Theft

by Luke Brown

  Emily had insisted on no poetry, allowing Andrew the music as compromise. Poetry should never be made trite, she explained to me, by forcing it to express profound statements of love. She had kept her face straight and I didn’t know whether she was teasing me.

  Did anyone know of any lawful impediment why Emily and Andrew could not be joined in martyr money?

  I had hoped Richard or Chloe might burst in at this point. ‘I’m sorry,’ they would say, ‘but there is something that the bride and groom should admit to each other first.’

  The minister left a polite pause. I wondered how many times in such a minister’s life they hear the question answered in the negative.

  It was down to me alone. I could call out and read aloud the contents of each card in my pocket.

  We all listened to the drone of a motor: the air conditioning or heating somewhere, a PC with a broken fan; the ambient clatter that rattles through all bureaucratic buildings.

  And then they were asked to face each other, confirm their names and repeat after me.

  Andrew was in a navy-blue suit and open-neck shirt, a white flower in his lapel. Emily in a red dress that cinched at her waist and made me remember what it had felt like to hold her there while she sang to me. She was shaking. She was scared. The stiletto of the heel trembled as she repeated those old adverbial phrases, as he repeated his in turn, as they smiled with great concentration at each other while the other said their lines. Was Sophie touched by this? Was her mind changed? Did she think that I was surrendering to soppiness as I used my hand to tell her that I was there, close to her, available if she wanted me?

  She shivered slightly to push my hand away and I put my hand down by my side again. She looked at me with her mouth shut and back again at Andrew and Emily. A breeze through the window stirred the leaves of the plants that decorated the ledges of the room.

  Emily would not meet my eyes, but Andrew made sure to turn to me and grin.

  It didn’t look like a very passionate kiss when they kissed.

  *

  I had no intention of giving Andrew the card into which I had folded the printouts of Emily’s texts with the married man she met up with in Blackpool, the man she took back, I can only presume, to my mother’s house, to have sex with in my bedroom, or on the living-room carpet I had never walked on while wearing shoes. Most of the time the gun on the wall is just for show, just the owner’s substitute for personality. I didn’t want to be a destroyer, just to know that I could be a destroyer, for my fantasies to carry a credible weight. I wanted to know that what was in my pocket was sitting there, so that when Andrew grinned at me like that, like I knew he would, and made it clear to me how powerless he thought I was, I could put my hand inside my jacket and feel the grain of the paper, imagine the blade of an old-fashioned letter-knife slicing through it.

  I had something in the other envelope too. Chloe and I had spent much longer together than the time it takes to drink a coffee. And though our dignity demanded that we spoke like we were only pretending, she had sent me just the evidence I had asked her for.

  *

  We made our way on foot to a pub where a section had been reserved and food ordered for ‘a little afternoon party’, as Andrew described it. He put his arm around me twice while he told me the arrangements. He was so jubilant I thought he might be about to put me in a neck hold and give me a head scrub.

  ‘How are you?’ I asked Emily, as we made our way there and walked slightly ahead together. They were the first words I’d said to her that day.

  ‘I’m good, thanks. Glad that’s over.’

  ‘What did you think of her who did it?’

  ‘She was fine. Functional. I wish we’d just done it on our own though.’

  ‘There were only six guests.’

  ‘I know. A bit much to walk in to taped violins, wasn’t it?’

  ‘No, no.’

  ‘Well, I’m not regretting things!’ she said.

  ‘Of course you’re not.’ I put my hand on her arm. ‘It was fine.’

  ‘Stop making off with my bride,’ called Andrew from behind us, and we waited up for the rest of the party.

  ‘I haven’t told you how beautiful you look in that dress,’ I said, just as Andrew arrived.

  ‘Now you have,’ she said. ‘You look very sharp yourself.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said. I hugged her so I didn’t have to look at her face.

  ‘Cool down, Cassio,’ said Gary.

  ‘Those trousers aren’t constricting you, are they, Paul?’ said Andrew. ‘They’re very tight.’

  Sophie caught my arm when I disengaged from Emily and I hung back to talk to her.

  ‘You two are very friendly,’ she said. ‘I was also tempted to tell you to get your hands off my father’s wife.’

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ I said. ‘Protective of their union.’

  She screwed up her face, and I laughed.

  ‘It’s done,’ she said. ‘What can I do?’

  ‘Devise a dastardly plot to split them up?’

  ‘Yes, I suppose I could. How would I go about it?’

  I pretended I was thinking about this for the first time. ‘I suppose you could find or manufacture evidence to suggest one or the other was cheating on the other.’

  ‘Oh, God, no. Old people and their ancient morality. I couldn’t take it seriously.’

  ‘That’s principled of you. So if you knew Emily was cheating on your father you wouldn’t think it any of his business?’

  ‘The important thing is honesty, not monogamy. Yes, I wouldn’t want to know.’

  I didn’t say anything and faced straight forwards as we walked.

  ‘Is she?’ she blurted. ‘She’d tell you, wouldn’t she?’

  ‘I have no idea why you’d think that.’

  She grabbed my arm. ‘What’s that tone about?’

  ‘There’s no tone.’

