I start clicking through the photos on my laptop, trying to find a better one for my profile picture, wondering whether to take a new one, although selfies are always horrendously unflattering, so maybe not. What about one of those ‘amusing’ ones where you put a picture of the back of your head, or a blurred photo? Mind you, maybe she’s looked for me before and seen the current one, so if I change it today and then send her a friend request, she’ll know that I’ve done it on purpose to impress her.
That brings me up short: impress her? My God, is that what I’m trying to do, even after all these years? I look back through the prism of time and it’s perfectly clear that Sophie was using me to shore up her own ego; that she needed someone less attractive, less cool than her to stand beside her and make her shine even brighter. I couldn’t see it then, but she was jostling for position as much as I was, just a few rungs up the ladder. But receiving this message from Maria has plunged me back to the playground and the lunch hall, where fitting in is everything and friendship feels like life and death. My professional achievements, my friends, my son, the life I’ve constructed – it all feels like it’s been built on shifting sands. My feet keep sliding out from under me, and I can sense how little it will take to make me fall.
In the end I leave the photo as it is and merely send a friend request, after some deliberation not including a message. After all, what on earth would I say? Hi Sophie, how’ve you been these past twenty-seven years? That’s a bit weird. Hi Sophie, I’ve had a Facebook friend request from our long-dead schoolmate, have you? Even weirder, especially if she hasn’t.
I sit at the kitchen table, abstractedly chewing the inside of my mouth, eyes on the ‘notifications’ icon. After two minutes, a ‘1’ pops up and I rush to click on it. Sophie Hannigan has accepted your friend request. Naturally she’s the sort of person that’s always on Facebook. She’s not sent me a message, which makes me feel a bit sick and panicky, but I trawl through her profile anyway. While it might not give me much of an insight into what her life is really like, it certainly tells me a lot about how she wants the world to see her. She changes her profile picture once or twice every week, an endless succession of flattering images accompanied by the inevitable compliments from friends of both sexes. One of her male friends, Jim Pett (who appears to be married to someone else) comments on every one: I would, one of them says; I just have, another. Oh Jim, you always have to lower the tone, she replies, mock-disgusted, loving it.
I know that Facebook offers an idealised version of life, edited and primped to show the world what we want it to see. And yet I can’t stifle the pangs of envy at her undimmed beauty, the photos, exotic locations, the comments, the uproarious social whirl, the wide circle of successful friends. There’s no mention of a partner though, nor any sign of children and I catch myself judging her a little bit for this. It seems that even after what I’ve been through I still see it as a marker of success for women: finding a partner, creating life.
When it comes to sending her a message, I am paralysed by indecision. How can I explain what has happened? But who else is there that I can talk to about this? Once I might have spoken to Sam, but that’s out of the question now. I decide to keep it simple and try to be breezy:
Hi Sophie, it’s been a long time! I type, cringing at the desperation that she will surely sense oozing from every word. Looks like we are both in London! Would love to see you some time! Too many exclamation marks but I don’t know how else to communicate breeziness. Clearly I shouldn’t have worried about that because a message pings back immediately.
Hey! Great to hear from you!! Love to see you!! Are you coming to the reunion?
Hope so! I type, my fingers slipping on the keys. Waiting to hear about a possible diary clash but would be great to see everyone!
I’m conscious of the mismatch between the brightness of my tone and the confusion and distress I feel as I type. A voice inside my head (probably Polly’s) is telling me to stop, to ignore the reunion altogether, but I can’t do it.
I know! Gonna be great!! she replies.
My God, these exclamation marks are killing me. I can’t do this on email; I need to see her. I gather myself and begin to type.
Be great to catch up properly before the big day – fancy meeting for a drink?
I press send before I have a chance to change my mind. Up until now the messages have been flying back and forth like nobody’s business, but there’s a slightly longer hiatus after I send this one. I hold my breath.
Sure, why not? Why don’t you come over to mine for a drink – how about this Friday?
I exhale, shaking. I feel a bit strange about going to her house – I would have preferred somewhere neutral – but I can’t keep this up much longer so I agree. She gives me her address, a flat in Kensington, and we say goodbye with a flurry of kisses and smiley faces from her and a couple of self-conscious kisses from me.. Another notification pops up straight away. I’ve been tagged in a post by Sophie Hannigan: Looking forward to catching up with my old mate Louise Williams on Friday night! I click the like button with trembling hands. I am thankful that this first encounter with Sophie took place online, giving me time to compose myself privately afterwards. I’m an adult now, I think. I don’t need her approval, but I’m not even convincing myself.
Outside, night is falling. I close the laptop and sit unmoving at my kitchen table for a long time. First the Facebook request, then the reunion, now this meeting with Sophie… I feel as though I’m on a ride, or a journey, that nobody asked me if I wanted to go on. Although I am profoundly shocked by the turn events have taken, at some level I’ve always been expecting this to happen, or something like it. I don’t know who is driving or where we are going, but wheels have been set in motion and I don’t know how to stop them.
Chapter 4
2016
I notice the photo is missing just before the doorbell rings.
It usually sits on top of the freestanding shelving unit next to the fridge: a selfie of me and Henry on the beach, framed by an unfeasibly blue sky, our eyes screwed up against the brightness of the sun. The unit also acts as a holding area for unpaid bills, letters from the school, shopping lists and scribbled reminders to myself about things I need to do. I knew that adjusting to life as a single, working mother would be hard emotionally, but the practicalities took me by surprise. Sometimes I feel that I am hanging on to life by my fingernails, always just seconds from falling.
I leave Henry sitting at the table, painstakingly forking individual pieces of pasta into his mouth, and open the door.
‘You’re early.’
‘Yes, well, even though I have babysat for you a million times, I know there’s going to be a list of instructions as long as my arm: current favourite book, the precise angle he likes the door to be left open, the configuration and pecking order of the cuddly toys. These things take time. Can I come in then?’