‘What?’ Jude said.
‘The baby bird. And she’s not there now, so she must have flown away, either back to the nest or somewhere else, I’m not sure. But Frazz definitely hasn’t eaten her because he’s been in the pub all afternoon. Anyway, how was your day?’
‘Amazing,’ he said. ‘I sat in on a consultation with a group of factory workers who were going to be laid off, and it looks like we’ll reach a compromise to save their jobs. That’s fourteen families who’ll still be bringing in an income. I feel like I’m really making a difference, and I’m learning all the time. I just can’t wait to be able to get my teeth into some actual work, if that makes sense, rather than just observing and shadowing.’
‘And you must be making useful contacts,’ I suggested, pouring myself some more wine. ‘I mean, I know it shouldn’t be who you know rather than what you know, but it’s like that everywhere, isn’t it?’
Jude brightened. ‘I’ve been invited to a meeting of the Alliance for Labour Liberty tomorrow and a meeting of the Workers’ Liberty League the next day. And I’m having a beer with some guys from the Revolutionary Workers’ Alliance next week.’
I couldn’t help giggling. ‘Isn’t that just like the scene in the Monty Python film, with the Judean People’s Front and the People’s Front of Judea?’
‘I don’t watch that film any more,’ Jude said. ‘It’s horribly transphobic.’
‘Oh. I suppose it is. But they do sound just the same, don’t they? How do you know which is which?’
‘It’s perfectly simple. The Alliance for Labour Liberty is a socialist collective, aimed at changing the party machinery from within. The Workers’ Liberty League is a grassroots Marxist organisation and the RWA are – obviously – revolutionary Maoists.’
He carried on explaining, and I listened carefully. I knew that what he was saying was important, and I ought to know this stuff already. But I couldn’t stop my mind wandering a bit. I remembered how panicked I’d felt about the baby bird, and how calmly Adam had dealt with the situation. I wondered what would have happened if he hadn’t been there – it didn’t bear thinking about. I imagined the little fledgling, out there somewhere in the night, hopefully safe in the nest with its parents.
‘So you should come along,’ Jude was saying, snapping my mind back to the present. ‘There’s a speaker from the Green Party and someone from the Climate Coalition. It should be really interesting.’
‘Uh… sorry, when was this again? I’ll have to check if I can get time off.’
‘Next Wednesday. Indigo’s going to be there. She was just texting me now.’
So that was what he’d been doing, staring so intently at his phone. Texting Indigo. I felt a hollow pit of anxiety forming in my stomach, and had to remind myself that I was meant to be fanning the flames of passion between us and not stifling him.
‘Sure, I’d love to come.’ If I was honest, I’d rather have done something with just Jude and me. But if the options on offer were Jude, Indigo and me or just Jude and Indigo, I knew what I was going to pick. ‘Would you like more chilli?’
Jude drained his beer and yawned. ‘I’m all good. And shattered. I’m going to shower and hit the sack.’
I cleared up our plates and went to collect Frazzle from the bar, gave him his dinner (which he was unenthusiastic about, whether because he was still sulking about the baby bird or because he’d been fed scraps by too many of the pub regulars, I couldn’t tell) and hung the final load of washing on the airer to dry. When Jude had finished in the bathroom I got ready for bed and slid under the duvet next to him.
‘Come here.’ He held out his arms and I edged closer, leaning my head against his chest and breathing in the clean smell of him. He kissed me and I felt the now-familiar beginnings of caresses as his fingers moved from my back around to my breasts. But instead of the flickering of desire that would ignite and grow until it consumed me completely, I felt something else.
I couldn’t put a name to it at first. It was like although my skin was warm under the bedcovers and warmer where Jude’s hands were, inside me was all cold. I remembered the last time we’d had sex, two or three nights before, and how, like almost every time, it had been over almost before it had even begun. I remembered taking Jude’s hand afterwards and guiding it gently between my legs, and waiting. And how he’d stroked me for a few seconds, casually, not really taking any notice of my response, before kissing me, telling me he loved me and I was beautiful and amazing, and then rolling over and going to sleep.
I knew that was what would happen again this time. I knew I had to talk to him about it, but I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, and how on earth could you tell a man that sex with him wasn’t working without hurting his feelings, exactly? If I hurt him, I might lose him, and then what? But the thought of what was going to happen in the next few minutes – the growing surge of desire and then the disappointment and resentment I’d feel when it was over for him and also for me, way before I was ready for it to be – and the prospect of that happening over and over and over again, and me being powerless to ever change it, was awful.
I knew what I was feeling, I realised, as he moved on top of me. It was dread. I remembered the message the Stargazer app had sent to me that morning, and I felt totally seen.
‘Jude, I’m too tired,’ I said. ‘Not tonight, okay?’
The next morning, feeling horrendously guilty for some reason I didn’t quite want to pin down, I got up early and silently, careful not to wake Jude, showered and went downstairs to the dark, silent pub. The cleaners had recently left, I could tell, because the smell of bleach was still hanging in the air, overlaying the smells of long-dead fires, beer and varnished wood, which were so familiar to me now I barely noticed them.
I let Frazzle out into the garden, then glanced into the kitchen and saw that everything was in order, ready for Robbie and me to start the day. There was the bread to prove, the breakfast pastries to bake, a vegetable delivery coming at nine and a vat of stock to reduce. But there was no hurry for any of that; no urgency. It was only six thirty and I could enjoy half an hour of blissful solitude with a coffee.
Every day used to be like this, I remembered, back when it was just me and Frazzle. I’d imagined that the rest of my life might end up being the same way, and even embraced the idea. But now, I’d got used to sharing my space with Jude – well, used-ish. However crowded the tiny flat might sometimes feel, whatever doubts were threatening to grow in my mind, there was no doubt that having another person in bed with me was reassuring; that I was only starting to realise that I hadn’t just been alone, but also lonely.
I carried my mug over to a table by the window, pulled up the cheerful orange-and-green-striped blind and sat down. The street outside was just beginning to get busy. Early commuters hurried past on their way to the station, laptop bags slung over their shoulders and phones clamped to their ears. A lorry rumbled by on its way to deliver an order to the Sainsbury’s supermarket down the road. The woman who owned the florist a few doors down parked her neon-pink van on a double yellow line, jumped out and began unloading armfuls of blooms and foliage. As I watched, the sun emerged over the rooftops opposite, and the street was suddenly flooded with light.