18
Harriet had claimed Jon would be broken with contrition after attacking Cal, and she was half right. She was right-ish. Lorna would’ve called it ‘wrong.’
Jon appeared with dark circled eyes – it had clearly been enough of a sesh to still be lingering by the summit that Harriet called in Laynes’ Espresso bar on Tuesday morning. He’d taken the week off work, whether that was in emergency recovery or planned, Harriet didn’t know, and didn’t trust him to tell her the truth anyway. He was downcast, very subdued at first, but not without lingering defiance. His Merc keys were slung as a casual status symbol next to his flat white, and Harriet was struck anew that she had been in a relationship with someone who refused to get public transport even when it was far easier than driving.
‘I’m horrified at what I did, it’s not me,’ Jon said, with a certain rehearsed fluency, not seeming horrified enough for Harriet’s liking. Was he … secretly proud at his laddish escapade? The likes of Gavin his squash partner would applaud. Gav’s profile picture on Facebook was Joaquin Phoenix dancing on the steps as The Joker.
‘I can’t remember much of it,’ Jon continued, ‘except a lot of shouting the odds, and then lamping that cocky man when he insulted me.’
‘Cocky?! You barged in and were threatening him in his house, wrongly accusing him of banging your ex-girlfriend,’ Harriet said. ‘I think he had the right to be a bit put out? I think being a little sassy could be excused?’
‘I was out of order, no question,’ Jon said. ‘Can’t you see how it looked though? Not telling me where you were, I go round and a bloke answers the door?’
‘I don’t care how it looked. I don’t have to make it look any certain way.’ God, the Barraclough family mentality.
‘All I’m saying is, had I been forewarned your housemate was male, it would’ve helped.’
‘If you hadn’t tricked my address out of my friend and turned up unannounced, that would’ve helped too?’
Harriet was moderating her voice, partly to keep a lid on the scene, and partly as she didn’t want to startle the attractive young couple at the next table, who she suspected were listening rapt to every word nevertheless.
‘Fair point. I’ve been a real dickhead.’
Harriet twinged with annoyance as an unexpected black pudding hash on toast with fried eggs was set down in front of Jon. ‘Medical necessity, Hats. Let the healing begin!’ They’d said coffee, not brunch. It indicated a lack of real shame. You weren’t all that tormented if you were ploughing into a pair of sunny-side-up Burford Browns. She narrowed her eyes.
‘If he goes to the police, I hope your bosses are understanding about giving you a day off for the trial.’
Jon, grinding a pepper mill over his dish, stopped. ‘Is he going to the police?’
‘Probably. Why shouldn’t he?’ Harriet said. Jon needed a good healthy scare and she’d do some white lying to help it along.
‘Oh … well … I mean, come on. It was completely shit on my part and I will grovel my apology, but do we honestly need a day in court over one right hook?’ He paused. ‘It’d drag you into it as well, as witness.’
Oh, so the effect on her was suddenly occurring to Jon, coincidentally right when raising it could benefit him? Oddly, this was what she needed to hear, to prove to herself that her heartbroken ex could be manipulative and selfish. She’d been feeling so guilty, but it was time to toughen up. Rather belatedly, she twigged that Cal kicking her out would’ve been, if not the intention, at least an unexpected bonus to Jon. So, so sorry, Hats, free bed and board at mine until you can find an alternative is the least I can do.
‘I’ll speak to Cal about his pursuing this and see if I can persuade him not to. But I need to make it absolutely clear: there’s no reason for you to be coming round and you have no rights over me. Even if I had been involved with Cal, that would be my business.’
Jon paused again, fork midway to mouth.
‘Are you?’
‘Jesus Christ, NO. I’m asking you,’ she enunciated clearly, ‘to accept that we’ve separated, and to behave accordingly. Don’t appear on my doorstep again. Don’t contact me. Respect my decision that we are over … and that’s not going to change.’
Harriet had broken into a light sweat at the harshness of spelling it out, yet this was vital clarity.
Jon said nothing, putting his cutlery down as if he’d abruptly lost his appetite.
‘It’d be simply “your business” if you were seeing someone, mere days after you gave me an engagement ring back? I’d not have rights to be upset, and wonder when it started?’
Harriet took a deep breath and remembered Cal’s advice. Do not equivocate or wrangle with ‘what ifs’.
‘Yes. You don’t get to carry on making demands of me and setting rules. You don’t seem to understand that my telling you where I was living was up to me. I don’t have ongoing obligations to you.’
‘It’s not that you have obligations to me … It’s that you don’t seem bothered, Harriet. At all. You just declared you were on a new course, that night in the hotel, and set sail without me. It leaves me wondering what this was all about, if you ever loved me. I don’t know who you are.’
‘It’s funny you say that, as right now I’m not massively sure of who you are.’
‘Oh come on, don’t be so disingenuous. I’ve not covered myself in glory but I’m flailing. I’m in bits, my heart is broken. Whereas not only is your heart clearly fully intact, you don’t seem to have had a moment’s pain over us finishing.’
