Ralph's Party Read online

  Lisa Jewell

  RALPH’S PARTY

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Acknowledgements

  Follow Penguin

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Lisa Jewell is in her early thirties and lives in north London with her husband and their cat. She used to be a secretary until redundancy, a bet, and a book deal took her away from all that, and she is now a full-time writer. She is the author of two other novels, Thirtynothing and One-Hit Wonder.

  For Jascha and Yasmin

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  RALPH’S PARTY

  ‘Deliriously enjoyable … although there have been many books trying to decipher the new rules of engagement, Jewell’s is one of the most refreshing: addictively readable without being irritating or glib’ Times

  ‘A party worth gatecrashing! Lisa Jewell pulls off a rare trick which even the likes of Helen Fielding and Nick Hornby couldn’t quite manage. She has written a book about relationships which appeals to men and women … It’s a spicy lamb kofta in a sea of bland chicken masala’ Daily Mirror

  ‘A joy … a fun, summer read’ Guardian

  ‘A lovely, modern, urban tale of interconnecting relationships, desires and disasters. Quite the nicest in this vein for some time’ Bookseller

  ‘A breath of fresh air’ Tom Paulin, Late Review

  ‘Addictive … Jilly Cooper for the combat-trouser generation’ Metro

  www.lisa-jewell.co.uk

  … IT IS ALWAYS LIKE THAT AT PARTIES, WE NEVER SEE THE PEOPLE, WE NEVER SAY THE THINGS WE SHOULD LIKE TO SAY, BUT IT IS THE SAME EVERYWHERE IN THIS LIFE …

  –A la recherche du temps perdu, Proust

  Prologue

  Smith put the phone down and glanced around the living room. A few people had already been round that night, and the flat was still relatively tidy after an earlier blitzing.

  He picked up empty mugs and glasses and carried them through to the kitchen. It was strange and vaguely unsettling to think that these objects still carried the lip marks, the fingerprints, the traces of saliva and microscopic organisms left there by the strangers who had been into his home that evening, strangers he had shown his bathroom, who had seen his grubby dressing-gown hanging behind his bedroom door, strangers who had sat on his sofa in unfamiliar clothes with unfamiliar mannerisms and names and lives, strangers who had been given the opportunity to peer into other strangers’ private lives.

  Ralph and he had reached decisions quickly and cruelly. It would be obvious in a moment that someone was unsuitable, but they all got the tour: ‘And this is the kitchen – you’ll be pleased to hear we’ve got a dishwasher and a washer-dryer!’; the talk: ‘Smith’s up with the lark during the week but we both like a lie-in at the weekends’; the interview: ‘What do you do for a living?’; and the conclusion: ‘Well, there’s still a few more people to see the flat – give us your phone number and we’ll let you know.’ Always the full fifteen minutes, so that the unwanted stranger would leave feeling like he’d been in the running, like he’d been given serious consideration.

  Jason had sounded hopeful on the phone but turned out to be looking for a ready-made social life. ‘I just want to live somewhere that’s got a bit of life – d’you know what I mean?’ he’d said, his eyes wide and over-keen.

  ‘Erm, maybe you could explain?’ Ralph had asked, thinking of the nights that he and Smith spent hopping mindlessly through forty-seven cable channels without talking and going to bed, stoned, at midnight.

  Jason sat forward on the sofa and cupped his kneecaps with his hands. ‘Like, for example, where I live at the moment, all that happens is I get home from work every night and nobody wants to do anything. It pisses me off, d’you know what I mean?’

  Ralph and Smith had nodded sympathetically and felt old.

  Monica had been a born-again Christian – would it bother them if she spoke in tongues occasionally? –and Rukhsana appeared to be on the run from an abusive arranged marriage. Her hands shook throughout the meeting, her dark eyes unable to rest on one object or hold a gaze. She explained that she and her husband were having a ‘trial separation’. Ralph and Smith decided that a permanent separation from Rukhsana’s sad but unpalatable situation would be best for them.

