16

In the past week Leah had seen a bathroom with mould growing on the carpet, a kitchen with a pet rat on the counter and a bedroom with no windows. She’d met a man whose trainers she could smell from the front door, a woman who’d just had a face lift and a guy with five Chihuahuas. She’d been told variously that she was allowed to watch television only until nine o’clock, that she would have to stay out on Friday nights and that she wasn’t allowed to drink alcohol in the ‘common parts’. If the flat was nice, then the flatmate was awful; if the flat was awful, then the flatmate was even worse.

Leah phoned Amitabh when she got home from a man called Willy’s malodorous, murky basement flat on Hornsey Lane. She phoned him partly because she was missing him and wanted to hear his voice, but mainly because she was so cross with him for putting her in this position in the first place.

‘Hello, it’s me.’

There was a split second of silence. ‘Hello.’

‘How are you?’ She tugged her trainers off with her feet.

‘Good,’ he said, ‘I’m good. How are you?’

‘Shit. I’m shit. Actually.’

‘Oh.’ She could hear Amitabh sitting down, presumably on his bed. She could imagine him stroking his chin like he did when he was uncomfortable.

‘Yes. This whole flat-hunting thing is a nightmare. I’m too old for flat shares. I’m too set in my ways. I can’t live with anyone else.’

Amitabh sighed. ‘I can’t understand why you’re not looking to buy.’

‘Because,’ she said crossly – they’d had this conversation a million times – ‘I have one hundred and two pounds in my bank account and last time I looked flats in London were going for a bit more than that.’

‘Get a mortgage,’ he said. ‘They’re doing 100 per cent mortgages again now, you know. 110 per cent even.’

‘Mmm,’ she said, ‘that’s a good idea. Tie myself up for the rest of my life with the mortgage from hell that I will never be able to pay off because I work in a shop. And of course never actually go out again because I won’t be able to afford to.’

Amitabh sighed.

‘This is all your fault, you know. All of this.’

He sighed again.

‘I mean, what were you thinking? What were you actually thinking?’

‘I wasn’t thinking. I was just … being. You know.’

‘No. I don’t know. All those weddings we went to, didn’t you ever, you know, stop to think about what was expected of you? Didn’t you sometimes lie in bed at night wondering what was going to happen to us? How it was all going to end?’

‘No,’ he said, ‘I honestly never did.’

‘So what did you think about?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Food. Work. Telly. I suppose that it hadn’t occurred to me that I was getting so old. That we were both getting so old. I suppose I just thought that we had for ever.’

Leah let a small silence highlight his words. ‘So,’ she said eventually, ‘if that old man hadn’t died and I hadn’t proposed we’d just have carried on, would we, carried on indefinitely, until one day we’d suddenly have woken up and realised we were fifty?’

‘Yes. No. I mean, I’d have realized sooner than that that it wasn’t working, but the old man dying made it happen earlier.’

‘Well, then, praise be to Gus for choosing his moment so well. Because it’s bad enough being in this fucking predicament at thirty-five. Imagine if I’d been forty? In fact, you know something, at this precise moment I’m feeling a lot of anger towards you … a lot of anger.’

‘Oh, God, Leah. I’m sorry.’

‘Yeah, well, sorry’s not going to help. Sorry’s a load of bollocks frankly. You’re a load of bollocks. A load of pathetic, immature, selfish, fat bollocks.’

‘Fat?’

‘Yes, fat. You’re fat. And hairy. But that doesn’t matter because some poor woman will just have to marry you anyway because her mum and dad tell her to.’

There was a stunned silence, followed two seconds later by a roar of what Leah at first assumed was indignation, but quickly realized was laughter.

‘Oh, God, Leah. You’re so funny. I miss you.’

Leah felt her adrenalin levels drop and her muscles relax, then she smiled. ‘I miss you, too,’ she said. ‘Loads. I wish you weren’t Indian.’

‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘so do I.’

It fell silent for a moment, then Leah looked at her watch. ‘Shit,’ she said, ‘I’ve got to go.’

‘Go where?’

‘To the Clissold Arms. It’s Toby’s birthday.’

‘Toby who?’

‘You know, Toby, across the road. Young Skinny Guy. Except he’s not that young. He’s thirty-nine.’

‘How come you’re going to the pub with him?’

‘He invited me.’

‘What? Like on a date?’

‘No. Of course not. He wants me to meet his house-mates.’

‘What – you mean you’re going to meet the Teenager? And, and the Air Hostess. And Sybil?!’

‘Well,’ she said, ‘maybe. I’m not sure who’s coming.’

‘And the Girl with the Guitar?’

‘I told you, Am, I don’t know.’

‘Oh, God, that’s not fair. I lived there for three years, then I move out and five seconds later you’re getting in with the neighbours. Can I come?’

‘No, Am, you can’t. We don’t go out together any more, remember?’

‘But we’re friends, aren’t we? We can still see each other?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe. Look, I have to go now. I’ll speak to you soon, OK?’

‘OK,’ he sniffed. ‘And Leah?’

‘Yes?’

‘I love you.’