‘Great,’ Jay says. He jangles his keys. ‘Tel me, how’s my friend Ben? I was thinking, we should al go out one evening, don’t you think?’

‘Oh . . .’ I say. ‘Yeah. That’d be great.’

Jay looks suspiciously at me. ‘What’s up? You two had a row?’

‘God, no,’ I say, putting my coat on. I put my phone in my pocket, and that’s when I see the text message.

Had to dash to Morocco unexpectedly for work! Know we need to talk darling. Just explained it al to Guy. He is around while I’m away. Perhaps you cld talk to him? See you for foundation launch? Do love you darling – Mum x

‘It’s from Mum,’ I tel Jay. ‘How is she?’

‘She’s in Morocco. She’s gone to bloody Morocco.’ She’d rather cal Guy and tel him where she’s going, Guy who she supposedly hates, than me.

We go down the stairs and Jay opens the front door. ‘Oh yeah, Dad mentioned she was thinking of going there,’ he says.

‘She could have told me she was going,’ I mutter. I stare at the phone again, wanting to scream. Yes, I do want to talk to Guy, Mum. But I’d much rather talk to you. Stop running away from me.

Chapter Forty

When I reach the studio there is a new receptionist, a Breton-striped-top-wearing boy, very skinny, with a mop of curly hair on top of his head, shaved at the sides. He is wearing the obligatory thick black glasses that al boys and girls in East London must wear, from Tania to Arthur to Tom and Tom, the two gay guys who run Dead Dog Tom’s, the hottest new bar in Shoreditch just down the road from the studio. I sometimes wonder what would happen if someone wore frameless steel Euro-style glasses in Shoreditch / Spitalfields – would an invisible forcefield shatter them?

‘Hiyaa,’ he says, not looking up from his phone. ‘How’re you.’

This isn’t a question, more a rapped-out courtesy. ‘Hi. Where’s . . . Jocasta?’ I say. ‘Or Jamie?’

‘I’m Jamie’s like brother?’ the beautiful boy says. ‘Dawson? She’s not wel today, her skanky boyfriend gave her food poisoning? So I’m fil ing in for her?’

I can’t keep track of Jamie’s love life. I thought she was with the dodgy pockmarked Russian mil ionaire and surely mil ionaires don’t get food poisoning. ‘Oh, right,’ I say.

‘Lily’s having an open studio this afternoon, so she asked Jamie to get someone to cover for her.’ Dawson’s eyes shift away from me, and then his face lights up. ‘Hey, you!’

‘Hey,’ says a voice behind me. ‘Oh. Hi, Nat.’

I swing round, my heart thumping loudly. There, in the doorway, is Ben, and again I adjust to the new person he is, shorn of hair. The person I kissed three nights ago. I stare at him, drinking in the sight of him.

‘Hi, Ben,’ I say. ‘Hey,’ he says, taking his backpack off his shoulders. He barely glances in my direction. ‘Hi, Dawson,’ he says. ‘How’s it going?

What are you doing here?’

He high-fives Dawson, who smiles at him and stands up, excited. ‘Ben, my man. Good to see you! Hey, thanks for those links! I checked out that photographer dude, he was amazing? That shit of those dead trees, and the foil – it was so . . .’ He shakes his head. ‘So relevant, you know?’

‘Good, good.’ Ben is nodding. ‘How’s Jamie?’

‘Good, she’s good. Wel , she’s not, she’s being sick every five minutes, but she’s good otherwise.’

Ben grimaces. ‘Oh, dear. Tel her I said get wel soon, and she should definitely lose the boyfriend.’ He turns to me. ‘Hey.’

I lean forward. ‘Yeah. So—’

‘See you later,’ he says, and turns away, making for the stairs.

I fol ow him. ‘Ben,’ I say, as we curl up to the first floor, out of earshot. ‘How – how are you?’

He nods vigorously. ‘I’m good, good.’

‘Look—’ I take a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry about the other night.’

A smal muscle on his cheek twitches in Ben’s lean face. ‘Yeah, no problem.’

‘I meant to text you . . .’ I say lamely. ‘To apologise for running off like that. But I . . .’

