Watching You: A Novel

At the end of the week, after a particularly rough day at work, Joey’s manager Dawn said, ‘Let’s go to the pub.’

Joey almost said no, she was skint and smelly and wanted to lie in the bath for two hours drinking Baileys and staring at the ceiling. But then she thought about Alfie and the way he kept looking at her as though he was wondering what she was thinking and remembered that he wasn’t working at the bar tonight and she decided that drinks with someone she barely knew and who, as far as she knew, had no interest in having a baby with her would be preferable.

They took along a boy from the Whackadoo café called Krstyan, who sat with his thumbs on his phone, taking rhythmic mouthfuls from a pint of lager and barely registering their existence. A few moments later Dawn’s wife Sam arrived with a friend of hers from work and then that friend’s friend joined them and chairs were procured from other tables and added to the small table where they’d started and soon there was quite a group of them, all pretty much strangers but all the better for it. Joey dealt with the strangeness of it by necking two vodka and tonics, and then a pint that someone bought for her without asking. The music in the background was loud and metal-based, the clientele mostly students and ageing rockers. The bar and the floorboards were painted lead black and a band was setting up in the back room where two lurchers sat with their heads on their paws looking as though they’d seen it all before and just wanted to go home.

‘I’m going to order some food at the bar,’ Dawn shouted over the music. ‘Do you want anything?’

Joey shook her head. ‘No thanks, I’m good.’ She was enjoying the sensation of alcohol hitting the empty pit of her stomach, the soft swirl of it, the redistribution of her psyche into more manageable chunks. She didn’t want to mop it up. Sam turned to Joey as Dawn made her way to the bar. She was a sweet-faced girl with pink-tipped hair and a pink stud in her nose who looked not much older than eighteen.

‘How are you getting on in the seventh circle of hell?’

‘Oh,’ said Joey. ‘Whackadoo?’

Sam blinked. ‘Indeed.’

‘It’s pretty grim,’ she said. ‘But Dawn’s a great boss. And sometimes it’s even a bit fun. How long have you two been married?’

‘Just over a year,’ said Sam. ‘And don’t worry. I’m older than I look. I’m actually twenty-seven. In case you thought I was some kind of child bride. How about you? Are you married?’

‘Yes,’ she said, still finding the concept strangely unlikely. ‘Yes, I am.’

‘How long for?’

‘Oh, just a few months, actually.’

‘Oh, bless. Have you known each other long?’

‘Ha! No. Also just a few months. It was a bit of a whirlwind.’

‘Wow,’ said Sam, ‘I wish you luck!’

And it was as she said this that Joey cast her gaze around the bar and her eye caught upon the back of the head of a man standing at the bar. A tall, well-built man with short dark hair, silver at the temples, wearing a rumpled work shirt with the sleeves pushed up. He turned, his large hands forming a triangle around three pints of beer, his mouth turned up into a wry smile and Joey froze.

It was Tom Fitzwilliam.

He carried the three pint glasses towards the room at the back of the pub and he rested them on a table in front of two men with beards and waistcoats, the ones with the lurchers. He pulled a chair across and joined them, his long legs slung effortlessly in front of him. His hand reached down briefly to touch the head of the dog nearest him. The younger of the two men said something and Tom Fitzwilliam tipped back his head and laughed.

Joey’s phone fizzed on the table in front of her and she pulled her gaze from Tom Fitzwilliam to her screen. It was a text from Alfie: When you coming home?

She started to compose a reply but could think of nothing to say so turned off her phone. When she glanced up again Tom Fitzwilliam was looking in her direction. Her heart pulsed hard for a second and her breath caught in her throat until she realised that he wasn’t looking at her, he was looking towards the door of the pub where two more men with beards had just arrived. All three men in the other room got to their feet to greet the new arrivals and more pints were bought and chairs moved about and dogs petted and hands shaken.

Dawn brought drinks back from the bar – a vodka and tonic for Joey. ‘It’s a double,’ she said with a wink. ‘You look like someone who wants to get blotto.’

Joey grinned and said, ‘You’re very observant.’

She drank it in the space of three minutes, during which Tom Fitzwilliam’s beardy friends had necked their own drinks and headed towards the stage where they started to pick up musical instruments and twang on guitar strings. The one in the beanie hat sat astride a squat stool behind the drum kit and rubbed a pair of drumsticks together. Tom Fitzwilliam’s friends were the band. The band, according to the decal on the bass drum, was called Lupine. How on earth, Joey wondered, did Tom Fitzwilliam, government-feted superhead, middle-aged dad, consummate suit-wearer, know a hairy rock band called Lupine?

