‘That sounds worryingly like code foryou’re fucked.’
He stuffs his hands in his pockets, stares straight ahead like he’s trying to think. ‘Remember when Lo did that stupid poll, at Christmas that time?’
I nod, because yes, it had been pretty stupid. Lola had decided, while a big group of us was hammered, that we should all rank each other – supposedly anonymously, though these things never are – in order of who we thought would get divorced first. Rachel had refused, sensibly. I’d shrugged and putLola and Gilesas number one, because she had proposed the poll, so it seemed only fair. Satisfyingly, once the votes were tallied, they came out top.
‘You and Rach were voted last,’ Giles says. ‘Remember?’
I push away an absurd pulse of nostalgia for Rachel and I having tabled bottom. ‘It was just a stupid poll.’
‘Yeah. But I guess what I’m getting at is... everyone’s always known that you and Rach... you’re solid. There’s no chance you won’t come through this.’
I appreciate the sentiment more than he can know. But it also makes everything worse, in a way. That I have screwed up the kind of love other people wish they had.
We reach Giles’s house first, then I carry on for home alone. En route, I pass a bus shelter plastered with a Lunn Poly advert – a hundred quid off a beach break. The beach itself looks shit, quite frankly. But the image sparks an idea in my mind.
Rach and I have never really been exotic holiday people. Mostly because we’ve not ever had anywhere near that sort of money. But maybe, right now, a complete change of scenery is exactly what we need.
I think of what Giles said.Try your best to make it up to Rach.
I’m not so naïve as to assume a romantic holiday will even come close to sorting out the mess I’ve made. But I’ve got to start somewhere.
23.
Rachel
June 2001
I don’t have a chance to talk to Josh until the following evening, when I get home from work.
I find him in the living room. He gets to his feet, his expression open and hopeful. Damp-haired, he’s freshly showered, wearing jeans and an old Teenage Fanclub T-shirt.
Usually, he would come straight over to put his arms around me. But there must be something in my face tonight that tells him I do not want to be touched.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ he says, before I can speak. ‘We should go away. Anywhere you like. My treat. Aruba?’
‘Aruba’s in the Caribbean,’ I say faintly.
‘Exactly.’ His voice is low and earnest. ‘Rach, I know I fucked up, I know—’
I talk over him, because I cannot bear to hear the end of that sentence. ‘I’m going to stay with Polly for a bit.’
A beat. I watch a lump jump in his throat. ‘How long isa bit?’
I know now that our world is moments from cleaving in two. The loveliness of our old life, versus a future I never thought I would have to imagine.
‘I think... we should separate. For a while at least.’
‘You’re not serious,’ he says, after a couple of whirling moments, his face and body stiffening with shock.
I press my gaze to his, so he can be in no doubt. ‘I am.’
A muscle quivers in his jaw, and I look at him as if for the last time, his tumbled hair and autumnal eyes, that expressive brow, the gentle contours of the bones in his face.
‘Rach, I know I fucked up. I know I betrayed your trust and let you down and risked our future and... But we can get back on track. I want to have kids with you, I—’
‘I don’t want to wait decades to see if that pill has worked, Josh. I can’t afford to. And not knowing what the future holds, for us... that isn’t who I am. Maybe you can live with uncertainty. An unconventional life. But I’ve felt completely at sea since you took that pill. And I can’t live that way. You know I can’t.’
He takes a step closer and grasps my hand, as if we’re at the edge of a cliff and he’s trying to stop me jumping. Through the propped-open sash window drifts the scent of a barbecue, kids laughing on the street, the thump of a football. The sublime simplicity of everyday life. And it reminds me why I am doing this.
