not sure it would have adequately prepared me for what was waiting when we approached her beautiful, doublefronted Victorian home. When the door opened, Melinda herself was standing there to greet us. I reached out to hand her the bottle of wine that we’d brought.

This was my first mistake. I narrowly avoided jamming her right in the boobs with it.

I looked up—all the way up—to see a six-foot-five-inch woman, dressed in a fashionable burnt orange polka-dot skirt and white ballet slippers. Wearing just about the warmest smile I’d ever seen.

“Mr. Shepherd!” she said to Peter, in a ravishing Australian accent. “Welcome! Welcome!”

She was carrying a tray of mixed hors d’oeuvres, which she immediately moved out of the way in order to lean down and double-cheek kiss him.

Then she turned to me.

“And you must be the divine Ms. Adams that I’ve heard so much about?”

“That would be me,” I said. “It is nice to meet . . .”

But before I could even say
you,
she was double-kissing me too and wrapping her arm around my shoulder, like we were the oldest of friends.

“We have so much to talk about,” she said.

And then she was leading us through a central tiled hall into her home—a
lived-in
home, to use a Britishism: decorated with an enormous farmer’s table, and photographs everywhere (wedding photos and family photos, photos of her husband and her traveling, photos from their respective childhoods), and the type of warm, playful furniture and artwork that made a home feel filled with people and music and laughter, even when it wasn’t.

Now it was filled to the brim with all three. As Peter situated himself with an old friend of his from university, right by the open bar, Melinda took me around and introduced me to seemingly every single person there: my future colleagues and their drunk significant others; Melinda’s neighbors and favorite friends; her
future
nanny.

She kept feeding me the delicious appetizers from her tray as we moved along through the crowd. And by the time we curled into two purple velvet chairs in the corner of the living room, the model-tall Melinda managing to do so far more gracefully than me—curling her lanky body beneath her, wrapping her hand behind her neck in rest position—I kind of loved her a little.

“So,” she said, “let me start by saying thank you for that.”

“For what?” I said.

“Saving me from having to think about what on earth to talk to all those people about, all on my own,” she said. Then she leaned in closer, and gave me a wink. “I dread cocktail parties.”

“I’m with you,” I said.

“Well, we will begin with the work stuff tomorrow, but I just wanted to welcome you into the fold officially,” she said. “I hear my cousin Caleb has been less than welcoming, officially or otherwise.”

I shook my head. “No, I wouldn’t say that,” I said. “I just . . . haven’t spoken to him yet.”

“Well, with any luck, we’ll figure out how to keep it that way for a while,” she said. “He is one of those people who thinks he has all the answers. So just to piss him off, I send him e-mails marked urgent at least twice a day, asking him impossible questions, like, what is the price of a quart of milk in Adyar, India?”

I started to laugh, just as someone called Melinda’s name.

“The problem is,” she said, “he always knows the answer. What is worse than that?”

“Very little,” I said.

She pointed at the name-caller to give her a minute. And gave me a kind look.

“I’m so sorry to leave you. But I think I have to put out a fire in the southwest corner.” She circled her hands around her mouth, making a clock. “Three o’clock.”

I turned to see a couple of some sort looking desperately awkward trying to talk to each other. Or desperately awkward standing together and not talking to each other. Their eyes on the floor.

“No, of course, of course . . .” I said. “Thank you for giving me as much time as you did.”

She stood up again, towering over me in an embarrassing way. “It’s wonderful to meet you, Annie Adams,” she said.

“You too, Melinda,” I said.

Then she handled me a final crab cake and ran off.

I watched her go, her bright polka dots moving away with her, and started to look around for Peter, to let him know I was ready to leave. But just then my phone rang, BLOCKED coming up on the caller ID.

Griffin, I thought immediately, and hopefully. We hadn’t talked since I’d left the house earlier in the week—heading first to New York, and then to London. We hadn’t talked since we had really talked. And I knew it had to come down to me, reaching out to him, if that was what I wanted. And I knew I didn’t have forever to do it. I had far less than forever if I were going to turn things around. Still, I found myself hoping. But it wasn’t Griffin on the other end.

It was Jordan.

