EX Files

by Jane Moore

  He inclined his head in a silent bow of agreement, stood up and started to walk towards the door.

  “Tony?”

  He turned. “Yes?”

  “I probably won’t see you again, so I’d like to ask you a favor.”

  His hand was resting on the door handle as he waited for her to carry on.

  “Don’t tell Mark about what happened in the wine bar that night. I don’t want him hurt any more than he already is.”

  Tony looked at her strangely for a moment, then said, “I give you my word I won’t.”

  Seconds later, he was gone.

  Saturday, November 30

  10:30 a.m.

  “So, there’s this newly married couple, right?” Brian swung round in his chair to face Mark.

  “Uh-huh.” Mark didn’t look up from his newspaper.

  “And he says he wants to try out a new sexual position . . .”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, she’s not sure, so he explains it to her. He says it’s the wheelbarrow position, and that all they have to do is put her hands on the floor while he grabs hold of her legs, and—hey presto!” He stood up and made thrusting motions with his groin.

  Mark’s face wore a pitying expression at his friend’s miming abilities.

  “And do you know what she said?”

  “No, what?”

  “She said, ‘OK, but promise we won’t go past me mum’s house!’ ” Brian fell back into his chair in paroxysms of laughter.

  Mark went back to reading the paper.

  “Oh, lighten up, for fuck’s sake!” said Brian, his grin vanishing. “I honestly don’t know what’s got into you lately.”

  “Probably a marriage that failed before it even started, and a distinct lack of any personal life since,” he said glumly.

  Brian rolled his eyes. “Well, you know what they say, if at first you don’t succeed, then skydiving is not for you.”

  Mark glared at him.

  “Look, mate,” said Brian, adopting a serious tone, “the near-marriage was nearly six months ago, and as for the lack of personal life, try going without one for as long as Muggins here. The last time I had a shag was the Queen’s jubilee. The silver one.”

  “Very funny.” Mark gave up on the newspaper, folded it and dropped it on the table beside him. “It’s not just that.”

  Brian looked worried. “There’s nothing wrong with you, is there? You know . . . medically?”

  “No, nothing like that.”

  “What, then? If it’s work, join the bloody club. I’m so bored of dealing with people’s bloody divorces.” He shifted in his seat. “I forgot to tell you. The other day, I had to write a letter from a client to her ex-husband, asking him to return a Bruce Springsteen CD that was hers. The cost of writing the letter was greater than the value of the CD, but she’s so bitter she can’t let anything go.” He shook his head in despair. “No wonder I can’t be bothered to look for a relationship—I see how most of them end up.”

  Mark got up and walked into the kitchen. He returned seconds later with a packet of cookies and offered one to Brian. “I’ll admit my job could be better at the moment, but it’s not that bad.”

  “OK,” said Brian. “I’m stumped. Work’s fine, you haven’t got six months to live, and it’s not the lack of sex. Why are you so fucking miserable?”

  Mark crunched a cookie and looked thoughtful. “I just can’t get it out of my head that I have made one Grade A fuck-up.”

  Brian looked baffled. “I do that every day. It’s hardly worth fretting over.”

  “No.” He helped himself to another biscuit. “This fuck-up concerns my future.”

  “So, you put the wrong topping on a pizza, big fucking deal.”

  Mark scowled. “Not my career, my personal life.”

  Brian snorted. “Just in case you’ve forgotten, the French débâcle wasn’t your fault. She dumped you, so how can it be your fuck-up?”

  Mark was staring into space, only half listening. By any yardstick, it had been a rough time since his split from Faye.

  The first two months had been the worst, mainly because he’d had to face so many pitying expressions as he told people that, no, the wedding hadn’t gone ahead and, if they didn’t mind, he’d like to keep the reasons to himself. Once the initial fuss had died down, he had finally been able to give some proper thought to what had happened on that beautifully sunny June day. His conclusion was that, from Faye’s point of view, he still wasn’t sure. From his, all he knew was that he’d survived it and life was returning to normality, whatever that was.

