down and up and down the bastard stairs. Did ever a woman have so much stuff? And to what end? Rails and rails and rails of clothes and shoes innumerable; and then the mutinous fucker of a dressing table and more boxes of clothes (now neatly labelled ‘keep for two years’ or ‘winter’ or – most gallingly – ‘don’t keep’); and then the bookcase and another mirror, complete with a maddening brown blanket that seized every opportunity to embrace the floor. And then the desk. The bloody desk.
The only respite was during the few intermezzi of trundling back and forth across the city in the removal van, knee-deep in the cabin detritus of crisp packets, burger cartons and chocolate wrappers left behind by generous generations of amateur shit-shifters before us.
The van went back and we switched to the car. But it was nearly six by the time we were finished.
At six thirty-nine, I awoke for the second time that day. And for the second time was plunged head first, without apology or warning, into die Scheisse.
I suppose that I must have drifted off to the underpowered lull of the Renault as we pulled away from Lucy’s mother’s Fulham address for the last time; and I suppose that the sudden silence, as she turned off the ignition, must also have woken me up.
Naturally, I had long ago discarded all thought of risking a return to my own flat and had begun instead quietly to look forward to a night with Lucy at her father’s Bloomsbury pied à terre. (I should say that Pa and Ma Lucy – David and Veronica – had been separated many times but had recently started living together again in Fulham, though Pa Lucy warily continued to maintain his bolthold of old. Thankfully, they were both in Scotland that weekend – on some sort of reconciliatory whisky-tasting tour – and so were unable to witness their daughter’s boyfriend’s multi-layered distress as he hobbled devotedly in and out of their garage.) Bloomsbury was not an unreasonable expectation since Lucy has been using her father’s as her base these last few weeks, while various estate agents wasted her time and lied to her about the properties she saw or liked or thought she might buy. If pushed, I suppose I had anticipated that we might slip off to some resuscitative little brasserie by way of a prelude to an early night of muted caress beneath the guest-room duvet. But that was as far as I got. I was too tired to plan. I was exhausted.
Imagine, then, my horror when I opened my weary eyes, stretched, gathered my sluggish bearings and realized that Lucy had pulled up outside … my own flat. For yes, we were, it pains me to relate, right back at number 33 Bristol Gardens. Square one – in all its recalcitrant glory – belligerent and incontestable.
My single point of honour was that I did not flinch. Not a giveaway muscle did I move. In the leering face of disaster, I merely yawned: ‘Luce, I think I fell asleep.’ Then I let a pulse or two pass before adding, as though it were a matter of supreme indifference: ‘Oh, why’ve you brought us back here?’
‘Pick up your keys for tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Everyone will be at work otherwise and you won’t be able to get back in.’
I glimpsed the passing of a fleeting chance – a short solo sprint across the road, a ding on the Roach’s ding-dong bell, a beckoning voice from the basement, a hasty thumbs-up to Lucy from across the street, a swift ascent, a covert collection of my own keys, a rapid verification of the general health of the premises, an expeditious gathering of clothes and then an equally pacy descent back down to the Renault, whereupon Lucy would hit the gas and we’d be off … But too late! Lucy’s door was open and the cold air was coming in.
‘It’s all right,’ I said, trying to hold her with my voice. ‘I’ll only be a second.’
‘Might as well come with you,’ she replied, ‘you’re going to have to change if you want to have dinner with me.’
It wasn’t so much that I was worried that Cécile might still be hanging around smouldering. No – the sad and sour truth was that with or without the corporeal evidence of la fille française in person, I knew the bedroom would give the game away. Wine glasses, supper, bottles, everything on the floor, a hat, the cigarette-holder, make-up on pillows … oh God. Events were conspiring against me. No time to prepare or launder. No time to arrange or devise. A single uncharacteristic lapse of the memory and suddenly all etiquette had been breached and a squalid face-to-face with the loathsome banshees of moral outrage was pending.
Towards the big black front door of the old Georgian house we now trod. We stood on the steps. The Roach wasn’t answering. Good news. We might not be able to get into my flat after all. Hopefully Cécile had shut my internal front door and – without my keys – we would be stuck in the hall. If not, if Cécile had left my door open, my best chance was that one of my other neighbours (contrary to all previous form) might start such a riveting conversation that Lucy would be rendered quite immobile for a few crucial minutes while I slipped up the stairs and sorted things out. So next I chose Leon, the cellist who lived directly beneath me and the neighbour with whom I was most friendly. He kind of owed me for listening to him practise.
‘Hello, yes?’ came the lugubrious voice through the intercom.
‘Leon, it’s me, Jasper.’
‘Hello. Are you locked out? Your door’s been open all day and –’
I interrupted him. ‘Thanks,’ I said, stepping back.
The lock clicked.
‘Must be just mine that’s broken,’ I said, before Lucy could, ‘and it looks like I left my own front door open after all, so we don’t need the spares.’
My second best chance was this: as far as I could remember, I had cleared the table after dinner and neither Cécile nor I had gone into my sitting room again. It should have been – as the spymasters might say – ‘clean’. And, perhaps, with just a little luck and good management, I might be able to contain Lucy in there. Everything depended on me reaching my flat first, tactically blocking various views, and somehow casually shepherding her out of harm’s way. And that all depended on me being in advance as we mounted the first flight of stairs. Which is precisely what did not happen.
Somehow, as I pushed open the door, Lucy got ahead. And once she was in front there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t very well barge past. Neither was there any point in hustling up behind her. I could only behave as normally as possible and follow her in silent agony, praying all the while that Leon would venture out into the corridor as I had calculated that he might.
We climbed one flight, two, three, and so to the fourth floor. Ahead, my own front door was ajar. To the right, Leon’s. But I still couldn’t get past her.
Leon’s door opened. And suddenly there he was: curly brown hair, five foot ten, auburn beard and Franz Schubert spectacles. He was carrying his cello case. He looked like he was on his way out.
‘Hello Jasper,’ he said, furrowing his brow.
‘Er … Leon, this is Lucy. Lucy, this is Leon.’
Lucy stopped.
‘Leon plays the cello in a quartet,’ I went on, unnecessarily, ‘he’s very good.’
‘Hello,’ Lucy said, smiling.
‘Jasper very kindly puts up with my practising from time to time,’ Leon replied.
I edged past Lucy. ‘Thanks for opening the front door,’ I said, affecting a more playful manner and nodding in the direction of my flat,
