Secret Smile

When we wandered into the foyer, it was dark outside. Nick lifted my hand and kissed the back of it. 'Where now?'

'My flat's nearer than yours,' I said.

We got a bus there and sat on the top, right at the front. I pressed my forehead against the window and felt the vibrations and looked at the people on the streets beneath me, walking with their heads bent against the gusts of wind. I felt nervous. Soon, I would be making love with this man who was sitting beside me now, not speaking, whom I'd only met twice. What then? Sometimes sex can feel casual and easy, but sometimes it seems momentous and full of problems; almost impossible. Two people with all their hopes and expectations and neuroses and desires, like two worlds colliding.

'This is our stop,' I said.

He stood up and then pulled me to my feet. His hand was warm and firm. He smiled down at me. 'All right?'

It was all right. Just fine. And then, after we'd made ourselves a sandwich out of one of those half-baked baguettes which I had in my cupboard, with goat's cheese and tomatoes, and drunk a glass of wine each, we went back into the bedroom and this time it was better than all right. It was lovely. Just thinking about it now, in Kerry's car, made me feel liquid with desire. Then we had a bath together, legs tangled up in the small tub, my foot pressed against the inside of his thigh, grinning like idiots at each other.

'What are you grinning at?'

'Mmm? Oh, nothing.'

'Here. This is the first one.' Kerry pulled up and squinted at the sheet of paper dubiously. 'It says it's a two-bedroom maisonette, retaining many period features.'

'Does it say it's next to a pub?'

'No, it doesn't.'

'Let's go and see, anyway.'

It's dangerous buying houses. You know before you set foot inside whether you like them. It's almost like a relationship, when they say it's the first few seconds that count, that instant, pre-rational impression. You have to fall in love with the house you buy. Everything else – whether the roof's sound, the plumbing good, the rooms numerous enough – is almost irrelevant at the start. You can knock down walls and install a damp-proof course, but you can't make yourself fall in love. I was here as the expert; as the voice of caution.

Kerry knocked and the door flew open as if the woman had been standing with her eye pressed to the spyhole, looking for our approach.

'Hello, come in, mind the step, shall I show you round or do you want to do it yourself, except there are a few details that you might miss, here, come in here first, this is the living room, sorry about the mess…' She was large and breathless and spoke in a headlong rush, words spilling over each other. She careered us from room to tidied room, over frantically patterned carpets. The walls were covered with plates they'd collected, from Venice, Amsterdam, Scarborough, Cardiff, Stockholm, and for some reason the sight of them made me feel sorry for her. She pulled open doors with a flourish, showed us the airing cupboard and the new boiler, the second toilet that was crammed into a space that had been carved out of the kitchen, the dimmer switches in the tiny master bedroom, and the spare bedroom that looked more like a broom cupboard and had clearly been built by cowboys. I pushed the wall surreptitiously and saw it shake. Kerry made polite murmurs and looked around her with bright eyes that transformed everything into her beatific future. She was probably already putting a cot in the spare bedroom.

'Does the pub bother you?' I asked the woman.

'The pub?' She acted surprised, wrinkled her brow. 'Oh, that. No. You hardly hear it. Maybe on a Saturday night…'

As if on cue, the first burst of music thumped through the wall, the bass notes shaking in the air. She flushed, but then carried on talking as if she hadn't heard anything. I glanced at my watch: it was eleven-thirty on a Sunday morning. We did the rest of the tour anyway, making vaguely enthusiastic remarks about the view from the bathroom window, the wedge-shaped garden. The more you don't like a place, the more you have to pretend you do. But I don't think the woman was fooled.

'What do you think?' asked Kerry as we left. 'If we

'Definitely not. Not for half the price.'

'It's falling down,' I said as we left the second house.

'But…'

'That's why it's so cheap. That's why the sale fell through. You might be able to afford to buy it, but you'd have to spend the same again. I'm not even sure you could get it insured.'

'It's such a nice house.'

'It's a wreck. She's got someone in to plaster and paint over the worst bits in the hall, but there's damp everywhere, probably subsidence. You'd need a structural engineer to check it over. The window frames are rotting. The wiring is primeval. Do you have the capital to do it up?'

'Maybe when Bren, you know, finds a job…'

'Is he looking?'

'Oh, yes. And thinking hard about what he really thinks is right for him. He says it's a chance to begin again and make the life he really wants for himself.' She blushed. 'For us,' she added.

'In the meantime, he's got nowhere to sell, and it's just what you get from your flat and your income.'

'Mum and Dad have been very generous.'

'Have they?' I tried to suppress the stab of resentment I felt when I heard that. 'No more than you deserve. But don't blow it on that house.'

You have to be able to imagine what isn't there, and imagine away what is, see underneath things, impose your own taste on top of them. The third place was filthy and smelled of cigarettes and years of unopened windows. The walls were brown and stained, or had faded flowery wallpaper covering them. The carpets were an unlovely purple. The living room needed to be knocked into the kitchen-dining room, to create a huge open space downstairs. The plasterboard needed to be ripped away from the fireplace.

'You could have a huge sunroof over the kitchen, and maybe open it out even further into a conservatory. It'd be fantastic'

'Do you think so?'

'With that garden, definitely. It must be about sixty feet long.'

'It's big for London, isn't it? But it's just nettles.'

'Think what it could be like!'

'Did you see the state of the kitchen?'

'He lived there for years without doing anything at all to it. But that's the joy of it – it's ready for you to do whatever you want.'

'It's more spacious than I thought we could afford. And all the cornices and mouldings and proper sash windows

'It looks pretty solid to me, as far as I could tell. I'll help you with it.'

'Really? You'd do that?'

'Of course.'

'And you think it's the right place for us?'

'It's your choice. You've got to want it and what I think doesn't matter. But you could make it really lovely.'

Kerry squeezed my arm. 'I can't wait to tell Brendan.'

I pressed the button on the answering machine.

'Hello, Mirrie. I hear you've just chosen our new home for us. That's very sweet. But a bit strange as well, don't you think? I guess we've just got to get used to that, though, haven't we?'

I pressed the erase button. My hands were shaking.

Tony and Laura and Nick and I went to the pub together. That was the stage we'd jumped to, going out as a. couple, in a foursome. Everyone was very friendly to each other, wanting to get along. Nick bought us all a round and then Laura did, and then, out of the blue, just when things were going so well, I found myself talking about Brendan.

'I should be happy,' I said. 'I mean, Kerry's over the moon.'

'Who are we talking about?' asked Nick amiably, putting a crisp into his mouth and crunching it.