‘Why not? It sounded amazing, your night in New York. Imagine, if you look at one another and there’s that zap of connection again, sheer chemical attraction. The years will melt away as your eyes lock. You’ll run into each other’s arms, an orchestra will start up . . .’
‘More like one of those sad trombones, knowing my luck,’ Lara scoffed. Her eye fell on a couple hurrying towards the service station entrance, him holding his jacket above both of their heads, and she had to look away because she couldn’t remember the last time anyone had done something like that for her. ‘Anyway, I can’t chat for long. Sorry about book group, but if you could just pop in and feed the cat, that would be brilliant, thanks.’
‘Sure, no problem. Just . . . keep me posted, yeah? And good luck.’
‘Thanks.’
Lara hung up, already wondering if she’d said too much to her friend. Wondering also if she might have been better asking the favour of her mother after all, who’d have reframed the trip in the cold hard colours of reality. Because Heidi’s exuberant optimism was surely misguided, and now Lara couldn’t help dreading Eliza being rejected by Ben, just like she had been.
Oh God, please let him not be a complete shit, she prayed, draining her coffee cup and throwing it into the nearest bin. Well, not actually into the nearest bin, in fact, because her aim was off and the cup bounced off the side and landed on the ground, earning her a dirty look from a woman wearing a plastic headscarf who clearly thought she was littering. Growling under her breath, Lara stooped down to retrieve the cup, rammed it into the bin, then headed back into the service station in search of some emergency chocolate. It definitely felt as if she would need it.
Chapter Ten
Back in the car, they set off once more. Less than an hour to go now. It was shallow of her, but following Heidi’s question about what she was wearing, the nearer their approach to Cambridge, the more pressing it felt for Lara to change her clothes to something more flattering. When Ben had met her, she’d been young and cared far more about her appearance than she did nowadays: she’d rocked that cool Audrey fringe for starters, and worn make-up and jewellery as standard, rather than a belated afterthought, sometimes spending hours choosing the right outfit for an occasion. Fast-forward to the present day and her look had degenerated from Girl About Town to Woman Putting the Bins Out. Whatever the outcome might be today, Lara still had some remaining shreds of pride, and definitely didn’t want Ben’s first impression of her to be one of dreariness: dressed in plain old work clothes with frizz-bomb hair, straight off the back of a long drive. Far better for him to experience a stab of loss at what might have been. To register, even on a subconscious level, that she had aged well over the years, and had managed perfectly fine without him. She thought back to the dishevelled reflection she’d seen in the service station loos and mentally added mascara, lipstick and a hairbrush to her shopping list.
By the time they reached the Cambridge road, the butterflies in Lara’s stomach were beating their wings a little faster. Keep breathing, she reminded herself. Keep your cool. However awkward things might be with Ben, she would survive the day. One way or another.
Her thoughts turned back to the aftermath of the night she’d spent with him; how dismal and lonely the following fortnight had seemed, how it had felt as if everyone in New York City was having a blast except for her. Still, days later, she’d been distracted at least by the arrival of Richie and a load of his mates, who had come over on someone’s stag do for a long messy weekend. Lara forced herself to put on a spangly top and a face full of make-up to go out with them, feelings of dejection temporarily shelved. ‘This is Danno, this is Sarge, this is Mick, this is Steve,’ said Richie, greeting her when she turned up at the bar, followed by introductions to all the other lads present, the names of whom she’d now forgotten. The stags were collectively on a mission to party hard and get hammered, and their buoyant moods proved infectious. Exactly what she needed.
Which was why she bought a round of shots, and gave herself up to a long night.
Which was why she found herself involved with shouty drinking games and competitively funny stories, with teasing and jokes and banter.
Which was why she didn’t bail out and go home when they moved on to a grimy nightclub just off Times Square, and why, several drinks later, she ended up drunkenly grinding against best-man-to-be Steve on the dance floor. And then snogging his face off at the end of the night and inviting him back to her place, because why not? She didn’t care what happened any more, and you know what everyone said about getting straight back on a horse after you fell off.
If she’d been hoping to break the enchantment Ben had cast upon her, it didn’t work. Instead of waking the next morning feeling free and unburdened, she woke with the worst hangover of her life, wishing that there wasn’t this large snoring man in her bed. A large snoring naked man with whom, it quickly transpired, she had little in common. If anything, their pairing only served to leave her feeling worse than ever. Cheap. Seedy. As if she needed a red-hot shower and a month-long detox afterwards.
He’d been nice though, taking her out for breakfast in her nearest café rather than bolting at the first opportunity as other men might have done. He’d even suggested they meet up again while he was in New York – or, given that she was returning to the UK in the autumn, perhaps they could see one another once she was home? Okay, she said, although she didn’t really mean it. However decent and uncomplicated he appeared, he wasn’t Ben; there wasn’t the same spark or easy intimacy, and she was pretty sure she’d never see him again.
Except that three months later, back in London, she discovered to her horror that she was pregnant. Life had been so chaotic, what with the move home and the whirl of catching up with her British friends, that by the time she realised what was happening, it was pretty much too late to do anything about it. ‘That bloke Steve’s been asking after you, by the way,’ her brother said, when he phoned for a chat soon afterwards. Richie and Steve weren’t friends as such, but moved in overlapping circles. ‘He’s going to be down in London next weekend for Adam’s wedding. Want me to pass on your number?’
It had felt like one of those see-saw moments where a person’s future can tilt either up or down. Poised in the middle, Lara was scarcely able to balance for a few heady seconds in an agony of hesitation. Was the baby Steve’s or Ben’s? They’d both used condoms and Lara had never been one to keep on top of her cycle dates – she genuinely had no idea. But did that matter right now? Ever since she’d seen the pregnancy test stick, she’d been obsessing about how much she’d hated growing up without a dad (he’d walked out weeks after she was born; she had tried not to take it personally but, you know, it did make her wonder if there was something repellent about her even then). Conscious of the ache that came from a parent’s absence, shouldn’t she at least try and nobble a father for her unborn child?