Chapter Ashleigh Fitch and Remy Hughes 2002 Aged 40 #13
‘Give Ada my love and give Ben a kiss from me. That’s Ben the baby, not .
. .’ Ashleigh let this hang. She heard his mouth open as if to say something else, but then he was gone.
His absence echoed down the line, and she smothered the desire to cry.
There was far too much to do today for that.
She sat for a while, composing herself, staring out of the window at the comings and goings along Chiswick High Road, wondering if it was her.
Ben? She stifled her laughter and couldn’t wait to hear what Archie thought of it all.
A quick squizz on the Peter Jones website, and a bouquet of baby vests was to be sent to their address, along with a bottle of champers and a box of cupcakes from the bakery they loved. No expense spared.
The door opened and in walked their accountant, Bernie. She wasn’t expecting him, not that it wasn’t nice to see him. He was smiley, round and calm, the perfect antidote to her call with Guy.
‘Hey, Bernie. I’ve just got off the phone to Guy. You’re not going to believe it, but the little one’s arrived!’
‘Oh, fantastic.’ He dumped his leather bag by the chair and sat down hard. ‘What variety did they get?’
‘Little boy, called Ben.’
‘Ben?’ She watched his brow furrow as the fact landed. ‘But isn’t that . . .’
‘It is,’ she confirmed. ‘I can’t even . . .’ They both laughed with their hands over their mouths, as if to do so in the business that was half Guy’s was not the done thing.
‘Well, that’s um . . .’ She watched the man try to find the right thing to say and mentally matched his confusion. ‘It’s going to be fun when one of them is naughty: Ben, stop eating grass!’
‘Ben, don’t cock your leg on the wheelie bin!’
‘Ben’s bitten the postie!’
‘Ben, stop sniffing Fifi’s bottom!’
‘Has Ben had his worming tablet?’
They both chuckled again before Bernie calmed and coughed, as if trying to find a level of gravitas befitting his role as their accountant. He pointed towards the door.
‘Shall I come back when Guy’s here, or do you want to go through the paperwork now? What’s best?’
‘Erm . . .’ She hated missing appointments or having meetings sprung on her when she had forgotten the intention or detail. It happened sometimes; everyone messed up. The image of a blue-and-red striped beanie floated into her thoughts and made her shudder. ‘What paperwork?’
‘The . . . the . . . the partnership stuff, for, for, Ada.’
His nerves were evident.
Ashleigh was glad she was sitting down, as she felt a little light-headed.
‘Partnership stuff for Ada?’ she asked with a fixed smile. Finding it hard to take a full breath.
Bernie’s neck positively glowed with an instant rash of embarrassment. ‘Oh God, Ashleigh, have I put my foot in it? It’s just that I assumed you and Guy had discussed . . .’ He stopped talking.
‘Discussed what?’
‘Making Ada a partner of Gallow and Fitch.’
‘Yes, yes, he did mention it, of course,’ she lied, not wanting to admit to Bernie that not only was she blindsided by the news, but that it was a slap in the face that Guy had done this sneaky thing behind her back. ‘You can leave the paperwork, and we’ll get it all sorted and back to you.’
‘Cheers, Ashleigh.’ He removed a sheaf of papers from his leather bag and placed them on her desk. She put her hands between her thighs, trying to halt the tremble to her fingers.
‘Obviously, no rush! I can imagine he and Ada will have their hands full over the next couple of weeks with the Bens.’
‘Obviously.’ She found a laugh that she hoped might disguise her desire to vomit.
‘What do you think I should send? Flowers, is that the best thing?’
‘I think flowers would be lovely.’ It was incredible to her that she was managing this conversation while the room spun, and the air felt like it was being squeezed from her lungs.
After Bernie had left, she sat for a while and let her pulse settle, staring at the paperwork that was so much more than the sum of its parts.
She and Guy had been good friends since they were eighteen.
