On The Market Chapter 10- It's complicated, a pride and prejudice fanfic

By mid-October Elisabeth was beginning to get used to being called Lizzie. She hated it, but she knew that to be given a nickname, any nickname, was an accolade. No one got anywhere in trading under their real name and even Andy, as it turned out, was known to his wife as Kevin. Will was either Boss or The New Guv'nor -and New he would remain until he retired or, hopefully, got sacked- while Neil had only graduated from Newbie to the equally offensive Jock since the even newer Newbie, from Essex, had started.

Hence Elisabeth counted her blessings to have ended up with something neither sexist nor Frenchist - just impossible to live up to.

She'd also grown used to dodging Mike's calls to her office line, to boiling pasta for two most evenings, and to using an extra egg for Sunday night pancakes: it turned out Tom's appetite for them was even bigger than Mac's. But just as things were beginning to settle down for her Mike cornered her, one Friday evening as she walked out of the building with Neil. There was no warning this time, so she was well past the turnstiles when he greeted her with a cheerful:

'Hi, darling! Thought I'd surprise you!'

Surprised she was, indeed. Not in a good way.

'Mike, this is Neil, one of the traders I've been working with since I got back. Neil, this is Mike.'

She said this confidently enough, though only to fill the silence. The two guys took each other in, exchanged pleased-to-meet-you's and then, to her utter dismay, Neil said he'd better get on, wished her a good weekend, and left through the revolving doors.

'Where shall we go?' Mike asked. 'How about some early dinner?'

Now that struck her as a very bad idea. She stared at him for a few seconds while she tried to think of an escape route. Objectively, Mike hadn't changed: he still was in every possible way a good, solid guy. His features were beyond reproach in a Viking sort of way: tall, broad, strong armed and strong handed, with vigorous dirty blond hair jutting out above his determined forehead, light blue eyes and the kind of creamy skin that tans brown at the mere hint of sunshine.

But today, with just a foot of physical space between them but at a distance of seven months, what she saw was the quantity of gel holding his hair in place, the open pores around his slightly thick nose, his full lips' tendency to droop a little on one side, and the sensible man-made fabric of his work suit.

'Uh, you know what, I had a late lunch,' she muttered, despite having skipped lunch altogether to make yoga at the gym. 'It's a bit early to eat anyway, isn't it? Let's just go for coffee or something.'

She started yomping out of the courtyard, hoping that she'd be able to avoid talking to him as long as she kept walking fast. But she felt him pull her right arm as soon as they got onto the pavement.

'Mike, let go!'

'Elisabeth, what's going on?' he asked, still holding on to her arm.

'Let go.'

'Please,' she added, trying to shake herself free.

He complied with a dramatic sigh, and used his free hand to push up his small wire-rimmed glasses. Oh dear, that normally announced a sermon, and tonight was no exception:

'Why are you being like this? You're just rude to me, and where were you when I came to pick you up last time?'

Elisabeth's skin crept. Here was another thing which hadn't changed about Mike: when he got angry he did not shout or swear as the traders did, he just started talking to her as if she were a naughty five year old. Sadly in that respect Elisabeth would probably never change either: that tone of voice still whipped her into a right fury.

A fury of the ancient, mythical kind. A fury on a really bad snake-hair day, hellbent on unleashing chaos:

'What last time?' she lied.

'Why are you being like this? Why are you ignoring me? You've not so much as asked me how I am,' he said with a long-suffering expression that was all too familiar. She tried for a deep breath in, and drew instead a shallow, exasperated one:

'How are you,' she said, making a petulant point of not sounding like she was using a question mark.

'I'm OK, thanks.'

She didn't move, or speak. She just glowered on – very much à la Kingsley-Darcy, come to think of it.

'I miss you, Elisabeth.'

'Oh,' she nodded, raised her eyebrows, chewed her lip and stared down at his shoes.

Same old pair of black Church's, she noticed. A bit more creased, he should get a new pair. Noticing these kind of things had always been her job in their relationship: Mike prided himself on his lack of sartorial vanity, and disapproved of spending a penny more than necessary on personal attire.

