by Alison Booth
Jeff was pleased. He was pleased even though I’d been sitting on the offer for a while before telling him. Perhaps he didn’t realise I’d wanted to make up my mind first and to reveal it only when I had my family in a protective ring around me. And I’d only made the final decision when we were out on the water. Anyway, he seemed thrilled. He knew it would mean more money in the future. I hadn’t been able to find a decent job and he could see that having a postgraduate qualification would make me more marketable. And Charlie was already at school. We didn’t plan to have any more children. We both thought Charlie was enough.
I remembered still the sweet feel of a baby’s downy head against my face, my lips. The milky smells, that fine, smooth skin. But I knew I couldn’t bring another child into the world. Not with a man like Jeff.
Chapter 17
NOW
There is no one in the women’s room. A feeble shaft of sunlight struggles through the grimy window. For barely a second, before being obliterated by clouds, it illuminates my face and that of my doppelganger in the mirror above the washbasin. I switch on the fluorescent light and check my hair, which I washed this morning. Exuberant is the word to describe it. Too exuberant; I try flattening it with my hands. While I’m applying some lip liner and lipstick, Kate bursts in. The lipstick is a light brownish shade and barely noticeable.
‘Lipstick,’ comments Kate at once. ‘You don’t normally wear it.’
‘I’m going out for lunch.’
‘You’re all dressed up too. Is that a new outfit?’
‘No, not really.’
In fact it’s Zoë’s suit. I phoned her last night to tell her about Anthony’s visit and, with her usual kindness, she was at my front door with one of her designer suits within half an hour. She is taller than I am, about the same height as Charlie, but the suit has a short skirt and it fits me well. It’s wonderful to wear; the fabric is so light and soft that it feels like a second skin.
‘You look lovely,’ Kate says. ‘A bit of a change from the old trousers, eh?’
I wipe off the lipstick that I have so carefully applied. Afterwards I decide I looked better with it on, and start to reapply it.
‘It suits you, Sally. Don’t rub it off again. Where are you going for lunch?’
‘Guillaume’s.’
‘Well, well. Rather special. And expensive too, so I’ve heard.’ Kate is powdering her already flawless skin, standing back to admire the effect. ‘Are you doing another book?’
‘No academic publisher would take me for lunch there. I’m just meeting a friend.’
‘I hope he’s paying.’
‘So do I.’ At once I realise how neatly I’ve fallen into her trap. In her oblique way she can find out all sorts of things.
She widens her mouth into a broad smile, and expertly applies bright red lipstick. ‘You must come to the surprise party I’m organising for Jim,’ she says. Her husband is about to turn forty. ‘It’s in a few weeks’ time. You can’t possibly be engaged that far ahead! It’s on a Saturday afternoon and I’ve booked a boat for a cruise along the Grand Union Canal. Only through London, but it should be fun. Perhaps you might like to bring someone?’
‘Lovely, thanks.’ I scribble the date onto one of the scraps of paper in my bag and at that instant remember Kate’s stepson, Ben. ‘Could I bring Charlie?’ I say. Normally Charlie would be reluctant to spend a Saturday afternoon with a bunch of my middle-aged friends. But not so long ago, when Kate and Jim brought Ben to one of my Sunday lunch parties, I noticed how well Charlie and Ben had got along.
‘Of course. Ben would love that. By the way,’ Kate asks as I’m leaving. ‘Your lunch date. Is it with that Professor Blake?’
I pretend not to hear her as the door swings shut behind me.
Chapter 18
THEN
The night it happened, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned in bed for what seemed like hours. My jaw was throbbing. When I got up to go to the bathroom, I could see that my left cheek was swollen from the jawline to the cheekbone. A bruise was developing and it would be a big one.
I went downstairs and sat in the living room. My green and white striped shirt was lying crumpled on the floor. The shirt was my favourite but it was going in the bin.
I began to feel dizzy and stretched out on the couch. What had happened to our love; what was happening to our marriage? I’d been a somebody once, a woman with a bright future. Now I was a nothing. A nobody who didn’t have the strength to do anything, let alone leave.
