‘Bigger the pad, better the party,’ said Ari.
‘Thought you’d been banned from all of that since your arrest,’ murmured Alfonso.
‘It was only the tiny weeniest itsy bitsy soupçon of coke,’ said Ari.
‘Ummm, and when are you getting some more?’ asked George.
‘I didn’t hear that,’ said Michelle.
‘You haven’t shared your life-changing moment, Michelle,’ said Alfonso. ‘You’ve told us what it wasn’t, but not what it is. Come on, let’s have it.’
Michelle made herself smile. Though Bob wasn’t aware of it, the two of them had something in common that Sunday. For both it was an anniversary connected to someone who’d caused them much unhappiness. In Bob’s case the birthday of the son he felt he had lost, in Michelle’s the anniversary of her marriage to the man who had abandoned her. They’d married young, and it would have been their tenth, known as the tin anniversary — which Michelle thought rather appropriate as tin was cheap and buckled easily under pressure. Like Bob, she was feeling uncharacteristically maudlin that evening. She’d thought she was over the hurt, but days like this reminded her that the pain was still with her, as it would be, she sometimes believed, for as long as she lived.
‘We might not be allowed to have meeting our partner as our answer, but leaving them ought to count,’ she growled. ‘Or in my case, being left by the fucker.’
‘Oh God,’ said George. ‘We are a cheery bloody lot tonight, aren’t we?’
‘Fair enough, Michelle,’ said Karen, ignoring him. ‘We all know how much it changed your life when your Phil walked out on you. New job, new town, new friends — not so much a change of life as a brand-new one, eh?’
‘Too fucking right,’ muttered Michelle through gritted teeth.
‘Oh, come on, it’s not all bad, is it?’
‘No,’ said Michelle. She paused for a moment, thinking things through. ‘No, of course it’s not,’ she continued. ‘And working for the Met does kind of beat being a Dorset plod. Or it would, if I wasn’t stuck in effing Traffic.’
She spat out the last sentence, but then lapsed into maudlin again: ‘It would have been nice to have been able to make a choice, that’s all.’
‘You did: you chose to come to London,’ said Karen.
‘Maybe. But I didn’t have much choice about leaving the town I’d lived in all my life and the force I’d joined when I was eighteen, did I? My bloody ex not only moved in with his girlfriend at the end of the same street, he worked in the same bloody office as me. I could see his effing desk from mine. If I hadn’t moved away, I might have damned well killed him.’ She paused. ‘Or her — smug bitch.’
‘Surely not? And you sworn to uphold the law and all.’ Marlena, full of mock severity, peered at Michelle over the rim of her half-moon spectacles.
‘I dunno,’ responded Michelle. ‘I’d definitely have gone barking mad.’
‘No danger of that now though,’ said Marlena, dry as dust. ‘You’ve certainly found sanity with us.’
Michelle managed a small smile again. ‘Would have been different if my dad was still alive,’ she said. ‘He’d have beaten the hell out of Phil.’
‘Bit of a bruiser, your old man then?’ enquired Greg.
‘You might say that,’ responded Karen. ‘He was a DI in the Met. Old style. Detective Inspector Dave English. Nobody messed with my dad, I can tell you.’
‘Crikey,’ said George. ‘Come on, Karen. Give us yours.’
Karen didn’t hesitate. She was perhaps the most straightforward of the group. She certainly appeared to be. And, after a couple of drinks, totally caught up in the question game, she’d more or less forgotten all about that silly lurking embarrassment concerning George. Her family was her entire world, she told herself, and always had been. She glanced across the table at George. Apart from that brief exchange upon her arrival he had taken little notice of her. There was no reason why he should, of course, and it would have embarrassed her further if he had. She still couldn’t believe what she’d done. And if George hadn’t kept his head, it would have been even worse.
‘Having my children,’ she said. ‘My family. It’s all that matters to me. You see, when I was a kid things were pretty bad. Me mum was always great, but...’
‘But what, Karen darling?’ asked Marlena.
Karen glanced at Greg.
He took her hand. ‘Karen’s dad went to prison when she was four. He was a drinker, killed a man in a fight. Got himself sent down and ended up dying in jail. That’s why I gotta be a good boy, eh, baby?’
‘You better had.’
‘That’s quite a story,’ said Ari. He looked around the table. ‘Any of you lot know that before?’ he asked.
They all shook their heads.
‘I try not to think about it,’ said Karen. ‘It was just Greg being so soft that got me going...’
‘Hey, Michelle,’ said George. ‘Maybe your old man was the one who arrested Karen’s old man.’
‘That isn’t funny, George,’ said Marlena.
‘It’s OK,’ said Karen. ‘I grew up with my dad inside. It can’t hurt me any more. Like I said, my children changed everything for me. I think any mother would say the same. One minute you’re a selfish cow thinking only of yourself and your own problems, and the next you have these little people with your face and you realize you’d sacrifice anything for...’
Karen stopped, aware of Michelle’s eyes boring into her.
Abruptly the young policewoman rose from the table.
‘Must go to the Ladies,’ she said.
Her head was down as she hurried away, the high heels she liked to wear when she was out of uniform tap-tapping on the wooden floor. Karen thought she saw her shoulders begin to shake. Michelle had never made any secret of her deep-seated desire to be a mother, and how that unfulfilled longing had been her greatest regret when her marriage ended. But the woman was young enough not to be worrying about her biological clock for some years, and bright and attractive enough to surely be able to find the right man sooner or later. All the same, Karen kicked herself for being so tactless.
Though the men around the table did not appear to have noticed anything amiss, it hadn’t escaped Marlena’s observant gaze.
‘Well done, old girl,’ she murmured softly to Karen.
‘Oh fuck,’ said Karen.
I made my excuses as we left the restaurant, needing to be on my own. Fast. Not only that, I needed to be out in the open, to get some air into my lungs, to let myself be swallowed up by the sounds and smells of the night.
I hurried down Wellington Street and across the Strand towards Waterloo Bridge where I took the steps to the left, by Somerset House, leading down to the Embankment. The city was quiet, peaceful even, or maybe it just seemed that way compared to what was raging inside my head.
I crossed over to the riverside and leaned over the river wall near Temple Pier. It was spring high tide, and I could see the Thames lapping against the tall stone balustrades. A police barge went by, travelling at speed, sending up a sizeable wave in its wake. Water splashed against the wall and a drop or two hit my face. My skin felt so hot I was almost surprised it didn’t turn to steam on contact.
I stayed there, hoping for another splash to cool me down, but it didn’t come. Eventually I pulled myself away and sat on a bench under a plane tree. It was the last Sunday in February and the branches were bare, but it seemed darker and more secluded there under the tree’s spreading arms. I felt in some way shielded, protected.
It wasn’t a cold night. If anything, it was quite warm, one of those spells of good weather in what had been a bitter winter. I’d hoped the air would be cold enough to cool my burning skin. But it would have to have been well below zero to do that.