Watermelon

by Marian Keyes

  “But I do love you,” he said, trying to hold my hand, “you’ve got to believe me!”

  “I don’t believe you,” I told him, shrugging his hand away with disgust.

  “I don’t know who or what it is that you love, but it certainly isn’t me.”

  “It is!”

  “No, James, it isn’t,” I replied, ultracalmly. “You just want some kind of moron you can control. Why don’t you go back to Denise?”

  “I don’t want Denise. I want you,” he said.

  “Well, that’s a pity,” I said evenly, “because you can’t have me.”

  The shock was a bit much for him. He looked like he’d been kicked in the stomach. You know—a bit like the way I had looked the day he told me he was leaving me.

  Not that I desired anything as crass as vengeance, you understand.

  “And do you know what the worst thing of all is?” I asked him.

  “What?” he said, white-faced.

  “The fact that you made me doubt myself. I was prepared to try and change the way I am, change who I am, just for you. You made me abandon all my integrity. You tried to destroy who I am. And I let you!”

  “It was for your own good,” he said, but without conviction.

  I narrowed my eyes at him.

  “Choose your next words very carefully, you asshole. They may be your last,” I told him.

  He went even whiter, if that was possible, and kept his mouth firmly closed.

  “I’m never going to let myself be bullied ever again,” I said with determination. I like to think that I had some of the grit of Scarlett O’Hara when she gave the “As God is my witness, I’ll never be cold or hungry again”

  speech. “I’ll always be true to what I know I am,” I continued. “I’m going to be me, whether it’s good or bad. And if any man, even Ashley, tries to change me, I’ll get rid of them so fast they’ll be dizzy.”

  James totally missed the Gone With the Wind reference. No imagination.

  “I never tried to bully you,” he said, all indignant.

  “James,” I said, starting to feel weary, “this discussion is closed.”

  “Well, never mind the past,” he said, sounding anxious and hasty. “But how about—hey…how about if I promise that I won’t bully you in the future?”

  He sounded as if he had just hit on the most innovative and novel idea.

  Archimedes hopping out of the bath naked would have seemed restrained and reserved in comparison.

  I looked at him with scornful pity. “Of course you’re not going to bully me in the future,” I said, “because you won’t get the chance.”

  “You don’t mean it,” he said. “You’ll change your mind.”

  “I won’t,” I said with a tinkly little laugh.

  “You will,” he continued to insist. “You’ll never last without me.”

  Wrong thing to say, I’m afraid.

  “Where are you going?” he asked, outraged, when he saw me picking up my bag.

  “Home,” I said simply. If I left now I’d catch the last plane back to Dublin.

  “You can’t go,” he said, standing up.

  “Watch me,” I said. And did another one of those swivels that my heels were so handy for.

  “What about the apartment? What about Kate?” he asked.

  Well, it was nice to know where his priorities were, the apartment being higher up on his list than Kate.

  “I’ll be in touch,” I promised with a pleasing echo of the words he had uttered to me that awful day in the hospital.

  I walked toward the front door.

  “You’ll be back,” he said, following me out to the hall. “You’ll never last without me.”

  “So you keep saying,” I said. “But don’t hold your breath” were my last words before I pulled the door shut behind me.

  I managed to get all the way to the subway station before I started to cry.

  thirty-five

  I can’t really remember much about the subway journey out to Heathrow.

  The whole thing passed in a daze.

  I knew I had done the right thing. At least, I thought I had done the right thing. It was just that this was real life and no decision was clearly sign-posted. It’s not like you take the right turning and you get everlasting happiness and you take the wrong one and your life’s a disaster. In real life it’s often almost impossible to tell which decision is the one you should make because what you stand to gain and what you stand to lose are sometimes—often—neck and neck.

  How could I really know if I’d done the right thing? I wanted someone to come up to me with a gold cup or a medal and shake my hand and clap me on the back and congratulate me on making the right decision.

  I wanted my life to be like a computer game. Make the wrong decision and I lose a life. Make the right one and I gain points. I just wanted to know.

  I just wanted to be sure.

  I kept listing the reasons why there could be no future for me and James.

  James wanted me to be someone I wasn’t. James wasn’t happy with me the way I was. And I wouldn’t be happy if I changed so that James was happy. And I wasn’t happy with James’s saint complex. If I took him back James would be happy because then James would think that I condoned everything he did. The way he already condoned everything he did himself.

  It would probably mean that at the first argument I had with James in our new improved marriage everything would split wide-open all over again. James was pompous and sanctimonious and James thought that I was flighty and immature. I was sure it was for the best that the marriage really was over now. It was just that there was always room for a little bit of doubt.

  You know, I wondered if I had been nicer, if I had been stronger, more gentle, more forceful, more patient, sweeter, kinder, nastier, crueler, if I had laid down the law more, if I had kept my mouth shut more, would I have saved my marriage?

  I was torturing myself with these thoughts.

  Because, at the end of the day, I was the one who made the decision. I was the one who said that the marriage could no longer work. I knew that James hadn’t given me much of an option, much of a choice, but I was still the one who’d pulled the trigger, as it were.

