Page 7

So stranger things had happened in Geeta’s life, but not many.

Squinting through the cold rain. The lane beneath her feet turning into a glassy pool, and heavy drops landing and leaping again. Nicola striding beside her, chin up and impervious to the torrential downpour.

She followed the taller woman past the Glebe field and golden stone cottages, beyond the village community shop. And when they reached a hedge-topped wall, they nipped through a gap, into a long, narrow front garden up to Nicola's terraced brick cottage.

Nicola flung open the door and hung their coats in the small porch. “Come in. I’ll get towels,” she said loudly, and disappeared up the stairs.

Geeta stood alone in Nicola’s Albright’s cottage. In the home of a woman who clearly disliked her. Who was opinionated, brusque and resided somewhere significant on the homophobia scale. Nicola had no respect for Geeta’s home life and they were the opposites in motherhood – Nicola being the one Olivia idolised, just to rub it in. But she’d warmly invited Geeta in from the rain.

Weird.

Geeta slipped off her wet shoes and padded inside, intrigued.

The scent of fresh paint tickled at the back of her nose, and bright walls offset wooden floorboards and paintings of rolling seas. Curiosity drew her into a cottage kitchen extended into a conservatory. The space was modern with clean lines but softened by an oak dining table and ochre rug. Tasteful, stylish, expensive. It was very Nicola. Geeta rolled her eyes. But, yes, surprisingly she liked the space.

“Here you go.”

Nicola strode in and held out a fluffy ochre towel, the same colour scheme as the kitchen.

“Thank you.” Geeta dabbed at her face with the soft towel, while watching Nicola pat her hair with another.

Geeta bit back a smile at Nicola’s hair tumbling into waves. The barrister must straighten it usually. Geeta rather liked the voluptuous locks that had gone wayward with rain, surprised that anything led Nicola astray.

Nicola threw back her head and swept the waves away from her face. Even after being caught in a downpour, the woman was striking. Jaw and cheekbones more prominent. Expressive eyebrows darker. Wet eyelashes accentuating those crystalline blue eyes.

“What?” Nicola said. Those eyes twinkled.

Geeta smiled, caught. “I didn’t know you had wavy hair.”

“I didn’t used to,” Nicola replied with a laugh. “Ever since menopause, nothing stays straight.”

Geeta paused at the double meaning.

“You know what I mean,” Nicola said with a tut, hearing the same thing.

“Yes I do.” Because she’d never imply Nicola was anything but straight.

At least Nicola wasn’t twitchy about the double meaning. Maybe her attitude had mellowed. Maybe.

“Sit down and I’ll get you a drink,” Nicola said, taking the towels and throwing them over a radiator. “Coffee OK?”

Geeta nodded. “Thank you.” She sat at the end of the table, so she could see into both the room and garden.

Nicola moved quickly around the kitchen, always busy, always on top of things.

“I see this a lot,” Nicola said, pouring beans into a coffee machine, then the grinder pausing conversation.

“It’s usually the woman in a straight couple who carries the burden of the marriage. Then the divorce too,” she carried on while reaching for stoneware mugs from a cupboard. “Looking after the children. Managing the household. Often in full-time employment too. Doing the emotional labour of nurturing a family, even when splitting up and rebuilding afterwards.”

Ah, of course. Nicola was a pro and saw divorce daily.

Nicola added over her shoulder, “Even if that’s your primary role, it doesn’t mean you should do all of it. Because, my goodness, it’s exhausting.”

She brought over two mugs of steaming coffee with a jug of milk and sat next to Geeta to look out at the garden.

Strange. She hadn’t thought of Nicola appreciating the human side of divorce, and she’d been through it personally too. Geeta wondered what it had been like. She’d assumed Nicola had been absent from family life as a mother who preferred work over domesticity, an impression made by snippets from Daniel and Charlotte. But you never knew what someone else’s life was really like.

Family had been everything to Geeta, loving being the heart of the group, with young Olivia, then bouncing Adam, the person that everyone came running to. It fed her soul while she fed others. Her identity.

“But who’s there for you?” Nicola murmured, her gaze gentle.

Geeta’s stomach sank.

