Chapter 42
Josh
At the pub, Giles says, ‘By the way, I’ve heard it’s not all roses between Rachel and her man. Lo says they’re fighting. Like, a lot.’
I stare at him. ‘What do you mean, fighting?’
‘Nothing physical. Just . . . they row. Quite badly, Lo reckons.’
I know arguing’s pretty common when you’ve just had a baby. But still, I’m concerned. Rachel and I would fall out from time to time, like any couple. Yet I’d have struggled to describe any of those disagreements as fights.
Later, I send her a message. Because I need to know.
Part of me expects radio silence. Mere minutes later, though, she calls.
It is the first time we have spoken since she had the baby.
‘Congratulations,’ I say softly, though it comes out slightly falsetto, because my mouth is so dry.
There is a long silence. So long, in fact, that I begin to wonder if she has butt-dialled me by accident.
I am sitting topless on the edge of my bed, a fan grinding away because it’s so damn hot.
Even now this room still feels like ours, filled as it is with little hints of the life we once shared.
The duvet cover we picked out. The chest of drawers we butchered together without looking at the instructions, stripping every single screwhead as we went.
The curtain pole we put up with no spirit level, so there’s always a gap when they’re drawn.
Eventually, Rachel speaks. ‘Thank you for your card. It was lovely.’
‘Sorry I haven’t called before now. But I thought it best to . . . you know.’
‘I know.’
I last saw her at Easter, in a beer garden a few weeks before Emma was born.
She looked radiantly happy. At one point, Lawrence put his hand on her belly and made eye contact with me at exactly the same time, which felt childish at best, creepy at worst. I left pretty soon after that, to deprive him of the rise it was clear he was seeking.
‘How’s everything going? How’s Emma?’ My voice keels a little as I say her name.
‘She’s perfect,’ she whispers. She is eating something. I don’t ask what, though my money’s on a Tunnock’s Teacake.
I might as well be straight with her. ‘Lola said—’
‘That was just a stupid row about . . . God, I can’t even remember. Formula, or something.’ She sighs heavily, as if this isn’t the first time she’s had to defend Lawrence.
‘But serious enough for you to tell Lola?’
‘She caught me at a bad moment. Lo and Polly and Ingrid . . . they’re not exactly the I-heart-Lawrence fan club. I assume you’ve heard.’
I hadn’t, actually. Though I’m hardly surprised. Temperamentally speaking, from what I can work out, the man is the equivalent of dropping a hairdryer in a bath.
For some reason I want to ask if the baby was planned. But I don’t, because I know it is none of my business.
I stare blankly for a moment through the gap in the curtains, at the star-strewn night sky.
‘I think everyone thinks . . .’ Rachel begins, then stops herself.
The seconds stretch.
Eventually, she says, ‘That Lawrence has a temper, or something. But he doesn’t. Not like that, anyway.’
‘Okay,’ I say slowly. ‘So what kind of temper does he have?’
‘Please don’t,’ she mutters. ‘You’re worse than Polly.’
We lapse into a strained silence. I look down at my hands, my wrist, the watch she gave me that I wear every day.
‘You’d tell me,’ I say eventually.
I hear her hesitate. ‘Hardly fair to make you my relationship counsellor, Josh.’
‘Oh, fuck that.’
‘Yes,’ she concedes. ‘I would tell you.’
I take a second to picture her as we talk, sitting in a flat I have never set foot in.
I imagine somewhere stylish and calm, brightened now by baby things.
Is she wearing his T-shirt? Perfume, or jewellery, he has given her?
How long is her hair now? My desperation for detail is at once compulsive and depressing.
Not dissimilar to drinking too many pints at the pub, then needing to chuck it all up in a hedge on the way home.
‘Are you still sketching?’ The question feels important, somehow. Like resting two fingers against her wrist, gently taking her pulse.
‘When I have time.’ I hear her swallow. ‘I do miss you, Josh. I wish we could talk more.’
I feel sadness whorl through me as she says this. Sparks of anguish, just spinning, with nowhere to go. ‘Can’t really help you there,’ I say softly.
She lets out a breath. ‘I know. Sorry. That was . . . I’d better go.’
‘Rachel?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Promise me something.’
‘Okay.’
‘I’ll always be here for you.’
A few moments pass, and I realise I’ve misworded it.
‘I mean, just . . . pick up the phone. If you ever need to. It doesn’t matter if it’s three o’clock in the morning. I’m here, okay?’
She doesn’t say anything else, just gently ends the call. But I can tell from the way she is breathing that she is trying not to cry.