The Thirty List

He started out of whatever he’d been brooding about. ‘You could hang out some washing, if you don’t mind. Alex will be at school, and then after-school club. I pick him up at six.’

That seemed a very long day for a four-year-old, but it was none of my business. ‘Should I walk Max?’

‘Would you?’

‘Of course. I love dogs. You know those crazy women who hang around outside shops and nick babies from prams?’

‘Ye-es.’

‘Dan—my husband, my ex-husband—he used to say I was like that with dogs. He was afraid he’d come home one day and there’d be hundreds, like in Dr Doolittle. So yes, I’d love to walk Max.’ Sometimes, I found if I ended the speech on the right note, it left people with the impression I’d said something vaguely sensible.

‘That would be great. I’ve been trying to cut back on work, but they keep really insane hours at the partnership. I’ll put out his lead and things. Just keep him on it, he’s a bit overexcitable.’ Max peeked over the basket again at this, as if he understood he was being slandered.

‘Why’d you get a dog?’ I asked. It was late and I was so tired and drunk I felt I could ask anything. ‘I mean with you working so much.’

‘I thought it would make us more of a family, I suppose. We were both so busy at work, and trying to look after Alex. She’d cut her hours way back at the bank, but she wasn’t coping well. It was supposed to be a compromise, but of course that just means no one is happy. She hated Max. Didn’t like his mucky paws and hair all over her beige furniture. But I wouldn’t get rid of him—I think once you take something home, you’re responsible for it.’

I wondered if he would feel the same about me. ‘Have you never had a nanny or au pair or anything?’

He clammed up slightly. ‘No. We never left him with anyone. It … We just decided not to.’

‘Oh.’

He hesitated. ‘Can I ask, what happened with you and … what was his name?’

‘Dan. What happened?’ God, not this question. ‘I …’

I paused for too long, and he began to talk over me. ‘Sorry, sorry, none of my business.’

‘It’s OK. It’s just that I …’

‘No, no, I shouldn’t have asked. I’ll let you get to bed.’

‘OK. Goodnight. Thanks for the wine.’

‘Goodnight, Rachel.’ The use of my name was jarring, after we’d talked so frankly. It felt almost as if he was trying to remind me I wasn’t his wife, and he wasn’t my husband. We were just strangers, sharing the same space. I went to bed, taking out the list book again to read in the pool of lamplight.

It seemed a paltry lot of things when set against the list of things I’d just lost—job, house, probably the chance of ever having a baby or dog, car, Jamie Oliver Flavour Shaker … I put it aside and turned off the light. In the night I woke up, lost, somewhere halfway down the big bed. ‘Dan,’ I whispered, to the empty dark. I’d been looking for his warm back, snoring away, but it wasn’t there, and it never would be again.

Things that suck about divorce, number thirty-eight: there’s no one there. Not to tell you off for being late, not to cuddle you close and warm your cold feet, not to snore and keep you awake. There’s just you, alone again. Naturally.

Chapter Six

The next day I woke up alone in Patrick’s house. Because I had to think of it that way, even if I lived here too. It was very definitely not my house. There were traces of other people all over the place—the old brass clock someone had placed in the bathroom, the candles clustered on the living room fireplace—Diptyque! If I ever had a Diptyque candle, I wouldn’t even take it out of its packaging. They’re about £1 a whiff. In the hall was a wedding photo, Patrick looking stiff and formal in a top hat and tails. Since he was already a head taller than anyone else in the bridal party, the hat just made him look ridiculous. He was frowning into the camera, as if the light was in his eyes. On his arm was a tiny, beautiful woman—she couldn’t have been more than five feet tall. Patrick had mentioned that Michelle’s mother was Chinese, and it meant her daughter had been blessed with poker-straight dark glossy hair and a pretty, heart-shaped face. Her wedding dress had been an enormous meringue of lace and tulle, almost but not quite hiding her slender arms and neck. This, then, was Michelle, whose house I was living in, whose dog I was walking, whose husband I was chatting to at night.