'Is that all you can say?' he asked.

He was finally sounding borderline angry. Though less annoying than his lecturing tone, it was also scarier.

'Mike I, hmmm…' she looked up at him, took a deep breath, and said: 'Look, what is it you want from me?'

She thought that in saying this, rather than "Please go away," she was making a huge effort, but Mike disagreed:

'Is it too much to ask for a bit of honesty? A bit of common decency and truth, a bit of an effort, for Christ's sake?'

'Hang on, what effort is it I'm not making? You've got the flat, haven't you? All I asked for was a bit of head space, so please give me that at least, OK?'

'But I didn't think it would be forever,' he said, and his bottom lip began to tremble.

She stared on at him but, to her great relief, she found that she did not give in to her old ways. Not only did she not pity him, she felt bold enough to bring up the touchiest of subjects:

'Well, I hear dear Caroline has all but moved into my side of the wardrobe anyway. I would have thought you two would be over the moon with me staying away.'

She'd tried for faux-innocence, but it turned out that even after seven months she was still unable to mention his sister without the most abject bitterness. Mike immediately picked up on it and perked up, and resumed his patient, patronising, infuriating tone :

'Elisabeth, I don't know what Charlotte's been telling you, but Caroline is only staying for a few weeks. Just until she goes off on her next trip.'

Tempting though it was to start an umpteenth argument about that blasted puppy, Elisabeth made a herculean effort to focus on Mike instead:

'Look, I'm sorry if I haven't been clear before: I'm not coming back. I'm sorry if you're not happy about it but I think it's the right thing to do. For both of us. I'm not coming back.'

She felt like such an ass stood there on the pavement with him. Dusk was coming, and with it a windy drizzle. It was absurd. He looked up at the rain, as if surprised by its arrival, then down, and pulled up the collar of his raincoat, still without looking at her. She could see his chest heaving as he stared at the speckles of water forming on the square concrete paving slabs underneath their feet.

'Elisabeth?' he asked, still staring at the pavement.

'Yes?'

'Elisabeth, couldn't we try again?' Mike said, looking up, 'At least try? I know things weren't right towards the end, but we can change! I have changed, I really have,' he said, but with a vehemence which belied every word, 'I've been doing a lot of thinking and I swear I will show you that...'

Elisabeth's eyes widened, and panic set in. She had to get away, she just had to. She shut her eyes and a Hawaiian beach flashed under her eyelids, while Mike went on and on about bright new beginnings. She opened her eyes again:

'Mike, we've got to move on,' she said, cutting him mid-flow, and making sure she spoke slowly and clearly while looking him straight in the eye. He would of course have called it rude, but she knew of no other way to fit a word in when he went on like that. And indeed he shut up long enough for her to hope he might have taken the hint, but no:

'I hear you, Elisabeth. And I agree! The old Elisabeth and Mike is no more, we must move on from that. But that does not mean that we have to move on separate paths!'

He joined his palms together to underline the subtle point about paths merging together.

'Mike, look, I really don't think that's a good idea, I...'

'Elisabeth, you feel this way now: you've been away a long time. But I know you, and I know that you will change your mind, that I can make you change your mind. I have changed, you will see, I will show you, and then…'

'Mike, stop it! STOP!' she shouted until he did, finally, stop. 'I'm not coming back, OK? I am moving on, and you should do the same.'

He gaped at her for a few seconds more, before looking down at the rain-splattered pavement again.

'Are you sure? Is that final?'

'Yes, yes it is. We can sort out the mortgage whenever you're ready, no hurry.'

She saw his jaw tense up: this, then, was the end. The end for him anyway. For her it had been over for a while. Her final act of charity, or so she thought, was to give him a few minutes to get used to the idea, though they were both getting increasingly wet.

'OK, OK then,' he said, looking back up. 'But answer me this and then I'll leave you alone, I promise.'

