‘He’sgorgeous,’ Sally said, turning her flawless, heart-shaped face up to Poppy.
‘Thank you,’ Poppy said, through extremely gritted teeth.
Well. Here was her opportunity to do some digging.
‘Did you enjoy the rugby on Friday evening?’ she asked.
‘Rugby?’ repeated Sally absently, cooing at Daniel.
Poppyreallywanted to yell that she should move away from her baby.
‘The rugby on Friday evening,’ she repeated.
‘Oh, the rugby. Oh, yes, Rory mentioned Declan was coming over. I went out with some girlfriends.’
‘Did you see Declan?’ Poppy’s questioning probably sounded odd but she didn’t care; she sensed that she was on the brink of catching him out in a tangible lie and she just wanted to get it over with.
‘No, I left quite early.’
And there it was: the lie. Just like that. Either Sally was lying now – and there could only be one reason for that – or Declan had been lying on Friday when he’d said he was with her.
‘He said he saw you,’ Poppy said.
‘Nope, definitely not me.’ Sally’s smile seemed entirely guileless.
‘Oh. My mistake. Well, it was lovely to bump into you. I have to go.’
9
GEORGIE
Georgie would not have predicted that she’d have been able to talk all three of the others into joining her, but here they were the next evening, bottoms in the air in the middle of a yoga class in a hall in a fairly run-down leisure centre on the outskirts of Cirencester.
Beth had said yes immediately, because taking up yoga was one of her resolutions too.
Ankita had had big news on Saturday, which was that she’d resigned from her job and was undergoing a metamorphosis from seventy-hour-a-week banking superstar to laidback rural dweller, and she’d said she was totally up for switching her yoga classes from a swish Notting Hill studio to a less glamorous one much closer to Melting.
Poppy had said yes at first but had then predictably – at the last minute, when Ankita arrived to pick her up – said she couldn’t come because of Daniel. Ankita (not entirely metamorphosed from scary kick-arse investment banker) had told her she would carry her to the car if she didn’t walk to it, so Poppy had walked.
So here they all were.
Georgie wasn’t loving the yoga experience. She was still not enjoying running, and it was already clear that she was not a yoga natural either. They were all in a row, rolled up on their shoulders with their arms bent, their hands supporting their waists and their legs in varying degrees of straightness with their toes pointed towards the ceiling, in a so-called ‘very basic’ Yoga Pose Shoulder Stand.
Georgie was alternating between being very grateful for her lovely new, comfortably waist-banded, large-size running tights, very pissed off that she’d been stupid enough to make her yoga resolution, and really worried that she mightfart. She never did, ever – the last time had literally been during labour – but there was a first time for everything, and the way yoga was going for her so far it didn’t seem unlikely that today would be that first time. Next time she came (dreadful thought), she’d remember not to eat curry the night before.
And then into the pain and heavy breathing-filled silence, Poppy blurted out a bombshell.
‘I think Declan’s having an affair.’
It took Georgie a little bit of time to grasp what she’d said. It was obviously taking Ankita and Beth some time to process her words too, because none of them said anything for a few moments.
Beth recovered her powers of speech first. ‘Oh my goodness, Poppy, I’m so sorry. Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’ Poppy sniffed.
‘Why do you think that?’ asked Ankita. The rest of them had rolled down but she was still in her perfectly vertical shoulder stand.
‘He’s distracted. He smelled of someone else’s perfume the other evening. He snapped at me when he thought I’d looked at his laptop screen last week. He snatched his phone out of mysight when he got a message recently. He’s been over-nice at times, likeguiltynice. Lots of small things like that. Andthen…’