The rest of the house was beautifully decorated—arty photos in shabby-chic frames, expensive patterned wallpaper in the bathroom, polished wooden floors, a beige sofa that seemed a startlingly impractical choice with a small child and a dog in the family. There was an astonishing lack of clutter, no dishes left out in the kitchen, no toys on the stairs, no crumbs on the table. I began to feel guilty about the explosion of clothes and books I’d left in my third-floor turret. Even Alex’s room was perfectly neat, his toys put away in blue boxes, his Thomas bedspread pulled straight. Patrick had already given me a list of ‘house rules’, mostly about what went in which recycling bin and how to sort the laundry correctly.

Luckily, Max was just as messy as me. I found him sprawled in his basket, with several chewed socks in there for company. He peered back at me, giving out a vague whiff of damp, ageing dog. Bless him.

I trailed around the kitchen, opening cupboards and trying to orientate myself. It was so strange being alone in someone else’s house. Like having a good poke about inside their heads. They never kept anything in a logical place—the tea beside the kettle, surely? The vegetables in the salad drawer? Patrick—and Michelle, the ghost in the house—had a bread bin shaped like a cat. I wondered how Max felt about this. He seemed to be staring at it sadly, as if to say, Oh, stationary cat, why do you taunt me with your stillness?

There was a whole cupboard of herbal teas, and that’s how I knew Michelle and I would never get on. I liked my tea the colour of brick and with a biscuit dunked in. I suspected she was the type of woman who considered ‘celery with a dab of almond butter’ to be an acceptable snack. I wasn’t even sure what almond butter was. Marzipan?

I felt a presence and realised Max had got out of his basket and was so close he was breathing on my leg. ‘Just having a look,’ I told him defensively. ‘I do live here now.’ Even so, I felt like a burglar. I’d ascertained which cupboards held the cleaning stuff, the biscuits, the canned goods—there weren’t many of them; this being very much an organic quinoa sort of house. There seemed to be one small cupboard on the end that was closed with a padlock. ‘What’s in there, Maxxy?’ I frowned at it. Murder supplies? The heads of Patrick’s previous lodgers? I wondered what my new landlord wasn’t telling me. I could hardly protest, given everything I wasn’t telling him.

‘This is an awful idea.’

‘Oh, come on. It’ll be fun! Remember we’re embracing life and making the most of it!’ I wasn’t sure I liked this new Pollyanna-style Cynthia. She’d actually arrived on time, changing in the loos of the bar from her terrifying work suit to a flowery dress with high strappy heels. I was wearing jeans and Converse, of course, but she had a cunning plan to get me out of them. ‘Ta-da!’

A shoebox with similar heels to hers—black patent Mary Janes. ‘But I can’t …’

‘Of course you can, darling, they were on sale. I practically made money.’

I glared at her. ‘You have to stop this. I feel like a charity case.’

‘Well, just borrow them, then, if it upsets your communist sensibilities. But you can’t dance in Converse.’

I gave in, because she was right, and also because I was amazed she was there—albeit tapping constantly at her phone. ‘How’s work?’ I asked. ‘Where are we right now on The Great Escape scale of awfulness?’

‘We’re dropping soil out of our trousers in the exercise yard.’

‘So, making progress?’

‘Making progress. What about you?’

‘We-ell, I’m not having much luck getting interviews. A few possibilities.’ I’d applied for every single vaguely art- or design-related job I could find in London, but my inbox was deafeningly empty. When I thought about it, I got a gnawing fear in the pit of my stomach, so I tried to push it away as Emma ran in several minutes later in her work clothes, sensible trousers and a blouse, with paint on her hands and a foul expression. ‘God, whose idea was it to meet in town on a school night?’

‘Yours.’

‘Hmph. Well, I suppose we better do it.’ Cynthia gave her a look. Emma forced a smile. ‘I mean, it’ll be great. Yay! Dancing! My favourite thing! Embracing life!’

Emma had certain physical skills—I’m told at school she was the terror of the netball court, bearing down with murder in her eyes on hapless Goal Defences. She could lift up small children who were having hissy fits over the allocation of the class pencils and carry them right into the ‘timeout corner’. She could make a working model of the London Eye using only drinking straws and toilet roll tubes. But one thing she couldn’t do was dance. In fact, at uni we had a little dance routine we called ‘the Emma’, which involved stepping from foot to foot and waving your hands as if trying to dry nail polish. Cheered by the thought that someone might hate this more than me, I pulled on my shiny new shoes and stood nervously on the dance floor.