  But something nagged at the back of his mind, something that told him his life would take a more satisfactory turn if he could just work out what was troubling him and act on it.

  Suddenly, Mark’s mind was whirring with the chemical rush of knowing he was about to do something completely out of character. “What time is it?” he asked.

  “Ten-thirty,” said Brian, peering at the digital clock on the video machine.

  Mark stood up. “Do you know what?”

  “Er, what?”

  “Instead of sitting around here whining about feeling miserable, I’m going to do something about it.”

  “Great,” said Brian, evidently thinking that his friend had lost his marbles. “Let’s be really wacky and go rollerblading in Hyde Park.”

  His sarcasm was lost on Mark, who was now pacing up and down in front of him. Then he stood stock still. “I can’t believe that, of all people, I’m asking you this question, but as you’re the only one here . . .” He looked directly at Brian to make sure he was concentrating. “If you really, really loved someone and thought you could be happy with them for the rest of your life, but you weren’t with them anymore, what would you do?”

  “Kill myself?” said Brian hopefully. He scratched his groin. “Do I win ten pounds?”

  “Brian! I want some advice.”

  “Er, never kick a dog turd on a hot day?”

  Mark fixed him with a steely glare. “This is serious. Just for once, will you drop the comedy routine?”

  “Sorry.”

  Mark waited to establish that his friend was listening, then continued. “What I want to know is, would you tell them how you feel in the hope that it could get back on track?”

  Brian stared at the carpet for a moment. “Yes, I would. I’d figure I had nothing to lose and I’d rather know one way or the other. Even if I got rejected, at least I’d be able to get on with my life.”

  “That’s exactly what I think,” said Mark, triumphantly. “And that’s why I’m going to sort it out this morning, once and for all.”

  He went to the overcrowded hat rack by the door and grabbed his coat, a heavy-duty jacket that had barely been off his back the past few wintry weeks.

  “Mark,” Brian looked apprehensive, “just be careful, eh? Remember what happened in France.”

  Mark didn’t answer. With a dismissive wave, he walked out of the door.

  Paying the cab driver, he turned to the vast red-brick building and looked up at her first-floor window. The curtains were open. He stared up at it for a few moments, but there was no sign of movement inside and he mentally crossed his fingers that she was in.

  On the journey over, Mark had run through several opening gambits, but instinct had told him he should just wing it and speak straight from the heart. After all, as Brian had said, he had nothing to lose. If she agreed to give their relationship another try, he’d be the happiest man on earth. If she rejected him, at least he’d know and could attempt to get on with his life.

  He realized now that it had been troubling him for some time, but he’d put it down to other things like money or work. She popped into his head first thing every morning, and when he drifted off to sleep each night, his mind was full of dreams about her. She was definitely unfinished business.

  He knew there was every chance she’d knock him back, but he had to know.

  “Here goes,” he mutte
red, and walked into the entrance hall. He noticed two letters addressed to her lying on the hall table and picked them up. Clutching them in his left hand, he climbed the first flight of stairs and stopped outside the bright-red door with brass numbers that said “45.” He wondered what lay behind it: future happiness or . . . He dismissed the alternative, determined to be positive.

  Then another doubt crept in. What if someone was there with her? After all, it was the weekend. He felt nauseous at the thought, but there was only one way to find out.

  He pressed the bell.

  Saturday, November 30

  11:20 a.m.

  A few seconds later, he heard a door open inside the flat and footsteps clattering on a hard floor. Then he saw her outline through the frosted-glass panel and his heart leapt.

  “Who is it?” she shouted.

  “It’s Mark.”

  She opened the door immediately, looking startled. “My God, it is you. What are you doing here?”

  She hadn’t said it antagonistically, more in a slightly bemused way and he hung on to this as a good sign. “Are you alone?” he asked.

