‘What makes you say that?’
His voice is cool and Marisa immediately knows she has misjudged it. Once, she had asked him what he most disliked about his work and he had replied, without having to think about it, ‘Office gossip.’ She had taken a mental note at the time, reminding herself not to say anything to him that could be construed in the same vein.
‘Something she said earlier,’ Marisa says, trying to sound non-judgemental and calm. ‘It was like she was trying to get in my head – asking me all this stuff about how it felt being pregnant, and it was just …’
‘Yes?’ He is sharp, now.
‘Maybe I misread it.’
She backs down wordlessly.
‘You probably did,’ he says now. ‘Like you said, hormones do crazy things.’
That wasn’t quite what I said, Marisa thinks to herself, but to Jake she simply nods. His mouth is a flat line.
‘If you gave her a chance, I’m sure you’d find that Kate is a really lovely person. She’s concerned for you, that’s all. We both are.’
The casual ‘we’ slices through her.
‘What do you mean “we”?’
Anger fizzes around her solar plexus.
‘It hasn’t escaped our notice,’ he starts. Jake’s language becomes more formal when he is upset or angry. ‘That you’re behaving a little…’ He stops and looks at her. His shoulders soften. He walks over and pats her shoulder.
‘Irrationally?’ she asks.
‘Not irrationally, I wouldn’t say that.’
‘You just did.’
He laughs then takes a step back.
‘No, you did. I saidnotirrationally,’ he repeats, with the emphasis on the negative, ‘but maybe a bit … erratically. And we’re worried, that’s all. For you and for the baby.’
She stiffens. ‘I’m perfectly fine.’
‘Yesterday,’ he continues, seeming not to have heard her, ‘I came downstairs and a pan of milk on the stove was boiling over.’
‘What?’
‘A pan of milk—’
‘No, I heard you, I just don’t drink milk so why would I be boiling it?’
It’s true. She uses almond milk for her muesli because she prefers the taste. It’s Kate who buys semi-skimmed from the supermarket.
‘OK, well, neither Kate nor I were boiling milk either, so …’
‘So it must have been me?’ Her voice is shrill.
‘I don’t want to upset you,’ Jake says, holding out his hand, fingers splayed as if he were trying to calm a wild animal. ‘But it’s not the only thing that’s happened, is it?’
He looks at her. ‘Remember all that unpleasantness with the music?’
The weekend before, Marisa had been trying to paint. She had been unable to concentrate because of loud music playing from downstairs. She had shut the door and closed the window and, eventually, twisted pieces of newspaper and put them into her ears like makeshift plugs but still the music was shatteringly loud. There was a screeching guitar and a thumping beat and the floor seemed to be reverberating beneath her sandals. When she could take it no longer, she went downstairs and found Kate and Jake in the sitting room. Jake was leaning against the mantelpiece, laughing at something Kate had just said, and Kate was standing too close to him, so close that their heads were almost touching.
‘Do you remember this one?’ Kate was shouting over the music. ‘Such a fucking classic.’
