The Girl in the Corner

by Amanda Prowse

  She watched him climb the stairs to make his way to the spare bedroom and wished it were that clear-cut for her. She left the box on the countertop and hoped that he would get rid of it, knowing she never wanted the necklace to touch her skin again.

  FOUR

  Rae folded two sets of pyjamas, her linen jumpsuit and a white crinkle-cotton maxi-dress, placing them in the suitcase that lay open on the bed before crossing the items from her list. She counted the pairs of knickers balled neatly into the corners: fourteen, with two spares, along with various sandals, swimming costumes, tunics, T-shirts and shorts and a couple more formal frocks, just in case. She held up the floral halterneck bikini to the mirror; placing it over her shirt, she ran the flat of her palm over the fabric, remembering the last holiday she and Howard had taken, when they had gone to Malta. She saw herself in the pool, laughing at something he had said, happy, so happy . . . Her tears caught in her throat and clogged her nose. It happened like this sometimes; sadness came over her in a wave, robbing her breath of rhythm and leaving her feeling weakened. It was a reminder that she was still fragile. The reason for this emotional fracture in her day was a pin-sharp memory, a glimpse of her old life, when things had been perfect, before the shine came off. She thought about a winter’s day a few years ago now: the kids had been at school and she and Howard had, unusually, shared a bottle of wine over lunch and decided in the giddy aftermath that the best thing to stave off the chill of the day would be to run a big hot steaming bath. Flinging their clothes on to the cold, tiled floor, they’d laughed at the illicitness of it all. And the mere frivolity of their actions had made her feel young. She’d liked it.

  The tub had brimmed with bubbles and the heat steamed up the big mirror on the bathroom wall. She’d lain back and raised her knee in the small gap at the side of the tub and pushed her hair back from her face, letting the hot water soothe her muscles. It had been sheer genius to choose a bath with the taps in the middle, meaning they could both languish in the water without the inconvenience or pain of taps in the back. It might have been winter outside, but here in the bathroom of their splendid Georgian house it was positively tropical.

  ‘So come on – your turn.’ She’d smiled at him over the rim of her mug.

  ‘Give me a minute. Let me think.’ He looked skyward.

  ‘You shouldn’t have to think! It’s supposed to be spontaneous, your innermost desire: the one place that if time and money were no object and you could jump on a plane without fear, spur of the moment, just one ticket – where would you go?’ She squeezed her knees together and trapped his legs, sliding against him in the foamy water.

  ‘Your talking is not helping my thought process.’

  She snorted her laughter. ‘God, Howard, you’d think you’d be used to me rattling on by now.’

  He winked at her and continued his ponderings. ‘I’m torn.’

  ‘Between what?’ She sighed her impatience, eyes wide. ‘Come on!’

  ‘If I only have one ticket, am I allowed to go by bus on to somewhere else? Can it be a two-centre trip?’

  ‘Two-centre trip?’ She threw her head back and chuckled. ‘Listen to yourself; you are being way too practical. What are you, a holiday rep?’

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Not really.’ She laughed. ‘You can go anywhere! The moon!’ She splashed the surface of the water.

  He pushed his fringe back over his head. ‘Definitely not the moon: no good restaurants.’

  ‘You could open one. Latimers Moon Grill has quite a nice ring to it.’

  ‘Now you’re talking!’ He laughed. ‘No, I’m thinking somewhere a little closer to home. New York and Las Vegas – so we could fly to one and then catch a bus to the other.’

  ‘Howard, you don’t get the bus in London; why do you think you might like to be in a bus across the States? Anyway it sounds like a long bus ride. Better to take an internal flight; we don’t want to get bored.’

  ‘Urgh.’ He shuddered. ‘Bored? You know I hate that word with a passion! Only boring people get bored! Bored is a mind that can’t think of something fun and inventive to do!’

  She laughed. ‘Okay.’ She put her mug on the tiled side of the bath and grabbed her phone from the Victorian washstand within reach along the back wall, dexterously jabbing at the screen. ‘It says here that to get a bus from New York to Las Vegas would take two days, ten hours and twenty-five minutes.’ She pointed to the squiggly blue line denoting the route across the USA.

