so sorry,’ Alice said. ‘Listen, I’m sure you really don’t want a stranger just at the moment – it was kind of you, but I’d better leave—’
‘Of course, you’ve got so much to do,’ Katherine said.
‘No, it’s not that,’ Alice said. ‘There must be someone who can come and—’
‘No,’ Katherine said. ‘There isn’t anyone, really.’ It was true. Her party rose up before her again; she found it difficult to call any of them a friend, and impossible to imagine, say, sitting with that pregnant girl and telling her anything. ‘I don’t have any friends.’
‘I’m sure it just feels like that,’ Alice said.
‘No,’ Katherine said. ‘It’s true. I’ve never had any friends, not really. You have friends at school, people you think are friends, but you lose touch with them afterwards. They get married, they go off and live on the other side of the city. And really all you had in common with them was that you were sitting in the same room with them most days, and when that stops, you don’t have anything much to talk about any more. And the people you work with, when you work, you leave, you say, “Oh, we’ll stay in touch,” and you mean it, and they mean it, but you don’t. Maybe you see them once in a while, just bump into them, and they tell you what they’re doing, their children, and you tell them what your children are doing, and then you go on and nothing ever comes of it.
‘My God, you’re wondering, what have I walked into?’
‘No,’ Alice said. ‘Don’t worry about that, I’m fine. You can talk to me, I’m here.’
‘There isn’t anyone else,’ Katherine said simply. ‘I thought about Nick. Nick, he’s my boss, he runs the florist’s. I thought he was, you know, my friend, but he isn’t, not really. I’m just counting them up. There are the neighbours – they’re just neighbours, really. There are other people – I used to meet these women for coffee in the morning, but…Can you imagine? They say, what – “We’re thinking of redecorating our lounge,” and you say, “That’s interesting, my husband’s left me.” They wouldn’t be able to say anything back. And Nick – I’ll tell you something. It’s all about Nick, really. I’m sure it is.’
‘What do you mean?’ Alice said. She felt that this woman had really forgotten the situation; she had forgotten that Alice wasn’t just a passing acquaintance she’d never see again, but someone who from now on would live opposite her. She, after all, was now exactly one of those neighbours and Katherine didn’t seem to understand that.
‘I’ve been silly about him,’ Katherine said, ‘I suppose. I like him, a lot. Well, he’s honestly not anything like most people in Sheffield. His brother lives in New York.’
‘I see,’ Alice said.
‘I don’t have a brother in New York, I don’t know anyone who does,’ Katherine said. ‘He’s funny, he’s really funny, when he talks – that’s the only way I can put it. And, you know, I’ve been kidding myself about him, I see that now. Because he’s a bit hopeless, really, and I’ve helped him out, I’ve kept him going, or so I thought, and he must have been quite grateful for it, or so I thought. But I had a party, it’s the first party I’ve had for I don’t know how long. Malcolm, he just doesn’t like the idea.
‘It would be a nice idea, you know? I said so to Malcolm. I said, I said wouldn’t it be nice if we had a little party for when the new neighbours move in, not just for that but for all the road to meet each other because these days, people, they don’t know each other, not because – but – well – I don’t know. I don’t know why people don’t know each other these days. My husband, Malcolm, he works in a building society, but he’s got lots of interests, outside interests, and he does know people. You wouldn’t think it to meet him, but he’s got all these friends through his societies – he’s keen on gardening, he’s in a society, and of course there’s the battle re-creation society, too—’
Katherine, so measured in her speech, had begun to loosen and quicken, her voice now free and bold, her vowels quick and emphatic with the speech of her Sheffield childhood. It was as if for years now she had been answering the telephone under observation. The voice was liberated from constraint and full, of all things, of new love.
‘Battle re-creation?’ the new neighbour was saying, puzzled.
‘Yes,’ Katherine said. ‘It’s an odd thing. They re-create old battles – they dress up, once a year or so, they act out old battles, just as they were, on the moors. Of course it’s usually the Civil War, that’s usually it – they can’t stretch to different uniforms every time, but once they joined forces with a society from Wales and they did the battle of Waterloo, that must be ten years ago. It takes a lot of work, it’s only once a year. Malcolm loves it. He’s got friends through that, you see.
‘But most people, these days, they don’t have the time, and they don’t really make friends with their neighbours particularly. I didn’t expect Malcolm to agree to the party, but he did. The kids, they weren’t around – I can’t remember why not – oh, it was – well, we were on our own, and it was a nice moment, not that I’d engineered it or planned it to get a favour out of him. But I asked and he said straight away, “Yes, let’s have a party.” He said it straight out, and he gave me a big smile, and it was something I’d asked, and it was something he could say that would please me. You see, he wanted to please me.’
‘He sounds a nice man, your husband,’ Alice said.
‘I think he is,’ Katherine said, almost surprised, it seemed, at the insight she’d been led to.
‘And you know him best,’ Alice said.
‘Do you think so?’ Katherine said.
‘Well,’ Alice said. ‘You know, I honestly don’t know – I mean, I don’t know you, I certainly don’t know your husband but—’
She stopped. Katherine withdrew her hand; without her noticing it, she had reached out and rested it on Alice’s. ‘I’m sorry,’ Katherine said, after a time. Something of her formal voice had returned; she might have been regretting the lack of stargazer lilies, late on a Friday afternoon. ‘I didn’t mean to.’
‘That’s all right,’ Alice said. ‘But you do know him best.’
‘I wonder,’ Katherine said.
‘You must do,’ Alice said. ‘Married to him.’
‘Maybe,’ Katherine said. ‘It was just that moment. When he said, “Yes, let’s have a party.” He hadn’t wanted to please me like that, not for years. He used to want to, it used to be all the time and you never noticed. You know when it’s been dry, all summer, and then one day it rains; and then everywhere there’s this smell of grass and earth and flowers, everywhere.’
‘Yes,’ Alice said. ‘Yes, I know that.’
‘But you never noticed it had gone, that smell,’ Katherine said. ‘And after a while, if it goes on raining, you can’t smell it any more. It’s just the air, it’s just ordinary, you take it for granted.’
‘It was like that.’
‘Yes, it was like that,’ Katherine said. ‘But I’m so stupid. I always ruin everything, always. He said that, and immediately I said the thing I was thinking
