Chapter 21
21
I kept a pair of sneakers in my book bag when I went around Highgate to teach. Boots and heels from Faye’s closet helped me look the part, but they were no help climbing the hills of North London or running to catch a bus as I scrambled to get to the handful of new cash-in-hand tutoring students I’d picked up through local school referrals. Twenty-five international students had signed up for my well-paid St. Giles class, and I’d also managed to set up an SAT “study group” at Highgate School, with help from a school counselor who liked my pitch. That’s where I was coming from today—four girls I met after school, in an empty classroom. All starting to warm up to me after our second session.
The sun was out after a damp gray week; everyone was out on the Heath, walking dogs, walking children, walking hand in hand. I was a little early getting to the park and had a climb ahead of me: meeting Liv and Andre at our old spot on Parliament Hill.
It’d been almost three weeks since I’d seen them last, at the house. Liv had wanted to cook dinner together tonight, but I already had plans with Tess and Ginny at Soho House on Greek Street. Then on to a party at the Stables: a two-hundred-year-old carriage-horse stable converted into a nightclub in Camden, each stall repurposed into a private booth with crimson leather couches. Hamza’s older brother had booked the whole place for his girlfriend’s birthday and hired Mark Ronson out of hiatus to DJ. Theo was back, so I’d see him there after almost a month. I had all the silly butterflies just thinking about it. That kiss he always gave me, slow and breathy, that said Hello there but also I’ll see you in bed later , that made me warm from my throat to my knees. I imagined how I’d look to him with my new Highgate haircut, easy and familiar among his friends. I’d picked out a navy shift dress: chic, flattering, simple. My new friends weren’t big on Facebook, but at a party like this, I’d have to be careful to duck for cover if anyone started snapping photos. I didn’t need Faye to catch sight of that dress, or me in it.
I’d changed into my old sneakers, anticipating mud on the Heath, but I hadn’t anticipated just how much mud. Between the men’s and ladies’ bathing ponds, a small black dog ran straight up to me—like we were long-lost friends—and jumped up to put his paws on my knees. I turned to shake him off, but his paws were already printed in mud on Faye’s camel-colored pants.
“Sorry, sorry,” a man was saying. I could hear him jogging up to the dog, admonishing it. It was only when he stood up from clipping on a leash that I saw it was Callum. “Oh no, Anna,” he said, before I could say anything. “Your trousers. I’m so sorry, he’s an absolute menace. Do you think they can be saved? I could replace them?”
I couldn’t speak, could only look down at the black paw prints, the clumps of dirt and grass clinging to them. What if the pants were ruined? How would I explain it? The dry cleaner wouldn’t even say no; he’d just point me straight to the rubbish bin. Maybe I could soak them as soon as I got home? Baking soda? Call Mom right when you get home, my frantic, panic-addled brain told me. She’ll tell you what to do.
I shook my head at Callum, and felt, inexplicably, the beginnings of tears in my eyes. Forcing a laugh, I bent over to examine the stains, letting my hair fall over my face. The karma of my closet trick was finally catching up with me, and of course Callum would be the universe’s perfect delivery method.
“I’m so sorry,” Callum said. “I let him off leash to play with the other dogs, but then he scampered.” He bent slightly, examining the muddy trousers.
“It’s my fault,” I said, straightening. “These are not park clothes.”
Callum took a dark handkerchief from his peacoat and, before I could stop him, knelt in front of me. He pulled the fabric taut and began to swipe lightly at one knee, brushing off the mud and grass.
“Don’t, please,” I said.
“Let me just get the worst of it.”
This proximity, him crouched and close below me, was not at all the relationship Callum and I had established in London. He chose others for conversation, turned to other seats if I sat down. Never obviously unfriendly, but never anything warmer than the stiff, obligatory cheek kiss I’d come to dread. And now this; I couldn’t just stand here in silence. The dog was sniffing around my shoes.
“What’s his name?” I asked.
“John Major.”
I laughed despite myself. “Nineties prime minister John Major?”
“My grandparents are big fans. But they don’t get around so well, so I take this little guy out a few times a week.”
“Of course, who would muddy the good citizens of North London without him?” I said. “Your grandparents live right around here?”