Nicola asked with such matter-of-fact sympathy and experience, it made Geeta think of a genuine answer, rather than ‘I’m fine’. And the brutally empty answer made her insides plummet. There wasn’t anyone. It seemed especially stark right now, with the only understanding coming from her adversary, of all people.

She stared at the rain without answering. Drops fluttered the leaves on shrubs, dabbed concentric circles in a birdbath, and pattered the conservatory roof.

How did she get here? Sad and staring at the rain with Nicola Albright. She quietly laughed through her nose.

“It's not how I planned it, you know.” She took a sip of coffee.

Geeta had ambitions as a teenager. She dreamed of doing everything her parents didn’t. Not a doctor like her father, or solicitor like her mother. Not staying in Birmingham close to family for her degree. She wanted to travel and meet new people and write for magazines.

She’d argued with her mother. Had looks from aunties. Even her easy-going father sat her down one day.

“Oh Geeta, I know you don’t want to study medicine or law.” Then his shoulders sagged. “But people have to listen to you when you have a professional qualification.”

And the attitudes he’d faced weighed on those shoulders.

But times had moved on, she’d told herself, and she didn’t want to be restricted like her parents. Oh, the irony of her own daughter adamantly pursuing law years later. She'd encouraged Olivia to pursue her dreams without limits, then had to sit, shoulders sagging like her father, while her daughter announced she wanted to study jurisprudence. And the family was back to law again.

Even after rejecting medicine when young, Geeta had been annoyingly good at science at school, so she’d compromised on studying microbiology.

“Do you know,” she looked at Nicola, “I didn’t plan to have children. Not then anyway.”

“Really?”

She bet not much snuck up on the barrister, but this surprised her. Geeta tutted and smiled.

“Is it hard to think of me as anything other than a mum?” Geeta scoffed.

“Oh, I see you as many things,” Nicola said. “Always have.”

Puzzling. She didn’t know what to say to that.

“I mean, I assumed I’d have kids.” Geeta carried on instead. “That was the given for everyone.”

“We were meant to have it all, weren’t we.” Nicola gazed into the garden, her expression distant. “Equal opportunities opening the door to career and family at the same time. Except that meant we had to do all the work too.”

Cynicism rolled around in the sentence, not what she expected from Nicola, and the barrister’s eyes glazed over as she stared out into the garden.

Geeta’s thoughts tumbled with questions, but before she could ask any, Nicola seemed to twitch and spark back into life.

“So, tell me. What were your plans?” Nicola prompted.

Nicola even smiled with what seemed genuine interest, rather than the usual brusque statements she fired at Geeta, designed to limit conversation. Should she tell her? Would Nicola forget like all the other details she let fly in the wind about Geeta?

What was the harm.

“I applied for a PhD in America and planned on going into research,” Geeta said.

A tilt of the head. Still genuine interest. “What stopped you?”

“The programme I wanted was cancelled. I planned to reapply for others, but I got pregnant.”

“Were you married? You must have been young.” Nicola looked skyward as if calculating.

“No. We weren’t that serious yet. Well...”

Geeta hadn’t been, but when had Sumit not been serious? She saw the same tendency in their daughter, while their younger son, Adam, bounced around similar to Geeta.

“Sumit was my studious lab partner at university.” Geeta smiled.

The beautiful, stern boy who sat on the other side of the lab bench. Who looked at her with disapproval when she rolled up, yawning from late nights out with Jerry, a skinny white boy who sat next to them.

Jerry was the first person Geeta met at university. He was out, proud and fabulous, and they were inseparable. Over three years they made a funny team with Sumit, Jerry flirting with Sumit and bringing him out of his shell, and Geeta amazed at Sumit’s patience. She'd commented on it once, when Jerry put his arm around him, calling him darling before running off. Sumit had shrugged and said Jerry understood he wasn’t interested.

But this was the eighties, and boys like Sumit weren't usually that comfortable.

Then Sumit said, “My brother's gay. I’m the only one in my family who knows, and he was terrified telling me. I hope others are comfortable with him and welcoming when he goes to university too.”

And Geeta had stared at the serious student, more broad-minded and generous than most. And she fell a little in love with him for it.

Nicola wouldn’t appreciate the detail, so she carried on. “We were lab partners before friends. Then one night I kissed him.”

“At a party?” Nicola smiled.

