Chapter 18 - 'That would be years off. If ever.'
Neil shows his cards at a house viewing, and Esther's worlds collide.
Welcome to my serialised romance novel Love You Too, Esty Mackie. If you’re new here, you might want to skip back to the start.
This is the second chapter this weekend, so if you missed the first one or you’d like a little catch up, click below for the previous chapter.
Previously: Ash and Esther reminisce over email and make plans to meet again
Esther
The estate agent is friendly in that keen-for-a-sale-because-he’s-got-targets sort of way. He turns the key, smoothly, in the lock and pushes open the door. Early evening sunlight floods the walls.
‘So you have this well-proportioned entrance hall,’ he says, brightly. ‘Gas central heating throughout.’ Taps the radiator. ‘Lovely big reception room to the right with a gorgeous bay window.’
We follow him into the living room, both acting as if we didn’t already know the layout. But it’s only two roads away and is almost exactly the same style, right down to the placement of the brushed chrome plug sockets and handles on the built-in cabinets. Plain decor, magnolia walls, cream carpet. A blank canvas. Just a bit bigger, but ready to move into. Neil looks out the window, at the driveway, the house opposite, the road to the green I sometimes walk in, and I can picture our furniture in here. Probably in exactly the same configuration as at home. We both look around, up into the corners of the ceilings, whilst the estate agent loiters in the doorway.
‘Shall we move into the kitchen?’ he asks, and leads us down the corridor, past the staircase, and into the kitchen diner where he shows us the integrated appliances and the utility room. ‘And then there’s the garden…’
It’s nicer than ours, and there’s a Wendy house, and a trampoline, encased in a net. Flower beds along each side, with solar lights stabbed into the ground, neatly cut grass, a gas barbecue and a table and chairs on a sandy coloured patio. And I notice there’s not a single weed growing between the slabs. No moss nestled in the grass. It’s so nicely maintained, and I wonder, if we were to buy this house, if we could keep it like this. And if one day, in the future, there’d be another trampoline or Wendy house or a goal net or a basketball hoop or a swing-ball set, and our own children racing about, making daisy chains, kicking balls, running through sprinklers.
‘It’s lovely out here,’ I say.
‘It certainly faces a better way than ours does,’ Neil agrees, which I take as a sign that he likes it, too.
Back inside we head upstairs, into the room at the front that is ours in our house and would be here, too. This estate agent is keen to point out the en-suite bathroom and the walk in wardrobe.
‘Oh god, space for more dresses you take a fancy to,’ Neil says, rolling his eyes, and laughing, like he means it to be playful or an inside joke, but like so many of his off-the-cuff comments lately, seems weird and disjointed. The estate agent peers out of the window at the street, and I resist the urge to respond.
There are two further bedrooms, and whereas our one spare room is full of boxes of Neil’s tech stuff, here they are both children’s bedrooms, and not spare at all, and the only rooms in the house that have seen paint that isn’t a variation on cream. A jungle themed nursery with sage green walls, sweet looking animal decals, colourful butterflies fluttering up the walls and on to the ceiling, and a cot with pastel yellow sheets. And a pretty, cloudy princess room, full of pinks and purples and dolls and dressing up clothes and plastic high heeled shoes, lined up against the wall.
‘Do you have any little ones?’ the estate agent asks, almost tentatively, as if he’s trying to suss us out.
‘No,’ we both say in unison, and then I add, ‘maybe one day soon, though,’ and Neil raises his eyebrows, and says he could take them or leave them, personally.
It’s noncommittal, as if we were talking about a package holiday, or a Netflix mini series, or that Indian restaurant in town everyone raved about but he couldn’t see the fuss over, and not having a family with me at all. ‘Actually, in addition to a guest room, I was thinking this one would make a great home office.’
And I have to really concentrate on keeping my face neutral whilst I flip back through all the interactions we’ve had recently about this, because isn’t this what we talked about in the car that one time? Wasn’t that what we were both hinting at? What we danced around in the coy way we did? Wasn’t the idea of a child exactly the hook he used to onboard me to the idea of moving house? More space, Esther, time to revisit the life plan. Now, standing here, in the doorway of the pink princess room, I feel duped, and Neil is oblivious.
After, as the agent drives away, he suggests we take an evening walk in the park, and I know it’s because he wants to talk about the house.
‘What did you think?’ he asks.
‘I liked it,’ I say. ‘It was almost exactly like ours, and I like ours, so… not really a hard sell.’
‘That, I was hoping, would be the selling point,’ he grins.
