The Two Lives of Lydia Bird(14)

‘You’re looking at me weird.’

You would too if you were me, I think but don’t say as I clear my throat.

‘Would you grab me a glass of water?’ I croak.

He frowns and looks at me more closely, then laughs. ‘Have you two been on the wine already? Jeez, Lyds, that’s hardcore even for you.’

‘Here,’ he says, coming back through with a couple of pills as well as the water. ‘Take these.’

I accept them one by one, swallowing them down.

‘You look like an extra from Shaun of the Dead,’ he smiles, smoothing my hair behind my ear. ‘You haven’t been crying, have you?’

I focus on the clock. It’s just after two in the afternoon, I can’t have been asleep for long. I backtrack over the time since Elle and David deposited me on the doorstep; the failed attempt to sleep on the sofa even though my brain ached, the last resort of a pretty pink sleeping pill with alcohol still swilling around in my system.

And then this. I’m wide awake in my sleep again and Freddie is here, taking the piss out of me for drinking too much with Elle. There is very little point in telling him I was drinking with Jonah Jones too and we couldn’t find anything to say to each other, because he won’t believe a word, and why would he? I don’t actually know what I’ve been doing here in this world. Maybe I have been out for a breezy morning shopping and a couple of lunchtime glasses of wine with Elle.

‘Hate to tell you this, Lyds, but you might want to scrape the mascara off your cheeks. Jonah’s coming to watch the game with me in about –’ he breaks off to look at his watch – ‘ten minutes ago. Late as usual.’

‘Do something with me instead?’ I say. ‘Take me somewhere. Anywhere. Just you and me.’

‘You sound more like Ed Sheeran every day,’ he says as he pulls his phone from the back pocket of his jeans, no doubt to text Jonah. But then he shoves it away as we hear the sound of the back door opening.

‘Cutting it fine.’ Freddie grins as Jonah strolls into the living room with a box of Bud under his arm. ‘Tell me it was for a woman at least.’

Jonah glances at me and I’m convinced he’s going to say ‘Yes, I was with Lydia’.

‘Auditioning for The Living Dead, Lyds?’

I stare at him, trying to work out if he’s playing a part. If he is, I can’t imagine him saying anything much crueller. I mean, come on: The Living Dead?

‘Knobhead,’ I mutter, and he does a tiny double take.

‘Grumpy,’ he shoots back, then grins.

‘She’s just woken up,’ Freddie says, taking the beer. ‘She needs five minutes to become her usual sunshine self.’ He shoots me a wink, laughing as he heads to the kitchen.

Jonah drops down on the other end of my sofa, his arms flung wide across the back. He shouldn’t be here; this is my dream. I’m pretty sure that means I’m entitled to have Freddie all to myself. I experiment with the idea of being in charge and try to mentally eject Jonah from the living room, half expecting him to spring up and leave backwards as if someone pressed rewind on a DVD. He doesn’t though. He just lounges in that boneless way he has, perpetually somewhere on a beach with a beer in his hand and his toes in the sand.

‘What’s new with you then, Lyds?’

Right, so we’re doing this. Surely it would be okay for him to break character now Freddie is out of the room?

‘You know,’ I whisper, leaning in, testing him. ‘In the pub, earlier? Wine and gin and vodka and brandy?’

He stares at me, nonplussed. ‘This morning? Bloody hell, Lyds, that’s going some.’

I watch him in speculative silence and realize there isn’t a trace of understanding in his clear brown gaze. What’s there is puzzlement, and then traces of discomfort as the silence lengthens. Embarrassment, even. I cringe a little and withdraw to my end of the sofa, aware my breath must smell like a pub carpet and I probably look like someone should stab me through the heart with silver.

‘Ignore me,’ I say, pulling the cushion over my head. ‘Pretend I’m not here.’

The irony isn’t lost on me. I cannot possibly be here.

‘Shall I stick the kettle on? Coffee might help.’

I fight the irrational urge to tell Jonah to piss off for trying to be helpful. Dragging the cushion from my face, I sit up straight and scrub at my cheeks as Freddie comes back in and flops on the chair.

Freddie. I want to climb into his lap. I want to fill my head with the scent of him, for his arms to hold me and his lips to kiss me. I want Jonah Jones to go, even as he accepts the beer Freddie holds out across the coffee table and they fall into easy conversation. I rest back against the sofa for a couple of minutes with my eyes closed, feigning disinterest as I watch Freddie through my lashes. And then my eyes fly wide open as Jonah speaks.

‘I’m buying a motorbike.’

I’m surprised; dismayed. Freddie was always on about getting a bike, always in a hurry to get further, faster, but Jonah has never struck me as the type. Since Freddie’s accident, the idea of anyone wilfully putting themselves in any kind of danger on the road fills me with dread. Just getting behind the wheel of the car again was an achievement for me.

‘Just fancy a change from the Saab, sometimes,’ he says conversationally, man-to-man. Jonah drives an old black Saab convertible, a leather-lined battleship on wheels he loves for no discernible reason. ‘It’s getting a bit long in the tooth, might shake things up a bit.’