Alison's the Sensible One Read online

  “Um, yes...you’re just over the partition. And across from me is the records room.” She had finally got out from behind the desk. “It’s locked, our records manager is one of our consultants and comes in once a week to check on things. The next door, just across from you is the server room, the IT guy is one of our consultants too, same arrangement.”

  “You, Susan, records, IT, me.” Lucy pointed at the desks and doors in turn. “I am right. I knew I was. You’re just like he said.”

  “Like who?” Alison faltered for a moment, a strange feeling twisted in her stomach, before recalling the earlier question. “Do you know John?”

  “Do you know John’s ex wife?” Lucy countered.

  “I’ve met her a couple of times but I wouldn’t say we know each other well.” She frowned but ploughed on with the tour. “Behind your desk is Reggie’s office. You’ll be looking after him. He’s been away for a week so I’m sure he’ll have lots -”

  “I haven’t met her yet and I’m terrified about it, you can’t imagine.”

  “Terrified.” Alison’s voice came out squeaky.

  “She doesn’t visit much but I’ve always managed to duck out just before she turns up even though I’m dying to meet her after all this time, such an interesting woman and affectionate mother.” Lucy was watching her face far too closely.

  “I’m sorry.” Alison couldn’t stand it anymore, and asked in as measured a tone as she could manage, “How do you know her?”

  “Oh didn’t I mention that part?” Lucy was acting too innocent. “I live with her son.”

  “I’ve only met Robbie a couple of times—”

  “Oh no! Not Robbie silly. Eddie.” There was triumph in Lucy’s voice, they had finally reached the part she was waiting for.

  “Ed—Edward.” Alison attempted to collect herself, bracing her hand on Charlotte’s—Lucy’s—desk, her watch slid down to meet her hand. “You live with Edward?” She was impressed how calm and disinterested she sounded.

  “Oh yes, I’m sure he talks about me all the time although maybe not in front of his father being how he’s not a fan of men and women living together unmarried.” This made no sense. John was living in sin himself and hadn’t worried about Alison living with George.

  There was a pause while Alison thought how to answer this. She shoved her watch back up her wrist, raised her arm towards the kitchen, opened her mouth and—

  “You knew Ed when he was a teenager didn’t you? You can tell me all about his awkward phase.”

  “Maybe some other time.” Like never. Alison gestured around the office and then indicated that Lucy lead the way.

  “Oh! Of course.” She started walking backwards, Alison wished Lucy would turn around or just go the hell away. “Work, work, work. Ed tells me how dedicated you are to your job. Can you help me though? I really have no idea what to do.”

  “Charlotte’s left a deskfile. This is the kitchen and the boardroom is across the hall. It’s hardly ever used. There’s usually just the four of us here. A varied roster of contractors pop in from time to time but mostly they’re on assignment outside of the office.”

  “Like building contractors?”

  “Like finance, policy and strategy, legal, you name it. Katherine has, um, had, the perfect person who was willing to drop whatever they were doing to work for her.” Partly from respect, partly from fear, partly from the inability of anyone to say no when she asked.

  They ended up back at Lucy’s desk. Charlotte's list was missing but a short search found it in a drawer.

  Alison escaped from Lucy fifteen minutes later by the expedient of going to the bathroom. Friday, her life had been so different. She had called the venue and the caterers to check that everything was ready for the party. She’d helped toast Katherine. She was busy, she was happy. On Friday there were exciting things in the future. Today, she felt lost. The bottom had fallen out of her world. She wanted to cry and scream and kick things but in five minutes she’d have to go back out there and play nice. She didn’t think she could manage both.

  She took a deep breath and met her eyes in the mirror. There were bags under them from a busy weekend and an early morning. Had she always looked like this? She couldn't remember the last time she’d looked in the mirror, examined herself. There were always too many other things to think about. Presenting herself as capable was more important than appearing attractive. Edward, who she’d thought was above such things, had chosen a woman based on her looks because, let's face it, there apparently wasn’t much else to her.

