The Best Thing I Never Had (20 page)

‘No, I guess it’s what I am,’ Demi answered slowly. Sukie reached out with her free hand and caught him by the chin, already rough with late afternoon stubble.

‘You’re more than that and you know it,’ she smiled shyly.

‘Just not in public.’

‘Not in public,’ she agreed. And then she leant to kiss him, to distract him, before the conversation got any more uncomfortable.

It was so much harder to resist the impulse, being at home. In his office social media sites were blocked, so it hadn’t been an issue. Adam had walked up to and straight past his PC three times since getting in from work. He should have called someone, gone out; he wondered if it was too late to. He scrolled through his mobile phone contacts list distractedly, opened that morning’s text from Johnny again and re-read it.

He stuck a frozen ready-meal curry in the microwave and, as it slowly rotated, gave in and switched on his computer. He glowered at it impatiently as it droned to life, then for some reason chose that point in time to undertake an impossibly long series of system updates.

Finally, the microwave pinged and his desktop loaded. Adam haphazardly tipped his steaming dinner onto a plate, stuck a fork into the pile of rice and carried it over to the desk. When he logged on to his Facebook, he had four notifications, one message and two invitations to play on some sort of virtual farm, all of which he summarily ignored.

He had gleaned from comments made by Nicky and Miles in the past that Harriet too lived in London: off-hand comments, as both of them studiously avoided referring to her when in his presence; he could only assume that, vice-versa, he was persona-non-grata when they spent time with her. It was a delicate balance indeed, one this wedding was certainly poised to tip. Sometimes, when he saw a short woman with a dark pixie crop on the tube, he had to fight an immediate compulsion to dive headfirst into his copy of the Evening Standard. It hadn’t ever been her though, not yet. But now he knew that she knew Johnny’s girlfriend. Small world indeed, he agreed wryly with Johnny’s text.

He only had to type H A R R into the Facebook search box before she came up, a result of their some fifty plus friends in common. As he suspected, her profile was set to private.
If you know Harriet,
Facebook suggested gleefully,
send her a Friend Request or Message her.
No thanks, he thought contemptuously at the website.

It was quite funny, looking at the small thumbnail of her profile picture. Jumping like a scared child at the sight of women with short hair was proved even more absurd than previously granted, as Harriet’s hair apparently now hung straight to her shoulders. The picture was typical profile picture fare, taken on some beach, the top half of her face taken up with a pair of ludicrously large sunglasses.

There nearly wouldn’t have been anything to recognise her by, if she hadn’t been smiling – her truest one, the one that almost seemed too big on her small face. Adam remembered the first time he’d caused her to have such a wide smile, how before then he’d seen it bestowed on the other girls on occasion, but never to him until that day. He’d felt in that moment like he had some sort of superpower, smiling back at her just as broadly.

So that was the only piece of information that this locked profile was giving up: that Harriet still had people in her life capable of causing this limitless smile. Adam turned abruptly to his rapidly cooling curry, shovelling a few forkfuls into his mouth, admonishing himself for the spite rising up warm from his core, telling him that she didn’t deserve it.

The whole sorry story came spilling out somewhere between the third and fourth bottle of rosé. Annie sat in thoughtful silence for some time after Harriet ran out of anything to say and simply sat back in her chair, feeling positively bloated by the combination of misery and too much wine.

‘Well,’ Annie said, eventually. ‘You were right not to tell me the whole story before; I would
never
have been your friend if I had but known!’ She waggled her eyebrows to show that she was only kidding, but Harriet’s stomach contracted painfully all the same. Annie moved to top up their wine glasses with the dregs of bottle number four.

‘For what it’s worth,’ she continued, ‘I think he probably did sleep with Leigha.’ Harriet glared at her friend, snatching away the wine glass and bringing it up to her lips the second Annie had stopped pouring. ‘She sounds like the sort of girl that encourages men to er, think with the
lower
of their two heads,’ Annie smirked, as she finished replenishing her own drink. ‘But you were wrong to run out on him like that. And on his birthday too, you bitch.’

‘I know,’ Harriet conceded miserably. ‘That’s the worst. All the others, they can bugger off, because I never did anything to hurt them. But I did hurt Adam. I handled the ending of things very badly.’

‘And he never tried to contact you?’ Annie asked. Harriet shook her head. ‘Not ever?’ Harriet shook her head again. ‘Hmmm,’ Annie said, thoughtfully. ‘He’s probably cool with it now, though, it’s been – what? – five years? Does he have a girlfriend?’ Harriet’s wine-filled stomach roiled in protest at the unpalatable thought of Adam being with another woman.

