ONE DAY(70)

For a moment, Dexter had a fleeting but perfectly clear memory of himself at his mother’s funeral, curled up on the bathroom floor while Emma held onto him and stroked his hair. Yet somehow he had managed to treat this as nothing, to throw it all away for dross. He followed a little way behind her. ‘Come on, Em, we’re still friends, aren’t we? I know I’ve been a little weird, it’s just . . .’ She stopped for a moment, but didn’t turn round, and he knew that she was crying. ‘Emma?’

Then very quickly she turned, walked up to him and pulled his face to hers, her cheek warm and wet against his, speaking quickly and quietly in his ear, and for one bright moment he thought he was to be forgiven.

‘Dexter, I love you so much. So, so much, and I probably always will.’ Her lips touched his cheek. ‘I just don’t like you anymore. I’m sorry.’

And then she was gone, and he found himself on the street, standing alone in this back alley trying to imagine what he would possibly do next.

Ian returns at just before midnight to find Emma curled up on the sofa, watching some old movie. ‘You’re back early. How was Golden Boy?’

‘Awful,’ she murmurs.

If Ian feels any glee at this, he doesn’t let it into his voice. ‘Why, what happened?’

‘I don’t want to talk about it. Not tonight.’

‘Why not? Emma, tell me! What did he say? Did you argue? . . .’

‘Ian, please? Not tonight. Just come here, will you?’

She shuffles up so that he can join her on the sofa, and he notices the dress that she is wearing, the kind of thing she never wears for him. ‘Is that what you wore?’

She holds the hem of the dress between finger and thumb. ‘It was a mistake.’

‘I think you look beautiful.’

She curls up against him, her head on his shoulder. ‘How was the gig?’

‘Not great.’

‘Did you do the cats and dogs stuff?’

‘Uh-huh.’

‘Was there heckling?’

‘Little bit of heckling.’

‘Maybe it’s not your best material.’

‘Bit of booing.’

‘That’s part of it, though, isn’t it? Everyone gets heckled sometimes.’

‘I suppose so. I suppose sometimes I just worry . . .’

‘What?’

‘That I might just be . . . not very funny.’

She speaks into his chest. ‘Ian?’

‘What?

‘You are a very, very funny man.’

‘Thanks, Em.’

He rests his head against her and thinks about the small crimson box lined with crumpled silk that contains the engagement ring. For the last two weeks it has been tucked inside a balled-up pair of walking socks, waiting for its moment. Not right now though. In three weeks’ time they’ll be on the beach in Corfu. He imagines a restaurant overlooking the sea, a full moon, Emma in her summer dress, freshly tanned and smiling, perhaps a bowl of calamari between them. He imagines presenting the ring to her in an amusing way. For some weeks he has been devising different romantic-comedy scenarios in his head – perhaps dropping it into her wine glass while she’s in the loo, or finding it in the mouth of his grilled fish, and complaining to the waiter. Getting it muddled up with the calamari rings, that might work. He might even just give it to her. He tries out the words in his head. Marry Me, Emma Morley. Marry Me.

‘Love you lots, Em,’ he says.

‘Love you too,’ says Emma. ‘Love you too.’

The Cigarette Girl sits at the bar on her twenty-minute break, her costume on beneath her jacket, sipping whisky and listening to this man as he talks on and on about his friend, that poor pretty girl who fell down the staircase. They’ve had some kind of row apparently. The Cigarette Girl tunes in and out of the man’s monologue, nodding every now and then and glancing surreptitiously at her watch. It is five minutes to midnight, and she should really get back to work. The hour between twelve and one is the best for tips, the high-water mark of lust and stupidity on the part of the male customers. Five more minutes and she’ll go. Poor guy can barely stand up anyway.

She recognises him from that stupid TV programme – and doesn’t he go out with Suki Meadows? – but can’t recall his name. Does anyone watch that show anyway? The man’s suit is stained, the pockets bulging with packets of unsmoked cigarettes, there’s a sheen of oil on his nose, his breath is bad. What’s more, he still hasn’t even bothered to ask her real name.

The Cigarette Girl is called Cheryl Thomson. She works most days as a nurse, which is exhausting, but does an occasional shift here too because she went to school with the manager and the tips are incredible if you’re prepared to flirt a little. At home in her flat in Kilburn her fiancé is waiting for her. Milo, Italian, 6' 2", once a footballer, now also a nurse. Very good-looking, they’re getting married in September.

She would tell all this to the man if he asked, but he doesn’t, so at two minutes to midnight on St Swithin’s Day, she excuses herself – got to get back to work, no I can’t go to the party, yes I’ve got your number, hope you and your friend work things out – and leaves the man alone at the bar, ordering another drink.





Part Three