Will sneers at the food. ‘Not really, no. This is supposed to be a River Café recipe, isn’t it?’ he says, as Lucy looks worried. ‘I sort of recognize it.’ Lucy nods, as Will continues. ‘I can’t put my finger on it, but there’s something not right about it. You’ve changed the herbs, done something different, what is it?’
Lucy’s face falls, and I look at Si in exasperation, as he simply looks crestfallen.
‘Well,’ Lucy says uncertainly, ‘the thing is, I don’t usually tend to stick to recipes all that precisely any more. I’m not sure what I did differently, but I just used that recipe as a guideline, a base. You don’t like it?’
‘Put it like this,’ Will says, picking up the knife and pointing it dismissively at the food as I hold my breath. ‘Inedible would be one of the nicer things I would say about it.’
Si and I catch each other’s eyes nervously, and nobody says anything for what feels like an interminably long time, when Josh stands up and the silence that has already descended on the table grows even more fraught.
‘Enough,’ Josh says slowly, and we all turn to look at him. ‘Will, I would like you to leave.’
I would love to say that I sat there and smirked, but in fact I was so shocked at Josh saying this, doing something about this ghastly awful man, that I just sat there open-mouthed, and it didn’t take long to realize that everyone else was doing the same thing.
‘You’re not serious,’ Will says, half smiling, picking up his fork and prodding the chicken on his plate.
‘Put. That. Fork. Down.’ Josh says, and my eyes widen because I don’t think I have ever seen Josh that angry before. I didn’t know Josh could even get that angry. Portia looks as stunned as me, and Lucy and Si are both looking at their plates.
‘I welcomed you into my home as a guest, and you have spent the entire evening making me regret ever allowing you across the threshold. You have insulted my wife, my friends and me. You are not welcome here, and I want you to leave this instant.’
Finally Will seems to realize that he’s not joking. Si’s face is purple with embarrassment, and, as Will scrapes his chair back, Si stands up as well, but he can’t look any of us in the eye.
‘Fine,’ Will says, as he walks out of the room, Si scuttling behind him to get their coats. ‘I was here on sufferance anyway.’ I keep my eyes glued to the tablecloth, terrified that if he catches my eye he’ll start on me, and I really don’t think I could handle that, because this man, I swear, is vicious.
Will storms out, slamming the front door, as we all wince, fully aware that there is a child asleep upstairs, and Si hovers in the hallway apologizing to Josh. And from what I hear, Josh is telling Si that it’s not his fault, and that Si is welcome to stay, of course he is, but if he wants to leave we’ll all understand.
Of course Si, loving, lovely, needy, insecure Si, leaves. And as soon as the door quietly closes behind him and we are all just about to breathe a sigh of relief, a familiar clattering comes down the stairs.
‘Lucy.’ Ingrid towers in the doorway. ‘Why are there doors being slammed when Max is asleep.’
‘God, I’m sorry Ingrid,’ Lucy apologizes. ‘It was one of our guests, he left in a bit of a hurry.’ She pauses. ‘Ingrid,’ and I can already hear the placatory tone in her voice. ‘Would you like some supper? We’ve got masses of this chicken left over.’
‘And it’s delicious,’ I add, just in case there’s any doubt.
‘No,’ Ingrid says, scanning the room. ‘I have eaten already.’
‘You know Cath, of course,’ Lucy says, as Ingrid barely nods in my direction. ‘And this is an old friend of Josh, Portia.’ Lucy presumably wants Ingrid to feel as if she is one of us, and I’m waiting for her to invite Ingrid to join us, but thank God one nightmare guest is enough for one evening. ‘Portia, this is Ingrid, our wonderful au pair.’
Portia smiles at Ingrid, and, Christ, does this woman’s charm never cease, Ingrid actually smiles back, and I realize that in all the time Ingrid’s been here, I’ve never actually seen her smile, and if I didn’t know better I’d think Ingrid was as sweet as sugar from the beatific smile she now bestows upon Portia.
‘Is there anything we can do for you, Ingrid?’ Josh asks, and I marvel at how they both seem to tiptoe around her, when it’s their bloody house.
