Page 39 of Between Us

She was almost relieved to find how livid she still was, and how pathetic and glib his excuses were. It made it simpler.

‘You’re pretending not to understand the difference between using anecdotes in general and ripping off traumatic, private things direct from your girlfriend’s past? Things told to you in strict confidence. Why didn’t you give me a warning about it? Is there anything else I should prepare for?’

The thought of the abortion being used made her insides turn into a mini earthquake.

‘OK, I’m sorry about that. I didn’t think. No, nothing else. I didn’t realise it was still this upsetting to you. You’ve probably forgotten, but you thought it was kind of … darkly, bleakly funny, when you first told me.’

This was so sly and unfair that Roisin authentically hated him, for a second. Maybe she had been playing it partly for laughs on the first telling. That was drunken youthful dates, trying to be fascinating and bold and own your family’s dysfunction as part of your fabulous rainbow, for you. Things said between two people newly sleeping together were not to be held up for daylight inspection. If you were perceptive enough about human nature to write about it, you were perceptive enough to know what was off limits.

‘You’re blessed with perfect memory for the tone of conversations we had ten years ago, but completely at a loss over why you didn’t think to consult me when you were writing it, a few months ago?’ Roisin said.

‘I see, this is one of those fights where anything I say gets me in bigger trouble.’

‘Are you serious?’

Joe screwed his eyes closed and paused. It was a stagey device, to make it clear that this was unnecessary. That she was what her pupils calledextra.He necked the last of his coffee and set his cup down on the step.

‘I intended to mention it. But in the hugely long-winded process of writing and rewriting and going into production, it fell by the wayside. As I said, I’m really sorry. It wasn’tintended to be such a clear reference that you’d find it this emotional. In my mind, it had become Jasper’s origins and part of something totally different. Obviously, as someone not involved in the process, I should’ve realised it’d be more of a shock to you.’

Roisin wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but nevertheless, she was aghast at this smooth horseshit. There was a level of honesty she needed before she could contemplate supplying her understanding or forgiveness. Even now, Joe wouldn’t be forced into offering it. She could only assume he didn’t need either her understanding or forgiveness. It felt more than dismissive. The wordcontemptfloated into her mind.

‘You know, Joe, this is ruthless. Worthy of a sweaty corrupt politician onNewsnight. You’re not being remotely truthful with me about what happened here. What’s even more worrying is that I don’t think you’ve even asked yourself why you did it. It doesn’t interest you.’

God, that was it. In a nutshell. Joe hadn’t wondered, in light of his girlfriend’s distress, whydidI think this was OK? She’d not seen him wrongfooted or concerned, whatsoever. He’d gone straight into damage limitation ‘fob her off with a glib apology’ mode. It didn’t bother him enough to check his conscience. It didn’t apparently occur to him to check it.

‘In what way am I being dishonest?’ he said.

‘The real version of this, Joe, goes – you knew it was theft and you knew it was sensitive. If you’d told me, I’d object and you’d have to take it out. So you went ahead and chanced it, thinking, if you got away with it, cool. If it went wrong and I kicked off, it was a price worth paying to keep it inthe script. Even when you knew I’d watch it here, with our friends around us, it didn’t change the stakes enough for you to come clean before you put me through that. Because why gift me an opportunity to be a nuisance? None of this fall-out means anything, because my pain over this is absolutely nothing to you. Not compared to your career. This is merely an inconvenient difficulty to be managed, before you get to the real business of some brunch meeting with men in designer sunglasses in Los Angeles where no one eats the food.’

When she finished speaking, Roisin saw that Joe looked embattled, but also faintly – and uncharacteristically – impressed. She had his attention. Roisin’s fury was obviously the first time he’d listened to her in a while.

She wondered if he was filing it away to use in the future. She wondered if any privacy was now an illusion.

Between usmeant nothing.

24

Roisin wasn’t going to break the silence that followed.

‘Right, we’re on the clock because of my flight,’ Joe said, after a while. ‘Before we both crank up any more levels, can I suggest we keep it for when I get back? It’s a lot right now. Especially when we’re here.’ He nodded back at the house.

‘Ah, the Calm Down, Crazy Woman gambit.’

‘No, more about the fact we have no time and a lot of company. It’s Dev’s special weekend.’

‘I’d have preferred this not to happen in front of them, too.’

‘Look, I haven’t actually exposed any secret. No one but us would know that moment came from your childhood.’

This said more about Joe than he realised. Image was everything, and he’d not damaged hers. That the fact that only she could perceive the treacherous plagiarism meant it as good as didn’t matter. Because, once again, she didn’t.

‘Even if that was the point here, my mum might recognise it, don’t you think?’ Her voice wavered. She couldn’t bear the thought of it.

‘She won’t see it. She stopped watchingSEEN, didn’t she?’

Joe resented his mother-in-law for her indifference to his work. Lorraine, of course, hadn’t bothered with the social nicety of pretence: ‘not my cup of tea’. Jesus, was Joe also taking oblique revenge?

‘Who knows, but it’s far from guaranteed that she won’t, isn’t it? What do I say if she asks me about it?’

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