After Hello Read online

  Copyright

  Harper

  Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

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  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain by HarperColl‌insPublishers 2017

  Copyright © Mhairi McFarlane 2017

  Cover design: Holly MacDonald © HarperColl‌insPublishers Ltd 2017

  Cover illustrations © Shutterstock.com

  Mhairi McFarlane asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Source ISBN: 9780007525010

  Ebook Edition © January 2017 ISBN: 9780008245153

  Version 2017-01-11

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Keep Reading …

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Also by Mhairi McFarlane

  About the Publisher

  Prologue

  Then …

  It’s quarter past eleven on an unremarkable and stereotypically rainy Friday night in Manchester. Except it is remarkable, and everything beyond the water-flecked windows of my flat, the night-lit Manchester, is made of magic and hope and promise and also I might be a little bit drunk.

  There are foil lid boxes of food from the Yang Sing strewn around the coffee table in this poser’s sprawling city flat full of mirrors and string lights, because I didn’t make it as far as the fridge when we stumbled through the door. (My mum would be saying: ‘Don’t touch the egg fried rice now, it’ll be ridden!’) I don’t know who we thought we were fooling by going to a restaurant instead of just heading straight here, to be honest.

  It’s our first night together – second, if you’re being picky, although Ben didn’t stay over after the ill-fated previous tumble – and we’re in the stupidly large bed in my flat which doesn’t feel oversized with both of us in it, propped up against each other on the pillows, legs tangled together, listening to the soothing hum of the traffic and the post-pub passers-by outside and enjoying a moment of perfect happiness.

  I don’t even remember any conversation over dinner, just a lot of grinning like loons at each other and pushing food around our plates and holding hands under the table and generally being obnoxious. Until the bill arrived and I said to Ben, ‘Would you like to come back to mine?’ and he said: ‘Nah, it’s been a full on sort of day. Would you like to go to WrestleMania with me a week on Wednesday though? Work has a corporate box.’

  And for a percentage of a split second I believed him and we both laughed far too much for such a crap joke and I thought: I will never tire of this friendship. Can it really have happened? A couple, at last? It feels so right but so strange.

  We were both nervous beforehand, given the amount of anticipation, until Ben accidentally jabbed his elbow in a stray portion of General Tso’s Chicken when we were kissing on the sofa. While laughing at his radioactive red patch, I decided to address the elephant in the room.

  ‘What if we don’t worry about this being perfect? It happening is enough for me.’

  ‘I was hoping you’d say that,’ Ben said, starting to unbutton his stained shirt which makes my stomach go whoosh. ‘Then I have a chance of meeting or exceeding expectations.’ I laughed, delighted and delirious. ‘Seriously. I agree. It doesn’t need to be perfect. It already is.’

  Yeah. We didn’t need to worry.

  ‘Do you think we’ve changed much since we were twenty-one?’ I say, in the post-coital peacefulness.

  ‘Er. In what way? You more than lived up to fond memories, if that’s what you—’

  ‘Not like that! In general.’ Though I’m glad to hear I don’t look like I’ve melted. That said, this flat has dimmer switches.

  ‘I hope so,’ Ben says. ‘I look back on that age and want to give myself a good slap.’

  ‘I wasn’t any better,’ I say.

  ‘You were. You were loyal to your boyfriend and decent and honest and annoyingly northern and not about to run away with the show off from London.’

  This ability to see me clearly, but see the best in me before all the bad bits, this is Ben’s unique gift.

  ‘Hah, that’s crazily magnanimous,’ I say.

  ‘Yeah well, it’s easy to be the bigger man when I’m the one in bed with you.’

  ‘Ah you’re not the bigger …’

  ‘SHUT UP YOU MOO!’ Ben shouts and we start laughing. ‘No, honestly,’ he continues, ‘I’m not sure what kind of boyfriend I would’ve been back then, either. And I was off travelling, imagine that as our maiden voyage. There was an outdoor toilet situation in Cambodia that I’m pretty sure would’ve broken us.’

  I laugh but it makes me wonder: is it true, or are we comforting ourselves? Were we actually best off not getting together for another ten years after that one-night stand? Would we still be as much in love now? He’s here, he’s next to me. After all this time and against all the odds. I slide my arm around Ben to prove to myself once again: he’s warm and solid and he’s actually here.

  There’s so much excitement but some fear, too, as I look out on a future at last with Ben. What did Caroline say, of my Forever Ben fixation? ‘It’s perfect because it’s a fantasy and it’s a fantasy because it’s perfect.’

  ‘I had Caroline and Mindy in this bed …’

  ‘Oh aye?’ Ben ruffles my hair.

  ‘… For a sleepover. When I had that flat warming.’

  ‘Oh, yeah,’ Ben says, with a sigh.

  I pause, for a moment, as we both silently ride the bump of remembering that the last time Ben was here, it was with his ex-wife. I may not be the reason they split up, but I hardly helped.

  ‘Caroline said that night that if you and I were meant to be, we would’ve happened at twenty-one. I felt so bleak. Everything I felt told me we had been meant to be, every single piece of logic went against it. And, you know. Morality.’