‘I would like some peace and quiet so I can read and Max can sleep,’ she says, turning on her heel, then turning back. ‘It was nice to meet you, Portia. I hope you all have a nice evening,’ and she goes upstairs.
‘You’re unbelievable,’ I say to Portia once she’s gone.
‘Why?’
‘You’re like one of those Indian snake charmers. You just manage to charm everyone.’
Portia laughs. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Oh, come on.’ Even Josh is laughing. ‘She’s right. First of all you were the only one who managed to charm that awful Will bloke, and then you manage to charm’ – and at this point he lowers his voice to a whisper – ‘the scary Ingrid.’
‘Is she scary?’ Portia laughs, also whispering.
‘God, yes,’ Josh whispers back. ‘Ask anyone. Ask Cath.’
Lucy’s watching us with a broad smile, and she nods at Portia, who looks at me.
‘No,’ I whisper. ‘If I’m being completely honest, I’d have to say she’s completely bloody terrifying.’
‘Speaking of which,’ Lucy says after we’ve giggled childishly at the fact that we’re sitting around a table, all of us in our thirties, and all whispering because we’re frightened of the au pair, ‘how terrifying do you find the fact that Si seems to be completely enamoured with that… that pig?’
‘I told you,’ I moan. ‘Nobody believed me when I said he was awful, but he is, isn’t he, he’s disgusting.’
Portia looks pained. ‘I didn’t think he was that bad, actually,’ and my jaw hits the floor.
‘Oh, come on,’ Josh starts laughing. ‘You’ve got to be joking.’
‘No,’ she says earnestly. ‘I know too many people like that, and all that arrogance hides tremendous insecurity. He wasted no time in telling me he’d spent the afternoon looking at company cars and that he was thinking of getting a Porsche Boxster, which I don’t believe for a second, but he thinks that makes him better than everyone else.’
‘Prick,’ Josh says, as we all nod in agreement.
‘But you know,’ Lucy says, doling out second helpings, which Josh and I eagerly accept, but Portia declines, whispering it was delicious, but she’s just too full, ‘I’m not sure that insecurity is a good-enough excuse for that sort of behaviour. We’re all insecure, and I really think he’s old enough to have discovered the reasons behind his insecurity, and do something about them.’
‘Darling,’ Josh says affectionately, ‘not everyone is a budding psychotherapist. He probably doesn’t even care what the reasons are.’
‘I bet I can tell you what the reasons are,’ Portia says suddenly. ‘At least some of them.’
‘Go on.’ I’m fascinated.
‘I watch people all the time, it’s how I do my job, and there were some obvious clues. First, he speaks in very polished tones. Too polished. If you listened closely there were some definite northern inflections, and after I’d asked him he confessed – reluctantly – that he was from Yorkshire.’
We’re all very impressed and stay silent for her to continue.
‘Before that he said his father was a bigwig at one of the City banks, and changed the subject when I asked which one. And then a while later he said that since he’s been living in London, for the last ten years, he’s been going home to his parents for the odd weekend and helping his dad with his accounts.
‘So his father clearly doesn’t work in the City. He’s probably a dentist or something, in a sleepy northern village outside Leeds, and Will thinks that in order to run with the fast crowd in London, which is what he so obviously wants to do, he has to make up a pack of lies that he thinks will impress people.’
/>
‘That’s the problem with lying,’ Lucy says. ‘You can never remember what you’ve said.’
‘You’re amazing,’ Josh says, as Portia gives a self-satisfied smile.
‘No. It’s amazing what you learn about people when you look for the right signs.’
‘But at the end of the day, even if he’s from a family who didn’t have a bean, it doesn’t give him the right to be arrogant, superior and, well, as Josh put it, a prick.’ I think about using the noun that Alison Bailey had used, but even among such good friends I can’t do it.
‘True,’ Portia says. ‘But I think he’s terrified of people discovering who he really is and where he’s really from.’
‘Okay, clever clogs.’ I give Portia a challenging smile. ‘You’re proving to be the witch tonight. Is Si going to stay with him for ever?’