  I felt so guilty.

  And then I told myself not to be so silly. What James was offering me wasn’t worth the paper it wasn’t written on. It was only a sham of a relationship and it would have been entirely on his terms and it wouldn’t have lasted a week. And if it had lasted, it would have been at the expense of my happiness. It would have just been a Pyrrhic victory.

  Around and around went my thoughts as I rocked gently on the train, my head chasing its own tail.

  God! I hated this business of being grown-up. I hated having to make decisions where I didn’t know what was behind the door. I wanted a world where heroes and villains were clearly labeled. Where ominous music starts playing the minute the villain comes on-screen so you can’t possibly mistake him.

  Where someone asks you to choose between playing with the beautiful princess in the fragrant garden and being eaten by the hideous monster in the foul-smelling pit. Not exactly a difficult one, now, is it? Not something that you would agonize over, or that would make you lose a night’s sleep?

  Being a victim isn’t very nice, but goddammit, it takes a lot of the confusion out of things. At least you know you’re in the right.

  And I suppose I was disappointed. Very disappointed. I had loved James once. I didn’t know whether I did anymore. Or if I did, it wasn’t in the same way. But a reconciliation would have been nicer than no reconciliation, if you know what I mean. A reconciliation that worked, that is. Not some kind of useless compromise.

  And I was sad. And then I felt angry. And then I felt guilty. And then I felt sad again. It was a bloody nightmare!

  One thing stopped me from going totally crazy. I realized that there was nothing stopping me from going back to
James. Right then, that minute, I could get off the train and cross the platform and go straight back to the apartment and tell him that I had been wrong and that we should try again.

  But I didn’t.

  And thick and all as I was, confused, bewildered, mixed-up, distraught, that told me something.

  If I’d really loved him, really wanted to be with him, I would have gone back.

  So I knew I was doing the right thing. I thought.

  And off I’d go again.

  Heathrow had calmed down a lot. Much quieter. It was lovely. I got on a practically empty flight back to Dublin.

  I had a whole row of seats to myself so I was able to sniff and cry in discreet comfort should the urge take me.

  The stewardesses were intrigued.

  I kept catching little huddles of them looking at me worriedly.

  They probably thought that I’d just flown to London for an abortion.

  When I got to Dublin it was raining. The runway was slick and shiny in the dark. And the arrivals area was deserted. I walked past the silent carousels, my sexy high heels echoing on the tile floors.

  I hadn’t told anyone that I was coming back, so there was no one to meet me.

  There didn’t seem to be anyone there to meet anyone.

  I spotted a lone porter. He was busy telling some bewildered man that to miss one flight was unfortunate but to miss two was careless.

  I click-clacked past all the shuttered shops, the bureaux de change that stood in darkness, the deserted car rental stands. I finally got as far as the rain-soaked entrance.

  There was a single taxi waiting outside in the wet night. The driver was reading a newspaper.

  He looked as though he’d been there for several days.

  He drove me home in unexpected silence. The only sounds were the swish of the windshield wipers and the noise of the rain drumming on the roof of the car.

  We drove through the sleeping suburbs and he eventually deposited me outside my home. It was all in darkness. I civilly thanked him for the journey. He civilly thanked me for the sum of money I handed over. We said good-bye.

  It was ten minutes past one.

  I let myself in quietly. I didn’t want to wake anyone.

  Not out of consideration for them, I’m afraid. But because I didn’t want to answer any of the inevitable questions.

  I was longing to see Kate but she wasn’t in my room.

  Mum must have thought that I wouldn’t be home and moved the crib into her and Dad’s room.

  But I ached to hold her. I missed her so much.

  I tiptoed into Mum’s room to take Kate, hoping desperately that I wouldn’t wake Mum.

  I rustled the child successfully. And then fell into bed, exhausted. Asleep with Kate in my arms.

  thirty-six

  When I awoke the next morning, I felt a tiny bit better. Not healed or cured or anything of the sort, but more prepared to wait. To wait for things to get better, to wait for the pain to go.

  I had made the decision not to be with James and, being “Instant Grati-fication Girl,” I wanted to feel wonderful immediately. I had wanted the fruits of my decision to fall into my impatient lap right now.

  I wanted it to be “Out with the old and in with the new!” To throw off the trappings of my previous incarnation, to have not a jot of feeling left for James, not an iota of doubt, not a crumb of indecision. I wanted an immediate, miraculous transformation. I wanted the Relationship Fairy to touch me with her magic wand, to sprinkle me with her sparkling recovery dust, and for me to instantly forget everything I ever felt for James, to forget that he even existed.

  I wanted to leave my grief under my pillow and for it to be gone in the morning. I wouldn’t even have cared if there wasn’t any money left in its place.

  But there was no magic cure, there was no Relationship Fairy. I’d realized that a long time ago.

  I had to get through this on my own. I realized that I had to be patient.

  Time would let me know if I had made the right decision.

  I still didn’t know if I had done the right thing by leaving James. But to stay with him would definitely have been the wrong thing.

  See if you can wrap your mind around that one.