“Over on the other side of the park, more Hampstead, near the Royal Free. When I was a kid, they lived in a little apartment south of the river. Lambeth. There’s an area there, Little Portugal, but a lot of my family is still in Lisbon. It’s a great city, the seafood’s unbelievable. I don’t suppose you’ve ever been?”
Callum seemed to regret the question immediately. We both knew that I had never been to Lisbon and would probably never go, unless some other globe-trotting family found need for a live-in SAT tutor. The corners of his mouth turned down as he stood, tucking the filthy handkerchief back into his coat pocket. “Anyway, Lisbon’s great fun if you go on a holiday—everyone’s just out in the streets enjoying themselves, bands playing, dancing. The best is April 25, Freedom Day. Big street parties.” He was trying his best to slide past the awkward moment.
“Well, that’s my birthday. Should I treat myself to a little trip?” I joked.
Now that he was standing, we were close together. Closer than normal. I usually saw him in low light: pubs, swanky restaurants, nightclubs. Here in the bright sun, his dark brown hair caught the light, waved like water. And then there was his warm perpetual tan. Was I staring? What exactly was happening here?
I stepped back and bent down to pet John Major. “I’ve got to go,” I said. “I’m meeting friends up on the hill.”
“Parliament Hill?”
“Yes, it’s sort of my spot,” I said, unable to resist needling him a little more. “Maybe you remember.” The dog stretched his neck out so I could scratch under his chin.
“We’ll walk with you partway,” Callum said, with a strange little smile.
“Only if you keep your paws to yourself,” I said to John Major. I didn’t know how to handle this version of Callum, talkative and willing to wipe mud off my knees. It annoyed me, of course—that he should be friendly as long as no one was around to see it—but mostly my annoyance was for myself. For the glow, a fine hum in my stomach, just because he’d turned his charm on me today, just because he was gracing me with something warmer than civility. Pathetic.
We started up the incline. John Major dashed in front of me, his leash like a trip wire. “The PM’s just waiting for a chance to knock me down,” I said. “Roll me around to get those really good grass stains.”
Callum tugged the dog back. “At least you’ll have plenty of time to change before the party tonight.”
“I’m having dinner first, with Tess and Ginny. Soho House.” A pricey place, but I had the cash from the Highgate study group—their parents each paid individually. Probably just enough to cover my share of the bill tonight.
Callum made a face. “Good food, weird crowd.”
It was indeed the food that had impressed me, not the minor celebrities; the last time we’d all gone as a group was my first time trying burrata. Heavy, creamy, cheesy heaven. But he’d eaten all the seafood in Lisbon. I bet burrata didn’t even leave a mark on him.
“Poor Callum,” I said. “Often forced to eat delicious food at members-only clubs with his lovely friends. And not even very good at pretending he’s enjoying himself.” I’d meant to tease, but it came out a little harder than that.
He scowled at me. “Has it ever occurred to you that it’s only hard to enjoy myself when you’re around?”
This was so baldly unkind that I laughed, taken aback. “I’m not an idiot, Callum. I know you don’t want me around.” But then why did it still hurt to hear it?
“That’s not it. But now you’ve wrapped me up in this lie. I never know what to say when we’re out together. It’s a very hard position you’ve put me in.”
“Oh, you’re in the hard position? Solvent, secure, surrounded by friends and family. Out here walking your grandma’s dog.” I waved at the park, at North London, his since birth. If I’d grown up with half of what he had—a quarter, an eighth—I might still have a mother. A mother with all the insulin and test strips she ever needed.
But Callum was shaking his head, his hair falling forward, his brow creased in frustration.
“These are my friends , Anna. I’ve known them my whole life. And now I have to either lie to them or blow up your cover story. Like, it’s weird enough that you’ve decided you’re going to lie to them, but you’ve also decided that I’m going to. So yeah,” he finished irritably, “probably I’m not doing a great job pretending to enjoy it.”
You have everything, Callum. Can’t you just give me this one thing? I couldn’t say it, couldn’t admit it, so I fired up instead. “Don’t pin this on me,” I said, shaking my head. “You were a grouch in Saint-Tropez, too. As soon as Theo and Lucy arrived. I even asked Faye about it.”