‘Serial dater, according to Nicky,’ she answered.’ Doesn’t seem to want to settle down’.

‘Sounds like someone else I know,’ Annie remarked knowingly. Harriet shot her an evil look. ‘Don’t be so crotchety,’ Annie instructed, patting her friend on the back of her hand. ‘Like I’ve been saying, this is a good thing. You’ve been frightened of facing those girls for years, and now you have to and you need never be frightened again. And as for the ‘one that got away’, well…’ Annie paused to take a large gulp of wine whilst she considered her phrasing carefully. ‘You should take this wedding as the opportunity to do what you should have done five years ago. Say goodbye to Adam. And forget him.’

‘I think we should have at least offered to give her a lift,’ Iona was saying, for the fifth time. Johnny felt his grip tighten on the leather of the steering wheel. ‘I mean, she might even be in one of these cars.’ Iona looked out of the passenger-side window attentively, as if Harriet was going to be at the wheel of the red Corsa in the adjacent lane, waving merrily. ‘Or maybe she’s on the train, with all her bags. Poor thing,’ Iona continued sullenly.

‘She’s not our mate,’ Johnny reminded his girlfriend, a little impatiently. ‘We don’t owe her lifts anywhere. I’m sure she’s making her way just fine.’

‘You’re going to have to see her soon enough,’ argued Iona. ‘And she’s my sister’s best friend. And I liked her fine when I met her and nothing you’ve told me has made me feel otherwise.’ Johnny rolled his eyes. If anything, Iona was
more
impressed with Harriet since hearing the sordid details of her involvement with Adam.

‘Sounds like
your ex
was being a
nasty
piece of work and Adam was a liar and Harriet just realised she didn’t have to stay and put up with it anymore,’ she had said. Johnny had just sighed.

‘Are you only taking that view because she was
my ex
?’ he’d teased, mimicking the bitchy stress that Iona had put on the words. Iona hadn’t dignified him with a response.

‘Well, if you’re that bothered about Harriet you can sit next to her and be her friend all weekend,’ Johnny said scathingly, frowning hard at the tarmac ahead of the car.

‘Whilst you sit with Leigha, I suppose?’ suggested Iona in an airy tone. Johnny couldn’t help but take his eyes from the road and glance at her. Had he ever told her Leigha’s actual name? He couldn’t remember. The word sounded amazing and strange coming from Iona’s lips. Iona met his gaze, mutely challenging, before he dragged his concentration back to driving.

‘Of course not, don’t be silly,’ he said roughly.

‘I can’t wait to meet all these people,’ Iona continued, idly twirling a brown flick of hair around her index finger. ‘They feel like celebrities. I know so much about them.’

They were going to be late, so late that you couldn’t even joke it was ‘fashionably’ so, but in her post-coital haze Sukie couldn’t quite bring herself to care. She started greedily on her second cigarette, dragging the heat as deep into her lungs as she could, revelling in the fact that – for once – she didn’t have to rush home. She was off the leash.

Her father had only grunted when she told him that she was going to be spending the long Easter weekend back on her University campus for her ex-housemate’s wedding. Obviously she hadn’t informed him about her incongruous date – or the fact that she planned to spend at least half of Friday with him inside of her. ‘Good Friday’, indeed.

‘You,’ growled Demi, playfully, ‘you are insatiable. We’re late.’ Sukie blew a smoke ring into his face.

‘We’re not that late.’

‘Honey, even if we had a magic teleporter thing and teleported straight to the place right this second, we’d still be considered late.’ Demi slapped her playfully on the thigh. ‘Get up, get dressed. I don’t want to make a terrible impression on your friends.’

Sukie laughed, sliding her hand across his hips to his groin. ‘Hi guys, sorry we’re late,’ she mimicked. ‘It’s all the fault of my gay fuck buddy here and his magnificent piece. I literally can’t get enough!’ Demi pulled away from her abruptly, refusing to share in the joke, sliding to sit on the side of the bed and pull items of clothing on.

‘Can’t you let me be your boyfriend for one weekend?’ he muttered, still not facing her. ‘Do we have to do the “gay fuck buddy” thing?’

Sukie bit down on the retorts that immediately rose to the tip of her tongue. But that’s what you are, aren’t you? You’re Rob’s boyfriend, not mine. Instead she mutely slipped to the opposite end of the bed and followed his lead by starting to get dressed.

An understandably harried looking Nicky opened the door after the knock. Silently Adam held his arms out to her and Nicky bestowed one of her infamous bear hugs upon him.

