Page 77 of The Lucky Escape

‘Now there’s a shocker,’ Jo retorted, rubbing her belly. ‘Your mum is always saying stuff, and she is nearly always wrong. We know this. This isn’t news.’

‘I know!’ I said. ‘But she pointed out that it’s a bit rash, getting out of an engagement and then having a new boyfriend a month later.’

‘It is quick,’ Jo said, nonplussed. ‘But that doesn’t mean it’s wrong.’

‘I’ve just not had a minute to think. I was so sad, and then meeting him and going away together happened so fast, and Australia wasn’t real life, it was …’

‘A holidayfromlife,’ she supplied.

‘Yeah.’

‘It’s not too late to slow it down. If it was too fast, now you can take your time and enjoy it. And look – if it isn’t right, you don’t have to stay together for ten years. It can be right, but for a month. It can be right, but for a year. Nobody is saying this has to be for a lifetime – by the sounds of it, not even your mother.’

I used the last of my crumpet to scoop up the jam that had gone rogue on my plate.

‘He just seems so sure. I think it took a lot for him to get here after his wife.’

‘And I can understand that. But, babe, that’s not your responsibility. That’s what you’ve learned after all of this, isn’t it? You’re not really making him happy if you’re sacrificing your own happiness. He’s a big boy. Whatever you need, you have to tell him. His reaction is his business.’

‘You’re right,’ I said. ‘I know you are.’ I pondered it some more. ‘But first: somewhere to live. Then I can decide what I think about Patrick, and Mum, and everything else that’s keeping me awake at night.’

‘Why put off today what you can put off tomorrow?’

‘Exactly,’ I said, licking the last of the jam from my fingers.

I spent the rest of the day trawling through websites looking for a flat that wouldn’t cost my whole monthly paycheque, texting Patrick to say I was seeing the Core Four when actually I wanted to be alone. I don’t know why I didn’t just say that to him – I don’t think he’d have minded. The lie just slipped out.

I was getting increasingly frustrated at the cost of a studio in London. It was all very well talking about how I dislikedmy job and wanted to retrain, but no way would I be able to afford to do thatandlive on my own. I knew that was a privileged problem to have. It’s not like I was risking true homelessness or in need of a food bank. My version of hardship was middle-class hardship. But it still felt unfair, having to choose. I refused to consider a flat-share though. It was fun when I was younger but being relegated to a shelf in a shared fridge, or having to queue for the bathroom in the morning … nope. No way. Grown-ups made choices, didn’t they, and my choice was to live alone, even if that put the kibosh on other plans I’d hope to make.

‘So stay at work longer than you thought you would,’ Adzo encouraged me as we took a morning walk to view one of the places I’d found that was mercifully in my budget. ‘Give less of yourself to work but still take the paycheque, and train in your spare time.’

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I suppose I just had this idea in my head of quitting my job and doing something I love and decorating a cute flat and everything going my way.’

‘Mate,’ Adzo intimated. ‘Everything is going your way! Keep your job, have the cute flat, and take the leap in a year, or eighteen months. You never know what else life might have in store for you. What’s the rush?’

There wasn’t one, to be fair. I think it was more a case of waking up from sleepwalking through my life, and so impatiently wanting to fix it all, right now this second, in case I risked falling back asleep. But I knew it didn’t work that way. True control over my life would look like relinquishing control over some stuff so I didn’t waste my energy on things that weren’t mine to control. Not to sound like Patrick, or anything.

‘No rush,’ I said. ‘You’re right. And plus, I don’t reallyhave a choice. I’m not doing a house-share so that means keeping this job to pay for a flat.’

She steered me by the elbow out of the way of an old woman with a shopping trolley. ‘I know I’m a badass at work,’ she offered. ‘But I don’t actually love it.’

I stopped walking. ‘Wait what? You don’t?’ I was genuinely shocked. I thought Adzo adored what we did.

She blinked slowly. ‘I mean, it’s fine,’ she said. ‘And it’s not as if I have to be down the mines every day, or that we don’t get a good-sized transfer into our account every month. But yeah, of course I wish that sometimes I could be a nurse instead, or a novelist, or the founder of a start-up.’

‘So why don’t you?’ I pressed.

‘Can’t be arsed,’ she replied, as we picked up our pace. When we stopped again, she looked up at where I pointed. ‘This can’t be it,’ she said. ‘Is this the address?’

I opened my email to double check. ‘Number thirteen? Yup. This is it.’

She surveyed the dark brick and ramshackle windows. ‘Okay …’ She exhaled, slowly.

‘Hmmm,’ I agreed. ‘I mean, I know it’s not exactly a palace …’

‘And this is six-fifty a month?’

‘Yup.’

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