I See You(22)

‘Want me to take a look at it?’

Neil does something in IT. I’ve never been sure exactly what, but he explained it once in such detail, I feel bad for not remembering.

‘It’s fine, honestly. You’ve got proper work to do.’

‘And lots of it,’ Melissa says ruefully. ‘He’s in Cardiff tomorrow, then at the Houses of Parliament for the rest of the week. I’m lucky if I see him once a week at the moment.’

‘Parliament? Wow. What’s it like?’

‘Boring.’ Neil grins. ‘The bit I’ll be in, anyway. I’m installing a new firewall, so I’m unlikely to be rubbing shoulders with the PM.’

‘Is your October paperwork ready?’ I ask Melissa, suddenly remembering why I needed to pop in and see her. She nods.

‘On the desk, just on top of that orange ring binder.’

Melissa’s desk is white and glossy, like everything else in the kitchen. A huge iMac dominates the surface, and a floating shelf above holds all the files for the cafés. On the desk is a penholder that Katie made in woodwork at school.

‘I can’t believe you still have this.’

‘Of course I do! It was so sweet of her to make it.’

‘She got a B for it,’ I remember. When we first moved in next door to Melissa and Neil, money was horribly, frighteningly, tight. There were more shifts on offer at Tesco, but with a school run at 3 p.m. it just wasn’t possible. Until Melissa stepped in. At the time she only had the one café, and she closed after the lunchtime trade. She’d pick up the kids for me and bring them home with her, and they’d watch TV while she did the food order for the next day. Melissa would bake with Katie, and Neil showed Justin how to add RAM to a motherboard, and I was able to pay my mortgage.

I find the bundle of receipts on top of the orange file, beneath a folded Tube map and a notepad filled with bits of paper, Post-it notes, and Melissa’s neat handwriting.

‘More world-domination plans?’ I joke, gesturing to the notepad. I catch a look passing between Neil and Melissa. ‘Oh. Sorry. Not funny?’

‘It’s the new café. Neil’s not quite as keen on the idea as I am.’

‘I’m fine about the café,’ Neil says. ‘It’s bankruptcy I’m less enthusiastic about.’

Melissa rolls her eyes. ‘You’re so risk averse.’

‘Listen, I might skip that tea, actually,’ I say, picking up Melissa’s paperwork.

‘Oh, stay!’ Melissa says. ‘We’re not going to have a domestic, I promise.’

I laugh. ‘It’s not that,’ although it is a bit. ‘Simon’s taking me out tonight.’

‘On a school night? What’s the occasion?’

‘No reason,’ I grin. ‘Just a spot of Monday-night romance.’

‘You two are like a couple of teenagers.’

‘They’re still in the first flush of love,’ Neil says. ‘We were like that, once.’ He winks at Melissa.

‘Were we?’

‘Wait till the seven-year itch hits them, Mel, then they’ll be watching TV in bed and bickering about who left the top off the toothpaste.’

‘We do lots of that too,’ I laugh. ‘See you soon.’

The front door’s unlocked when I get home, and Simon’s jacket is thrown over the end of the banister. I climb the stairs to the loft conversion and knock on the door. ‘What are you doing home so early?’

‘Hey, beautiful, I didn’t hear you come in. Good day? I couldn’t concentrate in the office, so I brought some work home.’ He stands up to kiss me, careful not to knock his head on the low beam. The conversion was carried out on the cheap by the previous owners. They worked around the original rafters, so even though it’s a big room you can only stand up in the middle.

I look at the pile of papers nearest to me and see a typed list of names, each with what looks like a brief bio below it.

‘Interviews for a feature I’ve got to do,’ he explains, seeing me looking. He picks up the papers and dumps them on the other side so I can perch on the edge of his desk. ‘It’s a nightmare trying to get hold of them.’

‘I don’t know how you find anything.’ My drawers at work might be a mess, but the top of my desk is almost empty. A photo of the kids and a plant sit next to my in-tray, and I make sure everything is tidied away before I go home. At the end of each day I write a list of everything I have to do the next day, even when some of them are the things I do on autopilot, as soon as I get into work. Open the post, listen to the answer-phone messages, make the tea.

‘Organised chaos.’ He sits down on the swivel chair in front of his desk and pats his knee for me to sit on his lap. I laugh and sit down, one arm around his neck to keep my balance. I kiss him, letting my body relax into his before I reluctantly pull away.

‘I’ve booked a table at Bella Donna.’

‘Perfect.’

I’m not a high-maintenance woman. I don’t waste money on clothes and beauty products, and if the kids so much as remember my birthday, that’s good enough for me. Matt wasn’t one for hearts and flowers, even when we were young, and nor was I. Simon laughs at my cynical nature; says he’s slowly bringing out my softer side. He spoils me, and I love it. After years of struggling to put food on the table, a meal out is still a luxury, but the real treat is time together. Just the two of us.