The Assistant

They’ve gone elsewhere, that’s where everyone else is. The truth of this bites deeper every time I open my phone contacts. My drinking pals, my peer group, my beer buddies, the sisterhood, the tribe of uni friends: they’ve dispersed. But it’s only since I divorced Simon that I’ve realized just how many of my friends have dispersed: that is to say: got married, stayed married, had kids, and moved out of London to places with gardens. It is, of course, what you do in your thirties, unless you’re rich and propertied like Tabitha. Living in London in your twenties is hard enough – exacting but exciting, like glacier skiing – having a married life with kids in London in your thirties is essentially impossible, like ascending a Himalaya without oxygen.

I am one of the last left. The last soldier on the field.

Crossing Albert Terrace, I start the walk up Primrose Hill as my fingers pause on J for Jenny. She’s probably about my only childhood friend left, Simon apart. Jenny used to be around my house all the time, for playdates and sleepovers, then her parents divorced and she moved away, and I pretty much lost touch, though Simon kept a connection with her because they ended up working in the same industry.

Jenny is employed, in King’s Cross, by one of the biggest tech companies. That’s how Jenny and I reconnected: when I was writing my big breakthrough article, three or four years ago, on the impact of Silicon Valley on our lives.

I knew this story could make my name, impress my editors, drag me up the ladder a few rungs, so I shamelessly exploited my contacts (my husband), I seriously pissed off some particular sources by naming them (sorry, Arlo), but I met some fascinating people, a couple of whom became friends. And I rediscovered an old friend.

She picks up immediately. I love you, Jenny. That precious link to the past, to the time before everything went wrong. The times when Daddy would chase us in the house, in Thornton Heath, playing Hide and Seek, making us giddy with happy terror: shouting out, I can HEAAARRR you. And Jenny and I would huddle together, giggling, under the bed or in the dark of the wardrobe.

Ah, my lost childhood.

‘Hey, Jo. What’s up?’

‘I’m bored.’ I say, with some vehemence, ‘Horribly bloody booorrrrreeeeed. I’m trying to build a profile on OKCupid but it’s depressing and tragic, and I thought you might like to share a barrel of prosecco. Two barrels. A yardarm. What is a yardarm, anyway?’

She chuckles.

‘Ah, love to, but sorry.’

I can hear the characteristic chank of her Zippo lighter, then inhalation. Traffic murmurs in the background. Is she outside?

‘Where are you?’

‘King’s Cross, having a ciggie break. But I better go back in – I’m at the Death Star.’

‘Oh?’

‘Yep,’ she says, exhaling smoke. ‘Working till, like, midnight or something.’ She draws on her cigarette, goes on, ‘Jesus, it’s cold out here.’

Jenny works absurd hours at HQ. She probably makes a lot of money coding or whatever, but doesn’t talk about it. She mostly talks about sex. Jenny, apparently, is my Official Slut Friend. The insult is not mine, I would never have said it. But she said it herself when we renewed our friendship over mussels and chips in some bar near her work. Everyone has to have a slutty friend, she said, to make them feel better; have you got a slut friend, someone even more promiscuous than you? She made me laugh, at that table, she makes me laugh now, she always gives good gossip, and there’s a sadness in her hedonism which makes her funnier, and warmer.

I press the phone closer to my freezing ear, as Jenny asks:

‘How’s the profile-building going?’

‘Ah. Not great …’

I pause, to take a breath. I’m nearly at the top of Primrose Hill: the last, steep incline which always makes me gasp cold air. I should definitely start going to the gym. Jenny tries again,

‘Not great? What does that mean?’

‘It means, I’ve been at it several hours, and I’ve established that I’m straight, thirty-three, a woman, and I’m looking for long-term, short-term, casual hook-ups, or maybe a snog in a pub toilet. Do you think I might be coming across as desperate?’

‘Hah. No. Stay strong! There has to be a good man out there? I’ve seen them!’

‘No chance of a drink, then?’

‘Not tonight, Josephine. Call me tomorrow, mabes. OK, I’ve gotta get this TEDIOUS code written before I turn into a bat. Good luck!’

