Simon's eyes remain fixed on the ground. He stares unsee-ingly at a slab of flooring. 'I don't know,' he says finally. 'You tell me.' At last he looks up at me.
'Of course not! After all we've been through these last few weeks, do you really think I'd still be in contact with him? He was just shit-stirring!'
'Isabel, let me ask you a question. Before you came back to Pantiles, how did you feel about me? Really feel about me?'
I blink; the query has taken me completely by surprise. 'Well, I, er, suppose that, em …' His eyes are fixed on my face. 'I didn't like you very much,' I finish in a small voice.
'Really, Izzy? Just "didn't like"? That's a bit mild for someone of your strength of character. Are you sure you didn't hate me? Don't forget that I was there when we were kids. I remember it just as well.'
I inhale sharply. This is the first time we have openly talked about his bullying. 'Okay, I hated you. Is that what you want to hear? Does that make me guilty of feeding information to Rob Gillingham?'
'Was that ever the plan?'
'What do you mean?'
'Did you come back to Pantiles to extract some sort of melodramatic revenge? I mean, you have to admit that you going out with a non-executive director of the company I am trying to buy is a pretty big coincidence.'
'We
had
finished by the time I got here and, yes, it was a coincidence. You're going to have to accept that. Are you also saying that I managed to arrange for a ball for five hundred people to happen here at the same time?'
'I'm saying that you and Rob might have seen an opportunity. Something that you could both get something out of. And you know, Izzy I wouldn't blame you. I really wouldn't.'
'What are you trying to say? That my behaviour has been a sham?' My heart is pumping in my ears. I don't like the turn this conversation is taking; it feels terribly dangerous.
'Maybe not. Maybe it was all for real. Maybe you and Rob didn't plan anything at all.'
'We didn't!'
'But my point, Izzy, is that somewhere very deep inside me, I doubt you.'
'You doubt me?' I say disbelievingly.
'Yes, and that makes me feel guilty as hell. Because of our past. Because of what happened fifteen years ago. I did all that stuff to you but I still doubt you.'
'I can't believe you would think I would do anything to hurt you or your family.'
'I'm sorry, I can't help it.'
'You're the one with the nasty streak, not me,' I snap.
He flinches slightly at this and I look down at the table, ashamed of myself.
'That stuff won't go away, will it?' he says quietly. 'You'll be watching all the time for some glitch in my character. Some small-minded act or thought that might signify a return to that time.'
I hesitate just for a millisecond – he has touched a nerve.
'I would if I were you,' he adds.
'Then tell me why, Simon. Tell me why all that stuff happened fifteen years ago.'
He looks at me for a long time and reaches out a hand to touch my face. I smile hopefully. 'There's nothing to tell, Izzy,' he says simply and walks from the room.
It is a few seconds before I manage to gather myself together and flee up to my room, Meg trotting after me. I stand in front of the mirror staring at myself. A very pale and scared-looking Isabel stares back at me. Don't you cry, I threaten myself, don't you dare. I think about finding Dom or Aunt Winnie but realise that if I do I will have to relate the whole conversation and that will well and truly open the floodgates.
Earlier there was no doubt in my mind that Simon and I shared some sort of intimacy. It was the same intimacy we had over fifteen years ago, until the bullying started – which I can't explain the reason for. So maybe I don't know this man at all. Maybe I have been imagining things that simply aren't there. Maybe some leopards don't change their spots. What the hell am I going to do? Go home, says a small voice inside me. Go home where you can cry your eyes out and eat Cornettos to your heart's content.
I close my eyes and rest my forehead against the cool glass of the mirror. There's a slight problem in all of this. The slight problem is that I think I love him. Almost as much as I did all that time ago, but this time it's a different sort of love. More intense, more fierce. But, reason tells me, I loved him fifteen years ago and look what happened there. Am I so stupid as to risk all that again?
And as tough as that is to handle, I think I have also fallen in love with his family. I not only want him, I want his family to be mine too. But how is this going to work, Izzy? Your Aunt Winnie and Monty look as though they might be forming some sort of an attachment and so you'll be forced to occasionally return to this house and this family and watch Simon at the heart of it. Watch him get married, watch his children growing up, chatter idly to Aunt Flo while wishing so hard that it was you at the centre of it all. I clench my hands into fists. It is almost too much to bear.
I go over to the bed and lie on it. Meg hauls herself up next to me and settles down in the crook of my legs with a contented sigh. For the next half an hour or so I remain exactly like that, staring numbly at the ceiling, taking a small amount of comfort from the furry body next to me. Eventually, I pull the duvet over me and close my eyes in an effort to blot out the pain. I suppose I must have dropped off – Lord knows how little sleep I've had over the last few days – because the next thing I know there is a loud knocking at the door. I awake with a jolt. 'Izzy? It's Dom. Can I come in?' he calls.
'Of course!' I reply.
He pokes his head around the door. 'Here you are! I've been looking all over! What's wrong?' he asks in alarm, seeing my miserable face.
'Simon,' I mumble.
'What about him?'
I feel tears prick at my eyes again. Dom comes over to the bed, sits on one side of it and gives me a big hug. This little piece of humanity is too much for me and I succumb. When my sniffles eventually calm down, Dom makes me tell him everything.
'So let me get this straight. Simon doesn't want to be with you because of your childhood—'
I interrupt him. 'He didn't even say that he wanted to be with me.'
'Oh. So even if he did, he wouldn't because of your past together.'
'I think so.'
'What do you think?'
'I don't know.'
'Would you be able to trust him again?'