‘I have a feeling,’ she says with a sigh, ‘that it won’t be long before we all find out.’
Chapter eighteen
Despite such an inauspicious start, the party at Josh and Lucy’s ends up being one of the better ones. Si and I are there for dinner all the time, but somehow having a new person completely changes the dynamic, and I truly find it one of the most refreshing and interesting evenings I’ve had in ages. In fact, probably the nicest evening I’ve had since, well, since that evening with James.
My only concern is Si, and the first thing I do when I step through my front door, even though it’s almost one o’clock in the morning, is pick up the phone and call to see if he’s okay.
And of course I’m not surprised that his phone is picked up by his answering machine, and I leave a brief message, asking if he’s okay and telling him that he can call me anytime if he needs me, because I’m praying that Will hasn’t taken it out on him.
I don’t hear from him until the next day, and then at around eleven a.m. I get a sheepish phone call.
‘It’s me.’
‘I know,’ I say, surprised he’s taken so long. ‘How are you?’
‘Embarrassed,’ he admits. ‘I know I’ve got to phone Josh and Lucy and apologize, but I don’t know what to say to them.’
‘Why are you apologizing? It’s your arse of a boyfriend who should be saying sorry. And before you start justifying him, he behaved appallingly.’
‘I know.’ And he does know, because I have never heard Si sound this contrite before. ‘But he won’t apologize. He doesn’t think he needs to, because he’ll never be seeing any of you again.’
‘Charming. I take it he liked us as much as we liked him, then?’
‘More, possibly. Except for Portia, whom he raved about all night, but then again she is a semi-celebrity, which seems to turn him on somewhat.’ His voice sounds slightly bitter.
‘So I take it all is not rosy in the garden of Eden?’
‘God, I don’t know, Cath.’ He lets out a deep sigh. ‘I thought it was just you, being difficult, but last night I saw a completely different side to Will. I went back to his flat, and he basically ignored me the whole night, and I was appalled by his behaviour at Josh and Lucy’s. I just don’t understand it.’
‘You mean you didn’t try to talk about it once you’d left? That’s not like you, Si.’
‘I couldn’t. He was in such a foul mood that I just sat there very quietly and then we went to bed.’
‘Si, what are you doing with him?’
‘He’s not all bad, you know, Cath. He can be incredibly sweet and loving, but…’ and he stops and sighs again.
‘So it’s not over yet?’
‘Not until the fat lady sings.’ And with a sad smile that I can picture as he speaks, we say goodbye.
And when I get home that evening there is a message from Lucy, a message from Portia, three messages from Si, and finally, as I’m expecting a fourth message from Si, I hear James’s voice on the machine.
‘Hi, umm, Cath. It’s James. Look, I’m not sure what I’ve done to upset you, but whatever it is I’m really, really sorry. I’d really like it if you called me…’ and he leaves the number. I replay the message a few times, trying to work out if there is a subliminal message lurking in between the lines, or if perhaps I can pick something up from the tone of his voice, but there’s nothing.
I kick off my shoes and wander into the kitchen, flicking the kettle on and opening my fridge to see if there’s anything vaguely edible. Luckily there is a tub of houmous, and an open pack of thin cheese slices with only the top one having gone hard and orange thanks to my inability to wrap food properly. I take them out and go to the cupboard, where I discover an open pack of rice crackers shoved right at the very back – God knows where they came from, as I’m sure I’d never buy anything that healthy for myself – and then I head back to the fridge just in case something delicious has materialized in the short time it’s taken me to open the cupboard door.
Nope. I didn’t miss anything, so I make myself a coffee and take it into the living room with the food to think about James and whether I should call him back. The problem is, I think, as I take a bite of rice cracker that’s so old it’s now soft and pliable, that I actually do quite like James.
The problem is that if I were to even contemplate getting involved with anyone at this time in my life, James is probably exactly the sort of man I’d choose.
But the bigger problem is that I can’t get involved. I can’t go through all the shit that Si’s going through now with Will – the hassle of introducing someone to all my friends and praying that they’ll like him and that he’ll like them. Although I suppose that bit’s already been taken care of with James.
