If I Can't Have You

by Charlotte Levin

  I couldn’t face enquiring about vegetarian options so filled my gold-rimmed china plate with a hunk of artisan bread and safe leafy salad. While chewing on the heavy dough, hoping it would soak up the alcohol, I felt a tap on my shoulder. My stomach overturned, thinking it was you. But it was her. ‘So . . . go on, then . . . What’s he like to work for, Samuel? Sorry, I mean Dr Stevens. It must be weird for you, me calling him Samuel.’

  I forced more bread into my mouth. ‘Not really.’ I chewed slackly, watching her lips squirm at my gob full of white paste.

  ‘Is he a good boss?’

  ‘He’s not my boss.’

  ‘Well . . . well, you know what I mean.’ She picked up a plate and dolloped practically every dish onto it.

  ‘No, not really.’

  ‘I mean . . . is he nice . . . to the staff? You know what they say – when dating a man, check how he treats the waiter as that shows more about the person than how he’s treating you.’

  The bread stuck in my gullet and I spoke in a deep voice. ‘You’re . . . you’re dating him?’

  ‘Oh no . . . No, we’ve only met tonight. So not yet anyway.’ She laughed. I didn’t. ‘Well, go on . . .’

  ‘Go on what?’

  ‘What’s he like?’

  ‘I . . . I think he’s still in love with someone.’

  ‘How would you know that?’ Her face warped with contempt.

  ‘It’s just what I . . . you know . . . what I heard, but I don’t really know. I’m just one of the receptionists.’

  ‘Yes . . . yes, exactly.’ She looked at me in a way I recognized. A look that said I wasn’t good enough. That I looked cheap. That I didn’t belong there. That I was a feral parakeet.

  A waitress offered up more champagne. I downed the remains of my glass and swapped it for a new one. Fiona looked at me with even more smiling disgust.

  ‘Oh no . . . I really shouldn’t,’ she said to the waitress.

  And I couldn’t help myself. ‘Oh, but you must. They now say it’s fine to have one or two glasses when you’re expecting.’

  ‘I’m not expe—’

  ‘Oh no . . . Oh my God, I am so sorry.’ I touched her arm and glanced at her tummy. ‘I don’t even know why I . . . I’m always putting my foot in it . . . I’m so sorry.’

  She put down her plate and reached for a glass from the waitress’s tray. We stood in silence for a minute until she said, ‘I’ve . . . got to . . . I should . . . I’ve just seen a friend,’ and left both me and the room.

  I too wanted to flee but couldn’t bring myself to leave you. You were in the corner surrounded by a gaggle of toffs. Holding court. They laughed at your jokes. You were relaxed, your shirt untucked. Not thinking of me, wanting to find me. I should have left and stopped the torture. But I couldn’t do it.

  It was nine o’clock, and for half an hour I’d been forced to talk to Linda and her husband, Racist Graham, about topics such as why they were convinced I’d soon die if I didn’t eat some meat, their new hot tub and how Nigel Farage was the only one ‘telling it like it is’. I perched on the edge of a claret velvet chaise, nodding politely, my feelings about Linda vindicated. Any grains of guilt I had for hating her evaporated into the air, along with Graham’s spit, which sprayed out with each offensive utterance.

  Across the room, I saw you in deep discussion with Dr Harris. I tried to lip-read while enduring Graham’s story about the supposedly unfriendly Muslim man on their street. I couldn’t decipher your words, but I was scared you were being talked into a permanent return to Harley Street.

  In contrast, you didn’t look over my way. Not once. Didn’t feel my presence. Want to save me.

  At nine thirty I could bear it no longer. Your conversation with Harris had ended some time ago and you’d now disappeared. I had to find you. Talk to you.

  I excused myself from Adolf and Eva, determined to corner you, but as I was heading for the lounge door, the lights went off and Mrs Harris was wheeling in a trolley on which perched a huge candle-lit cake with crackling sparklers. The guests began to sing. ‘Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you . . .’

  Dr Harris took centre stage, repeating, ‘Thank you, thank you, all,’ as the room sang off key. It took forever for him to blow out the fifty candles. At one point I thought he might die before extinguishing the last flame.

  You’d disappeared.

