Chapter 9

Books are mirrors. You only see in them what you already have inside you.

Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Already this winter is being likened to some of the big freezes over the past decades, and there's an appreciable accumulation of snow outside the patio doors of the mews. Fortunately the boiler has been fixed and I have the heat up high, but it's still chilly. At the other end of the garden, the solitary light in the big house is glowing gently. It comes on at sunset, and sunset in December is at four o'clock in the afternoon, although the bank of grey clouds in the sky is making it feel as though it's almost midnight.

I can't concentrate. It's been a horrible few weeks and I don't know if that's because Charles has been away for so long and I'm panicked about what he might be working on (if he's working at all) or because, along with my failure to sign Francesca Clooney, I also missed out on a young writer who I thought had great potential after reading his short story in a magazine. But when I made contact with Bernard Loughlin, he told me that he didn't want the pressure of having an agent and being tied to a publisher and that he was going to do it for himself. I then discovered that he'd signed with Martin Hellman at my old agency. And not that Martin isn't a good agent, but he used to be my effing assistant when I worked in London, and it's annoying to be thrown over for your assistant. Also, my current assistant, Shelley, dropped in earlier to let me know she'll be heading off to Naples in the summer, where she hopes to get a job, as she speaks fluent Italian.

‘I'll be sorry to lose you,' I said.

She flicked her dark curls back and smiled at me.

‘I've really enjoyed working for you, Ariel. It's been so interesting. But it's time for me to do something different. I don't want to stagnate.'

I can understand that. I felt the same way when I was her age. I was grasping life with both hands when I went to London. I wanted to make a name for myself and be a roaring success. And I am successful, I remind myself. I'm good at my job, I love my authors, and over the years I've had some great offers from other agencies to join them. But I like the freedom of working for myself, even if, right now, I'm in a bit of a slump. Terrifying though they may be, I can deal with slumps. They've happened before and I've always bounced back.

I finish the email I was composing and print off a few spreadsheets. Then I close my laptop, pull on my wellies and take a bottle of red wine from the walnut sideboard that runs along the wall behind me. I put on my jacket, heave a couple of bags over my shoulder and let myself out of the office, locking the door behind me, before trudging up the thirty-foot garden to the house.

A blast of warm air hits me when I let myself in, and I almost purr with satisfaction. It's been incredibly difficult not to come up here to work over the past six weeks, but I would have had to change the programming on the central heating for that to happen, and I've never been good at programming the central heating. I'm glad today's pre-set has worked perfectly.

I remove my boots and take my stretchy jeans and a pair of Skechers from one of my bags. I change into them, then walk through the kitchen to the storage room beyond. Hauling out two large cardboard boxes, I carry them upstairs, leaving one in the front reception room and the other in the living room. Then I return to the reception room, where I open the box and look at the Christmas decorations.

Charles and I have always decorated two trees for Christmas. One for the front bay window, mainly to impress the neighbours, and the other for the living room at the back at the house, strictly for us. Even since we split up, I decorate the trees. I don't want people to think Charles is a Christmas Grinch, but I know if I leave it to him, he won't bother.

I listen to an audiobook while I work on the bay window tree. The decorating is reasonably quick, because each year when I take down the decorations I place them neatly in individual boxes within the main storage box and I know exactly which decoration goes where. When I'm finished, I switch on the fairy lights and smile with satisfaction. I'm pleased with the effect, which like every year is cool and sophisticated. The theme here is silver and blue, which goes with the pale greys and blues of the reception room.

In the living room, things are a little different. It's always been a wonderful place to relax – south-west-facing so it gets whatever sun might be available through the painstakingly restored windows, and with heavy drapes to keep out the chill. The high ceilings allow for an impressive chandelier (which is hardly ever switched on, because the side lamps are more restful) and the decor of reds and golds is very inviting.

