Pole Position (31 page)

We barely spoke in the car. I huddled in my seat and stared out of the window. Jon drove fast, muttering under his breath from time to time. When we pulled up at my house, he turned off the engine and looked at me fully, the first time since we left Downham.

“I’m assuming by ‘home’ you mean here?”

“Yes.” I saw a muscle twitching in his cheek, the grim line to his jaw. I was strangely calm, I’d resigned myself to this, and I’d see it through, When he’d gone, when I was finally alone, I could break down then. But not yet.

Jon flipped open the glove box and pulled out a brightly colored paper bag. “I bought you this, take it with you. Please don’t embarrass us both by opening it here.”

I took the bag with shaking hands. Now the moment had come, I was terrified. “I need my rucksack.”

He leapt out, bristling with energy, and retrieved it for me, dumping it on the ground as I climbed out of the car.

“Thanks.” I picked up the bag, and slung it over my shoulder. “Thanks for everything, Jon. And…” I wanted to keep putting it off, keep him here as long as I could. “And good luck, I really mean it.”

He stared at me. He looked furious and shocked at the same time. Stepping forward, he hauled me into his arms and crushed my lips with a bruising, final kiss.

And then he was gone, hurtling out of my life the same way he’d charged into it, in a flurry of screeching tires.

Danny, the lovely big idiot he was, would be coming out of hospital on Monday. We had a lot to work through together, and Danny had to go for counseling. He was incredibly grateful to have the chance to do it, and wanted to thank Jon, and apologize to everybody. I’d never seen him humble before, and it hit me with a profound sense of sadness that we’d come so close to losing him. It’d been a spur of the moment thing, he said. He realized how much he’d fucked up his life, and after drinking half a bottle of whisky, it’d made perfect sense.

I’d only just moved in with Sienna, and it’d been easy to pick up my boxes and bags and transport them back to Cumberley. I still had my notice to work at the bookshop, and I might think about staying there too. For now though, I wanted to get the house clean and tidy, and the fridge stocked up with all Danny’s favorite foods.

I drove back on Sunday afternoon, after staying at Clare’s overnight and then spending a large part of the day beside Danny’s bed. Anita’s car was still there, but I figured she’d probably come back for it later. I sang happily to myself as I went in, my arms full of groceries. I really needed to invite Jon and Anita round at some point. I could never thank Jon enough. He’d saved Danny’s life, even though he hated him. That took a special kind of strength and courage.

Anita stared at me blankly from the table as I bustled into the kitchen.

“
Shite
.” I practically dropped my bags. I thought I’d been alone. “God almighty, you gave me a shock. Is Jon here with you? Danny will be home tomorrow, so I’m moving back tonight.”

She was silent.

“Anita? Honey?”

She looked back at me, her bottom lip wobbling. “I’ve left him.” It sounded as though the words were being dragged from her mouth.

“What?
Jon
?” I crossed to her side, put my arms across her shoulders. “For the love of God, why?” She just shook her head. “Oh babe, come here.” All I could do was hold her while she sobbed on my shoulder, like a reversal of yesterday.

I was stunned. They’d been so firmly together the day before. Jon was magnificent in a crisis, and he was clearly still besotted with her. I’d swear she was madly in love with him, so what the hell had happened?

I made her coffee, she ignored it. I made her food and that was left untouched. I got her phone and threatened to ring Jon, but she just shook her head and looked away. Something had clearly gone wrong.

In desperation, I took her phone into my room, transferred Jon’s number into my phone, and rang him. It went to voicemail, and I left a message.

“Jon, it’s Colette. I don’t know what’s going on, but Anita is here at our house, and she’s in a right state. She says she left you. Are you both crazy? I hope this is all a huge mistake, please call me back. By the way, she doesn’t know I’m calling you, she was adamant I don’t. And she won’t tell me what’s happened. Thanks again.”

I slipped her phone back onto the table, but she didn’t seem to notice. She looked in a trance, sitting there hugging her knees. I couldn’t leave her there. I took her into the living room and sat on the sofa with her, my arm around her shoulders. She wouldn’t tell me anything, just that it was over.

Eventually Jon rang me back. “Colette, it’s Jon. I think you wanted me?” He sounded exhausted.

“
Yes
. What the hell’s happened to Anita?”

“I dunno. That’s the truth. She’s left me.”

“But why?”

I heard him sigh. “I don’t know. She won’t tell me.”

“She’s in pieces. I’m really worried about her.”

“I love her, Colette, and I want to spend the rest of my life with her, but she doesn’t want me. What can I do?”

“And are you going to sit there and put up with that? You should get your arse round here and put it right!”

“I tried. I tried everything I could. I don’t have anything left.”

I hung up, none the wiser. She was my friend, and I would have to find out what troubled her.

The excitement of bringing Danny home was tarnished by the knowledge that Anita was in such a mess. I passed on a sick message to the bookshop. It was easiest to say she had the flu.

Jon sent me a text message to say he was off to Houston this evening and would be back in four weeks. If I could find out what had gone so wrong, to let him know, please.

I was helpless. There was nothing I could do.

I warned Danny, just before we arrived at home, that Anita had come back and was in a bad way.

She looked dreadful, as though she’d slept in her clothes. Her eyes were dull and her face blotchy. Many tears had been cried and she picked nervously at her fingernails. When Danny went to give her a hug, she refused. He sank into a chair at the end of the table, and rubbed his hands across his face.

“I know
sorry
isn’t good enough. Not even nearly. But it’s all I have right now.”

