Perfectly Ordinary People(52)

Thus, Saturday the 4th of October found us carrying Dan’s stuff up from his catering van.

‘You’re sure this is all going to fit in?’ Dan asked, as I unlocked my front door.

‘I told you,’ I said. ‘I’ve made space.’

We carried the cases and bin bags in and dumped them on the sofa. Dan glanced around the room and I thought I saw him raise an eyebrow at the fact that he couldn’t see any evidence of me having made space. Then he lifted a rather elegant old leather suitcase on to the table and undid the straps.

‘You said to bring some personal effects,’ he said, opening the lid.

I moved to his side and looked down at the random assortment of objects – an ashtray, a Nintendo, a paperweight, a buddha . . . – before selecting a framed photo of Dan with his grandmother, a photo I recognised from Dan’s bedroom. I span on one heel and set it down on the middle shelf of my bookcase. ‘Here?’ I asked.

‘Yep,’ Dan said. ‘One down, fifty more to go. And you’re bringing stuff to mine, right?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Of course.’

‘Good. Then I’ll have hostages in case you refuse to give Granny back.’

Buggles appeared from my bedroom and sat blinking at the light. I’ve never known another cat take so long to wake up. In that we’re perfectly matched.

‘What are you looking at?’ Dan asked him, then, ‘He looks like he’s never seen me before.’

And it was true. Buggles was staring at Dan quite intently. Had he understood that Dan was moving in?

‘He’s just not awake yet,’ I said. ‘He always stares into the middle distance when he wakes up. He’s like me. Can’t do anything until he’s had his coffee.’

Dan handed me a bin bag filled with folded clothes, which I carried through to my bedroom where I proceeded to add them to his existing stuff already in my wardrobe.

By the time I returned, he’d scattered the contents of the first suitcase around the room. None of the items, I noticed, were where I would have chosen to put them, but I realised that I’d have to be tactful in moving them to less obtrusive spots.

He was holding a frying pan in one hand and an electric whisk in the other.

‘Wow,’ I said. ‘You’ve brought everything but the crib.’

Dan froze. ‘What?’ he said.

‘What what?’

‘What did you say?’

‘What, everything but the crib?’

‘Yeah, that.’

‘Oh, it’s a Solomas saying. Actually, I think it might be one of Mum’s.’

‘Ah,’ Dan said, visibly relaxing. ‘Good, because you had me worried there.’

I frowned at his back for a moment as he continued unpacking the case. Because there had been something of note, hadn’t there? A certain hint of urgency that had taken me by surprise.

I thought about Dan’s relationship with the children we’d come across. He’d been great with Eirla’s lot, and had held Gina’s sister’s baby without qualms. So I’d just assumed . . . But we hadn’t had The Baby Conversation yet, and I wondered if that was a mistake.



It turned out that we didn’t see a huge amount of each other even when living together at mine.

Dan would get up at six and was out the front door by seven thirty, an hour that had me blinking like Buggles at the daylight.

In the evenings he’d get home at either 8 p.m. or midnight, depending on whether he’d had a function that evening or not, so some days we didn’t speak at all.

But it felt nice, all the same. When he got up he left a warm impression in the bed that felt like more than the mere shape of where he’d been sleeping. I’d roll into his musky warmth and inhale his essence and have the most fantastic dreams.

Likewise, though he was rarely in the flat when I was, it too seemed to hold a memory of his presence, a memory that felt comforting and warm. So though, objectively, during the day, I was exactly as alone as before, it honestly didn’t feel that way. The atmosphere in the flat felt different somehow. After all, I had his grandmother watching my back.

I decided not to raise the subject of children immediately because I didn’t want to upset the first few days of our experiment. But I knew I needed to at least broach the subject, to find out if we had a problem.

I’d intended to bring it up on the final Sunday morning, just before changeover. But Dan got there first.

He’d returned home in the early hours of Sunday after a Westminster function the night before, so for once, I was up before him.

Unlike Buggles and myself, Dan is a man who wakes up at the speed of a lightning strike. So where my morning mood could be described as soft and blurry, if anything, Dan tends to be on edge.

That morning, he came into the kitchen and pulled out a bar stool while I poured him a cup of coffee.

When I turned to offer him the mug, he was sitting bolt upright, staring at me with such intensity it made me jump. ‘Good morning,’ he said, then, ‘Can I ask you something?’

‘Sure,’ I said, turning back to the pot to refill my own mug.

‘Are you still on the pill?’

‘Oh!’ I said, pulling a face before turning back, so that he wouldn’t see. ‘Um, yes, of course. Why?’