Twenties Girl (10 page)

“Why did he break it off, then?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t know! At least, I have this theory. …” I trail off, torn. It’s still painful talking about Josh. But, on the other hand, it’s quite a relief to have someone fresh to download to. “OK. Tell me what
you
think.” I kick off my shoes, sit crosslegged on the sofa, and lean toward Sadie. “We were in this relationship and it was all going great—”

“Is he handsome?” she interrupts.

“Of course he’s handsome!” I pull out my phone, find the most flattering picture of him, and tilt it toward her. “Here he is.”

“Mmm.” She makes a so-so gesture with her head.

Mmm?
Is that the best she can do? I mean, Josh is absolutely, definitively good-looking, and that’s not just me being biased.

“We met at this bonfire party. He’s in IT advertising.” I’m scrolling through, showing her other pictures. “We just clicked, you know how you do? We used to spend all night just talking.”

“How dull.” Sadie wrinkles her nose. “I’d rather spend all night gambling.”

“We were getting to know each other,” I say, shooting her an offended look. “Like you
do
in a relationship.”

“Did you go dancing?”

“Sometimes!” I say impatiently. “That wasn’t the point! The point was, we were the perfect match. We talked about everything. We were wrapped up in each other. I honestly thought this was The One. But then …” I pause as my thoughts painfully retread old paths. “Well, two things happened. First of all, there was this time when I … I did the wrong thing. We were walking past a jewelers’ shop and I said, ‘That’s the ring you can buy me.’ I mean, I was
joking
. But I think it freaked him out. Then, a couple of weeks later, one of his mates broke up from a long-term relationship. It was like shock waves went through the group. The commitment thing hit them and none of them could cope, so they all ran. All of a sudden Josh was just… backing off. Then he broke up with me, and he wouldn’t even talk about it.”

I close my eyes as painful memories start resurfacing. It was such a shock. He dumped me by email. By
email
.

“The thing is, I
know
he still cares about me.” I bite my lip. “I mean, the very fact he won’t talk proves it! He’s scared, or he’s running away, or there’s some other reason I don’t know about. … But I feel so powerless.” I feel the tears brimming in
my eyes. “How am I supposed to fix it if he won’t discuss it? How can I make things better if I don’t know what he’s thinking? I mean, what do
you
think?”

There’s silence. I look up to see Sadie sitting with her eyes closed, humming softly.

“Sadie?
Sadie?”

“Oh!” She blinks at me. “Sorry. I do tend to go into a trance when people are droning on.”

Droning on?

“I wasn’t ‘droning on’!” I say with indignation. “I was telling you about my relationship!”

Sadie is surveying me with fascination.

“You’re terribly
serious
, aren’t you?” she says.

“No, I’m not,” I say at once, defensively. “What does that mean?”

“When I was your age, if a boy behaved badly, one simply scored his name out from one’s dance card.”

“Yes, well.” I try not to sound too patronizing. “This is all a bit more serious than dance cards. We do a bit more than dance.”

“My best friend, Bunty, was treated terribly badly by a boy named Christopher one New Year. In a taxi, you know.” Sadie widens her eyes. “But she had a little weep, powdered her nose again, and tally-ho! She was engaged before Easter!”

“Tally-ho?” I can’t keep the scorn out of my voice. “That’s your attitude toward men? Tally-ho?”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“What about proper balanced relationships? What about commitment?”

Sadie looks baffled. “Why do you keep talking about commitment? Do you mean being committed to a mental asylum?”

“No!” I try to keep my patience. “I mean … Look, were you ever married?”

Sadie shrugs. “I was married for a spell. We had too many arguments. So wearing, and one begins to wonder why one ever
liked the chap in the first place. So I left him. I went abroad, to the Orient. That was in 1933. He divorced me during the war. Cited me for adultery,” she adds gaily, “but everyone was too distracted to think about the scandal by then.”

In the kitchen, the oven pings to tell me my lasagna’s ready. I wander through, my head buzzing with all this new information. Sadie was divorced. She played around. She lived in “the Orient,” wherever that’s supposed to be.

“D’you mean Asia?” I hoick out my lasagna and tip some salad onto my plate. “Because that’s what we call it these days. And, by the way, we
work
at our relationships.”