'He hurt me pretty badly. I suppose he broke my heart really. I think he's right; we couldn't ever be together.' Tears fill my eyes once more. 'Our childhood will always be between us, won't it?'
'What are you going to do?'
'Go home, I think.'
'That would be the smart and sensible thing to do.'
'You really think so?'
'When we're back in London, I'll buy you a Cornetto.'
He pats my knee and finally says, 'Do you want me to go and find you some chocolate?'
'There you go. You can see now why I thought you were gay, can't you, Dom?'
'I am merely in touch with my feminine side,' he says with as much dignity as he can muster and sets off, his feminine side telling him that he doesn't need an answer to the chocolate question either.
I don't think I have ever been so miserable in my entire life.
Oh yes, silly me. I have.
C h a p t e r 24
A
hideous evening ensues where Simon refuses to make direct eye contact with me, even when Aunt Flo starts a lively debate as to the attractiveness of short hair or long hair on men. After a while I leave them to their arguments and go to bed. I lie awake until about four, listening for the chimes of the grandfather clock in the hall until I belatedly realise that the bailiffs have taken it away. This agitates me so much that I have to turn the light on, check the time and then Meg and I pace up and down for a bit while I try to persuade myself that the events of the last few days do not justify my taking up smoking for real. Although I fail to rouse Dom, who can sleep through anything, I do wake a sodding grasshopper who begins to chirrup happily. I feel as though this is all part of a giant jigsaw puzzle but all the pieces haven't been given to me yet – if I could just understand what's missing then maybe everything will be all right.
I must fall asleep at some point because when I wake up Dom's bed is empty, stripped of all its covers, and his bags are sitting in a neat pile at the end of the bed.
There's a knock at the door and Meg bounds into the room. Dom follows with a cup of tea. 'You know,' he says, 'I think I'm going to miss this place. Our flat will seem quite empty after all this.'
'What are you going to do now?' I ask, conscious of his current state of unemployment.
'Write my novel and live off the money from this job for a while, I suppose.'
'So you'll be at home all the time?' I take a sip from the cup.
'Shall we ask if we can take Meg with us?'
'Just what I was thinking,' I smile, hugely comforted by the fact that we could possibly adopt her. Otherwise it would have been yet another loss.
'I'll go and ask now. You get dressed and packed and I'll see you downstairs.'
'Who's down there?' I ask. I'm not sure if I want to see Simon.
'All the family except Simon. He's preparing for the press conference this morning. Then we're helping load up the furniture for Aunt Winnie to take back. After that, I suppose it's the office for you and home for me.'
He smiles and leaves me to it. After I've got dressed, I start to pack up my belongings and then spend the best part of ten minutes staring out of the window. You'll feel better when you leave, I tell myself firmly, and then spend another ten minutes staring out of the window. There's another knock at the door. 'I'm just coming,' I yell at Dom and start frantically stuffing my bags with clothes.
'No, it's me, Izzy. Aunt Winnie. Can I come in?'
I walk over and open the door. Aunt Winnie and Jameson practically fall through it.
'Hello dear! Just came to see if you're all right! I've been worried about you.'
I frown. 'I'm fine, just packing up.'
Meg tries to play with Jameson but Jameson, being older and wiser, is having none of it. He curls up in the corner with a dignified air. Aunt Winnie closes the door behind her. I make a great show of actually folding my clothes up to pack rather than my usual practice of just stuffing them all in.
I'm fine until she actually speaks. 'So you're leaving, are you?'
I feel the tears well up in my throat. 'What else can I do?' I ask, practically choking with the effort of keeping my emotions at bay.
Aunt Winnie thinks I'm suffocating and gives me a couple of hefty slaps on the back. I eye her warily in case she starts the Heimlich manoeuvre.
She sits down on the bed. 'You could stay. Stay and see what happens.'
'Simon and I have talked about it. We don't think it's smart.'
'Smart?' snorts Aunt Winnie. 'I think of you as many things, Izzy, but smart isn't one of them.' I look at her sharply. Is that what she meant to say? 'Look, Izzy. After you went to bed last night, Dom told me what happened.' What happened when? This is the problem with having so much history in one place. She sees me looking doubtful and adds, 'When you and Simon were kids.'
'Oh.'
'I think Dom was worried about you and needed a second opinion. I kind of knew something had happened anyway. I mean, you were always really funny when Simon's name was brought up and I could see that you never wanted to come back here to visit after you'd left.'
'What was your second opinion?'
'History is a funny thing, Izzy. If you had met Simon Monkwell for the first time a couple of weeks ago, would you still be in this situation? Of wanting to be with him, I mean? Or would you have had an altogether different impression of him?'
'Er, I don't know. Are we going anywhere with this, Aunt Win? Anywhere specific?' I could really do without the philosophy lesson.
'Think of old school friends.' I think of the few I made when Sophie and I were living with Aunt Winnie. 'If you met them for the first time now, would you be friends with them? Or is the bond that you share simply common memories?'
'Are you questioning how I feel about Simon?' I tentatively ask, to try to find the point to all this.
She looks relieved and nods slightly. I come and sit next to her on the bed. 'Aunt Winnie, I love him because I know him so well. Not because we share common memories. In fact, it's the common memories that are keeping us apart.'
Aunt Winnie pats my hand for a second and looks down at the floor. 'Izzy, since we're talking about shared history, I think there's something I should tell you.'
I look at her uncertainly. Is this the link I have been missing? The thing that will make everything fall into place?
'I meant to tell you ages ago.'
'What?' This comes out a little more tersely than I intended.