It's a grown-up room in a grown-up house that's full of atmosphere and the hidden lives of the people who've gone before. Though, being honest, I rarely think of the people who've gone before. I'm more interested in the here and now. Which is what I get in my own apartment, a modern build about three kilometres away that overlooks the Dodder river. Walking distance from here in the summer. Not quite as inviting on days like today.

The living-room tree is always decorated in warm shades of red, gold and green. The audiobook ends just as I finish. I turn on the lamps and uncork the wine. But before I pour it, I take a black wool dress and my black stilettos from another of my bags. I run a brush through my hair and let it flow loosely around my face, refresh my lipstick, then flop onto the sofa and stretch my legs out in front of me, leaning back against the deep cushions and gazing at the tree. There's something about a Christmas tree that's joyful even when you don't feel particularly joyful yourself. But I'm finding my joy again in lying here looking at it.

Where did it all go wrong? I sip my wine and ask myself that question over and over again, even though I already know the answer. We wanted the same thing until we didn't. We loved each other until we didn't. We were good together until we weren't.

Until the day I had to choose and I didn't choose him.

The warmth and the wine make me sleepy, and it's the sound of the front door being opened that jerks me out of the doze I've fallen into. There's a scuffling in the hall, a muttered cursing, and then the door to the living room is opened.

‘Jesus Christ,' he says as he sees me. ‘What the hell are you doing here?' And then, ‘Oh. You've decorated.'

‘Welcome home, Charles.' I lift the bottle of red from the table. ‘Freedom Friday. I brought a bottle of Monastrell. Didn't you notice the tree in the front?'

He takes off his leather jacket and slings it over the back of the sofa. Then he sits down beside me.

‘Now that you mention it, yes. But the street is festooned with trees and lights, so it didn't seem like anything out of the ordinary. Thanks, though. You know me and decorating.'

I do.

I pour him a glass of wine and raise mine to him.

‘Season's greetings,' I say, then give him a quizzical look. ‘Has Santa brought a manuscript?'

He hesitates, and I feel my stomach sink. Then he grins.

‘He absolutely has,' he says, and clinks his glass against mine. ‘And he's very, very happy with it.'

‘Very, very mysterious, too.' I take a sip of wine. (Not a sip. A gulp of relief.)

‘I needed to be,' he says. ‘It's different. But you're going to love it.'

‘Am I?'

‘I know it's a very tentative first draft and needs work, but it's got bestseller written all over it.'

‘Gosh.' I take a more modest sip and replace the glass on the table. ‘You're not usually so gung-ho.'

‘I'm in a gung-ho mood. A gung-ho-ho-ho mood, in fact.'

He sounds so remarkably cheery I feel the tension leave my shoulders.

‘So . . . are you going to give it to me?' I ask.

‘I have to print it out first,' he says. ‘The hard copy I have isn't complete. The hotel printer decided to throw a hissy fit. I'll do it now while I change into something more comfortable.'

He leaves the room and I hear him go up the stairs, and then the sound of his footsteps overhead. Most of the floorboards in the house were salvaged in the great makeover, but they creak a lot. Then I hear the printer whirring into action and allow myself a relieved smile. I wasn't a hundred per cent sure Charles really was working in his island paradise, and I'm very glad he was.

I pour myself another glass of the rich red wine, and this time I drink appreciatively, enjoying its tangy blackberry flavour. I've always been a red wine drinker, even in the summer, when most people like to switch to whites or rosés. I'm more of a full-blooded-flavour person myself.

It's about twenty minutes before he comes downstairs again. He's changed into a pair of grey Hugo Boss leisure pants and a matching grey sweatshirt. He looks great in them. That's the annoying thing about Charles. He always looks great.

‘Manuscript?' I ask as he sits beside me and pours himself some more wine.

‘Is that all I am to you?' he asks. ‘The man with the manuscript?'

‘Of course not,' I say. ‘I'm eager, that's all.'

‘It's still printing,' he says. ‘So while we're waiting, tell me how things have been.'

