me at the Rock,’ he says. ‘Dress warmly.’
And, of course you wonder if he’s taking you skating. Why else would he want to meet at the Rockerfeller Center in the weeks before Christmas? Does he know you can skate? I doubt it, because he hasn’t done his research, has he? Not like I have. He imagines you clinging to him; him holding you up as he sweeps you around the rink: manly, strong. Could there be a more perfect first date?
And I have to give it to you: you look adorable. Just the right note of sweet and vulnerable and sexy all wrapped up in black leggings and a longline twinset of cashmere sweaters in the palest of shell pinks, with a scarf and gloves, your cheeks rosy with cold and your hair flying. Yes, the rink’s smaller than he thought, not as glamorous – not quite the setting he’d imagined from the movies – but it doesn’t matter. The lights in the adjacent skyscrapers twinkle as dusk falls and he sweeps out onto the ice in the shadow of the enormous Christmas tree.
But you: you hang back. Of course you do. You watch as he demonstrates skating forwards, a wobbly turn, backwards, another turn, a bit of speed and then a show-off hockey stop that showers you in a spray of ice crystals.
‘Come on!’ he says as you stand beside the ice. ‘Don’t be scared! It’s easier than you think. I’ll look after you!’
And then you step onto the ice, not at all like Bambi: like an Olympic figure-skating champion. You laugh, and then you’re off around the rink, fast, graceful, confident, your hair flying out behind you while he picks his jaw up off the ice. You do a high-speed turn, your hair whooshing into your face, then you look back at him and laugh again as you launch into a leap, a spin, and then a beautifully executed salchow. I know you do it again because he gets a photo this time. It’s there, on Instagram: your silhouette in mid-air looking every inch the ice princess. You’re so proud of that picture, aren’t you? You roll it out regularly for Instagram’s #throwbackthursday. Eight times, so far.
‘I love skating!’ you call, and he ploughs over towards you, conscious only now of how unrefined his own moves are. But it doesn’t matter. He’s made you happy. ‘I’ve always wanted to skate here!’ you say, catching his hand and squeezing it. ‘It’s a dream come true!’
But is that the moment that seals it? Is it as simple as him booking two general-admission tickets to this tourist-trap of a rink?
I believe it is. By the end of the session, he knows he wants to marry you.
It’s enough to make me puke.
It’s a measure of how involved I am in creating the mood boards that I don’t hear the car pull up outside the house. Neither do I hear the sound of Jake’s key in the lock and the opening and closing of the front door. If the skin on the back of my neck does that animalistic prickle to warn me he’s about to arrive home, I miss it – not even my famous sixth sense picks up the fact that my husband’s home and quite likely shrugging off his jacket in the hallway. It’s Saturday evening and I’m at the desk, lost in Pinterest images. I’m staring at the screen, click-clicking till my wrist aches as I gather images and send them to a printer that’s constantly whirring into life with a rattle so alarming it makes me think, every time, that it’s about to die. Please don’t die!
The whole desk’s under siege: I’ve got a little production line going. On the other side of the table from the computer, I gather the images together, cut them to size with a metal ruler and scalpel, and then I laminate them and move them to a piece of A1 foam board on which I’m collating the look I think will work best for Anna. It’s a strong, eclectic style, which I hope she’ll like because I’ve used the colours that I know she likes – the red of the sofa as well as the blue of the sweatshirt she was wearing – and I’ve used some rich yellow to lift it. It’s a triadic colour scheme that looks global, and I think it really works as the yellow pulls in all the random items and makes the whole room look more styled.
I’ve also got a smaller board on the go with an image of my own living/dining room at the centre – the images surrounding that are all in calming blues and whites. I can’t imagine it’s Anna’s taste, really, but I want to show her what could be done should she wish to invest in more of a change. But the main thing, I think as I tap my lip with my finger and switch a couple of images around on the triadic mood board, is that Anna’s pleased with what I’ve done. I really want to impress her; I want her to think I’m an expert; to give her a reason to look up to me, to respect me and, of course, to want to spend more time with me.
I swap the position of a couple of the images, step back to view my masterpiece, and nod to myself. Only now will I start fastening the images in place. I pick up my StudioTac then let out a yelp as Jake throws his keys onto the desk next to me and kisses the top of my head.
‘Oh my god!’ I fan my face, faking a faint. ‘You nearly gave me a heart attack!’
‘That’s a nice welcome from my wife after a lonely week on the road,’ Jake says. ‘Sorry. I thought you’d heard me and were deliberately ignoring me… Unless you were giving your lover time to escape out the back?’
The question hangs a moment too long and irritation flares in me before I’m able to beat it back down. How dare he?
Jake holds his hands up. ‘Sorry. Unfair. Let’s start again. How was your day, sweet wife of mine?’
I take a deep breath in and out to clear any residual anger. ‘Busy, dear husband,’ I say. ‘I was lost in…’ I wave my hand at the table. ‘I’m making a mood board for Anna.’
‘Lipstick lady?’ It takes me a minute to realize he means Sarah.
‘No. This is my friend from the walking group.’
‘Oh, good.’ Jake loosens his tie, slips it off and hangs it over the back of a dining chair.
‘She’s really nice and she lives just around the corner. You’d like her.’
‘I look forward to meeting her.’ There’s a pause, then Jakes finally asks how the baby is.
‘Coming along nicely.’ I pat my belly. ‘How are you? Good week?’
‘Awesome,’ says Jake, rolling his eyes. ‘Training idiots. God, you would think they would have to have some aptitude for or interest in the job before they were hired, wouldn’t you? Come on, let’s sit down. I’m parched.’
Jake gets a couple of cold drinks and pats the sofa next to him. I sit down so our bodies are touching.
‘So what are you doing for this Anna woman?’ Jake asks. ‘Doing up her house?’
‘Sort of. She’s quite new in her house and has no idea about furnishings, so she asked me to help. Her husband works in the Middle East. Qatar, I think she said. Or somewhere like that. He hasn’t even seen the house, and she wants it to be nice for him.’
Jake nods. ‘Yes, I can imagine he doesn’t make it home most nights.’
‘You can say that again.’
‘So you’re doing her interior design for free – lucky girl.’ There’s an edge to his voice. It’s just how he is: every minute of his time is charged to one client or another. He’s not used to doing things for free.
I tut. ‘I’m just trying to make friends. And maybe, if I’m good at it, it’s something I could turn into a business.’
‘Sure,’ he says. ‘I’m not knocking it.’
We sit in silence for a moment, then Jake says, ‘Maybe we could have them over for dinner one night when the husband’s back. What do you think?’
‘Good idea. I’ve no idea when he’s back, though. She made it sound like he’s hardly ever home.’
‘Oh well. Bear it in mind.’
‘I