Page 92 of The Spark

She pulled me into a hug as we parted ways in the car park earlier. ‘When I’m back from Rome, you and I need to talk. Properly. Okay?’

‘Okay,’ I said. But something about the intense way she looked at me struck a strange chord inside me. A jumble of notes clashing deep in my belly. The chime in a film score that tells you to panic; the moment when everything changes.

Chapter 39.

I mess up at work. A developer calls one morning to ask where I am: the meeting we’d arranged slipped right out of my head. The drive to site is forty minutes, and the developer can’t wait, so after grovelling my apologies, we reschedule for next week.

Kelley summons me to her office, demands to know what’s going on. She’s tapping her pen against the giant jotter she keeps on her desk, fixing me with minty-green eyes as she waits for my reply. Her blonde bob is a blade against her set jaw. I feel like a contractor who’s got all their measurements wrong.

To my dismay, as I apologise, I realise I am fighting tears. I’ve never cried at work before, and I wasn’t intending on starting today, and certainly not in front of Kelley. ‘I took my eye off the ball.’

‘I shouldn’t need to tell you that forgetting a meeting is incredibly unprofessional, Neve.’ Kelley never raises her voice, because she doesn’t need to. Her power comes from her cast-iron composure. She’s like a monk out-staring a fly.

‘I know—’

‘If you need some time off, please take it.’ Her voice has softened, but only minutely. You’d have to know her to pick up on it. ‘But I’d ask you not to let your personal problems affect your work, and by turns, our reputation. It’s unfair on me and everyone else who works here.’

‘I know. I won’t. It won’t happen again.’

Back at my desk, I stare blankly at my copy of On Decorating. I brought it in, once Lara and I started talking again, propping it up on my desk as a reminder of how far I’d come. But now, it seems, everything’s going wrong. And I can’t find a way forward, of making things right.

Since she has to get her kicks where she can, I guess, my mother calls out my low mood. ‘You look very down in the dumps, Neve.’

I’ve dropped in after my spin class with some chicken soup, because that’s what you’re supposed to do when someone has flu, isn’t it? But Mum’s evidently made a quick recovery. I find her in her bedroom – not ill in bed, but trying on dresses for a gig at the weekend. She looks hot and sheened with sweat, like she’s been taking garments on and off for hours. Her hair is wild, a slow-motion explosion. I resist the urge to pass her a headband.

‘Just tired,’ I tell her.

She peers at me. ‘Boy trouble?’

‘Man, not boy.’ Sometimes, I really do think her need to get on my tits is bordering on pathological.

‘Forget him, darling.’

‘Wow. Thanks. Wish I’d thought of that.’ I sit down on the edge of her bed.

‘I’m being serious.’

‘You met him for about five minutes when you were hammered. You don’t even know him.’

I hadn’t got round to telling her we were moving in together. I foresaw her condescension, the crap impression she’d do of a relationship expert, telling me it was far too soon and blah, blah, blah.

She shrugs, sways gently back and forth in front of the mirror. The dress she has on is smothered in silver sequins. It’s nice – though more Academy Awards than 3-star hotel bar. ‘I wasn’t talking about Ash.’

‘What?’

She makes eye contact with me via the mirror, because she prefers it that way. ‘I was talking about Jamie.’

‘You’ve lost me.’

‘From what I can work out, Ash is a nice boy. So he deserves you to appreciate him for who he is.’

‘Please stop calling him a boy. Also, you don’t know anything about it.’

‘Tell me I’m wrong, then.’

I feel a prickle of irritation at the back of my neck. ‘You said yourself Ash reminded you of Jamie, when you met him. You actually called him Jamie, several times. See, Mum, this is why when you drink, you never—’

‘Do you want to spend the rest of your life looking backwards?’

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