The week drags past. This module we’re on is the most boring one so far – all health and safety issues in the workplace and risk assessments and protocols. I spend most of the time half-listening in lectures, doodling in the margins of my notepad, and feeling sick at the thought of seeing Jess.
And then Friday comes and I come back from college to find the front door open. Jess’s red and white striped key ring is lying on the dresser, and her coat’s hanging on the end of the banister. I try and act casual, taking the stairs one at a time. I don’t want to look like I’m hurtling up there to see her but I realise I’ve got butterflies in my stomach. God, this is ridiculous.
I knock on the door and wait a second.
‘Hello?’ Jess says from within.
‘It’s me.’
‘Alex!’ She grins as I push the door open, popping my head round.
‘Bloody hell,’ I say. ‘You’re organised. Unpacking already? I always leave my case shoved under the bed for days after I get back from being away. Weeks, sometime.’ Shut up, you fool, you’re gibbering nonsense.
‘Oh.’ A strange expression flits across her face. She bites her lower lip and looks up at me. A long strand of hair curls across her face. ‘I’m not unpacking. I’m packing.’
Her hair’s escaping from a loose ponytail and falling in wavy tendrils around her face. She’s wearing a huge fluffy jumper that hangs off one shoulder and her legs are folded underneath her. She looks adorable, and slightly frazzled, and I can’t read the expression on her face at all.
‘Packing? Didn’t you just get back? Is your Nanna Beth okay?’
‘She’s fine. Really good, actually.’ Her face brightens into a smile, and she adds, ‘She’s been misbehaving again.’
‘She’s going to get into trouble,’ I say.
‘I’m just glad she’s back to herself. She’s doing really well.’
‘Oh that’s good news. You must be relieved,’ I say, conscious I sound stilted, formal.
‘I am.’
‘So what’s the case for?’ I ask.
She blushes slightly and drops her gaze. ‘James. He booked us a surprise trip for my birthday weekend. We’re going to Venice – tonight.’
I don’t think – if I’m really, truly honest with myself – I’d have let myself be as excited about James’s announcement, if it wasn’t for something Becky said. Or rather, what she didn’t say.
Having dumped my stuff at the bottom of the stairs, I had walked into the kitchen just as she made a slightly pointed comment about the other night to Emma.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Emma had said, popping an olive into her mouth. She was standing by the fridge, still wearing her coat. She’d turned around, spotting me, and closed the fridge.
Becky was standing with her back to me. ‘Just saying, you and Alex sloped off without even saying goodnight. Rob and I came back into the kitchen and the two of you had buggered off. It’s not exactly subtle, is it?’
‘Are you sure?’ Emma sounded unconvincing. ‘God. I was so pissed I don’t even remember. Oh, hi Jess.’
Becky spun around and looked at me with an odd expression.
‘When was this?’ I tried to keep my tone of voice casual. I felt a strange sort of dropping in my stomach.
‘Oh we all had far too much to drink one night when you were away, and it all got a bit messy.’ Becky lifted her chin slightly. Emma shot her a look. It was one of those looks – the let’s not mention this now kind.
‘Sounds like a good night.’ I’d cleared my throat. ‘I really need to get my stuff organised,’ I’d said, making a rapid exit. I could hear my heart thudding in my ears.
When I got up to my room I’d flopped down on the bed with a groan. If things were back on between Emma and Alex, it was a fairly obvious sign. I needed to stop half-wondering if there was something between us, and work out what it was I wanted in my own life. And if a weekend in Venice wasn’t a good way to start that, I didn’t know what was. I opened my wardrobe and tried to decide what to pack.
‘Oh my God, that’s the most romantic thing EVER.’
Sophie hadn’t even waited to message back when I shared the news on our little group chat. She’d dropped everything and called. I was on the train back from Bournemouth. I have to admit that it’s sweet that James couldn’t resist the urge to tell me before he saw me in person at the station when I got home to London.
‘How are you feeling?’ I said.
‘Like death.’
Oh yes. There’s another thing – a pretty big one – that happened this week. It’s clearly some sort of cosmic shift, or something. I can’t believe it’s happened. Sophie is actually pregnant. Eight weeks, which is early – I know that much, although I’m a bit hazy on the rest of the details – but she couldn’t resist telling us. Sometimes I find myself wondering if she’d carried on doing headstands after sex, and if that had been the thing that had done the trick. It’s a pretty weird image to have in your head.
‘I feel like I’ve got travel sickness but I’m not moving.’
‘That sounds awful,’ I said.
‘Ah, but it’ll be worth it,’ Soph replied, in a dreamy voice. I could already imagine Gen’s sardonic comments. It’s weird that we’re friends when we’re all so different. I guess that’s why it works. Plus I bet Gen’s going to be the best aunty you can imagine to Sophie’s baby. She’ll be taking it for exotic days out and introducing it to all her thespian friends at the theatre.
‘So what are you taking to wear? Where are you staying? Oh my God, you don’t think he’s going to get down on one knee, do you?’
I felt a leaden thud of fear in my stomach at that. ‘God, I hope not. I hardly know him.’
‘Jess!’ Sophie chided me.
‘I don’t mean “I hope not” like that, just …’ I felt a weird sensation at the idea of it. I mean I like James, and everything, but – the idea of settling down fills me with a vague sense of terror.
‘But he’s lovely,’ Sophie said. I know she’s very keen that we end up together. It’s very Sophie to want me to be with someone she’s selected specifically for me.
‘Oh yeah, yeah,’ I replied, nodding so vigorously that the woman sitting opposite me on the train looked at me as if I’d lost the plot. ‘Totally lovely. I just don’t think we’re quite there yet.’
