Lessons in Love. Kate Lawson

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СКАЧАТЬ soon as she can pull herself out from under Simon, by the sounds of it.’

      Jayne lifted an eyebrow but didn’t comment. ‘Well, when you’ve got it sorted out, ask Gary to get the guest room ready. He adores company.’

      Jane looked round the elegant office with its view out over the garden, the lake, the deer. ‘No. No, actually I think I’ll tell her I’m too busy at the moment. I’ve never been a lucky penny before. And, to be frank, I’m not sure I’m ready for Simon, my mother and the whole Tantric sex conversation.’

      Jayne laughed. ‘Fair enough, but please, use the place as if it was your own. If you want her to come and stay, well, it’s up to you. Meanwhile, what I suggest you do is go through the sites while I go and get us some coffee; they’re all bookmarked. Get a feel for what the companies do and sell and handle. Ray can help you with anything you don’t understand, and he knows which fork to use, even under pressure.’

      Jane looked at the screen. ‘If you’ve already got Ray why do you need me?’

      Jayne paused thoughtfully. ‘I don’t know. In theory you’re absolutely right, I could have stepped away from all this months ago—but I had this feeling that the time wasn’t right, that it wasn’t the moment but that I would know when to go. The other day when you turned up, it felt like some sort of sign. You having the same name—oh, I don’t know, I just had a feeling, and like I said, over the years I’ve learned to trust my instincts, at least where business is concerned, so I feel like now is just perfect.’

      ‘And while I’m busy trying not to ruin all this for you what are you going to be doing?’ asked Jane.

      ‘I want to make sense of what I missed first time around.’

      ‘And what was that?’

      ‘How would I know if I missed it?’ Jayne laughed. ‘OK, I suppose I was about your age; I’d done all kinds of dead-end jobs, saving furiously, saving up to travel. And then…’ She paused.

      ‘And then?’

      ‘Well, I was backpacking with a guy named Andy Turner. I suppose it was in the early eighties. Anyway, we were sitting on a beach in Kos, sharing a couple of bottles of beer. Andy had built a fire out of driftwood and there was the sound of waves washing against the shore, night sounds, but otherwise we could have been the only two people on the planet. It was getting cold and I remember leaning back against him to keep warm and he put his jacket around me and then his arms. And as we watched the sun set over the ocean, as the light faded into this soft peach and purple glow he said, “Jayne, I want to ask you something.”

      ‘I knew what he was going to say. He held me closer. I can still remember looking over my shoulder and seeing the reflection of the fire in his eyes, and then he asked me to marry him.’

      Jayne sighed. ‘It has to have been the most romantic moment in my whole life, and then all of a sudden that wasn’t what it felt like at all. Suddenly I could see this path stretching out in front of me. Andy’s mum knew my mum—we’d grown up within a few miles of each other, been to the same school, had the same friends. And you know what? I panicked. I couldn’t breathe. I just thought that there had got to be more to life than this—more than getting married and living a mile away from my mum and dad, taking turns to go round for Sunday lunch, and having kids and—and the sun set in the ocean. And he said, “So what do you think?” And I said, “No.”’

      ‘Wow.’ Jane stared at her. ‘And is that what you want to go back to, to that moment?’

      ‘Good God, no,’ said Jayne, heading towards the door, the moment broken. ‘I’ll go and get the coffee.’

      ‘Oh,’ Jane said, ‘but it sounds so romantic. I thought you meant that you loved him and you wished you had married him and lived happily ever after, raising small Andy Turners a few miles from your mum and dad.’

      Jayne shook her head wistfully. ‘No—no, but there is a part of me that wishes I had been strong enough to say, yes I love you but I’m not ready to settle down yet and I need to explore some more—maybe we both do and how about we do it together? But things were different back then, or at least they were where I came from. I grew up in a little village near Ely, where, if you weren’t engaged by the time you were sixteen they thought there was something wrong with you. My mum was convinced that I was on the shelf by the time I was twenty. And Andy wouldn’t have seen it as a positive thing at all. He would have thought I was rejecting him, fobbing him off.’

      ‘And were you?’

      ‘No, looking back I don’t think so. I just wanted more than what my mum and dad had settled for. It’s so much easier now but then it was still a struggle for someone like me: a working-class woman, trying to build a business. And the other thing was, if I’m honest, I wasn’t sure then that Andy was the one. I thought I’d be able to find just as much love somewhere else. And you know what?’ She paused, her smile faltering just a fraction. ‘I never did.’

      ‘Oh, Jayne.’

      Jayne waved the words away. ‘Don’t. It was entirely my own fault. I had it, I knew it, and I threw it away.’

      ‘So what happened to Andy?’

      ‘We carried on travelling together till the end of the trip and then when we got back he went off to a job in Manchester. We vaguely agreed that we’d travel together again sometime but I think we both knew we wouldn’t. Last time I saw him was when I was waving him off at Euston. Ten minutes later I headed across London to Liverpool Street, went home and started my first business. Monday, the eighteenth of April 1983.’

      ‘As?’

      ‘Owner, only employee and chief cyclist of Sandwich City. Firms would ring their orders in before eleven thirty everyday and I’d pedal like hell round Cambridge to all kinds of offices and shops, with rolls and homemade soup in the winter, salads and stuff in the summer. With the profit I put a down payment on a house and converted it into flats for students.’ Jayne grinned. ‘My mum and dad thought I was totally mad but I just knew that it would work—and I wanted to be free and thought if I worked hard and got rich it would give me my freedom, give me choices, let me buy nice things.’

      ‘And did it?’

      ‘Most certainly it did. I built up the sandwich business, franchised it, sold that on. Met Ray—bought more houses. For the first few years it felt like Monopoly for real. I still get a buzz out of watching when it goes right.’

      ‘And Andy?’

      Jayne sighed. ‘You know, I don’t know. I suppose without meaning to, he got lost in the rush. At first we spoke a few times on the phone. He’s still in Manchester somewhere, an accountant. Happily married, probably, two point four children. God, he might even be a granddad by now. Lots of times I’ve thought about looking him up, contacting him. I mean, how hard would it be? And yet I can’t quite bring myself to do it.’

      ‘Why not?’

      ‘Oh, I don’t know. I’ve moved on, years have gone by. In my head he is still tall, blond, tanned and gorgeous. What if he’s bald now—or fat? What if I made a terrible mistake back then? What if he never got over me? Worse still, what if he did?’

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