  Realising she was staring at herself in the bathroom mirror she smiled at her reflection. Brown hair, brown eyes, just average. Not small enough for the guys that liked “normal” girls; not big enough for the chubby chasers. No. Her smile faded. She would have chosen Lucy over herself too.

  Chapter 4

  “You can’t judge a book by its cover.”

  Alison looked up, startled. How long had Margaret been there? Were they in the middle of a conversation?

  “It’s the title of my English assignment,” Margaret continued, unaware Alison was trying to pull herself back to reality. “I have to critique a cover of one of the three assigned novels and design a new one. I was thinking maybe you could help me. You used to do art, didn’t you?”

  Alison had started drawing Lucy without realising, lines on a page had became a jawline, a cheek bone, she had excellent bone structure. A pen wasn’t satisfactory so she’d found a pencil in the stationery cupboard. It felt better in her hand, more solid—she could shade and smudge. The pencil had migrated home with her.

  “I haven’t,” Alison replied, pushing her sketch away, “—not since I left high school. But sure, I’ll help you.”

  “I was thinking maybe I could design it and you could draw it for me? It’ll be so much better than everyone else’s - they’ll be making them on the computer. But this will be something real.” Margaret examined the picture of Lucy. “This looks real. Who is she?”

  “No one.” Alison flipped the sketch face down, it was a good likeness. “I might be a little rusty. I’m not sure if it’ll be much good.”

  “I think that was good.” When Alison didn’t say anything she added, “You used to draw for me. I remember.”

  “You remember that?” Alison was touched.

  Margaret nodded. “Before I started school. I’d paint at kindy then I’d come home and tell you about what I’d painted and you’d draw it for me. Sometimes right on top of my painting. I thought it was magic.”

  Alison didn’t know how to respond. Margaret was looking at her, expecting an answer. She remembered a small child’s smile, the feeling of creating something together.

  “I want a woman for my cover,” Margaret said finally. “That’s as far as I’ve got.”

  “I’ll go look for my sketch books,” Alison said, running away from her sister’s open admiration.

  It was lucky that when Alison had returned home, several months earlier, her room was just as she left it. She had moved her things back—the bookshelf and the books it contained, her clothes; the bed had remained. No posters had ever graced the walls, the closest had been a study schedule, first for high school then university. The walls were neutral as they were throughout the house to make a cohesive space, the curtains were blue on the solitary window.

  On the top shelf at the back of her wardrobe she found them. The books were filled with sketches of her father. Alison selected the portfolio containing her various attempts at portraits; miniatures, half-lengths, whole-lengths, pencil, crayon, and watercolours had all been tried in turn. She had always wanted to do everything, the creativity pulling her along several paths at once. No great variety of faces as she had only her own family to study. There was her father—another of her father—again, and again, and again. He would sit whenever she asked.

  She moved the pictures of her father to one side and sorted through the rest. She would look again, later, when Margaret wasn’t waiting f
or her.

  As the week progressed, and Alison spent more time with Lucy, drawing her became an obsession. She would hardly listen to the things coming out of Lucy’s mouth, sketching the movements in her mind, reducing her to pencil drawings. Unintentionally she realised that Lucy was the woman on the cover of Margaret’s book. You couldn’t see her face but the body shape, the way she stood, was all Lucy.

  Margaret was exacting. “Not so skinny. I want her to look like a real person who could just walk off the page, none of this idealised stuff everyone else will be doing.”

  Alison smirked and decided there was no point enlightening her sister that the subject was a real woman.

  “It’s a shame that Edward doesn’t like art.”

  Alison paused. Margaret couldn’t know who she was drawing, there was no way she could know. “Doesn’t like art. What makes you say that? He doesn’t draw or paint, but he likes seeing others work. I think he would’ve drawn well, given the chance. He distrusts his judgment so much, that he’s unwilling to give his opinion on any picture.”

