When Good Friends Go Bad (33 page)

The hell with that scheming bitch! Jen's throat was scorching as she stormed home, too upset to return to work. The confrontation with Meg had changed everything. No longer were her feelings for Aiden a delicious little secret she could hug to herself; Meg had made them seem cheap, tawdry, loathsome. What if she told Georgina? Knowing Meg, she was holding off until the moment of maximum impact, waiting till the revelation would create most damage or be of benefit to herself.

She threw off her coat and picked up a J-cloth, needing action to expel her fury. Half an hour later her kitchen was spotless and she was attacking the upstairs bathroom with a scourer and a bottle of Cif. The taps were gleaming, the bath whiter than white, but she couldn't erase the giant stain that had suddenly tarnished her happiness.

What right had Meg to criticise her? And why was she so angry? What skin was it off Meg's nose if she and Aiden were flirting? It couldn't be morals, everyone knew Meg had none of those. Loyalty to Georgina? Meg caring about someone other than herself? One could only wish!

She squirted the white liquid on the tile floor, scrubbing on her hands and knees in self-imposed penance. She'd spent days summoning every tiny thing that annoyed her about Georgina, so that instead of thinking of herself as a nasty piece of work slyly cheating with her best friend's husband, she could soothe her conscience by telling herself that they'd never really got along.

And what had she come up with? She rested back on her knees, reflecting. Well, Georgie had her mother's stuck-up attitudes. More than once she'd made remarks about council 'yobs' and Jen had had to remind her she used to live on a council estate. And she treated Aiden like another servant, sending him here and there. And often in their phone calls Jen could hear tap tap tap in the background and she sounded distracted, obviously still working on her laptop – even if she was the one who'd phoned. And if Jen said, 'Hey, you're busy, why don't we talk later?' Georgie would jump back with, 'No, it's fine,' but the minute Jen went back to chatting, the tapping would start up again. How was that?

Rude enough?

Annoying enough?

Reason enough to justify Jen wanting to steal her man?

Enough to cast her off as an old and valued friend?

Truth was, everyone had irritating qualities. Helen with her nagging. Anamaria with her blunt directness. Georgina with her snobbishness. Meg with her exaggerations and fabrications. And the closer you got to people, the deeper your knowledge of them, the more you discovered their weaknesses – Meg being a stunning example. Georgina probably thought Jen was unmotivated and she probably hated her style of dress or something. But would that mean the door was open for her to run off with Ollie, say, if Jen were the one still married?

What defined a friend, anyway? When did someone stop being an acquaintance or work colleague and make that transition? The first time they invited you out for a drink? Or to accompany them to a film? Did it depend on how much time you spent with them, how nice you thought they were, if they lived conveniently near you, how often they remembered your birthday or helped you through difficult situations?

For twenty-two years she'd got along fine without Georgina, and presumably vice versa, neither of them contacting each other, never even exchanging Christmas cards. What kind of best friendship was that? Was it something worth sacrificing her happiness for? Or just a childhood term that had stuck?

The floor was growing cold and hard under her knees. She stood up and wiped down the mirror, staring at her reflection. Instead of her usual sleek groomed look, her hair was shaggy and unkempt. With all the excitement she'd missed at least two hairdresser appointments, and it was in that messy in-between stage when it had passed her collar, lost its style and refused to do anything but fall in her eyes. She might have shed the middle-aged housewife veneer but golly, what a scruffbag. And yet she didn't look like an evil person, a home-wrecker. But that was what she was.

'Yeah, baby,'
she heard Meg say.
'Are you hot for me? Do you feel the magic?'

Unbidden and unwelcome, a parade of memories began marching round Jen's brain. Walking down Ashport high street hand in hand with Aiden and being turned 180 degrees when they saw Astrid coming the other way. The time she saw Astrid leaving the squat just as she arrived and he'd explained she'd stopped by to pick up some books. The way Aiden always opened his window and looked out when someone rang his doorbell, instead of running down to answer it. Other things that had seemed just slightly odd but were now slotting into place.

The phone was disturbingly light in her hand when she picked it up. It should have been one of those vintage black Bakelite models with circular dial, where even the receiver weighs a ton. Much more suitable for a femme fatale about to kill off her lover in true film noir fashion. She punched in the number.

'Hi, it's me,' she said, before he had a chance to speak. 'Just one question. Were you sleeping with Astrid all that time you were going out with me?'

'What?' Aiden laughed in a startled way, then recovered. 'I'm sorry, who is this?' he teased.

A shiver ran through her as she held the phone hard against her cheek, wanting to feel a different pain.