  He sat back and laughed heartily. ‘Well I could definitely manage the two days and ten hours but the last twenty-five minutes might be a challenge!’

  ‘Do you think it stops en route?’ She looked up at him.

  ‘Sometimes I question if you have the sense you were born with, Rae-Valentine. As if it would travel for two days and ten hours without stopping for fuel or a loo break!’

  ‘Some of them have loos!’ She looked at him sternly.

  ‘It would need to have. Good Lord. I think I’ll pass. You have put me off. Okay, serious thinking head on now.’

  She put her phone back down and reached again for her cooling tea. ‘Come on! Where?’

  ‘Norway.’ He folded his arms across his chest, as if satisfied.

  ‘Norway? Norway! I thought you were going to go for a Caribbean island or the Great Wall of China!’

  ‘Great Wall of China . . .’ he muttered under his breath. ‘I sometimes think you don’t know me at all.’

  ‘Maybe I don’t. A man of mystery!’ She raised her eyebrows in the most alluring way she could manage. ‘How exciting.’

  They both chuckled.

  ‘Okay, why Norway?’

  ‘Ooh, hang on, I’ve got a bit of cramp!’

  She felt him flex his foot beneath the water.

  ‘Mind my bottom!’ she howled.

  ‘It’s hard to mind your bottom in this situation! We need a bigger bath.’

  ‘Or I need a smaller bottom.’ She grimaced.

  ‘Okay, so Norway,’ he began again. ‘When I was learning the trade, my dad sent me to work at the Savoy as a pot wash for the summer.’

  ‘Really? Why have you never mentioned this?’ She winked at him; he liked to tell the story.

  ‘Ha ha! Very funny. Yes, but what you might not know is that I worked alongside a chap from Oslo. In those days I was of course a smoker and we’d take our breaks together, standing in the London drizzle down a cold alleyway, and he’d tell me about the fjords and the skyline and the snow and the cities and it just stuck with me and I always thought that would be a lovely thing to do: take a cruise up the fjords, a spot of whale watching.’

  ‘It does sound lovely,’ she conceded. ‘Okay, I am in. Norway it is.’

  ‘We could sit under a blanket on the deck of the ship and hold hands under the stars.’ He smiled at her.

  ‘Howard, you old romantic!’ She liked the flush of warmth that the picture filled her with.

  ‘Less of the “old”, if you don’t mind. So what about you, Miss Rae-Valentine; where would you head?’

  ‘Hmm. I think I’d like to go island-hopping in Greece. I remember reading about it when I was at school and in my head I saw this confident girl with a red knapsack and a ponytail, taking great big strides like a giant from one island to the other; she was tanned and she looked like she could take on the world. I thought I might like to be that girl.’

  ‘I think she might need a bit more than a knapsack if she’s going away for any length of time.’

  ‘There you go again with your practicalities! Ooh! It’s our programme tonight! We need to set the recorder. I think we should eat with the kids but I don’t want to miss it.’ She was looking forward to the second part of the period drama they had got into – loving the costumes and poetic language of a bygone era – and looking forward just as much to nestling on the sofa with her feet warming on her husband’s thigh, as was their way.

  He smiled and sank down further and she watched t
he water rise over her chest.

  ‘I used to like my boobs,’ she commented out of the blue.

  He snickered with his eyes closed. ‘Well, if it’s any consolation, I still like your boobs.’

  ‘It’s not really, but thank you.’ She cupped her small chest and lifted.

  ‘When did you start to dislike them? Just curious.’

  She took a deep breath and considered this. ‘I suppose after George. I fed him until he was eight months.’

  ‘I do remember,’ he interjected, as if to remind her that he had been there.

  ‘And by the time he was on solids my boobs, what little I had of them, had gone south.’

  ‘I never noticed!’

  ‘You bloody liar!’ She flicked water at him. ‘I wonder how Lisa Hopkirk’s boobs have fared.’ She eyed him mischievously.

  ‘Don’t be so ridiculous!’

  ‘What’s ridiculous?’ She chuckled. ‘I only asked the question!’

  ‘You are being ridiculous. I have told you: she was just a friend!’

