Chapter 6
Mackenzie arrived for dinner at six thirty that evening. Eve boiled the spaghetti, heated the pasta bowls and set out trays on the worktop.
‘Red or white?’ Mackenzie said, holding up a bottle of each.
‘Red, I think. Thank you.’
‘Have you come straight from work?’ she asked, eyeing her daughter’s belted trench coat and smart black trousers.
Mackenzie nodded, taking a gulp of wine. ‘I’ve been in town all day. I got a bus here from the station. I had a merchandising event at Harrods.’
‘Oooh. Harrods,’ Eve said. ‘How posh.’
Mackenzie shrugged dismissively. ‘It’s what buyers do, Mum. It’s market research. I don’t work for Harrods.’ She took off her coat and draped it over a chair.
‘I love your blouse,’ Eve said.
Mackenzie glanced down at herself, as if she’d forgotten what she was wearing. ‘Thanks. It’s from Zara.’
Eve drained the spaghetti and tipped it into the bowls, then spooned the sauce on. ‘Be careful,’ she said. ‘The sauce is—’
‘Hot,’ Mackenzie finished for her, smiling and picking up her tray, but her smile was tight, Eve noticed.
‘So, what have you been up to?’ Mackenzie asked, walking into the living room with her food and sitting down on the sofa.
Eve felt a stirring inside her. ‘You mean … today?’
‘Well, any day, really.’ Mackenzie picked up her fork and folded the sauce into her spaghetti. ‘I meant, generally.’
‘Oh, you know. The usual,’ Eve said, sitting down in the armchair and balancing her tray on her knees. ‘Lectures. Tutorials. Lesson planning.’
‘Aside from work.’
Eve hesitated. ‘Well, I met someone,’ she began.
‘What? Online?’ Mackenzie smiled and put down her fork.
‘Well … no.’
‘Where, then?’
Eve hesitated, taking a sip of wine. ‘I bumped into him in Blackwell’s, actually, and then bumped into him again and … and he invited me back to his house to …’ She paused.
‘Mum!’ Mackenzie grinned. ‘You didn’t tell me about this!’
‘Well, there wasn’t really anything to tell until today, and actually, there still isn’t. Not really. It was more of an opportunistic thing.’
‘Opportunistic?’ Mackenzie scoffed.
‘Well, I needed some oregano and he overhead me asking for it in the shop and invited me back to his garden to pick some.’
Mackenzie burst out laughing. ‘Oh yeah. That old chestnut.’ She lowered her voice, imitating a male one. ‘Wanna come back to my place and see my oregano?’
Eve smiled at her. ‘It wasn’t like that at all,’ she said. ‘It definitely wasn’t a pick-up line – in fact, he was kind of cool with me to begin with, as if he wished he hadn’t offered, and if I’m honest, I still don’t really know if it’s anything, but …’ She trailed off.
‘But?’ Mackenzie persisted. ‘Go on. What did you talk about?’
Eve hesitated, trying to sort out the conversation she’d had with Joe into the bits she could tell her daughter about and the bits she couldn’t, but she already knew she wouldn’t be left with much.
The truth was that she’d mostly talked about Rich and Mackenzie and how she felt about the way that Mackenzie had bonded with Julia over the wedding preparations, and how she’d come to realise that Mackenzie and Julia were more alike, and had far more in common than she and Mackenzie had ever had, which hurt, but it had somehow made her feel better to say it out loud.
And to give Joe some context for the way she felt about Rich’s new baby, she’d told him that she hadn’t been able to have children of her own, which had necessarily meant telling him they’d adopted Mackenzie when she was seven.
And because Joe had been such a good listener, she’d told him quite a lot more than she’d originally intended to.
‘Oh, nothing important,’ she said now. ‘He made me a cup of tea, that’s all, and we just chatted about this and that.’
Mackenzie frowned and swallowed a mouthful of food. ‘Well, you’re still here, so it looks as though he didn’t try to poison you.’
Eve thought about this for a moment. She supposed, with hindsight, that drinking a cup of tea that had been made for her by a complete stranger – someone she’d only just met – wasn’t the wisest thing she’d ever done.
But, on the other hand, she’d been upset and he had felt sorry for her.
What was he supposed to do? Besides, he hadn’t exactly lured her there secretly.
It had been broad daylight. Anyone could have seen her with him, watched her walking down the street with him and going into his house.
‘He lives in Norham Gardens,’ she said, watching her daughter’s face, knowing this would impress her.
‘Norham Gardens? Are you serious? As in … the most expensive street in Oxford?’
‘Well, I’m not sure if it’s that, but …’
‘What does he do?’ Mackenzie blinked slowly at her.
‘I’m not sure,’ Eve admitted. ‘I didn’t like to ask.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because it might seem … I don’t know. Vulgar?’
‘Well, it should be easy enough to find out,’ Mackenzie said eagerly, setting her tray down on the coffee table and picking up her phone. ‘What’s his surname?’
‘I don’t know,’ Eve said. ‘I didn’t ask.’
‘What number does he live at?’
‘No,’ Eve protested. ‘Please don’t google him. I don’t want you to try and find out. I just … I just want to let things happen naturally.’
Mackenzie dropped her phone into her lap. ‘So, do you think you will see him again?’
Eve considered the question. ‘Honestly?’ she said. ‘I don’t know.’
Mackenzie left an hour later, saying she and Simon were going to visit his parents in Dorset the next day and wanted to make an early start.
Eve stacked the dishwasher, sliced and wrapped the sourdough before putting it in the freezer, and put the uneaten cheese and salad into the fridge.
As she wiped the surfaces down, she found herself daydreaming about the possibility that this might not be her kitchen for much longer, that – instead of living like one of her students – she might, one day in the near future, find herself living in a nice house, with a nice man.
She was thinking about Joe – she knew that.
What was it she liked about him? Mackenzie hadn’t asked the question, and Eve had barely had time to think about it herself, but there was definitely something, something more than just the fact that there wasn’t anyone else on the horizon.
Was it because of where he lived? She didn’t think she was that shallow.
Eve walked into the bedroom without turning the light on and went over to the window, ready to close the blinds.
She hesitated, then flung the window open instead, breathing in a lungful of cool air as she peered out into the vastness of the night sky.
A band of cloud bordered the horizon. Up above – stable, dependable, ever present – was the bright, silver orb of the moon along with a few lone stars.
Directly ahead, she knew, was the park, and behind it, Norham Gardens.
She smiled. This was the very same stretch of sky that Joe could see from his bedroom window, if he were looking out.
She thought of his intense blue eyes and the aura of sadness around him as they’d sat together at the table in his kitchen, as he’d listened to her talk.
It was as if there was something missing for him, as there was for her; something they both craved.
Something dark had happened in his past, she felt sure of it.
As she climbed into bed and closed her eyes, she could almost feel his pain, his hurt, his need radiating towards her as he lay in his own bed on the other side of the park.