Charlotte and I had always been close, ever since our days as little girls, and life only drew us nearer. After finishing school, Charlotte moved to London to attend university, and before long, she settled therefinding a job, renting her own flat. Despite the miles between us, we never drifted apart. Shed come home during the holidays and wed speak on the phone often. When I reached the age of twenty, I married and had a daughter. Just last year, my husband and I decided to move to London ourselves, quite by chance renting a flat in the very same neighbourhood as Charlotte.
By then, Charlotte was twenty-seven and had been single all that time, which puzzled me, for she was an attractive and bright woman. But then, quite recently, she told me with a glint in her eye that shed started seeing someone at last. Delighted, I pressed her to introduce me to her new beau, but she simply smiled in that secretive way and said the time wasnt quite right.
It was about a month later when I finally met himThomas had moved in with her, and her sister invited my husband and me over for tea. The first sight of her fiancé left me speechless. He looked well over thirty, his face bearing the marks of someone acquainted with too much drink. He was dishevelled, almost rough, as if life had worn him thin. My husband and I exchanged startled glances across the room. I found out later that Thomas was unemployed and had finished only a handful of school years.
Why would Charlotteso educated, lovely and cleverchoose him? I decided I had to speak with her about what troubled me, but she shouted at me, insisting I keep out of her affairs. She went so far as to say she wished to have a child with him, which left me cold with fear. The mere thought of her raising a child with a man like that was almost unbearable to me. I couldnt make sense of her decision, no matter how different peoples tastes might be; it all seemed utterly bewildering, even now, as I reflect upon it after all these years.
