“Ah, but that’s because I’m here,” interjected the third woman at the table. Courtney’s long-term partner in love and life, Clara Bridgford, reached out and wrapped a shirtsleeved arm around her lover’s shoulders, smiling broadly. Courtney rubbed a delicate hand over Clara’s brown-trousered thigh. Jos watched their easy affection with something like envy.
“There is that, of course. But Jos here is asking my advice about emigration, dear, and I don’t think she’s in love with you too.” Courtney smiled sweetly.
“I don’t see how she could resist. You couldn’t,” Clara said, with a wink at Courtney.
“It’s a chore, Clara, I’m sure, but I manage.” Jos smiled, shaking her head slightly. It would undoubtedly be hard to leave her friends, if she really were to leave the country. She did not really relish the idea of starting anew in an unfamiliar place. Her friends were, in many ways, the anchors which stopped her drifting aimlessly.
“What’s responsible for this sudden wanderlust, then?” Clara asked. “You didn’t mention this when we dined together last week.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought of it last week.” Jos sipped more scotch, almost wishing she’d not started the conversation. She’d been feeling lonely and a little low-spirited, and afternoon drinks with two of her most beloved friends had seemed like a good idea, but now she wished she’d stayed in her flat and enjoyed her scotch with no need for conversation or musing on her future.
“We’re not having that, and you know it.” This was Courtney. “You’re always the same, Jos, darling—you start to tell us how you feel and then back out of it. Well this is important. We don’t want to lose you.”
“I don’t suppose I’m really going anywhere. I’m in London for the whole of pantomime season at least. And it’s not really wanderlust, more a sense of having rather exhausted all there is for me here.”
“But you’d hate to leave us,” Courtney said, “and you’d miss Vernon too.”
Jos nodded her acknowledgement of this. “Yes, I would. Although my dear brother is making rather a good fist of being a small-business owner, I have to say. I never knew he had it in him.”
“But he was born to be the perfect host,” Clara said.
“I know, it’s more that I didn’t expect he could keep his own accounts or manage his staff. He surprises me daily. I don’t feel like I need to look after him any more, really.” Jos missed the feeling of being responsible for her brother. She was pleased to see his increasing success, but it was odd to see him building a life while hers just ticked along, day by day.
“Now, now, Vernon will always need a chaperone. To save him from himself, of course.” Clara rolled her eyes. “He’s making some questionable choices these days.”
“I don’t interfere in his affairs and he stays away from mine.” Jos shrugged. She did not necessarily approve of the string of women Vernon had seduced, but she could hardly claim a more decent track record. “And I’m happy he’s keeping himself entertained. You know it was hard for both of us for a while.” She thought of the dark days after their parents’ death, when the war had seemed likely never to end. Of the scars on her leg, which still ached on cold days. Vernon had coped remarkably well on the surface of things, but she remembered his sleepless nights and slide into self-destructive hedonism when given a chance. In many ways, it had been her feelings of responsibility for him that had arrested her own spiralling into drink and despair. She had been the one to talk him into starting a business of his own, of pursuing his love of socialising and music to start a jazz club. There was no point, she told him, in taking the sensible and safe option. Life had to be lived, its pleasures pursued. And now he was leaving her behind. Not that he was aware of how she felt. She didn’t like to share feelings that would be a burden on him. Not on anyone.
“Well, you don’t live just for Vernon, do you now? What do you really want, Jos? For yourself?” Clara was looking at her in earnest.
Jos tried to shy away from the question. “Could you even answer that question yourself, Clara? Either of you? If I asked you what you really, truly want?”
Clara looked thoughtful. “I suppose not entirely. But I have an idea. I want Courtney by my side, a circle of friends who know me deeply, enough money to live the life I’ve chosen, and to never be bored.”
“And I want to be with Clara, to visit my parents only sporadically, to never put on any weight, and to have reason to smile for at least half of every day.”
Jos looked evenly at Clara and Courtney. However many jokes they made, being with each other was the essence of what each wanted. She didn’t have that. But could she claim it was a woman she wanted? Not really. Perhaps. “It’s easy for you two. You have each other. I honestly don’t really know what I want. To be happy, I suppose. I just don’t know how to find it. I never intended to stay in London, you know.”
“You didn’t?”
“No, it’s one of the reasons I’ve stayed in the theatre. Opportunity to travel the country, or even the world. I didn’t want to feel tied down to one place.”
“And yet you’re still here.”
“Perhaps because sometimes it feels as though the world comes to London so I don’t need to go anywhere.”
“Well that’s awfully lazy, darling.”
Jos felt a