That sounded like a much more attractive proposition, if somewhat over-dramatically phrased. He was looking at a point about two inches to the side of her head now, blinking furiously as you do when the lenses of your glasses get too wet to see. She took her own glasses off and watched a rivulet of water run down the side of his cheek - not a tear, just rain, lots of it.

Just as she might have started to feel sorry for him he said:

'Is there someone else?'

The hackneyed phrase. The sad, bad, vaudeville cliché. To go out with someone for seven years, live with them for four, and end up like this. In a drizzle thick with spite and sleazy suspicion. He'd always been expert at piling the guilt on her, at being the victim. Over the tense last few months of their relationship he'd openly suspected her of sleeping with just about everyone in her team. He'd even asked her about Toad once, when he must have felt particularly sorry for himself.

OK, so he wanted to play that little game once more, for old times' sake? But of course, by all means. If that meant he'd really leave her alone, then it had to be worth a shot.

'Yes, actually. Yes there is,' she said, crossed her arms, and had another vision of the beach in Lahaina. This time she was walking out to sea, wearing a red two-piece suit and carrying a snorkel. This was not something she'd ever done in real life, she realised even as she pictured it, else she would have sunburnt after about ten minutes in the water, and come back out the colour of the two-piece suit itself. But in theory it was a really nice thought.

Meanwhile Mike swayed back, stunned, then nodded at her shoes and eventually, agonizingly slowly, he took his useless glasses off and looked back at her.

'I see.'

Really, and what did he see? There was no way he could see, because she was lying through her teeth. But it was a convenient exit route, and for once in her life she felt no compunction at being dishonest, despite the pain she could read in his eyes through all that heavenly water.

The pain she was knowingly putting there.

'Is it that guy I just saw?'

She frowned: it took her a moment to catch who he meant.

'Neil? No, it's not him.'

'Do I know him? Is it that Greek guy from your old team?' he asked again, in a trembling voice and matching hang-dog look.

'What?! No! Leave Kostas alone!'

'Sorry.'

'Save yourself the trouble, Mike, you don't know him.'

This was good. Good and easy. Spite was finally making it easy. No more pity, no hesitation, just pure Elisabethan ruthlessness, and almost certainly nothing but relief and jubilation tomorrow if she could but put an end to it tonight, and make him stay away for good. His pale blue eyes widened as he saw that she was not moved, that this time she was not faltering. He looked down, then back up again:

'What's his name? I won't ask anymore, I swear. I'll go, just tell me his name, so I can put a name to it, in my head.'

She let her arms unfold, hooked her thumbs in her coat pockets and felt, in the right one, her old copy of Moby Dick. She'd dug it out, still bulging with sand and sun-cream stains, a few days after Tom had moved in. She took a deep breath in, raised her chest, tilted her head to the right, and looked Mike in the eye.

'Tom: his full name is Thomas Wickham Lorcan George Reilly. So now you know, good bye, Mike.'

xxx

Her phone rang not ten minutes later. Charlotte of course.

She rang three times, but Elisabeth did not feel up to talking to her. Will had been a pain in the backside all day, refusing to see why she "couldn't just" now make her fabulous spreadsheet work for the whole of Europe overnight, or alternatively why she "couldn't just" have tradePad plugged in to the maze of Pimms' databases and the myriad of the bank's brokers, all ready to use by the end of next week. She tried to explain to him that this job had taken two über-geeks three months in New York but the lad simply had no patience. Well, he was only a trader.

At least since the Rheinland incident Will had started looking her in the eye when they were arguing, which was progress of a kind. Still, Elisabeth felt she'd had enough bickering in one day to last her a lifetime, and she didn't need Charlotte to give her a hard time too, however right she would be to feel sorry for Mike.

Back at the flat Elisabeth found the boys sat at either end of the sofa, picking at their guitars and giggling like a pair of girls. Such levity in Ben was rare enough to make Elisabeth hold back before she entered the lounge. She watched them play for a short while, as she'd often watched the twins play. I.e. very much as an outsider, albeit a benevolent one. Keen not to ruin their happy mood with her own less cheerful one, she attempted a quick exit but Tom stopped to look up at her as she passed the sofa.