  Simon had been sweet but at least twenty stone, his frame throwing the rest of the flat temporarily out of proportion, the sofa making a painful noise it had never made before as he gingerly lowered his bulk on to it. Rachel had the sort of skin condition that made them want to hoover the flat the minute she’d left, and John smelt of Pedigree Chum. They’d just about given up hope.

  Who was that on the phone?’ Ralph switched on the television and spread-eagled himself on to the sofa, the remote control poised for action in his hand.

  ‘Someone about the flat,’ Smith replied from the kitchen, ‘a girl – she’s on her way over now. She sounded nice.’ He kicked the door of the dishwasher closed. ‘Her name’s Jem.’

  Jem took the first turning off Battersea Rise, which brought her into Almanac Road, a small sweep of three-storey Edwardian houses, long and thin with basements– unusual for this part of South London.

  As she walked down the road, peering nosily into uncurtained basement flats, she began to feel strangely like she had been here before. There was something familiar about the proportions, the width of the pavement, the colour of the bricks and the spacing between the weedy saplings that lined the road.

  Jem stopped outside number thirty-one, and the feeling of familiarity increased further. She suddenly felt safe, like a child coming home after a tiring day out, to a warm house and Saturday-afternoon television.

  Jem glanced down into the basement flat and saw a young man, his back to the window, talking to someone out of view. It was then that she knew she had been here before. Maybe not this exact place, but somewhere very similar. In her dreams, since she was a teenager – a basement flat in a tall house in a terrace; a view through the window, at night, the room lit up; a man on a sofa smoking a cigarette, whose face she couldn’t see. Her destiny. Was this him?

  Jem rang the doorbell.

  Chapter One

  The girl standing in the doorway was tiny, about five foot two, black curly hair held on top of her head with pins and clips in some complicated but very feminine style that looked as if it should have sported ivy wreaths. She was post-coitally pretty, with cherry-red cheeks and a bitter-sweet mouth, the bottom lip drawn back very slightly under the top, and her eyes were bright and mustardy, framed by mascaraed lashes and faint but lively eyebrows. She should have been wearing wood-nymph muslins and lacy leather sandals but instead had on an equally beguiling soft flannel suit with fur at the collar and cuffs and a short skirt that would have looked obvious on a taller woman. T
he tip of her nose was winsomely pink.

  Smith let Jem walk in front of him down the hall, watching her as she turned her head this way and that, examining the pictures on the walls, peering through half-open doors and patting tabletops as she went. She was definitely cute. She turned to Smith.

  ‘This is lovely, really, really lovely.’ She smiled widely and suddenly turned to face the wall, grabbing the top of the radiator with both hands and letting out a sigh of relief. ‘Sorry,’ she laughed, ‘my hands are freezing, like blocks of ice – feel.’ She made her small white hands into fists and placed one on each of Smith’s cheeks. ‘It’s so cold out there!’ Smith started and felt suddenly shy.

  ‘Shall we go to the kitchen? I’d love a cup of tea.’

  ‘It’s just through the living room,’ offered Smith, attempting to overtake her.

  ‘Oh, yes. I know where the kitchen is. I saw it through the window. Outside.’ She laughed again. ‘Sorry, I’m really nosy. And I’ve seen so many horrible flats tonight I don’t think I could have faced coming in here if it hadn’t looked nice.’

  They walked into the kitchen.

  ‘My flatmate’s around somewhere,’ said Smith, filling the kettle. ‘He’s probably in his room. He’s called Ralph. I’ll take you to meet him when the tea’s done.’

  Jem was examining a rack of herbs and spices. The plastic lids of the jars were covered in a layer of greasy dust; all of them were full. ‘Do you and Ralph ever cook?’ she asked.

  Smith laughed. ‘Erm, I think this speaks for itself.’ He opened the door of the fridge to reveal shelves laden with colourful packets proclaiming ‘Thai-style Green Curry’, ‘Creole Chicken with Cajun Rice’, ‘Chicken Tikka Masala’, and floppy see-through bags containing fresh pasta sauces and soups.