  ‘Says you. Your sister says different!’ She loved teasing him.

  ‘I’m not discussing it any more. I was a teenager – a long, long time ago! And you should know by now that Dolly is an unreliable witness; she is the one convinced that a ghost came and stood by the side of her bed and told her to take better care of her hair.’

  They both howled with laughter at the memory of that particular confession.

  ‘I mean, come on, Rae! Of all the messages from the afterlife, they came with a shampoo recommendation? She is nuts!’

  ‘Don’t be mean about my best friend.’ Their laughter settled. ‘And you always do that; make me laugh to change the subject. That makes me suspicious.’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake!’

  ‘I can’t help it. I admit it: I get jealous. I love you too much.’

  ‘Well, don’t. Get jealous, that is. Loving me too much is just fine.’

  ‘I do love you,’ she confirmed, smiling at the man with a rush of love in her stomach. It was a mock jealousy that she knew flattered him. She knew she had no reason to be jealous. They had been together for all this time, shared kids, a home . . . they were all set.

  ‘I love you too.’ He smiled.

  They both looked towards the bathroom door at the sound of the front doorbell.

  ‘Shit!’

  ‘Bugger it!’

  ‘Shall we sit still and hope they go away?’ she whispered.

  ‘Might be an emergency,’ he suggested. ‘Or it might be the kids?’

  ‘No, they’ve both got—’

  It was as she formed the words ‘keys’ on her tongue that the sound of Hannah’s voice floated up the stairs.

  ‘Hello! Where is everyone? I’m starving.’

  ‘Shit!’ she mouthed again, as her husband stood, bottom in her face, grabbed a towel from the rack and made for the door. He opened it a smidge, calling down to Hannah.

  ‘Shan’t be a sec, love; Mum’s just having a bath!’

  Rae felt the blast of cool air rob the bathroom of its tropical fug. That was it then. Luxury bath time over . . .

  ‘How’re you doing?’ Howard asked now from the bedroom doorway, his question making her jump and pulling her from the memory of that lovely day, the echo of it in her chest making her feel sad with longing for the woman who had felt as if she had the whole wide world in the palm of her hand, and longing for the man who she thought was good, honest, a man worthy of her trust, her friend. A reminder of the wonderful closeness they had lost. It felt a lot like grief. She threw the bikini into the suitcase.

  ‘I’m just trying to figure out what I need to take.’ She disliked the new clipped tone with which she addressed him; she sounded like a stranger, but it felt a lot like self-preservation, another way of armouring her already dented heart.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry too much. You can guarantee that Dolly will be taking more than you could both possibly need; she always does.’

  It was Howard who had suggested that Dolly take his place on their trip. They had given the excuse of his workload and Rae was actually a little relieved, knowing she would have felt too nervous to travel that far alone.

  ‘True.’ Rae busied herself with the bottles, jars and tubes of potions, lotions and medicines on the bed, popping them into grip-seal bags and hiding them among her clothing. ‘I was also thinking about that day when we took a bath in the afternoon after too much wine.’

  Howard stepped forward and sat on the edge of the bed. He took a deep breath and bit his lip, as if he too might be remembering the easy laughter, the physical contact, both glorious.

  ‘I loved that day.’ He spoke with a catch to his throat. ‘I miss days like that.’

  ‘Yes. Well . . .’ It feels like a different person, someone other than me . . .

  ‘I am trying to make it up to you, Rae. I am and I won’t stop trying. You know that, don’t you?’

  She turned to look at his pleading expression and it killed her, realising how little impact his hurt had on her, how far they had slipped off course. Her words when she found them were more softly delivered. ‘Buying me gifts, throwing parties and sending me on trips is not the answer; you must realise that. They are all the same thing, skimming over the real issues, papering over the cracks. A distraction, a delay.’

  ‘What are we delaying?’ He sounded anguished.

  ‘Deciding how this ends.’ She paused in organising her clothes and held his gaze. The words had leaped unbidden from a place deep inside, and to hear them spoken out loud filled her with a new and sharp anxiety. What will you do, Rae? She still found it hard to picture herself as anything other than Mrs Howard Latimer.