'Hey, guys,' she said, her hand on the handle of the door to the corridor.

'Hello, Elisabeth!' they replied, looked at each other, giggled again, and went back to playing some strange riff, ending in an interrogative twang, then looked up at her again and burst out laughing. She opened the door to go and get changed.

'OK, OK, listen:' Tom started when she got back in. 'I think we've got an ode to your pancakes.'

'You do?'

They certainly seemed to enjoy eating them on a Sunday night, and sometimes on a Wednesday night too. Now they sang along to their absurd little riff, an air that started "Zab-a-zab zab, flip'em flat. Stack'em high and make them sweet,", carried on in the same silly alliterative vein for two verses, then stopped as abruptly as it had started, though not without having put a smile back on her face.

'What do you think?'

A bit like the fresco on the wall: she found it endearing, if perhaps not strictly speaking "good".

'Don't give up the day job yet – oh silly me, you don't have one!'

'I'll have you know I'm starting one on Monday, actually,' Tom retorted, and played a few desultory notes.

'Really? You won't know what's hit you.'

He shrugged.

'And when is it you're moving out to sunny Finsbury Park again?' she asked.

'Sunday why, are you that keen to see the back of me?'

'Don't be silly.'

'I can still come and stay though, right?' he said, looking at her only.

'Hmmm, not sure!' she said, and looked away at Ben, whose smile had vanished. 'Perhaps, in the interest of musical history-making, I'll take it upon myself to bear with it as best I can.'

'I'll miss you!' Tom said, grinning.

Typical: ostentatiously meaning both of them, and privately shooting her that look, the little flirt. And the worst part was, she could not help but smile back at him, though she knew full well how much Ben hated being witness to this sort of behaviour.

'Right, aren't you two supposed to be going out? Come on, clear out!' she shooed them. 'Have a nice evening!'

Yep, it was high time that Tom cleared out of the flat, and for good, she mused while catching up on the last few days' worth of dirty dishes. High time too for Mac to come back and get on with the housework.

And high time for Tom to stop rubbing Ben the wrong way with his shameless flirting. Sadly, Tom didn't seem ready or willing to try anything on beyond shameless flirting, which was getting more than a tad frustrating. Elisabeth had evolved an unspoken rule of only accepting every other invitation he extended for her to go out with him and Ben. It required considerable self-restraint on her part, but Ben seemed to cheer up the moment the two of them grabbed their jackets to go out without her.

The only other drawback of this strategy, beyond the toll it took on her willpower, was that Tom seemed to think she was playing hard to get, and to relish the challenge.

But then: why was she letting that get to her? He wasn't even what you could call dashingly handsome, far from it. He was more like the little pancake tune and the big fresco: a bit left-field but strangely endearing.

Her phone rang in her back pocket, and she pulled it out with a wet hand, forgetting to check who was calling:

'Elisabeth, what on earth is going on?' asked Charlotte.

This was no idle, general enquiry. Charlotte's tone demanded an explanation, but Elisabeth had not had time to work one out just yet:

'Not much, you know, doing the dishes... Hang on a sec while I dry my hands,' she said, and crooked her neck onto her phone while she found the towel.

'Oh don't get cute with me, Elisabeth! What's this I hear about a Tom?'

Elisabeth prepared herself for a chiding.

'When were you going to introduce me?!' Charlotte cried at the other end of the line, with so much excitement that Elisabeth let the tea towel drop to the floor to move the phone away from her ear.

'When was I going to introduce you?'

'Yes! So what does he do? Is he very handsome? How did you meet him? Is he from work? Is he one of the traders?'

'Hang on. Hang on hang on hang on,' said Elisabeth, confused. 'Aren't you calling to give me a hard time and feel sorry for Mike?'

'Naaaaaa, Colin's been on the landline doing that for over an hour. Sorry if your ears have been buzzing, hon! Where have you been anyway? Canoodling with Tom, I guess?'

