Page 92 of Duplicity

‘Just tell me if he’s still around.’

She toys with a piece of mango on her fruit platter, spearing it elegantly, before locking eyes with me.

‘He hasn’t been around since Marlowe told him she was pregnant.’

‘Fuck.’

‘Yeah.’

‘What a loser. So he’s not in the picture at all—he has no relationship with Tabby?’

‘He’s never met her. And that, mister, is all you’re getting from me.’

My contempt for this guy grows even as some kind of sick relief hits me that I’m not competing with anyone else here. How the hell do you walk away from a woman like Marlowe, and how the hell do you make the decision to miss out on fathering her child? It’s fucked, that’s what it is.

‘So she got pregnant at uni?’

‘She completed a three-year degree in four years. What do you think?’

So she got knocked up at uni and then not only went ahead with the pregnancy but went back to finish her degree. Plus, she got herself an MBA afterwards. Seriously fucking impressive. But I realise that trying to push Athena for more is a fruitless task. She’s a vault. I change the subject.

‘So how do you two know each other?’

‘We became friends at school—Cheltenham Ladies. She doesn’t come from money—she was there on a full choral scholarship. She’s an incredible singer, you know.’

‘I know,’ I tell her. ‘I caught her singing Ave Maria at my place. It was unfuckingbelievable.’

Her face softens. ‘Yeah. She’s really something.’

‘Do you think she’d ever want to pursue it professionally?’ I venture.

Athena fixes me with a steely look. ‘That’s not a dream she’s ever had the indulgence of entertaining.’

I nod. Life got in the way, and she was stuck raising a sick kid and making enough of a living to support them. I ask the question that’s been circling around and around in my head. ‘You said her parents were in the picture, but how the hell hasshe juggled working full time with all the hospital visits? It must be a lot.’

Her face is grim. ‘Sheer determination, and commitment, and immense sacrifice. Not to mention organisation. She has these printed fact sheets at Tabby’s school with her full medical history. They get doled out every time an ambulance is called. It’s the same as for most single parents, with the added kicker that she never knows when she’ll get the emergency call.’

‘Does it happen often? It hasn’t happened since she worked for me, has it?’

I rake over my memories of these past couple of months of Marlowe’s employment. She’s always been so professional. So put together.

‘She had one a couple of weeks ago,’ Athena tells me now. ‘You have to understand, Marls was adamant when she took this job that she wouldn’t let her personal life interfere. She knew what an opportunity you were giving her, and she got fired from her last job for leaving early to go to the hospital.’

Fury washes over me in a scorching wave. ‘Wait. She wasfired?’

‘Yes, because her boss was a total dick. And she couldn’t afford for that to happen with you. So she’d already made it clear to Tabs that if she got sick during the week, it would be her grandparents taking her to hospital.

‘But she had a bad spell the other day and they had to call an ambulance. Marlowe’s mum called her at work to let her know, and apparently your PA found her crying in the loos and bundled her off to the hospital.’

I stare at her, horrified, trying to understand how she could have suffered through so much drama under my very nose while I remained totally fucking oblivious.

‘She went home sick a week or two ago,’ I say slowly. ‘At least, Elaine told me she was sick.’

‘That was probably it. She had a late one, I think. She told me you found her asleep the next day and were very sweet about it, but she was mortified.’

Jesus. That day in the hotel room. She was sleeping off a night in hospital?

This narrative I’ve woven for myself which, like everything else in my life, has me at the epicentre, is, I now realise, completely unreliable. All this time, Marlowe has existed as some kind of side character, there to humour and entertain and serviceme, and this entire time she’s been dealing with the kind of shit I’ve never encountered in my cushy, entitled life.

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