  ‘Oh, God – typical boys! That’s such an expensive way to eat!’ exclaimed Jem. ‘Cooking’s brilliant, you know – I’ll teach you. And Ralph, if you like.’ She used the name Ralph comfortably, as if she knew him. ‘I’m very good. I think. Well, so I’ve been told. I can cook a Thai curry. These ready-made things are dreadful for you – it’s all the salt they put in them to make them taste of something.’ She closed the fridge and wandered back into the living room.

  ‘Do you want to ask me some questions?’ she called, picking up a paperback from a shelf and examining the back cover.

  ‘Milk and sugar?’ Smith called back.

  ‘Have you got any honey?’

  Smith futilely opened and closed a few cupboards. ‘No,’ he shouted. ‘Got some golden syrup, though.’

  ‘This is a gorgeous room, you know. No offence or anything, but it doesn’t look like two boys live here.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Smith was embarrassed, and slightly shocked at being referred to as a boy in his thirtieth year.

  Jem quickly took note of the objects strewn around the top of the dark wooden coffee table inlaid with ornate brass work. She approved of a good messy coffee table – they held so many interesting clues to the day-to-day content and clutter of people’s lives. Smith and Ralph’s coffee table held a selection of remote controls, a satellite TV guide, an ashtray full of stubs, two packets of red Marlboro, a business card, a box of matches and a home-delivery pizza menu. Somewhere underneath it all she could make out a proper coffee-table art book, a set of car keys and, barely visible but unmistakable, a small piece of green cardboard torn from a packet of Rizlas. Jem smiled quietly at her discovery.

  ‘Let’s go and say hello to Ralph,’ Smith was lingering in the doorway, his face cocooned in wreaths of steam from his tea, ‘and then I’ll show you around.’

  Ralph barely noticed Jem the first time he saw her. He was arguing with his girlfriend Claudia, sitting at his desk, the phone cradled under his chin as he carelessly pulled elastic bands into tight ligatures around his wrists in an apparently subconscious attempt to cut off his blood supply and end the painful predictability of it all.

  As Smith entered he grimaced and took the phone from under his chin, holding it a foot or two from his ear so that Smith could hear the tinny drone of the unhappy woman. He hit the speakerphone button:

  ‘I just feel like I’m the one doing all the work here, Ralph, d’ you know what I’m talking about? No, of course you don’t. Who am I kidding? You can’t see anything beyond the remote control – as long as you’ve got a piece of technical equipment in your hand that will prevent you from doing something else, something that might, just might involve you getting up off your arse and doing something …’

  ‘Ralph,’ whispered Smith, ‘this is Jem.’

  Jem twinkled at Ralph from the doorway.

  Ralph saw a small, smiley girl, tendrils of hair framing her face.

  ‘Are you listening to me, Ralph, or have you put me on that fucking speakerphone?’

  Ralph smiled apologetically at Jem and mouthed a ‘Nice to meet you’ as he hit the speakerphone button again and began murmuring inaudibly into the phone.

  Smith and Jem left the room, closing the door quietly behind them.

  ‘Claudia can be very … demanding. They could go on like that for hours. Poor bastard.’ Smith smiled smugly and took a slurp of tea.

  ‘You don’t have a girlfriend, then, Smith?’

  ‘Very perceptive,’ he replied ungraciously. ‘No, I don’t.’

  Not for the first time since Jem’s arrival, he found himself feeling uncomfortable. He wanted to be friendly and welcoming, to create a good impression, but try as he might, he just couldn’t, and was coming across instead as frosty and impolite. He put his hand out to grasp the antique door-handle in front of him and pushed the door open.

  ‘This would be your room.’ He reached to the left for the light switch. ‘It’s quite small, as you can see, but it’s got everything.’

