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There was silence for a moment. ‘Why are you there if she isn’t?’ he asked suspiciously.
‘I like her bedsit better than mine. It’s tidier.’
True, Miriam thought. Ridiculous answer, but true none the less.
‘Put Miriam on, would you?’ Jay’s voice had an edge to it.
‘Can’t, sorry. I told you, she’s not here,’ Clara lied merrily, clearly enjoying herself.
‘It’s eight-thirty on a Saturday morning. Where the hell is she if she’s not at home?’ Jay grated, losing patience.
‘Work?’ Clara suggested sweetly.
‘She doesn’t work on a Saturday.’
‘Shopping?’
There was a pregnant pause. ‘Now, look here—’
Pushing Clara aside, Miriam said quietly, ‘Hello, Jay. What can I do for you?’
There was another pause, longer this time. Miriam could hear her heart beating, the blood thundering in her ears. She found she was holding her breath and forced herself to breathe out slowly, aware of Clara’s eyes on her.
‘I need to talk to you,’ he said with dangerous softness after some moments.
With Clara waving her arms and mouthing ‘No!’, Miriam found her thought process had frozen. ‘Why?’ she murmured stupidly.
‘I’d prefer to discuss that face-to-face.’
‘I’m still in my pyjamas.’
This time his voice had a smoky quality to it when he said, ‘I’ve seen you in pyjamas before. And without them.’
Miriam was not about to go there. Especially with Clara’s eagle eyes on her. Refusing to blush, she said crisply, ‘Give me a couple of minutes to get changed and then come up,’ as she pressed the release for the door.
‘I knew it,’ Clara said with infuriating smugness. ‘He’s worked the old magic, hasn’t he?’
Now colour did creep up into Miriam’s cheeks. ‘Clara, I have to change. You don’t mind cutting breakfast short?’
‘I do, but not because of the food. I don’t want your heart broken again.’
There was real concern in Clara’s voice and spontaneously Miriam hugged her, nearly impaling her forehead on the spiky hair, which was lacquered as stiff as a board this morning. ‘I’ll be fine. Don’t worry. One thing I’m absolutely sure about is that Jay and I are finished. I couldn’t go back there, Clara. I know that. But if we can agree to do this in a relatively friendly fashion it’ll make things so much easier. Believe me, I know how it can be when the two parties are fighting and it isn’t pretty. I see it every day at work.’
Clara looked at her. ‘You’re too nice for him,’ she said feelingly. ‘I’d want my pound of flesh if I were in your position.’ Tilting her head, she added, ‘Actually you’re probably too nice to be friends with me but I’m glad you are.’ Hugging Miriam back, she then made her way to the door. ‘I’ll talk to him for five minutes to give you time to titivate.’
‘No, Clara, don’t.’
Her words fell on deaf ears. Clara had already shut the door behind her. Miriam groaned. Great. If she’d wanted the final straw in this little scenario Clara had just provided a cartload.
Whisking off her pyjamas, she grabbed a vest top and combat trousers from her wardrobe—her usual Saturday cleaning-the-bedsit-and-messing-about clothes, and she was blowed if she was going to change the routine and dress up for Jay—and ran
a comb through her thick hair. She couldn’t resist glancing in the mirror. Without any make-up her freckles dominated her creamy skin and made her look about sixteen, and her slim figure and wide, guileless eyes completed the picture of naivety. She clicked her tongue in annoyance. She was as far removed from the elegant, sophisticated beauties who populated Jay’s world as the man in the moon, and about as seductive, she told herself irritably. She had nothing about her to entice a male and drive him crazy—she didn’t even have Clara’s individuality.
She pushed back a strand of chestnut hair from one flushed cheek, searching her reflection for what had attracted Jay in the first place. After a few moments she admitted defeat. It was as big a mystery to her now as it had been when they’d met, she thought, turning away, but then stopping in her tracks.
Jay had accused her last night of never trusting him, of biding time until he betrayed her as her father had betrayed her mother. Had she felt like that? She hadn’t thought she had. She had loved him beyond life.
But love wasn’t trust. A separate part of her mind was playing devil’s advocate. You could love someone without trusting them—she only had to look at her mother with her father to know that was true. Shortly after her mother had got together with George, she’d confided to Miriam that this relationship was as different from the one she’d had with Miriam’s father as chalk from cheese. ‘Until I met George I’d never realised I hadn’t trusted your father from even before our marriage,’ Anne had murmured quietly. ‘Your father was so handsome and charismatic, I suppose. He drew people to him like moths to a flame, especially the women,’ she had added without any bitterness at all. ‘They threw themselves at him. He was just one of those men; it wasn’t his fault.’