I trail off. He is stil as granite, watching me. Was it real y Thursday that we kissed? It seems so long ago. He seems like a different person, tal and forbidding. He’s hugging his backpack to him. ‘I didn’t text you either,’ he says. ‘It’s fine. Look, I’d better get on . . .’

‘Fine, of course,’ I say. I feel almost winded in the face of his hostility, it’s like running into a brick wal . ‘See you – see you in a bit.’

I go into my studio and shut the door, trying to breathe normal y, but my chest is rising and fal ing alarmingly quickly. I lean against the door, listening to the silence, and then I shake myself down, go over to the counter, and get my stuff out. I write my list for the day, get out my sketchpad; sort out some more filing, turn on my laptop. I flick through the post. The details of my little stand at the trade fair in June have come through; I can see my position on the map, and it’s OK. There’s a sale on at the place I get my clasps, hooks, earring hoops. A letter from the bank, inviting me to a seminar on Smal Business Management. I smooth it out flat and put it in my in-tray, thinking I should go. The last letter is from Emilia’s Sister, the shop on smart Cheshire Street. They’ve sent through an order. An old-fashioned, paper order! It’s like a novelty item, beautiful y printed, and I stare at it in disbelief. They want twenty necklaces, thirty charm bracelets, some of the dangling rose earrings I’m having made . . .

There’s a knock on the door. ‘Come in!’ I shout happily, and then look up. It’s Ben.

‘Hey,’ I say, putting down the order and picking up the broom which I use to sweep the floor. I brush it nervously. I don’t know why I’m surprised it’s Ben knocking at the door: it’s always Ben. Always used to be. ‘What’s up?’

He shuts the door. ‘Hi, Cinders. I just wanted to say sorry for being a cock.’

I laugh nervously. ‘What are you talking about?’

Ben rubs one eye; he looks tired. ‘The last however many days, basical y. I have been a cock. Shouting at you . . . Kissing you . . . Not cal ing you . . . Just now . . . Real cock behaviour. I know you’re having a bad time at the moment. I shouldn’t have taken advantage.’

For a brief microsecond I let myself think of his lips on mine again, the feeling of his skin, his tongue in my mouth . . . I shake my head, smiling.

‘You’re many things, Ben Cohen, but you’re not a cock,’ I say. ‘I should have cal ed. Cleared the air.’

‘No,’ he says, smiling back at me. ‘I should have done.’

‘I behaved real y badly. I’m the one who . . . who ran off. And I was drunk and hysterical. I’m sorry.’

Ben laughs. ‘You weren’t drinking alone, you know.’

‘It makes me feel better if you were as drunk as me,’ I say. He pauses. ‘Let’s say I was, and cal it quits.’

‘Um – yes,’ I say. ‘Definitely.’

I stare at him, unsure of what to say next – so, is it normal between us now? Is that it?

‘So it’s . . . it’s OK?’ Ben says, watching me. ‘Yes of course,’ I say. I want to explain. ‘Look – me and Oli – when I ran off like that, ’cause he rang, it wasn’t what you think.’ And then I stop. Because it is what he thinks. ‘I mean, you know. We’re stil married, we have to talk to each other . . .’

There’s a silence. I look up at him. ‘I just want you to be happy, Nat,’ he says.

Suddenly, I desperately want . . . No, this is stupid. I’m leaning on the diary and the post, and I stand upright and brush myself off, as if I’m dusty.

Ben blinks, as though he can’t remember why he’s here, and I think to myself again how tired he looks.

‘Hey,’ I say, more than anything else to have some sound in the deathly quiet of the studio. ‘So, I found the diary.’

I don’t expect him to remember. ‘Cecily’s diary?’ he says immediately. ‘I’ve been wondering about that. Did your mum have it?’

‘Yes . . .’ I stare at him. ‘She did – how on earth did you know that?’

He shrugs. ‘I just guessed she probably would. Knowing your mum, even as little as I do. I thought it’d turn up sooner or later.’ His voice is kind of flat.

‘That’s amazing,’ I say. I smile, I can’t help it. He knows us al , knows me better than I know myself. And he makes it sound so simple. ‘Wel , yeah – she did have it.’

‘Have you read it?’

‘Yes. Last night, in fact.’

Ben gives me a sideways glance, as if he’s reluctant to ask, but can’t help himself. ‘So, what’s in it? Is Jesus buried in your garden?’