We were in a bar near St Paul’s, all dark lighting and wooden floors. The tables had been pushed back to create an empty space, and around it were gathered twenty or so students, all wearing the same ‘going to the guillotine’ look of British people who are going to be called upon to dance in public without the aid of alcohol.

‘Hiya, everyone!’ The teacher was a dancer. I mean, of course she was. But she was really a dancer. Slender, graceful, wearing leg warmers over her dancing shoes and a pink leotard. All the men in the room visibly straightened their spines. ‘I’m Nikki, yeah.’ She spoiled the graceful impression somewhat with a hard-as-nails Cockney accent. ‘If everyone’s here, then—’

There was a noise at the back of the room and someone bumbled in, a blur of expensive suit. I saw to my surprise it was Rich. ‘He’s here?’ I said to Cynthia. ‘He actually left work?’

She tossed her hair vaguely. ‘I thought we’d better try new things—you know what I said about us both working all the time.’ He was coming over. Her face morphed into a smile. ‘Darling. You made it!’

Rich was frowning and stabbing at his BlackBerry. ‘Had to cut the damn meeting short. The partners are not happy.’

‘Well, you’re here now. There’s Rachel.’

‘Hi, Rich,’ I said, making a vague forward movement to hug him, which wasn’t reciprocated, so I turned it into a pre-dance stretch instead.

‘Hi,’ he said briefly. He didn’t ask how I was, though this was the first time he’d seen me since the split.

We were all amazed when Cynthia turned up with Rich on her arm. It was Emma’s birthday, her twenty-sixth, I think, and we were at a World War II–themed dance. Emma had on red lipstick and a tea dress, and Ian was in a shroud—his idea of humour. I had on a pair of overalls and my hair in a victory roll, which fell out after half an hour. Dan, who didn’t really do fancy dress, had reluctantly worn combats and carried a plastic gun. Rich, however, rolled up in a full Navy uniform, which it turned out had actually belonged to his grandfather Admiral Lord Richard Eagleton. At uni, Cynthia had joined us in mocking the public-school boys who banged on about rugger and tuck. Now she’d fallen for one. Granted, back then Rich had been tall, fair and strapping, though now corporate lunching and long hours were leaving him with a distinct brick-like appearance—red, square and hard.

Cynthia stood close to him, snuggling into his arms, and I was left with scowling Emma, who was limbering up as if going into the boxing ring. ‘Right. At least I can dance with you if I have to …’

‘Male-female partners only, yeah,’ called Nikki. ‘This is tango, innit. The dance of love. Maybe you will fall in love tonight.’

She made us pair up. Cynthia clung to Rich and I got the feeling that if forced to move she’d draw up some kind of contract to show that her rights of dance partnership were clearly asserted. Emma, still sulking, had somehow been paired with a slightly geeky but cute man in glasses. And me, of course, I got Mr Groper. The only man in the room who was over fifty. He had awful breath and insisted on squeezing me tight. ‘It’s how you do it,’ he said in that man-splaining way of men doing any activity. ‘It’s a dance of submission. I lead. You follow where I say.’

‘We’re not doing that,’ I heard Emma say to her partner. ‘It’s 2014, for God’s sake. I’ve read The Female Eunuch.’

‘Um … me too,’ stuttered Sexy Geek Man—I upgraded him on the basis of the Germaine Greer reading.

Nikki had us learn a sliding step—we had to get up close to the other person and then sort of slide our feet round theirs. I kept hearing Emma say sorry as she stepped on Sexy Geek Man’s toes. ‘Look, it’s really better if you just let me lead.’

‘It is,’ called Cynthia, as she glided past in Rich’s arms. Although she was naturally tall and gangly, she’d trained herself out of it with dance lessons before her wedding. Rich had learned at public school, and I’d remembered watching with a sort of mounting fear while he hurled her about the floor during their first dance, in a series of pre-learned moves to the strains of ‘You’re Beautiful’.

Dan had refused to get lessons for our wedding, pronouncing it ‘totally naff’. So it was just us plopping about aimlessly to ‘Dancing in the Dark’, to totally different rhythms. Sort of a metaphor for our whole marriage, really.

‘Not like that. Here, let me show you.’ Mr Groper put his hand on my lower back. My very, very lower back.

I’d had enough. ‘THANK YOU. I get it.’