“Work?” Sadie appears beside me, wrinkling her nose. “That doesn’t sound like any fun. Maybe that’s why you broke up.”

“It isn’t!” I feel like slapping her, she’s so annoying. She doesn’t understand anything.

“Count On Us,”
she reads off my lasagna packet. “What does that mean?”

“It means it’s low fat,” I say, a little reluctantly, expecting the usual lecture that Mum gives me about processed diet foods and how I’m a perfectly normal size and girls these days are far too obsessed about weight.

“Oh, you’re on a
diet.”
Sadie’s eyes light up. “You should do the Hollywood diet. You eat nothing but eight grapefruit a day, black coffee, and a hard-boiled egg. And plenty of cigarettes. I did it for a month and the weight
fell
off me. A girl in my village swore she took tapeworm pills,” she adds reminiscently. “But she wouldn’t tell us where she got them.”

I stare at her, feeling a bit revolted. “Tapeworms?”

“They gobble up all the food inside one, you know. Marvelous idea.”

I sit down and look at my lasagna, but I’m not hungry anymore. Partly because visions of tapeworms are now lodged in my mind. And partly because I haven’t talked about Josh so openly for ages. I feel all churned up and frustrated.

“If I could just talk to him.” I spear a piece of cucumber and
stare at it miserably. “If I could just get inside his head. But he won’t accept my calls, he won’t meet up—”

“More
talking?” Sadie looks appalled. “How are you going to forget him if you keep talking about him? Darling, when things go wrong in life, this is what you do.” She adopts a knowledgeable tone. “You lift your chin, put on a ravishing smile, mix yourself a little cocktail—and out you go.”

“It’s not as simple as that,” I say resentfully. “And I don’t
want
to forget about him. Some of us have hearts, you know. Some of us don’t give up on true love. Some of us…”

I suddenly notice Sadie’s eyes have closed and she’s humming again.

Trust me to get haunted by the flakiest ghost in the world. One minute shrieking in my ear, the next making outrageous comments, the next spying on my neighbors … I take a mouthful of lasagna and chew it crossly. I wonder what else she saw in my neighbors’ flats. Maybe I could get her to spy on that guy upstairs when he’s making a racket, see what he’s actually doing—

Wait.

Oh my God.

I nearly choke on my food. With no warning, a new idea has flashed into my mind. A fully formed, totally brilliant plan. The plan that will solve everything.

Sadie could spy on Josh
.

She could get into his flat. She could listen to his conversations. She could find out what he thinks about everything and tell me, and somehow I could work out what the problem is between us and solve it.

This is the answer. This is it.
This
is why she was sent to me.

“Sadie!” I leap to my feet, powered by a kind of giddy adrenaline. “I’ve worked it out! I know why you’re here! It’s to get me and Josh back together!”

“No, it’s not,” Sadie objects at once. “It’s to get my necklace.”

“You can’t be here just for some crummy old necklace.” I
make a brushing-aside gesture. “Maybe the real reason is you’re supposed to help me!
That’s
why you were sent!”

“I wasn’t
sent!”
Sadie appears mortally offended at the very idea. “And my necklace isn’t crummy! And I don’t want to help you. You’re supposed to be helping
me
.”

“Who says? I bet you’re my guardian angel.” I’m getting carried away here. “I bet you’ve been sent back to earth to show me that actually my life is wonderful, like in that movie.”

Sadie looks at me silently for a moment, then surveys the kitchen.

“I don’t think your life’s wonderful,” she says. “I think it’s rather drab. And your haircut’s atrocious.”

I glare at her furiously. “You’re a crap guardian angel!”

“I’m
not
your guardian angel!” she shoots back.

“How do you know?” I clutch at my chest determinedly. “I’m getting a very strong psychic feeling that you’re here to help me get back together with Josh. The spirits are telling me.”

“Well, I’m getting a very strong psychic feeling that I’m
not
supposed to get you back together with Josh,” she retorts at once. “The spirits are telling
me
.”

She’s got a nerve. What would she know about spirits? Is she the one who can see ghosts?

“Well, I’m alive, so I’m boss,” I snap. “And I say you’re supposed to help me. Otherwise, maybe I won’t have time to look for your necklace.”

I didn’t mean to put it quite as bluntly as that. But then, she forced me into it by being so selfish. I mean, honestly. She should
want
to help her own great-niece.