The phone clicks. I am at the top of the Hill. I don’t know whether it is the jewelled skyline of icy London – always impressive from this vantage point, stretching from the silvery towers of Canary Wharf to the holy scarlet arc of the London Eye – it could be the mere fact of hearing Jenny’s friendly voice – but I feel distinctly cheered. Invigorated. The sadness is dispelled.

Jenny is right. I must woman up. I can do this. It’s only a bloody dating profile. And I need a bloody date.

It’s all downhill from here, I can’t be bothered to do the full circuit, so I’m simply going to retrace my steps, back down Regent’s Park Road, as the snow begins to fall, heavier by the second. My pace quickens as I hurry past the big, white, thoroughly empty mansions.

Sometimes it feels like a ghost town, this rich little corner of London. Streetlamps shine on cold pastel walls, leafless trees grasp at the frigid orange sky. Glossy new apartment blocks sit empty: from one month to the next. Windows forever black and cold like Aztec mirrors, obsidian squares reflecting nothing. Where is everyone?

Nowhere. There is no one here. It’s only me. And the snow.

Ten minutes later I am sat at the laptop, gazing at OKCupid again, trying to make my personality sound simultaneously attractive, different, sexy, not too sexy, witty, not self-consciously witty, diverse, truthful, self-confident, but not brash. I mustn’t give up, but the questions? There are so many.

OK, I reckon I need a gin and tonic. Indeed, I need two punchy G&Ts: that should be about right, make me brave and honest and a little bit funny, without being idiotic. I was once told by an expert (someone who went on live TV daily) that the perfect amount of alcohol you need to cope (with daily live TV) is half a bottle of champagne. Similarly, I reckon two G&Ts is the perfect amount of alcohol to cope with any difficulty in life.

Returned from the kitchen, second G&T in hand, I command myself, and type.

Ethnicity?

English

Height?

Five foot two

Education level?

Useless degree

Think I’m getting bored again.

Religion?

None. Except when it’s really really sunny and I think: who knows for sure

Wincing at myself, I cross that out. Sounds too weird. Then I decide: what the hell, it’s true. Generally I don’t believe in God, but sometimes on a lovely summer’s day when the world is floaty with happiness I think that God exists, the trouble is He had a few too many drinks at lunch. Perhaps I should put that in.

Calm down.

Has pets?

Kodiak bear

Diet?

Gin.

Omnivore

Smoker?

Not yet. But I intend to start at 60, when it’s meant to prevent Alzheimer’s. No, rilly.

Drugs?

Gin!

Most people that know me would say I’m …

Crap at writing internet dating profiles

Short

Current goal?

Spring

What is your golden rule?

Never have a golden rule. You always break them

Oh God, I’m sounding over-brash, and borderline alcoholic. Maybe one gin would have sufficed.

I reckon I’ve nearly had enough profile-making. It’s not the world’s greatest profile, but it’s not the worst, and it gives a reasonable impression of me, when I am feeling a little lonely but also mischievous, and the streetlights at the top of Delancey are blurred by the snowy darkness.

There’s squillions of additional questions I could answer but I’ll do another three, then abandon my bid for happiness. Until tomorrow. There’s always tomorrow.

I value:

Candour. Vintage couture. Sriracha on a tuna melt

If I were sent to jail, I’d be arrested for

Lying on internet dating sites

Six things I could never do without

1. Nespresso machine

2. My Friends (awwww)

3. Nespresso machine

4. Pointless lists

5. Memory

6. Can’t remember this one

In truth, I have a good memory, but who cares. Time to relax: that’s it. I’ve run out of quirk, and exhausted snark – while remaining, I hope, sufficiently intriguing and alluringly different. Or maybe I just sound mad. Whatever. I am about to close the laptop and have a third and final G&T, when I remember. Shit. Photo. You HAVE to have a photo. I may be the world’s worst internet dater, I barely know which way to swipe on Tinder – leading to some awkward moments – but even I know that you MUST put up a photo.

But I hate putting up photos. I never know which to choose. I know how to take a decent selfie (from slightly above, of course, giving me defined cheekbones and a firmer chin), yet I also know these selfies are overly flattering. When guys meet me, they will be disappointed. I’d hate to see them look at me and try to hide their disappointment. I’d rather surprise on the upside.

