Chapter Three
JESS
I summon an Uber with shaking fingers when I reach the end of the hotel drive, and stand shivering, holding on to myself, as I wait the four minutes for it to arrive.
It’s chilly for mid-May and, thanks to my dramatic exit, my wrap is still in the hotel cloakroom.
Thank goodness I snatched my clutch from the table in the ballroom on my way through. It’d be a long walk home otherwise.
I’m so angry. So, so angry.
How dare Luke contact my mother without my knowledge? He knows how I feel about her. He also knows why I feel that way. He’s the only person I’ve opened up to in the slightest about my toxic childhood. I just don’t get it. Why, in all that is good and holy, did he think this would be okay?
Just thinking about how blindsided I felt, how the shock rippled through me like a volcanic tremor, makes my internal temperature rise, and I don’t do anything to curb it, because it’s much easier to be angry than it is to feel the other emotion that’s scratching and clawing its way to the surface.
I don’t want to feel any of these things. I want to lock myself in a grey box, with grey walls, a grey floor and a grey ceiling and to not feel any of it anymore. I want to be comfortably numb, as the song says.
The Uber arrives and I climb in the back.
The driver probably thinks I’m an unfriendly bitch, because I just stare, stony-faced, straight ahead, as we drive home, ignoring his attempts at friendly chatter.
I just can’t. My jaw is spasming, and it’s all I can do to clench my teeth together to stop them from chattering.
A black hole is opening up deep inside of me.
It’s small now, only a pinprick, but if I’m not careful, it’ll grow and grow and grow. And then I will fall into it, and then I won’t know who I am anymore. That can’t happen.
Luke is supposed to be my person, the one human being on this planet who will always have my back, but tonight has knocked all of that on its head. What if he isn’t? What if my husband isn’t who I think he is? The thought makes my insides swirl in cold fear.
I exit the cab swiftly, tapping on my phone to give the driver the maximum tip, and open my front door.
Once inside, I ignore the light switches and head for the back of the house.
I feel as if I want to hide, but property prices are high in South East London, and our house isn’t large.
Our starter house. We’ve been saving for the last few years to upgrade to something with more living space downstairs and an extra bedroom.
I walk through to our kitchen, which is twice the size now than it was when we bought the house.
Large French doors lead onto our courtyard garden, and I sit at the small table that overlooks the pots outside.
I zone out, and I have no idea how long I’ve been sitting there when the front door bangs and I startle.
My heart begins to race. If only I could close my eyes and turn invisible, just as I did when I was a child.
A shout comes from the hallway. ‘Jess?’
I don’t answer. I’m too angry with him to give him even that. It’s childish, I know.
I hear him opening doors, turning on lights.
It isn’t long before he’s silhouetted against the kitchen doorway, peering into the darkness.
He almost turns around again and heads upstairs but then he stops.
A second later, a soft glow fills the other end of the room as he turns on the under-cabinet lighting.
He walks halfway across the space but stops by the peninsula where the breakfast bar is situated.
The silence curdles around us, but eventually Luke cracks. ‘I know you’re upset … ’
I let out a sharp laugh. ‘You think?’
He tips his head slightly. ‘Yes. I think. But I didn’t think you’d be this upset. In fact, I didn’t think you’d be upset at all. Surprised, maybe. But I hoped that, underneath it all, you might be pleased.’
His tone is calm and reasonable. It makes me want to punch something. ‘You thought I’d be pleased?’ I echo, trying to keep my voice steady and even. ‘Why, Luke? Please tell me what was going on in your head so I can make some sense of this!’
He sighs. ‘Over the last few years, you’ve said some things that made me think you were softening to the idea.’
My head snaps round. ‘Like what?’
‘Like … Like you’ve said something about family being important a few times, about how you wish you had one like mine. Like tonight! When you did your speech, and you said that it was all about family … ’
I make a face. ‘I didn’t mean her. I meant us. Our family. The one we’re in the process of building.’ We’ve talked about trying for a baby for the last few years but haven’t quite got around to doing anything about it.
‘She is part of our family, Jess. You can’t just erase her.’
I turn to face him fully. ‘Can’t I?’
He looks so confused. I know he doesn’t get it.
But why would he, with his perfect un-divorced parents and happy, successful siblings?
Thinking about his family makes the tears fall.
I hate crying in front of him. I cover my face with my hands, trying to hide the evidence, then I sniff loudly and look up at him.