  Ben’s quiet and I worry that referring to the now defunct marriage at this point is distasteful.

  ‘… I don’t know what “meant to be” means, really, do you?’ he says, eventually. ‘It suggests there’s some sort of God and a grand plan and life happens the way it’s supposed to, with or without input from you. Which is a pretty depressing notion, if you think about it. We don’t have any free will, if things are meant to be.’

  ‘I don’t know if that’s it. Perhaps it just means, if things mess up, there’s usually deeper reasons than the ones you acknowledge.’ />
  ‘So you’re changing your story entirely and saying you didn’t like me enough?’ Ben laughs.

  ‘No! Oh, I don’t know. I didn’t mean there were reasons. I wish I’d never raised it.’

  Ben squeezes me. ‘Say anything you like. Things unsaid have done us enough damage.’

  I squeeze him back.

  ‘I’m just in shock that I get another chance.’

  ‘Me too,’ Ben says.

  ‘And,’ he adds, adjusting his arm around me, ‘part of you is fretting what if we’re not soulmates. We’re just two people who met at university and still fancy each other and this whole “giant love affair at last” thing is going to go horribly wrong?’

  ‘Yes, maybe,’ I smile.

  ‘Well I’d rather have things go wrong with you than right with anyone else,’ Ben says. ‘I think that’s pretty romantic, Chicken Little.’

  ‘God, that’s it, isn’t it!’ I say. ‘It doesn’t matter.’ I pause. ‘The phrase is hopelessly in love. It’s easy to miss the hopeless part.’

  ‘I’ve accepted your potential hopelessness as a partner,’ Ben says.

  ‘Likewise.’

  ‘Also,’ Ben says, ‘kiss me like that again, and then tell me we’re not soulmates.’

  And I do, and I can’t.

  1

  Two years later …

  While we always thought any Mindy wedding would go supersize with curly fries, we didn’t anticipate it would extend to falconry.

  The four of us – me, Mindy, Caroline and Ivor – are having a Thursday-night dinner at The Grill On The Alley, which is basically a poshed-up TGI Friday.

  It’s a weekly catch-up tradition that Caroline and I put in place when our friends Mindy and Ivor got together. As great as it was and as pleased as we were for them, we didn’t want factions and politics developing and this seemed a good way of 1) ensuring the democratic state of the four of us as equal friends continued and 2) not having to worry about what to cook for dinner 1/7 of the time.

  We needn’t have worried it would imbalance anything though: the pairing up has made them even more like themselves, somehow. She’s still a rainbow of nonsense and he’s her straight man and (now not-so-secret) biggest fan. They pecked at each other endlessly as friends until the penny dropped they were smitten.

  Ivor proposed last Christmas, and while we were overjoyed we were also aware that a period of rank insanity would commence. Because Mindy.

  ‘I was thinking …’ Mindy said, as she forked her steak around the plate in the fashionable murky gloaming.

  (She’s been on various fad diets since the announcement, the latest is the Paleo. ‘Did Prehistoric women have mashed potato?’ she had asked our confused waiter.

  ‘Sir Walter Raleigh found the potato,’ Ivor said to her. ‘A bit later.’

  ‘Oh my God yes, I remember that Blackadder now,’ she said. ‘Did he also invent the bicycle?’)

  ‘… On the big day. I want a bird of prey to deliver my ring,’ she declares.

  Ivor spits out his mouthful of appletini.

  ‘I’m not sure it’s the time to reenact scenes from Game of Thrones?’ I say.

  ‘I’m serious!’ Mindy says. ‘There are venues where you can get a bird of prey to fly down from the roof. It clasps the ring in its beak and it lands on the groom’s hand at the altar. It promises an unforgettable spectacle, the website says.’

  ‘No shit,’ Ivor says. ‘I don’t want to be an unforgettable spectacle, thanks. Some lairy parrot clawing my hand off while blood spurts everywhere and people scream. Jesus, Mindy, it’s a wedding, not a show by Siegfried and Roy.’

  ‘It doesn’t claw you!’ Mindy wails. ‘They give you a giant Michael Jackson glove. Or how about a barn owl?’

  ‘Or a pigeon!’ I say. ‘You could lure it with a chip.’

  Caroline and I start laughing, spraying bits of our ‘home-cut’ chips around while making NURHURHURHUR noises.

  ‘Mindy,’ Ivor says, rubbing his temples, ‘are you telling me you’ve been somewhere and had an actual conversation about this bird bullshit?’

  Mindy sucks coyly on the straw in her Long Island Iced Tea and gives a look I’d describe as furtive.

  ‘I was passing by Peckforton Castle and called in and …’

  ‘PASSING BY PECKFORTON CASTLE!’ Caroline bellows. ‘In Cheshire!’

  ‘Peck your finger off Castle, more like, am I right?’ I add.

  Ivor puts his face in his hands.

  ‘This is so not squad goals, from you two,’ Mindy snaps at myself and Caroline.

  ‘What did we say from the start? Agree to nothing without prior consultation,’ Ivor says. ‘We’re not getting married in a castle, Mindy. Apart from the expense, that footballer crap gives me the willies. It’ll be Rolls-Royce Ghosts and cream silk cravats next.’

