Page 82 of You Belong With Me

‘God, really? I’m Patron Saint of the Other Woman to her,’ Edie said.

‘Something like that.’

Edie pondered if it was unsisterly to say the next thing and concluded that she didn’t owe Jess much. ‘Is it also possible she feels … especially possessive of you?’

‘It’s possible,’ Declan said, and Edie liked hisstraight-forwardness. His face fell. ‘There’s nothing going on! She’s married. Or she was.’

Edie smiled. ‘Too late, Seedy Edie is sitting in judgement.’

‘Urgh. Jess is going to have one minging shame hangover from this.’

Edie doubted that. You needed to sober up to have a hangover. From what she could tell, the court of public opinion had cleared Jack and convicted Edie, with no right of appeal.

‘In other news, I’m now the proud owner of a mangy longhaired cat,’ Declan said. ‘I found him licking a crab stick he’d nosed out of the bin. I’m calling him King Prawn. I’ve taken him to the vets to check if he had an ID chip, and he’s registered as mine. It’s official: I’m a father.’

Edie managed to laugh. ‘Why not call him Crab Stick?’

‘I don’t want to make him a figure of fun. Ah look. We’ve got an email from the boss,’ Declan said.

‘Oh shit,’ Edie said. If Richard was scheduling his royal visit, that timing didn’t bode at all well.Perhaps all things considered, freelancing would be a better fit …

Declan scanned it. ‘I don’t think you’ll hate it …’

Mouth dry, Edie opened it.

You two! The Pepsi proposal is rather, if not very, impressive. They’re taking the meeting and suggest the details below. Knock them dead. I’ll take you for lunch afterwards.

Well done. Much more of this and I’ll have to assume you’re doing some actual work up there.

R

PS Thompson: I hope you are observing correct procedure when it comes to a certain former colleague and treating him with the shattering indifference he deserves. Apart from anything else, bloody dreadful jacket.

God, Edie loved Richard.

43

Edie had an unhelpful superstition that any day of travel that began badly would continue the theme. It would be start to finish ‘tomfuckery’, to borrow a Nick word. (‘Like tomfoolery, but darker. The way Pennywise the clown in the sewer is not a children’s entertainer. You do not enjoy tomfuckery.’)

After a fidgety-sleepless night, her American trip started with her taxi rolling up forty-five minutes late. Every traffic jam they encountered en route saw Edie nervously recalculating her chances of making the departure, instead of enjoying her podcast.

She fielded a nerve-jangling rant at Heathrow from a fuming client who’d been stood up after their mis-diary of a meeting, initially refusing to accept it was their error. Then a child cannoned into her leg in the queue for the gate. The small boy deposited a strawberry milkshake down her leg, with the frankly self-absorbed expression of regret, given she was in Wolford tights, ‘Oh no, I’ve frowed my eat.’

Edie knew LHR to JFK today was pure tomfuckery territory.

By the time Edie was seated next to a fractious family offive who had apparently not encountered a social taboo they recognised – arguing, clothing removal, personal information repeated in public zone, breaking wind, sodcasting entire Micky Flanagan routines, egg mayo butties in their carry on – she limply accepted it as her due.

‘They’re from Braintree,’ said the bespectacled man next to her, by way of full and entire explanation.

By the time she was passing immigration, Edie was utterly spent. She had the very specific, shop-soiled clamminess of long-haul travel, complete with bone-tiredness, shadowed eyes, and furry mouth. She feared she had the aroma of a vet’s thermometer and absolutely wasn’t fit for presentation, let alone a whirlwind evening out on the tiles in the city that never sleeps.

As the car that Elliot sent to collect her approached the glittering iconic cityscape, Edie knew she should feel euphoric. As it was, among other woes, she was annoyed at herself for not feeling euphoric – what sort of privileged nause turned this experience into a negative?

But not only did Edie feel like a used dishrag – she was having a very ill-timed prolapse of confidence. How much her physical and mental state were feeding off each other, she couldn’t tell. She was overawed. Her partner was so successful that he was famoushere, too; it fair blew the mind after she’d sat on a jumbo jet for eight hours. Edie even wondered if she’d delayed visiting him in the States so that she could cosplay Elliot being a boy next door, keeping him carefully out of context.

The disorientation continued as she was deposited outsidea forbidding security-fortress apartment block, her driver getting out to jab the relevant buzzer.

Edie shouldered her bag and dragged her case into a private elevator that took her to the second floor, where she found the relevant door. Oh God, were those multiple voices she could hear on the other side? Oh, fuck this forever.

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