The room was swimming. I felt as if our house was being sliced vertically through the middle, like a doll’s house. I could see Charlie sound asleep in her bedroom, dreaming sweetly in a world uncomplicated by responsibilities. And in our bedroom, I could see Jeff sound asleep too, elegant as always, even when he had completely abandoned consciousness. And then I saw myself, there on a couch in the living room, separated from my husband by a couple of solid brick walls and the thickness of the floor.
I felt that I inhabited a different world now.
Yet I was connected to my family by the ties of our common existence in that house. And as I watched, these took tangible form, like some spider’s web trapping us as if we were flies. And the threads of the web grew stronger as I watched, and thickened into filaments. It was as if some dreadful fungus, some ghastly growth like dry rot, had taken over our lives, and was catching us up in the fast-growing fibres of its obscene expansion. At that moment, I wondered if I was about to have a nervous breakdown.
But after a while the hallucination slipped away, and I went upstairs and fell asleep. And the following day we carried on as usual, as if nothing had happened to change things between us.
Charlie noticed of course. The next morning I woke up to the pad of her feet across the bedroom floor, the usual early morning occurrence that meant there was no need for an alarm clock. I opened my eyes and looked at her face a few centimetres away; she was kneeling next to the bed watching me.
‘What happened, Mummy?’ Her voice was a whisper.
‘Morning, darling.’ I rolled onto my back. Jeff was lying on his side, with his back towards me, still asleep.
‘What happened to your face?’ Charlie touched my jaw, which felt painful to her touch.
‘I walked into a cupboard door. Silly me, I didn’t have the light on and couldn’t see where I was going.’
‘Poor Mummy.’
She climbed onto the bed, and clambered over me into the space next to Jeff. As she snuggled up to me, she gave my shoulder gentle pats, as if I were some fragile thing that she didn’t want to see hurt. I pulled her close and curved my body around hers. More and more she was becoming the one I was living for. She felt warm and soft and giving, and she needed my love as much as I needed hers.
When Jeff woke up, he started playing with Charlie as if nothing had happened the previous night. As if nothing had happened.
I put make-up over my bruised jaw and kept a low profile for the following week. If anyone enquired, I said I’d collided with an open cupboard door in the kitchen. As the days slipped by, I felt I was a nothing still. I felt as if my energy was draining away. I had only enough to look after Charlie, and to read again and again the letter from University College offering me a postgraduate studentship.
Chapter 19
NOW
Although it’s raining, the pavement outside the Darwin Building is thronging with lunchtime crowds. The wind blows the rain up under my umbrella and threatens to turn it inside out. I begin to wish that I’d worn a mackintosh over Zoë’s suit, the skirt of which is getting splashed. In my unsuitable high-heeled shoes I tip-tap around the piles of leaves and rubbish flitting hither and thither, driven by a wind that cannot make up its mind from which direction it’s blowing. In Bedford Square, a few hardy stalwarts are sitting on the benches overlooking the gardens. Huddled under umbrellas, they eat their sandwiches while they fight off the pigeons.
The blustery weather exacerbates my nervousn
ess. When the prospect of seeing Anthony was in the future, I’d been looking forward to it; but the closer I get to my destination the more anxious I become. Perhaps we won’t recognise each other; or maybe I’ve been mistaken about him and we’ll have nothing to say.
There is a rumour circulating that he’s been offered an endowed professorship at Columbia University in New York. Yesterday afternoon I heard several colleagues discussing this in the common room and one even claimed to know the precise amount of the offer. Ever since, I’ve been wondering if there’s any truth in it. Academics are notorious gossips and although it’s possible that an offer has been made, I have no idea if it’s likely that Anthony will accept.
