Happy Endings (16 page)

Sorry I missed your call again. My reception is a bit patchy. I hope we can talk soon.

I’m in Sydney at the moment and having a blast. It’s incredible, such a cool city and I feel at home here already. I met an Irish girl called Orla and we have so much in common. She’s a little crazy but I think that’s what I need at the moment. She certainly keeps me on my toes! We moved into a house in a suburb called Glebe, which is so hip and bohemian, you’d love it. I’ll email again soon. Just remember that whatever decision you make, do it for you. If you need to talk, call me. Love you.

K x

Jack

When Emma left there was so much I didn’t say. I felt like it was becoming a reoccurring theme in our relationship. We looked at each other but didn’t say anything important. I knew she was still angry with me. I told her it was fine she was going, but I don’t know if she really believed me.

I had a cup of coffee and some toast and sat down on the sofa. I scrolled through the TV channels, but nothing was on. It was midweek and my day off work. I’d usually spend the day with Emma. We’d walk to a local café for breakfast or take the tube into central London and visit a gallery or museum. Sometimes we’d just potter about at home doing nothing, but nothing with Emma was still something. Without her it was dull and I didn’t know what to do with myself. Normally I’d write, but my book was finished and I’d sent letters begging agents to give me a shot. All I could do was wait. Wait for the rejections before I decided what to do with the rest of my life.

After an hour of thinking and another cup of coffee, I decided to give Emma a call. It was almost nine o’clock and I hoped hearing her voice would lift the gloom that had descended upon the living room. I grabbed my mobile and dialled.

‘Hello?’ said a voice.

‘Is Emma there?’

‘She’s in the shower. Who’s calling?’

‘Who’s this?’

‘Rhys. Who’s this?’

The moment I heard his name, a hundred irrational thoughts went flying through my mind, forming a whirlpool of ridiculous paranoia that threatened to pull me under.

‘It’s Jack. Her fiancé,’ I said, not attempting to hide my anger and mistrust. ‘Why are you answering her phone?’

‘I was in her room . . .’

‘While she’s in the shower?’ My voice wobbled with a raging jealousy.

‘Listen, mate, it’s not what you think . . .’

People only said ‘it’s not what you think’ when it was. If he didn’t have a reason to feel guilty, he wouldn’t have said anything. I didn’t know what to think, but I knew that whatever was going on, it wasn’t innocent. I was a bloody fool. Of course something was going on. It was Rhys Connelly. Every woman’s perfect man and he was in Emma’s bedroom while she was having a shower. I threw the phone across the room. I had to get out of the flat and away from everything that reminded me of her. I got dressed, grabbed my jacket and left the flat before standing outside on the street with no idea what to do next.

‘Do you want to talk about it?’

‘Not really. I just want to drink.’

‘We can definitely do that,’ said Therese with a smile. That smile.

I was tired of talking. I was tired of going over things in my mind, trying to figure everything out and be everything to everyone, but mostly I was tired of feeling like a failure. I wanted to get drunk. I wanted to act without thinking, without thought, without fear, without the future hanging over me, without the past judging me, without a plan, without a way home and without thinking about Emma. I wanted to be twenty again, before life became complicated and mixed-up. I guess I wanted to be just like Therese.

‘Then it’s my round,’ I said, downing half of my pint in one go. ‘Back in a sec.’

I looked back at Therese from the bar and she smiled a gorgeous, seductive smile. I felt that pang of lust again. It wasn’t so much a deep need for Therese, but for youth. Why did that always happen? Why did life seem so much better then? Why did I yearn to be twenty again and why did Therese make me feel that way? Maybe it was inevitable. I was fast approaching thirty, my fiancée was off making her life, while mine was stalled, and the only thing that made sense was to go back to a time when things weren’t like that.

‘It’s just . . .’ I started as I returned to the table with our drinks.

‘Just what?’ said Therese.

‘Things were fine, they were. We were fine, but now she has the film . . .’

‘You feel a bit like a spare part?’

