The Reunion

the seat in the living-room window, writing in his notebook. It was unmistakeable.
    Jen remained silent, she continued to ruin her pedicure.
    ‘So what is it then?’ Nat asked. ‘If it’s not practicalities, and you do feel something for him, then…’
    Jen looked over at her, her face grave. ‘There are things you don’t know. Things no one knows,’ she said.
    ‘Well, that sounds ominous,’ Lilah said. ‘But if you’re talking about you and Dan, Andrew told me. And I told Nat. So we know all about that. I mean, we don’t know the details, I don’t think we want to know the details…’
    Natalie, catching the expression on Jen’s face, said: ‘You don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to.’
    ‘Yes, she does,’ Lilah said.
    ‘Lilah.’
    ‘If not now, then when? Tell me, even if it’s just me. It might help.’
    ‘I got pregnant.’ Jen blurted it out so loudly they all jumped. ‘Sorry,’ she said in a whisper. ‘I got pregnant.’
    ‘You mean, other than with Isabelle?’ Lilah asked.
    ‘Obviously,’ Natalie said, sucking her teeth at Lilah.
    ‘Yes.’ Jen hung her head, she put her chin on her knees and closed her eyes. ‘Ninety-six. A few months before the crash. I had an abortion. Conor never knew.’
    ‘Oh,’ Natalie said.
    Lilah was quiet for a moment, then she said: ‘Is that it? I don’t understand. I mean, I know that’s not very nice and everything, but how does it affect you now, how does it affect you and…’ She broke off. ‘Oh.’
    ‘Oh!’ Natalie said.
    ‘I don’t know,’ Jen said. She looked up at them, mortified. ‘It sounds like the most horrible thing in the world, the most awful, horrendous thing…’
    ‘No, it doesn’t, Jen.’
    ‘I didn’t know. Who the father was. Fuck’s sake, Lilah, of course it sounds awful, it sounds like I should be on the
Jeremy Kyle Show
.’
    Lilah laughed. ‘You wouldn’t get anywhere near Jeremy Kyle, sweetheart, not unless you were choosing between your brother and your cousin as the father of your child. You slept with two men, both of whom you had feelings for, at least one of whom, and probably both, you were in love with. It’s hardly the stuff of great scandal.’
    Natalie moved back a little so that the three of them could sit facing each other, a tiny closed circle. ‘Jen, why didn’t you say anything? We could have helped you.’
    ‘Nat, you would have been horrified. I was horrified. I was ashamed,’ she said. She took a deep breath. ‘And to be honest, I didn’t even allow myself to think about it. I found out, I booked the appointment, I got it done, as quickly as I could. I never gave myself the opportunity to think twice about it because I couldn’t bear to. But now… You know how Dan feels about family, about his childhood, about having missed out on having a family? And now I’m thinking about being with him – can I do that, without telling him? I mean, I think telling him would be a mistake, it would be an awful thing to do because then he’d know, or at least wonder about, this thing, this child he’d missed out on. But not telling him, it seems such a dishonest way to start something…’
    Lilah cut in. ‘Don’t you dare tell him,’ she said, her voice almost menacing. ‘Don’t ever tell him. Nothing, absolutely nothing good can come of that.’
    A cloud passed in front of the sun, it felt chilly for just a few moments, then the shadow passed and it was warm once more. Jen started to talk again: ‘I’ve wanted to tell you for such a long time. Not because I wanted you all to know about my horrible behaviour, but because I thought it might help everyone understand what happened afterwards, the way I ran.’
    ‘You didn’t have to explain…’ Natalie started to say, but Lilah cut in.
    ‘Nat, let her say it,’ she said, and Jen smiled at her and took her hand.
    ‘I thought… at the time, I thought there would be time,’ she said, shooting another anxious glance at Lilah, ‘to make amends. To Conor. To make up for the things I’d done, even if… even if he didn’t know about those things. I thought there would be marriage, a baby. Another baby. And then there wasn’t. Then everything was just gone. The life I thought I was going to have, it was just gone.’ She took a deep breath, she flapped her hands around at the sides of her face, the way women do when they’re trying not to cry. ‘That was one thing, that was bad enough, but the worst part, the thing