'Jen,' he said, when she failed to respond. 'What is this?' She could just see him raising his hands in disbelief, shrugging his shoulders to his ears. 'Why would you even . . .'

She pressed the red off button.

Immediately the phone rang. She knew it was Aiden but she didn't answer it. Instead she went into the sitting room and switched on the TV full volume – but nothing she watched could take her mind off things. In one ear she was hearing Georgina's voice, 'Is this piffle really on every morning?' and in the other, Meg. 'Do you think he stayed celibate for
you?
You were
so
naive.'

When the adverts came on, she rose out of the armchair and picked up the phone again.

'I'm glad you called.' Tom held the restaurant door open for Jen and guided her through with a hand lightly placed in the centre of her back. 'I was going to wait a couple more days until I phoned. The Rules, you know. Playing it cool – didn't want you to think I was overeager.'

'Who cares about rules?' Jen tossed her head as they walked past the Please Seat Yourself sign.

His hand stayed there as they weaved their way through the tables to the corner, as if without his touch she might wander in the wrong direction or – who knows – fall over. Jen felt like swatting it away or speeding up to make him run or lose contact but resisted the urge. So he had manners, holding the door for her, pulling out her chair. Was that so bad?

She might be dressed up to the nines in the marigold slinky satin dress she'd bought with Chloe, but she was starting off the evening as a right old grouch. Better change her attitude or she might as well leave before the first course. After all, as he'd pointed out,
she'd
rung him. It wasn't his fault that all day she'd been fending off calls from Aiden, refusing to answer the phone, although every cell of her body was vibrating with desperate curiosity, yearning and yet terrified to find out what he had to say.

'So what do you think of this place?' He opened his napkin.

'Nice.' She gazed around. It was a little faux-bistro affair with vast framed posters on the wall – the Eiffel Tower, Robert Doisneau's famous couple kissing by the Hôtel de Ville, giant adverts for the Moulin Rouge and Gauloises. The tables were packed too close together, so that if she stretched out her elbow could rest on the one beside them, and there was a minuscule area set up for a band. The air should have been blue with smoke, except that of course it was banned these days.

'The food's supposed to be out of this world and they have music later. Jazz. Do you like jazz?'

'If the mood takes me.'

'Does the mood take you?'

'My mood's not worth discussing.'

'Oh?' He raised a questioning eyebrow.

'Sorry. Ignore me. I'm rotten company tonight.'

He gave a kind, fatherly smile. 'Well then, I've brought you to the right place.' He handed her the drinks menu. 'A word of warning, though. I don't know what they put in their cocktails but they're bloody lethal.'

Nor was he kidding. It was like that old joke, one tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor, except that the drink was Long Island Iced Tea, followed by wine with dinner, and if she didn't quite hit the floor, it was only thanks to Tom's grip on her elbow when they left. Food came and went. A band started and she vaguely remembered dancing, drinking some more, then stumbling as she staggered to the car park.

The rest of the evening was a blur . . . falling through the door of Tom's bedroom, discarding clothes . . . kissing . . . making love . . . or rather having sex . . . because truthfully that's all it was.

The next thing Jen knew it was morning, and she was naked and in a strange bed in a room she'd never seen before. Her first flush of panic – where was Chloe? Had she abandoned her? – diminished when she remembered allowing her daughter to go on a sleepover, almost unheard of on a school night, but surely preferable to staying in with a mother in the state she'd been in. She rolled over, dreading what she knew she'd see.

Lying beside her on the bed, with half his body exposed to the elements, was Tom Dugan. Obviously she'd stolen all the covers. Just like Ollie always said she did. His body was good but too hairy, not like Ollie's smooth skin.

And with that thought, stricken with horror, she scrambled out of bed and into the satin dress she'd poured herself into last night, so appropriate this morning for the walk of shame she'd have to endure until she could find a taxi. She didn't want to linger, even a few moments, for the time it'd take to call a cab, in case he woke up.

Instead she found herself shivering down the road in her too-thin evening coat, hugging it to her against the biting December wind and curious stares. She could see why when she caught sight of her reflection in the taxi window. Dark smudges under her eyes, hair sticking up all over the place, there was still just enough make-up left on her face to show that last night someone had been up to no good.

