Page 75 of The Lucky Escape

‘I think it’s hit him that it’s over,’ I said. ‘Isn’t that odd? Only now does he get what he’s done. He blows up my life, and six weeks later he’s the one who is upset by it.’

Patrick wrapped his arms around me, and I inhaled the scent of sex on his body.

‘Come back to bed,’ he sighed into my neck, and I did.

Before we fell asleep, I asked him: ‘Do you think it’s bad that we’re together when the dust has barely settled with Alexander?’

Sleepily, he replied: ‘No. Don’t let him get in your head.’

He spooned me tightly and breathed into my ear, which I normally loved. I loved that he was as close to me as a person could be and it still wasn’t enough for him. He was asleep within minutes, but I still lay there turning over the thought. Alexander was kind of right to be upset, I supposed, but he didn’t know the details as far as I knew – that I hadn’t planned it, and hadn’t meant to fall for somebody else. I wondered if Fernanda had told him I’d taken somebody else away with me. She still sounded pretty mad at him in her texts. She could love him and still hate the choice he’d made. I knew she was embarrassed, too. That was a strange thought – that his own mother’s anger could be outlasting my own.

I hadn’t meant to jump from one relationship to another.It had just happened.

But then, maybe that wasn’t such a good thing.

In the harsh reality of home, I couldn’t help but ask myself: I was supposed to be actively choosing how my life would look from here on, wasn’t I? Not just letting life happen to me. Holidays could happen to a person. What happened on holiday could simply unfold. But now, back in real life, I had to be smart. Patrick mumbled in his sleep and rolled over to the other side of the bed. Had I chosen this? Or hadn’t I changed at all? Was I still just going with the flow when what I needed to do was question everything and be deliberate about my choices?

I remembered what Mum had asked.

Do you really want to leap out of one relationship and into another?

Shit,I thought, as Patrick started to snore.Shit, shit, shit.

36

The next morning, on my way to see Jo, Alexander sent a text.

I’m selling the house. You’ve got a month to leave or buy me out before I get lawyers involved.

I’d barely slept, exactly like after it all happened and I’d had insomnia. Patrick had asked if everything was okay before he’d left for the day, and I’d lied and told him it was. I’d never lied to him before. Not since we’d been properly together. I don’t know why I did that.

Fine by me,I texted Alexander back.

I didn’t want to be in Alexander’s stupid house. I wondered what my having paid rent meant legally – if I could get that money back. It had to be nearly twenty grand! I wanted to cut every single last tie I had to him as quickly as possible, so that I could move on as happily as I had been doing when we were away. I resented being dragged back into the feelings I thought I’d gotten rid of, and the more I thought about it the more outrageous it was to me that if Alexander had to show up, he’d done so at two o’clock in the morning inthe rain. Typical Alexander – it was a time and place that suitedhim.

Don’t text me again,I added.I’d prefer the paper trail of email, if we’re going to start talking about lawyers.

‘So that’s that,’ I said to Jo over homemade crumpets and jam in her living room. ‘I’m officially on the countdown to find somewhere new to live. Which I am crapping myself about, now. I’d been looking for places, but not really, you know? I was burying my head in the sand a bit.’

‘Well, it’s not fair that you have to find the mental bandwidth for a new house on top of everything else, is it?’ She knelt down on a pillow by her coffee table, using a little wooden spoon to smother her crumpet with her mother’s fig jam before settling it down in its own little wooden spoon holder, shaped like a trough. ‘And he’ll be lucky to find a buyer within a month, if that’s what he’s assuming. He doesn’t have to be such an arse about it. All things considered.’

I chuckled, helping myself to more jam too. ‘It’s helpful, I suppose. Speeds the job up. All aboard the Change Train.’

‘In for a penny, in for a pound?’ Jo said.

‘Something like that, yeah,’ I replied. ‘Everything I thought I wanted has crumbled, so now I have to start from scratch. Although I suppose I’m trying to look at it more as an opportunity, rather than an obligation.’

Jo considered what I’d said as she licked crumbs from her fingers. ‘You seem really well,’ she noted. ‘That trip really did you the world of good. I’m happy for you. And you know, I think a lot of people would secretly like to have a do-over.’

‘Do you think?’ I asked.

‘Yeah. I’m not saying I’d start again, but the idea that aftera rough draft I could live life for real is quite seductive, to be honest.’

Relief flooded my body. I hadn’t realized how much I’d been needing to hear somebody say that – to tell me it wasn’t my fault, how everything had blown up.

‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t stand it if you told me to grow up.’

‘Why would I say that?’ she exclaimed.

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