Jude couldn’t hear what his brother said, but quickly gathered it was something kind yet sarcastic. Something that made clear he already knewshewas not OK, and that she was the priority right now.
‘Yeah,’ Hannah said into the handset, her voice thick with misery. ‘That’s right .?.?. For a while, now, but there was nothing I could .?.?. No. OK, yep. That makes sense. I won’t .?.?. I’ll wait to hear from her. And yes, I will. Bye.’
‘Well .?.?.?’ Charlie said, after Hannah hung up.
‘He says this is bad PR, but not terminal. He has his agent on the case – she’s going to call me. I’m to do nothing for now – no answering texts or calls about this, or replying on socials. No confirmations or denials. The most I can do is change my settings, turn off commenting on posts – but the view is, even that might make me look a bit .?.?. guilty.’
Jude felt a towering wave of fury rise inside him. ‘You’re supposed to just sit back and let this guy carry on hurting you? Leave him to continue spinning lies that affect you personally and professionally?Thatis Joe’s supposedly sage advice – do nothing?’
‘He said you’d say that,’ Hannah told him. ‘Somehow, he knew you’d be here.’
‘How the fuck .?.?.? It’s witchcraft. It’s the only explanation,’ Jude said, shaking his head.
‘He also reckons the worst possible thing that could happen now is any sort of “white-knighting” by you,’ Hannah said. ‘Those were his exact words. He told me to tell you that you cannot be anywhere near this story, or anywhere nearme, over the next few days. If we’re seen together – photographed together – it’ll just confirm everything Marc’s ever implied about me being a cheating slapper.’
‘For fuck’ssake,’ Jude groaned, irate that everything she’d just said made some degree of sense.
‘He said he’ll see you at your mum’s. That you should head back there now, before this gets any bigger. In case any local journos turn up.’
‘I don’t want to leave you,’ he said, meaning every word. He could easily have added,Not now, not ever.
‘I know,’ she told him, stretching up to kiss his face. ‘I believe it. And for the moment, that’s what matters.’
25
The atmosphere inside his mother’s house was stale and tense. Lillian was in the garden doing odd jobs, but some unspecific threat seemed to be radiating from her anyway, creeping in through the open sash windows.
Jude took the opportunity to race upstairs and make himself presentable before she could accost and question him. He was so angry on Hannah’s behalf right now, and so powerless to do anything to help her, that he knew he’d lack the mental dexterity to explain why he’d ‘been for a run’ in jeans and a henley.
Almost as though he could sense Jude’s distress, Larry chose this moment to send him an email. The iPhone notification pinged ominously as Jude pulled on a fresh t-shirt, and he wondered what could be so important that his boss felt the need to share it at .?.?. 10.38 p.m. on a Sunday, Aussie time. He opened the message with trepidation, but knew it was better to find out what it said now than to wonder and worry all afternoon.
The content took a short while to load. Once it had, Jude stared at it in confusion for several seconds, eventually registering that it was a job offer .?.?. for a permanent position at LogicLabs. There was a contract attached, as well as a bunch of official-looking documents about Australian immigration procedures and how to apply for a permanent residency visa. The salary attached to the role he hadn’t even applied for was astronomical: $80,000 more per year than he’d been earning as an already heftily remunerated contractor.
Jude was stunned. There’d been a time when he’d thought he wanted this – when he’d evensaidhe wanted it. Then, the prospect of starting a completely new life would have felt like a gift. Now, it simply left him cold. What life could he ever really have, beyond people who truly knew, valued and cared about him? The past few months had reminded him that they might be few, but they were all here: his brother and Ed; Livi, Claire and Jane; Clive; maybe even Suni.
And then there was Hannah. It seemed absurd to him now that he’d spent so long trying to redraw the boundaries of his life – trying to doctor the map so he could pretend every road on it didn’t lead back to her. You could paint a new picture, he realised, rearrange how things were displayed, but you couldn’t change true north. She was it, for him, and he needed her to know, even if she didn’t feel the same. And if she did .?.?. If she did, there was nothing in the world –no onein the world – that would persuade him to part from her again.
There was a knock on his partially open bedroom door, and Jude steeled himself for the day’s first encounter with his mum. He breathed out when he saw Joe pushing his way into the room. His brother looked as serene and superior as ever, but surprised Jude by asking, ‘Have you any idea why I’m here? This is the first time I’ve been asked to lunch in eight years. Morbid curiosity demanded I didn’t decline the invitation.’
‘No clue, I’m afraid,’ Jude told him, reeling a little at this revelation. He’d long known his mum and Joe essentially had no relationship, but seeing the dysfunction up close remained deeply uncomfortable. For years, he’d written it off as none of his business – told himself there was probably fault on both sides, reasons for the rift he just didn’t understand. His perspective had shifted in recent weeks.
Joe wasalot, but he had integrity and empathy. Fundamentally, he was kind. Yes, he’d been scheming like a Bond villain to push Jude and Hannah together, and it had been infuriating at points – but he’d done it based on a solid understanding of Jude’s heart, of what he truly needed to be happy. As Jude thought this, a parallel idea took shape in his mind; one that had been drifting in and out of focus for a while, undulating like smoke. Lillian had once done the reverse, desiring the opposite outcome, with no regard for how it would damage him. Even as Jude questioned whether this could possibly be right, his whole body seemed to vibrate with certainty that the only things up for debate were how far she’d gone to separate him from Hannah, how hard she’d tried .?.?. and how stupid he’d been not to see it at the time.
He felt a little sick as he thought again about how he’d behaved this morning. When his mum had questioned him, he’d pretended he wasn’t with Hannah on fearful instinct; he’ddeniedher, like some character from the Bible. He recalled what Hannah had said at the shag party, too – remembered how her use of the term ‘unsuitable’ had bothered him, lurking afterwards like an unpleasant odour that wouldn’t dissipate. It was a Lillian word; one he now guessed Hannah had heard from her repeatedly, in moments when he wasn’t listening.
Then there were his own memories: things he recalled his mother had implied, or suggested, or insisted upon .?.?. a litany of small, seemingly unimportant things she’d said and done that extended over years. Moments that had redirected his focus, shaken his faith in things he’d been sure about, or fed his deepest insecurities.
In isolation, each could be written off as innocuous. Together, they added up to a darker sort of manipulation than he wanted to believe Lillian capable of. Jude had never thought his mumnice– even as a small child he hadn’t been that naive – but it had never occurred to him before that his happiness mattered less to her than bragging rights. Than simply having him under her control.
‘Are you OK?’ Joe asked. ‘You look like you’re doing algebra in your head.’
‘I sort of am.’
‘Worried about Hannah?’
‘Yeah,’ Jude said. It was the truth, but he was also relieved Joe had misread him. He wasn’t sure how to voice any of this; he was scared to utter it aloud, in case saying it made it all true.
‘Thank you for putting yourself out to help her,’ he added. ‘For getting your agent involved, and all. I’m grateful, and I know she is, too.’
