‘Does Lucy know that?’ Ruth asks, simply.
‘Oh.’ Jo lets out a breath that is almost as long as the one that Lucy exhaled in Wilbur’s flat. She now understands Lucy not replying to her letter that mentioned Ruth, Malcolm and the shop. Her barbed comments about her friends. Jo’s, ‘Oh,’ turns into an, ‘Aah.’
Jo declares, ‘I need to get back to her.’
Ruth puts out a restraining hand. ‘Before you do, I’d like to tell you something.’
Jo pauses, and looks into Ruth’s face, which for once is solemn, all trace of humour gone. She wonders,is this it?Are they going to learn the secret of the Runaway Vicar?
‘My best friend, Julie, died when we were both in our early forties. She had breast cancer.’
Jo and Malcolm instinctively move closer.
Jo has not been expecting this.
‘It was devastating for her husband and family, of course, but very few people understood how I felt as her best friend. I don’t think we realize what that kind of friendship can mean to someone. It doesn’t have a place in how society proportions grief.’ She smiles sadly at Jo. ‘Julie’s death was well over fifteen years ago, but I still think of her most days. I have often thought we spend too much time obsessing about finding, “the one”, and we forget that a best friend can be a lifelong love. There is a fundamental truth, comfort and joy in having a best friend.’ Ruth smiles, a little mistily. ‘I think of it sometimes; all over the earth there are these unacknowledged love stories, making the world a better place. I personally think it is one of humanity’s best-kept secrets.’ Ruth looks at Jo, ‘You need to put things right with Lucy.’
Jo does not reply. She doesn’t have to.
By now the three of them are sitting so close, they are almost touching, and Jo remembers the pub. That was the first time they broached the subject of Ruth running away. Jo doesn’t think this will be the reason behind it, but more than ever she wants to understand what troubles the vicar.
‘You must never give up on yourfriend,’ Malcolm urges, and Jo recalls the time he also gave her advice and hinted about thegreatest regret of his life. She realizes how much she still has to discover about these friends, and she just hopes that she has the time. She feels a decision about her future is looming.
Before they say goodbye, they confirm what time they will be meeting at Jo’s for supper on Friday, Malcolm trying to suppress his eagerness to share with them what George Eliot and Abraham Lincoln’s chiropodist, Issachar, might talk about. Jo wonders if this will give them any insight into Malcolm’s life and his regrets. She certainly found that William Foyle and John Lobb pointed her very clearly towards appreciating the importance of friendship. And with this thought, she knows she needs to get back to Lucy.
As she walks away from the deli (carrying a bag full of food she thinks Lucy will like), she wonders why neither she nor Ruth had thought to comment on Malcolm’s apparel. He had been sporting a knitted tank top in a glorious shade of tangerine with lime green tassels around the bottom edge.
Too busy unravelling Jo’s problems?
Just too startled?
Or maybe, she thinks, they are getting used to the transformation of Malcolm Buswell.
This time, Jo doesn’t let the closed door stop her. She knocks softly then pushes her way into Uncle Wilbur’s bedroom, manoeuvring the door with her foot, her hands grasping mugs of hot chocolate – Lucy’s favourite.
Lucy is half sitting, half lying on the bed and is looking at her phone.
‘Don’t worry, I can get an earlier train. I’ll get out of your way soon.’
Jo ignores this and puts one of the mugs down on the bedside cupboard. ‘Budge up,’ she says, settling herself on the other side of the bed to Lucy. ‘I’ve brought you some hot chocolate.’
Lucy reluctantly accepts the proffered mug.
Before Lucy can say anything, and before Jo can lose her nerve, she starts.
‘Luce, you are my best friend. You always have been and always will be.’ Jo hears her voice waver but she keeps going, ‘The thing is, you can only ever have one best friend. I guess the clue’s in the name, really, but it does mean that we’re linked together; you are mine and I am yours. Someone told me today that they thought the joy of having a best friend was one of humanity’s best-kept secrets.’ Then Jo repeats what Reverend Ruth had said, ‘All over the earth there are these unacknowledged love stories, making the world a better place.’
Jo says all of this not looking at her best friend. She hears Lucy put down her mug of hot chocolate.
‘And I need to tell you something.’ Jo draws in a trembling breath.
‘Just before James left me, I thought I was pregnant.’ Jo can feel the body stiffen beside her. Jo still cannot look at Lucy and so she talks to the opposite wall, on which hangs a watercolour of Ullswater. ‘I was only a week late; after ten days I took a test. I was, it was …’ Jo can’t finish, and she thinks if she lets the tears come now they might wash her away. ‘Three days later, my period started and well … that was that.’ Jo feels Lucy’s hand slip into hers. ‘I told myself it was a mistake, maybe I had misread it and that I hadn’t really been pregnant.’
Now she holds tight to her best friend’s hand, focusing on the warmth of it, trying to make it all that she can feel. ‘But Iwaspregnant, Luce, and when … well, after that, all I could think about was a baby. The desperate ache of wanting to be a mum became part of me. I thought about talking to James, but I couldn’t.’
‘Oh Jo.’
‘I should have known then. I was worried about telling him. Wasn’t sure if he’d be pleased.’ Now she looks at Lucy. ‘I think I knew, he wouldn’t have been. But I told myself, he will be one day. When the time is right.’ Jo’s twisted smile turns to a small shudder. ‘So, I kept telling myself that I hadn’t really been pregnant, that it didn’t count, had been nothing. Nothing to make a fuss about.’