Standing under the hot shower of her own bathroom, watching the soap bubbles disappear down the plug as she scrubbed viciously at every inch of skin, she was overcome with remorse. It was like she'd deceived everybody, herself included. She thought about Aiden and his reaction, she thought about Chloe and how let down she'd be if she ever found out, but worst of all she felt bad about Ollie. All these years she'd been sleeping with him, used to his body and his ways, and now it was over and that part of her life had definitely come to a close. At least if it had been a romantic passion-filled night with Aiden, it would have been more justifiable and she would have been truer to herself. But that it had been Tom, someone she barely knew, didn't love, but who definitely hadn't deserved to be used as a form of spiteful revenge, made her feel dirty and shabby and . . . immoral.

God, she had to talk to someone. If ever she needed a friend it was today, when she'd fought with, rejected or done the dirty on everyone important in her life. Or almost everyone. She towelled her hair, staring at Feo who was sitting in front of her, staring back. He wagged his tail and dipped his body into a play bow.

'You won't believe this,' she said to him, her mouth full of toothpaste. 'We're going to do the unthinkable. We're going to visit Helen.'

It was funny how with all her mental griping about Helen, she'd forgotten one thing. When the fat hit the frying pan, her bossy interfering friend had always been there for her. Today was no exception. Instead of the expected withering response to what was admittedly a litany of ill deeds and wrong-doings, she astonished Jen with a full-on embrace.

'Poor soul,' she commiserated, as Jen's miserable recitation of woes trailed to a shaky halt. 'Sounds like you've got yourself in a real muddle.'

Jen put her tea mug down with a not quite steady hand. 'Oh I don't know,' she said wryly. 'Could be worse. I've only buggered up my life and everyone else's I've come in contact with. The original Black Spot, I am.'

'You know you and Chloe can always move in with me if you haven't found anywhere when your house completes. It'll be just like old times.' Helen smiled and placed a bottle of vodka and another of tonic on the tall circular table that formed a small island in a corner of her kitchen. 'Let's have a drink, shall we?'

'Now?' Jen glanced at the round clock above Helen's sink. 'It's not even eleven o'clock.'

'Sun has to be over the yardarm somewhere,' Helen chirped gaily. 'I won't tell if you don't.'

'I thought you'd be disgusted with me.' Jen leaned forward on the bar-style chairs and rested her chin on her hands, her elbows on the table. 'You're always so tetchy about women who cheat with other women's husbands.'

'But you haven't cheated though, have you?' Helen reasoned as she threw ice into each glass and added a generous measure of spirit. 'And you wouldn't do anything like this unless your heart was truly involved. I know you, Jen. You'll figure out what's right. And I wouldn't pay too much attention to this Meg either. Sounds a right cow. You'd be amazed how many women loathe seeing other women happy.'

She splashed a tiny amount of tonic into each glass, took a hefty slug and sighed. 'I fell in love with a married man once. A real looker. Male model. German. Met when I was temping at his agency and bam, there was an instant connection. Anyway he was married and I was married and . . . well, we had coffee a couple of times, we even went for lunch once but that was as far as it got.'

'You didn't . . . ?' Jen let the question trail away.

'Not even once. I was gaga over him, couldn't think of anything else – but in the end we took the high road. It all felt very noble at the time, but six months later that bastard husband of mine ran off with his floozie. I 'spose I've often regretted I never went for it.'

'I thought you were so against that sort of thing,' Jen said, dumbfounded. 'Solidarity of sisterhood, etc.'

'I was. Still am really. I don't ever want to do to some poor soul what that mercenary bitch did to me when she walked off with Roger. But fact is both our marriages broke up without any help from me, and all these years later I'm still the one left sleeping alone. That's where hifalutin' principles got me.' Her mouth drooped cynically.

'So what happened to the German in the end?' It was a relief to focus on someone else's story for a change.

'He found someone else, fortnight after I told him no. A Polish girl. Swept her off to paradise instead. They ended up getting married and moving back to Munich. I guess he wasn't lying when he said his marriage was on the rocks.' She stirred the ice in her glass noisily and gave a rueful grin at Jen. 'Probably a narrow escape if I could be replaced that easily. My number one rule – never go out with a man who looks better than you do.'

'Should have been one of mine,' Jen grimaced.

'Nonsense,' Helen said stoutly. 'I don't know why you say those things. Men swoon over you, always have. You're very attractive, Jen.' She took a second glance at her jogging bottoms, lack of make-up and scraped-back hair. 'Well, not today, of course.'

It was so Helen that Jen had to laugh. Alas, it was short-lived. Helen leaned forward, mouth pursed, to deliver the kind of news that makes killing the messenger seem a reasonable, even enlightened, act.

'By the way, I saw your ex-hubby the other day. Apparently that Frances Hutton has suggested that they visit Euro Disney with the kids.'