‘Why that, specifically?’ I ask.
‘Esther. You’re a creature of habit.’
‘Am I? Is that what you think of me?’
‘Absolutely,’ he says. ‘You like things the way they always were. You like to know where you are. You like your job the way it is, the last three cars you’ve had have all been the same, you always dress the same way, need I go on?’
God. I’ve never been made to feel more boring in my entire life.
‘What? That’s not true,’ I protest. ‘The dress! The very dress you keep making into a thing.’
‘You know what I mean,’ he says, waving it off like I’m being dismissed. ‘But, it’s okay. I like that about you. You know where you are with Esther Mackie.’
Jesus.
‘But what if I don’t want to be like that? What if I want to be edgy and unpredictable and exciting? What if I’m actually all those things but they’ve somehow been buried over the years?’
‘Esther,’ he says, patiently, like he’s talking to a child. ‘You are full to the brim with lovely attributes, but I don’t think we can count unpredictability as one of them. Shall we ask about taking another look? We’ll have to move quickly.’
‘Sure. Yes, I’d like that,’ I mumble.
Neil takes out his phone and sets a reminder to call the estate agent tomorrow, and I think it’s funny that he thinks I’m the predictable one, but not haha funny.
He’s still happy about the house the following morning. He’s up earlier than normal and I find him on his laptop, his god forsaken Excel spreadsheet of expenditure on screen, complete with conditional formatting and formulae.
‘I’ll call them at nine, Esther,’ he says. ‘I’ve managed to get a day working from home.’
‘Okay… don’t you need to be on site? In case something goes wrong?’
‘I can do it all remotely,’ he says, and he pushes his glasses up his nose. ‘In fact, that’s what I was thinking for the second bedroom. I’ll need a home office. I’d like to work from home more.’
And I’m glad he’s confirmed this because last night I lay awake for ages, trying to find unbreakable links in what he’s said about life plans that would indicate we’re on the same page, and coming up horrifyingly short. Suddenly changes to his life plan could mean working from home. More space could mean that damn office. My heart tightened in my chest, pounding heavily at the same time. I looked at him, sleeping, peaceful, and my breath caught in my lungs.
‘I quite liked it as a kid’s room, actually,’ I say, and I pour us both a cup of coffee.
‘Let’s not jump the gun here, Esther,’ he says. ‘That would be years off. If ever.’
‘Oh,’ I say, “if ever” ringing through my head like an echo down a tunnel. And if he looked up from the screen, he’d see me, hands around my mug, leaning against the door of the dishwasher, and he’d know how badly that stung. But he doesn’t. He’s so absorbed in his spreadsheet, he doesn’t notice me at all. Instead, I dump my coffee into the sink because suddenly I feel trapped and the house is stifling and I need to get out of here. ‘I just remembered I need to be at work early today.’
He opens the front door as I’m starting the car.
‘Esther,’ he says, motioning for me to unwind my window. He’s looking kindly at me. He’s realised. He’ll suggest we sit down and discuss it later on. He’ll come up with an addendum to the plan, a new tab on the spreadsheet, and we’ll talk about it all this evening, or over the weekend, and I’ll feel reassured that he’d like to take it rather than leave it, and that if ever will turn into when.
‘Yes?’
‘Don’t forget your lunch.’
For fuck’s sake.
‘You have it,’ I say through gritted teeth, shifting the car into reverse and stamping on the pedal.
Anna asks about the house viewing and I tell her, whilst we buy lunch, about the kid’s room and how I looked at it and felt like I might want it to stay that way. And about Neil’s flippant comment there, and about the other flippant comment he made at Amber and Will’s house, and the conversation in the car, weeks ago, that sparked all this off and his office plans. She tries so hard to disguise her reaction and maintain a neutral expression but she’s rubbish at it.
‘You might as well say what you think,’ I say. ‘I’m sure it’ll be similar to my sister’s opinion and she won’t be shy about sharing.’
‘Do you think maybe he’s scared? she asks, sniffing. ‘He wouldn’t be the first.’ But I shake my head.
‘Neil doesn’t really do scared as such.’
She rolls her eyes, so I’m quick to explain. ‘It’s not that he’s fearless, more that he’d never put himself in a position where he could be. Everything he does is so calculated, like he’s worked out all possible outcomes beforehand and has gone with the most favourable. So I’m pretty sure he’d take it in his stride if it was something he wanted. He’d plan and predict and have everything worked out.’
