‘Well then,’ he cuts me off. ‘We know what to do. It’s therightthing to do, Jan.’
‘I can’t. I can’t do it.’
Dan polishes off his beer. Anger clouds his face now. ‘You have to. It’s either that or you have the baby on your own. I’m serious, J. I don’t want a kid and I can’t believe you’re even considering it.’ He gets up.
‘Dan! Wait!’
He returns. We stare at one another; suddenly we’re on opposite sides.
‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘I can’t do this.’ I watch as he chucks a ten-pound note on to the table and leaves and a voice tells me not to go after him, it will only make it worse.
Back at the flat, I stab at the buttons once more. Please answer, please answer. I pray that Granny has just walked through the front door. It clicks into their machine again. ‘Timothy and Patricia aren’t here to take your call so please leave us a message…’
‘Granny, it’s me,’ I say, yearning to hear her voice. ‘Ring me the moment you get this.’
Alone in the flat, I pace the corridor, unable to think straight or sit still. I stare at my mobile, wondering, hoping, praying that Dan might call to say that he overreacted. He’ll suggest coming round tomorrow to talk it through more calmly. Or maybe he won’t call this evening. He’ll sleep on it. I’ve had time to get my head round the idea of having a baby. He hasn’t. He’ll wake up tomorrow feeling different.
I lean against the wall, sink down to the ground and throw my mobile on to the floor. I place my head on my knees. How can it be that, a couple of weeks ago, I felt like the luckiest woman alive with my entire future ahead of me? Deep down I know Dan won’t call me. I can’t see him ever changing his mind. Clearly he hates the idea of being pinned down with a child so soon. In many ways I don’t blame him.
What was his news? What did he want to ask me? Surely Dan will call? If he doesn’t, I’ll ring him tomorrow. He can’t throw us away just like that. I feel lost and scared too, not sure which way to turn. Maybe Ishouldlisten to him? Maybe I should get rid of it. I touch my stomach. I feel like a child who has run out into a busy road without looking left or right. Horns are screeching. Drivers are shouting at me to get out of their way. I stand paralysed in the middle of the road. My mother is scolding me for not looking before I stepped out on to the road. This is how lives are lost, January. But she takes my hand firmly in hers and guides me safely to the other side of the road.
I crawl across the floor to retrieve my mobile. I ring home again, wishing I were back in my blue bedroom, looking out to the sea and hearing the sound of the waves. What will Granny think? Will she be angry? Even worse, disappointed? All I want is to feel her arms around me. I take a steadying breath and wipe my eyes with my shirtsleeve. I’m in trouble. Real trouble. Please answer. It rings and it rings, before I hear her familiar voice on the answering machine again. I hang up. ‘I want my mum,’ I say, rocking backwards and forwards. ‘I want my mum.’
I don’t move until Lizzie comes home. ‘It’s over,’ I say to her. ‘Dan doesn’t want to know.’ I’m grateful she asks me no questions. My body aches with tiredness, drained of every single emotion. Lizzie helps me up and slowly walks me to my bedroom. Carefully she takes off my clothes and my shoes and helps me into bed. ‘We’ll get through this. You’re strong, January,’ she says, before switching off my bedside light and gently shutting the door.
13
2014
It’s Friday, late morning. Ward is at a pitch with the head of the Sevenoaks office. Graham and Lucie are discussing one of our clients who is looking for a house in Devon with a ‘nice long driveway’. I am finding it hard concentrating on my brochure when all I can think about is meeting Dan’s girlfriend tomorrow. ‘Who doesn’t want a nice long driveway?’ says Graham. ‘I’d like one, but hey, dream on.’
‘She also wants a wreck,’ Lucie reminds him.
Graham looks as if he’s playing the memory-card game. The houses registered with us along with our applicants are all cards faced down, Graham is thinking hard before he turns two over, hoping to find a matching pair. ‘I’ve got it!’ he pronounces, swivelling round in his chair to face her. ‘How about that pigsty of a place in Suffolk?’
Lucie and Graham high five before Lucie makes a telephone call.
Ten minutes later we discover our applicant doesn’t want the pigsty in Suffolk. ‘You see, when a person says they want a banana,’ says Graham, peeling his own, ‘they want a banana. Not a fig.’
‘But what you don’t ask you’ll never find out,’ quotes Nadine in her singalong voice, before sticking her head round the door to see if we want anything for lunch from the deli round the corner. ‘I’ve discovered a delicious beansprout salad,’ she says, with peculiar excitement.
Later that day I take Mrs Roberts upstairs to the boardroom. Mrs Roberts is one of our new clients, here to discuss the forthcoming brochure of her five-bedroom house in St Albans. She’s rake-thin, dyed blonde hair held back with a claw clip. She’s wearing a chic cream shirt with a navy jacket, but her fifty-something-year-old skin is more lined than it should be, either from heavy smoking or too much worrying.
‘Thank you for meeting me,’ she says, as we sit down. ‘I feel the brochure has to be perfect.’
‘I couldn’t agree more, but I think it’s looking promising so far.’ As I lay the designs out on the table, Mrs Roberts puts on her glasses and scrunches her nose in concentration, before tapping my arm. ‘Why isn’t my greenhouse in the floor plan?’
I know Mrs Roberts is an avid gardener. The few times I have called, she’s always just come in from her greenhouse where she tells me she’s been transplanting her seedlings.
‘Well, technically, we don’t need to include—’
‘But it’s a lovely greenhouse.’ She produces a brown envelope from her handbag and out spills a selection of matte photographs. ‘My husband printed these out on his new printer. They really capture the evening light and the apple blossom, don’t you think?’
I take a look and try to disguise my concern. ‘They’re lovely.’
‘Aren’t they. A close up of the apple blossom could look perfect on the front of the brochure, don’t you think?’ She speaks quickly, as if everything is a matter of urgency. ‘And then on the back we could have a shot of the greenhouse in the morning light.’
I hear footsteps coming upstairs and catch a glimpse of Ward. ‘You OK?’ he mouths.