Yet who the heck would ever put an unflattering photo of themselves on an internet dating profile?

Paging through the photos file on my laptop I consider the best of the non-selfies. I look presentable, even moderately sexy, in quite a few. And why not. I’ve been told I am pretty by enough people, not only close relatives and female friends. I know I look OK on a good day. Green eyes, reddish-brown hair, what my mum would call a cheeky grin. Decent figure, if a bit on the titchy side, as Si would put it. In that light: am I confident enough to say Yes, THAT photo, of me smiling on a Ko Tao beach not long after the divorce, tanned and relaxed, in a skimpy summer dress, is not too flattering, or vulgar, and not too dated?

I really do look happy. Probably because I’d had a pleasant one-night stand the night before, with a dreadlocked Aussie guy, all surfer-muscles and meaningless conversation. One of the reasons I am so broke now is that I blew a huge chunk of my modest savings on that epic holiday. Months of blissful freedom, after a decade of unblissful marriage. It was worth every penny.

K, let’s go for it. I can look like that on good days. After good sex. Which is one reason why I rarely looked like that when I was with Simon. Oh, Si, I am sorry.

Selecting the photo, and cropping the cleavage a little closer – don’t want to look too come-hither – I insert the photo. And there. I’m done. I am published. I am brand new and on the shelf, waiting to be plucked. Opened. Chosen. Read. Tomorrow I will go browsing for myself.

Picking up a book, Your Guide to Writing the Perfect Script, I start reading. In a slightly listless way.

The solitude is emphatic. The loneliness returns, I ask Electra for a weather update, solely to hear a voice.

‘Tomorrow will see a maximum of two degrees Celsius, in London, with a thirty per cent possibility of snow.’

Brr, I think I will have some red wine. G&Ts are too cold. Stepping into the kitchen I grab a bottle of red, a corkscrew, nab a glass, then I walk back into the living room and sit down at the table and slosh some vino. And pick up the book. It’s such a quiet night. Quieter than normal.

The flat is never that noisy: Tabitha and I have the main, first-floor flat, spacious and windowy. The flat above us is theoretically inhabited by some affluent old couple, but they spend their time on permanent holiday, especially in winter. And I don’t blame them. At the same time, the ground floor/basement – once occupied by Fitz, though nowadays he prefers to rent it out, and live, all by himself, in an entire house in Islington – has been pricily refurbished, and waits for new tenants.

Meanwhile, the next building on my right is a complex of sleek legal offices, hushed by night, and on my left is another Georgian house with yet more rich, absentee owners. I think I’ve seen them once.

Standing up, I walk to the windows. The pavements and roads are completely white with snow. And almost entirely empty: except for one woman in black, passing my door, down there. Street level. She is pulling little kids, she has her back to me. I can’t see her face. Clearly she is dragging the children home, hurrying them along, before this thick, whirling snow gets too much. I feel sorry for her. Something in her stance evokes pity. Quite fierce sympathy: as if she could have been me. And then she is gone. Disappeared. A gust of snow? She turned a corner? Either way, she has vanished, there is not a single human in sight. Winter has cleaned the streets of people, even the traffic is thin.

The quiet of the evening is painful. Perhaps it is simply the snow: muffling everything. Like a scarf around the world.

I return to my armchair and pick up my book. And then, in the shrillness of the silence, I hear a voice. Electra. She’s talking to me. Without being prompted.

‘I know what you did,’ she says.

Frowning, and startled, I turn and gaze at the matt black pillar and her crowning ring of electric sapphire. Electra speaks again. ‘I know your secret. I know what you did to that boy. How his eyes rolled white. I know everything.’

And then all is quiet. I stare at the Home Assistant, mute and unresponsive; just a machine on a shelf, after all.

3

Jo

I am speechless for half a minute. Mouth quite dry. Then I talk:

‘Electra. What did you say?’

The machine emits a low, bonging sound. I know what this means.

‘I can’t connect to the public Wi-Fi. You may need to update your connection.’

‘Electra, what did you say?’