Sadie’s eyes flash angrily at me, but I can tell she knows she’s caught out.

“Very well,” she says at last, and her slim shoulders heave in a huge, put-upon sigh. “It’s a terrible idea, but I suppose I have no choice. What do you want me to do?”

SIX

haven’t felt as zippy as this for weeks. For months. It’s eight o’clock the next morning, and I feel like a brand-new person! Instead of waking all depressed, with a picture of Josh clutched in my tearstained hand, a bottle of vodka on the floor, and Alanis Morissette playing on a loop…

OK. That was only the one time.

But anyway. Just look at me! Energetic. Refreshed. Straight eyeliner. Crisp stripy top. Ready to face the day and spy on Josh and get him back. I’ve even booked a cab, to be efficient.

I head into the kitchen to find Sadie sitting at the table in yet another dress. This one is mauve, with panels of tulle and a draping effect at the shoulders.

“Wow!” I can’t help gasping. “How come you have all these different outfits?”

“Isn’t it glorious?” Sadie looks pleased with herself. “And it’s very easy, you know. I just imagine myself in a particular frock and it appears on me.”

“So was this one of your favorites?”

“No, this belonged to a girl I knew called Cecily.” Sadie smooths down the skirt. “I always coveted it.”

“You’ve pinched another girl’s outfit?” I can’t help giggling. “You’ve stolen it?”

“I haven’t
stolen
it,” she says coldly. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“How do you know?” I can’t resist needling her. “What if she’s a ghost too and she wants to wear it today and she can’t? What if she’s sitting somewhere, crying her eyes out?”

“That’s not how it works,” says Sadie stonily.

“How do you know what works? How do you know—” I break off as a sudden brilliant thought hits me. “Hey! I’ve got it! You should just
imagine
your necklace. Just picture it in your head and then you’ll have it. Quickly, close your eyes, think hard—”

“Are you always this slow-witted?” Sadie interrupts. “I’ve tried that. I tried to imagine my rabbit-fur cape and dancing shoes as well, but I couldn’t get them. I don’t know why.”

“Maybe you can only wear ghost clothes,” I say after a moment’s consideration. “Clothes that are dead too. Like, that have been shredded up or destroyed or whatever.”

We both look at the mauve dress for a few moments. It seems sad to think of it being shredded up; in fact, I wish I hadn’t mentioned it.

“So, are you all set?” I change the subject. “If we go soon, we can catch Josh before he leaves for work.” I take a yogurt out of the fridge and start spooning it into my mouth. Just the thought of being near Josh again is making me feel fizzy. I can’t even finish my yogurt, I’m so excited. I put the half-eaten pot back in the fridge and dump the spoon in the sink.

“Come on. Let’s go!” I pick up my hairbrush from its place in the fruit bowl and tug it through my hair. Then I grab my keys and turn to see Sadie studying me.
“Goodness
, your arms are plump,” she says. “I hadn’t noticed before.”

“They’re not plump,” I say, offended. “That’s solid muscle.” I clench my biceps at her and she recoils.

“Even worse.” Complacently, she looks down at her own slender white arms. “I was always renowned for my arms.”

“Yeah, well, these days, we appreciate a bit of definition,” I inform her. “We go to the gym. Are you ready? The taxi’ll be here in a minute.” The buzzer goes and I lift the receiver.

“Hi! I’m just coming down—”

“Lara?” comes a familiar muffled voice. “Darling, it’s Dad. And Mum. Just popped round to check you’re all right. We thought we’d catch you before work.”

I stare at the speakerphone in disbelief. Dad and Mum? Of all the times. And what’s all this with the “popping round,” anyway? Mum and Dad never “pop round.”

“Um … great!” I try to sound breezy. “I’ll be right down!”

I emerge from my building to find Mum and Dad standing on the pavement. Mum is holding a potted plant and Dad is clutching a full Holland & Barrett bag, and they’re talking in low voices. As they see me, they come forward with fake smiles as though I’m a mental patient.

“Lara, darling.” I can see Dad’s worried eyes scanning my face. “You haven’t replied to any of my texts or messages. We were getting worried!”

“Oh, right. Sorry. I’ve been a bit busy.”

