The Reunion

‘That’s not what I meant. I mean I think
I
should go back with the girls. You stay on here. It’s best that way.’ He’d never been any good at lying to her, he may as well tell the truth. ‘I could do with some time by myself,’ he said.
    ‘Oh.’ The silence seemed to stretch out for days. ‘You mean, some time away from me.’ She looked up at him, big green eyes beseeching.
    ‘Yes,’ he said, and he saw her flinch, it felt like a knife in his chest. ‘I need some time away from you.’ He reached out his hand to pull her up, but she waved it away. He could see the pain in her face as she got to her feet. They walked back to the house in silence.
    He took Lilah out to lunch the day before he left. They drove all the way to Digne-les-Bains, and sat on a sun-drenched terrace overlooking the Bléone River, eating oysters. Lilah drank three glasses of champagne and after lunch insisted that she felt like a walk, so they ambled along the road beside the river, she leaning heavily on his arm, pausing every ten paces or so to catch her breath. After a few hundred yards they came to a bench, where they sat down and watched a mother duck solicitously ushering her ducklings from the bank into the water.
    Lilah rested her head on Andrew’s shoulder and slipped her bony little hand into his. Her skin felt dry and papery, like old parchment.
    ‘What’s going on, Drew?’ she asked him, and before he had time to reply, she went on: ‘Don’t say nothing, because I’m not stupid. Things are all wrong with Nat, they have been since you got here. And now you’re leaving early, without her? And don’t think I haven’t noticed the thing with Jen, either, the fact that every time she comes into the room, you walk out. And every time Dan comes into the room the muscle in your jaw tenses and your hands ball into fists. You’re pissed off with everyone. Everyone except me, which makes a nice change.’ She snuggled closer to him and closed her eyes. ‘But I don’t want you to leave like this, so angry. Tell me, please?’
    He poured it out, all of it. His irrational anger over Dan buying the house, which now didn’t seem irrational at all, because he had been right about ulterior motives. The thing with Jen, which, he knew, was none of his business, but he couldn’t help but feel the betrayal as though it were his own, he couldn’t help but feel aggrieved, furious, on Conor’s behalf. And on his own, too, because he felt as though he’d been duped, as though somehow he’d spent all these years caring about a woman who didn’t even exist. Lilah opened her eyes wide and laughed at that.
    ‘You thought Jen was perfect, did you? Come on, Andrew.’
    ‘You knew?’
    ‘No. Christ, I didn’t know
that
. I knew that Dan was a little bit obsessed with her… He used to talk about her all the time – you probably don’t remember this, but after you and I split up, I went to stay with him for a while.’
    ‘I remember.’
    ‘Well, he was constantly banging on about her then, he talked about her all the time. It didn’t seem that weird, though, we were all worried about her then, and it was obvious that he’d always felt
something
for her. I didn’t think it was reciprocated though. I never thought she would… you know. I understand why you’re shocked, why you’re upset, I would never have thought that Jen would have strayed. But still. She did. She made a mistake.’
    ‘That’s exactly what she said.’
    ‘And she’s right. Drew, my darling, you know how I love you but you do set impossibly high standards…’
    ‘That’s what she said too,’ Andrew replied. ‘But frankly, I don’t think it’s actually an “impossibly high standard”–’ he found himself making bunny ears with his fingers – ‘to ask someone not to cheat on their boyfriend with one of his close friends.’
    Lilah looked up at him with a lazy smile, raised an eyebrow.
    ‘That was different, Lilah.’
    ‘Really? Was it better or worse?’
    ‘There were circumstances.’
    ‘Drew. There are always circumstances. And even when there aren’t circumstances, haven’t you ever made a really stupid mistake?’
    ‘You know very well I have.’
    ‘Well then. I have, too, as you well know. I’ve made hundreds. Thousands, possibly. So really, is it so terrible, what she did? Think about it, if it hadn’t been for what went after, losing him like that, we might all have seen things in a rather different light, mightn’t