I picked up my bag and turned away.
The other staff were staring at me, agog, but lowered their eyes when they saw me glaring at them. The office was hushed as I walked through, my face burning, my heart pounding. As I shut the door behind me I heard an explosion of angry voices.
So, it might be better to look somewhere else for a job.
CHAPTER 12
Ruby
My mistake was going from the recruitment agency straight to the letting agency, where with increasing desperation I was taken to view a number of flats.
My home with Tom had been lovely, even if it didn’t always feel like mine. I’d lived there with him for twelve years and in that time we’d worked hard on it. Every room was freshly decorated. Paintings hung on the walls, soft rugs lay on the oak floors, and everything was clean and comfortable and warm. Josh came to visit a couple of times a week, but even he didn’t make much mess. Before I married Tom I’d lived in my own apartment, a stylish minimalist place whose huge windows overlooked the skyline of Liverpool. I’d loved living there; there was a crowd of us in our twenties who had apartments in the area and there was always someone to go out for drinks or a lazy Sunday brunch with. Those friends were long gone. Some had moved abroad and it was inevitable we’d lose touch, but others had disappeared after I married Tom.
Before I went to the letting agency, I bought coffee in a small café, hoping I wouldn’t bump into anyone I knew. I was still humiliated from the conversation with Kourtney. I knew she must have had a complaint from Sheridan’s, but had they really told her about our affair?
I desperately wanted to talk to Harry, but I forced myself not to call him. He was the one person whose advice I valued, yet he had let me down so badly.
When I’d finished my coffee I checked my bank balance on my phone. I needed to know how much I could spend on rent. Without a job I’d struggle to get somewhere anyway. I was close to tears at that thought. I opened my banking app and my jaw dropped. Tom had put £5,000 in my account. It made me realize that I’d had no idea how much he had in savings. Was this a lot to him? It was to me; I had virtually nothing in the bank. How much did he have?
I sent Tom a message:
Thanks for putting that money in my account.
Immediately he responded.
That’s fine. Let me know if you get stuck. Come round to the house when you can; we need to talk about the sale x
I slid my phone into my pocket. I had a horrible feeling that if I had to go back to my house, I’d want to stay there.
* * *
• • •
I couldn’t believe how expensive it was to rent. I hadn’t rented since my early twenties and then I lived in house shares. I wasn’t going to do that now; I needed my own space.
Pretty quickly I remembered why I used to share a house; it’s so much cheaper than having your own place. The rental prices anywhere decent were high. I needed to get a job and a new home fast. I couldn’t live in the hotel for much longer. I had to get something, no matter what it was like.
For the first time in years, money was absolutely the priority. The cheaper, the better, I thought, until I saw what cheaper would get me. I flinched at the photos of some of the apartments, at the flimsy front doors; the cheap, unstable furniture; the stained and worn carpets.
I didn’t know what to do. Should I buy furniture? Surely I could have some from the house. When it was sold, Tom would move into a smaller place. He wouldn’t need all of the furniture. And some of it was mine, too. I wondered whether he’d let me have that back.
I decided to look only at furnished apartments; I needed to move in immediately. And of course, just as I expected, the issue of my not having a job came up.
“Name of employer?” Gill, the woman at the letting agency, asked. I froze. She saw me hesitate and added grimly, “So that we can write to them to ask them to confirm your employment.”
Frustrated, I said, “I’ve just finished a long-term contract. I’m looking around for work now.” I crossed my fingers. “It won’t take long.”
“I’m sorry. Most of these landlords will only let to employed tenants.”
I stared at her. “That’s disgraceful!”
“Not really. They need to be sure you can pay the rent.”
I thought of the money Tom had put into my bank. “I can pay the rent. That’s not a problem.”
“Very well,” she said coolly. “You’ll have to pay six months’ rent in advance and a deposit against damages.”
“How much do you think I’ll have to pay per month?”
She shrugged. “Most of the one-beds go for around six or seven hundred a month. Before bills, of course.”
Frantically I made calculations in my head. “I can put six months’ rent down now, but I want a monthly contract. I don’t want to pay rent if I’ve got somewhere else to live.”
“There’s no point in you trying to write your own rules. The courts have no power to make a tenant leave until six months are up, so you won’t find a landlord who’ll give you a contract for less than that.” Gill must have seen the wave of panic that flooded me then, because she softened and spoke more kindly. “Look, if you sell your house and want to move out of the flat early, I’ll put in a good word for you. You’d lose your deposit, but they’d probably let you go.”
* * *
• • •
By the time we reached the fifth flat I was ready to take anything. Gill parked her car just off the main road. I got out and looked around. There was a row of a dozen or so shops and the area was tidy and well kept.
“The flat’s up above the florist’s shop on the corner,” said Gill. “I’ve placed people there before and everything’s been fine.”
“Is it safe around here?”
“As safe as anywhere,” she said. “In the daytime all these shops are open, of course, but it’s a quiet enough place at night. It’s not the sort of place where you’ll have trouble with people hanging around.”
“Are there other flats in the building?”
“No, these shops have just one flat above each of them.” The front door was on the side road, around the corner from the shop entrance, and Gill pulled out a key ring and opened the door. Inside there was a small hallway and a set of stairs leading up to the flat. An unadorned lightbulb hung from the ceiling and she flicked the switch before we both went upstairs. In the dim light the stairs looked gloomy and the thick carpet was covered in a fine layer of dust.