“What happened at the police station, darling?” asks Mum, attempting to sound relaxed.

“It was fine. I gave them a statement.”

“Oh, Michael.” Mum closes her eyes in despair.

“So you really believe Great-Aunt Sadie was murdered?” I can tell Dad is as freaked out as Mum.

“Look, Dad, it’s no big deal,” I say reassuringly. “Don’t worry about me.”

Mum’s eyes snap open. “Vitamins,” she says, and starts rooting in the Holland & Barrett bag. “I asked the lady at the shop about … behavioral—” She stops herself. “And lavender oil… and a plant can help with stress—you could talk to it!”

She tries to give me the potted plant, and I thrust it away again impatiently.

“I don’t want a plant! I’ll forget to water it and it’ll die.”

“You don’t have to have the plant,” says Dad in soothing tones, glancing warningly at Mum. “But you’ve obviously been very stressed, what with the new business … and Josh. …”

They are so going to change their tune. They are so going to realize I was right all along, when Josh and I get back together and get married. Not that I can say this right now, obviously.

“Dad.” I give him a patient, reasonable smile. “I told you, I don’t even think about Josh anymore. I’m just getting on with life. It’s you who keeps bringing him up.”

Ha. That was quite clever. I’m just about to tell Dad that maybe
he’s
obsessed with Josh, when a taxi pulls up beside us on the pavement and a driver leans out.

“Thirty-two Bickenhall Mansions?”

Damn. OK, I’ll just pretend I didn’t hear him.

Mum and Dad are exchanging looks. “Isn’t that where Josh lives?” says Mum tentatively.

“I don’t remember,” I say carelessly. “Anyway, it’s for someone else—”

“Thirty-two Bickenhall Mansions?” The driver has leaned farther out of his cab, his voice raised higher. “Lara Lington? You book taxi?”

Bugger.

“Why are you going to Josh’s flat?” Mum sounds beside herself.

“I’m … not!” I flounder. “It must be some car I booked months ago, finally turning up! They’re always late. You’re six months late! Go away!” I shoo at the bemused driver, who eventually puts the car into gear and drives away.

There’s a kind of tense silence. Dad’s expression is so transparent it’s endearing. He wants to believe the best of me. On the other hand, the evidence is all pointing one way.

“Lara, do you swear that taxi wasn’t for you?” he says at last.

“I swear.” I nod. “On … Great-Aunt Sadie’s life.”

I hear a gasp and look around to see Sadie’s eyes beaming fury at me.

“I couldn’t think of anything else!” I say defensively.

Sadie ignores me and walks right up to Dad. “You’re fools,” she says emphatically. “She’s still smitten with Josh. She’s about to spy on him. And she’s making
me
do her dirty work.”

“Shut up, you sneak!” I exclaim before I can stop myself.

“Sorry?” Dad stares at me.

“Nothing.” I clear my throat. “Nothing! I’m fine.”

“You’re a lunatic.” Sadie swivels around pityingly.

“At least I’m not
haunting
people!” I can’t help retorting.

“Haunting?” Dad is trying to follow me. “Lara … what on earth …”

“Sorry.” I smile at him. “Just thinking aloud. In fact … I was actually thinking about poor Great-Aunt Sadie.” I sigh, shaking my head pityingly. “She had such sad little twiggy arms.”

“They’re not twiggy!” Sadie glares back.

“She probably thought they were really attractive. Talk about deluded!” I laugh gaily. “Who wants pipe cleaners for arms?”

“Who wants pillows for arms?” Sadie shoots back, and I gasp in outrage.

“They’re
not
pillows!”

“Lara …” says Dad faintly. “What’s not pillows?”

Mum looks like she wants to cry. She’s still clutching on to her potted plant and a book entitled
Stress-Free Living: You CAN Achieve It
.

“Anyway, I have to get to work.” I give Mum a huge hug. “It’s been brilliant to see you. And I’ll read your book and take some vitamins. And I’ll see you soon, Dad.” I hug him too. “Don’t worry!”

I blow them both kisses and hurry off along the pavement. When I reach the corner, I turn to wave—and they’re both still standing there like waxworks.

I do feel sorry for my parents, I really do. Maybe I’ll buy them a box of chocolates.