'Euro Disney? Ollie and Frances?' Suddenly all the breath was squeezed out of Jen's lungs.

'Yes, well, Chloe and her daughter seem to have hit it off and besides, they are both single.' Helen sucked on her piece of lemon and nodded to emphasise the point, apparently unaware of the hurt she was inflicting. 'Frances has free tickets. Some promotional thing through her company.'

'But he can't,' she said, incensed. 'What about Chloe's passport? When? Why didn't he tell me? Leaving the country? Can he do that without my permission? Flying her off without asking me?'

'Oh come on, Jen calm down.' Helen tutted soothingly. 'It's not like he's going to abscond with her. It's only France, not Fetihye, for Christ's sake. And do you even need passports for the EEC any more? They may even be taking the Eurostar for all you and I know.'

'Well, Chloe's got football practice after school tonight. I'll ask him when he drops her off.'

'Oh no, don't,' Helen looked dismayed. 'He'll know I told you. Wait till he mentions it.'

'Helen. How did you find all this out? Do you have a spy camera in their walls or what? You've never taken an interest in Ollie before. It's always been "Oh, Ollie's there, is he? I'll come over some other time." I thought you couldn't stand him.'

Helen had the grace to look a little embarrassed as she primped her hair fussily, eyes flicking away.

'Probably didn't want to intrude. Oh maybe we've had our ups and downs but, well, of course I only ever cared that you were happy.'

This was so far from Jen's recollection of past history that she had to stop and think about it. Had Helen's dislike of Ollie been all in her imagination, then? Or had her recitation to Helen in the early days of the small everyday quibbles, trivialities really, her relationship doubts, petty miseries, idle complaints about men's impossible nature, been responsible for tainting her friend's attitude towards her husband? Either way this was such a turnaround that her head spun.

'And besides,' Helen continued, while she was still digesting this, 'I was having real trouble finding a gas fitter. Worst time of year, it seems.'

Jen frowned, baffled. 'What's that to do with Ollie?'

'Well, he's living with one, isn't he?'

'He is?' She'd forgotten what Saul did when he wasn't running up and down the football sidelines. She always thought of him as the kids' coach and one of Ollie's gang of pals from the pub, but now she thought about it, of course he had that big white van with the blue-flame logo on the side.

'Yeah. Saul. Anyway I'd gone through local papers, Thomson's, Talking Pages and whatnot and then I mentioned it to the cashier in the newsagent and she had his card in the window. Small world as they say.'

'Unbelievable!' Jen was stunned.

'Saul and I got on like a house on fire,' she laughed loudly, throwing back her head, 'to coin a phrase. Told me I could drop in any time. I might at that. He's dead nice. A few years younger than me but who's counting?'

Had the world gone crazy? Had she fallen into an alternative galaxy? Jen stared at her friend in amazement. Helen was going to be dropping in on Ollie and Saul where Jen dared not tread? Helen was going after a younger man after all those years of implying Jen had robbed the cradle?

'I thought he was engaged?'

'It didn't work out. She finished with him a few weeks ago. Ah, well, one woman's reject is another woman's dream date.'

It was all too much, Jen thought, rattling her ice cubes. Bad enough her ex-husband had a whole other life without her. Unreasonable as it might seem, fresh from the bed of a semi-stranger, she had the very strong conviction he ought to be shoved into cyberfreeze, only to be thawed out for parenting and babysitting duties. Ollie and Frances at Euro Disney, whirling together in the teacups, snuggling through the Haunted House and Pirates of the Caribbean . . . it was shocking how much it hurt.

Almost as much as her head, now that the hair of the dog seemed to have viciously turned on her. How could she object to Euro Disney when she herself was canoodling with one man and shagging another?

Nor could she exactly accuse Helen of disloyalty for consorting with the enemy and the enemy's new flatmate, when she'd spent the last hour admitting her urge to steal her oldest friend's husband. She couldn't even articulate her inner surprise that Helen, so keen on doctors and solicitors, would be interested in a gas fitter, because then she'd be revealing that she was as big a snob as Georgina.

In one respect Helen was dead right. She was in a real muddle. Perhaps the best thing would be to retreat to her own house, crawl into bed, pull the blankets over her head and not emerge until at least tomorrow.

'Helen,' she kissed her at the door, 'you're such a good friend. A real lifesaver.'

'Hmm, not sure about that,' Helen replied. 'But I read somewhere that you can't have more than seven friends in life – real friends, I mean, lifetime ones, not casual acquaintances. Friends who'll stick by you no matter what. Well, Jen, I've always thought of you as one of my seven and I hope you can count me as one of yours.'

