doing homework when Oliver logged into his email account, the Hotmail one, the private one, the one his son couldn’t possibly know about. As a family, DeeDee had set them up with their own web address, all of them at Bourne three dot com: [email protected], jont@ bournethree.com, [email protected].
From the start, Oliver had rarely used it, entrusting DeeDee to check his inbox, to physically drag him to the computer, when absolutely necessary, to read some missive of merit. He told her he was always happy for her to respond on his behalf. She often did, signing off as Ols and sometimes having the last laugh by adding an inappropriate x or two. Nowadays, he logs in and deletes most of the messages, making a note on a pad of paper who’s been in touch so he can call them at some later date if he can remember. That evening, the inbox was crowded but he deleted most of them, still unread. Then he checked DeeDee’s account. New emails still arrived. Today, there were offers from Johnnie Boden and Jo Malone – as if they were personal friends. Ocado was trying to coax her back with discounts and free delivery if she could order before Friday. It was comforting that out there, she was still seen as alive.
Mostly, for email, Oliver used his work account bourne@ arbor-vitae.co.uk, but actually, he preferred the phone. A man in his mid-forties doesn’t really do the whole email thing as a social communication tool. Nine months after DeeDee died, however, he set up the Hotmail account, realizing there was a useful distinction between communication and contact. This account he does check regularly – not obsessively, but regularly and very privately. Furtively, rather than privately. A secret account, really, rather than simply a private one.
He logged on. There was an email in the inbox. He opened it. It was an invitation for that weekend. He thought he’d better respond straight away.
Saturday is good, he wrote. Let me know where and when.
The George and Dragon
‘And you’re here with—?’
This was the third time Vita had been asked the question, as if a girl like her couldn’t possibly be at a party like this on her own. Or be on her own, full stop.
The first time, she’d faltered and blurted out, Oh, I’m here on my own – because, because I’m not with anyone. Not any more. Just me – I’m on my own, you see. Which is why I’m here – er, on my own but it’s a nice party, isn’t it. And the woman had given her a kindly nod contradicted by a slightly startled look about the eyes. So after that, Vita had taken to saying, I’m here with Michelle and Chris. Because everybody there knew Michelle and Chris.
‘I’m so glad you’re here.’ Michelle came up behind Vita and gave her a squeeze. ‘And you look good enough to eat.’
She’d been with Vita when she’d bought that frock this time last year, a shift dress in soft raspberry hemmed in velvet the colour of blueberry. ‘You look like summer pudding.’
‘Better than Eton mess,’ Vita said, thinking back to the first outfit she’d tried on – a cream top with a skirt of splodgy reds. God, the trauma of changing time and again, earlier that evening. How she cursed Tim for not being there – completely overlooking how she’d cursed him when, on occasion, he’d given her a look just before they went out which said, Honey – I’m not sure about the frock. It had hurt like crazy and such evenings had been marred because of it. But he’d loved the dress she was wearing tonight. She’d given herself a twirl in her bedroom and she’d stopped and stared straight at herself. Amazing how he could both raise my self-confidence and dash it. And yet she did long for him just then, to hear him say, Come on, woman! We’re late already – nice frock, by the way. Instead she called out Bye! to the emptiness of the house, locked the door and made small talk with the cab driver.
Michelle hugged her, Mel did too. Their husbands brought her drinks and food. Then they made a really sweet, attentive job of introducing her to anyone they were talking to. And Vita worked hard to join in breezily, to laugh alongside them and nod or frown at appropriate moments. She raised her glass in a nonchalant way when they drifted away naturally to socialize elsewhere while she dealt with the excruciating intervals when she found herself alone, standing like a lemon with a casual smile fixed to her face while she gazed vaguely around the room. What she wanted to do was go home and watch TV in her jimjams. And it was hard work when Michelle so sweetly passed by every now and then with a fresh drink for her and a really genuine, Are you OK? Isn’t this fun! The only reply possible was to nod and grin some more and say, Yeah! It’s great! because it wasn’t the place to say, Mushroom this is torture.
‘He’s single,’ Michelle whispered, bringing Vita a cosmopolitan. She was nodding towards an oaf of a man with a laugh as bad as his shoes, who already had food and drink splattered over his taut shirt like bad graffiti.
Momentarily, Vita looked at Michelle in horror until she saw the sly smile. ‘Cow.’
‘Moo,’ said Michelle, matter-of-factly. She scouted around the room. ‘I don’t think you’re going to pull tonight.’
‘I’m not here to pull,’ Vita said levelly, ‘I’m here because you told me to come.’
Michelle looked at her gravely. ‘Well, I’m glad you came.’ She looked over Vita’s shoulder, smiled and raised her glass. ‘Come and talk to Annie. She’s lovely. She’s single. She went out with a real shit – he’d disappear without warning on drunken benders which lasted days on end. And Corinne – her ex gambled away all his money and then started on hers, but she’s picked herself up and dusted herself down. Di over there found out her husband went dogging. Radiant, all of them – don’t you think?’
As Vita let herself be led over, she thought, Why do I want to make small talk with strangers when all we have in common is the thing I hate most? I am reluctantly single. No doubt I am now known as Vita, the one whose fiancé couldn’t keep it in his trousers. I don’t want to spend my evening alternately slagging off men and then raucously talking of pulling them too.
When she was introduced, she knew in an instant that they knew who she was – as if they’d been briefed, as if her misfortune was manifested physically in the form of an unsightly blemish and they mustn’t stare. Talk about anything else. Steer clear. Don’t mention the scar. It was burdensome to realize that, for the time being, she was spoken about, albeit with affection, as Poor Vita who’s been through a Really Tough Time.
But actually, Corinne was sweet-natured and Annie was funny and Vita was heartened by their normalness; their self-confidence and good humour were compelling. Had their bad experiences made them stronger? Hers had made her feel feeble. Perhaps their poise and vivacity came from the passing of time. Give it time, dear – that’s what her mother had said. Everything passes, love, everything passes – she remembered still her late father’s mantra.
But the women were funny and spirited and bright and, as Vita listened and laughed, she wondered whether they had made a fundamental decision that at some point, introversion had to stop and a life apart was to be embraced. Did they close the door on their past one day, padlock it and seal it shut with a massive sign saying CLOSURE? Had they read the prescribed quota of self-help books? How many therapy sessions had they attended? (Vita hadn’t gone down that route.) Had they worn an elastic band around their wrist to ping hard when negative feelings surfaced? Did they take a physical step to the side when confronted by destructive reflection? Did they resort to evening classes to keep the loneliness at bay for just one night a week? A little voice whispered to Vita, See, this could be me.
Actually, the women didn’t bond merely because they were all single; it wasn’t weighty issues which attracted them to each other, it was discovering that they shared much softer common ground. They soon found out they all preferred vodka to gin and George Clooney to Brad Pitt. They all wanted Nadal to win Wimbledon. They’d all been to Lanzarote. They all loved loved loved the new Mark Ronson. They chinked glasses not because the aim was to knock the drink back, but because there was simply great geniality between them. And when they shared a puerile snigger at the expense of the bad-shoe lousy-laugh man Michelle had first singled out, it wasn’t because they’d been scouting