  The room was tiny and L-shaped. The walls were clad in caramel-coloured wood-panelling, and the room was lit centrally by a ceiling lamp housed in a brass and glass star-shaped shade. A single bed stood at the far end, covered with a vivacious Indian throw and several large cushions with tassels and fringes. A 1920s wardrobe with mirrored front panels stood in front of it, and at the other end of the room was a single sash window hung with densely patterned heavy curtains and a small chest of black-lacquerwork drawers.

  Jem turned and grasped hold of Smith’s hands. ‘I absolutely love it. I love it. I knew I would. Please can I live here? Please!’ Her face was glowing and childlike, her hands felt small and warmed by her mug of tea.

  ‘Let me show you the rest of the flat first and then we can have a chat.’ Smith could still feel where Jem’s hands had covered his. ‘I need to talk to Ralph as well – lots of other people have been to see the room. I’ll need to consult him.’ He could feel himself blushing and turned his back on Jem.

  ‘OΚ,’ she said lightly. She wasn’t worried. She already knew that the room was hers.

  Chapter Two

  Siobhan knew she should feel happy. I mean – ALR, All London Radio. That was something else, it really was.

  When Karl had first told her, earlier on that evening, she had felt ecstatic – all his dreams come true. He was on the phone to his Irish mother and Russian father in Sligo now, telling them the news. She looked at him over the top of her book; his soft, handsome face was alive with an energy she hadn’t seen for years as he explained to his no doubt bursting-at-the-seams-with-pride mother that her one and only son, her precious, sweet Karl, had just been handed a peaktime slot on London’s biggest radio station.

  She couldn’t quite imagine it: ‘Good evening, London, and welcome to the Karl Kasparov Show.’ Her Karl, not some faceless, naff DJ, but her Karl, having thousands of listeners, his own jingles, doing interviews. His name would be there in the radio listings: ‘3.30-6.30 p.m. – Karl Kasparov.’ Drive Time, that’s what they called it, Karl’s slot. Karl was going to have a Drive Time radio show.

  Siobhan imagined a classic ‘Hot in the City’ scenario, a traffic jam on a steaming summer’s day, bumper-
to-bumper gridlocked traffic and the sound of Karl’s voice purring from car radios, ‘It’s hot out there – so keep cool by staying tuned to Drive Time ALR’ before seguing into ‘Up on the Roof.

  A barely perceptible whimper jolted Siobhan from her train of thought. It was a quarter to eleven – they’d forgotten about Rosanne in all the excitement. She was now sitting stoically by the living-room door, aware that tonight was not a normal night and trying, without irritating, to convey the message that she still had a bladder and it was getting late.

  ‘Oh, baby, did we forget about you?’ The sympathetic tone of Siobhan’s voice elicited a tentative wag from Rosanne’s tail, which increased with velocity and force as Siobhan headed towards the hook in the hall that bore her lead.

  ‘Karl, I’m taking Rosanne out for a pee. Come on, baby! Come on, we’re going out!’

  Siobhan struggled into her winter coat, so much tighter around her upper arms and chest than it had been last year, and Rosanne panted delightedly at the door waiting for her mistress to join her.

  Siobhan was glad to be out in the cold night air. The central heating, the excitement and the champagne had fuzzed up her mind. It was a beautiful October night and the tall, elderly houses of Almanac Road looked elegant beneath a jet-black sky brightly illuminated by a huge full moon.

  Rosanne seemed to sense the fullness of the moon above, uncertainly sniffing the air around her, her black coat looking extra glossy beneath the bright white light. They walked to the end of the road, Siobhan thinking hard about her feelings. She’d got so used to she and Karl bumbling along in their unimpressive lifestyle. It had never mattered to her before that she hadn’t really worked since losing her job as a technician at a fashion college in Surrey – she’d made ends meet with the odd wedding-dress commission and handmade cushions for an interior-design shop on Wandsworth Bridge Road. And Karl’s weekend deejaying at local pubs and functions, plus what he earned at the Sol y Sombra teaching Ceroc had been plenty to meet their paltry mortgage repayments and modest-lifestyle expenses.