In the hallway, I reached out to touch my favourite photo of us, taken at Emelie’s birthday the year before. Simon was laughing at something Matthew had said and I had my arms linked around his neck, my face leaning into his shoulder. He looked handsome, I didn’t look fat and we were happy. The perfect picture. I could feel the sobs building in my chest when I heard scuffling at the front door. Turning on the lights, I peered through the glass. It was Simon. I waited a couple of seconds, my mind completely empty, before I flipped the lock and swung the door open.
His left eye was already turning purple and, although someone had tried to clean him up, his nose was bloody and his lip was bust. Between his messed-up face and my seductive ensemble, this was so far removed from the perfect picture, I could have smiled. Could have.
‘The lock needs some WD-40 or something,’ I muttered, one hand holding up my shorts.
‘I’m sorry,’ Simon was still hovering outside the door.
‘Not your fault,’ I shrugged. ‘It’s been sticky for ages.’
‘No, I’m sorry,’ he said again.
I moved away from the door to let him in, my back pressed against the wall of photos. He paused right in front of me and opened his mouth to say something before changing his mind.
‘Simon?’
He stopped, turned around and looked me up and down.
‘Is that my T-shirt?’ he asked.
‘Yeah,’ I pulled at the frayed hem. ‘It’s comfy to sleep in.’
‘I thought you’d thrown it out,’ he replied.
Feeling my bottom lip start to tremble, I shook my head. I squeezed my toes and feigned a yawn so I could push back the tears.
‘Right,’ he said, his hands deep in his pockets.
I nodded. He just stood there, battered, bruised, miserable and staring at the shoes I’d never seen before. I knew I had to say something and say it now. By the morning, it would be over. Relationships like ours always died quietly in the night; we weren’t ones for violent, bloody deaths played out in public. Far too English for that. But my tongue was tied up with too many questions and my heart was already playing dead. Swallowing hard, I opened my mouth, no idea what was going to come out.
‘New shoes?’
For a moment, I really didn’t know what was happening, I was still staring at Simon’s shoes as they came over and then his arms were around me, his hot, damp face on mine. It wasn’t until I felt a picture frame digging into my shoulder blade that I realized we were kissing, that his hands were running up and down my back and then tangling themselves in my hair and back down again.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said into my hair. ‘I’m so sorry.’
Instinctively, my arms went up around his neck and my lips took his kisses on autopilot, but the sharp corner of the photo was still cutting into my back. It was only when he moved the kisses from my mouth down to my throat that I realized my eyes were open and my mind was completely quiet. What was wrong? This was the plan. Simon paused and looked up at me with a new expression on his face, half confused and half desperate to get his end away. I’d seen them both independently of each other enough times over the last five years but this was a new combo.
‘Rach?’ he panted. His concern was reasonable: firstly, kissing my neck was the surefire way to get into my pants, as he well knew; and secondly, I’d wanted this so badly for so long, I ought to be responding at least. Something was just off. ‘Rach, honest, I’m sorry.’
‘Stop. You can stop saying that,’ said a voice that sounded like mine. If he apologized, that meant he had something to apologize for and I couldn’t deal with that right now.
‘OK.’ He reached around my neck and scooped my hair over one shoulder, a gesture so familiar my stomach dropped through the floor. ‘OK.’
I nodded and closed my eyes when he leaned in to kiss me again. I kissed him back, trying not to hurt his split lip. But he didn’t care about his split lip. For the first time in a month, he wanted me, so I let him turn me towards the bedroom door, push me onto the bed and I felt the comfortable weight of his body on top of me. I didn’t need to think, I didn’t need to act, his hands started on their regular route around my body, lips making their way across my collarbone, my left leg curling up around his waist. I’d missed this so much. I’d missed him so much. My body should be screaming for him, not just reacting. It was just weird because it had been so long, that was all. And so I ignored the little voice in my head, intent on chanting ‘not the one, not the one, not the one’ over and over and over. Instead I closed my eyes and began playing my part. I had him back. And that was what I wanted. He was what I wanted. And he was mine again.
