Page 35 of The Woman Who Said Yes

‘Erm, I hope you don’t mind me asking,’ I continue, my heart quickening, ‘but d’you live at number twenty-nine?’

‘Yeah, I do,’ she replies. ‘Can I help you with something?’

I throw Sam a pointed look, and he snaps into the role. ‘It’s just, we’re trying to get hold of the owner?’

‘Oh, right.’ She brightens, as if this is good news. ‘Is this something to do with the building?’

‘A few issues, yes,’ Sam says, having adopted a faintly comical official tone.

She emits a small mirthless laugh. ‘Well, it’s good to hear that something’s happening at last. You’re from the council?’

‘Well, um, we’re sort of⁠—’

‘Great, because we’ve put in so many complaints. We’ve been onto environmental health and threatened to withhold our rent and nothing ever happens…’

‘You’re from flat C?’ I ask.

‘Yep, that’s right.’

‘Plumbing problems, then,’ Sam adds sagely.

She blows out air. ‘You could say that.’

‘D’you mind telling us,’ he adds, with a studied frown, ‘if you rent your place through an agency?’

‘No, nothing official like that,’ she replies with a shudder, as if the whole arrangement has been a terrible mistake. ‘We just deal with someone called… Jerry, I think it is? I’m not the one who handles it all, thank God…’ She exhales heavily, as if we might understand why no one would wish to have dealings with Jerry.

‘Right,’ Sam says gravely.

The young woman wrinkles her nose as if an unpleasant smell has wafted up through a nearby drain. ‘Can I just say,’ she adds, ‘that it’s getting to the point where it’s beyond a joke?’

‘I’m sure it is,’ I say firmly.

‘With the big toilet pipe?’ Sam confirms.

‘Yeah! That’s right. And all the rest of it. Nothing ever gets fixed. Anyway…’ She shrugs stoically, and a determined smile lifts her face. ‘I’d better get going. But thanks for coming round…’

‘That’s quite okay,’ Sam says.

Still gripping her bike’s handlebar, she seems to hesitate. ‘D’you need to go in and have a look around? Make notes and stuff? My flatmate’s in, she won’t mind⁠—’

‘Oh, no, we won’t disturb her,’ I say quickly.

‘Okay, if you’re sure.’ She nods. ‘I have to say, I’m really glad you’re onto it anyway.’ With another wide, grateful smile she clambers aboard her ancient bicycle and pedals off down the street.

20

WEDDING COUNTDOWN: 35 DAYS

My phone is being passed around the table so everyone can wow over the picture of an enormous construction of profiteroles. That’s Phil, our daughter Marnie, her brother Jake and his partner Kian, plus my dad and Trudy. It’s Marnie’s thirtieth birthday and we’re having a family dinner – not at a restaurant she’d have chosen, featuring chilli-spiked ramen – but a more traditional place with thick white tablecloths and hefty silver cutlery.

‘Mum, of course it’s fine,’ she insisted when we were debating where to go. ‘Granddad and Trudy love it and I’m sure Jake and Kian won’t mind.’ She didn’t mention what her dad might think, but we don’t worry about that.

At first, after the break-up six years ago, I’d kept communications with Phil to the bare minimum. It wasn’t just that he was now living with Gina (which I insisted on pronouncing to rhyme with vagina, until he told me sharply to stop. ‘Jean-nah,’ he’d correct me. ‘JEAN-nah!’). It was the fact that, in order to move on, I needed to focus on sorting out my own life and, once our house was sold, on finding somewhere affordable to live.

By this point, Phil had retired from the force and joined an old school friend’s company based in Shoreditch. Smart mirror technology is their thing, and Phil is a project manager. ‘Very apt,’ I told Sam and Eva. ‘He can design a special mirror on an extendable cable so he can look up his own arse.’ Then, a couple of years down the line, something surprising happened. Perhaps Gina (Jean-ah!) had discovered that Phil was only faking his love of Stravinsky and Mahler as, suddenly, he was no longer residing in her boxy flat with the Playmobil garden. Or indeed with her at all. They had broken up and I resisted the temptation to revel and gloat.

No, that’s a lie. If I’d had the means, I’d have set up an old-fashioned sweet shop and that’s what I’d have called it. Revel & Gloat. However, in more recent times my attitude has softened. We are cordial, I suppose. We even see each other occasionally when it’s something to do with the kids. Like tonight, with all of us here together, talking over one another and drinking wine and giving Marnie her presents. Phil, I notice, is making a special effort to chat to my father and Trudy, to make them feel part of it all.