He and Archie, even longer. The three had been through all the exploits that went with this phase in their lives, drunken misspent evenings, the many dating disasters, falling in love, marriage, watching their careers take shape as they turned into the men and women they were always destined to become.
Guy was one of the three people in her phone she could say with certainty she could call at one in the morning, and he’d be there, offering help, no questions asked.
Guy, Archie, and of course, her sister Remy; the three pillars that she knew would remain upright in her life, even if she crumbled.
In ordinary circumstances, she’d have called Guy immediately or raced to his house or tracked him down as her anger grew and her frustration gathered and words of discontent and hurt queued up on her tongue, which she would no doubt unleash in a garbled, emotional manner at the sight of him. It wouldn’t be the first time.
‘You absolute dipstick, you could have been killed! You just walked out in front of the fricking car! You’re drunk, go home! Jump in a cab right now and go home! You’re a liability and I’m not your mother!’
Or:
‘You told Archie I liked him? I told you that in confidence, you knob! And now I can’t even look at him or be near him because he knows I like him and he’s so far out of my league it’s just excruciating! He’s seeing Tamara and now I can’t face her either! Thanks a bunch. God, I hate you!’
This felt very different.
Not only was he at home revelling in the baby bubble, which she, no matter how hurt, was not about to burst, but she also recognised that this discovery was not something that required anger or a flare of discontent.
It was more than that: deeper, more affecting.
And this was where she felt the hurt; at a visceral level.
The deceit, the planning, the exclusion, the discussion with Bernie while she was in the dark, all sharp knives that she felt sticking into her chest. Gripping the desk, she took deep breaths with a terrible feeling that she had almost known it was coming, in one way or another.
Waiting for it all her life – the exclusion, the unmasking, the stripping away of something she had no right to. A fraud.
She called Archie.
You have reached the answerphone of Archie Fitch.
She ended the call. Maybe it was a good thing he was otherwise occupied, knowing she needed to think very carefully about what she wanted to say, what she wanted to do, and that probably meant reading the infernal document that seemed to glow on the desk in front of her.
With her phone in her hand, her actions almost instinctive, she made the call.
‘Hey, little dove.’
‘Hey, little dove! Long time no speak!’ Remy replied, and just like that Ashleigh felt the sob leave her body as her tears ran down her face, no doubt smudging her Dior mascara, but that was by the by.
How could Guy do this to her? Why would Guy do this to her? What the hell was going on?
‘Oh. Ash, don’t cry! Don’t cry! What’s the matter? I hate to hear you upset. What’s happened? Did someone take the last Curly Wurly?’
And just the sound of her sister and this reminder of a different time, when she had sobbed upon discovering her dad had eaten her Curly Wurly, was enough to make her smile through her tears that just kept a-comin’.
‘Nothing’s the matter!’ She sniffed.
‘Yes. Ignore me. You do actually sound on top of the world!’
Ashleigh laughed and took a deep breath. ‘Have you got a minute?’
‘For you’ – her sister spoke slowly, sincerely – ‘I have two.’
‘I don’t know what to do,’ she managed to say, her voice no more than a strangulated whisper.
‘About what, my love?’
Her sister’s sweet and empathetic tone only made her tears fall harder. It seemed that once she started talking, she couldn’t stop, and it all came pouring out.
‘About everything! I want to spend more time with Evie! I do, but it’s not easy!
Archie and I hardly see each other, we’re always working, and who has a bloody baby and names it after their dog?
I mean, I like the name Ben, I do, but what the hell?
This is my business, my thing! How can someone just dump paperwork on my desk and tell me that’s how it is? Is that right or fair?’
‘Okay.’ She heard Remy take a deep breath. ‘Let’s take this one thing at a time.’
‘Okay.’ Ashleigh wiped her face and breathed deeply. She pictured crying in the cubicle of their loo in primary school and how her sister had been there, holding her tight. This was what Remy did, made everything feel a little bit better.