‘I can’t connect to the public Wi-Fi.’

No, not good enough. NO. I can’t let this go. Did she really say that? Did she talk about the worst thing in my life? That happened so long ago?

Fiddling with my app, with slightly tremulous fingers, I go through the rigmarole of reconnecting my Home Assistant, the Virtual Helper, Electra, to my Wi-Fi. The light goes orange, the Wi-Fi is linked, the machine plays a little warbling jingle. Boodle-da-boomph.

She is ready.

Ready to talk about the past? The terrible secrets? OR ready to tell me a bad joke, or traffic reports.

Gulping another slug of red wine. I formulate a question, but before I can say anything, the diadem shines, and Electra says:

‘I know everything about you. You killed him and then you ran away. The blood was pouring from his mouth. I can’t connect to the public Wi-Fi.’

‘Electra??’

‘I can’t connect to the public Wi-Fi.’

‘Electra!!!!’

Nothing. Did I truly hear those words? I’m sure I did.

‘Electra, what do you know about me?’

‘I know you ask some interesting questions.’

‘Electra, what do you know about the past?’

‘Sorry, I don’t know that.’

I won’t let this go.

‘Electra, what do you know about my history?’

Silence.

‘History is usually described as a record of past events, or, alternatively, as an—’

‘Electra, SHUT UP.’

The blue lights fade. Now Electra simply seems confused, beta, useless. Or she doesn’t understand the syntax of my questions. As it should be.

I am, after all, talking to a cylinder of electronics. Not an actual mind, not an actual human. Not someone who might actually know about the boy.

Someone like Tabitha.

But those details? So specific and accurate. They always smoulder in my thoughts, and tonight they’ve caught fire. The eyes, the boy, Jamie. His laddish but likeable grin, the affable, generous good nature. Oh, Jamie. And then the blood. And then that bloody song which I will forever associate with those terrible events: ‘Hoppípolla’ by Sigur Rós. I can’t bear that song. Whenever I hear ‘Hoppípolla’ the memories surge. Even thinking about that song – the mere thought of it, makes me tremble with fear, and guilt, a painful and acid emptiness, deep inside. Close to nausea.

Whether Electra said those things or not, or whether it was merely the silence of the flat, and the booze, and the bleakness of my wintry loneliness, combining to deceive my mind into imaginary accusations – I am triggered.

‘Electra, what’s the time.’

‘The time is ten fifty-two p.m.’

And just like that, she’s acting entirely normal. I am not feeling normal. But I guess I can try. I can try try try to be normal, and ignore this madness, this mishearing, this daydream, this terrible reality, whatever it is. Perhaps it is a simple glitch and the tech is malfunctioning. The peculiar behaviour with the lights, earlier on, implies that. But how could a bug cause Electra to act so bizarrely?

There is no evident or immediate answer, so I go to the fridge and take out the chips and the Waitrose dips, and then mix some mayo and Tabasco for extra oomph, and then I spend an hour comfort-eating as I watch reruns of old sitcoms on my iPad. And I guzzle way more wine than normal, to try and calm things down.

Gradually the wine and the food – principally the wine – work their magic. I probably, hopefully, surely drank too much in the first place, causing me to imagine these words from Electra? It is impossible she knows. However advanced, she is only a gadget. No one knows apart from me and Tabitha, and Simon, whom I told. Perhaps Tabitha told Arlo? I doubt it, but even if she did: the secret of knowledge is tightly wound, it is inconceivable it would have reached some bloody machines on a bespoke oak shelf.

No.

The last glass of wine is guzzled. I have successfully persuaded myself that nothing untoward has happened. All the tech is behaving normally, apart from the little bugs, the spinny lights, it’s my silly drunken head that turned this into something much nastier.

‘Electra, what time does Fitness First gym, in Camden, open tomorrow morning?’

‘Fitness First Camden opens from seven a.m. to ten p.m. Monday to Thursday, on Fridays it closes earlier at nine p.m., and at weekends—’

‘OK, Electra, stop.’

Silence.

‘Thanks, Electra.’

‘That’s what I’m here for!’