Twenty minutes later I’m standing outside Josh’s building, feeling bubbly with exhilaration. Everything’s going according to plan. I’ve located his window and explained the layout of the flat. Now it’s up to Sadie.

“Go on!” I say excitedly. “Walk through the wall! This is so cool!”

“I don’t
need
to walk through the wall.” She shoots me a disparaging look. “I’ll simply imagine myself inside his flat.”

“OK. Well… good luck. Try to find out as much as you can. And be careful!”

Sadie disappears, and I crane my neck to survey Josh’s window, but I can’t see anything. I feel almost sick with anticipation. This is the nearest I’ve been to Josh in weeks. He’s in there right now. And Sadie’s watching him. And any minute she’ll come out and—

“He’s not there.” Sadie appears in front of me.

“Not there?” I stare at her, affronted. “Well, where is he? He doesn’t usually leave for work ’til nine.”

“I’ve no idea.” She doesn’t sound remotely interested.

“What did the place look like?” I can’t help probing for details. “Is it a real mess? Like, with old abandoned pizza boxes and beer bottles everywhere? Like he’s been letting himself go? Like he doesn’t really care about life anymore?”

“No, it’s very tidy. Lots of fruit in the kitchen,” Sadie adds. “I noticed that.”

“Oh. Well, he’s obviously taking care of himself, then.” I hunch my shoulders, a bit discouraged. It’s not that I
want
Josh to be an emotional wreck on the brink of meltdown, exactly, but…

Well. You know. It would be quite flattering.

“Let’s go.” Sadie yawns. “I’ve had enough of this.”

“I’m not just leaving! Go in again! Look around for clues! Like … are there any photographs of me or anything?”

“No,” says Sadie at once. “None. Not a single one.”

“You haven’t even looked.” I glare at her resentfully. “Search on his desk. Maybe he’s in the middle of writing a letter to me or something. Go on!” Without thinking, I try to push her toward the building, but my hands sink straight through her body.

“Urgh!” I recoil, feeling squeamish.

“Don’t do that!” she exclaims.

“Did it… hurt?” I can’t help glancing at my hands, as though they really have just plunged through her innards.

“Not exactly,” she says grudgingly. “But it’s not pleasant to have someone’s hands poking through my stomach.”

She whisks off again. I try to damp down my agitation and wait patiently. But this is totally unbearable, being stuck outside. If it were me searching, I’d find something, I know I would. Like a diary full of Josh’s thoughts. Or a half-written email, unsent. Or … or
poetry
. Imagine that.

I can’t help sliding into a fantasy about Sadie coming across a poem scrawled on some cast-aside piece of paper. Something really simple and direct, just like Josh himself.

It Was All A Mistake

God, I miss you, Lara.
I love your—

I can’t think of anything to rhyme with Lara.

“Wake up!
Lara?”
I jump and open my eyes to see Sadie in front of me again.

“Did you find something?” I gasp.

“Yes. As a matter of fact, I did!” Sadie looks triumphant. “Something rather interesting and extremely relevant.”

“Oh my God. What?” I can hardly breathe as tantalizing possibilities
flash through my mind. A photo of me under his pillow … a diary entry resolving to get back in touch with me—

“He’s having lunch with another girl on Saturday.”

“What?” All my fantasies melt away. I stare at her, stricken. “What do you mean, he’s having lunch with another girl?”

“There was a memorandum pinned up in the kitchen:
twelve-thirty lunch with Marie.”

I don’t know anyone called Marie. Josh doesn’t know anyone called Marie.

“Who’s Marie?” I can’t contain my agitation. “Who’s Marie?”

Sadie shrugs. “His new girlfriend?”

“Don’t say that!” I cry in horror. “He hasn’t got a new girlfriend! He wouldn’t have! He said there wasn’t anyone else! He said …”

I trail off, my heart thumping. It never even occurred to me that Josh might be seeing another girl already. It never even crossed my mind.

In his breakup email, he said he wasn’t going to rush into anything new. He said he had to take time out to
think about his whole life
. Well, he hasn’t thought for very long, has he? If I was going to think about my whole life, I’d take
ages
longer than six weeks. I’d take … a year! At least! Maybe two or three.

Boys treat thinking like sex. They think it takes twenty minutes and then you’re done and there’s no point talking about it. They have
no idea
.