Between You and Me Read online

  She springs off the bed almost coltishly, and something about the action reminds me that despite her ability to come across as a little too grown-up and smart-alecky at times, she really is just a kid.

  I watch her root around in her bag that’s hanging on a small wicker rocking chair that’s laden with a pile of discarded clothes that could rival Mount Everest.

  ‘Voila! ’ She presents me with a clunky plastic contraption.

  ‘What is it?’ I ask.

  ‘What does it look like?’

  I take it from her, inspect it. ‘I think if I knew that, I’d not be asking.’

  She snatches it off me. ‘It’s a magnet, duh! No pesky little security tag will ever escape this puppy.’

  ‘Hang on . . . you have an actual device to help you shoplift? This wasn’t a one-off. You’ve taken other things?’

  She gives me the Puleese! face again, her forehead rippling with a host of cute little wrinkles like a Shar-Pei. Then she leaps back on to her bed and crosses her legs.

  ‘How long has it been going on?’ I can’t work out why she’s being so open about it.

  ‘Er . . . let me think now . . .’ She gazes at the ceiling, eyes ablaze with roguery again. ‘Since I was nine.’

  ‘Nine.’ What was so special about nine?

  ‘Just little things at first, like bubblegum or a hairbrush, or I’d swipe some make-up or a necklace or something. You know . . . from Primark, not Tiffany’s.’ Her tone says, clearly, if it’s Primark and not Tiffany, that makes it okay.

  I try not to overly react – in case this is all just a game to get a rise out of me. ‘So when did it become clothes?’

  ‘Erm . . . Around the same time it became bags and shoes.’

  I must look entirely gobsmacked. ‘This is a joke, right? You haven’t really stolen bags and shoes.’

  She wags an index finger at her wardrobe. ‘If you look in there, about forty per cent of everything you see is lifted. And I’ve got an even bigger stash at Mum’s.’

  I did think she had a lot of stuff. I put that down to her having parents who spoil her outlandishly.

  ‘What makes you think you can do that and get away with it?’ I ask. ‘What gives you the right to take things that other people have to pay for?’

  She hugs her knees with her arms, rests her chin on them. ‘Because unlike other people, I’m a brand ambassador, aren’t I?’

  ‘A what?’

  ‘My vlog! People see me in that cool green waistcoat or those Bally ankle boots, and they run out and buy the exact same thing. Because I gave it eminence.’

  I almost cough up my spleen. I wait for her to say I’m just pulling your leg! None of this is true! But nothing about her delivery says she’s anything other than serious. ‘Grace . . .’ I say, ‘I hate to enlighten you . . . Taking stuff without paying for it doesn’t make you a brand ambassador. It makes you a kleptomaniac.’

  Suddenly the bravado falls away and she looks at me like I’ve mortally offended her. ‘Tell me, Lauren,’ she says, and I realise she’s never actually called me by my name before. I’ve never made it past pronoun status. ‘Do you think for one minute that any member of the royal family pays for the stuff they wear? Everything on their back is an advert for something or someone. British designers no one’s heard of have had their entire careers made because Kate happens to wear their raincoat or their walking boots, otherwise they’d still be nobodies! Do you think they make her go and buy a pair?’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘But she didn’t nick them either!’ This is insane. ‘Kate is a brand ambassador because she’s a member of the royal family. You are not Kate.’

  She tuts. ‘Yes, I know that. And I wouldn’t want to be! She’s old and not even remotely relevant to my generation.’

  ‘But you are relevant to your generation?’

  ‘Of course.’ She has absolutely no idea I’m ribbing her.

  I let out a disbelieving gasp.

  ‘So what are you going to do with all this new knowledge you have about me?’ she asks, and something in the air changes. I feel we are getting down to what lies behind this conversation. ‘Run and tell Daddy, I’m guessing.’ For an instant she looks a little vulnerable.

  ‘Do you want me to?’ I ask.

  She studies me, then drops her gaze.

  ‘No,’ I say, though I didn’t actually know this was my decision until right this second. ‘Not this time I’m not.’

  She assesses me again, eyes loaded with suspicion. ‘Why not?’