  ‘You sound angry.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘Have I what?’

  She spun her head to gesture with her chin at Emily.

  ‘No.’

  She squeezed my arm harder.

  ‘Seriously, have you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I don’t know if I believe you. If you haven’t, it’s probably not through lack of trying.’

  ‘Why would I want to try? It’s you I like.’

  ‘I don’t believe that either. Don’t you feel entitled to a certain amount of revenge?’

  ‘On who?’

  ‘Me.’

  We followed the party down a path through the grounds of a large Gothic-looking church.

  ‘You haven’t answered,’ she said.

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘I’m still thinking about it.’

  *

  Five bottles of champagne waited for us in an ice bucket. Little pastries and sandwiches, hot, spiced things made from chickpeas. And our party got along quite merrily, to begin with, on our raised platform in the back of the pub. There were seats to sit on but we remained standing. Felix eyed my cigarette packet wistfully as I nipped out, before emerging to steal one from me, looking over his shoulder every few seconds for any sign of his mother. I liked Felix. He thought I had a ‘cool life’ when I told him, through force of habit, that I was a bookseller, with a magazine column, and that I lived in a shared flat on the Kingsland Road. ‘You sound like you have it sorted, mate,’ he said, and I realised that, yes, I had lived a teenager’s idea of a perfect life for the last thirteen years.

  Back inside we talked and drank and ate and when I went to pour everyone another glass of champagne from the last bottle it ran out before I could pour myself one. Andrew called over to me to get a couple more, stick them on his tab.

  So off I went to the bar, where a TV presenter in front of me was wearing a leather jacket. He looked around at me and nodded. I pretended I didn’t recognise him. ‘Congratulations,’ he said, looking at Emily.

  ‘Oh, yeah. Thanks.�
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  ‘Want a drink?’

  ‘No, thanks. I’m getting a couple of bottles.’

  ‘You have a beautiful wife.’

  ‘I really don’t.’

  ‘It’s a bit early to be disenchanted already, isn’t it?’

  ‘I mean, she’s not my wife. She married the older gentleman over there.’

  ‘Oh! God. Right, well, he really does have a beautiful wife.’

  ‘Yes, he does.’

  He turned back to the bar but I tapped him on the shoulder. ‘Why did you think we were married?’

  ‘I don’t know. You both look like you’re getting married. And you know, you’re the same sort of age.’

  ‘I’m with her,’ I said, pointing out Sophie, keen to impress him for reasons I would wince about when I had time to examine them. ‘I think.’

  ‘She looks very pretty too. I’d thought she was your sister. My girlfriend and I have been watching you from our table. Funny the way we think we can read a situation from the surface, but get it totally wrong.’

  While this was going on Emily had walked over.

  ‘Hello,’ I said.

  ‘We need fizzy water too.’

  ‘Congratulations,’ said the TV presenter.

  Emily did a double take. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘He thought we’d just got married.’

  ‘Oh!’ she said.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Anyway, have a great day.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, and we watched him take two glasses of wine over to a table in the corner where a woman was waiting.

  ‘Great,’ she said.

  ‘It’s going OK, though, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah. It’s nice.’

  ‘Were you worried about Sophie acting up?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘She seems less against you than before.’

  ‘That’s probably the pre-nup.’

  ‘Ha ha.’

  She looked back towards our platform and back to me.

  ‘Of course. There probably was something like that.’

  ‘Mm hm,’ she said. ‘I thought it would ease the tension.’

  ‘Is that what the tension was about? I thought it was her mum.’

  She took a mirror from her bag and looked at herself in it.

  ‘These things don’t really occur to me,’ I lied. ‘I suppose it’s pretty complicated. Inheritance.’

  The barman popped the cork of a bottle of champagne and set it down.

  She put the mirror back in her bag. ‘It’s just to reassure the family that I won’t run off with all his money if he happens to die suddenly, or if I catch him fucking his students and divorce him.’

  ‘Would you mind?’

  She shrugged and looked away. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sophie would think that unenlightened of you.’

  ‘Yes, she’s full of theoretical positions. I suspect she’s capable of jealousy too.’

  ‘Certainly where you’re concerned.’

  She pulled a face, though I thought she looked slightly pleased.

  ‘And you’re not feeling upset, that you were pressurised into something less than you deserved?’

  ‘Jesus, fuck, Paul.’ She didn’t look pleased any more. ‘Did you just say that? On my wedding day?’

  ‘About the money. Not about Andrew.’

  ‘That’s not much better,’ she sighed. ‘I’m sorry. I just wanted to get on with life the way it was, and this seemed a good way to do that. I met a man who I’m happy with, much to my surprise. I fell in love with him, not his money. He’s kind, intelligent, handsome. Don’t roll your eyes.’

  ‘Convince yourself when I’m not around, please.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You came back with me the other night and you’re talking like nothing at all happened.’

  ‘Paul. Please.’

  ‘I mean: I’m not actually sensitive about it. It’s the principle of the thing. That you might at least consider that you might want to be sensitive about it.’

  ‘Come on,’ she said, putting her hand on my waist. ‘You can’t have wounded feelings while sleeping with my boyf— my husband’s daughter.’