The next morning came like any other, the sun streaming in through the too-sheer curtains on the bedroom window that I never bought blackout curtains for, because Simon liked to wake up to natural light. And, as though he’d never been away, there he was beside me, that natural light illuminating his dark blond hair until it was almost golden. I lay on my side, a few inches away from him, just watching him sleep. Last night had been strange, I hadn’t been able to quite shake off the feeling that we should have talked before Simon jumped back into my bed, but this morning everything felt right. We were back on track. Whatever madness he’d been suffering, he was over it.
I turned onto my back, trying not to wake him and smiled to myself while I thought about my daily chores. Perhaps I could let myself off the list today: the post could wait at the post office until Monday and I’d get Matthew’s birthday card tomorrow. But I did need to go to the supermarket – we were out of everything. I slid off the bed, not budging the mattress, and grabbed last night’s jeans and tank top that were still lying in a sad puddle on the floor. I got dressed in the hallway, grabbing my phone, cash card, keys and a cardigan on my way out through the door, pausing just for a second to straighten the frame we’d dislodged the night before. Nothing was really aligned, but to see it there, cockeyed and nudging the next photo, made me come over all OCD. I put it back where it had been before but it still didn’t look right. Instead of fannying around and making too much noise, I took it down and propped it against the wall, making a mental note in my temporary to-do list to put it back up later on. After breakfast. After whatever Simon wanted to do today. I’d rewrite the list for tomorrow. OCD assuaged.
It was super-early for a Saturday and London was mostly still asleep, but buses bustled by and weekend workers walked on, heads down, earphones in. I dabbed on lip balm, tenderly touched my chafed chin and wrapped my hair around itself into a relatively controlled knot on the back of my head as I wandered down the street. I really had to get it cut; I really had far too much hair for just one person. But Simon liked it long. And I was used to it. Even if Dan did call me Cousin It whenever I wore it down on set.
I couldn’t believe Paul had punched Simon. It was the nicest thing he’d ever done for me. Totally made up for the time he’d cut the hair of every single one of my My Little Ponies. Well, maybe not all of them. I should call him and let him know we’d worked things out, otherwise it was going to be incredibly awkward at my dad’s wedding in a couple of weeks. Right now, I needed to think about getting pastries, coffee and cream. And probably some stain remover to try and get the blood out of Simon’s shirt. And they say romance is dead.
The supermarket seemed strangely busy, full of people on their way to work, buying tuna sandwiches for their lunch break, early risers doing their shopping, and more than one creased-looking gentleman with a terribly self-satisfied expression on his face.
‘All right?’ Something reeking of YSL Kouros nodded at me over the croissants. ‘Heavy night?’
‘Something like that,’ I said, without eye contact. Didn’t he realize he was in London? We didn’t talk to strangers. We didn’t even talk to our neighbours for the first five years unless it was to complain about the noise or errant pet shitting in our garden.
‘Yeah, trick is to get out before the ‘wake-up,’ he said, filling up a plastic bag with c
innamon Danishes. ‘But I always leave a note. You’ve got to leave a note. Just out of order not to.’
‘Right,’ I gave him a tight smile and backed away slowly towards the queue for the till.
And he followed.
‘Always felt bad for girls,’ he went on. ‘You know, you see a bloke on the walk of shame and everyone thinks, “Get in there, son!” but you see a girl walking down the street at six a.m. on a Saturday in last night’s clothes and everyone just thinks “slag”.’
‘Yeah,’ I said, flicking through the items in my basket for a moment before I realized what he’d said. ‘Sorry, what?’
‘Not me though,’ Kouros Man flung out his hands, spilling his already opened can of Red Bull. ‘I do not judge. And it’s not like you’ve got your skirt up your arse and tits hanging out like some of them, is it? Good outfit.’