By the time I reach Adeline Place, I’m starting to wish I hadn’t agreed to this lunch. I look at my watch. I am far too early: fifteen minutes to go and I’m nearly there. To fill in time, I start a second circuit of the square. Three or four joggers straggle past, their joyless expressions revealing a dogged determination to achieve physical fitness regardless of its cost. An old man is lying on a bench; he is covered with a coarse piece of sacking over which is spread a clear plastic sheet, formed from a builders’ merchant bag. As I walk by, I catch a whiff of whisky overlaid with urine. I look more closely to see if he is dead, but his chest is rising and falling. I glance at my watch again: ten minutes to go, and it will take only five to reach the restaurant.
At this moment I hear someone call my name and look around, half expecting to see another Sally being hailed. But it’s Anthony shouting at me and my pulse rate quickens. He is hurrying towards me from Bayley Street on the west side of the square. His cream raincoat flaps as he runs, revealing a green polo-neck jumper. He stops a metre away, and we look at each other. His hair is almost dripping wet; he has no umbrella. Then he raises his arms and takes hold of my shoulders.
‘Wonderful to see you,’ he says. He leans under my umbrella, and kisses me on each cheek. ‘Serendipity. Now neither of us will have to wait for the other at the restaurant.’
He beams at me, while maintaining his hold on my shoulders. He is close enough for me to see that the skin under his eyes is criss-crossed with fine lines that I find curiously affecting. He tells me he has come from a meeting at Senate House but I don’t really take in the detail of what he is saying. I am so pleased to see him that I can’t stop smiling. His hair has been darkened by the rain to almost black, against which the few white hairs stand out sharply.
‘You’re all wet,’ I say at last. His eyes look a deeper blue than I remembered; it’s as if the grey day has absorbed some of their colour.
‘Say that again.’
‘You’re all wet.’
‘No, just say my name.’
‘Anthony.’
‘I love the way you pronounce it. You put all the emphasis on the first syllable.’
I laugh. ‘You’ve been listening to too many American accents. But your hair really is wet. You’re saturated.’ And I think back to the other occasion when he stood dripping in front of me, and I had almost caressed his face, in the hotel lobby in Vigo nearly three weeks ago. ‘Get under my umbrella. It’s big enough for two.’
The enforced closeness of sharing an umbrella is one way of bringing together two reserved people. Anthony takes my umbrella and I take his proffered arm, and we proceed towards the restaurant. With part of my brain I think of the blood pulsing through his cardiovascular system barely millimetres from my own. With a different part of my brain I think of the miracle of two people meeting in central London when yesterday we were thousands of miles apart. But soon I forget to be analytical as he begins to talk. We have no trouble thinking of what to say: it’s as if all the face-to-face conversation we might have had over the past few weeks has been dammed up. Released now, it rushes forth in a torrent.
At the restaurant we are shown to a quiet table for two, in front of a stained-glass window. I sit facing the room and Anthony sits opposite. I watch him obliquely while he studies the menu. The light from the window washes over his face: pale lozenges of blue and yellow and mauve, dappled with the faintest shadow of what must be raindrops sliding down the outside of the window behind me.
‘Do you remember when we last saw each other in Spain?’ he says when we have placed our orders and the waiter has gone.
‘Yes, on the terrace.’ I don’t tell him how often this has been on my mind.
‘I really wanted to see you again. I thought Thanksgiving was too long to wait. So when this trip came up, it seemed like an excellent opportunity.’
‘Killing two birds with one stone.’
‘Well, that’s one way of looking at it.’ He smiles. ‘But you knew we would see each other again soon.’ This is a statement and not a question.
‘The funny thing is that the day you called I’d more or less decided to send you an e-mail. I was starting to forget what you looked like!’
The waiter brings the main course. After he has gone away, we gossip about colleagues and academic intrigues: who has got an offer from a prestigious US laboratory, who is thinking of moving to Cambridge. This moment would be the ideal time to ask him if there is any truth in the story that he is considering staying in the States. I know I should do this but my mouth refuses to articulate the words. Can I really expect him to reveal his career plans to me, a near stranger? And even if I am more to him than that, can I expect him to reveal his career plans to me, a possible lover? Of course I can. I try to put myself in his position: brilliant scientist, middle-aged bachelor, not bad-looking. Which would come first, the career or the potential love life? The career obviously. That is why he is what he is. And there are plenty of unattached women in the US, plenty of other possibilities.