  It suddenly dawns on me what might lie at the root of her behaviour. ‘Because I think deep down you know stealing isn’t the way to get attention, and that it’s wrong, and that if you get caught, you’ll have more attention than you’re looking for – you’ll have a criminal record as well.’ I try not to say it judgementally. ‘I doubt your fans would see you having much eminence when it comes out that you’re a common thief.’

  She drops her gaze again, blushes, stares unblinking at her kneecaps.

  ‘Believe me, Grace, I know you’ve been through a lot recently,’ I say carefully, after a close study of her, of how still she has become. ‘You were an only child for a very long time . . .’

  It suddenly comes to me. Of course. Nine. Around the time her mother would have fallen pregnant with Toby.

  ‘Out of the blue you acquire a baby brother. Then your mum and dad split up. Your dad is now with me. You’ve got two homes. Two sets of everything. Schedules and school work . . .’

  She looks up, and I feel the heat of her curiosity. This is a new me she’s seeing.

  ‘I know you have good friends. But . . . well, I only know from my own experience, there are things you can talk to your friends about and things you can’t. Some things, unless people have been through them, they’re never going to understand. So sometimes we end up bottling them up and carrying them around, and that’s not always healthy.’

  By the slight parting of her lips I think she’s going to roll her eyes or say something sarcastic, but it never comes. We just look at each other, held captive in a surprising moment of truth.

  ‘If you ever wanted to talk – about anything . . . I know someone . . . a colleague who—’

  ‘Oh my God.’ Something in her expression seems to calcify. ‘You want me to see a quack!’

  ‘He’s not a quack.’

  ‘What is he then? A doctor who specialises in children’s problems? Mental health problems?’ She contracts into a ball, pulling back towards her pillow. ‘I’m not crackers! I’m just . . .’ Another jolt of movement; she jumps off the bed. ‘Done with this weird conversation!’

  I open my mouth, but she marches to the door, yanks it open. ‘And by the way, can you please stop looking up my clothing? Anyone would think it’s you who needs to go and see the quack.’

  I play this back. ‘What did you just say?’ My cheeks burn with embarrassment.

  She stands there, not looking at me, just holding her door open. ‘You’re a weirdo!’

  The blood pounds in my face. ‘Grace . . .’ I suddenly feel confused, and hurt and insulted. I get to my feet. ‘I’m not deliberately looking up your clothes. But as you go around the flat with no knickers on half the time, it’s hard not to notice.’

  We meet eyes. Her face blazes red. ‘So you’re the underwear police now? As well as everything else?’

  ‘No,’ I say, hating that I’ve been wrong-footed. ‘I’m not the underwear police . . . But I don’t see anything wrong in wearing knickers – especially outside of your bedroom.’

  ‘Oh my God.’ She almost laughs. ‘Did you really just say that? No wonder Mummy said she can’t tell by looking at you whether you’re twenty-five or forty-five! You’re from the Jane Austen era! Even Caroline Bingley was more exciting than you!’

  It’s a double punch. I’m not sure which hurts more. Did Meredith really say that about me? Is that how I come across? I know people have often told me I’m an old soul, but do I look like one too?
/>   She is still staring daggers at me. But beneath the false front I can tell she’s way more wounded than she’s letting on. ‘Can you, like, go now?’

  I don’t want to go. I want to take it all back, say it differently, or not say it at all.

  ‘Get out of my room,’ she says, still hanging on to the door.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘Grace . . .’

  ‘Just fucking go.’

  As I pass her, she sharply turns her face away from me.

  I keep my eyes down until I am out of her room, down the hall, and can bring myself to let out an excruciating breath.

  THIRTEEN

  The class is full by the time I arrive. I search for a place to set down my yoga mat and then see a hand waving at me. Lucy’s. She pats the floor beside her.

  ‘Thank you,’ I whisper, as I carefully roll out my mat and try to slide, unnoticed, into my first downward dog. We go through the flow for forty-five minutes, occasionally sending each other smiles. I try to focus on the choreography of movement, on the therapeutic power of my breath, but I can’t shake Grace and the ugly turn of our conversation from my mind. When Elena says, ‘Namaste’ and I’m finally lying on my back, staring up at the ceiling, I turn to catch Lucy studying me.

