She screamed and kissed him - smacking him on the cheek and on the forehead.
Even as recently as a few months ago, they'd probably have had quick, celebratory sex. But Nathan and Sara no longer had sex.
Neither of them had mentioned it; it made them too sad, too awkward and too embarrassed.
Now, Sara got so childishly excited - running and whooping -- that she had to run to the bathroom.
At first, this pleased him; it had been a while since she was so happy in his company. Then he began to wonder when, exactly, she'd begun closing the bathroom door when she needed to pee.
It seemed to him that he really should know something like that if only so he could identify it as the moment he knew for sure that it was really over.
But he hadn't noticed, and the moment he knew for sure it was really over was right now, right this second.
After the moment had passed, he called out, 'I'm late, I have to run!' and opened the door.
From the bathroom, she yelled, 'See you, babes!' and he smiled.
He caught the bus to work.
Saturday was the night of the party. Nathan slept late and woke, unusually, to the sound of Sara going about the house, singing. It was a sunny, late-winter afternoon, and from the flat the traffic noise was reduced to a monotonous hiss.
He got up and pulled on an old and faded band T-shirt. Utterly Bastard Groovy, it read, green on black. Utterly bastard groovy was exactly what Nathan never felt, not any more.) In this and a pair of Calvins, he slapped barefoot to the compact living room.
Sara was sitting at the table, one hand round a mug of coffee, reading the Guardian Review. Nathan was struck by the reality of her. He saw how pretty she was, and how young; with her face cleansed and scrubbed of make-up, he could see the tiny imperfections and freckles on her nose and cheeks, and her eyes looked naked and vulnerable. She was bare-legged, wearing only one of his Tshirts. It fitted her like a minidress. This is how she'd dressed on those far-off Saturday mornings when he first knew her; those days when it would have seemed impossible that he could ever grow to dislike her, or she him. Or that they could ever stop having sex.
In the afternoon they snuggled chastely on the sofa, watching a black and white film as the winter sun dipped in the west.
At 5.30, they began to get ready. Nathan took a shower and shaved. He had a couple of good suits hanging in the wardrobe -- he'd bought them with his first credit card when he and Sara were first together and he was light- headed with the idea of being in love, and being loved by this lovely girl. There were some good shirts, too (also yet to be paid for), and several good ties. Nathan never wore ties; he had the wrong kind of job. But Sara kept buying them, and with each tie he unwrapped from tissue paper, he sensed her disdain for his lack of ambition ratchet up another notch. The ties hung on a rack in his wardrobe, a Technicolor indictment.
When, in a rolling cloud of scented steam, Sara finally emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in a white towel, Nathan was dressed and ready, laying out his wallet and keys on the kitchen table. He wore a charcoal-grey suit over a black T-shirt.
He sat on the bed and watched her. There was no prevarication; she'd been planning her outfit for days now. She blow-dried her short hair with brisk, staggering efficiency, so the asymmetrical fringe fell over one eye. She applied her make-up with a few, quick, practised strokes (but in a manner he knew required years of diligent practice, like elite sportsmanship). Towel off: knickers on. Bra. Pull-up stockings.
Spritz of perfume. Dress. Slip on heels. Suddenly remember to apply roll-on deodorant. Examine self in mirror from several difficult angles, smoothing down creases with an alluring little shimmy. Open handbag. Double-check keys, address book, mobile phone, whatever other mysteries the bag contained. Lean in to mirror. Fiddle with fringe, minutely calibrating it. Add mascara.
She ordered a taxi and mixed them a gin and tonic. The plan was to sit listening to music - Sara's choice - until the taxi arrived. Nathan hated the Cranberries.
He walked to the bathroom, locking the door behind him.
Faintly embarrassed by his own nervousness, he ran the taps just to make a noise. Then he removed from his pocket a little Ziploc bag containing four grammes of cocaine in four paper wraps. He'd cleaned out his savings account to buy it. The supplier was Howard, the grey-haired ex-hack who produced The Mark Derbyshire Solution.
Nathan racked up two fat lines on the cistern, then took the little pewter snorting spoon he'd bought from a now-closed head shop in Cornwall one good summer that seemed a million years ago, and he snorted back, crisply and efficiently. Then he stood straight, looking at the ceiling, sniffing. His snot tasted chemical.
He smiled with joy at the memory of it and knew it was working already.
He tucked the spoon into one pocket and the wraps into another, opened the bathroom door and walked out, sniffing.
In her party dress, Sara stood alone in the centre of the room, one hand cupping an elbow, the other holding a long glass of gin and tonic. As if she were the host and waiting for the party to begin.
At the railway station, they queued for tickets. There were twenty minutes to kill. They stopped for a drink at the generic railway bar.
Nathan visited the lavatory. Then they hurried to catch the train. It sat on a wintry platform. They boarded and sat without speaking, Sara staring - apparently sombre - at her blank-eyed reflection in the train window, and through it to the passengers on the platform who passed spectrally by.
Nathan said, 'Christ. I'd kill for a cigarette.'
She gave him the look.
'Come on,' he said. 'Just one night. It's party nerves.'
She allowed herself an expression of benevolent radiance. 'Go on.
It's only one night.'
It's only cancer, he thought, producing a packet of Marlboro Lights from his coat pocket; one of four he'd bought to last him a long evening.
He stood between the carriages of the juddering train, blowing smoke out the window.
Half an hour later, they pulled up to Sutton Parkway. It was little more than a dark, astringently cold concrete platform.
Nathan gathered himself, saddened a little to know the best part of Sara's evening, the anticipation, was nearly over. Almost certainly, from now on, the evening would only get worse.
Outside the station, they caught a minicab.
Nathan paid the driver and the minicab pulled away, its tail lights smudged and indistinct in the billowing white exhaust.
Their party shoes scratched on the cold gravel of the long driveway.
From inside the big house came a faint, muffled, repetitive boom; the windows vibrated with it.
Mark Derbyshire had built this mansion in the late seventies, when he could still afford it. At the rear was a helicopter landing pad, long since overgrown.
Nathan offered Sara his elbow and together they approached the door. It was answered by a balding man dressed as a butler; Nathan hoped he'd been hired for the evening.
Sara removed her coat, shrugging it from her narrow white shoulders in a way that made him remember, for a moment, why he'd once believed himself to be in love with her.
The magnolia hall was hung with gold and silver discs from forgotten bands and singers whose records Mark Derbyshire had once helped to climb the charts. And there were many framed eight by tens. In them a younger and thinner Mark Derbyshire - but with the same neatly trimmed beard, the same look of jovial malice - placed his arm round the shoulder of one squirming celebrity or other: a young Madonna was there, and David Bowie showed his David Bowie teeth. Elton John looked frumpy and unhappy in a straw boater and comedy spectacles. The photographs made Nathan melancholy.
Sara said, 'Shall we?' and - feeling for a moment like Cary Grant -- he led her inside the double door into the ballroom.
At the far end, the wedding DJ stood at his mixing desk. A few guests, mostly young local girls, were dancing.
Sara tugged his elbow.
