No one’s fault.
The clock ticked towards six-thirty. Maddie sat on the couch and waited.
Would it be so bad if she went early? If she didn’t go now, she would talk herself out of it altogether. Besides, she might catch Ben before he went to bed, could maybe offer to bath him or read him a story.
Fuck it, I’m going, she thought, then felt scandalous at hearing the curse word in her head and giggled into the empty room.
The entrance hall outside her front door was cavernous, her footsteps echoing off the walls. She climbed the stairs to the first floor and looked around at the bare walls painted the same magnolia as downstairs. In the far corner it looked like another corridor led off from the landing. The door directly opposite her was number 4.
Maddie knocked, then stepped back and waited, pulling on the sleeve of her cardigan with her free hand. She suddenly felt silly. Why was she even here? She turned to flee, excuses bouncing around her head, just as the door was flung open.
Jade stood in front of her in loose tracksuit bottoms, her hair still pulled tight. Her black T-shirt was emblazoned with the Def Leppard band logo. Maddie wasn’t sure if that indicated her musical taste or if she just wanted people to think she was a metalhead. Maddie felt overdressed in her jeans, blouse and cardigan.
‘Hey,’ Jade said with a wide smile and stepped back with bare feet. Her toenails were naked but her fingernails were shaped into long talons and painted bright orange. The talons were tapping the side of a glass of wine and she said, ‘I’ve already started. You need to catch up.’
Maddie stepped over a takeaway menu on the carpet. The same one had been shoved under her own door a few days ago. She bent down and picked it up, then closed the door behind her.
The room was identical in shape to Maddie’s downstairs, but decorated very differently. The walls were covered in a beige, swirly wallpaper that was peeling in places. In one corner, the wallpaper had been torn away completely and crayon was scribbled on the lining paper underneath. There was stuff everywhere. A small dining room table in the corner of the room was covered in magazines, plastic bags, clothes and empty mugs. The floor was a cheap-looking, wood-effect linoleum, with a large blue rug covering most of the centre of the room. It looked like it could do with a vacuum cleaner run over it. Instead of a garden beyond the sliding doors, there was a balcony with a drying rack strewn with women’s underwear that swayed in the breeze.
Jade clearly wasn’t one of those who cleaned frantically before anyone came over. There was very much a sense of ‘this is who I am, like it or not’ about the place.
A dark brown leather corner couch dominated the room, facing a large flat-screen TV that was attached to the wall, on display like a piece of art. The evening news was on mute. Jade pointed at the screen and said, ‘Can’t stand that Mary Nightingale. Too much of a stuck-up cow for me.’
‘Um, yeah,’ Maddie said, although she didn’t have strong feelings about Mary Nightingale or any other newsreaders either way.
She followed Jade into the kitchen, still holding the menu in her hand. The countertops were strewn with empty dishes and unopened letters that looked suspiciously like bills, all addressed to Miss J Tingly. Maddie added the takeaway menu to the pile.
Jade was rummaging in a cupboard, her back to Maddie, so Maddie took the opportunity to look her over again. The seat of her tracksuit bottoms was baggy and her T-shirt had a tear at the back, as though it had caught on a door handle. A long thread dangled down from the hem like a tail and Maddie had to fight the urge to reach out and snap it off. Jade was definitely younger than Maddie, maybe in her mid-twenties, but her make-up-free face looked sallow, her skin the colour of paste.
Jade finally found a glass and sloshed some wine into it.
Maddie reached into the bag on her arm and handed Jade the bottle of red wine and chocolates she had brought along. ‘Here you go, thanks for having me over.’
‘Oooh, posh chocolates! Thanks, we’ll crack into these later.’ They weren’t particularly posh, but Maddie was pleased Jade thought she’d made a special effort. Jade handed her the wineglass and Maddie noticed an old line of lipstick still painting the rim. She rubbed at it subtly with her thumb, then rotated the glass so that the lipstick stain pointed away from her.
‘Cheers,’ she said. The white wine was cold but sharp and acidic, setting her teeth on edge.
Maddie looked around for Ben, surprised he hadn’t come running to meet her. ‘Is Ben here or is he in bed already?’
‘No, I told you he’s at his dad’s,’ Jade said sharply.
‘Oh, that’s a shame. I brought him a present.’
Jade looked at the toy car Maddie held out, then took it and tossed the box onto the kitchen counter, saying, ‘I’ll give it to him when I see him next, thanks. Truth is, I’m shattered, so I’m pleased the little shit isn’t here.’ Maddie’s eyebrows shot up, but Jade didn’t seem to notice as she walked past her and flopped onto the couch. ‘Sit, sit,’ she said, gesticulating with her wineglass again.
Maddie sat primly on the couch, adjusting the cushion behind her, and set her bag at her feet.
‘So…’ Jade said, staring at her. ‘What’s your story then?’
‘My story?’
‘Yeah. You’re married, but you live alone?’ She was looking at the thin wedding band and shiny, square-cut diamond Maddie still wore on her left hand.
‘Oh! We’re separated.’ Maddie tucked her hand beneath her.
Jade raised her almost non-existent eyebrows. ‘But still wearing the ring, so newly separated. Interesting. Who cheated? You or him? I can’t imagine it was you. You look too… nice.’
‘It wasn’t like that—’
‘And kids?’ she continued before Maddie could clarify.
‘No, I—’
‘Smart woman. Little buggers suck the life out of you.’ Maddie realised that Jade was already a little drunk. She slurped her wine, then noticed the look on Maddie’s face and said quickly, ‘Sorry, Ben is a sweetie when he wants to be. It’s just hard work sometimes, you know?’
Maddie didn’t know.
‘Do you work?’ Jade continued.
‘Not anymore. I used to work for my husband – bookkeeper and admin for his company.’
‘Oh, shit, so you lost a husband and a boss? That sucks.’
‘Yes and no. I still have the job if I want it. I don’t know if I do though.’ Maddie sipped on the wine for something to do. ‘What about you? Do you work?’
‘Ben is my work, ha!’ Her attention was diverted by the television. ‘Don’t judge me, but I love this show!’ Jade turned the volume up as The One Show started.
They sat in silence for a while, Jade occasionally laughing out loud, while Maddie looked around some more, curious at how different the flat felt to her own. It was certainly more chaotic and messy, but also more lived in, like things happened here, stories were told, dramas unfolded. Her own flat still felt sterile and cold in comparison, with no memories to warm up the walls just yet. There was a basket of toys in one corner near to the wall art scribbles. Down the corridor she could just make out an open bedroom door with a glimpse of an unmade king-size bed. The door to the second bedroom, which she assumed was Ben’s, was closed. Maddie’s small second bedroom in the flat downstairs was filled with the boxes she hadn’t unpacked yet. A dumping ground of old memories, shared mostly with Greg.