She felt like she'd been beaten with a hundred birch brooms by the time she made it home, hung up her keys and collapsed on to the couch, Feo jumping on her and licking her face. When the bell rang, without thinking she answered the door.

'I lost you once.' He stood there on her doorstep, hands in pockets, white-faced. 'I'm not going to do it again. Why didn't you answer my messages? What have I done wrong?'

'Ask Meg, Starkey,' she replied coldly, turning on her heel. She should have slammed the door, she thought, but instead she left it ajar. 'Ask Meg.'

'Let me get this straight.' Aiden sat with his head in his hands, his wavy hair spilling through his fingers. He'd followed her into the living room, listened to her without interruption and now he looked completely bemused. 'You don't think it'll work out between us because of something that happened when we were both silly young kids. It doesn't make sense.' He raised his gaze, his eyes looking haunted. 'Are you sure that's all Meg said?'

'She told me you were screwing Astrid when you were with me.' Jen stuck out her chin. 'Why, what else was there?'

Across the room Feo was busy killing a small stuffed penguin that Chloe had bought him. He'd already removed its shiny black eyes. Now he was throwing it in the air, catching it and shaking it, growling. On any other day his antics might even have been entertaining.

'Nothing,' Aiden met her gaze levelly, 'but it'd be just like Meg to fill your mind with poison.' He crossed over to the sofa next to Jen, reaching for her hand. 'Don't be like this, please. The whole thing was so juvenile. I was a jerk, maybe. I did love you, hopelessly, but I hated to hurt Astrid.'

Furious, Jen pulled her hand away, but Aiden held her shoulders, forcing her to face him. 'Hear me out. After I finished with her, right when I started seeing you, she came crying back, desperate, wouldn't leave me alone. And I was weak, I hated seeing her upset, so, well, like an idiot I let her in.' He released her, wearily rubbing his temples as if they were throbbing. 'Then as we got serious I knew I had to cut her out of my life, but I kept putting off the evil day. I handled it badly, I admit, but it wasn't because I wanted to two-time you.' His brows drew together darkly. 'I imagine Meg tells it differently.'

'Not really.' Jen was torn between empathising with his pain, mirroring her own, and feeling wholly let down with the disappointments and shocks of the last twenty-four hours. 'It's only . . . I thought we had this incredible love. It's like it's been the one shining beacon I've built my life around. That for a short time, at least, you loved me and me alone. And all the while you were . . . cheating.' She could hardly say the word.

'It wasn't
all the while.'
He sounded the faintest bit frustrated as Feo, heedless of the atmosphere, dropped the penguin at his feet and waited expectantly for him to throw it. 'It was just at the beginning. What else can I say? You're talking about events that happened when I was nineteen. I can't turn back the clock, but I loved you then and I love you now, you know I do.'

'All right then, while we're being honest, cards on the table, I have another question. Did you sleep with Meg?'

'Did she say I did?' He frowned again.

Her mind flashed back to the park, to those horrid sounds that Meg made, the words she'd used.

'No. But she knows . . . things.'

He stared into her eyes and gave a huge heartfelt sigh. Expecting him to deny it, she knew, when he got up and walked around, what his answer would be.

'Yes, I did.' He picked up Feo's penguin and slung it across the room, to the dog's delight. 'Another mistake. I admit it.'

'And how did that happen?' she said snippily.

'How do you think?' He met her eyes. 'Broken heart. Too much brandy. Wrong girl. It's hardly original.'

'You mean you slept with her at the Marlow Arms?' Now she was confused. Was that worse or better – that it was Georgina he'd betrayed with Meg, Georgina who'd been lied to and turned into a fool?

'I told you about that night. Some of it, anyway. Meg, Irwin Beidlebaum and I had been in her room, knocking back a bottle of brandy he bought somewhere, shooting the breeze. Irwin left and I went to your room. I was in shock from seeing you again. I was ready to leave Georgina that very night. To run away with you. Make up for all the lost time. I was also smashed out of my skull. But you didn't answer.' He was walking towards her, his burning dark eyes locked on hers. She couldn't look away. 'I stumbled back down the corridor, feeling like my life had ended, and as I passed her room Meg opened the door. She was pretty drunk too. She started off comforting me and we ended up in bed together. It meant nothing to either of us. Nothing meant anything. I knew I'd lost you.'

'I always wondered . . .' her voice cracked, 'what would have happened if I'd opened the door that night.' Would he really have left Georgina?