  Her expression changed to one of mild irritation. “Is that any of your business?”

  “No, I don’t mean it like that,” he said quietly. “I merely ask because I want to come in and talk to you.”

  “About what?” Her body was blocking the door.

  “About us.”

  “Mark, the last time I looked, there was no us.”

  He stood there for a few seconds, unsure what to do or say. The old Mark would have muttered, “Sorry to trouble you,” and left, but he was determined to get a definitive answer to his question of whether they had a future together.

  “I want to come in,” he said firmly.

  “Oh, do you?” Her eyes were mocking. Then she was serious. “In that case, you better had.” She stepped out of his way. “Go into the kitchen. I’ll make coffee.”

  Ten minutes later, nursing a mug of packet cappuccino, Mark had filled her in on how things were going at work, the welfare of his family, and even commented on how lovely the weather was for the time of year. Anything but what he’d come to talk about. Eventually he ventured into the unknown.

  “Kate . . .”

  “That’s my name, don’t wear it out,” she quipped.

  “I said I wanted to talk to you.”

  “You did indeed.” It was clear she wasn’t going to make it easy for him.

  “There’s no point beating about the bush . . . I’ve come here because I wanted to suggest that we give things another go.”

  “Things?” Her voice was hard.

  “I mean us,” he mumbled.

  At first, her expression betrayed nothing. A minute or two passed and neither of them spoke. Then she let out an impatient sigh. “Is that it?”

  “Um . . . yes.” He felt horribly awkward. “There’s not much else to say.”

  She stood up and pointed towards the door. “Goodbye, Mark.”

  He stayed where he was. “What did I say?”

  “It’s more a case of what you didn’t say.” She looked furious now.

  “Sorry, you’ve lost me. I’ve just said I want us to get back together, and you’re reacting like this . . . I don’t get it.” His forehead creased with worry lines. “Unless, of course, the idea repulses you.”

  She rubbed the frown furrow between her eyes. “Do you seriously think that after everything that’s happened you can just swan in here, say you want us to get back together, and I’m going to fall into your arms?”

  He looked suitably humble. “No, of course not. I know we have have a long way to go, but I thought we could at least discuss it.”

  She sat down and stared at him intently across the table. “Tell me why you want me back.”

  Mark was thrown by this, but he realized that it was a crucial moment. Whatever he said now would undoubtedly determine what happened next.

  “I want you back because you’re the best thing that ever happened to me.”

  She said nothing and he deduced that it would take a lot more than that to convince her.

  “I want you back because I haven’t stopped thinking about you for the past six months, ever since what happened in France.” He let out a small sigh. “Sure, I felt like shit at the time, but I soon saw that most of it was humiliation rather than heartbreak.”

  Her expression had softened. “Go on.”

  “I worked out that the misery I felt had nothing to do with the aftermath of the non-wedding, and everything to do with not being with you. When I looked back, it struck me that the moment I saw you step out of that car with Ted I knew I was still in love with you. But I denied it to myself, particularly as we were so far down the line with everything . . . and then she called it off anyway.”

  Kate chewed her lip. “I’d love to believe all this, Mark, but the cynical devil on my shoulder is telling me that you’ve reinvented history somewhat because you’re feeling sorry for yourself and want to get back with me because there’s no one else on the horizon.”

  “Kate, that’s so not true,” he implored.

  She raised a hand to stop him interrupting. “In France, I was desperate for a sign, any sign, that you still had feelings for me. But there wasn’t one. You just looked like a man desperately in love with his wife-to-be.”

  “I thought I was in love with her at the time,” he said miserably. “Afterwards, I realized I wasn’t. It was lust, really.”

  “Very convenient,” said Kate, drily.

  Mark leaned across the table and took her hand, comforted that she didn’t pull away. “Look, I can’t rewind to that time, so you have to trust me on this. There’s nothing like making the biggest mistake of your life—or almost, in my case—to teach you what you really want.”