  ‘We should go for coffee sometime,’ she says.

  ‘That sounds really nice!’

  ‘Can’t today though. Got a couple of appointments in Mayfair. But next week perhaps? If you turn up.’

  I smile. ‘I know. I haven’t been the best at getting into a routine. I do shift work and there are times when no matter how much I know I should, I just can’t drag myself off the sofa.’

  She looks me over analytically. ‘I believe it. Nursing’s got to be hard work.’

  We roll up our mats. ‘Actually . . . I’m a doctor.’

  I glance at her in time to see her face flood with colour. ‘Oh. I . . .’ There’s a second where she laughs to hide her discomfort. ‘I’m so sorry, I have absolutely no idea why I assumed . . .’

  ‘It’s fine!’ I laugh a little too. ‘I just thought maybe I should set you straight.’ Then I tell her how I went through med school letting another student call me Laura for four years because it always felt like it had gone on too long to correct her.

  ‘That’s funny,’ she says. ‘It’s a shame I haven’t time today for that coffee . . .’

  ‘Well, I’m going to make an effort to be here next week,’ I tell her. ‘I feel like a new person right now.’

  ‘Me too! When I became single again, I had so many hang-ups about being back out in the world – you know – as a newly dating woman, walking a path I never thought I’d go down again in my life . . .’ She looks wistful for a spell. ‘Yoga saved my sanity.’ She glances at her watch. ‘Going to have to flee. I have to rush home and dress . . . See you next week?’

  I smile. ‘Stay sane.’

  She chuckles and runs.

  I go back to the flat, picking up a ready-made sandwich and a juice from a cute little cafe on the high street. Mozart is full of excitement when I walk in, so I pop on his lead and take him for a pee break, returning to have a quick shower and put on fresh clothes. I have a meeting with my clinical supervisor at 3 p.m., so I head over to the hospital early, which gives me the chance to have a coffee with a couple of the other house officers I get along well with. After my meeting I walk back to the train and am just crossing the concourse at Victoria station when Joe texts.

  Taking Toby to his first karate lesson!! Grace home now. Should be back by 7.

  Ugh. The thought of Grace and me alone until seven o’clock rolls around makes my stomach churn. Want me to pick up stuff for dinner?

  No need. Leftover casserole in fridge.

  I send a smiley face.

  At the sound of my key in the door, the dog comes running to greet me. ‘Hi, little fella.’ I bend to stroke him and in the background I can hear Grace on the phone and her saying, ‘Oh God. I better go.’

  As I walk into the living room, she barges past me. ‘Hello. Goodbye.’

  ‘Grace . . .’ I am caught in the draught of her exit. ‘Where are you going? Look, please don’t . . .’

  ‘I’d have thought it was obvious,’ she says. ‘Anywhere but where you are!’ She makes off in the direction of her bedroom.

  ‘For heaven’s sake!’ I stare after her, noting that instead of just her long T-shirt and bare legs, she’s wearing a pair of fluffy tracksuit bottoms. I suddenly feel horrible all over again about the underwear comment. ‘Grace . . . look . . . can we stop this? Please. I think we should talk.’

  She halts by her bedroom door, turns and meets my eyes, the sting in her own subsiding slightly. ‘Er . . . Yes, that’s appealing!’

  ‘Look,’ I say. ‘I’m sorry I mentioned your clothing. I truly am. It didn’t come out the way I intended. In fact, I really don’t even know how I intended it . . .’ I try not to sound emotional, or as utterly out of my depth and hopeless as I suddenly feel. ‘I really, really don’t want us to be at each other all the time . . . and I cannot believe that you do either.’

  She goes on observing me, as though weighing this unexpected peace offering and contemplating whether to accept it or wage war. But then she just seems to crumble. ‘I’m sick of this!’ she says. ‘Just so, so sick of it! You don’t want me here, and I don’t want to be here – I don’t want to be anywhere near you! I’m just so, so sick of it.’ She gulps air. ‘I just want my life back the way it was!’

  Despite the weight of her words, she doesn’t sound melodramatic, but more straightforwardly honest, which feels way more awful.

  ‘I’m sick of this as well, actually,’ I say, quietly. ‘And there are days when I too just want my life back the way it was.’