‘Oh God,’ said Sam. She tipped her head in the direction of the back room. ‘Not this lot again.’

Joey looked at her curiously.

‘They were on last week as well. Bloody racket.’

Dawn looked up from her chicken pie and groaned. ‘Oh God, yeah. I remember them. Cats being tortured.’

‘Donkeys being murdered,’ agreed Sam.

‘With chainsaws,’ added Dawn.

‘Do you know them?’ Joey asked.

‘The band?’ said Dawn. ‘God no. But apparently two of them are teachers at the local comp. Geography teachers playing rock stars on their night off.’ She laughed. ‘Bit tragic really.’

Joey went to the ladies’ toilet. Like everything else in the pub, it was painted matt black and smelled of stale beer and old mops. Through the thin wall she could hear the rat-a-tat of snare drums, an isolated thwang of bass guitar. She took in her reflection in the mirror. She looked terrible. She searched her handbag frantically for lipstick, for a hairbrush, for a stub of black eyeliner. She fixed herself, fluffed out the dry bleached ends of her ponytail, studied herself again. She would do. She would have to.

Tom Fitzwilliam turned the corner towards the toilet just as she turned it going the other way. The narrow space was immediately filled with him, with the solidity of his existence. Joey’s first instinct was to squeeze herself small against the wall and give him space in which to pass. But his eyes were already on her and he was half smiling and he said, ‘Oh. I know you. I think … do I?’

She could have said, No, I think you are mistaken, grabbed her coat from her chair, said goodbye to everyone and left. But she did not. She stood straight and she returned his half-smile and she said, ‘I have a funny feeling we might be neighbours. I think I’ve seen you in the bar at the Melville.’

He folded his arms across his stomach and he made a show of appraising her and then he said; ‘Yes. I think that’s it. I remember you. You knocked over the leaflets.’

She smiled and her stomach roiled. He’d seen her. He’d noticed her. This big, important, handsome man. ‘That sounds like me,’ she said.

‘And if I’m not mistaken,’ he continued, ‘I’ve seen you in Melville Heights. Coming out of Jack and Rebecca Mullen’s place.’

‘Yes!’ she said. ‘Jack’s my brother.’

‘Wow. I had no idea! Not that I know Jack all that well. I’ve only spoken to him a handful of times.’

‘He’s great, isn’t he?’ she said. She often did this subconsciously, pre-empted the Jack-love.

‘He seems like a great guy, yes.’ But the way his eyes searched hers told her that he was more interested in talking about her than her perfect brother. ‘Are you here with friends?’

‘Yes. Well, sort of. I’m here with my boss and her wife and some other randoms.’ Joey paused. ‘Who are you here with?’

‘Ah, well, rather bizarrely I’m here with the band.’ He gestured behind them with his head. ‘I’m a teacher,’ he said, ‘over at the Melville Academy—’

Joey nodded, disingenuously, as though she had absolutely no idea who he was.

‘—and a couple of the teachers are in the band and they asked me along. So here I am. Not where you’d normally find me on a Friday night. But it seemed churlish to say no just because I’m old and I’d rather be at home watching Narcos.’

They both turned then as two women walked into the corridor and they held themselves tight against the wall to make room for them to pass. Tom’s hand pressed briefly against Joey’s leg and she thought, I knew this was going to happen.

They turned to each other and smiled.

‘Well,’ said Joey. ‘It was nice to—’ at the exact same moment that Tom said, ‘Are you going to watch the band?’

She paused to manage her response. There was intent there in those innocuous words. There was an invitation. An invitation she should ignore.

‘My friend says they sound like donkeys being murdered with chainsaws.’

Tom laughed. ‘Oh dear,’ he said conspiratorially. ‘I did have my suspicions.’ He smiled. ‘Well, unlike me, you’re free to leave. But if you do stay, come and say hello after and I’ll introduce you to the band.’

She smiled and nodded.

‘I’m Tom, by the way.’ He offered her his hand.

‘Hi Tom. I’m J—’ She stopped, for a split second. ‘Josephine.’

‘Josephine,’ he said. ‘What a beautiful name.’

Joey thought, I knew you’d like it. ‘Thank you,’ she said.

‘Lovely talking to you,’ he said.

Joey took her seat next to Sam and pretended to be listening to their conversation while keeping half an eye on the toilets. When Tom reappeared, he caught her eye and smiled. She pulled her phone from her bag and she replied to Alfie’s text.

Watching a band in town with Dawn and some friends. Be home in a couple of hours.