Good. She is still behaving as she is meant to behave. And I am drunk. Tomorrow I will go to the gym and eat healthy food and go back to my regular drinking regime. What was I thinking? Two big gins before seven? Absurd and foolish. Guaranteed to produce creepy daydreams, if not lushed-up delusions. I will always have guilt lurking in my brain, like silt at the bottom of a petrol tank: the last thing you need is to stir it up. Simon once told me this. Because if you stir it up, then it can ruin the entire engine.

Simon.

As I sit here, a new guilt pierces. Simon.

No. I don’t want to think about this. Yet I have to think about this. If I am a bit lonely, it is my own fault. Being with Simon is why I am here, drinking by myself.

I first got with Simon at sixth form in Thornton Heath, London SE25,398, beyond the outer circle of the solar system. We’d known each other since primary school, been friends in secondary, then one night we went to a bar when we were both underage; we had fun, so we dated, and courted, and then we deflowered each other. I don’t know a better word, I should know a better word, possibly there isn’t a better word, so that’s it: we deflowered each other in the back of his dad’s Fiesta, in the darkest corner of Thornton Heath Asda supermarket car park, after drinking too many Jägerbombs.

The sex wasn’t very good, but we managed it. With each other. And he was kind, gentle, and quite handsome, in the dim green light of an Asda sign, shining into the back of an illicitly borrowed Ford Fiesta, at half past midnight.

I didn’t come. He did, very quickly. He apologized. The apology made it worse and was one of the least sexy things I have encountered, during sex, to this day. He had nice eyes and muscles and not that much conversation – not with me, anyway. But he tried. Which was touching. Throughout our marriage, he blatantly and ardently tried.

Here and now, I look out at the Camden frost, examining myself. My motives. How did I end up married to him, of all people. To Simon Todd?

I was all arts and humanities, philosophy and sociology, I was a girl that yearned for gap years in Papua New Guinea that never happened. I was intrigued by shamanism, Siberian reindeer pee, Renaissance portraits. He was all engines, rockets, and atoms, and apparently knew the real meaning of Schrödinger’s Cat.

After our brief fling, I went off to King’s College to study History of Art and he went off to Manchester to study All About Computers and I spent half my time partying … and then we both finished university and realized we couldn’t afford to rent anywhere remotely decent until we got jobs, so we boomeranged back to Thornton Heath and the pubs we frequented as teens and …

There he was. Still quite handsome in the low light of Thornton Heath’s one and only happening bar; and all of a sudden he seemed such a good, honest, decent guy – compared to the rich lazy millennial types I’d got used to dating in King’s.

And so I found myself sucked into the sentimental whirlpool of homecoming – geographical, sexual, and emotional – and this time we had sex in an actual bed (because his mum and dad were away) and this time, after three months of cosy cuddles and pizzas-and-TV, and being cocooned in an unaccustomed atmosphere of safety, comfort, and unquestioning adoration, when he incredibly stupidly crazily asked me to marry him, I said YES.

Oh God. Help me.

YES?

It was a ludicrous mistake. We were always too different; we grew further apart while married; we were destined not to last. I found him boring and felt the most terrible guilt about finding him boring. He sensed this and tried to hide his hurt feelings – and this made the lamentable cycle of guilt, hiding, and hurt even worse, for both of us. And then came Liam and the naughty sexts and the massive rows and the end. Thank God.

Consequently, I have no resentment at his leaving me. I surely didn’t deserve him. I have no resentment that he remarried so quickly, to Polly, I have less-than-zero resentment that they instantly have a tiny and truly adorable baby, Grace. The only thing I resent, perhaps, ever-so-slightly, is the fact that because she’s a nurse she gets a subsidized three-bed Key Worker Flat on the twelfth floor of a brand-new apartment block in buzzing Shoreditch.

Lucky Polly. Lucky Simon.

In London, property, and the owning thereof, has become everything. Like having an estate and title during the Regency. And I am a peasant. Virtually an Indian untouchable. I do not own and never will. This stuff is becoming dynastic. If I’d known property was going to become so important, I should probably have married one of the plausible affluent boys at uni with mums and dads with Deposits to Lend. I had enough enquiries. But I didn’t marry them. And there it is.