Ghostwritten. Isabel Wolff

it go to your head,’ Al said.

      She laughed. ‘Where else is my bite supposed to go?’

      Soon it was time for the speeches and toasts; the cake was cut, then after coffee there was a break before the evening party was to start.

      Amy and Sean had to leave, to get back to their baby. Vincent Tregear also said his goodbyes. As the caterers moved back the tables, Rick and I went out into the garden.

      We sat on a bench, watching the sky turn crimson, then mauve, then an inky blue in which the first stars were starting to shine.

      ‘Well … it’s been a great day,’ Rick pronounced. The awkwardness had returned, squatting between us like an uninvited guest.

      ‘It’s been a lovely day,’ I agreed. ‘We should …’

      ‘What?’ he murmured.

      My nerve failed. ‘We should go inside. It’s getting cold.’

      Rick stood up. ‘And the band’s started.’ He held out his hand.

      So we returned to the marquee where Jon and Nina were dancing their first waltz. Soon everyone took to the floor. But as Rick’s arms went round me and he pulled me close, I felt that he was hugging me goodbye.

       TWO

      ‘So … what are we going to do?’ Rick asked me gently the following day.

      We’d had lunch – not that I’d been able to eat – and now faced each other across our kitchen table. I shook my head, helplessly. I didn’t trust myself to speak.

      ‘We’ve got three options,’ Rick went on. ‘One, I change my mind; two, you change your mind; or three …’

      I felt my stomach clench. ‘I don’t want to break up.’

      ‘Nor do I.’ Rick exhaled, hard, as though breathing on glass, then he looked at me, his blue eyes searching my face. ‘I do love you, Jen.’

      ‘Then you should be happy to let me have what I want.’

      He flinched. ‘You know it’s not that simple.’

      A silence fell in which we could hear the rumble of traffic from the City Road.

      ‘I keep thinking about this quote I once read,’ Rick said after a moment. ‘I can’t remember who it’s by, but it’s about how love doesn’t consist in gazing at the other person, but in looking together in the same direction.’ He shrugged. ‘But we’re not doing that.’

      I cradled my coffee mug with its pattern of red hearts. ‘We’ve been together for a year and a half,’ I said quietly. ‘We’ve lived together for nine months, and we’ve been happy. Haven’t we?’ I glanced at the framed photo collage that I’d made of our first year together. There were snaps of us on top of Mount Snowdon, walking on the South Downs, sitting on the swing seat in his parents’ garden, cooking together, kissing. Then my eyes strayed to Nina’s wedding invitation on the kitchen dresser. I bitterly regretted having teasingly asked Rick when we might take our relationship forward.

      ‘We have been happy,’ Rick said at last. ‘That’s what makes it so hard.’

      Another silence enveloped us. I could hear the hum of the fridge. ‘There is a fourth option,’ I said, ‘which is to go on as we were. So let’s just … forget marriage.’

      Rick stared at me as though I were speaking in tongues. ‘This isn’t about marriage, Jen.’

      I glanced at my manuscript, the typed pages stacked up on the table. Bringing Up Baby. From Newborn to 12 Months, the Definitive Infant-Care Guide. A page had fallen to the floor.

      ‘So what are we going to do?’ Rick asked me again.

      ‘I don’t know.’ A wave of resentment coursed through me. ‘I only know that I was always honest with you.’ As I picked up the sheet, random sentences leapt out at me. Great adventure of parenthood … bliss of holding your baby for the first time … what to expect, month by month.

      ‘You were honest.’ Rick nodded. ‘You told me right from the start that you didn’t want to have children and that this was something I had to know if we were to get involved.’

      ‘Yes,’ I said hotly, ‘and you said you didn’t mind, because you work with children every day. You said that your brother has four kids, so there was no pressure on you to have them. You told me that you’d never been bothered about it and that people can have a good life without children – which is true.’

      ‘I did feel like that, Jenni. But I’ve changed.’

      ‘Well, I wish you hadn’t, because now we’ve got a problem.’

      Rick pushed back his chair; he went and stood by the French windows. Through the panes the plants in our small walled garden looked dusty and withered. I’d been too distracted and upset to water them. ‘People do change,’ he said quietly. ‘They’re allowed to change. And it’s crept up on me over the past few months. I’ve wanted to talk to you about it but was afraid to, precisely for this reason, but now you’ve brought the issue into the open.’

      ‘Why have you changed?’

      He shrugged. ‘I don’t know – probably because I’m nearly forty now.’

      ‘You were nearly forty when we met.’

      ‘Or maybe it’s seeing the kids at school develop and grow, and wishing that I could watch my own kids do that.’

      ‘That didn’t seem to worry you before.’

      ‘True. But now it does.’

      I glanced at the manuscript. ‘I think it’s because I’ve been working on this baby-care book.’ I felt my throat constrict. ‘I wish I’d never agreed to do it.’

      ‘The book has nothing to do with it, Jen. I wanted to be with you so much that I convinced myself I didn’t want children. Then I began to believe that because we were in love we’d naturally want to have them. So I thought you’d change your mind.’

      ‘Which is what you’re hoping for now?’

      Rick sighed. ‘I guess I am. Because then we’d still have each other, but with the chance of family life too. I’ll be applying for head teacher posts before long: I’d like to try for jobs outside London, if you were happy to move.’

      ‘I’d be happy to be wherever you were,’ I said truthfully.

      ‘Jen …’ Rick’s face was full of sudden yearning. ‘We could have a great life: we’d be able to afford a bigger place.’ He looked around him. ‘This flat’s so small.’

      ‘I don’t care. I’d live in a bedsit with you if I had to. But, yes, it would be wonderful to have more space – with a bigger garden.’

      He nodded. ‘I’ve been thinking about that garden a lot. I see a lawn, with children running around on it, laughing. But then they fade, like ghosts, because I know you don’t want any.’ Rick sat down again, then reached for my hands. ‘I want nothing more than to share my life with you, Jen, but we have to want the same things. And the question of whether or not we have children isn’t one that we can compromise on; and if we can’t agree about it—’

      I withdrew my hands. ‘Let’s imagine that I do change my mind. What if we then find that I can’t have kids?’

      ‘At least I’d know that we’d tried. Or maybe, I don’t know … we could try IVF.’

      ‘A bank-breaking emotional rollercoaster with no guarantees. The other day Honor interviewed a woman who’s spent forty thousand pounds on it and still