Chapter 5
FIVE
I stayed in bed as long as I could the next day. I felt like a child who was about to be called into the head teacher’s office for a misdemeanour she hadn’t committed – I knew I’d done nothing wrong. But, with equal certainty, I knew that Samantha wasn’t going to see it that way. Still, the only alternative I had to getting up and facing whatever there was to face was staying locked in my room for the rest of my life – a prospect that wasn’t without appeal.
It was the sound of Gary snoring that finally propelled me out of bed. Even through my closed door and Samantha’s across the landing, I could hear it as clearly as if he was in my bed, not hers. A grinding inhale, a pause, a snorting exhale. Over and over.
Abruptly, I sat up. It was pathetic to hide away in here like I was some kind of criminal. Besides, I needed to wee and clean my teeth. I opened my bedroom door tentatively, peering out on to the landing then scuttling furtively to the bathroom.
Fifteen minutes later, showered and dressed, I made my way downstairs. My trepidation had eased now, and I was feeling resolute if not exactly confident. I’d take myself out, buy a copy of Loot and read the accommodation section.
I’d make a plan.
It came almost as a shock to see Samantha when I got downstairs. She was sitting on the sofa in her pyjamas, last night’s make-up still smudged under her eyes, her hair hanging lankly over her shoulders, eating tuna mayonnaise out of a cereal bowl with a spoon.
‘Good morning,’ I said, as calmly as I could.
She didn’t respond to my greeting. She looked straight through me, as if I wasn’t there. I saw right then what lay ahead – weeks and weeks of being shunned and ignored, treated as if I was invisible, until eventually I gave up and moved out.
‘You don’t have to bother sulking,’ I said. ‘I’m going to find a new place to live. And you might want to find a new boyfriend.’
Then I put on my coat and headed out into the cold, bright morning.
Anger and adrenaline carried me to the end of the road, past the corner shop with its stacks of newspapers outside, past the greasy spoon where solitary old men and groups of students were piling into bacon and eggs washed down with cups of tea, through the park where daffodils turned hopeful faces up to the thin sun, and across the bridge over the canal, wanting to put as much distance between me and Samantha and Gary as I could. I walked on and on, not really noticing where I was going. Red buses roared past me, women in black abayas stood chatting in doorways, a group of men in Lycra whizzed by on racing bikes, but I barely saw any of them.
I must have walked for almost an hour before hunger made me slow down, pausing to take stock of where I was. I’d passed through the run-down bustle of Whitechapel and almost reached the City. Over the hum of traffic, I could hear market traders’ shouts, and a small stream of people seemed to be making their way down a side street to my left. I followed them, deciding to find a shop where I could buy a paper and then get some food.
It didn’t take long for me to find what I was looking for. On opposite street corners were two shops. One was an off-licence, a dishevelled old man emerging from it clutching a can of extra-strength lager and rolling a cigarette. The other was smaller, a traditional newsagent with metal racks outside holding Sunday papers from all over the world and shelves laden with magazines inside. As I approached the doorway, the comforting smell of paper and ink drifted out, mingling with incense.
But I didn’t go inside. The window, I noticed, was full of cards that had been stuck to it from the back. They were all colours: mostly white but also pink, pale blue, light green and yellow. Some were handwritten and others printed. I couldn’t get close enough to read any of them because a woman was standing by the window, hands on hips, gazing at the cards.
She wasn’t tall, but the way she held herself and her wedge-heeled boots made her look that way. Her hair was cut short, in a spiky pixie crop, deep brown threaded with grey. She was wearing a long tweed coat, the cuffs of her wide-legged trousers just visible below it. Above the collar of her coat, the line of her jaw was sharp and clean and her full lips were bright red.
My first thought was, She looks like a film star. But she couldn’t be, of course – not here, in the melting pot of East London on a Sunday in March. She was just some random lady out for a walk, curiosity leading her to stop and browse in a window not for clothes she might buy but for the details of people’s lives she might glean from reading the display of cards.
But she wasn’t browsing, I realised. She was gazing intently at one of the cards, right in the centre of the window, the Blu-Tack that held it there still fresh. As I watched, she nodded as if in satisfaction, then abruptly turned on her heels and strode away.
At least, she would have stridden if I hadn’t been there, loitering right by her shoulder, trying to see what was written on the card she’d been studying so closely. Instead, she cannoned into me and almost sent me flying.
‘Oh my God,’ she gasped, torn between shock and embarrassment. ‘I’m so very sorry. I just didn’t see you there.’
‘It’s my fault. I was standing too close, practically breathing down your neck trying to read those.’
‘Are you all right?’ Her voice was breathy, with the hint of an accent I couldn’t place. ‘I didn’t hurt you?’
‘Really, I’m fine,’ I said. Up close, I caught the vanilla scent of her perfume and could see the colour of her eyes – a hazel so bright they were almost golden. ‘I was just waiting for you to…’
I gestured towards the window.
The woman smiled. ‘I just put a card in there. Or rather, Imran did on my behalf. Probably nothing will come of it, but I had a stroke of luck with one the other day and I thought I’d try the same thing myself. Serendipity, you know. Or more likely superstition.’
I took a step closer so I could read the card she’d been staring at.
Rooms for rent in house on Damask Square. Reasonable rates. Call Orla. And a phone number.
Serendipity , I thought.
I said, ‘Orla – is that you? My name’s Livvie.’