through to Molly Foster at EAA.’ All she could hear was a peculiar distant clicking and crackling. At first Molly thought it might be an automated cold call until she realised she could hear someone breathing heavily on the other end of the line, and was about to slam the phone down when Jonathon said, ‘Molly, is that you? You there?’
‘Yes, how are y—’ she began, but before she could get any further Jonathon snapped, ‘Is Jessica pregnant?’
As was often the case when Molly spoke to her ex-husband, she instantly found every word he said infuriating.
‘Does it matter if she is?’ she demanded, while thinking how very like Jonathon not to have asked Jess himself.
‘Well – well no, obviously, of course not. I mean I didn’t say anything when she rang because I didn’t want to upset her, she sounded so happy,’ he blustered. ‘But if she is I just didn’t want her to think that she has got to get married to this Max just because she’s – well, you know.’
‘Pregnant? A fallen woman? Unclean? An awful lot has changed since the dark ages of our youth, Jonathon, people don’t have to get married any more, in fact they don’t seem to have to do anything they don’t want to. Those days have long gone. Thank God.’
‘I suppose we should just be relieved that given all that, he’s still going to stand by her.’
Stand by her? Molly groaned inwardly; Jonathon Foster, closet Victorian.
Jonathon paused, obviously needing a moment or two to catch up. ‘So are you saying that Puss isn’t pregnant?’
‘As far as I know, no, I’m sure she would have said something but I will ask.’
‘In that case, what’s the bloody hurry? I mean she barely knows the chap.’
‘She’s young…’
‘Well, he isn’t. What is he? Forty? What’s the hurry? They barely know each other.’
Molly decided to ignore him and press on. ‘She’s in love and, let’s face it, when you’re that age you think waiting for anything is a silly idea.’
‘Personally,’ said Jonathon, using a tone that suggested Jessica’s news was entirely Molly’s fault, ‘I don’t understand what the rush is – I mean we weren’t like that, were we?’
Molly laughed. ‘Of course we were. I remember my mum and dad suggesting we waited another couple of years and saved up and you were absolutely furious.’
‘Things were different then,’ snapped Jonathon. ‘We were more mature, more sensible. We took things seriously.’
‘Did we? I seem to remember the real reason we wanted to get married was so that your mother would let us sleep together when we stayed at your parents’ house – I don’t think it had much to do with having noble plans for a shared life of poverty and pain and procreation.’
There was a pause and then Jonathon said, ‘So, what do you think of him?’
‘Max?’
‘No, the Pope. Of course Max, who else is my only daughter planning to marry?’
‘Our daughter,’ Molly said tersely.
‘Whatever. The thing is, what is he like?’
‘You’ve met him, haven’t you?’
Jonathon sniffed. ‘Of course I’ve met him. Once or twice but only in the “Hello, pleased to meet you, so you’re the bastard who is sleeping with my little girl” kind of way.’
Molly laughed; sometimes, Jonathon could also be delightfully self-aware.
‘They dropped in on their way back from somewhere or other and then Jess brought him over to have Sunday lunch with us,’ Jonathon continued. ‘What does that tell you about anybody? He seemed nice enough, but who knows? He could be an axe-murdering psychopath for all I know. Something in banking, isn’t he?’
‘No, that was Glenn. The one before, the one who went off to America? San Francisco?’
‘Ah.’ There was another pause and then Jonathon asked, ‘So what does Max do?’
‘IT, project management, I think. I’m not sure what exactly.’
‘Ummmm, not a banker then? I suppose we should be grateful really.’
‘We have to trust Jess to make her own mind up, after all she knows him better than we do. These are her decisions to make. She’s not a child any more.’
‘So you say.’
‘Jonathon, we’d already got her and Jack by the time I was her age.’
‘Yes, but we were different,’ said Jonathon. ‘Things were different.’
True, now it seemed that adolescence lasted until you were well into your thirties, thought Molly ruefully, whereas when she and Jonathon had been dating, it ended as soon as you left school. She felt younger now than she had in her twenties – probably looked younger too, she decided, catching sight of her reflection in the monitor.
‘Right, well, I suppose we should get together and discuss the wedding, then. Money and the arrangements and things. I know that in the good old days the bride’s father used to stump up for the whole shebang but as you said, times have changed.’
Molly groaned inwardly; the one time Jonathon took notice of something she’d said it was obviously going to rebound.
‘Before all this kicked off I had been thinking of giving Jess something towards the deposit on a house or a flat,’ Jonathon said.
‘They still might prefer that…’
Molly looked back at the website she’d been browsing through. With the cost of a wedding today Jonathon wouldn’t be far out. The price of a deposit on a first time home equalled just about what it would cost to throw a half-decent wedding. In fact the all-inclusive charge on a featured venue of the month cost more than Jonathan and Molly had paid for their first house.
‘How about we talk everything over once Marnie and I get back?’
‘Fine by me. So you’ll ring Jess and make the arrangements?’
‘Oh.’ Jonathon sounded genuinely surprised. ‘I was rather hoping you’d do that.’
‘But if we’re coming to yours…’
Jonathon gave a funny little throaty cough.
‘You want everyone to come to mine?’ said Molly. Mindreading was right up there on the list of talents required to deal with Jonathon. She certainly didn’t miss being married to him one little bit. ‘Not your place?’
‘I don’t think that’s a very good idea, do you? I don’t want to upset Marnie,’ he said.
‘But it’s all right to upset Nick?’ asked Molly, her tone level.
‘You know how things are, Molly –’
What Jonathon actually meant was he didn’t live with Nick and therefore he didn’t give a rat’s arse about how upset Nick might or might not get, because Nick wasn’t anything to do with Jonathon, and Marnie – five foot two, six stone wet, with a tongue that could strip paint, and a temper to match – most definitely was. Seeing the way Jonathon ran around trying to placate Marnie, Molly had come to the conclusion that sometimes it paid to be difficult.
‘Besides,’ he was saying, ‘your place is so much easier to get to, and you’ve got more parking. Our place is a bit tucked up for all those cars.’
All those cars – two more at most. Molly wondered just how many reasons Jonathon would be able to come up with before she put him out of his misery. On screen she had found a really beautiful oyster-coloured suit with a hat – apparently a