Brilliant. Not only was this charmer still drunk, he thought we were one-night-stand kindred spirits.
‘You should probably give me your number, you know, in case you ever need company.’ The stale stench of whatever he’d been drinking/spilling down himself last night combined with the overabundance of intense aftershave came closer, making me gag.
‘I have a boyfriend,’ I said quickly, holding the basket between us. ‘So no.’
‘Right, course you do,’ he replied, fingering a packet of Durex for a moment before adding it to his booty. Double gag. I turned my back, hoping he would just go away, but I could still smell him. I had a feeling it would be a lingering odour. Thank god Simon had come to his senses. That was the first man in five years to ask for my number and I really didn’t feel like he was a keeper.
I paid for my breakfast bounty and vamoosed back out onto the street, so enthralled by my iPhone that I couldn’t even hear Kouros Man muttering loudly after me. Muttering something that sounded suspiciously like ‘bitch’. No, he didn’t judge.
August never guaranteed good weather in London, but that morning was beautiful. Bright, cool sunshine and a clear blue sky. I bounced back along Upper Street, scanning text messages from Matthew and Em. They wouldn’t appreciate a blow-by-blow phone call pre-seven a.m., so I tapped out an ‘everything’s fine’ text, deleted the torrent of abuse aimed at Simon, and kept the effusive messages of love. Never hurt to have them around.
I locked my phone and slipped it into my back pocket. I wasn’t particularly good at expressing emotion and I had never been particularly free and easy with the ‘L’ word. I loved my parents, I loved my brother, I loved Matthew, Emelie, Simon, Galaxy chocolate, Alexander Skarsgard and Topshop Baxter Jeans. And I really, really loved my flat. I’d lived in a wild assortment of shitty bedsits and tolerable house-shares since university but this, our beautiful two-bedroom first-floor flat, snagged for a song in the middle of the recession, was my home. The last eighteen months had been spent feathering our nest. Mostly with piles of clothes I never got around to ironing, but still. Home. I climbed the five steps up to the royal blue door and paused for a moment. I was nervous. What if Simon was awake? Maybe I should have attempted to make myself look half decent before I left. What was I going to say to him? Maybe we could just pretend last night never happened.
‘At least he won’t be wearing Kouros,’ I said to myself, and sort of to a passing dog walker, as I stuck my keys in the lock.
The flat was still quiet when I passed through the door and I slipped off my shoes so as not to wake Simon. OK, I would brush my teeth, make coffee and then whatever would happen, would happen. Setting breakfast down on the kitchen countertop, I made a beeline for the bathroom. Whatever would happen would happen. And so what? I thought as I splashed my face with cold water. One awkward conversation and then back on the road to marriage, babies and bliss. Everyone had bumps in the road; everyone had their little moments of madness. What relationship was perfect? I grabbed my toothbrush and reminded myself that the happily-ever-after myth was just that. A myth. Hmm, no toothpaste. Automatically, I reached into the cabinet beside the sink for a new tube. Real relationships were difficult and required work. They needed understanding and compromise. You couldn’t just run away when things got tough, you had to …
The toothpaste.
There wasn’t a new tube of toothpaste in the cabinet beside the sink because I’d started a new tube of toothpaste the day before. But it wasn’t in its holder. And neither was Simon’s toothbrush. And his razor was gone. Still clutching my toothbrush, I padded back through to the hallway and stopped outside the bedroom door. Even though I already knew what I was going to find, I just couldn’t open it. I felt sick. And angry. And stupid. I pushed the door open with my big toe and peered inside. At the empty bed. I stepped backwards and felt something hard and cold under my foot, followed by something sharp, stinging and hot. The photo from Emelie’s birthday. Simon must have knocked it over on his way out. In his rush.
Toothbrush in one hand, phone in the other, I slid down the wall, knocking every other photo onto the floor on my way down, and watching my blood trickle out onto the laminate flooring Simon had so lovingly laid, the day after last year’s FA Cup final. Simon always said there was no DIY during football season.
