‘Sorry, Malcolm,’ she says, turning to face him.
‘Joanne …’ Now Malcolm sounds concerned, and a little shocked.
She didn’t realize that her face would give her away so completely.
‘Not bad news, I hope? Your Uncle Wilbur is all right?’
Not really,Malcolm;often he can’t remember what he did five minutes ago. Jo doesn’t say this; instead she tells him that Wilbur is fine and offers Malcolm a cup of tea.
The old man’s face falls. ‘That would have been very pleasant, Joanne, but I do have an appointment at the bank … about my pension and so forth,’ he finishes, still looking worried.
‘Another time,’ Jo suggests, summoning a smile.
Malcolm glances at the noticeboard. ‘Is there anything I can do to help?Anythingat all?’
She wants to say:Please could you make James love me and make him realize he has made a huge mistake.
She says this in her head often enough and at times out loud in the quiet of the flat. Sometimes she even believes it could happen.
She wants Malcolm to explain to her why, after nearly six months apart, it still hurts so much. She tells herself it is a lot to do with pride, but this does not quite equate to the visceral pain that squeezes the breath out of her, when she is curled up in a tight ball in bed at night.
Jo is suddenly conscious she hasn’t actually said anything, and she feels she owes Malcolm something for his concern. She volunteers, ‘It’s a letter, well, a bill from my old boyfriend. We lived together for four years and broke up before I came down to London. It just brought it all back.’
Malcolm nods, as if this is making sense of things.
‘We were going out for two years before we moved in together.’ Jo wonders why she feels the need to mention this. To underline itwasa serious relationship? That itdidmatter?
‘It’s been hard, I guess, on both of us,’ although she wonders if this is true. She adds, somewhat irrelevantly, but feeling she doesn’t want Malcolm to think badly of James, ‘Everyone likes James.’
Ah, except Lucy. And – it comes to her –andJemima. Jemima, who rescued her in that meeting. No, Jo would bet a sizeable amount on the fact that Jemima had never liked James. Had never fallen for his charms.
Her ruminations are interrupted.
‘Indeed, indeed,’ Malcolm continues to nod, ‘and that is why you came to London?’
‘Yes,’ Jo admits, ‘I heard that he’d started seeing someone else. A girl who I used to work with.’ She tries to smile, ‘So, I ran away.’
‘No, no,’ Malcolm exclaims, and Jo wonders if the repetitions are there as a double dose of reassurance. ‘Not at all, not at all – you came to the aid of a favourite uncle. I am sure your family and friends do not think you have run away. I am sure they all miss you very much.’
‘Oh, Malcolm,’ is all Jo can muster.
Where does she even start?
7
Average Jo
Later that evening, sitting by the gas fire in her uncle’s chair (deep-seated and remarkably comfortable), Jo revisits her conversation with Malcolm. She knows her family misses her (well, maybe not her brothers, but her parents certainly do); however, when she thinks of her friends, she feels uncomfortable to the point of queasiness.
It had happened slowly. She barely noticed it. They always seemed to end up doing what James wanted to do. Went where he wanted to go. But then he did have good ideas. A man so reasonable, it seemed petty to create an argument just because she fancied doing something else. And there were other people to think about. James had a circle of friends who often joined them. For once in her life she felt she was part of the ‘popular crowd’, even if she was only there on sufferance as James’s girlfriend. That had been novel and mostly good. Plus she had been lonely when they met. Lucy and Sanjeev had just moved to Amsterdam with his work– a posting of two years that eventually stretched into four. She had been happy to throw herself into her life with James.
She knows with a wave of guilt that, in doing so, she let some older friendships drift. She got swept up in being with this new crowd. The bank paid well. James kept telling her that they worked hard, so should play hard. It was one of his favourite sayings. So they went away for weekends, went skiing, out for expensive meals with the ‘friends’ that she no longer sees or hears from.
She doesn’t miss these people – even back then she could see that some of it was a bit much – but James was always different when it was just the two of them. Especially after his dad died from a heart attack and he was broken by his sudden loss. She held him together, had been the one in charge. Looked after his mum, too.
During all of this, Jo had tried to keep faith with Lucy, to visit, to call, to make time for her, especially in the last two years when she was back in the UK and living nearby. Whatever James said. She had, hadn’t she? Tried so hard to get their friendship back on the old footing? Never reminded Lucy that she was the one who had left.
Then why does the thought of her friendship with Lucy only add to her queasiness?