  Margaret hovered but said nothing else.

  “I hope, Marg,” continued Alison, “you don’t think he’s completely devoid of taste?”

  “I don’t know him as well as you do obviously. I know he’s a good,” she struggled for an adjective, “... kind person.”

  Alison snorted. “That’s high praise, especially from you.” She bent back over her sketch, a new shape forming. “He’s just shy and Mary-Anne talks so much she monopolises the conversation around here. We’ve spent a lot of time together over the years; he’s intelligent and funny, he reads a lot.” She was rattled, trying to absorb herself in her drawing to avoid the conversation, she didn’t think how these words could be taken.

  “He’s even kind of cute, don’t you think?” Margaret asked.

  “I’ve never really thought about it,” she said dismissively, trying to focus, hoping to end the topic.

  “I think you think he is.”

  Alison started at this declaration. She looked up but Margaret had her eyes fixed on the picture Alison was drawing. She looked down. It was Edward.

  “I like him.” She wished she could turn the sketch over. At least this wasn’t the final. “I love him, as—as a brother.”

  “As a brother.”

  “What was it you said the other day about incest?” Alison rallied. “Believe what you like Marg. He’s been part of our family for eight years, it’d be awkward and don’t you think that if something were going to happen between us it would have already?”

  “Anyone can see that he likes you.” Margaret was eager. “Mary-Anne has a theory that the two of you have been continuing on behind our backs.”

  Alison was tempted to ask when Mary-Anne had said this as she'd locked herself in her room all week. Instead she laughed along but she was far from convinced of Edward's liking her, though her sisters considered it certain. The more time they'd spent together, the more she doubted his feelings; and sometimes, for a few painful minutes, she believed it to be no more than friendship. Now she didn't know what to believe.

  Alone in her room she laid the pictures of her father across the bed. The images tracked the course of his illness; he became thinner, cheeks hollowed, shoulders curved. She sorted them chronologically. There he was well, and well again, then he looked somehow less himself, they continued on. His watch, the one she now wore, became looser on his wrist. She had kept every picture of her father, he looked alive even when he was dying.

  The burden of knowing about her father's illness, of being the only one who knew, of sharing the secret with him, had eaten away at her as surely as the cancer had eaten him. There were days when she wished she didn’t know, when she knew that ignorance was bliss. She had silently grieved for him as she supported him through the process and when he finally succumbed to the cancer ravaging his body her grief remained silent. Her mother and sister fell apart—she had to be the strong one. Once, Mary-Anne had accused her of being heartless. Mary-Anne who right now was shut up in her room, refusing to talk to anyone or tell them why.

  Chapter 5

  The hint of body spray, lightly applied. Beneath that, clean flesh. On the edge of her senses, something she’d missed. A real man. She wanted so many things—to breathe him in, to press him to her, to remove the layers of clothing between them, to devour him. Her breath sped up, her brain fogged. Her body wanted one thing; to be closer to him. Her mouth wanted to touch that skin.

  The months without him stretched behind and in front of her.

  The thud of the headboard made them pause. They wriggled down the bed. The last thing they wanted was for anyone to know what they were doing or leave a permanent reminder on the wall. The movement started up again no-one-can-know, no-one-can-know. It doesn’t matter what her head is saying because the rest of her is singing; she is close to reaching crescendo.

  The ringing phone woke Alison.

  She groped for her trousers and pulled them towards her. She retrieved the phone from a pocket, pressed the screen and put it to her ear in one motion.

  “Hello?”

  “Ali, where are you?” the voice on the other end demanded.

  She sat up on the edge of the bed and swore silently. She should have checked who it was before answering.

  “Oh. Hi, Will,” she tried to sound normal. The last thing she wanted was for Will to know where she was, what she’d been doing.

  “Are you OK?” concern coloured his voice.

