The telephone rings. ‘Hello,’ Isla says, picking up, ‘the Wild household. Oh hi, Dad. Why did the Mexican man push his wife off the cliff ?’
‘Can you talk?’ Dan asks me when I come on to the line.
I dread what he wants to talk about. I’ve been putting off the conversation all week, hoping it would go away. I pour myself another glass of wine before taking the call upstairs in my bedroom. ‘Who is she, Dan? Why haven’t you mentioned her before?’
‘I didn’t want to introduce you until I knew she was going to stick around.’
‘Is she CRB checked?’
‘For fuck’s sake, January.’
‘What does she do?’
‘She’s a teacher.’
‘Are you sure you’re ready?’
‘You know what, forget it.’
‘It’s fine. Let’s meet her and get it over with,’ I snap.
‘This isn’t about me being ready, is it? Sometimes, January, I think youstillhaven’t forgiven me.’ The line goes dead.
I sit down on the edge of my bed, staring at the phone. What did I expect? That Dan would never meet anyone ever again? Neither of us has had a serious relationship since we’ve been back in touch. I had a short and sweet relationship with one of Lucas’s friends, Tom, a lawyer. I met him at my brother’s flat. Isla was staying, for the first time, with Dan for a long weekend and I was feeling strange without her. I kept on looking over my shoulder, expecting to see her face or hear her voice. I couldn’t get used to not having to get her an orange juice or help her to walk upstairs. Then Lucas had called unexpectedly; he’d wanted something, can’t remember what. He asked if I could pop round and I was only too pleased to get out of my house.
That night I ended up getting so drunk with Lucas and his friend that I can’t even remember taking a cab home with Tom. The following morning I woke up disorientated, dressed in a T-shirt that had that unmistakable man smell, a smell I’d missed. I expected Isla to come into the room and hop on to the bed. Instead I rolled over to face Tom. ‘We didn’t do anything, did we?’ I asked, self-consciously, but nevertheless thinking it was a shame.
‘Nothing. Which is why we have to make up for it now.’
I smile, remembering us ending up on his bedroom floor, naked, laughing breathlessly. ‘Well, I haven’t done that for a while,’ I told him.
He grinned. ‘Which is why we have to do it all over again.’
Each time Isla went to see Dan for the weekend, Tom and I hooked up. It was perfect; he didn’t want commitment; I wanted distraction from being alone. It went on for six months until finally he met Isla. I think we were both unsure if this thing between us was more than a thing, so I broached the subject of him coming over one weekend. Isla didn’t stop us from making a go of it, but she did burst the bubble. She didn’t like him or the attention he gave me. ‘She’sMYmum,’ she shouted, throwing chocolate cake mixture in his face and down his shirt. Tom had a sense ofhumour failure (I don’t blame him for that – it was an expensive shirt), but he was desperately awkward around her. When we tried to pick up from where we’d left off it didn’t work. Sex can take you only so far. We had nothing else to keep us going. His last communication was to send me a bill for the dry-cleaning. Since then I have invested practically all my energy and emotion into Isla and I’ve been happy in so far as it keeps everything simple. Although sometimes…
I think about Dan’s new girlfriend again. I imagine he’s had many flings, but maybe now, finally, he has met ‘the one’ who will fit into our lopsided triangle. But the truth is, I’ve felt comfortable with our routine, I’ve loved the way we have co-parented Isla these past few years. Despite everything that has happened between Dan and me, I’m proud that we have become friends again.
I head back into the kitchen. ‘Is something wrong?’ Ruki asks.
I confide that Dan has a serious girlfriend. ‘I want her to be nice,’ I say quietly, ‘of course, I want Isla to like her, but…’
‘You still have feelings for him?’
‘I don’t think so.’I don’t think so?Confused I say, ‘No.’
‘Perhaps it’s timeyouwent out on some dates,’ Ruki suggests, taking a seat at the kitchen table, next to me.
‘I’m fine,’ I pretend, hearing all my friends, even Graham, Lucie and Jeremy, asking why I chose to be on my own. Yet I only have to think of Dan and how wrong everything turned out between us not to want to complicate my life again. I’m better off on my own. At least I’m in control and no one can hurt Isla and me.
‘You’re fine,’ Ruki says dubiously.
I touch my locket. ‘I have a beautiful daughter and Spud. I have no one snoring in bed. I have you. We have cottage pie in the oven.’
Ruki smiles, but I sense she can see my loneliness. She wants to understand exactly what happened between Isla’s father and me to make me feel this way. All she understands is that Dan and I parted ways, as millions of couples do.
She knows I have told her only half the story.
‘I had a terrible relationship back home,’ Ruki confides. ‘He left me when I needed him most, broke my heart. But I won’t give up on love. Love may hurt, but not loving hurts more.’
