Chapter 11.
I first see Lara again on Sunday morning as I’m heading home from a spin class. She is walking towards me along London Street with a man, her hand wound into his. She’s wearing a long blue-and-white dress that billows around her ankles. Her blonde curls are cropped shorter now, and she’s thinner than she used to be. But it is her smile I recognise first. Like sunshine slicing through cloud.
We’ve not spoken since that night. For years I pictured seeing her again, coming face to face. I practised what I would say. I wondered if anger would overwhelm me, if I might reach out and slap her, or throw a drink at her, if I had one to hand.
She glances up now, sees me. Stops walking. Our eyes meet.
I watch as her boyfriend (or maybe it’s her husband) follows her gaze. As he looks at me, I know he knows. She’s told him everything.
She swallows, takes another couple of steps forward. I do the same.
I can recall very little about our conversation, the last time we spoke. Though I do remember knowing that I never wanted to see her again.
The sky today is surly and grey, the air heavy with humidity. It keeps threatening to rain, a few errant spots landing here and there. It suddenly seems fitting, somehow, as for me, rain is the weather of loss and heartbreak.
Despite everything, her face reflects none of my trepidation. Her eyes glow warm and bright. ‘Neve. Hi. How are you?’
It’s an almost unfathomable question, but Lara always did have a habit of launching into huge, unassailable topics, no matter the context. (As we were getting ready to go out: How many different kinds of love do you reckon there are? Over dinner: Do you think addiction is nature or nurture? While we were watching TV: Would you say cancer’s mostly genetic or environmental? )
It was one of the things I loved most about her. How deeply she made me think.
‘You’re back,’ is all I manage, one of the million things I could say.
‘Temporarily. Family stuff.’ She glances up at the man by her side. ‘This is Felix. Felix, meet Neve.’
He puts out his free hand and grips mine, looks me right in the eyes. His demeanour is gentle and warm, and he is very tall, just as my mother said. Six foot three at least, possibly taller. ‘Pleasure to meet you.’
Is it? I think, the cordiality catching me off guard. You must know our history. And then, You’re American.
‘Felix is my—’
Don’t say husband. Please don’t say husband . I’m not sure I can face hearing about Lara getting married without me. Even though I uninvited her to my own life many years ago.
‘—boyfriend.’
I nod, then can’t come up with anything else to say. Even though there is so much. Too much.
‘You know what,’ Felix says. His voice is very soothing, a deep river of charm. ‘I have some things I need to catch up on, so why don’t you go ahead and grab a coffee? I can see you back at the house.’
What house? I think, wildly, and then, Who are you to suggest we go for coffee?
Lara looks at me. ‘Do you have some time?’
Even just a couple of weeks ago, I’m sure I would have shaken my head and walked away. But everything has changed since then. I have met Ash, who reminds me so much of Jamie, I’ve been pulled unexpectedly back into my life of nearly a decade ago, of which Lara was a huge, unalterable part.
‘Okay,’ I say.
Felix puts an arm around Lara’s shoulders and squeezes her, then pecks her tenderly on the head. ‘You going to be okay?’
She nods meekly, and straight away I marvel at how much she has changed, that when I last knew her, she would have baulked at such over-protectiveness. She might even have shoved an elbow into his ribs.
But she doesn’t do that. And I don’t even comment with my eyes, as I would have done once, because it is no longer my place to.
Lara suggests a cafe we both used to love, and though it feels all wrong to go there – to time-travel back to the days when she was my closest friend – I agree.
Back then, I wouldn’t have known how to survive nine days without her, let alone nine years. But after the accident, my anger became like a creature living inside me. Over the years that followed, I missed her so badly the pain of it felt physical sometimes. But I simply couldn’t picture her face without picturing what she’d done too.
She tried hard to make contact at first, sending postcards and letters and emails, leaving messages. She even dropped in on my mum a couple of times. But I never responded. A few years passed, then she sent me an email from a work account, a couple of WhatsApps. But I deleted them unread. It made me angry, the idea of her thinking the years would have smoothed away the sharpness of what had happened.
She stopped trying after that.
‘You look great, Neve,’ she says now, as we regard each other across the table.
She looks mostly the same as she did back then. Her teeth are a little straighter and whiter, maybe. Her skin carries a few new creases. Her face has lost its adolescent plumpness, which makes her blue eyes seem even more striking, somehow. Freckles pepper her cheeks and nose. She always got them in summer, would try to cover them with concealer, until I persuaded her not to.
My heart is a starfish in my chest. My oldest friend is right in front of me. Right here .
Our server comes to take our order. Lara asks for black decaf. I go for espresso, maybe to indicate I don’t plan on staying long.
‘Neve. There are some things I need to say to you.’
I shake my head. ‘Not now. I can’t do that... now.’
Her expression recalibrates slightly. Perhaps she had a speech prepared. Maybe, like me, she’s stood in front of myriad mirrors over the years, mouthing the words she imagines it will make her feel better to say.
‘Tell me about Felix,’ I say instead. Because, despite everything, I know I’m happy for her. I guess some instincts you can’t overturn.
She smiles, and it glitters. Love has blazed its trail across her face. ‘He’s from California. Well, he was born in Chicago, but he moved to Santa Cruz a few years ago.’
‘How did you meet?’
‘I beat him at pool, at a house party in St John’s Wood. He used to be a professional tennis player, so he was used to winning everything. Anyway, he found me later and challenged me to a rematch, obviously, but I was enjoying this amazing view out on the balcony, overlooking the cricket ground. The sun was coming up, so we just stayed out there talking. And he ended up trying to explain cricket to me, which was hilarious, because it was obvious he didn’t have a clue, so I just waited for him to finish like I didn’t either, then I told him he’d got practically all of it wrong. And when I started explaining what actually happens when one side declares, I don’t think his ego could quite handle it, so to shut me up he kissed me, and... Well. Here we are.’
