‘Youremember. I’ve got to go meet his new girlfriend?’ He looks blank. ‘The one he met in Corsica, remember?’
‘Oh, yeah, the holiday romance!’ He laughs unkindly. ‘Where does she live again?’
‘Out in the country. Essex or Bedfordshire, something like that—’
‘You’re going for the whole day?’ Although he grew up in the wilds of Somerset, Miles always looks a bit unsettled whenever the country comes up in conversation. He once said he ‘didn’t see the point of it’.
‘Just for lunch. Remember I told you she’s a cookery writer kind of thing?’
‘Oh, yeah.’ His tone tells Esther that he has no idea what she’s talking about.
‘So I’m going to head home,’ she adds. ‘You stay if you like.’
He seems to weigh up the options then says, ‘Nah, babe, I’ll come home too.’
They say their goodbyes, and she manages to dodge a hug and kiss from Kevin, who now has cheesy white stuff in the corners of his mouth. On the way out she spots Anya with her friends, all laughing and looking like they’re having a great time being together. It’s all girls, no boys at all. The bolt of envy that hits her is like a kick in the gut. Esther can’t remember the last time she went out with the girls, because she doesn’t have ‘the girls’ anymore. Gracie and Jess are away at university in Durham and St Andrews, living their lives, making new friends, studying economics and medicine – proper clever stuff. On the rare occasions when they all get together, the conversation is peppered with words likesemester,essay,dissertation, and it all sounds pretty thrilling, running around with piles of books, being with all those super-brainy people.
Esther didn’t apply for university even though Amanda, her history teacher, had urged her to: ‘You’re made for it, Esther. Honestly, you’d love the whole experience.’ However, she was already earning money and in demand; people were paying her to endorse things on social media. Her main income at the moment is through a paid partnership with Bethani jewellery. Nothing wrong with that, Esther reminds herself. The world needs doctors and economists but it also needs beautiful earrings, right?
Spotting her, Anya waves and Esther waves back. ‘Who’s that?’ Miles asks.
‘Just a nice girl I was chatting to in the loos.’
He chuckles. ‘You girls, always chatting in the loos.’
Esther smiles and takes his hand, and on the way home in the cab she snuggles close to him in the back seat. Maybeshe’s a little bit drunk. (She did neck a few vodkas to anaesthetise herself from seeing Miles and his friends all jumping about on the dance floor together.) But now she’s thinking they’ve been through a lot already, the two of them. They broke up, they worked it out and now they’re fine again. She’s glad they’re together and making plans for their future. But something in the shorter term is more concerning to her right now.
‘Miles?’ she starts.
‘Uh-huh?’
‘Would you come toLauren’s with me tomorrow?’
‘What?’ he exclaims, as if she’d asked him to go to Tibet.
‘Would you come with me and Dad? Please?’
They’ve stopped at traffic lights. Miles glances out at a group of cheerful studenty types all carrying guitar cases, then frowns at her. ‘You don’t want me there, babe.’
‘I do!’
‘What for?’
‘Because you’re my boyfriend. Why else?’
‘That’s not a reason, Est …’
‘For a bit of moral support then.’
‘Why d’you need moral support? You’re an adult. It’s not as if you’re about to get a newstepmother…’
‘I know that,’ she says tetchily, realising now that she absolutely needs to persuade him to come. Lauren is obviously a big deal to her dad; since he came back from Corsica, all tanned and smiley and seemingly having forgiven Esther for not going with him, there’s been a kind of lightness about him that she’s never seen before. He just seems happier in himself. And she’s pleased for him; of course she is. But she is also aware of this simmering pressure to like Lauren instantly, and she knows she’ll feel better if Miles is right there at her side.
However, there’s more to it than that. She also wants him to do something forher, for once – to show he cares, like he did at the start, two years ago when she was just eighteen years old and he adored her. It’s a kind of test, she supposes. Will he do this tiny thing for her? Will he venture out to the terrifying countryside for one afternoon?
‘Please come,’ she says.
He sighs. ‘It’s not really my kind of thing, babe.’