'Nowhere... guess my phone must have been playing up,' Elisabeth lied. She hated lying to Charlotte. Over time, like every good friend she had learnt that there were things it was best not to be overly sincere about: things like her true opinion of Charlotte's current favourite coat, or the actual calorie content of the cream icing on carrot cake. But though Elisabeth would never have dreamt of lying to Charlotte about anything as big as a relationship before she now found herself considering just that course of action.

'I know, bloody things,' Charlotte said, 'iPhones are even worse, mine lost signal in bloody Selfridges again this afternoon!'

'Really?'

'So go on! Who is he?'

Elisabeth stared at the burn marks on the lino at her feet and pondered what to say next. Could she trust Charlotte not to tell Colin, not to tell her future husband, that she wasn't really going out with any Tom? Perhaps she could, but it would be torture. It would be like sitting Charlotte in front of the most gigantic sugar-frosty carrot cake and telling her not to touch it. She would do it, she was that good a friend, but she would hate every second. And even if she didn't intend to, she might let slip by accident, and then Colin would for sure go and tell Mike, and that didn't bear thinking about. Elisabeth had a flashback of Mike rambling on about honesty and changes and new beginnings: it sent a shiver down her spine.

'Look, Charlie,' she said, 'I haven't told you because it's a really new thing, and it's uh... it's really just casual for now. I mean I'm not even sure if I'm going to see the guy again.'

'Oh really?' said Charlotte, disappointed. 'Why, what's wrong with him?'

'It's uh, it's just... complicated.'

How lame.

In Elisabeth's experience people said "it's complicated" a lot, especially in soaps, when what they meant was that they didn't want to have to think too hard about the consequences of their actions, or face up to any kind of tough decision. She wasn't at all above enjoying a good soap, of course, but in the real world a fine analytical mind such as hers had never had very much patience for "it's complicated".

Charlotte, on the other hand, was a complete sucker for it: how convenient.

'Oh my god, really? Poor you!' she cried, and made Elisabeth blush with shame.

'Is there someone else?' Charlotte then whispered and Elisabeth, suspecting there might be as much curiosity as sympathy in the question, briefly stopped beating herself up. With a clearer conscience she now saw an opportunity to indulge Charlotte with a few suitably dark details, whilst indulging herself with a nod in truth's general direction:

'Well,' she sighed, 'I don't think he's quite over his ex, Sara. Actually he says so himself so you see, I just can't tell where it's going.'

There: she was back on the path of truth, if perhaps not of enlightenment. Charlotte let out a sympathetic sigh on the other end of the line.

'Do you think he's going to leave her for you?'

'I really have no idea.'

'I'm sure deep down he loves you but he's just not ready, he's still hurting, right?'

Elisabeth blessed the telephone as she beamed at the fresco in front of her. If Charlotte could see her now, she'd be done for.

And if Tom could hear this! Hear of his burning, tortured love for Sara reduced to such … triteness? She thanked him for equipping her with the word, and soaps for making it so easy to lead Charlotte along. It was wrong to do so, of course, and Elisabeth did feel bad about it, but she reminded herself that she was only lying to save her best friend from having to lie on her behalf. Surely that was alright?

No, it wasn't just alright. It was the only decent thing to do:

'I guess, it's really hard to tell with Tom sometimes,' she muttered in the end.

'Oh you poor thing! But don't be down about it, darling, it'll be fine, you just need to give him time, you know? Give him time to accept his true feelings for you.'

Now for all her guilt Elisabeth couldn't help but smile: Tom, "accept his true feelings for her"? Gobbledegook, he would say, and laugh.

No, not in her wildest fantasies did she flatter herself that Thomas Wickham Lorcan George Reilly faced any kind of internal struggle with his urge to flirt with her. And do it very well indeed.

'You poor poor poor thing, but you'll be all right!' Charlotte said again, misinterpreting Elisabeth's silence.

'Hey, don't you feel sorry for me!' Elisabeth said, jumping at the chance to close the subject: 'I told you, it's nothing serious anyway. Just a bit of fun, don't worry about me, OK?'

