Her offer on the flat had been accepted. She had arranged a mortgage through the bank used by her company. What was extremely strange was that all the time she was involved in these transactions she had felt she was right in proceeding with them, and also she had not sensed any diminishment in her excitement over the flat. How could it be that one could feel such heartache and such hope at the same time? How was it that something could feel so right and so wrong simultaneously? And how could one ever know, in these shapeless days of moral codes being so much a matter of personal choice, if one was behaving in the way that one ought to be behaving? She put the heels of her hands up against her temples and closed her eyes. What, anyway, did ‘ought’ mean any more?
She clicked on ‘Reply’ to Laura’s message.
‘Forget fridge,’ she wrote, ‘I need advice. No, I don’t. I need comfort. I thought if I showed Matthew the flat – and it is stunning – it would somehow persuade him that we could work it out together in a place like that. But he was wiser than me. He saw what I didn’t want to see, and he’s gone. Laura, he’s gone. And I am devastated. But I am still thrilled about the flat. Laura, am I a freak?’
‘Like the blazer,’ Matthew said, nodding at the sunburst buttons.
‘It would be kinder not to mention it’. ‘I can’t not mention it’.
‘Yes, you can,’ Rosa said. ‘Unless you want to make even more of a point about contrasting my life with yours’.
There was a tiny pause and then Matthew said, indicating the menu, ‘What d’you want to eat?’
‘Are you paying?’
‘Yes’.
Well, I’ll have the courgette-and-broad-bean thing with a grilled chicken breast’.
‘Please’.
Rosa smiled at him.
‘Please’.
Matthew turned and gestured for a waiter. Rosa said, ‘And possibly a glass of Sauvignon?’ Matthew glanced at her.
‘All right’.
‘Matt, one glass—’ He turned back.
‘I don’t begrudge you a glass, Rose. You can have a bottle if you want. It isn’t that’.
‘What isn’t what?’
A waiter appeared, in a long black apron, holding a pad. He smiled at Rosa. She held up her menu, so that he could see, pointing at what she wanted. Then she looked up at him and smiled back.
‘I’ll have the kedgeree,’ Matthew said, ‘and a salad. And one glass of house Sauvignon’.
‘Aren’t you having any?’
‘No’.
‘Why not?’
‘Because,’ Matthew said, ‘I really don’t feel like it’. ‘Why not?’ Rosa said again. ‘Tummy? Head?’ Matthew picked up the menus and handed them to the waiter.
‘Heart,’ he said shortly. Rosa sat up. ‘What’s happened?’
Matthew picked up a basket of bread and offered it to his sister.
She ignored it.
‘Matt. What’s happened?’
‘Well,’ Matthew said, putting the bread down and leaning his arms on the table, ‘Ruth and I are – over’.
‘Oh no’.
‘Yes’.
‘Not you two—’
‘Yes’.
‘Same outlook, same interests, same ambition—’
‘No’.
‘Has she met someone else?’
‘No’.
‘Well, from the look of you, you haven’t’.
‘No’.
‘Matt—’
‘I’ll tell you,’ Matthew said, ‘if you’ll just shut up a minute’.
The waiter put a glass of wine down in front of Rosa. She said, ‘I can’t believe it, I can’t grasp—’ ‘Nor can I’.
‘This flat—’
‘That’s it really,’ Matthew said, ‘the flat. The bottom line is that she can afford it and I can’t. And she should be on the property ladder. It’s the right decision for her, I’ve told her so. But I can’t join her’.
Rosa said slowly, ‘I thought you were earning a shed of money’.
Matthew made a face.
‘Half what Ruth earns’.
‘Half?’ ‘Yes’.
‘Heavens, I always thought—’
‘I know. I didn’t stop anyone thinking that. But the truth is, it’s been a struggle to keep up and lately – well, lately I haven’t been keeping up. And I certainly can’t begin on fancy flat buying’.
Rosa’s gaze moved, item by item, over as much of her brother as she could see above the table.
He said, ‘Say stupid if you want to’.
‘I don’t want to. And I’m hardly in a position to say anything anyway’. She paused and took a mouthful of wine and then she said, ‘Poor you’.
He shrugged.
‘What – what if she doesn’t buy the flat?’ ‘Too late,’ Matthew said. ‘You mean too late, she’s bought it?’ He shook his head.
‘No, too late to retrieve where we were. The flat was just the catalyst. It made us face the disparity’. ‘Did she throw you out?’ ‘No!’ he said angrily. ‘Sorry—’ ‘I threw myself’.
‘Oh Matt,’ Rosa said, ‘I wish I’d done that’. He said sadly, ‘It’s awful, whatever you do’. She leaned forward. ‘Do you still love her?’
The waiter appeared again, holding their plates of food. Matthew leaned back.
He waited until the kedgeree was in front of him and then he said, ‘Of course I do. You don’t just switch that off in an instant. You should know that’.
Rosa looked at her plate.
She said hesitantly, ‘I meant, do you still love her enough to try again?’ Matthew sighed.
‘Not under present circumstances’.
‘But Ruth will just go on being successful. Won’t she?’
‘Yes. And she ought to’.
‘What, put work before relationships?’
‘Well,’ Matthew said, putting his fork into the rice and taking it out again, ‘you’ve got to put something first, haven’t you? Not everything can take priority’.
Rosa waited a moment. She cut a strip off her chicken.
‘Matt, what about you? Couldn’t you have compromised?’
Matthew sighed.
‘Apparently not’.
‘A cheaper flat—’
‘Ben said that. But I couldn’t afford even a cheaper flat. And she was – kind of stuck on this one. Elated’.
Rosa stopped cutting chicken and looked soberly across the table at her brother.
‘Matt, what about you?’
He said, not looking up, ‘I’ve still got a job’.
‘Do you like it?’
‘I don’t mind it. In fact, I do quite like it. But it feels different now, if there isn’t going to be Ruth. It was just one part of life and now it’s got to be almost all of it. So – well, it doesn’t feel like it used to. I can’t quite remember what it’s for’.
‘D’you think,’ Rosa said, ‘that having Mum and Dad still together makes us feel we ought to be in a relationship?’
Matthew took a tiny mouthful.
‘I don’t think that’s got anything to do with it’.
‘Have you told them?’
‘It’s only just happened,’ Matthew said. ‘Ben knows, that’s all’.
‘Before me?’
‘He just rang me,’ Matthew said patiently. ‘He just happened to be around’.
Rosa picked her wine glass up. ‘Where are you sleeping?’ ‘On the sofa’.
‘Ruth in the bedroom, you on the sofa—’
‘Yup’.
‘You can’t do that—’ ‘No. Not for long’.