to relocate and I am most interested in your room. I should like to view it at the earliest convenience. Erm … I’m down the road right now. Call me. Oh … it’s Rachel.’
I hung up. Classic rubbish voicemail, I’d managed to sound mad, posh and needy all at once. I paid for my biscuit and went out into the drizzle. Approaching me was a shiny red bus, slick with rain and the word ‘Hampstead’ on the front.
I’ve heard people say that they sometimes have moments when they feel as if Fate is tapping them on the shoulder and saying, ‘This way, please,’ like one of those tour guides with the little flags being followed around by Chinese tourists in matching raincoats.
I’ve never had this happen. Even if I did, I’d get stuck on the Northern Line and Fate would have left for another appointment. But that day I thought, sod it, I’m getting divorced, I have nothing to do and the bus is right there. So I got on. And, ten minutes later, I found myself ringing the bell at the house of Patrick Gillan.
As I stood on the doorstep of a house on a tree-lined street in Hampstead, a dog started barking inside. I smiled. There really was one. I caught sight of myself in the shiny door knocker and sighed. My hair was frizzy with rain and I wore a fraying mac, jeans and holey Converse. When I worked in an office, tights were the bane of my life, like having cling film applied to your most delicate areas, always wrinkling round your ankles or laddering if anyone breathed in a ten-mile radius. So since going freelance—this was how I was choosing to describe my current circumstances to myself—I mostly worked in jeans … OK, pyjamas. The door had panels of stained glass, and I saw someone approach, turned different colours by the light. I stuck on my best ‘not a crazy person’ smile. The man who opened the door was holding a phone in one hand, and with the other had a barking Westie by the collar. ‘Shut up, Max!’ He, the man, not the dog, wore jeans and a soft blue-grey jumper. He had greying curly hair and a cross expression. ‘What is it? I don’t plan to vote in the council elections. Not until you do something about the disgraceful state of your recycling policy.’
‘No— It’s— I saw your ad. The room. I was in the area and …’
He stared at me for a few moments while the dog tried to climb up me.
‘I’m not mad,’ I said quickly.
‘That’s good to know.’
‘I suppose a mad person might say that.’ I laughed nervously.
He looked me up and down. Sighed. ‘You better come in.’
Sometimes, when you walk into a place, you know you were meant to be there. It just smells right or something. Dan hated this method I had of choosing houses. What do you mean it didn’t feel right? It’s got outdoor decking and a dedicated parking space!
‘It’s amazing,’ I said. The inner doors all had stained-glass panels, filling the hallway with a kaleidoscope of colour. The floor was old-fashioned parquet, a little scuffed, and the place smelled of coffee and daffodils, of which there was a large handful crammed into a jam jar. I could tell instantly it was a middle-class home because:
The man still looked cross. ‘Come into the kitchen. I’m in the middle of something, so I wish you’d waited, but never mind.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘I said so, didn’t I? Do you want coffee?’
‘Oh, thank you, I don’t drink it.’ I may as well have said I didn’t believe in changing my socks.
‘You don’t?’
‘I don’t like the taste. I like the smell and I love coffee cake and those sweets you get in Roses. Isn’t that weird? I mean, hardly anyone likes those.’
He studied me. The phone in his hand chirped and he looked at it, frowned. ‘Tea, then?’
‘Yes, please.’
‘How do you take it?’
‘Milk, quite strong, but sort of milky if that makes sense.’
Once I sat down, the dog scampered across the kitchen and hurled himself onto my knee, where he crouched with his chin on my shoulder, panting. ‘Oof! Hello.’
‘He goes mad for new people. Sorry.’
‘It’s OK. I wish I had that effect on men.’ Oh, shut up, shut up, Rachel. Another side effect of working alone—you forget that there are supposed to be ‘inside head’ thoughts as well as ‘outside head’ sayings.
Patrick peered at the kettle. ‘So, Rachel—that’s you, I assume? What made you want the room?’
‘Honestly? I need somewhere to live at short notice. I also work from home at the moment, so I can’t really be in a big flat share.’ Or the sex slave of a rich city banker, come to think of it. All the sex-slaving would probably cut right into my freelancing time.
He was still frowning. ‘And where have you been living?’
‘Out in Surrey. I owned a place.’
‘Don’t you want to buy again, then?’
Things that suck about divorce, number fifteen: having to explain it to strangers. ‘My husband and I are splitting up. He’s keeping the house for now, so I have to move out.’ I cuddled the dog. ‘I’m in bit of a bind. But—’
‘You’re not mad.’
‘No.’
‘You’re getting divorced.’
‘Yes.’
He leaned against the counter and I saw he had no wedding ring on. ‘Join the club.’
‘Oh.’
‘Not much fun, is it?’
‘It sucks. In fact, I’m keeping a list. Things that suck about divorce.’
‘How many things are on it?’
‘Several hundred and counting.’
‘How about this one?’ The kettle had boiled, but he kept staring out the window. The phone beeped again, but he ignored it. ‘Having to find a lodger so they can dog-sit and look after the house, because you spend too much time at your job, and that’s why your wife left you in the first place, because with all the time she was on her own she had to find new hobbies, like, for example, having an affair with the next-door neighbour?’
I followed his gaze to the house just visible over the fence and nodded slowly. ‘I’ll put that one in after having to move out of the house you bought in the suburbs because your husband doesn’t want you there any more,