‘Exactly,’ I said, drunkenly pointing at Therese across the table. ‘Like a spare part. You got it in one. And there’s Rhys. He’s gorgeous.’

‘I’d do him,’ said Therese and then she laughed. ‘Sorry but I would.’

‘I know. So would I, if I were a girl. And I trust her, I do, but it’s him. How can she resist him?’

‘But she loves you, Jack. Just because he’s gorgeous, it doesn’t mean she doesn’t have any willpower.’

‘I know and I’ve gone over it in my mind a hundred times.’

‘And what did you come up with?’

‘It’s obvious, isn’t it?’

‘Is it?’

‘Yes, of course. She’s going to be a famous actress and I work at a shitty coffee shop. Eventually, whether it’s today, tomorrow or next month, she will leave me for someone better. She has to . . .’

‘Why does she have to?’ said Therese, looking more and more tempting with every passing moment.

‘Because that’s what happens. It just happens. You’ll understand one day.’

‘What, when I’m as ridiculously old as you?’

‘Exactly,’ I said and we both laughed.

‘A campervan,’ said Therese, twisting the straw around in her mouth. ‘All across Australia for like six months.’

‘My dad had one of those.’

‘They’re so cool,’ she half-shouted through the semi-darkness. We were in a club near Leicester Square. I didn’t know which one. She’d led me there by the hand, stumbling through the dark, noisy streets of London. We were standing at the back of the room together, our bodies touching, still somehow holding hands and talking. A song I didn’t recognise came on, but she suddenly jumped up in the air and made a sort of squeal. ‘We have to dance,’ she said, pulling me towards the dance floor.

I didn’t have the chance to tell her I didn’t dance. It was too late.

Except for the occasional wedding, I hadn’t danced in years. But before I knew it, I was giving it everything. I’m sure the alcohol had loosened me up, but I was spinning around, flailing my arms around like a lunatic and jumping up and down with everyone else. I was actually enjoying myself. Therese was a far better dancer than me and soon attracted the attention of a couple of men and so she danced against me and they soon understood and tried their luck with another girl. Therese and I danced together, getting closer, touching more and before I knew it, she had her bum rammed into my groin and was gyrating backwards and forwards and I seemed to lose all control. I was running my hands up and down her body, feeling her breasts and her legs, until eventually she turned around and we were face to face.

‘You’re getting married, you know.’

‘I know.’ She was barely an inch from my face. ‘What are you trying to say?’

‘Just . . .’ she said, and then stopped.

She had her arms around my neck and then the next moment she leant in and kissed me. The music was blaring in the background while Therese and I were locked in our little world, our mouths together and our hands moving over each other’s bodies. It felt frantic and passionate and intense. I hadn’t felt anything like that for a long time and I didn’t want it to end. The alcohol made my head swim and we seemed to kiss forever. Through one song and then another, until eventually we pulled away, both gasping for air.

‘Back to mine?’

‘You sure?’

‘Definitely,’ I said and grabbed her by the hand, leading us through the maze of people and then out into the dark, cold night.

We kissed in the back of the taxi. It wasn’t a black cab, but just an Indian man in a beat-up old Toyota that smelt like kebabs and vomit. It wasn’t the most romantic place in the world but then again young love isn’t romantic, is it? Not that it was love or anything close, but late-night sex with strange girls was never about romance. Sex in your late teens and twenties was about needs and alcohol and when the two collided, it didn’t matter when or where you were. It was the polar opposite to sex with Emma. In a relationship sex becomes like food: it’s a necessity and sometimes you get all dressed up and go out somewhere nice, but usually it’s just something convenient and quick between TV shows.

We slammed in through the front door of the flat, ripping and tearing at each other’s clothes, kissing and frantically trying to devour each other. We were half-naked before we fell onto the sofa. I couldn’t believe what I was doing, but I couldn’t stop myself either. I was too far gone to put an end to it.

‘You want to do it here?’

