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“I don’t know if I want to remember.”
“Poppycock. Of course you do. I’m going to leave first and make sure the coast is clear, and then you’ll follow me out and meet me outside the hospital. If you turn right outside of the main entrance downstairs, there’s a little park halfway down the street. Meet you there, okay?”
She nods.
I head out of the room. Now for a distraction to make sure none of the nurses or orderlies notice India leave her room. On the nurses’ reception desk is perched a big vase of flowers. Perfect. I sweep past it, jogging it with my elbow. It hits the floor with a satisfying crash, the glass shattering on impact.
“Oh my gosh!” I cry in great distress. “How did that happen?”
I make a fuss, apologizing profusely, playing a sweet little nobody again, the kind who can’t possibly be blamed for the damage. I have to inject a dose of vapid given that I’m looking like a siren. When the nurses gather to clear it all up, I back away, and take the elevator down to the ground floor.
India is waiting for me in the little park. We walk to the local tube station and I take her back to Shoreditch. When we exit from the station at Shoreditch, she looks around herself nervously.
“I’m not sure I want to do this,” she says.
“Yes you do,” I tell her firmly. “No chickening out now.”
I guide her in the direction of the scene of Friday night’s revelry and disaster. As The Half Moon pub comes into sight she drags her feet, and I have to tuck her arm into mine to make her come inside the bar with me.
It is busy inside, packed with the crowd of after-work city workers. She swallows hard as she looks around. I drag her by the arm to the bar.
“Do you remember what you were drinking that night?”
She shakes her head. Then she nods, somewhat reluctantly. “We were drinking grey goose martinis. Rachel thought it was cool.”
I order the drinks and we stay at the bar, sipping them. “Is this bringing anything back?”
She nods. She is looking at a particular section of the pub, a booth of seats towards the back. “We were over there. We were dancing and drinking.”
“Must have been fun.”
“Hmm.” She smiles. “I was dancing with Charlie. And he asked me to move in with him.”
Then she shakes her head as if she doesn’t want to remember. She downs the rest of the martini. I order us another couple, and hand them both to her. All the better to loosen her up. She was fuzzy headed that night. She needs to be fuzzy headed now.
“Drink up,” I urge.
She gratefully tips the second martini down her throat. She is still looking at that section of the pub, a fixed look on her face. She sips the third drink as if she is barely aware of it in her hand.
“Rachel was there,” she murmurs. She walks over to the spot as if in a trance, and I follow. The music is muted but I start dancing anyway. I take India’s hand and spin her in a circle.
She gasps. “Rachel says she’s sick. She doesn’t feel well. We’re going out of the bar. That way.” She points to a door. A different one than we came in by.
I take the cocktail glass out of her hand and put it down on a nearby table. I guide her towards the back door. She follows me without protest, her eyes looking a little glazed. I push open the door and we go outside. It is dark now and the alley is not so well lit as the other street had been. The streetlamps are spaced more widely apart. We pause outside the door. A group of people are standing on the street nearby, beer glasses and cigarettes in their hands, all chattering, oblivious to us.
I take two of Rachel’s menthol cigarettes out from my handbag and hand one to her. I light them up. She puts it to her lips, her fingers shaking. She takes a long drag. I take one too, because I am supposed to be Rachel, and Rachel had been smoking.
“What were you and Rachel talking about?” I ask her. “Was she bored? Did she want to go home?”
She is looking at me slightly dazedly, as if she is seeing Rachel instead of me. I take off my jacket again, all the better to let her see the red dress.
“She’s telling me I shouldn’t move in with Charlie. Jacob told her about it. I’m angry because Jacob shouldn’t have told her. I wanted to tell her myself.”
“Isn’t she happy that you’re going to move out?”
“She’s mad. She doesn’t want me to move in with Charlie. She says he is no good. I’m telling her she’s just jealous. That she should be glad I’m moving out. She won’t have to be squashed in the same room with me anymore. She won’t have to pay the rent and the bills for me anymore.”
“And she says she doesn’t care about that, doesn’t she?” I say. “She doesn’t care about the money. She doesn’t want you to move in with Charlie. Why? Because…” I hesitate, giving her time to fill in the blank.