  ‘Jesus, listen to this sordid fucking… Yuck.’

  ‘I know. What are you doing here, Paul? What are you hoping for?’

  ‘Right now, just a dignified end to it. Then a new start.’

  ‘Well, amen to that.’ She fiddled with her ring. ‘I suppose I am convincing myself a bit. What a funny thing this is. I have a husband. I have this ring on my finger. This marker.’

  ‘It’s easy enough to take it off.’

  ‘It really isn’t,’ she said. ‘I mean actually. I think it’s stuck on.’

  ‘You twist,’ I said.

  ‘Still stuck.’

  ‘Twist and pull. Here,’ I said, taking her hand, twisting and pulling, meeting resistance until I didn’t and the ring skidded across the pub floor to land under the table of the TV presenter and his companion.

  ‘For heaven’s sake,’ called Andrew, who had probably been watching our conversation for a while, they all probably had. ‘What is going on?’

  ‘It’s OK,’ I said, rushing to the other side of the pub with Emily. ‘I saw where it landed.’

  ‘Jesus Christ.’

  The TV presenter and his girlfriend were peering under their table. Emily got on her hands and knees and crawled under it, and her dress rode up. I looked away, in the direction of Andrew who was striding towards me. Then I got on my hands and knees too. ‘Let me, Emily,’ I said. ‘I’m not wearing a dress.’

  She straightened up and banged her head, backed out while rubbing it.

  ‘What does it look like?’ asked the TV presenter.

  ‘A wedding ring,’ said Emily.

  ‘How did that happen?’ said Andrew.

  The ring had disappeared.

  ‘Congratulations,’ said the TV presenter and his girlfriend. ‘I’m sure he’ll find it.’

  I had found it. I was tempted to slip it into my pocket and pawn it later.

  ‘Here it is,’ I said, coming out from the table on my knees.

  Emily held out her hand. Instead of dropping it into her palm I slid it over the end of her finger, all the way to the base.

  ‘Why, Paul, were you removing Emily’s wedding ring?’ Andrew asked, after we’d moved away from the table.

  ‘Calm down,’ said Emily. ‘I was just saying it was stuck already, and he was explaining, demonstrating, how to take it off.’

  He looked at me, his forehead as knotty as old tree bark. I was pleased I’d annoyed him. I put my hand in my jacket to make sure I still had my cards. My reflex was to apologise but I bit down hard on it and said I was going for a cigarette.

  *

  While I was smoking, Sophie came out and we had a conversation I don’t like to think about. No, I said, I did not throw Emily’s ring across the pub on purpose, as a comment on the marriage, and it was not even a Freudian slip of the hand.

  Whatever you might think.

  But I suggested to Sophie that it was now a good opportunity to proceed with our plan and go off somewhere on our own, wasn’t it?

  ‘Ah,’ she said.

  She had been thinking actually, she said, that she should go back and check on her mum, and we could hang out another time, was that all right?

  ‘Right?’ I said. ‘Right?’

  ‘Stop saying right. Is it all right?’

  ‘How it could it not be all right? How could any reasonable man insist you leave your miserable mum on her own, if that’s what she is, miserable and at home and on her own.’

  The sun was fading out, and we were nearly finished. I only had to turn around and go. But I didn’t.

  ‘So it’s not OK,’ she said. ‘I understand you’re disappointed but I don’t think you have the right to be annoyed, given the circumstances.’

  ‘We’d made an arrangement. I was looking forward to it.’

  ‘So was
I!’

  ‘Come on.’

  ‘You really are needy. I don’t make excuses.’

  ‘You certainly believe the press releases you write for yourself.’

  ‘Oh, fuck you.’

  ‘It’s just inconsiderate and insensitive. To puff yourself up with virtuousness by evoking your sad mother to me.’

  ‘Oh, Paul, I’m sorry about your mum, but I just won’t do emotional blackmail.’

  We might have come back from the brink if I’d walked away then. It would probably have been the end but we might have remained friends.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I just thought we were going to take care of each other today.’

  Her expression softened and she’d stepped up close to me before something occurred to her. ‘Why would you need taking care of? What’s your disappointment here?’

  ‘There’s no disappointment. I just mean—’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘What was I to you? Just a way of making her jealous? Pissing off my dad?’

  ‘If you want? Would that let you off the hook? Yes, then, if that’s what you want: you were nothing to me. I used you to annoy Emily, to get at your dad. I was laughing at you all the way. That’s the kind of man I am. Just a clever schemer.’

  ‘Clever?’ she said. ‘What have you got away with?’

  *

  I thought I would try to leave with one last display of grace.

  Back inside, Sophie was making her own farewells to everyone. I hung back so I’d be the last person she’d walk past, and I leaned against the wall, watching the others watch me. Sophie hugged Emily awkwardly, then Andrew swept her up in his arms and spoke into her ear.

  She nodded. She shook her head. They both turned to look at me.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said, as she walked past me.

  ‘Yeah, me too,’ she said, and she patted me on the arm and left.

  Andrew walked over to me.

  ‘I’m really sorry about before with the ring,’ I said.

  ‘Sophie said you’ve been arguing.’