‘I don’t care,’ said Therese before she grabbed at my head and pulled me down on top of her. The rest of our clothes quickly gave way, falling on the floor in a pile. We were naked and I was about to do something I never thought I’d do. I was going to have sex with someone other than Emma.

I closed my eyes and felt Therese’s body beneath me and it felt good. Suddenly, through the darkness of the room, I heard my mobile buzzing in the corner. It was still lying on the ground where I’d thrown it that morning. That morning that felt so long ago. Therese and I stopped for a moment and I looked up quickly. It was probably Emma.

‘Do you have to get that?’ said Therese, her voice breathless and suddenly so young.

‘No,’ I said before I closed my eyes and sank into her.

Emma

‘Who was on the phone?’ I said, walking back into the room and leaving the steam of the bathroom behind me.

‘Jack, and he sounded a bit weird.’

‘In what way?’

‘Mad, angry, jealous maybe?’

‘Oh shit, he probably thought . . .’

‘Thought what?’ said Rhys, who was lying across my bed looking his usual gorgeous self. His hair was a tangled mess and his firm, muscular body was stretched out like David relaxing between poses for Michelangelo.

‘That we were . . . you know. I told him about our kiss and then you answer my phone while I’m in the shower.’

‘I can see why he’d be jealous . . .’

‘Oh and why’s that?’ I said, drying my hair with the towel and suddenly realising the top of my legs were poking out through the dressing gown and Rhys was looking. I quickly flicked the dressing gown to cover myself.

‘A girl as beautiful as you, stuck in a grand old mansion with me for a week. I could see how he’d think something might happen. It isn’t so hard to believe.’

I felt myself getting warm and blushing wildly.

‘You’re trying to seduce a pregnant woman?’ I said with a silly little giggle. It was the first time I’d laughed or even smiled since I’d found out. ‘That’s a low, even for you.’

‘Barely pregnant,’ said Rhys, sitting up and looking at me. ‘You still look incredibly shaggable.’

‘Rhys, stop it,’ I said with a stern smile. ‘You know we’re not going to happen. Why don’t you go and shag one of the sound girls or that pretty young thing playing your sister?’

‘That’s a bit incestuous don’t you think?’

‘She isn’t really your sister and she does have a great pair of tits.’ I couldn’t believe what I was saying, but I didn’t want him flirting with me. It made me feel guilty about Jack and I didn’t want to encourage him. I didn’t come here to sleep with Rhys. I came here for the film. I felt the tears again and suddenly wanted Rhys to leave. I had to call Jack and talk to him. I had to tell him about the baby.

‘They are a pretty fantastic pair,’ said Rhys, staring off into space. ‘Are you going to be all right?’

‘I’m a big girl. I’ll be fine,’ I said with a reassuring smile. ‘Now go and seduce that poor young girl and break her heart.’

‘Right, will do,’ said Rhys with his gorgeous smile and then he left.

After he was gone I fell onto the bed and cried again. I wasn’t crying because of the baby anymore, but because I’d finally come to a decision. I was crying for that.

Sara Gifford was in the same year as me at school. She was one of the popular girls, always dressed fabulously and she seemed to have everything: poise, confidence, intelligence. Meanwhile, I was the ugly duckling still waiting to grow into my body. I didn’t quite fit. I would blossom at eighteen, but at fifteen Sara Gifford was the girl all the others wanted to be and all the boys wanted to do. Then she got pregnant and vanished without a trace.

Rumours flew around the school. She’d been sent to Coventry. We didn’t know what that meant, but apparently it was awful. She’d been sent to a home for pregnant girls. She’d been taken to far-flung north Scotland. She was suddenly an outcast because she’d made the mistake of making a mistake. She left school on a Friday, got in the back of her dad’s Range Rover and never came back.

A few months later I was walking past her house and saw a Sold sign up in the garden. I realised then that babies didn’t just change lives, they made lives. I was twenty-nine, not fifteen, but I felt the same. This baby wasn’t planned, it wasn’t expected, but it was going to define and shape of the rest of my life.