  ‘We can’t have proper cars either?!’ Mindy cries. ‘Oh sure, why don’t I arrive on one of those mobility scooters with the flag poles on the back?!’

  A beaten-looking Ivor excuses himself to the gents – ‘Take his shoelaces and belt first,’ I say – and everyone except Mindy is laughing again.

  ‘Why is he being so nowty?! Stop encouraging him!’

  Caroline lays a cool palm on Mindy’s blue-silk-clad arm. (I was hoping she’d get wed in one of her trademark peacock-brights but she’s going cream-white she says, not that she’ll let either of us come with her dress shopping. ‘I can have the red and gold in the Hindu bit in India afterwards.’)

  ‘Dearest beloved Parminder. Don’t get sucked in by castles and eagles and the fucking cake knife fucking hire, which I’m still furious I paid for, and that was before I was getting divorced. I know it’s exciting but it’s only a day, it goes by in a blur. Trust me, you don’t want to be waking up the morning after to the reality of thirty grand on credit cards. You want to be setting off on honeymoon on a debt-free natural high.’

  ‘Yes! It’s going to be amazing whatever you do. The best,’ I say. Good cop, bad cop. Nice sly mention of Caro’s impending divorce too, bound to bring Mindy’s fevered temperature down by a few notches (for her own good).

  ‘I want it to be different, though.’ Mindy pouts. ‘I don’t want the function room with the sash-tie chairs you’ve seen a million times. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s not individual.’

  ‘Then you need somewhere you can decorate and customise yourself,’ Caroline says.

  ‘Really?’ Mindy said, doubtfully. ‘I don’t want a barn dance vibe. Oh my God, did I tell you that my cousin Nuvvy had his thirtieth in a community centre? There was a noticeboard with a Photofit of a sex attacker with a goatee on the loose in Cheadle Hume. It was so not a party buzz.’

  ‘I’ve know,’ I say, inspiration suddenly striking, ‘how about Victoria Baths in Chorlton? One of the feature writers at work did a piece on it, it looked incredible. It’s restored Edwardian but you can gussy the room up how you want. You get married actually in the tiled swimming pool.’

  ‘In your cossies?!’

  ‘No, it’s drained.’

  Mindy has already whipped her iPhone out and is Googling at a speed that could give you whiplash.

  ‘OMFG! Rach, I LOVE it!’

  Caroline winks a ‘well done’ at me, Mindy squeals some more, I glow with smug and Ivor returns from the loo.

  ‘Oh God, what?’ he says.

  I make a covert thumbs up sign at him. After a browse of the pictures, Ivor’s also enthused, it looks far more within budget and trendy without being revolting, and I’m so pleased I could shag myself for thinking of it.

  ‘And now, my thoughts on the hen do …’ Mindy says, and mine and Caroline’s bums clench and Ivor laughs heartily.

  2

  ‘I’m thinking Miami!’ Mindy says.

  Caroline does a reel back. ‘Unless there’s a Miami I haven’t heard of in Northamptonshire, I’m out.’

  ‘Caro, this is my hen do! You’re supposed to push the boat ou
t.’

  ‘Yes, and we will, but not all the way across the Atlantic. Right, Rachel?’

  ‘Er …’

  ‘This is a week before the wedding, right?’ Caroline asks Mindy.

  ‘Right.’

  Mindy’s hen has to be close to her wedding because her Indian relatives can only afford one trip to Europe.

  ‘With long haul, you’re risking being jet lagged on the day. Imagine. Tired as you like. No energy for boozing and dancing. Puffy face on the photos,’ Caroline says, mock grimacing.

  I can see Mindy doesn’t want to give in this quickly but Caroline’s got her good and proper.

  ‘Hmm OK. So my next best idea,’ she does eyes up, opens palms in the air, motioning an imaginary sign, ‘MINDYFEST. A hen festival. I hire a field. We all glamp, think Hunter wellies and Ray-Ban Wayfarers. Artisanal sausages. Cider. Cream teas. We could get a band!’

  ‘I think Daft Punk are out, dear. Your budget is more Gay Dad,’ Ivor says.

  ‘I wondered if Rhys would consider it?’ Mindy says, tentatively.

  I’m momentarily thunderstruck. ‘Will I ask my surly ex and his mates to play a gig at your hen do? You’re kidding, right?’ I say.

  ‘You’re on good terms though, aren’t you?’ Mindy says.

  ‘We would say hello if we ran into each other, I’m not really into spending drunken weekends away together.’

  ‘Yeah OK, I see that,’ Mindy nods vigorously. ‘But also I had wondered if Rhys would do covers of Taylor Swift.’

  Ivor stuffs a napkin into his mouth, Caroline shakes her head and I don’t know what to say. Mindy has always had a silly side, I wonder if this wedding has made her, to use a technical journalistic term, nuttier than squirrel shit.

  Mentioning Rhys has given me a pang. I don’t miss Rhys, yet thinking of him cohabiting with his new girlfriend – not so new, now – still feels strange. I sure as hell don’t want to holiday with him.