Look at me. I’m sprawled on the sofa, one leg flung over the back, crap sit-coms that I’d never admit to watching blaring from the television screen, and I’m cramming soft rice cakes topped with plastic-effect cheese and a healthy dollop of houmous (scooped from the tub by my finger, I’ll have you know) on the top. I’m slurping the coffee because it’s too hot, and the only reason I can do any of this is because I’m on my own.
I remember being with Martin. I remember being with other men at university, and going out with men in my early twenties. The whole palaver of having to make an effort all the time. Making sure you look nice. Ensuring he doesn’t know you spend evenings stuffing your face with tasteless crap because you can’t be bothered to walk the three minutes to the corner shop to buy something decent.
I wouldn’t be able to do this if I were with James, with anyone. And even if I could, the risk of hurt, or loss, is always there, and right now I’m happy. I don’t want anyone to come and spoil that.
‘Not even if you could, potentially, be a thousand times happier?’ Lucy once asked.
‘Not possible.’ I shook my head with a grin. ‘Not when I’ve got all of you.’
‘You can’t grow as a person,’ she said sadly, ignoring my joke, ‘when you close yourself off emotionally. It’s all well and good saying you avoid pain by avoiding relationships, but what about the wonderful things you’re avoiding as well? What about the joy and the intimacy and the trust that come with finding someone you love?’
‘I don’t need to find someone I love to have that,’ I remember saying. ‘I have joy and intimacy and trust with my friends. What I don’t have is heartache and insecurity and the loss of my self, and Lucy, trust me, I’m happy like this.’
‘No pain, no gain,’ Si sniffed, but then again he would, because no matter how many times we have this discussion, no matter how many times I try to explain how I feel about men, about relationships, Si just can’t understand.
Which is why, I suppose, he’s with Will now. Si has always settled for second best, for men who use and abuse him, because as far as he’s concerned it’s better than being on his own, although he doesn’t use those exact words. Si always thinks he can change them. The worse they treat him, the more of a challenge it is, and I will say this for Will: he definitely poses the greatest challenge of Si’s life.
I finish the rice cakes and head back into the
kitchen, opening the fridge again just in case, but no, same old mouldy vegetables as there were half an hour ago. Aha! The freezer! I thank God, and thank Si, that nestling in among the frozen peas and spinach in the top drawer is the one thing that’s guaranteed to make my night.
A Sara Lee frozen Cinnamon Danish that Si brought over one Sunday but that we never – for some extraordinary and inexplicable reason – got around to eating. Licking my lips, I set the microwave to defrost and linger in the kitchen, smelling the delicious cinnamony, almondy smells that waft from the left-hand corner of the kitchen.
I can’t wait for the ping. I open the door ten seconds before it’s ready and pull the Danish out, tearing off a large chunk even before I put it on a plate. Oh God, this is delicious, the soft dough and marzipan melting in my mouth, and I take the plate inside, vowing to eat only half and settle back into the sofa, plate balanced on my knees.
Ten minutes later I’m groaning with disgust, but even as I groan I’m licking my index finger and sweeping it around the plate to catch any crumbs I missed earlier. I’ve eaten the whole thing, and it was delicious, and I don’t feel guilty. Well, not that guilty.
And let’s face it. I’d never be able to do this if I had a boyfriend, would I? But James is a nice guy. James could be a good friend. I’ve always said I don’t need any more friends, but that’s mostly because Si has filled the role of boyfriend/brother/best friend better than anyone else I could have hoped for. But now that Will has come on the scene, maybe it is time I looked for someone else. Not to replace Si, because nobody could do that, but, even in the short time since he met Will, Si hasn’t been around for last-minute cosy suppers at home. I haven’t been able to pick up the phone to him at five thirty p.m. and tell him to meet me outside the cinema in an hour because we’re going to the movies.
And maybe I have been feeling just the tiniest bit lonely since Si met Will. Then again, I muse, there is always Portia; yet, however close we were once upon a time, I can’t help but feel that there’s too much water under the bridge for us to be that close again.