I slid the lock off my phone and pressed the last call button.
‘Matthew?’ I said quietly, trying not to flex my toes. ‘He took my toothpaste.’
CHAPTER FOUR
‘I’m going to kill him,’
I nodded.
‘I mean, I’m going to destroy him. Hold him down, punch him in the face and then rip off each limb before beating his face in with the soggy ends.’
‘’K,’ I agreed.
‘And then I’m going to—’
‘Emelie,’ Matthew interrupted, reaching down to scoop me up from the floor. ‘You’re not helping.’
I leaned into my friend and squeezed my toothbrush in one hand, my phone in the other.
‘Want to give me that now?’ he asked, holding out his hand. I gave him my phone.
‘And the toothbrush?’
I reluctantly passed it over.
Matthew and Emelie had crossed London in record time and made it to my door before I’d even moved. I had called Matthew, he had called Emelie and she had called Domino’s but they weren’t delivering yet. But the thought was there. I’d given them the abridged version of what had happened since I’d got in the cab, punctuated by sniffling, sobbing and general self-pity and, in turn, they’d filled me in on what had happened at their end which basically consisted of Paul knocking Simon on his arse, Matthew watching with admiration and Emelie landing a kick to the crotch while calling him something terrible in French that didn’t really translate. When the police were called, my three musketeers had scarpered to the nearest McDonald’s and Simon had crawled into a cab. Which was where my story took over.
‘It never occurred to me that he would come here,’ Matthew said, stroking my hair as I sat on the sofa. ‘We were going to come over but you didn’t answer the phone so I assumed you were asleep. You always reply if you’re not asleep.’
‘I did sleep,’ I said. ‘I’ll be all right.’
‘I know you will,’ he said. ‘Of course you will be. You’re well rid of that arsehole.’
Was I rid of him? Surely he was the one who had got rid of me? And I wasn’t an arsehole. I didn’t think.
‘You’re so going to be all right.’ Em was brewing enough tea to quench the thirst of Bristol. ‘How about a bath? A bath might feel good.’
‘I don’t know.’ How did someone not know whether or not they wanted a bath? Oh good, I’d gone mad.
‘Well, whatever you want to do, just tell us.’ Matthew kissed the top of my head and looked at me expectantly. ‘Or, you know, sit there in silence and we’ll just talk at you. Either way.’
The clock on the DVD player said it was 10.00 a.m. The Mad Men DVD has gone from the top of the DVD player. How could it only be 10.00 a.m.? Your life wasn’t allowed to go down the shitter before noon on a Saturday, surely. Simon must have
taken the Mad Men DVD. I should get changed. I actually should have a bath. But a bath would make my foot hurt. I cut my foot. And what was I going to get changed into? Pyjamas would be too pathetic; clothes seemed too optimistic. Maybe I could go back to sleep. It was still early. If this was a normal Saturday and I hadn’t just been completely screwed over by the person I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with, I’d probably still be in bed.
‘Rachel, are you thinking things and not saying them out loud?’ Matthew asked.
Oh, I was.
‘He’s taken the Mad Men DVDs,’ I said eventually. My voice sounded thick and tragic.
‘Had you finished watching them?’ he asked.
I shook my head.
‘Fils de pute,’ Emelie breathed. ‘It’s one thing to take a girl’s toothpaste, it’s another to take her Don Draper—’
‘Right, bath first,’ he said, giving Emelie the nod. She immediately stopped refilling the kettle and hotfooted it into the bathroom. Taps turning, water running, Emelie swearing when she scalded herself on our hot tap just as she always did. ‘OK?’
I really couldn’t do much more than nod. It was like I was asleep with my eyes open. Somewhere between two and twenty minutes passed before Emelie called that the bath was ready. Matthew helped me up and gave me a gentle push towards the bathroom.