‘It’s good to see you,’ she murmured into his chest. Adam straightened them out, holding Nicky at arms’ length and inspecting her.

‘No, it’s good to see
you,
’ he corrected. ‘The blushing bride!’ Nicky gave a roll of the eyes that suggested blushing was the last thing she was doing at the moment.

‘Is that my Best Man?’ came a voice from inside the room; Miles appeared over Nicky’s shoulder, looking a damn sight less stressed than she did.

‘Hey mate!’ Adam greeted him. ‘All systems go, eh?’

‘All systems go,’ Miles agreed, cheerfully. ‘You’re half an hour early. Weird being back here, isn’t it?’

‘Very weird,’ Adam agreed. ‘Gives me a craving to drink cheap alcohol.’

‘Funny, I’ve got that craving too,’ Nicky said, wryly.

‘What room are you in?’ Miles asked, eagerly. Adam shifted the weight of his hold-all on his shoulder to better inspect the number engraved on the key fob in his left hand.

‘Eight.’

‘Next to me,’ Miles smiled. ‘I’ll go along with you.’

‘Wait, this isn’t your room?’ Adam asked, confused.

‘No!’ Nicky stepped aside in the doorway to let Miles past her and out into the corridor. ‘It’s bad luck for the bride and groom to wake up together on their wedding day.’

‘Really?’ Adam asked. ‘You two don’t strike me as über traditional like that…’ Miles shot him a look that showed his agreement.

‘We’re not seeing one another after the dinner until it’s at the altar,’ Nicky said firmly.

‘Dinner?’ Adam repeated. ‘What dinner?’ His mind lit dubiously on memories of the various campus cafés and cafeterias.

‘Yes, dinner,’ Nicky confirmed. ‘The whole wedding party. Mauritzo’s, on the high street. Seven o’clock. What, did you think we were all going to order in pizza to the rooms?’

‘I can’t believe that place is still running,’ Miles mused. ‘Especially in this economy.’

‘Okay,’ Adam said, shifting his bag again, restlessly. ‘Seven o’clock. Is anyone else here yet?’ Nicky shook her head.

‘Because you’re half an hour early!’ Miles told him again, slapping him companionably on the shoulder.

Roddy had spent the last 45 minutes talking incessantly about his time at university, a subject matter that Leigha had little to no interest in. She wasn’t bothering to make her apathy any less blatant, just stared out the car window as the featureless motorways changed into roads more familiar, until finally they were cruising at 30 mph down streets she still knew like the back of her hand.

‘This turning?’ Roddy paused in his anecdotage to ask her. Leigha roused herself back to the present.

‘Hmm? Er, yes. It’s a one way system when you get onto campus, I think. I’ll tell you where to park.’

It was the middle of the Easter holidays and campus was more or less quiet, in that sad, abandoned way that places of liberal activity felt when deserted. Despite her earlier indifference, Leigha couldn’t resist the stirrings of nostalgia as they slowly made their way through her old home.

‘That was where I had most of my lectures,’ she blurted out, pointing at a building to the left hand side of the road; Roddy glanced over politely. ‘We’re going to come round on the halls of residence in a minute,’ she added, leaning a little forward in her seat. ‘The top couple of floors of one of the buildings is used as a Bed & Breakfast all year round. That’s where we’ll be staying.’

‘So we’re actually staying in the student digs?’ Roddy raised his eyebrows.

‘Oh, they’re like little Travelodge rooms,’ Leigha told him dismissively. ‘Mini kettles and everything. Don’t worry, nobody’s going to ask you to use a bin bag full of rubbish as a beanbag and play Playstation with them.’ Roddy chuckled.

‘Boy students aren’t quite
that
bad, I’m sure nobody ever suggested that,’ he assured her. Leigha merely looked at him archly to remind him that she didn’t exaggerate. Chastened, Roddy pulled his Audi efficiently into the parking space she’d just indicated with a mute flick of her wrist.

As the safety locks clicked off, Leigha slid as elegantly from the car as she could manage. Her professional smile moved smoothly into place as an eager looking woman emerged from the door of the halls’ reception and waved enthusiastically; the campus event coordinator, judging by the clipboard. Leigha took a deep breath and mentally girded herself as Roddy walked around the car to stand by her side. Here we go.

Harriet could feel sweat beading against her hairline as she made the last push up the hill from the train station, her small wheelie bag bumping and swerving erratically behind her on the uneven paving stones. She briefly considered removing her jacket and carrying it, but she really didn’t want to look even more like a bag lady than she already did.