  “Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. I just...woke up,” she finished. “Is Mary-Anne OK?” Had they fought, was that why he was calling her? To explain why Mary-Anne had hidden herself away.

  “No, she's fine,” he replied.

  “Really? She’s been a bit weird this last week. Did something happen?”

  “No—no. Everything’s fine. Um, you do realise that you’re late, right? For Katherine.”

  Oh god. This had nothing to do with her sister's love life. She was meant to be meeting her formidable old manager, Will’s grandmother.

  “I was looking for that scarf she got me and I guess I got tired and I just...” Alison clamped down on her babbling. “Is she mad?”

  “Surprisingly no. I was just worried when you didn't turn up. She wanted me to see you too.” Katherine probably knew that they hadn’t talked in some time, she knew everything. “But I guess you needed that sleep, huh?”

  “Yeah, I guess I needed it.”

  There was a noise behind her which sounded suspiciously like a laugh, she resolutely ignored it.

  “I didn’t realise you were going to be there too. It’s been ages since I saw you.” She kept her eyes straight ahead as she fumbled for her things.

  “I actually have to leave now so you won’t get to see me. When do you think you’ll get here?”

  She picked up her father’s watch from the nightstand and examined it. She calculated how quickly she could get there if she didn’t get held up again.

  “About half an hour?” She slid the watch over her hand. “Please apologise to Katherine for me.”

  “I will. Talk soon?”

  “Yes.” She nodded although he couldn't see her. “Bye.”

  “Bye.”

  Alison pressed the screen of her phone and dropped her hand into her lap.

  She couldn't avoid him anymore. She turned to face the other occupant of the bed.

  George reclined like a model, head resting on his hand, sheet around his hips revealing excellent abs that could have been chiselled from marble.

  “I guess you needed it,” he said with a smirk.

  “Nope, nope, no.” She fumbled with her clothes, trying to regain some composure. “This did not happen. It didn't happen if I don’t talk to you about it.”

  “Alison, thank you for coming. Tea?” If Katherine was irritated at her being late she masked it well.

  “Yes. Please.” Alison took the seat Katherine indicated and sat ramrod straight. She tried to slow her brea
thing and remember what else she was meant to say. “Thank you for inviting me.” That was it. She smiled.

  “You are most welcome. I do hope we’ll stay in touch now we aren’t working together. How is your friend Charlotte?”

  Was this a trap? Katherine had never made small talk. “She’s good. Thank you for asking.” Alison tried to remove the sound of suspicion from her voice. “She’ll return next week from the UK. She’s been making a tour of churches.”

  “How wonderful.” Katherine acted as though this were a surprise. Alison kicked herself realising that she’d been there when Charlotte left, she already knew this. “I’m certain you’re looking forward to her return.” She smiled and turned to prepare the tea.

  Without a focus Alison’s mind drifted back. Had it only been that afternoon? She’d gone back to the flat she’d once shared with George to find a scarf Katherine had given her.

  She’d jumped at a sound behind her. “Jesus!”

  “Nope, just me.”

  She turned. “George what are you doing here? Sorry, what I meant to say was ‘what the hell are you doing here!?’”

  “Well, it's good to see you too.” Oh god it was good to see him. “I live here. But you moved out, remember?” He accompanied this with what in other circumstances would be referred to as a charming smile. Damn, he was right.

  “Yes, oh I forgot something.” What the hell was it? “I just need um...”

  “Need?” he moved towards her.

  “Something...” she trailed off breathless.

  “I know what you need.”

  The rattle of a teacup on a saucer snapped Alison back to the present. Katherine didn’t appear to have noticed her lapse.

  Katherine was rhapsodizing about her early days “at the helm” of Burke, illustrating how she had “blazed the trail” for her “younger successor.”

  “I held board meetings every week for the first month. I had to get them on my side and keep them on their toes. Has Susan met with them yet?” Katherine paused, for the first time expecting an answer. Now Alison knew what role to play she proceeded to fill Katherine in about her replacement.