The Other Son by Nick Alexander

agrees, eying up the cakes behind the counter. “Though they said the other one – Costa, I think – they do.”
    “Well, we’ll go to Costa next time,” Alice says. “But today I’m in a hurry. Tim’s coming around, so I need to get home with the shopping and cook lunch.”
    “Is he bringing the little ones?”
    “No, just Tim today. He’s got a meeting nearby. A work thing.”
    “Still, that’ll be nice.”
    “Yes.”
    “Can I help you, ladies?” the barista asks.
    Once they have their drinks and are seated, Alice says, “He forbade me to see you anymore. Did I tell you that?”
    “Tim?” Dot asks. “Oh, Ken, you mean.”
    “Yes. Ken.”
    “He forbade you?”
    “I know!” Alice laughs. She sips her cappuccino, and then wipes the froth from her top lip. “Men, huh?”
    “What did you say?”
    “Oh, you know what it’s like with Ken. I stood up to him at first, and then decided it was easier just to lie. You can never win an argument with Ken. I agreed I wouldn’t, but here I am.”
    “I don’t know how you put up with him,” Dot says.
    “You put up with Martin for long enough. That should give you some idea.”
    “Yes. I suppose I did.”
    “It’s just habit, I think.”
    “Go on, have half of this,” Dot says, prodding her slice of brownie with the knife. “It’s delicious.” For someone who’s in the middle of a boycott, she’s unexpectedly enthusiastic about Starbuck’s brownies.
    “No, not half. Just... a little... yes. Like that,” Alice says.
    “Did you never even nearly do it?” Dot asks, slicing the cake. “Leave Ken, I mean.”
    “Oh, of course I did. Lots of times.”
    “When he used to hit you?”
    “Oh, he never really hit me,” Alice says. “We just, you know, used to scuffle.”
    “ Scuffle ...” Dot repeats doubtfully, through a mouthful of cake.
    “Yes.”
    “If you say so.”
    “If I’d ever had, you know, a proper plan... an escape plan, like you did... I might have done it, I suppose. There were certainly times... But we can’t all be as organised as you.”
    “Maybe you need to make an escape plan.”
    “Oh, I’m not going to leave Ken now,” Alice laughs. “I’m too old to go wandering off into the sunset.”
    But as she says it, she realises that it’s true but also untrue. She realises that whatever part of her brain is speaking is having to choose from a swirl of different, conflicting Alices. And one of these knows that she’ll never leave Ken. And the other Alice could walk out tomorrow, could almost be persuaded to simply not go home today. “So you’ve got no regrets then?” she asks, trying to move the focus away from her own marriage and onto Dot’s.
    Dot laughs. “You’ve got to be joking. Martin was worse than Ken.”
    “Well, Ken’s not that bad,” Alice says. And again, the Alice that said it believes it to be true. It’s just that there’s another Alice that knows she’s talking complete nonsense, knows, in fact, that she’s lying.
    “I don’t even have a bank account,” Alice says. She frowns as she says it, because she realises that she has briefly channeled the other Alice, she has let a slither of that other version of the truth slip out.
    Dot has picked up on it. She puts down her fork and reaches across the table for Alice’s hand. “If you need help organising things, you know I’m here for you,” she says earnestly.
    Alice pulls a face. “Organising what?”
    “We can go and see my young man at the Nationwide. He was ever so nice with me. Tom, his name is. Ever so helpful. He looks a bit like that guy from the telly. Alan Carr. Talks a bit like him too.”
    “No,” Alice says, firmly. “No, I don’t think so.”
    “Why not?”
    “You just think everyone should be like you, that everyone should do whatever you’ve just done,” Alice says. “You always did.”
    “But even if you’re not going to leave Ken,” Dot says, ignoring the barb, “you should still have your own bank account.