In London it was perfectly acceptable to not own a car; the world was her Oystercard. Back out here, in the suburbs, she felt uncomfortably like a child again. Dolefully, she wished that she was sweeping up in something red and fancy that positively screamed: ‘Look how well I’m doing!’ instead of trudging up red-faced and perspiring.

She hated her shoulders for tensing up as she made the turn into campus. This place had been her home for three years, she had been happy here; she would never have imagined that she would be returning to it so on edge.

It was startling how everything looked exactly the same. She’d been prepared for differences, for something to jar, but nothing did. She might have only just left. Johnny and Adam might be coming over that rise from the sports’ centre, studded football boots dangling from their hands. Over to the west of the older buildings was a huge tree, tall and thick and hundreds of years old. Harriet blinked away the memory of a grinning Leigha, stuffing jackets and cardigans into plastic bags and into crannies under the roots, so she wouldn’t have to pay to coat check them when they got to the Union.

Harriet let her mind wander, giving her feet control to take her down the familiar route to the halls of residence. She felt 18 and 100, happy and sad, far too many incompatible things, all at once. That’s what she hated them most for, the other girls; they’d ruined all the thousands of happy hours she’d had here, and with them. Almost imperceptibly her pace slowed and she forced herself to speed back up to a normal stride.

Although she’d done almost nothing else but for the last few days, Harriet decided to run through the possible scenarios again.

Scenario one. Leigha bursts into an ear-splitting squeal and flings her arms around Harriet the minute she walks into the room.

‘Oh my God, I haven’t seen you for ages, you look so well!’ she cries.

‘The gang’s all here!’ Sukie agrees, adding herself to the hug.

‘I love you girls!’ Nicky coos, making it, officially, a group hug. Adam watches from where he leans against the far wall, waiting for the excitement to abate before he moves closer. He runs the pad of his thumb along the line of Harriet’s jaw.

‘Hello, Trouble,’ he murmurs.

Scenario two. Harriet walks tentatively into the room; a deadly hush falls over its inhabitants. Leigha storms up to her, her high heel shoes clicking angrily against the flooring as she does. In one fluid movement she removes an axe from her hand bag and – just as smoothly – decapitates her erstwhile best friend. From where he leans against the far wall, Adam applauds enthusiastically.

Harriet ruefully shook her head at herself. Frankly, both scenario one and scenario two were about as likely as each other.

Harriet felt her pace falter again as she moved into the southern part of the campus, the nearer of the residential buildings already in view. To be honest, she was hoping for scenario three – the scenario where each party maintains a feigned civility and more or less ignores the others until the end of this long, long weekend. That would do her just fine. She intended to lead by example.

She just needed to do something about her face. This place was stirring up more memories than she could keep out of her expression. In her head, she was everywhere, across the grass throwing snowballs at Sukie; then over in the bottom car park, sitting in silence in Seth’s battered old Polo, watching him rest his forehead against the steering wheel and cry as she broke his heart for the last time. And over there she was walking with Adam, back before things got complicated between them, him carrying her purple book bag home from lectures for her, thrown effortlessly over his shoulder as if it weighed nothing.

She dragged her focus back front and centre. There was no need to chase memories of Leigha, Sukie and Adam, when she was going to be facing the real deals soon enough.

Leigha followed the jabbering blonde coordinator into the Reception, smiling at all the right places, whilst her attention darted about, looking for familiar faces.

As she had feared, Harriet was already there, leaning causally against the Reception desk with her back to the room. Her hair was long now – strangely long – more Leigha’s own length; Leigha felt irrationally annoyed by the imitation. Harriet was talking to – Leigha felt a warm flush of pleasure tempered with guilt – Johnny, who glanced up at just that moment. Leigha saw his jaw working as he clenched his teeth.

Noticing her companion’s sudden disquiet, Harriet turned her head to see what he was looking at. Except it wasn’t Harriet at all, Leigha quickly realised, as soon as the angles of the girl’s face moved into view. The anonymous girl blinked, her focus switching from Leigha’s face, to Roddy, and back again. Roddy; Leigha had almost forgotten he was there. She reached out blindly with her hand until she connected with the solidity of his arm, and looped her own through it smoothly.

Johnny looked as if could very well grind his back molars down to stumps as Leigha approached; he didn’t reach out for the girl, she couldn’t help but note.

‘Hey, stranger,’ Leigha said softly as she arrived in front of the desk.

‘Roderick McCorley,’ Roddy said, putting his hand out proudly for Johnny to shake.

‘John Blake,’ Johnny mumbled in return, returning the handclasp gracelessly.