What became of us

to ferrying their passengers around in metallic grey two-seater sports models, she had just seen Ursula getting into her lover’s car and driving off at speed.
    Annie let the curtain drop back in front of her face. Outside, in the scant privacy of Beaumont Street, both her virginal ex-flatmates were carrying on illicit affairs, while the one who had been renowned for her promiscuity looked on from the window of her chaste single room.
    When Ian had tipped her out of the shopping trolley onto the steps of the Randolph earlier that morning, there had been a moment when she knew that if she held onto his hand for one millisecond longer than she needed to get her balance, they would end up in bed together. In the space of twelve hours her relationship with him had gone from not even remembering who he was, through tolerating him for politeness’ sake, right the way to beginning to fantasize about what would have happened if she had noticed him when they were at university. Her initial assessment that he would be a boring lay had changed in the light of his laughter, his unneurotic appetite for chocolate in the middle of the night, and particularly his remembering what she had said about the shopping trolley. Now she thought that he might well be a considerate and inventive lover, but somehow that made it all the more difficult to think about going to bed with him. There was too much at stake. She didn’t want to spoil their larky night together with all that ‘I’ll call you’ stuff in the morning.
    That, and the fact that the torn muscle in her left calf made her leg feel as if it were trapped in a vice, had made her gently withdraw her hand from his.

    Annie got back into bed, pulled the cover right over her head and tried to go back to sleep, but the image of Ursula ducking into the stubby little sports car tormented her with its intrigue. For one thing, what self-respecting middle-aged man would drive such a car? Secondly, it was so unlike Ursula to lie. Ursula had many qualities, but she simply did not have the imagination to invent a child with chickenpox as a reason to bunk off from her obligations as a friend and aunt.
    Annie turned over onto her front, but unconsciousness continued to elude her. If she was going to go to lunch with Roy and the girls, she thought, she would have to buy them presents. She was clearly famed for the presents she sent them because just the day before, as they were leaving to go Punting, Lily had suddenly registered who she was, and demanded to know whether she had brought her anything. It had been a sweet moment for Annie, flanked by Ursula and Manon, and she the only one not a godmother.
    Annie stuck her left arm out from under the sheet and squinted at her watch. She had no idea how far it was to Penny’s parents’ village, but she found it impossible to drive with a map on the steering wheel as some men did, and she wasn’t very good at navigating even with the car parked in a lay-by and both hands and eyes free to work out how the lines on the page translated into the scenery around her. If she didn’t get a move on, she would not even get there for lunch.

    By the time she had showered and dressed, breakfast downstairs was over, but they were serving morning coffee in the lounge. She discovered Ian behind the Observer, which slightly surprised her because she would have had him down as a Sunday Telegraph kind of man, although she did not really know what that meant. Of the great pile of newspapers she lugged back from the newsagent’s every Sunday lunchtime the only one she ever read was the Mail on Sunday. Most of the people she knew who called themselves Guardian readers spent the tube journey to work craning over the person in the next seat’s shoulder to read the Sun.
    There was a rather forlorn-looking Danish pastry on a plate beside his cup.
    ‘Do you fancy a fry-up in the covered market?’ she greeted him.
    ‘Good morning! Are you quite determined to harden my arteries?’ he asked.
    ‘I beg your pardon?’
    ‘Pounds of chocolate and a fry-up in less than twelve hours?’
    ‘Well, I’m going on a diet tomorrow, so might as well get in as much as I can today. Perhaps the cafe in the covered market does muesli or something healthy these days?’
    ‘Perhaps,’ he said, standing up.
    ‘Not that we’d want to eat it or anything,’ she added.
    ‘Course not,’ he said smiling.
    They both avoided greeting each other with a kiss.

    It was better this way,