‘What, that we all need to start being better? Who wouldn’t like that?’
‘Do you even believe it?’
‘I said it, didn’t I?’
‘You also once posted that you couldn’t live without rose-scented toilet bleach you’d been paid to promote. Did you believe that?’
‘That’s different. Suggesting every single household should be made to record their conversations is a valid and controversial talking point. Why aren’t more people up in arms over it?’
‘Maybe they think you’re only saying it to get a rise.’
‘Do you have to be so bloody pessimistic all—’
Roxi was interrupted by a vibration on her wrist. It was followed by another, then another and more. The watch face revealed hundreds of notifications and a handful of missed calls. ‘What the . . .’ she began before realizing her watch had been too far away from her phone to receive any updates. She grabbed her phone from the glovebox and hurriedly scrolled through it, then held it to her ear.
‘Look, tomorrow is Saturday,’ Owen continued. ‘Let’s go out for the day, the four of us. Catch the Express to London. We can be there in twenty-five minutes. I’ll make us a reservation on the South Bank for lunch then we can go into town and do some shopping. Make a day of it.’ His wife was too distracted to respond. ‘Rox? Rox?’
Her attention was fixed on a voice note. ‘Sorry, I have plans,’ she said.
‘Doing what?’
A smile unravelled as Roxi moved her phone from her ear and showed him the screen. ‘Because of this.’
She pressed play for a second time, this time on speaker mode. ‘Hi Roxi, it’s Dani Graph here, a booker for Sky News. I spotted your very passionate Instagram TV post and wondered if you’d like to come on our midday show tomorrow to talk more about it? Please call me back as soon as possible.’
Roxi clutched the phone to her chest. ‘This is it, Owen! This is where it all begins.’
She was too preoccupied with the future to register her husband’s present, muted response, or the palest of red lights on the car’s console recording their conversation.
15
Corrine
Corrine was standing under the porch outside the frontdoor of the home she had shared with her family for the last twenty years. Each of the extensive three-storey townhouses surrounding hers in this much sought-after area were identical, from their internal floorplans to their duck egg blue-coloured garage doors. Their landscaped front gardens maintained the same species of plants and a carbon-capturing English oak tree had been planted in the centre of each manicured lawn. Every rear garden contained a solar panel-heated swimming pool and summerhouse. Every property was indistinguishable from the next. Except – briefly – for hers.
Seventeen months ago, Corrine had, on a whim, repainted her front door. It was no longer duck egg; instead, she had chosen Anderson blue. The difference was subtle and the neighbours had not noticed until an eagle-eyed security patrol officer clocked it. First the concierge had called asking if there was a problem with the original colour, then a letter arrived from the estate’s management company offering to repaint it for them. Corrine politely declined. Within a month, each of her neighbours’ front doors had instead been painted Anderson blue by the estate board. It had been a small but important victory for Corrine. The objector inside her who had remained dormant for half a lifetime was awakening. And it never went back to sleep. Today, she was certain that she wouldn’t miss this house or those around it once her and Mitchell’s divorce was granted.
An alarm on her watch sounded. She had set it for eleven a.m. to remind her it was time to shift from the world of her friends and family and into another that she kept hidden from them. How much longer she could remain with a foot in both camps, she couldn’t be sure. The Eleanor Harrison disaster had made her question her confidence in her own decision-making. Earlier that morning she had once again monitored online news sources for an update on the MP’s condition, and she’d been relieved to discover Harrison was stable. But Corrine had yet to determine the condition of Nathan, the unconscious young man she had left outside the hospital ten days earlier. He was the real casualty of that night. Perhaps the others she was going to meet might have answers.
Corrine waved or smiled to each neighbour who passed by on foot or by wheel then directed her attention towards a house opposite. Of all the neighbours who had moved in and out over the years, it was Maisy she missed the most. She had been the life and soul of that street, a force of nature and fiercely loyal friend and wife. And it pained her that no one ever spoke of her friend any more. Each time Corrine tried to bring her name up, she was shut down, almost as if talking about her might befall a similar fate upon those who reminisced.
Maisy had been closer to her than any of their other neighbours so her unexpected diagnosis of advanced cervical cancer hit them both like a punch to the face. The Government’s lack of regular NHS funding meant a two-month wait for a specialist’s appointment. It was only when she’d asked her husband Derek for their private health insurance details that he’d been forced to admit they were no longer covered. He had lost most of their savings in bad investment opportunities.
There was a solution, he’d said amongst the tears and upset, and that was to upgrade to a Smart Marriage. Its benefits included better healthcare on NHS+. But first they would need to divorce. That arrangement would only remain for twenty-four hours before their application was approved and they could Upmarry.
Maisy, true to form, had made an event out of it, inviting their friends to the house and hiring a celebrant to officiate in the garden under an arch made of white roses. However, the only invitees who’d failed to attend their rewedding on the day itself had been the groom and his best man, Mitchell.
Maisy had been beside herself with worry, convinced that something terrible had happened, but Corrine hadn’t been so sure. ‘Tell me you took out the twenty-four-hour marriage gap insurance to protect yourself,’ she had asked Maisy.
‘I don’t need to,’ her friend had replied. ‘I mean, it’s Derek. What’s he going to do? Change his mind?’
But that’s just what he’d done, which Maisy had learned soon after in a lengthy text message. He’d explained that after witnessing both his parents die of cancer-related illnesses in his youth, he could not watch his wife succumb to the same fate, even though her death was far from a certainty. He’d completed his confessional by informing her that, hours after their divorce, he had spent the morning at the Guildhall Register Office marrying his secretary. Mitchell had been his best man. ‘I have to think about myself if you don’t make it,’ Derek had written. ‘If you pass away within the first six months of our remarriage, I’ll have to repay all your treatment costs. I don’t have the money.’
The law, which favoured couples over singletons, ensured Derek and his new wife could begin their new life together in his old home and Maisy was forcibly evicted by bailiffs soon after.
‘I want her to stay with us until she gets back on her feet,’ Corrine had told Mitchell. She was still furious with him for keeping Derek’s secret. He’d laughed at her request.
‘Like hell she is,’ he’d replied.