Geeta laughed. “I admit I had a bit to drink.”

“Isn't that how most relationships started at college?”

“Half of mine did.”

And Sumit would never have kissed her first.

“Then we slipped into seeing each other. It was easy. We hung out anyway, revising and studying towards finals.” God, it was a blur of sex, study and celebrating the end of finals with Jerry. “And I hadn’t realised I’d missed a period. Actually two.”

Her body had already changed without her noticing, her breasts sore and larger, and pregnancy had a real grip over her.

They both knew that Geeta wanted to study, and Sumit quietly supported her decision.

Except Geeta delayed. And again.

Then one day, Sumit said, “What if you had a baby with me? I’ve been talking to my new college in Oxford, and we’d get family accommodation. A small flat. We’d have to live frugally, but we could do it. If you wanted that.”

He’d thought it all through. And if Sumit thought something through then he was committed. There was no in between.

“And I want to marry you,” he said at last. “And you could apply for another PhD.”

So this was how, after all her plans not to follow in her parents’ footsteps, Geeta started a family with exactly the kind of boy her family approved of. She was both livid and in love.

She looked at Nicola.

“Then having children took me completely by surprise.” She laughed, recalling. “You know how motherhood was idealised everywhere. Whether it was my family’s views, or white friends’ preconceptions of a 1950s picture of motherhood. Empty smiles, flowers and soft focus.”

Nicola nodded.

“I wasn't prepared for how messy and fierce it is.”

“What birth?”

“All of it!” She threw her hands in the air.

God, the things people didn't tell you about giving birth. Brutal. Exhausting. How on earth did people consider it afterwards. Then she’d done it all again to have Adam. Bonkers.

“But the moment I saw Olivia, lying on my belly, looking at me with shining brown eyes...”

The most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. The rush of love instant. A switch turning her into someone else. A baby she loved above everything, would do anything for, with murderous ferocity.

“I never imagined how fierce the love would be. Terrifying too, because the worst thing that could happen to me was anything harming this tiny child. Life felt a hundred times more precious and precarious.”

And the love and euphoria of Olivia clutching to her, and the smile she had for no-one else. She flared with happiness remembering it.

“It’s a drug-induced high and turns you into a beast.”

Nicola looked at her, carefully put down her coffee, then coughed on her mouthful.

“Well, having kids is fucking insane.” Geeta threw up her hands.

At this, Nicola laughed out loud.

“Sorry,” the barrister said, dabbing the corner of her mouth. “Yes it is, but that’s not what I expected from earth mother of the year.”

See, that’s exactly what Nicola dismissed her as.

“I hadn’t imagined it to be so exciting,” Geeta continued. “It was an adventure I didn’t plan. Two new humans I got to discover and love. I felt so lucky.”

“But now?” Nicola said, more seriously.

“I helped everyone grow up and establish their careers.” She breathed in, then sagged as the air escaped. “And now everyone has their own lives, except me.” She shook her head. “And I...we...tried to make things better. But Sumit’s job is his life, and he finally made head of department. I always knew he wanted that...”

She stumbled over the gaping hole inside.

“So, I left Sumit.” She choked.

There it was.

The guilt flooded over her, as if it could wash her away. She peeked at Nicola for her reaction.

“I don’t think it matters who leaves,” Nicola said quietly. “Not really in the end. For most marriages, it's a sign it’s not working, and that’s usually down to both people.”

Oh. Such easy acceptance.

Geeta let out a breath. “Thank you for saying that.”

Because she hadn’t talked about this to anyone. Not without having to make her case and persuade Sumit to let her go. Or defend herself to her mother over and over. To Adam, still in disbelief. To Olivia, who hugged her. Oh my goodness, she was grateful to her girl, but Geeta feared what Olivia would think when she finally processed it.

But to, without judgement, talk. What a relief.

“I was just too unhappy,” she whispered.

Nicola listened.

“Suddenly in my fifties, deeply lonely, with the prospect of sleepwalking through the rest of my life. I couldn’t face it. But I...”

Geeta’s throat squeezed.

“Except it hurts too,” Nicola finished for her.

