ONE DAY(114)

‘I’m not, I just . . . it was nothing to do with pity, and you know it. But it’s . . . complicated. Us. Come here, will you?’ She nudged him once more with her foot and after a moment he tipped over like a felled tree, his head coming to rest against her shoulder.

She sighed. ‘We’ve known each other a long time, Dex.’

‘I know. I just thought it might be a good idea. Dex and Em, Em and Dex, the two of us. Just try it for a while, see how it worked. I had thought that’s what you wanted too.’

‘It is. It was. Back in the late Eighties.’

‘So why not now?’

‘Because. It’s too late. We’re too late. I’m too tired.’

‘You’re thirty-five!’

‘I just feel our time has passed, that’s all,’ she said.

‘How do you know, unless we give it a try?’

‘Dexter – I have met someone else!’

They sat in silence for a moment, listening to the children shouting in the courtyard below, the sound of distant televisions.

‘And you like him? This guy.’

‘I do. I really, really like him.’

He reached down, and took her left foot in his hand, still dusty from the street. ‘My timing isn’t great, is it?’

‘No, not really.’

He examined the foot he held in his hand. The toenails were painted red, but chipped, the smallest nail gnarled and barely there. ‘Your feet are disgusting.’

‘I know they are.’

‘Your little toe’s like this little nub of sweetcorn.’

‘Stop playing with it then.’

‘So that night—’ He pressed his thumb against the hard skin of her sole. ‘So was it really so terrible?’

She poked him sharply in the hip with her other foot. ‘Don’t fish, Dexter.’

‘No really, tell me.’

‘No, Dexter, it was not such a terrible night, in fact it was one of the more memorable nights of my life. But I still think we should leave it at that.’ She swung her legs off the sofa and sidled up until their hips were touching, taking his hand, her head on his shoulder now. Both stared forwards at the bookshelves, until Emma finally sighed. ‘Why didn’t you say all this, I don’t know – eight years ago?’

‘Don’t know, too busy trying to have . . . fun, I suppose.’

She lifted her head to look at him sideways. ‘And now you’ve stopped having fun, you think “good old Em, give her a go—”’

‘That’s not what I meant—’

‘I’m not the consolation prize, Dex. I’m not something you resort to. I happen to think I’m worth more than that.’

‘And I think you’re worth more than that too. That’s why I came here. You’re a wonder, Em.’

After a moment she stood abruptly, picked up a cushion, threw it sharply at his head and walked towards the bedroom. ‘Shut up, Dex.’

He reached for her hand as she passed, but she shook it free. ‘Where are you going?’

‘To have a shower, get changed. Can’t sit around here all night!’ she shouted from the other room, angrily pulling clothes from the wardrobe and dropping them onto the bed. ‘After all, he’ll be here in twenty minutes!’

‘Who’ll be here?’

‘Who do you think? My NEW BOYFRIEND!’

‘Jean-Pierre’s coming here?’

‘Uh-huh. Eight o’clock.’ She started unbuttoning the tiny buttons on her shirt, then gave up, pulled it impatiently over her head and whipped it at the floor. ‘We’re all going out for dinner! The three of us!’

He let his head fall backwards and let out a long low groan. ‘Oh God. Do we have to?’

‘I’m afraid so. It’s all been arranged.’ She was naked now, and furious, at herself, at the situation. ‘We’re taking you to the very restaurant where we first met! The famous bistro! We’re going to sit there at the same table and hold hands and tell you all about it! It’s all going to be very, very romantic.’ She slammed the bathroom door, shouting through it. ‘And in no way awkward!’

Dexter heard the sound of the shower running, and lay back on the sofa, looking at the ceiling, embarrassed now at this ridiculous expedition. He had thought that he had the answer, that they could rescue each other, when in truth Emma had been fine for years. If anyone needed rescuing, it was him.

And maybe Emma was right, maybe he was just feeling a little lonely. He heard the ancient plumbing gurgle as the shower ceased, and there it was again, that terrible, shameful word. Lonely. And the worst of it was that he knew it was true. Never in his life had he imagined that he would be lonely. For his thirtieth birthday he had filled a whole night-club off Regent Street; people had been queuing on the pavement to get in. The SIM card of his mobile phone in his pocket was overflowing with telephone numbers of all the hundreds of people he had met in the last ten years, and yet the only person he had ever wanted to talk to in all that time was standing now in the very next room.

Could this be true? He scrutinised the notion once again and finding it to be accurate he stood suddenly with the intention of telling her straightaway. He walked towards the bedroom then stopped.

He could see her through the gap in the door. She was sitting at a small 1950s dressing table, her short hair still wet from the shower, wearing a knee-length old-fashioned black silk dress, unzipped at the back to the base of her spine, opened wide enough to see the shade beneath her shoulder blades. She sat motionless and erect and rather elegant, as if waiting for someone to come and zip the dress up, and there was something so appealing about the idea, something so intimate and satisfying about that simple gesture, both familiar and new, that he almost stepped straight into the room. He would fasten the dress, then kiss the curve between her neck and her shoulder and tell her.