  She gawks at me, almost does a double-take. I slip my bag from my shoulder and let it drop into the chair. It lands with the heavy clunk of defeat. ‘Grace . . .’ I remind myself she’s a kid and try to say it without enmity. ‘You barely say a civil word to me. You hardly ever look in my direction. You rat me out to your mother at the first opportunity . . . How do you think that makes me feel? I am trying my best here, but I’m tired of finding tripwires everywhere I turn.’

  We hold eyes. Hers have filled with tears.

  ‘You’re hating this?’ I say. ‘I get it. I understand. But guess what? Right now, I’m hating this too. But unlike you, I can’t live between two places. I don’t have two homes to go to.’ Then I find myself adding, ‘Sometimes I don’t even feel like I’ve got one.’ By the time I’m done I am almost breathless with anxiety.

  There’s an astonished pause, then she says, ‘All this is you attempting to make the best of it? You could have fooled me!’

  Once again, I am struck by how much older than her years she seems, like she bypassed childhood and joined the ranks of the cynical and misunderstood. But I am worn out by her – by this. ‘Ah . . .’ I throw up my hands. ‘Whatever,’ I say, and I walk towards the kitchen.

  She hurries after me. ‘What does that mean? Whatever? Like you’re some kid . . .’

  In one regretful, angry blast, I swing around. ‘I am not the child.’ I dig my finger into my own chest. ‘You are the child. And this is my home, and you need to show me some respect.’ I glare at her, unrelenting. I have never, even slightly raised my voice to her. She looks stunned, mystified, and then I see the tears fall.

  My heart is banging. She focuses on the ground, her body managing to look steeled and defenceless at the same time. Despite everything, a part of me wants to hug her, to force some kind of interaction that’s not a brutal one. But instead my arms fall helplessly by my sides.

  ‘Grace,’ I say, when I really can’t bear her being this upset any longer. ‘Can we please, please, please try to get along? I am begging you.’ Then I add, ‘It’s all I want in the world.’

  She looks up, meets my gaze, and I think I see a slight thaw in her eyes.

  Then she swipes a wrist across her running nose. ‘It’
s never going to happen.’

  FOURTEEN

  The article is stored in my Favourites. I click on it, and read the description again. Join us and you’ll have like-minded friends who can offer you the benefit of their experience – or, if nothing else, a safe place to have a good rant.

  First things first: I have to set up a bogus Gmail account. This part isn’t all that tricky. Next I have to give myself a name. Hmm . . . Harder.

  I decide to call myself what I’m feeling right this second.

  Miserable.

  A few minutes and . . . voila! I’m in!

  The forum is organised into a bunch of categories: Your story. Speak Out. Bitch Session. Positive Advice Only. Plus links to useful books and resources, and ideas for activities and fun.

  I click on Speak Out, and scan all the post headings:

  Enough is Enough

  I hate my SKIDS!!

  End of my Rope

  Disgruntled.

  Invisible.

  Furious.

  Fed up!

  I read some of the posts, familiarise myself with the acronyms. BM: biological mother. OH: other half. DH: dear husband. SS: stepson. SD: stepdaughter . . .

  I click on Disgruntled.

  Today was SS 7th birthday. OH took the kids to their grandparents for a party. I wasn’t invited. Understand I’m new to the family and not exactly welcomed by all, but what will this mean for Easter, Christmas etc? Am I always going to be saying it’s okay, I’ve got other stuff to do anyway? So disheartening!

  Second Best replies:

  I went through this with my in-laws! Sat down with them, had the conversation. Things got better over time. Was worth it for me! Try it!

  Invisible who Can’t Stand This Child!!! writes:

  So we had SS, the snotty-faced, mollycoddled, money-grabbing little monster, again this weekend! This kid is nine years old. ‘Why can’t we do this? Why do I have to eat that?’ Fucker got freaked out by the wind and jumped into bed because he wanted Daddy! Despite previous conversation with OH about bedroom being off limits, OH can’t resist being needed. I tell him but he doesn’t get it. My space = my sanity! Sorry but I just don’t feel comfortable sharing a bed with my masturbating SS! Okay?!!! We’ve been married less than a year – I only want to share a bed with my bloke!