‘Um—‘ I take a deep breath, and it catches in my throat. I’m not sure how to explain it, and I can’t think about it without thinking of the last page, of my mother and Cecily on the morning she died, sitting on the bed together, promising each other that everything’s going to be OK. ‘It’s – it’s that thing of thinking you know someone and it turns out you don’t.’ I try to explain. ‘Like you saying “knowing your mum”. That’s what’s awful about it. I don’t think I know her at al . I think al these years, we’ve al looked at her in the wrong way. She went through some bad stuff, and it turns out the people who should have been looking after her – wel , they weren’t. At al .’

I am shaking slightly as I say this. ‘Have you talked to her?’ Ben asks, fiddling with a bit of paper, shooting glances at me out of the corner of his eye.

I shake my head. ‘She’s gone off for a few days.’

‘You need to talk to someone about it.’

Not me. I can feel him, ever so politely, pushing away from me. ‘It’s fine,’ I say, I can’t explain that I couldn’t wake him, it sounds so stupid. ‘I’m trying to get hold of Guy – old family friend, he – oh, it’l be fine. Just – stuff to think about.’

I want to talk to him about it so much, though. I want his advice, as though it’s back to normal in the studio and we’re chatting about al and sundry the way we used to, before Oli’s affair and Granny’s death and before he split from Tania and everything got weird. I want to say, Read this diary, I want to know what you think, what you think I should do, for God’s sake, because I have no idea myself and it’s freaking scary.

And I know I can’t, because everything’s changed, not least our relationship.

Most of al I want him to read the diary to get to know Cecily, to see what she was like, to hear her voice. I want more people to know her. Ben would get her. He’d like her.

‘Look,’ he says, cutting into my thoughts. ‘I can’t stay.’ He takes something out of his back pocket. ‘I just came to give you something.’

‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Right.’

‘I had these printed out for you,’ he says, handing me a manila envelope. ‘But I didn’t get round to giving them to you . . . They came out pretty wel considering how much we’d drunk.’

I tip the envelope open. ‘Oh . . . wow,’ I say, grinning. ‘I’d forgotten, thank you so much.’

They’re the photos of the necklace Claire, that girl in the Ten Bel s, was wearing on Thursday, the necklace I’ve been working on adapting, using Cecily’s ring and some of the duck-egg-blue laser-cut birds I’m waiting for today. I gaze at them with pleasure. He’s had them properly printed, with white edges, and each shows the necklace perfectly. I flick through them.

‘Thank you so much, Ben,’ I say, gathering them up. ‘They’re – wow, they’re just what I needed. You are great.’ I glance at the last one. ‘Oh.

That’s of me!’

I am raising my glass, my hair fal ing over my shoulders, and I am smiling, clearly one or two drinks up. He looks at it, and the muscle on his now-smooth cheek twitches again.

‘Oh. Yes, it is,’ he says. He pauses, just a second. ‘Yes – I thought you’d like one with Cecily’s ring on it, to see how it looks next to the others.’

‘That’s great, Ben, thanks so much.’ I come round to his side of the counter and squeeze his arm. ‘You’re a great man.’ I look at him again.

‘With short hair.’

He laughs, but there’s a terseness to his tone. ‘Right. Look—’

‘Thanks again,’ I say, as he turns to leave. Emboldened by this new, more friendly footing, I say, ‘Um – do you want to grab some lunch, or something? I’d love to tel you about the diary. Get your advice, and . . .’

I trail off. Ben looks down at the photos in my hand. ‘I don’t think so,’ he says gently. ‘Nat, I think you kind of need to talk to Oli, or Jay or someone, about that stuff first, not me.’

Taking a little step back, I nod. ‘F-fine,’ I say. ‘You’re right. But – honestly, Ben, it real y is over with me and Oli. I’ve moved in with Jay. It was –

he did come round that night, but he shouldn’t have. It’s over,’ I say, not real y knowing why I say it. ‘It real y is.’

The tension in the room is suddenly palpable. ‘I wasn’t asking if it was or it wasn’t,’ Ben says. He taps his forehead furiously with one finger, as if he’s trying to release something in his brain. ‘Nat – I’m not stupid. You don’t need any more complications in your life at the moment. Once again