Alphabet Weekends - Elizabeth Noble [40]
It had been a vicious row – Natalie self-righteous and hurt, and Simon undoubtedly tired, but also indignant and defensive. ‘What’s the big fucking deal, Nat?’ he had ranted. ‘You don’t even like them, for Christ’s sake. You made that pretty clear when you met them before. Don’t ask me to choose between you and my friends.’ His tone was dangerous. It felt like a threat. ‘We’re not joined at the bloody hip or anything, are we? It’s not like we’re married or anything!’
And that was it. They weren’t. Married. Or even anything. She had her mortgage, her sister-flatmates. He had his rent, albeit on a flat so squalid and so devoid of someone who would do laundry, dinner and fellatio at all hours of the day and night that he spent all his time at her place. And being married, or anything, obviously equated, for him, to being conjoined. Which was so obviously not a good thing as far as he was concerned. And he was telling her that, despite the laundry, the dinner and the fellatio, if she made him choose, he would choose them – people he didn’t even see that often. Choose freedom.
She didn’t often cry. But she had then. She’d crumpled into the sofa and cried. Which had made Simon incredibly angry. He had spat something nasty at her about clingy women and he had gone.
Just for a moment, she couldn’t believe that he had walked out on their row. On its vast, iceberg-like agenda. She remembered half crawling to the window to scan the street for his car. Surely he would be sitting in it, head in hands, wondering what had gone wrong, how he could have been so unkind, and contemplating what to say when he came back in. But of course he had gone.
And he had come back, of course. Late. A little drunk. (He’d left the car, and Natalie remembered that she’d driven him to pick it up the next morning, and they’d been invited in for a coffee, and the friends had spent half an hour reminiscing about the night before, as they would.) And very sorry. He’d breathed garlic and red wine and apology and love and excuses into the back of her head as she lay curled tensely on the edge of her bed.
And she had rolled over and breathed forgiveness and longing, of course.
Now she stood up, and rubbed the small of her back ruefully. She walked over to the window, just as she had that night.
And Tom’s car was still there.
When she opened the front door again, Tom saw that she’d brushed her hair and put on some lipstick. He wound down the passenger window, and she stuck her head in. He started to apologise, but Natalie raised her hand. ‘Complete over-reaction. Bad day. Not bad friend. Bad idea, maybe, but not bad friend.’
‘Lunch? You choose.’
‘Sushi. Much better. E for Eating.’
‘Get in.’
Nicholas and Anna
‘Happy birthday, sweetheart.’
Anna rolled over and saw Nicholas at the door, with a laptray. She’d bought it when Susannah got her A-level results. Each of the girls had had a Bucks fizz breakfast in bed, with a flower in a bud vase, and a scary brown envelope to open. She’d forgotten they still had it – he must have climbed into the loft to get it. She sat up and smiled at him. ‘What’s this?’
‘Breakfast in bed for my beautiful wife.’ He put the tray down.
A pile of cards was tucked into the side. He was trying so hard. The doctor had given her pills, not Prozac, but something like it, and gone on about how depression was nothing to be ashamed of, it was chemical, and just as much in need of treatment as ingrown toenails or even breast cancer. She’d given her a three-month prescription and asked her to come back in April. But she’d urged her to talk to Nicholas about the root causes of her unhappiness as well. Of course.
And, of course, she hadn’t. Not yet. She didn’t know how. She