Her mouth fell open at this. She was damned if she’d soul-bare after the way he’d behaved. He now wanted her to describe her sense of loss, prove she cared?
‘I have. Sorry. I don’t know how this is relevant to what you did.’
‘No. Clearly.’
Jon stared at her intently.
The idea here was she left him with no hope of a way back. How had she been side-tracked into apologising?
‘You’re sorry,’ Jon said. ‘It’s like you scraped my paintwork or fly-tipped my bin. You used me, didn’t you?’
‘Used you for what?’
‘Used me to get over something. Or someone.’
It occurred to her that Jon was saying the exact same thing she’d overheard Cal remarking to Sam in the garden, about her lack of possessions suggesting she was running away. Harriet never so much as hinted at the figure in her history and yet somehow, they all knew he was there. She balled her trembling fingers into a fist under the table, out of sight.
‘D.H. Lawrence said “women in their nature are like giantesses. They break through everything and go on with their own lives.” I never knew what he meant until now.’
Harriet rolled her eyes. At least he sounded more like himself. Classic Jon-ning.
‘Did he now. Sounds sexist. I’m not here to have another fight, Jon.’
‘OK, understood,’ Jon said, jutting his chin out. ‘You’re a free agent, and so am I. Message fully received, Harriet. Remember that’s what you said.’
‘How are you turning this into a threat?’
‘I’m merely reiterating that the same rules apply for all. You only hear a threat if you think we’re not equal.’
‘We are equal.’
Harriet stood up to leave, putting a five-pound note down for her coffee, and a tip.
‘Have you told your parents we’ve separated?’ she said. She’d had no further texts from Jacqueline, and despite the impossible position Jon had put her in, disliked how rude it had felt to ignore her. She wondered if Jacqueline raised it with Jon, and if so, what was said.
‘No, not yet, only because the barbecue was teeming. I will tell them this afternoon, I think, in fact.’
‘OK. Enjoy your brunch.’
Jon looked contemptuous. He was no doubt made ratty by her ill manners in not staying until he’d finished the food he’d not said he’d ordered, and listening to more accusations of her emotional frigidity. Harriet said ‘bye’ to a stony countenance.
As she walked back through the city centre, she saw a missed call from Lorna. She called back.
‘Listen to this. Gethin’s booked a table at The Dive this Saturday. Keen, right?’
‘Yep.’
‘WRONG, he’s bringing two friends. Two!’
‘Is this less keen?’
‘One friend is a wingman, and to be expected. Two is three lads total, which is a gang. It says, “don’t get any ideas”.’
‘Let me ask you this: if Gethin had a restaurant and had invited you, wouldn’t you take us, on your first visit? Hedge your bets?’
‘Yes, but.’
‘What?’
‘You can prove anything with this sort of smart arsery, Hatley! I don’t need it; I need your help. You and Roxy have to come in that night. Please tell me you don’t have a wedding.’
‘You’re in luck, this week’s is a fashionable Friday at the town hall and reception at Issho’s.’
‘Yasssssss! You and Roxy have a table, also at around half eight, nine, and then if things go well, all six of us do a lock-in. That way, if I’m being mugged off here, I didn’t act like I had any expectations.’
‘It sounds like he wants dinner and you’re casting for West Side Story. Is it not a little bit obvious if you’ve got us in at the same time he’s got them in?’
‘It would’ve been, had I not had the reactions of a ninja and as soon as he said he was bringing pals I said smoothly, oh that’s a coincidence, this’ll be fun, my mates are in that night too. Gethin is not dealing with an amateur.’
‘Haha. Lucky I could make it then.’
‘Seriously though, this is bringing it all rushing back. All the flirting and the signals, then suddenly a big air horn of nope.’
‘Wasn’t the air horn you falling down a manhole, thinking he’d ghosted you, when in fact you’d ghosted him?’
‘I knew you’d throw that “fact” in my face.’
Harriet updated Lorna on her meeting with Jon, and how he started quoting literary greats on the perfidy of women.
‘Unbelievable. He is a possessive shit in bad denim who has never really respected you. That’s from Jane Austen.’
‘I know. I mean, I appreciate he’s really cut up and didn’t see our break-up coming …’
‘Stop making excuses for him. Punching your landlord isn’t OK. Accusing you of infidelity based on nothing isn’t OK. Proposing to you as a form of entrapment isn’t OK. He is misaligned.’
Harriet couldn’t find an error in this.
‘You’ve got to stop planning for the Jon you thought you had and start dealing with the Jon you actually have. Who appears to be an absolute danger.’
It was no good – indicting Jon always led Harriet to the same place.
‘Lorna …’
‘Yes.’
‘Is this definitive proof I have the worst judgement in men?’
‘No, you don’t. What you have is trust, that has been abused. Men aren’t your fault.’