“Are you still mad at me? ” she asked. “And, before you answer that, please note that I’ve made a list of several very
compelling
reasons why you shouldn’t be. Almost like an ode to my favorite column. That’s number one, actually. That ‘Checking Out’
is
my favorite column.” She paused. “And I’ve written more letters to the editor than anyone on earth to say so.”

I stepped out onto the balcony, where I could get some peace and quiet, the party still visible—like a silent film, before me—through the glass doors.

I sighed. “What’s the point of being mad now?” I said. “It feels like a lot of energy.”

“Really?”
she said. “That’s great news!”

“I’m glad you’re pleased.”

“You have no idea.”

“But I do reserve the right to be mad again, when I’m feeling more up to it. And less jet-lagged.”

“Reserved!” she said. “So, tell me, how is it?”

I looked at the festive party happening before me, and then turned to stare up at the starry sky above, the dry wind feeling nice against my skin.

“Unseasonably mild,” I said.

“That’s a good sign!” she said. “That’s a very good sign! And you start this week?”

“First thing tomorrow.”

I spotted Melinda through the window, which wasn’t hard to do. She was doing a little tap dance for a group of guests—a chocolate layer cake in her hands, the guests applauding wildly. Whether it was for her or for the cake wasn’t entirely clear.

“My new boss seems pretty great, actually,” I said.

“That’s the spirit!”

“Is it?”

“Yes! It’s
good,
Annie, it’s
right.
. . .” She paused. “And have you seen Nick yet? You know he’s still there.”

I almost hung up the phone, right there. “You’re fired,” I said.

“Okay, okay. I take it back,” she said. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. It doesn’t matter. You’ll call him, you won’t call him. I’m just glad it’s all coming together out there in the world.”

Through the window, I saw Melinda still tapping away, holding the cake high above her head now, moving it up and down in quick succession. Then I looked around the room at everyone else: Peter and the other editors, Melinda’s many friendly friends. The nice greetings they’d all given me.

And I couldn’t help but think of what Thomas the driver had said, just a few hours earlier, the two of us standing by my new living room window.

“It’s a ready-made life,” I said.

“Who couldn’t use a ready-made life?” Jordan said. “Nothing wrong with that, at all.”

T
he next day—more than a bit hopped up on a third cup of coffee, the jet lag having reached its full force—I found myself at my new desk in the crowded newsroom of Beckett Media’s print headquarters. I had, at most, ten square feet of cubicle real estate, but it was
good
real estate: a big-windowed corner looking out at Buckingham Gate, at the Hong Kong Association and Society, their beautiful gardens, the boats in the river beyond them.

I was trying to lay out a plan of attack for my first new column—something exciting and something new—when I gave up and turned to the window, drawn to the river, feeling content staring at it. Or maybe
content
wasn’t the right word. Maybe it was closer to lonely, which at least felt more honest.

Then I heard someone slide by my desk, giving its side a soft knock, pulling me out of my reverie. I looked up to find Melinda staring down at me in a slightly different polka-dot skirt than she’d been wearing the night before—and I do mean slightly: this one more cherry red than burnt orange, if someone were looking closely enough. Which, apparently, I was.

“Good skirt,” I said.

“Good taste!” she said. “So, what do you think of your new space? I had to move someone from Architecture to get you the corner with the views.” She paused. “That’s a bit ironic, actually, isn’t it?”

I smiled. “It’s great,” I said. “Thank you.”

“Great! So, Annie girl . . .” she said. “Does anyone call you Annie girl?”

I shrugged. “My mother, maybe,” I said. “When I was six.”

“Well, I don’t want to bring that memory back,” she said.

“Probably for the best.”

Then she tossed down—from her station, up closer to the sky—a Montblanc pen and a yellow legal pad, which, by some small miracle, I managed to catch.

“Walk with me,” she said.

We headed down the hall, Melinda moving at a rapid pace, me moving at an even more rapid one, trying to keep up with those legs.

“Well, when I finally got the last hanger-on out my door last night,” she said, “I read all of your columns over. . . .”

“All of them?”

She gently linked her arm through mine, which should have been hard to do considering our height discrepancy, but she managed it beautifully.

“Every single one, Annie,” she said. “And I can honestly say I’m a fan now. We are going to have a lot of fun with the column’s evolution. I am swimming with ideas.”