Callum shot me a look. “What’d she say?”
“She thought maybe you’d just outgrown it all. The nightlife stuff.” She’d called him a self-serious spoilsport, too, in the cab home from that first yacht party, but I didn’t have to share that. Much as I might agree.
Callum’s eyebrows went up. “She’s not wrong,” he laughed. “But I guess I thought I was doing a better job of hiding it.”
“You’re really not.”
He shrugged. Not like he didn’t care, but like he didn’t have an explanation to offer. I wondered if he’d ever had to explain himself, to anyone, ever. If any of them did.
The idea annoyed me. “Explain,” I demanded.
He sighed, spreading his hands in front of him. “I guess I wonder if they’ll be doing it their whole lives—you know, going out, the clubs, the big dinners and big nights,” he said. And then, after a moment: “I don’t think that will be my life.”
I watched John Major turn and juke toward an overly bold squirrel. “I’ll tell you, to me, it seems like Neverland. You’re all the Lost Boys, young and free forever. No one ever has to grow up here.”
“ Has to , no. But still, I think it might be nice to. Eventually.”
“No one’s making you do it, you know. If it’s not your thing anymore, why do you still come out all the time?”
He gave me a quizzical look. “They’re my oldest friends. I still want to see them, I still want to be part of their lives,” he said. “I just wish they’d branch out sometimes, do something different.”
“It’s not all they do.” I’d been thinking of Theo; he’d promised me a tour of Parliament this week, then the open-air food market by London Bridge. But for some reason, I didn’t want to talk about Theo with Callum, so I said, “Tess and I did a walking tour of Bloomsbury, and a Dickens one, too.” We’d talked about taking the train to Jane Austen’s house in Hampshire. “What’s a grown-up night, to you, then?”
He thought for a moment before answering. “I just want to cook dinner. Have everyone round and cook a meal together. But they’re eating six courses at Soho House, or at Gordon Ramsay’s whatever, so why would they want to be at my flat, cooking pasta?” He shrugged. “I can’t sell them on my kind of life, and they’re still trying to sell me on theirs, even though I’ve lived it.”
Callum studied me again as we walked, like he was judging whether I understood. Logically, I did. But if the shine had gone from this lifestyle, probably it was because he’d always had access to it. It was still magic to me. The cab rides home full of laughter and sequins, shoulders pressed together, sleepy and happy and lucky—I would never be sick of that, I was sure.
“Well, what would you cook?” I asked.
He laughed. “You should cook. Make us something really quintessentially American.”
“Like what? Apple pie?”
“I was thinking more like hot dogs. Or Fluffernutter sandwiches.”
I scoffed. “Is that what you think we eat all day?”
“Isn’t it?”
“I’ve actually never had a Fluffernutter,” I said. “When I was a kid, my classmates would bring them for lunch. I thought it was so fancy, like fluff was a delicacy or something.”
“God, why?” he said, clearly disgusted.
This wasn’t something I wanted to tell Callum, but then, why pretend? He already knew about my family. He was the only one who did. And he’d proven himself pretty good at keeping my secrets, even if he resented having to do so.
“I didn’t bring lunch from home, like a lot of the kids. I had to get hot lunch—you know, the cafeteria food,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant. “You get free school lunch if your parents don’t make a lot of money.” If you were on food stamps, which we were.
“Right,” he said, nodding. “I think they have that kind of thing here, too.”
They did, of course, but no need for it in the schools Callum went to. “You know, when you’re a kid, you just want to do what other kids are doing. I really, really wanted a brown-paper-bag lunch. Some of the moms, they sent really elaborate, over-the-top stuff. So yeah, I thought fluff was fancy. Something other moms could get that mine couldn’t.”
We walked a few more steps in silence, and then Callum looked over at me. His dark, heavy eyebrows were drawn together.
“If I can ask,” he said, watching me, “how old were you when your mum died?”
“Not much younger than I am now,” I said. He’d been picturing me as a motherless child, growing up alone, without her. The picture was so wrong—she had been so present, every day, such an oversized part of my life—that I felt temporarily disoriented by it. “It was a year ago this month,” I said.