I half-listened to Sophie chatting happily about odd, alien things, like nursery school waiting lists and house purchase timetables, making the right noises in the right places, staring out of the window as we passed the backs of suburban houses. The gardens follow a pattern. Untidy, stacked with miniature bikes and plastic toys and a huge trampoline on the grass. Neatly kept, with a greenhouse, tidy borders edged with hedges. Scruffy and chaotic, with uncut lawns and shaggy, overgrown hedges.
That’s what our garden in Albany Road looks like. Becky’s been saying she’s going to hire someone to sort it out for ages, but it’s funny, we all forget it’s there. Sophie’s going to be joining the trampoline and plastic toy society before long. When I think of that, I feel a pang of something I can’t put my finger on – it’s not jealousy, though. More the sense that she’s going to disappear out of our lives. I resolved to call her and Gen when I get back from Venice and sort out a night out, maybe dinner or something, and we can catch up. It’s ridiculous that we’re all living in the same place and we go weeks and weeks without seeing each other.
Shortly after I’d finished talking to Sophie, the train ground to a halt at Waterloo and I’d bumped my bag out, walking up the platform towards the gate. As I was showing my ticket, I saw James, taller and blonder than almost anyone else, like a huge Viking (if Vikings wore suits and had neat, well-kept haircuts). His face beamed with a huge smile of welcome and I thought to myself how lucky I am to be loved by someone who feels so safe, and solid, and sweet. He wrapped his arms around me.
‘I didn’t want to be one of those people who does the whole pack your bag, we’re going on a surprise trip thing,’ he’d explained, taking my case and wheeling it along as we headed for the tube. ‘But I thought you’d had enough stress, and you could do with a break.’
He’d stayed on the tube and I’d kissed him goodbye, heading back to Queensway where I got off and bumped my case along the streets to Albany Road. There was a parcel in the porch, and I’d picked it up and opened the door, balancing it under my chin. Inside the house had smelled faintly of one of Emma’s expensive scented candles.
It’s weird. We’ve been living together for almost a year and I still feel like I know nothing about her. I’ve spent hours standing in the kitchen, helping Rob prep vegetables and learning how to cook some of his favourite dishes. Alex and I have walked so far over London that our Fitbits have given us all kinds of badges for effort. Becky – well, she’s never here because she’s always working, but I know her so well from uni that it doesn’t count. But somehow, Emma and I have always kept each other at arm’s length. I guess it’s the Alex thing – not that there’s an Alex thing from my perspective, I remind myself. We’re just friends.
I told her I was off to Venice with James and she looked genuinely delighted for me.
‘Oh, it’s gorgeous. Hang on – I’ve been a couple of times with my ex,’ she said, running up the stairs. ‘I’ve got a couple of really good guidebooks.’
And then, once I’d gone into my room to get my stuff together, Alex appeared. And there was a moment when my heart leapt as his head popped round the side of the door and he stood there chatting to me. I felt weird, somehow, telling him I was going away with James. But he was his usual self, and waved me goodbye and wished me a happy birthday when it comes. I need to get over myself. And him. I’ve created a whole thing between us when there’s nothing there, and there’s a real live James who was messaging me that second. I clicked on my phone screen to read his message, telling myself to forget about Alex once and for all.
So now we’re sitting in Terminal 5, drinking Prosecco and eating cashew nuts and looking at Emma’s guidebooks.
‘We have to do a gondola trip,’ James says, pointing out a photograph on one of the pages. ‘You can’t go to Venice without doing that.’
I make a non-committal noise. There’s something a bit weird, I’ve always thought, about sitting on a boat looking self-consciously romantic while a bloke stands at the end, trying not to look at you.
‘How’s Sophie?’ James asks.
‘Says she feels sick.’ I’ve told James Sophie is pregnant – I checked it would be okay when she called and she said she didn’t mind, but she’s not telling anyone else at work.
‘I’ll cover her back in meetings,’ he says, kindly.
We get on the plane; British Airways, of course. I don’t know why I guessed it would be, but it’s very James. We sit back and relax whilst they come round with champagne. It’s a bit of a change from my last flight, which was a Ryanair last-minute job to Madrid with the girls.
And then, once the flight and taxi are out of the way, we arrive in Venice, and it is so – Venice-y. I mean Venetian. I mean, it’s not like one of those cities where you get there and there are two streets that look like the brochure and the rest of it’s all Holiday Inns and high-rises and dodgy-looking side roads. Literally everywhere you look it’s so beautiful that it makes my heart ache. It’s the most romantic city in the world.
Our hotel room is huge.
‘D’you like it?’
James stands behind me as I look out onto the sparkling water of the canal. I can feel his breath in my hair. He wraps his arms around my waist.
‘It’s gorgeous. More than gorgeous.’
I turn around and he kisses me gently. ‘I’m going to have a shower,’ he says, dropping one more kiss on my temple before he goes. I turn back to look at the view, and a huge yawn escapes from somewhere deep inside me. I take a photo and share it on Instagram. Nanna Beth likes it straight away and leaves a comment:
Love you very much xxx
I feel tears prickling at the corners of my eyes. It’s been such a long week, and I am so tired. Nanna’s back in her sheltered accommodation, only with a carer popping in once a day just to make sure she’s okay. She’s got a ton of medication to take each morning and evening, but she’s sorted it all out with neat little pillboxes – it’s very her. But oh, I miss her. I wish I could be there – wish I didn’t have to be so far away. Wish I wasn’t so tired …