Thank God Nikki then told us to change partners. I was hoping for Sexy Geek Man, but he got snapped up by an aggressive-looking girl in spandex, and Emma was on to someone on the far side of the room. Cynthia had Mr Groper, God help her, and I saw Rich had ended up dancing with the teacher, who seemed to be laughing at something he was saying—maybe she found corporate tax really funny. I’d wound up with Adrian. He was very nervous—his palms felt wet against mine and he had sweat stains under the arms of his beige shirt. He was nice, but after a few minutes being manhandled by him, coated in sweat and constantly apologised to, I was a bit fed up. How was this supposed to help me get over my disastropiphany and find a more joyful and fulfilling life? It wasn’t fair. Eat Pray Love woman got to go to Italy and Bali, and I got to dance with sweaty men in East London.

Things that suck about divorce, number fifty-seven: other women thinking you’re suddenly after their short, ugly, balding menfolk. I could catch the suspicious looks when I took a man’s hands for the dance, as if I was just dying to seduce Derek, who worked in Accounts and had the remains of his lunch down his tie. I was starting to realise why people talked about their ‘other half’. There were some things you just needed another person for. Dancing was one. So was Scrabble.

Another was, well, sex. I remembered that this was on the list too. Did that mean I’d also have to sleep with short men who had sweat issues? I tried to think of things I could do on my own. I could dine in restaurants, smiling mysteriously when asked if it was just for one. I could play solitaire and cook gourmet meals, then eat them by myself with a single candle burning. Oh God. It sounded even worse than sex with a Derek.

‘Time for the circle dance, innit,’ called Nikki. ‘Change partners, yeah.’

I looked around, blinking, to see if my knight in shining armour would appear, dishevelled and gorgeous, having been tempted along to the dance class by his supportive wise-cracking friend, in order to get past the traumatic break-up/bereavement/death of his cat he’d just suffered. He’d see me there in my new shoes and the socks underneath that had pigs on them and think, yes, this is the girl for me …

‘Lady needs a partner!’ Nikki was yelling behind me. ‘Single lady here! Needs a partner! Here you go, handsome gent for you, darlin’.’

I turned hopefully, looked up … then looked down. ‘Hi,’ said a voice from somewhere near my ribcage. ‘I’m Keith.’

As I reluctantly smiled down—way down—I heard an agonised cry from the other side of the room. Emma seemed to have broken Adrian’s foot.

I headed home after another day in the post-divorce world—or the post-split, pre-divorce world—tired, a little tipsy, with blisters on my feet from the new shoes. I wondered if this would be my life now. When we were at uni, I used to have a theory I called shoeology—studying Art History leaves you with a lot of time on your hands. The theory was this: relationships are like shoes. There are pretty ones you can’t bear to leave in the shop, though you know they will hurt you and ruin your bank balance. You walk tall in those, feeling sexy and strong—until the blisters start. Then there are comfy ones, which let you run and walk easily, until they start to lose their shape. You don’t want to wear them out of the house any more. You slump in those shoes, instead of walking tall. And with repeated wear they will simply fall apart.

There are relationships that are like slippers—nice for indoors, but you don’t want anyone to see you wearing them. There are situation-specific relationships, like flip-flops or snorkelling flippers—fine for holidays, for example, but with no place in your real life. A key point of shoeology was that nearly every pair hurt at first—like my new dance shoes had chafed. Perhaps the first time I went on a date with someone it would be the same—leaving me with cuts and blisters until I broke them in. And who even was there? Sexy Geek Man had, it turned out, come with his fiancée, a dumpy blonde with a ponytail who commandeered him for the cha-cha.

As I turned my key in the door and went in through the living room, I saw Patrick was putting something into the cupboard on the end—the locked one. ‘It’s me!’ I called needlessly. As I rounded into the kitchen, I saw him click the lock back on and wondered again what was in there—was it possible he shut away his valuables, that he didn’t trust me? That was a little depressing, though I supposed we hardly knew each other.

‘Oh, hello. I was just going to open some wine.’ I wondered if he drank a bottle every night. Dan and I used to do that, when things were very bad and we couldn’t talk about it, but I’d cut back since Cynthia had given me a booklet called ‘Are you an early-stage addict?’ after the night when I had to go and make myself sick in the toilets at All Bar One. I decided I’d just have a few sips. He did pick the best wines, rich and bursting on the tongue. I suspected he did not buy the ones with orange stickers on from the Londis round the corner.