  “What was I wearing?” she asked suddenly.

  “Sorry?”

  “When I got out of the car with Ted, what was I wearing?”

  Mark closed his eyes. “You had on a denim jacket, with a blue-and-white polka-dot top underneath that showed a glimpse of your stomach . . . and white jeans with blue-and-white sneakers. Your hair was slightly shorter than it is now, with little curls in the nape of the neck, and you were wearing your favorite perfume, Knowing by Estée Lauder . . . Oh, and you were wearing a necklace I hadn’t seen before, with a little heart on it.’

  He opened his eyes to see that Kate had tears in hers. “Very good.” She smiled.

  “And in the evening, you wore a black silk dress with—”

  “Yes, yes.” She laughed joyfully. “I believe you.”

  “Good.” He squeezed her hand a little tighter.

  “But I still don’t understand why you didn’t say something. I can’t tell you how it broke my heart to come to your wedding and pretend how happy I was for you.”

  He smiled. “You did such a good job of pretending you were happy that I believed you. And, as I said, I didn’t work out what I was feeling until afterwards, when all the fuss had died down. I just put it down to nostalgia.”

  She turned her head away and stared at the stripped-wood floor. “I came to find you, you know, but you’d gone.”

  He looked sheepish. “I just couldn’t face anyone . . . I couldn’t bear the inevitable questions, particularly from Mum and Dad, so I took the coward’s way out and left immediately.”

  She nodded to indicate that she understood. “Have you seen her since?”

  “Nope. She called me a couple of times in the following month, probably through guilt.” He took a sip of his coffee, which had gone tepid. “She left a message on my mobile asking if I was OK, but I didn’t bother calling back. I didn’t need her concern. All I could think about was calling you, but I was convinced you wouldn’t want to hear from me.”

  They sat quietly for a few moments, the only sound that of a pigeon cooing outside the window. Mark was acutely aware of how content he felt, just sitting with her, saying nothing. Then a thought struck him and he sti
ffened. “Are you still with Ted?” He managed to sound matter-of-fact, but inside he felt uncomfortably apprehensive.

  She looked at him curiously. “You don’t know, do you?”

  “Know what?” His mind raced with possibilities. Perhaps they’d secretly got married. Perhaps he’d died.

  “Ted’s gay,” she said, with a grin. “He just came to the wedding as a favor, so I could pretend he was my boyfriend. There was no way I was going to watch you marry someone else while I looked like a sad singleton.”

  Mark burst out laughing, more from relief than anything else. “I didn’t have a bloody clue!” he spluttered. “And I was so jealous of him!”

  “I thought Tony would have told you by now.”

  “Tony?” She nodded.

  He looked baffled. “Yes, he knew. We had a long chat at the wedding, and I told him then, but asked him not to say anything.”

  “Well, to his credit, he didn’t,” said Mark. He thought about it some more and smiled. “He’s always been a secretive sod.”

  “He’d say discreet.”

  Now that things were more friendly between them, Mark felt himself relax a little. Then Kate withdrew her hand and he tensed again.

  “There’s no one serious in my life,” she said, putting both hands round her coffee cup. “There hasn’t been since you and I split up. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to walk straight back into this.” She pointed at him.

  Getting up, she put her mug into the sink and turned to face him, leaning against the drain board. “Mark, do you have any idea how much you hurt me when you left here to go and live with Brian?”

  He shook his head slowly. “I’m so sorry. I was a complete idiot.” He didn’t know what else to say.

  “I’m not sure I can trust you not to hurt me again,” she said quietly.

  Instinctively, he stood up and took two steps towards her. Grabbing both her hands, he looked her straight in the eye. “Kate, I swear I will never, ever hurt you again.”

  “There’s no guarantee of that.”

  “Maybe not, but as close as dammit. I’m a different person now. That whole France business made me grow up rather rapidly.”