I smile, because I can just imagine her calculating exactly the right moment at which to take him down. ‘Whose place was it?’ I ask, wondering exactly how much a balcony flat overlooking Lord’s sets a person back these days.
‘The director of a film I was working on. I’m... a production designer now.’
I know this, of course, because I stalk her online from time to time, checking her IMDb and Wikipedia like she’s an ex I can’t get over. She started out in the theatre before moving into TV and film, recently working on a BAFTA-winning series set in the 1800s and even an Oscar-nominated film, a science-fiction love story.
Before I can stop it, I feel second-hand pride bloom in my belly.
‘So are you... Will you move to America? To be with Felix? Is it better for work out there?’
She hesitates. ‘I think... I’ll probably move in with him at some point, yeah.’
The server returns and sets down our drinks.
‘Is he retired?’
Lara laughs. ‘Ha. No. He’s in tech. He co-founded a robotics company.’
‘Tennis to robotics? That’s . . .’
‘I know. He’s one of those infuriating people with the Midas touch. And he’s insanely intelligent. Honestly, Neve, sometimes he starts talking and I just have to stop him and say, I literally have no idea what you’re on about .’ She laughs. ‘And we go to these dinner parties, and... they’re on another level, some of the people he hangs out with. Seriously. So clever. All these investors and tech people and serial entrepreneurs.’
I think about how protective Felix seemed just now. I picture him lecturing her about cricket or robotics or the Nasdaq, and I wonder if it’s possible Lara can have become a completely different person in the years since I last saw her. ‘You’re intelligent,’ I remind her, in case she’s somehow forgotten how she barely needed to study for those A-stars in her exams.
She meets my eye and smiles. ‘Bad choice of word. I guess I meant we’re from very different worlds. But I love him to bits, Neve. From that first night, I was just... blindsided by him. Like, I knew he was my person, you know? I’d never felt that way about anyone before.’
I think of Jamie, and swallow.
‘And actually, I have you to thank.’
‘Me?’
‘Yeah. Remember that night you came to get me? After—’
‘Yes,’ I say, because I’ll never forget that night. How it sat in my stomach for weeks afterwards, the way close calls usually do.
‘Well, you told me that night that I deserved better, that I deserved someone who knew my worth, and... I never forgot it, Neve. I thought about it for years afterwards, and... Felix was the first guy I met who truly fitted that description. So.’ She holds my gaze for a couple of moments, and I am taken right back to that horrible night, the way she cried and doubted herself, and the fury that flared inside me on her behalf.
‘And you?’ she says. ‘Are you seeing anyone? What about work? I want to know everything.’
I tell her about my job, that I’m hoping to be promoted, that I’m probably borderline workaholic but wouldn’t have it any other way. I describe my house, all the work I’ve put into renovating it over the years.
‘Oh,’ she says, her eyes lighting up. ‘You’d love Felix’s place. It’s a designer’s dream, honestly. It overlooks Monterey Bay. It’s completely insane.’
She gets out her phone to show me, and as I look through images of the panoramic views and pool, of the walk-in wardrobes and floating staircases, of the wine cellar and movie room – the calibre of interiors, frankly, I could only dream of having the budget to execute – I realise this man is rich. Like, off-the-charts wealthy.
‘Lara,’ I say, looking at her.
She makes a face. ‘I know. Sorry. I’m honestly not trying to brag. I had no idea when I met him.’ She puts her phone away. ‘Anyway. You never answered my question.’
‘What question?’ I say, though of course I know.
‘Are you seeing anyone?’ She speaks tactfully, like an addiction counsellor trying to discern whether or not I’ve fallen off the wagon.
I swallow. ‘There’s someone... I like. Through work. But it’s not... turned into anything yet.’ I don’t mention, of course, how much this person resembles Jamie. That there are so many similarities between them, it’s starting to feel weird.
She smiles, says something about a boy from school I don’t quite catch because I keep getting distracted by the fact that we’re sitting in this cafe, chatting as if we’re spin class buddies, as if we have no history, as if we don’t know the meaning of tragedy. Fear keeps rising inside me in waves: did I make a mistake by cutting her out of my life? Was I too stubborn, too unreasonable? But then I remind myself of what happened that night, and the queasiness of doubt subsides.
If I’d known talking to Lara would feel this physical, I’d have forgone the espresso.
‘So tell me about this guy,’ she says, but suddenly it’s too much, this muddle in my head of Ash and Jamie and now Lara being back... and I have no idea how to feel about any of it.
‘Actually,’ I say, checking a watch that isn’t on my wrist, ‘I really have to go.’
‘Please give me your number,’ she says, like she’s been fully expecting me to try to leg it. Across the table, she covers my hand with hers, and it feels nice and absurd all at once, a bit like it does when my mum tries to touch me. ‘I really want to see you again, Neve. It’s been way too long. Please.’
I hesitate, then make the mistake of looking right into her eyes. They are the beautiful, depthless blue of Californian skies, and I have missed them. ‘Okay,’ I say.
She passes me her phone, and I tap in my number, then pass it back to her. Straight away, I hear my own phone buzz.
She meets my eye and smiles. ‘Just wanted to make sure.’
I nod, and pull on my jacket, grab my bag.
‘This was nice,’ she says.
At this, finally, it ignites inside me: the anger and indignation, a white-hot flare of fury. Do you think because we’ve had coffee, all is forgotten? Do you really think this is all it takes?
‘I know you don’t want to talk about that night,’ Lara says, ‘but I have to say this to you, before you go. I’m so sorry, Neve. I’m so sorry about what happened.’
I just stare at her. She’s told me this before, of course, but maybe this time – maybe – I am finally ready to hear it.