‘Good night?’

‘Mmm. I’m not sure.’ I told him about the Keiths and Adrians, the sweating and the difficulties of correctly crossing in the tango. ‘I used to think I was a fairly good dancer, but seriously, I couldn’t even do it right once.’

He stood up, holding his hands out to me after wiping them on his cords. ‘Come here a second.’

Startled, I did. He was very close suddenly, and the wool of his jumper tickled my face. He smelled of lemons and fabric softener. ‘Is it like this?’ And he’d twisted me into a perfect cross.

‘Yes! Why couldn’t I get it before?’

‘The man is supposed to lead. If it’s not working, then it’s his fault.’ He dropped my hands quickly, sat down again. ‘We had lessons. You know, for the wedding and that. Me and … my ex-wife. Wife. Whatever.’ He seemed unable to say her name. ‘She wanted this whole routine, to wow people. I’d always hated dancing, but I suppose I sort of enjoyed it. She didn’t like letting me lead though.’

‘Yeah, it is a bit sexist.’ Oops, half the delicious wine was gone already. ‘How’s Alex feeling about the whole thing?’

His face changed. ‘He’s fine. They keep in touch, and there’s Skype and stuff … you know. I’ve been trying not to let him hear anything about her affair. It’s always assumed men are the ones who do it, but when you find out your wife cheated, well, it hurts.’

The topic was making me squirm. I didn’t want to talk about this, or think about it. He misread my reaction. ‘Rachel. I’m sorry. I’m completely oversharing and we barely know each other.’

‘No, I don’t mind. It’s …’

‘I’m sorry. I should let you get to bed. I tend to ramble on, I know.’ Suddenly, we’d gone back to landlord and tenant, not what I wanted. He was washing the dishes, putting the bottle in the correct recycling bin, so I went up the three flights of stairs with my new shoes in hand. My blisters throbbed as I slipped my feet under the covers. I used to think Dan was a one-in-a-million shoe—those sexy heels you can dance in all night and still run in to catch the bus, that would shield me from the broken glass and chewing gum of life’s pavements, and would never leave me with blisters. Then they started to chafe and bind, so some days I felt as if I might leave bloody footprints on the ground.

There’s a lesson there—it’s hard to wear one pair of shoes for the rest of your life. That and always keep the receipt.

Chapter Seven

Outside the door was the sound of squishing. Blop blop blop. I put down the box I was reluctantly unpacking and listened. ‘Alex?’

There was quiet for a moment. Then a small voice said, ‘It’s not me.’

I got up from my table and opened the door. ‘Hey, look, it is you.’

His face creased in existential uncertainty. He was wearing his yellow mac and red wellies, and on his head his train driver’s cap flattened his gorgeous dark fuzz. ‘What’s in there today?’ I indicated his wellies. Patrick encouraged him to wear them for some reason, both out of the house and in.

He stepped carefully from one foot to the other. ‘Guess.’

Something dry. ‘Crisps?’ I guessed. He nodded. ‘What type?’

‘Orange ones.’

‘Wotsits? You’ve got Wotsits in your wellies?’

He nodded solemnly.

In the time I’d spent in this house so far, I had picked up that Alex had a weird habit of putting things in his wellies. Mostly food—Angel Delight, avocado, biscuits—but also gravel, marbles and once his friend Zoltan’s hamster. Luckily, Harry was rescued before any feet went into the boots, and Alex received a lecture about not putting living things in the wellies—and yes, frogspawn counted.

‘Why does he do it?’ I’d asked Patrick, over what had become our nightly glass of wine.

‘I think it’s something to do with safety—he puts in things he likes. To keep them there, maybe.’

I didn’t want to ask why Alex would be afraid of losing the things he loved, and for a moment, I felt stunned by gratitude that Dan and I hadn’t managed to have a baby. I couldn’t imagine bringing a child into the middle of everything that was going on.

‘What are you doing?’ Alex was watching me setting out my art supplies on my new desk. ‘Are you colouring in?’

‘Sort of.’ I showed him some of my old drawings, drafts of wedding caricatures and funny sketches for magazines. ‘People ask me to do pictures for their birthdays, or weddings. Cartoons.’

He looked puzzled. ‘Cartoons like on TV?’