“So recent,” he said. “I’m sorry. You were very close?”
“We were. That’s partly why I left and came here. Home became just this place where she used to be.” My life had felt like a cleared-out house: just empty rooms to walk through, the corners swept clean, my voice echoing off the bare walls and sealed windows. You couldn’t stay in a place like that.
We were nearing the hilltop, more people appearing around us, climbing toward the view. Callum looked up ahead and made a funny sound to clear his throat. “I did mean it, about the trousers, you know. I’m happy to replace them.”
There was no way I could let him. He’d see the boutique label and know immediately they weren’t mine. “But they’re irreplaceable,” I said with mock gravity. “So much sentimental value.”
“Still,” he said, with a smile I couldn’t read. “Let me sort it.”
I tried to think what Tess would say, or Ginny, or Zara. How would they shrug him off? Probably they wouldn’t even notice one less pair of beautiful linen trousers in their closet. Maybe Faye wouldn’t. Maybe that would save me. “No, that’s really not necessary,” I said firmly. “I’ll take care of it.”
Callum didn’t look at me. He was watching John Major, out ahead of us on the end of his retractable leash. “They are likely to be a bit outside of your usual shopping budget,” he said flatly.
So he knew, then. Knew the extent of my deceit and wanted to make sure I knew he knew. My cheeks began to burn, and I let the resentment bubble up like a laugh, like a live thing in my chest, lungs, throat. No, I didn’t owe him anything. I didn’t have to make excuses. I didn’t have to litigate my bad behavior with him, much as he might feel entitled to an explanation.
“Are you going to tell on me?” I said acidly. “Is that what this is all about?”
He stopped abruptly and looked at me, but I just kept walking. John Major strained to follow, stuck at the end of the leash, looking back for the cause of the interruption.
Callum took large strides until he caught up with me. “Anna, you need help. I’m trying to help,” he said. “That’s honestly it.”
“I don’t need help,” I said. “I need a dry cleaner.”
He laughed, but the sound was only frustration. “It just feels a little unsustainable in the long run. I’m not sure it’s as important as you think it is—maintaining this act or whatever you want to call it.”
“I’m not acting,” I said, so furious I felt like baring my teeth. “Your friends, they are my friends, too. That’s real, okay? I can stay out of your way if that’s what you want, but I’m not going to stay home.”
His voice finally rose up to meet mine. “That’s not at all what I’m saying,” he snapped. “You really are infuriating.”
“Look,” I said. “Forget it. I’m fine, you’re fine, everything’s fine. Just go. I have to meet my friends.”
Almost as soon as I’d said it, Andre and Liv were there, waving excitedly, shouting my name from thirty feet away. I hadn’t realized we were at the top of the hill. Callum would just have to add my loud friends to the long list of things about me he disapproved of.
“Look at you,” Liv said exuberantly, gesturing at my new haircut and the navy peacoat. Then her eyes reached the muddy paw prints on my knees, and her voice sank. “Oh, Anna, look at you.”
Andre bent down to look at the little black dog. “Already captured the culprit? Who’s this?”
John Major kept his muddy paws to himself with Liv and Andre. Maybe he only had it in for really nice trousers. I should make introductions, I knew, but I was too drained to play polite. Callum did it for me—introduced John Major and himself. He joked about which qualities the dog and the former prime minister shared, and Andre made a crack about the general election debate, and the three of them were off to the races.
I watched my friends, watched Callum win them over instantly, easily. It was like seeing myself when I’d met him the first time, at dinner with Faye and Pippa. Like looking directly into the sun. But it had been months since that glow had shone on me. I had no idea why Andre and Liv were getting the full, blinding force of it, but they seemed to be enjoying it all the same.
So I stood back and let them talk, let the hostility drain out of me, leaching through my old, worn-in shoes into the old, worn-in grass of Hampstead Heath. Just standing here, just being near Liv and Andre, felt comforting and right. I wanted to go back to the house with them and lie on the couch and complain, and then get up and cook pasta together. But I couldn’t. I needed to soak Faye’s pants, get dressed for dinner with Tess and the party after. I’d have to smile and laugh and dance all night with Callum there. The only person who knew how much I had to lose.