The taxi set off, plowing its way through the still busy London roads. "I'm good. I was going to be meeting you there anyway so I have extra bits in my handbag. I'm so sorry you had to see that with Richard."
"Why are you apologizing?" Any touching Jackson scrimped on before was being made up for. His hands kept me pulled in to him; usually, I'd have found it too much, but tonight I seemed to crave it, which in turn made me anxious.
"Because I should've been braver and started proceedings against Richard before this week. Why did I let it go on for this long? I knew we were over and there was no way we could still run a business together – his lack of effort was part of the reason I became distant from him emotionally," I stopped, reigning in my rant.
"Let's talk when we get in," he said. "But you have to remember when we're talking that it is all going to be sorted out. In a few weeks' time, he will be out of your life for good so you really don't have to worry about anything."
I inhaled his aftershave and pecked a kiss on his shoulder, wondering how long it would be before he came to his senses and realized just how much baggage I was carrying from a six-year relationship with a man who had never had a clue how to even be partners, let alone try and help me. Not that I needed help. I sat up, moving my head away. How long would it take before I relied on him and then it ended?
"Can you drop me at mine?" I said. "I think I want to be on my own after everything that's happened."
"No."
"What?"
"We're nearly at my house. Come in, have a drink, talk and then I'll call you a cab home or take you there myself." There was no other reaction, he didn't try to put his arm around me again or debate my complete U-turn. I'd changed my mind that fast I'd left skid marks and a car crash in my wake.
He paid the driver and I followed him into his home, everything as I remembered it from the previous weekend. It felt familiar and part of me ached to clamor into his big bed, cry my eyes out with tears I hadn't shed for nearly twelve months and let Jackson hold me, but that was part of the problem: I didn't let people hold me; I held them.
"Tea?" Jackson said, switching on the kettle. "My cleaner's left fresh milk."
"No, yes – I'm not sure..."
"It's just tea, Vanessa."
"It's not just tea. I'll sit down and drink it and tell you why I'm acting as if I have multiple personality disorder..."
"Is that still a recognized diagnosis?"
"I think so... Fuck. Yes, tea please."
He moved about the kitchen with ease, even finding chocolate in his fridge. We said nothing; my eyes drifting from Jackson in the kitchen still wearing his tux to the city's skyline.
"Here," he said, putting a mug of tea and a bowl of sugar next to me on the kitchen island. "There's chocolate. It's my guilty pleasure. I'll just do extra reps tomorrow."
I added a spoonful and took a few blocks of the chocolate. I said nothing, unsure of where to start or just to put my heels back on and head home.
"At this moment in time, I want you just to think of me as being your lawyer," Jackson said finally. "That I'm your legal representative so you can own the business fully and sell the apartment you own together."
"You know everything."
"I know what you have on paper. I know the financials. I know Richard has refused to engage in communication with you on both matters, despite you having made him very reasonable offers to buy the business and for you to take a loss if he was to buy you out of the apartment. But if I'm going to sit in court or mediation as your representative, knowing how difficult he's made things for you will help you have a better outcome and see him walking away with his tail not just between his legs, but cut off and stuffed up his ass." Jackson sat down next to me, a mug of tea that looked as dark as the Thames itself in front of him.
"Before I found out about him and Charlotte we'd become increasingly distant," I began. I could see Jackson's perspective. I also knew I could tell him the story and walk away, no need to rely on him for anything other than as my lawyer. "I was working excessively; the creative and the business side. He was involved in two other businesses, both owned by his dad and one he'd started himself involving recruitment."
"Which has now folded leaving him with quite a lot of debt," Jackson added.
"I didn't know that but I'm not surprised. Richard was given the marketing business by his father and told to run it otherwise his allowance would be cut off. His dad was fed up with him being an inheritance fund kid. He did his master's degree as a way to appease his dad and I suppose when he met me, he had an easy solution. But as I became busier, I became more resentful towards him, that I was putting in the effort and making the business successful, and he was spending most of his time at the other companies or on the golf course or with friends from his school. I came home early one afternoon as the heel of my shoe had broken and I needed to change outfits and shoes to see a potential new client. He was in bed with Charlotte who was the office manager at one of his father's companies."
"What did he say?"
"'It's not what it looks like.' Seriously, he couldn't even come up with something remotely witty. I wasn't hurt. I didn't love him anymore, if I ever did. It was more the hassle because I had been so comfortable and as much as he was a waste of space in the business, it meant I could run things as I pleased. I gave it five weeks, trying to remember what I loved about him in the first place, but I couldn't even bring myself to have sex with him. I moved into Sophie's: she'd been telling me to leave him anyway and it took about a week before he started begging me to come back. I considered it, but then Alice told me she'd seen Richard out in a restaurant with Charlotte the day I told her I was considering returning. I questioned him and he denied it, but by then I knew I'd be lying to myself if I went back. I could manage without loving him; I didn't want kids with him, I was too career focused, but I needed to respect him and feel he was my equal. Then I understood I hadn't felt like that for years, if ever, and I'd probably used him as it was an easy way into running my own marketing firm." I took a sip of my tea and nibbled on the chocolate.
"What did he do when you didn't go back?"
"Cried. Pleaded. Emotional blackmail. Threats to ruin the business, hurt himself – not that I ever think he was serious. He couldn't understand why someone like me had left someone like him. I have the voicemails he left and the text messages he sent. I tried to not communicate directly with him as he was never ready to listen or take on board my perspective."
"And you buried yourself in work."