  ‘Or how it continues.’ He swallowed. ‘Truth is, Rae, I don’t know what else to do.’

  ‘I know.’ She felt the first stir of pity for the man. ‘And if it’s any consolation, I don’t know what to do either.’

  ‘It’s not. Not really. I kind of hoped one of us might have our hands on the wheel.’

  Rae sat on the other side of the bed.

  ‘I wish it wasn’t so complicated, such a bloody mess.’ She heard his snort of agreement. ‘And it hurts to say this, Howard, but it’s now not only about Karina, not any more.’ She saw him wince as she spoke her name. ‘Although that’s undoubtedly when the earthquake hit. But I’m beginning to think that maybe over time we had started to tilt, tip without realising, and when you told me what had happened we tumbled over, smashed, and what is left is rubble. So no matter how much we try to build we are skating on stones and nothing can take root, because we don’t have any foundations.’

  ‘No foundations? Please don’t say that. We have kids! A home! A business! Is that not enough?’

  ‘It was for me.’ She saw the slope to his shoulders. ‘And I can only imagine how it feels to hear me remind you of that again – and, believe me, I don’t mean to keep bringing up your infidelity; it does neither of us any good.’ She again saw the movie playing in her head that night when her feet were sore from dancing and her face ached from laughing: Rae, there is something I need to tell you. I don’t know how to say it, but I know I must . . . ‘But it opened up this chasm and everything we had fell into it and the words I have aren’t adequate for how I am now. Hurt, disappointed, lonely, angry – they are all valid, but none really convey how I feel.’

  ‘How do you feel?’ he asked quietly, hopefully, as if her response might give him the clue he was looking for about how to go forward.

  She looked out of the window at life passing by in their beautiful street. ‘I feel lost. Like I’ve lost my place and my purpose and at the same time I feel trapped. It’s hard to describe.’

  ‘I love you, I—’

  ‘Please stop saying that to me, Howard! It isn’t like when the kids hurt their knee and we could give it a magic kiss to make everything better! “I love you” isn’t some charmed phrase that resets my emotions or erases hurt. Part of me loves you too, of cours
e – you gave me my kids; we have shared this life – but I love you differently. Less, I suppose, and that means I am not sure I want to share the rest of my time on earth with you. “I love you” doesn’t mean automatically that we can go on, doesn’t mean we have a future . . .’

  His expression was pained, his voice indignant, shocked. ‘You don’t mean that! You can’t mean that, Rae.’

  ‘What did you think?’ She held his gaze. ‘That we would just carry on?’

  ‘I don’t know. I wasn’t thinking. I was caught up in the moment. It was alcohol, it was fun, a diversion, and it was a mistake!’

  Rae hated the image in her mind of the young girl who had unwittingly wielded so much power as much as she hated his facile justification.

  ‘Other people get through much worse.’

  ‘Is that right?’ She again felt the flare of anger. ‘Do you think I could possibly care about what other people do? Because I don’t. I care about you and me and Hannah and George.’

  ‘Me too; I only care about us. I was just . . .’

  She watched him flounder, again with something close to pity in her heart at the fact that he just didn’t get it.

  ‘Whether we like it or not, things have changed between us.’ She thought again of the easy conversation that had been a constant in their lives, the familiar, comfortable sex, and the assumption that this was how it would always be. ‘I feel different now and I feel differently about us.’

  ‘I don’t want us to be different. I don’t want things to change,’ he pleaded.

  She noted the tremble to his bottom lip and thought he looked a lot as George had when he was little.

  ‘I want us to go back to how we were, all those wonderful years, Rae, you and me against the world!’

  ‘It’s not that easy, Howard. It’s already happened. It’s like we are this very knotty piece of string and trying to figure out where to start to unpick the mess is hard enough, let alone how we move forward. If we can move forward.’

  Howard stood and faced her. ‘We need to find a way forward, Rae, or we give up. I know those are the options. I know it, but I can’t stand the thought of not having you by my side. I want to go back to how we were, completely how we were, friends, lovers, without this cloud of awkwardness hanging over us. How we live now, it’s a half-life. It’s draining, depressing.’