Neil would have been very jealous. Up to a point. Ed sat back in his chair and folded his arms. He was on location in the garden of a sprawling manor house in the heart of the Home Counties, directing a promotional video for Sit-Down Showers—a device which no one who is fat, over fifty and terminally unfit should be without.
The idea was that if it was all too much of an effort to stand up for the three minutes required to shower, why not sit in a cozy, plastic armchair while you lather up your bits instead? If you were actually infirm rather than just lazy, this would be of great benefit, but the powers-that-be at Sit-Down Showers wanted to stress the glamour and labor-saving elements of their products rather than the fact that they’d come in a bit damn useful if your legs were buggered.
To illustrate this, they’d chosen a lithesome twenty-year-old brunette called Bonnie, with barrage balloon breasts and a 1970s curly perm, to “model” a Sit-Down Shower, involving her, of course, in getting her extremely scanty bikini and her curly perm very wet. Bonnie’s legs were definitely not buggered, but it was becoming abundantly clear that her brain probably was. They were on take 472 or something—Ed had lost count and the will to live—and she had yet to manage saying anything other than “Shit-Down Sowers” before dissolving into fits of giggles.
The first few times, the crew had roared, which was a big mistake, because she’d then played it for laughs for half an hour. Then, when they’d lost interest, she’d gone for the sympathy vote, and now didn’t appear to be able, even if she was willing, to nudge her needle out of the groove it was stuck in. Ed felt tempted to go and slap her across the face to snap her out of it, like they do with hysterical women in films.
Neil would have found this all very amusing. And this is where they differed. As brothers, they had never shared the same taste in women. Neil liked airheads. He liked woman whose breasts were more evident than their brains. The subtle charms of wit, conversation and intelligence didn’t score highly on his brother’s eligibility chart. Neil would have enjoyed just looking at Bonnie, despite the fact she was having trouble stringing one sentence together. Perhaps that was why Neil could never hold down a relationship, because he always ended up with women who were the complete opposite of his ideal. All his serious relationships had been with hard, controlling women who had tried to change Neil and ultimately dumped him when his inability to morph into someone else became apparent.
It had taken them hours to rig up a working shower cubicle in the middle of a garden just so that viewers would immediately make the connection that it was much more natural and wholesome to take a shower rather than a filthy old bath. The main problem had been to protect the shower from the intermittent bouts of rain that had also brought proceedings to a halt.
Trevor sidled up to him. “Shall we break for lunch?” he suggested. “See if she can get her gob working after that?”
“Good idea.” Sandwiches, soup and tea had been set up in a tent at one side of the garden for the crew, and Trevor ambled off to tell the lads that they could take a break for half an hour, during which time they would, undoubtedly, all take turns chatting up Bonnie.
Orla had been watching from the sidelines, networking with the various luminaries of Sit-Down Showers who had turned up ostensibly to see how their advertising budget was being spent, rather than admitting that they were taking the opportunity to ogle Bonnie, who had on relatively few occasions graced page three. She, too, made her way toward him. “Lunch?” Orla said.
“Not yet.” Ed waved his mobile. “I’ve a few important calls to make.”
“Want me to bring you a sandwich?” This was possibly the nicest Orla had ever been to him, and he wondered if she sensed the coolness in their relationship since the “bedroom” conversation.
“I’ll follow you in a minute,” he said, forcing a smile. “Won’t be long.”
Ed fingered the envelope in his pocket and, when Orla was safely out of harm’s way, pulled it out. Even the sight of it gave him a shiver of something. Trepidation? Pleasure? He wasn’t sure. But he was sure he recognized the writing on the envelope, he just wasn’t certain it was Ali’s. Maybe she’d tried to disguise her handwriting. Maybe she’d even got Jemma to write it. He opened it and slipped the gold-edged invitation from inside, his fingers not entirely steady, shaking like a schoolboy’s. There were only three things written on the card, in the same flowing hand:
The Ivy
Saturday 8.30
Please Be There
Ed stared at it, deep in concentration, eyebrows knitted together in a frown. It could only be Ali. This was exactly the sort of thing she would do. Or the sort of thing she used to do. She was always secretly arranging surprises for his birthday or special occasions—over the years he’d been treated to flying lessons, white-water rafting, rally driving, hot-air ballooning, weekends in Paris, Rome, Milan. You name it, he’d done it. He only had to mention, in passing, an interest in some new experience, and Ali had dutifully organized it. So much so that he would have been more surprised if there hadn’t been a surprise. Birthdays had always been fun times with Ali, and had made him feel very loved, very special. A lump came to his throat. Perhaps he hadn’t said so at the time.
It would have cost her a lot to have made a gesture like this. Not just financially—which wasn’t a mean consideration with the prices at somewhere like The Ivy—but the emotional cost would have been huge. They had always promised themselves to go there, but had never quite made it. Could it be that she was making the first tentative step toward reconciliation? There was a part of him that really hoped so. He’d felt terrible after their meeting yesterday, and this must already have been in the post. Ed ran his finger round the wavy gold edge. He’d been a bastard, and Ali had looked fantastic and as if she wasn’t missing him at all, which had made him want to be even more of a bastard. She’d phoned this morning to give Christian’s version of events of the dope-smoking discovery, and he’d done nothing more about it other than ground the children for the rest of their natural-born lives. Yet.
Besides, she was hardly likely to be all mysterious and stump up for The Ivy if all she wanted to do was discuss divorce, was she?
Orla returned bearing a plate of curled-up cheese sandwiches on tired white bread and a cup of tea. “Your tea’s going cold,” she said.
“Thanks,” Ed said.
“I wanted to show you how much I love you.” She kissed him on the cheek, and Ed scanned the garden to check that no one was watching, resisting the urge to brush away the damp circle she had left behind.
Orla sat down beside him. Ed turned sideways and attempted to tuck the invitation into his pocket without her noticing. Her eyes flickered across the card, and he wondered if she had managed to read it.
“What’s that?” Orla asked.
Ed shook his head. “Nothing.”
“Then why are you looking so guilty?” She laughed lightly and handed him his lunch.
“It’s from Ali,” he admitted.
Orla frowned. “Bad news?”
“I don’t think so,” Ed said with a smile, and lifted up a corner of his sandwich to see just how little cheese lurked beneath. He bit into the flaccid bread absently. It had to be Ali. Who else could it be?