‘Esther… I know you don’t need me to unpack this for you, but you’ve literally just said he’d be planning it if it was what he wanted… and…’ she makes her hands like scales and shrugs her shoulders. ‘instead he’s planning a home office.’
I wish she wasn’t so right, but she is.
‘And what about what you want?’ she continues. ‘Seems like you spend a lot of time doing things his way. Like it’s always you who adjusts.’
‘I think it’ll work out,’ I say. ‘Things usually do.’
She looks resigned.
‘Okay. Well, I just think if you feel like this now, you always will. If this is something you want, with him, he’ll have to work on his flexibility.’ And I nod along, but know in my heart it would fall on deaf ears.
Most days, our colleague Chloe spends her breaks online shopping, or reading celebrity gossip and announcing it to the rest of us as if these were people we knew personally. Sometimes I don’t know who she’s talking about so I do a surreptitious Google search so as not to appear out of touch. Sometimes I couldn’t care less and tune out. Today, as Anna and I get back to the office, she’s engrossed in a news story on her phone, and as we settle ourselves, she holds it up.
‘Did you see this?’ she says. It’s a photo of Ash looking lost at an airport. He’s small and almost green, being supported by a taller, broader man who looks similar but healthier and who I instantly recognise as Tyler. For a second, I can hear my heartbeat in my ears and when the sound returns to normal, she’s talking to Anna about the story, and Ash in rehab, and how he must be a huge fuck up, and I consider my options as two of my worlds collide and decide it’s best to stay quiet.
‘They were meant to release an album last year,’ she’s saying. ‘But it got pushed back and everything went really quiet. And now this! No one’s heard a peep for ages. I’d love to know which rehab he’s at.’
‘Probably one in London,’ Anna muses. She stabs her fork into her pasta and pesto salad. A pea falls off her fork onto her desk, and she picks it up and flicks it into the bin.
‘For heroin, I expect, looking at him. He’s got that gaunt, drug addled look. Plus he comes across really arrogant and difficult, to be honest. I mean, to push everything back like that. He must have really screwed up.’
‘He’s not arrogant or difficult,’ I say, defensive and apparently unable to stay quiet after all, because they’re wrong about him.
‘What?’ Chloe giggles, incredulously. ‘How do you know that?’
The pair of them are watching me now, keenly interested in how matte, regular Esther would know anything about shiny, irregular Ash at all. I bounce my eyes between them.
‘I went to school with him,’ I admit, after a pause.
‘Tsk! No you never,’ she scoffs.
‘Why would I make up something so easily verifiable? In fact…’ But I stop myself. I can’t go any further into it, and I’m certainly not telling them we were together, not so much because they wouldn’t believe me, but because I don’t fancy the deep dive if they did.
‘In fact?’ Anna prompts, interested now.
‘We were in English class together. He wasn’t really difficult at all.’
‘I don’t believe you,’ Chloe says, sitting back in her chair. She’s sort of right not to. I wasn’t being completely truthful. He was disruptive. He got sent out of class a lot.
‘About any of it, or that he wasn’t difficult in English?’
She looks confused now, and looks between me and Anna.
‘I don’t know,’ she says. ‘On one hand, it’s a weird thing to make up, but on the other, I feel like you’d have mentioned it before.’
‘Well, I’m sure his Wikipedia page will say where he went to school. Plus, my parents definitely have a year group photo. And I didn’t mention it before, because, why would I?’
‘Err because he’s really famous, obviously,’ Chloe says.
‘Do you think he’s round here then,’ Anna speculates, correctly. ‘Why else would he come back for rehab?’
She looks at me pointedly, and I shrug.
‘I don’t know. I lost touch with him in college. Just thought I’d mention that I knew him once upon a time, that’s all.’
‘Well, you’re a dark horse,’ Chloe says. ‘Imagine going to school with Ash from Grandeur Looms.’
‘Chloe, she doesn’t have to imagine it. She did go to school with Ash from Grandeur Looms,’ Anna laughs.
‘Whatever. Knowing a pop star is lit! You must have some mutuals. Can we find him on the internet? Someone must know where he is.’
‘Beg friend,’ Anna tuts. ‘But can we?’
‘No,’ I say. ‘I wish I never mentioned it to be honest.’
‘I’m already on it,’ Chloe says, tapping at her phone.
But there’s nothing online that ties me to Ash at all, so they can search all they like.
Chloe’s work phone rings, and she picks it up and slings her mobile back in her bag, and I’m relieved that no one mentions Ash again for the rest of the day.