Lost Among the Living(23)

Still, I would find some way to keep fighting. I could not count on Alex to support me, and I certainly could not count on him to marry me. My own birth, and Mother’s example, had taught me that men, while wonderful, were completely unreliable, especially when it came to serious things like babies. By his own admission, Alex was aimless, a layabout, a man who already had everything he wanted. I did not want to think about how I felt about Alex. I did not want to think of the look that might come on his face when I told him, of how things would cool, how he would quietly fade from my life and become the faint memory of a wild incident. Men, no matter how honorable their intentions at first, could walk away from such difficult complications, and women could not; to expect anything else was foolish.

I do respectfully address your inquiry. However, with regard to the person or persons mentioned, such issues would be comprehensively addressed in the matter under contract, and heretofore referred to under subsection B . . .

I took only a brief luncheon, perusing Casparov’s newspapers unseeing. Perhaps I was lucky, and there was no child. I would not know for weeks. In the meantime, I could make preparations just in case. I ran the numbers through my mind as my eyes traveled the words blurred in newsprint over and over again. I had a small sum put away. I could move to a smaller room in my boardinghouse, save the train fare if I cut every second visit to Mother, skip two meals per week, and just perhaps . . .

At five o’clock I covered my typewriter and put on my coat and hat. I had walked out onto the street and was pulling up my collar futilely against the wet wind when I saw Alex leaning against a lamppost, waiting for me.

He had changed his clothes. I had not spoken to him when I left his flat that morning; I had left him still sleeping. Now he wore a knee-length black wool coat and black leather gloves, as well as a fedora of deep charcoal that matched his trousers. He was clean-shaven and well rested; he had not been working a job, under a crushing burden of worry, as I had. I saw him instantly—I would have seen him from a mile distant, even though he looked just like every other Londoner heading home in the faltering April light.

Thinking of Casparov, who might follow behind me through the door at any moment, I pulled my collar yet tighter and walked away, moving briskly in the direction of the bus that would take me to my boardinghouse. “Go away, Alex,” I said.

I heard him follow me, could picture how his body moved beneath the cover of the wool coat. “I’m worried about you,” he said.

“Go away,” I told him again. “If he sees us, I’ll lose my job.” A squeeze of panic jolted through my veins. If I lost my job now, before I had a chance to save any more money . . .

“Are you all right?” Alex asked, his voice coming from just behind my shoulder. “Where are you going?”

“Home, of course.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“You needn’t.”

He must have read something in my tone, because he said, “Very well, Jo. I’m sorry I approached you like that. It was rather stupid after yesterday’s subterfuge. But that doesn’t mean I can’t accompany you home.”

“I’m taking a bus,” I said.

Now his voice was just a little amused. “I think perhaps I can manage that. I’ve done it before.”

I reached the stop—there were a handful of other people waiting, men and women on their way home from work—and whirled to face him. In my panic it crossed my mind that he was looking for a repeat of the night before, as if I would be foolish enough to risk everything, to lay myself bare before him, every night of the week at his pleasure. But when I met his gaze, I could not sustain the idea. From beneath the brim of his hat, those unmistakable eyes were looking at me with concern—true, sincere concern. There was no trace of lust in his gaze. Or none that I could see, perhaps. It struck me as possible that I wasn’t as good a judge of men as I’d thought.

“Go home, Alex,” I tried again.

“No,” he replied.

So we took the bus, he and I, crowded in with the other London workers, as rain began to pelt the glass. He said nothing, merely sat next to me, his shoulder brushing mine, as if we did this every day. I thought for certain he’d be noticed, not only as of a higher class but also—to my mind—the best-looking man who had ever existed, but in his ordinary coat and hat no one gave him a second glance, not even the women. It seemed that when he wanted to, Alex could fade into the city background, invisible to everyone but me.

I looked out the window, wondered if I could walk to work instead and save the bus fare, and for the first time felt like weeping.

Still my shadow, he followed me off at my stop and from there to my boardinghouse. I roomed in a house that was cheap, horrid, and female-only, the landlady a termagant about her rules. “You cannot come in,” I told Alex. “Men are not allowed.”

“I’ll explain,” he said.

I pinched the bridge of my nose, my thin gloves cold against my skin. Now I would lose my home as well as my employment. Perhaps I could find somewhere cheaper. I’d be turned out if I was pregnant, anyway. In defeat, I turned my back on him and came through the front door, taking the stairs to my flat.

The landlady, who lived in the ground-floor room and watched everything from her front window, came immediately into the front hall, protesting, when Alex followed me. I kept walking and let her words wash over me, followed by Alex’s soothing tone. He told her something; I knew not what. I did not listen. I took the second set of stairs and put my key in the door to my rooms.