‘What are you thinking about, Sally? You look miles away.’
Apologising, I decide to take a risk even though I mightn’t like the answer. ‘And you,’ I say, choosing my words so carefully that my sentence comes out as if I’m speaking to someone whose first language isn’t English. ‘And you – are you thinking of staying in North America?’
‘Almost certainly not. I like it better here.’ Although Anthony’s face is impassive, he looks me straight in the eye.
I gaze back while considering his response. I estimate that there is about a five per cent probability he will stay in the States, give or take a bit. It’s definitely worth gambling at those odds. I wonder if he can see the relief in my eyes or if instead I look as inscrutable as he does.
We are interrupted by the waiter removing our plates. Anthony asks me about Charlie and I tell him in some detail about her A-levels and how lucky I am having a daughter who causes me little worry. Then I remember I told him this on the way to Spain; perhaps I am too much the doting mother. I also notice that I’ve finished my second glass of wine. So I stop myself talking and there’s a pause in the conversation. Although this might have been the time to do it, Anthony doesn’t ask about Charlie’s father. So I tell him I am a widow.
‘I’m sorry.’ He looks quite shocked. He must have thought I was divorced or never married.
‘Thank you,’ I say automatically. ‘My husband Jeff died ten years ago.’
‘Do you want to tell me about it?’
‘No.’ My response is like a slap in the face. I feel ashamed of my abruptness; a flush of heat moves from the base of my neck and slowly ascends to my cheeks.
Anthony raises his eyes to examine the stained glass in the window behind my head. The feeling of intimacy has vanished. I have hurt him and he can’t quite hide it. Should I apologise? The thought of telling him about Jeff fills me with dread. Perhaps Anthony thinks I’m still in love with my husband; or maybe only that I’ve been rude. I can’t second-guess him on this. One of the things I’ve realised since starting my sessions with Helen is that my empathy is the projection of my feelings and reactions on to someone else.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘That was a bit abrupt. What I really meant to say was, not yet.’ Why do I think I have to discuss this wi
th Helen first? I’m starting to feel confused, crippled with indecision. But Anthony is reaching out to touch my hand as it fiddles with the stem of the wine glass. His skin is warm and his touch gentle. Calmed by his gesture, I smile and ask him if he has ever been married.
‘No.’ He retrieves his hand and begins to play with a fork.
I look away, fearing my need for him will be obvious. I’m not yet ready to risk exposure.
He says, ‘I lived with someone when I was in my early thirties and we thought about it.’
I had expected that he would have a serious relationship behind him. He is too pleasant not to have, even though, like all serious academics, his work is probably his main interest.
‘But Katherine became ill.’ He pauses and inspects the tablecloth; he sweeps some stray breadcrumbs into a neat pile. ‘She developed breast cancer. It was a particularly virulent kind that had spread before it was discovered. She was dead within six months.’ He is speaking quickly. Unlike me, he is glad of this opportunity to unburden himself.
‘How terrible. You must have had an awful time.’
Now he is focusing on the single white rose in a vase in the centre of our table. Although its petals are tightly furled, they are already beginning to wither at the edges.
How grim those six months must have been. Perhaps his reaction to my widowhood was a shock of recognition; he might think we have a similar past. I reflect on the statistics – the one-in-twelve chance women face of dying from breast cancer – while I watch Anthony contemplating the white rose. His face is set and tense. He is probably still not over his loss; he may never recover from his loss.
‘She died five years ago.’ He glances up at me for an instant before resuming his rearrangement of the pile of breadcrumbs on the cloth in front of him. He tells me about the guilt he felt, as if Katherine’s cancer were somehow his fault, especially once he discovered that her grandmother had also had breast cancer. ‘We should have been on the lookout for it,’ he says. ‘I’m a geneticist but I didn’t even have the wit to consider how genetics might affect the woman I was going to marry.’ He has stopped playing with the crumbs and is now engaged in rearranging the salt and pepper.