She’d left the beautiful man who adored their daughter. Who slept in the bath so Olivia could lie next to Geeta in the tiny studio flat. He rocked Olivia to sleep while typing up his PhD and was so obviously proud of his family. The clever researcher who bounced ideas around with her for years until she fell too far behind. The man who shared three decades of history and a home with her.

“I miss him.” It broke over the lump in her throat. She couldn’t breathe, with the weight of it pressing on her chest. “I miss him like I’ve torn out a part of myself. As if I deliberately ripped out my heart. And I look at myself in the mirror some days and wonder what the hell I've done.” Upset sang in her breath when she inhaled. “But it’s done.” She gasped. “I couldn't just wait for life to end.”

“So, you’ve been beating yourself up, while carrying everyone else?”

Geeta stared at Nicola, expecting to feel vulnerable in front of her. But Nicola made a simple and insightful observation with sympathy.

“Yes, I have,” Geeta said with surprise. “And I’m tired.”

What a relief to say it out loud. And of all the people to help her realise, it was Nicola.

Nicola smiled with patient understanding, then quietly asked, “Would you like another cup?”

“Yes, please,” she whispered.

Nicola stood to return to the kitchen, except she paused by Geeta. A warmth hovered on her shoulder, then slowly descended with comfort, and Nicola’s hand gently squeezed her for a few moments.

"Maybe it’s time to stop blaming yourself,” Nicola murmured.

The warmth and contact bled into her whole body. Human touch had been so infrequent, it seeped deep into the absence. And this came with genuine sympathy, the gesture perfectly pitched to soothe. Nicola had experience and authority in this, so Geeta believed her words, and though the barrister's confidence annoyed her sometimes, it was a relief right now.

“Yes,” Geeta nodded. “I think it is.”

“Good.”

She looked up at Nicola, seeing an understanding she’d never expected. But it was stupid, really, thinking of them as opposites, housewife versus barrister, when they had much in common. Similar age. Having children young. The daughters being friends. God, she’d cursed that tie when bumping into Nicola and having to be polite. But of course, Nicola would understand what she went through.

“What about you? Was it the same? Did you find splitting up with Daniel hard?”

“God no,” Nicola waved the suggestion away and walked into the kitchen area. “I wasn't still in love with him like you are with Sumit.”

And, poof, the common connection evaporated. Geeta shook her head and laughed. Nicola bloody Albright. Honestly.

“No, we loathed each other,” Nicola continued.

“Really?” Geeta said in disbelief.

Impervious Nicola was back, relentlessly bulldozing through life unaffected. Gah. She was envious. Not giving a crap about anybody must be nice sometimes.

“Oh, I didn’t realise how late it was,” Nicola said, glancing at a wall clock, then spinning round. “Do you fancy some lunch?”

Again, Geeta couldn't believe she was here, with Nicola, who wasn't being offensive, and was now asking her to lunch.

“Yes,” Geeta blurted, realising her slowness to answer. “That’d be lovely.”

“Now.” Nicola reached into a larder fridge and piled ingredients on the counter. “Don't expect much. It’s just soup. My East European mother ensured I could at least make a hearty broth. But I’m not a good cook like you.”

Geeta couldn’t hold back the snort on this one. “When the hell,” she started with a laugh, “have you eaten my food?”

“What do you mean?” Nicola glanced up.

Geeta crossed her arms. "You rejected my food, every time I offered, for fifteen years,” she stressed.

Then she had to laugh, because it had been downright petulant at times.

“Not true,” Nicola replied with a nonchalant blink. “I enjoyed the lemon drizzle cake you brought as a housewarming gift to Charlotte’s. And,” Nicola raised a sharp knife to point it out, “I sampled a whole range at your garden party last autumn.”

“Oh.”

Her stomach dropped. Geeta had forgotten Nicola had been there. She and Sumit had just agreed to split up, while living in the same house with only a couple of others knowing the decision. She’d spent the whole party trying to smile.

“Sorry.”

Nicola gazed at her, sharp blue eyes unblinking, with a tetchiness more like their usual interactions.

“Yes, I remember you were there now.” Geeta lifted her hands in apology. “I was distracted that day.”

Nicola nodded but still stared.

“You usually make an impression.” Geeta raised her eyebrows. “Really, you’re very memorable. I wouldn’t worry about that,” she grumbled.

And Nicola laughed out loud.