And then, because I always tell him everything, I say that it's been pretty shit and I admit to not having signed Francesca Clooney and missing out on Bernard Loughlin too. I say that Lucy Conway is pregnant and so probably won't write her usual book next year, and that it looks like a small independent publisher will fold while owing money to authors, including mine. And I tell him about the boiler being on the blink, that I've been working in a fridge while he's been sipping cocktails and that my assistant is leaving me. Rather to my surprise, I hear my voice wobble at the end.

‘Hey, hey, Ariel.' He obviously hears it too. ‘You've had a bad few weeks. But you always come out on top.'

‘Do I?'

‘Of course you do. Remember that time Sven Bergensson insisted he had writer's block and he couldn't finish his book and you held his hand through the whole process and in the end he won a PEN America award? And it was a major bestseller. If it wasn't for you, that would never have happened.'

‘I'm glad you think it was me, but it was Sven himself,' I say as mildly as I can.

‘He hasn't done that well since,' observes Charles. ‘What's he at these days?'

‘He's writing,' I reply. ‘Slowly.'

‘Even slower than me?' He laughs, and I do too.

‘Here.' He fills my half-empty glass, then frowns. ‘You forgot the peanuts.'

I usually bring peanuts on Fridays. Or Bombay mix. It's become a tradition of ours and I've missed it while he's been in the Caribbean. I've missed him.

I slide along the sofa and lean my head against his shoulder. He stiffens for a moment, then relaxes.

‘I think I'm fed up because of the weather,' I murmur. ‘It's been so bloody cold here. I've been thinking of you enjoying yourself beneath tropical skies, and I guess I've been jealous.'

‘I was working,' he says.

‘Every day?'

‘I have a manuscript for you, so yes, every day.'

‘But there must have been some fun times too?' I sit up straight again and take another sip from my wine glass. ‘You know, cocktails and canapés on the deck.'

‘I wasn't on a boat.'

‘I seem to remember you were at a party when I called you last. And I'm betting there was a deck somewhere.'

‘There was,' he concedes. ‘And beachfront dining. And calypso bands.'

‘How lovely.'

‘It was very therapeutic,' he says. ‘It put me into a different space.'

‘A creative space, obviously.'

‘Eventually.'

‘Meet any interesting people?'

‘Some,' he says. ‘But I was working.'

‘And listening to calypso bands . . .'

‘Not really my sort of music.'

‘True. Hey, Siri,' I say. ‘Play jazz.'

The room is suddenly filled with the mellow sound of Chet Baker's ‘I Fall in Love Too Easily', which is one of our favourite songs. Any time I ask Siri to play jazz, that's the first thing that comes up.

We sit in silence for a while and I feel myself begin to unwind for the first time in weeks. It shouldn't be because Charles is beside me, but it is. There was a long time after our split when I wondered if we could even maintain our professional relationship. But after a tricky few months when we didn't work together, we adapted. Even though I'm based at the bottom of the garden, we rarely see each other during the week, but since late last year I've come to the house with a bottle of wine and some nibbles most Fridays, and we talk about the stuff we used to talk about before. Charles outlines his creative thoughts and I give him encouragement and advice.

We've got to a good place in our relationship. When he ran into a block in putting his latest idea down on paper, it was me who suggested he should head off somewhere for a few weeks to write without interruption. I proposed a few weeks in the Mayo cottage, but apparently his sister Ellis had taken up temporary residence there, as she frequently does. I then suggested rural France as an ideal alternative, but Charles had already decided on the Caribbean. For a complete change of scenery, he said. Something to challenge his senses. And I told him about the hotel that Corinne Doherty had gone to years ago and from which she'd written her smash Jemima Jones hit, the one that had been made into a movie followed by an Apple TV series featuring the female detective. I pointed out that he already had the movie and the TV series, so he was way ahead of Corinne, but he was in the depths of anxiety at that point and didn't really listen to me. However, it appears the blue seas and skies, and the white sands and calypso bands have worked their magic.

I can't wait to read his book.

I need some good news this month.