Girl A(65)

‘Happy birthday,’ I said. We watched her totter across the street. At the hotel door, she stepped onto a loose paving stone, and a puddle lapped over her shoe.

We ducked back into the taxi, and JP lay across the back seat, his head in my lap. ‘Fucking hell,’ he said.

‘Come on,’ I said. ‘She’s not that bad.’

‘She’s terrible,’ he said. ‘You wouldn’t be the first to say it.’

‘She’s fine,’ I said. ‘You know, there was a time when ordering from a menu was the most stressful thing that I could think of.’

‘But not any more.’

‘Well, no. Not any more.’

JP sat up. ‘And I love you even more,’ he said, ‘for that.’ He extended one of his hands and bent me towards him. ‘You know – one day,’ he said, ‘together – we’re going to have the family we both deserve.’

There it was: the gut punch of it. Harder than anything I’d ever requested. His words spread under my skin and into the tissue, so that later, when he watched me undress, I was surprised that he couldn’t see the mark of them. That to him, I was unchanged.

Here is an old legal principle: Caveat emptor. Buyer beware. You are selling a property. The walls are solid; the roof is new; the foundations are strong. You know all of this: you built the house yourself.

Each spring, fleshy roots infest your garden. They grow fast. Canes emerge, bloated and purple. Their leaves are like hearts. Through summer, the canes grow at a rate of ten centimetres each day. You attempt to cut the plant at the canes. Within a day, it returns. You attempt to cut the plant at the roots. Within a week, it returns. You seek consultation.

This is Japanese knotweed. By now, its roots will have penetrated the foundations of your house. They will have nestled three metres deep. In time, it will destroy your property. If a single stem is left in the ground, reinfestation will occur. Its removal is prohibitively expensive.

Should you disclose this invasion to your buyer? If they ask you: yes, of course. But how specifically must the buyer ask? If, for example, they enquire about environmental problems, or contaminative materials – what then? Shouldn’t the buyer have been more explicit? How should you respond? How will you feel at the thought of them unpacking their lives in your empty rooms, with the plant stirring beneath them?

For a second, JP looked at me as a stranger. Then I half waved, and his face softened.

I had selected my outfit with great care, and following two consultations with Christopher. (‘Promise me,’ he had said, ‘that we will never be above such things.’) I wore a golden silk vest (the one item in my suitcase that I remembered JP had liked: I thought of him), a leather skirt with a heavy buckle (did he recall the feeling of the material in his fingers, and the resistance of pulling it up to my waist, when he didn’t want to fumble with the belt?), and quilted Chanel pumps (I was richer than I had been when I last saw him, and was, generally, doing well).

‘Hello,’ he said. ‘And sorry I’m late. This client – well. Let me tell you with drinks.’

Our conversation was more civilized than I had expected, although I shouldn’t have been surprised. Neither of us enjoyed deep and meaningful disclosures, and we had the benefit of having a lot in common. It was the kind of discussion you have with a former colleague, with genuine questions to ask and enough gossip to be entertaining. He talked about his client, who had a penchant for shredding documents, and meetings in international waters. He asked, politely, about Devlin, whom he had always considered crude, and not quite as clever as she thought she was. One of his old law professors had died. JP returned to university for the funeral, and at the dinner afterwards, when he was asked about his career, somebody said: You know, I always thought you looked more like a bouncer than a barrister.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I’m boring you.’

‘Talking of boredom,’ I said. ‘I have a legal question. For you.’

‘A legal question?’

‘I’m not joking.’

‘I’m sure you’re not. Can you afford me?’

‘I don’t know. You’re pretty overpriced.’

I reached for my drink, but it was already finished.

‘Let’s say you were the executor,’ I said, ‘of a will.’

‘Your mother’s will? For example.’

‘For example. And a house has been left to this person’s surviving children. But one of those children – they were adopted when they were tiny. Years and years ago. They were too young to remember a thing. Technically, they’re a surviving child. But they don’t even know it.’

‘Lex,’ he said, and shook his head.

‘Do you need to tell them?’

‘I don’t know the answer to that question.’

‘Come on,’ I said. ‘What would you do?’

‘You want it to be watertight?’ he said. ‘Then yes. You do.’

‘But.’

‘But what?’

‘But that isn’t what you think I should do.’

He gathered the glasses and stood over me, with his body turned to the bar and his face turned to mine. ‘That,’ he said, ‘is beyond the scope of my retainer.’

I had seen JP in court once, although I had never told him. He had always resisted any suggestion that I might attend one of his hearings. It was a minor case by his standards, and pro bono: he was acting for a young mother whose divorce lawyer had failed to explain her basic rights. The woman was left with nothing, yet still expected to pay the fees. I had little on at work, so I caught a bus from the City to a miserable courtroom in East London. I had brought a notebook in the guise of research, but now that I was here, it seemed to make me more conspicuous. But JP didn’t even look at the gallery. He was cutting and concise, polite to the judge and to his learned friend. I awaited his every phrase with an exhilarated terror. I thought that you have to care about somebody very much to have the energy to hope that they don’t stumble over a word. I guessed that it was the kind of caring that most people save for their children.