  And if you get the hang of it, would you mind explaining it to me?

  James called at eight o’clock the next morning. I declined to speak to him.

  And at eight-forty. Ditto. And at ten past nine. And ditto once again. Then came an unexpected lull until almost eleven, when there were three calls in quick succession. Ditto, ditto and ditto. Twelve-fifteen there was another one. Ditto. Five to one, five past one and twenty past one, all saw calls.

  Ditto, etc. Calls remained steady for most of the afternoon, coming every half hour or so. Then a final flurry came around six o’clock. Ditto re above.

  Mum very decently fielded the calls all day. I have to say it, when the chips are down, that woman is worth her weight in Mars Bars.

  Dad came home from work at twenty past six and at twenty to seven burst into the room where I was sitting with Kate and all the documents relating to the apartment and roared at me, “Claire, for God’s sake, will you go and talk to him!”

  “I’ve nothing to say,” I said sweetly.

  “I don’t care,” he bellowed, “this has gone too far. And he says he’s going to call all night until you come and talk to him.”

  “Leave the phone off the hook,” I suggested, turning my attention back to the deed of the apartment.

  “Claire, we can’t do that,” he said in exasperation. “Helen keeps hanging the bloody thing back up.”

  “Yes, why should my social life suffer just because you married a lunatic?” came Helen’s muffled voice from somewhere outside the door.

  “Please, Claire,” pleaded Dad.

  “Oh, all right then.” I sighed, putting down the pen I had been using to make notes with.

  “James,” I said into the phone, “what do you want?”

  “Claire,” he said, sounding cross, “have you come to your senses yet?”

  “I wasn’t aware that I had taken leave of them,” I said politely. He ignored this.

  “I’ve been calling all day and your mother says you don’t want to talk to me,” he said, sounding angry and put out.

  “That’s right,” I agreed pleasantly.

  “But we’ve got to talk,” he said.

  “No, we don’t,” I said.

  “Claire, I love you,” he said earnestly. “We have to work this out.”

  “James,” I said coldly, “We’ve worked out as much as we can. And now we’re at the end of the line. You think you’re right. I think you’re wrong.

  And I’m not wasting any more time or energy trying to convince either of us to change our minds. Now, I wish you well and I hope we can keep this civilized, especially for Kate’s sake, but there really is nothing further to discuss.”

  “What’s happened to you, Claire?” asked James, sounding shocked.

  “You were never like this before. You’ve changed so much. You’ve gotten so hard.”

  “Oh, didn’t I tell you?” I said casually. “My husband had an affair. It kind of made an impact on me.”

  Very unkind, I know. But I couldn’t resist it.

  “Very funny, Claire,” he said.

  “Actually no, James,” I corrected him, “it wasn’t funny at all.”

  “Look,” he said, starting to sound annoyed, “this is getting us nowhere.”

  “That’s fine by me,” I said, “because nowhere is precisely where we’re going.”

  “Very witty, Claire. Very droll,” he said nastily.

  “Thank you,” I replied with excessive sweetness.

  “Now listen,” he said, suddenly sounding all official and even more pompous than usual. I could almost hear papers rustling in the background.

  “I have a…um…proposition for you.”
<
br />   “Oh?” I asked.

  “Yes,” he said. “Claire, I do love you and I don’t want us to split up, so if it makes you feel better I’m prepared to um…make…um…a concession to you.”

  “What’s that?” I asked. I was hardly interested. I barely cared.

  I realized, with a shock, that there was nothing, absolutely nothing, that he could say now to make things better.

  I didn’t love him anymore.

  I didn’t know why or when I stopped.

  But I had.

  James continued to speak and I tried to concentrate on what he was saying.

  “I’m prepared to forget all about you having to change when you come back to live with me,” he was saying. “You obviously feel very strongly about having to try harder at being mature and considerate and all the other…um…things we discussed. So if it means that you’ll abandon this idea that we’re splitting up, I can put up with you being the way that you were in the past. I suppose you weren’t that bad,” he said grudgingly.

  Anger surged through me. I forgot for a moment that I no longer cared.

  I mean, the sheer gall of the man! I could hardly believe my ears.

  I said as much.

  “Are you glad?” he asked cautiously.

  “Glad! Glad?” I screeched. “Of course I’m not bloody well glad. This makes it all even worse.”

  “But why?” he whined. “I’m saying here that I forgive you and that everything will be fine.”

  I nearly exploded. I had so many things to say to him.

  “Forgive me?” I said in disbelief. “You forgive me? No, no, no, no, no James, you have it all wrong. If there’s any forgiving to be done around here, it’s me forgiving you. Except that I’m not.”

  “Just a minute…” James blustered.

  “And this is supposedly the reason you had the affair with that fat cow.

  Me being immature and selfish. But you’re prepared to overlook it now, at the drop of a hat. Yet it was important enough for you to be unfaithful to me. Make up your mind, James! Either it’s important or it’s not.”

  “It is important,” he said.

  “Well, then you can’t overlook it,” I said furiously. “If you want me to be a certain way and it’s important, then what kind of relationship will we have if I can’t be that way?”