'You sure?'

'Yes. I am, I'm absolutely fine,' said Elisabeth truthfully: by far the worst thing about her relationship with Tom right now was having to lie to her best friend about it. And what a best friend:

'Should I invite him to the wedding then?' Charlotte asked, at which not even Elisabeth could reason herself out of feeling terrible.

'Oh thanks, that's so generous of you, Charlie. But I'm not sure Colin would agree and don't worry, I don't think Tom and I are quite there yet anyway.'

'You sure?'

'Definitely sure.'

'Just let me know when you are, then! Ooooh I'm so excited!'

Elisabeth blushed with shame and briefly considered backpedalling. No no, much easier to wait a couple of weeks, until Mike was used to leaving her alone, and then just tell Charlotte she'd split up with Tom again. Much easier all around, much more sensible.

'Hmmm, don't be too excited. I mean, not yet. And how's the wedding going then? Is that what you were at Selfridges for?'

Thankfully Charlotte took the bait.

Who knew lying was so exhausting?

xxx

Come eight o'clock the next day Elisabeth was even more shattered. Why oh why had she decided to take Dan and Sophie out? Oh that's right: Jane was so knackered she could barely function, and since Vincent was too busy catching up with the cricket on Sky to cut her a break, Elisabeth had stepped in and sent her upstairs for a nap. Not without much protestations on Jane's part, of course, but she had.

By Saturday evening Elisabeth had found then put on two little pairs of wellies, done up the buttons of two raincoats (Boden naturally, the weekend uniform of the North London middle class child), retrieved one hat (easily) then taken her own boots off, and found the other hat three floors up, on a teddy bear's head. She'd put her shoes back on, her jacket on, closed the door behind her, walked three paces, walked back three paces, re-opened the door, taken her jacket and shoes back off, taken off one pair of wellies and one coat, lifted a dress, pulled down a pair of little tights, wiped a little bottom, and put all of it back on, then set off for the Heath at snail pace in the rain, then popped back in to fetch the two boxes of organic raisins she'd forgotten on the heater cover in the corridor the second time she'd left the house, then set off a third time, frozen half to death while watching the twins mud sling for 45 minutes until complete nightfall, then stripped them naked in the hall, then taken her shoes and jacket off, run a bath, washed and rinsed two delightful blond curly heads to a screeching duet of protestations, dried them, lathered them (against their will and despite much wriggling) in organic-fragrance-free-non-animal-tested-baby-lotion (not unlike fighting a recalcitrant octopus), bundled them into their White Company PJs (night-time uniform of the North London etc.), rinsed the bath and toys, as promised to Jane, started a washing machine of muddy clothes while boiling pasta, chopped the cucumber and tomatoes, served tea, cleared tea, wiped the organic-no-sugar-added-strawberry-yogurt off the highchairs, table, floor, and, worryingly, the lounge's DVD player, read three stories (in French), had a shower, changed into her own PJs, and sat down on the front room sofa for about 30 seconds before remembering to get up and put the laundry out.

So as her head hit a crease-free, high thread-count pillowcase in the bijou guest room, Elisabeth congratulated herself on having gone to bed early the previous night rather than out with Ben and Tom. Next she wondered how on earth Jane ever did all this while holding down a job and being pregnant. But to do this while holding down a job, fighting Toad to make MD next year, and getting up three times a night to feed one or possibly more newborns that was, well, probably outside the realm of the possible.

Soon however, tiredness got the better of Elisabeth's concern for her friend. She fell into a deep sleep, dreaming of swimming in a red bikini.

The next morning, like every Sunday, as if fatherhood had never happened to him, Vincent took off to go and play football, leaving his sister to empty the twins' potties while his wife tried, and failed, to keep down the posh dinner he'd treated her to the previous night. Not for the first time, Elisabeth was struck by the unfairness of the arrangement. Keen though she was to get back home, she waited until Vincent got back from footie, read him the riot act, and did not leave until he had called around a number of posh country spas, and booked a weekend away for his wife and his sister on his own credit card.