‘You betrayed me. What I said earlier is true: you had no right to invite her. Not after I’d been so clear how I felt. ’
He opens his mouth.
‘And even if you’d been right, and I was softening towards the idea of having her back in my life, you should have talked to me about it first. Not sprung it on me like some stupid Long Lost Family episode!’
‘But I did try talking to you about it!’
‘When?’ I can’t remember any conversations in the last few weeks when Luke has brought my mother up.
‘Loads of times.’
‘Give me an example?’
Luke shakes his head. ‘I … I don’t remember exactly … I tried maybe two months ago, and over the years, plenty of times, but every time I start to talk about your mum, you shut me down.’
‘Isn’t that my prerogative? She’s my mother. And don’t you dare try and turn this on me! I’m not the one in the wrong here.’
‘I’m not turning it around on you!’ He runs his hand through his hair and turns around on the spot. ‘God, Jess … Why do you always have to assume I have the worst intentions? I was trying to do something good, something nice for you. Can’t you see that?’
‘Why can’t you see that maybe I know what’s good for me, and you don’t always have to swoop in and try to fix things?’
He shakes his head. ‘It’s not like that and you know it.’
It is like that. But he’s never going to admit it. ‘And you haven’t answered my question, not really. Why did you think this would be a good idea? I need to understand.’
‘Like I said … family is family. And I see how much not having what I have hurts you. I see how much you want those strong family ties.’
His words are a stab to my heart. ‘There’s a reason I don’t have what you have – not all families are as happy and healthy as yours, and no amount of trying will make them that way.’
Luke comes around the counter and comes to sit opposite me, waits for me to meet his eyes. ‘You honestly don’t ever want to see her again?’
‘That’s what I’ve always said, isn’t it?’
‘You can’t give her another chance?’
‘No.’
‘But she’s sober now … She got remarried. You’ve got two stepbrothers you don’t even know about.’
I freeze momentarily. This is way too much information. Information Luke knows and I don’t … I stand up. ‘How do you know that?’
He splutters a bit. ‘I … Well … ’
‘Have you been stalking her Facebook page?’
‘No.’
Luke’s just as bad as lying as I am, so I know he’s telling the truth. So how did he … ?
‘Oh, my God! You’ve met up with her!’
His face says it all.
‘Behind my back?’ I get up because, suddenly, I have to move, I have to …
I run my hands through my hair, not even caring a hair grip or two go flying.
‘I can’t believe you!’ I pace some more.
Luke watches me nervously and I turn to him and laugh.
‘She sucked you right in, don’t you see?
She’s got you feeling sorry for her, but it’s all part of the game. A game I refuse to play anymore!’
‘Jess, I don’t think so. I truly think she—’
I hold up a hand and he falls silent. ‘You want to know why I can’t give her another chance?
Because she used them all up. She used them up falling down the stairs naked when I was fourteen and I had to drag her onto the living room sofa and cover her up with a blanket.
When she missed my university graduation because she found some drinking buddies on the train down.
When she went to rehab, because she was really going to do it this time, and then four months later I found her secret stash of tequila hidden in the laundry hamper.
Each time I have given her “one more chance”, she stomped all over it! ’
Luke’s eyes are wide. I’ve talked a bit about what my childhood and teenage years were like, but I don’t think I’ve ever let the ‘naked falling down the stairs’ thing slip before.
‘It was like living with someone who’d pulled the pin out of a grenade and was just walking around with it.
You’re just waiting for the moment it slips from their fingers – and it always does slip, or get dropped, when they’re too wasted to care anymore.
I couldn’t live like that any longer. That’s why I had to go no-contact. I thought you understood!’
I stare at my husband, my rock – or so I thought – silently begging him to come up with a reasonable answer.
‘You’re still angry with her.’
‘You think?’ Uh-oh. Sarcastic Jess is coming out to play.
This is never a good sign. I try and form a more sensible reply.
‘Yes, I’m angry, but that’s just the top layer.
Underneath I was disappointed with her. And not just the “Oh, well … better luck next time” kind of disappointed. I was crushed, Luke.’
Saying those words pops the bubble of my current anger, and it begins to drain away, threatening to no longer do its job of holding back the tidal surge of sadness. He’s braced against the kitchen counter, solid and still, but I need to move again, so I walk back towards the French doors.
‘I expect it from her,’ I say quietly, and I can hear the threat of gluey tears that are currently stuck in my throat. ‘The one person I didn’t expect to let me down was you.’ I turn and look at him. ‘But you have, Luke. You really have.’