I squeezed his hand and drew a hint of a smile from him. He was officially my fiancé now, having dropped to one knee in the hospital, and proposed to me. We’d go over to Dublin in a few weeks, to break the news to my family, and choose a ring. In the meantime, we were going to fuck each other’s brains out as much as possible.

I fussed over them both at the table and then brought a brightly colored package over to Anita. “This was on the floor next to your backpack. Is it yours?”

She slowly opened it to find a shiny new silver iPod. She stared at it dumbfounded and handed it to me.

“Wow. Was this a present from Jon?” She nodded, mute. I turned it over and gasped. “There’s an inscription on the back.”

Anita’s eyes opened wide. “What does it say?” Her voice came as just a whisper.

Anita. Let’s spin around the sun together. All my love, Jon x

She stared into the distance. “Aurora,” she whispered.

I frowned, puzzled. “Aurora?”

She gave me a fleeting and very wobbly smile. “By the Foo Fighters. It’s my favorite song.” She took the iPod, held it to her chest and bowed her head, then ran upstairs sobbing. I immediately leapt up, but Danny held me back.

“Leave her. When she’s ready, she’ll tell us.”

“But you’ve seen the state she’s in. I want to sort it out.”

“And we need to sort ourselves out too.” He pulled me onto his lap. “I really fucked up, and I have a lot of making up to do. To both of you. Now give me a kiss, my love.”

Jon had pre-loaded the iPod with all the songs that were on his, a handful of TV shows he knew I liked, and a whole set of photographs of us, me with Sam, and the places we’d been together. My favorite was one of us at Blackheath Show, taken ironically by Danny, before everything went wrong.

Jon and I stood entwined, feeding each other ice creams, laughing at something or other. We both wore huge smiles and the picture radiated love from both of us. I spent hours just looking at that picture.

Some day, years in the future, I’d be able to show it to our child and say,
Look here, this wonderful man is your daddy
.

Anita showed no signs of going back to work. I thought long and hard about things and retracted my resignation. Working in Cumberley would be far more convenient since I now lived there again. I could see Danny during the day, we could meet for lunch, and I was only a five-minute drive from home. But Anita still worried me hugely.

She ate a few morsels every day, drank the minimum amount of water to keep herself alive, and faded away before us. Danny was going to reduce his hours at the stables for the moment, and between us, we’d keep an eye on her. Something had to happen. She couldn’t carry on like this indefinitely. And then she cracked on Thursday night.

We’d had dinner, Danny and I, and were fooling about in the kitchen when she sidled in. She looked like a ghost, pale and weak, and sat quietly at the table for a few minutes before we even noticed her.

“I want to tell you,” she said. “I need your help.”

I should have guessed. When she told us she was pregnant, Danny exploded.

“How dare he leave you like this—”

“He doesn’t know.”

We stared at her in silence. Danny took my hand and squeezed it.

I spoke first. “Why not?”

“Because I don’t want him to know.”

“He has a right to know. It’s his baby too.” I spoke gently, as though I talked to a simpleton.

Her eyes were huge when she turned to stare at me. “He’s adamant he doesn’t want children for five or even ten years. We’ve been together for a month, just one month, and I can’t tie him down with this. He’d give up racing, and I won’t force him to do that. It’s not right. It’s my mistake. I didn’t read the instructions properly for the pill, and I’ll live with it.”

My head reeled. I tried again. “Honey, he still needs to know. It’s his child, you made it together.”

She shook her head. “He’ll think it’s a ploy to keep him at home. He’ll resent me for it forever if he has to give up his career just when he’s getting to the top. He’s on the verge of making it into Formula 1, and he can’t get saddled with a pregnant girlfriend now. I want him to remember how it was, how we were. I forbid you to tell anyone. Do you promise?”

We reluctantly swore agreement, and she nodded. “So, now I need your help.”

“How? What can we do?”

“I want to move back to Mum and Dad’s. My car isn’t good enough to drive that far, so would you please take me back there with all my stuff? And then, Danny, would you please bring Sam for me once I’ve sorted out stabling for him?”

I glanced across at Danny and he looked back at me. “You’re moving permanently?”

“There’s always going to be a chance I might bump into Jon here in Cumberley.”

“Do they know? Your parents?” That was Danny. He knew how protective her father was.

She looked down at the table again. “Not yet, you’re the only ones who know. And you’ve sworn to not tell anyone.” Her voice was low and fierce in its intensity.

I looked back at Danny, and he nodded slightly. “Okay, so when do you want to move?”

“This weekend.” She looked up at Danny, her expression serious. “Danny, you owe me, big time. I don’t know what the hell you were thinking of giving me those photos. It caused us both an unimaginable amount of distress. And we figured out you set up the story in the Comet, and gave away Jon’s phone number.” Danny went to interrupt, but she stopped him in his tracks.

“No, let me finish. I cannot forgive you, or trust you ever again. So if you do this for me, we’re quits.” She turned to me now. “And Colette, I’m depending on you to make sure Danny honors his promise, since I can’t trust him anymore.”

Danny looked appalled, but she froze him out. Standing up, she swayed slightly and held the edge of the table. “So please set it up for Friday, and I’ll pack my bags.”

As she drifted away upstairs, Danny and I cuddled together. “Babe,” he muttered, “what the fuck can I do to make up for that?”

“You were a prick. And you’re going to honor your promise, that’s how you make it up to her.”

Time passed. Slowly. I worked on the engine testing. I worked out in the gym every night, pushing myself to a state of near exhaustion in order to get any sleep. I ate and drank, but no alcohol. I wasn’t going down that route again. I spoke politely to the sponsors and business partners, and I thought endlessly about Anita. I tried to work out the point at which she made up her mind, and why.

What was the point of anything? It was all just marking time.