  Dizzy with champagne and frustration, I needed to escape for a while, gather myself and have a fag. I slipped away as everyone cheered and pretended Harris was a ‘jolly good fellow’ when I’m sure they too thought he was a wanker.

  As I neared the lounge door, I encountered Dr Franco, who tried to make small talk through the hip-hip-hooraying. We both politely gave up and I mouthed I was going outside for a cigarette. I caught him looking at my dress. Not in a lecherous way. In a way that indicated he knew it was all a facade.

  Outside was bliss. As the door shut behind me, and I stood in the spotlight once again, I wondered if I would even go back in. The night air was cool. The breeze kissed my skin, covered me in goosebumps. I enjoyed the shivering.

  I crossed over the road to see if there was a way of getting into the garden square, but the gate was locked, so I returned to my earlier observation spot, rested against the railings and lit a fag. The interior of the house appeared brighter in contrast to the now-blackened sky. But I couldn’t watch that show anymore. I was separate from them. Different. Instead, I perched on the narrow rim of concrete holding the metal fence in place. Slipped off my shoes to circle my poor bruised feet and closed my eyes, enjoying the nicotine and my freedom.

  They jolted open again to the sound of Harris’s door slamming. The security light switched on.

  And there you were.

  It wasn’t just you, though, was it? She was draped on your arm, laughing like the moron she was, as if you were hilarious. But you weren’t hilarious, Samuel. You were not funny at all.

  My breath locked high in my chest. Had I been standing, I think I would have keeled over. You didn’t see me. Not because it was dark but because you were so busy kissing her, touching her. Pressing yourself against that fucking belly.

  Swaying, you took her by the hand. She wasn’t even drunk. She was just posh. A party girl. That’s what they’re called, isn’t it? Whereas if she was poor, she’d be a slapper. Was I just a slapper to you? How were you not aware of me in the shadows? How could you not sense such hurt happening so near to you?

  You walked away. Hand in hand. On the same side of the road as me. Oblivious. Laughing, kissing, laughing. I knew what that walk meant. I’d been on one oh so recently, hadn’t I?

  Without warning, I threw up on the pavement between my legs. It sizzled on the concrete. Once I’d raised my head, I’d lost you in the darkness.

  The merriment continued through the window. The world still turning. Like it always does. I didn’t cry. I didn’t even want to cry.

  I retrieved my mother’s spattered shoes and scrambled in my bag for a tissue. There wasn’t one, only a Costcutter receipt, which merely smeared the vile juice from one part of the shoe to the other and which I then had to discard on the ground. A snapshot, in this lovely part of London, that showed me up for what I was.

  On the Tube, I stared at myself in the window opposite. My ghost. Her ghost. We were the same. To others, I’m sure I appeared blank, lifeless, but inside were images of the two of you I couldn’t erase. Images I’d created. You kissing her naked body. Fucking her from behind. A perverted movie I couldn’t switch off.

  I’d fully intended to go home. You must believe me.

  It was at Ealing Common that the shift happened.

  I climbed the steps of the station and stopped midway. A man tutted at me for blocking his exit. But I didn’t care. Didn’t move. Didn’t give a shit about anything other than what you’d done. And as I stood, people passing me by, it rose from my blistered feet and spread through me like a wildfire.

  There was no conscious jo
urney between standing there and standing outside your flat. It was trance-like. Hypnotic. Can you sleepwalk while awake? You’d know, Doctor.

  I leant against your car, looked up at your window. The lounge light was on. I couldn’t breathe. Knowing what was going on in there. Drinking. Talking. Kissing. Listening to music. Our song. Her sitting where I should have been sitting. Lying where I should have been lying.

  I lit a cigarette. Took an elongated pull. Do you have any idea how you’d made me feel? Do you understand now? The inner force that pulled the metal striker wheel of my lighter towards your car like a magnet? What made me press hard, deep, into the metallic paint? Silently screaming, until my possessed hand stopped the contact.

  I couldn’t look at what I’d done and removed my shoes for a quicker escape. With my bare feet on the cold concrete, I was diminished in every sense. I should have just walked away. And I would have done, had I not foolishly glanced up at your window one last time.

  The lounge was now black. The bedroom shone with the familiar soft glow of your copper lamp. The images played stronger, more vividly. Your sweaty bodies. Stop. Smashing against each other. Please stop. Melding together in ways I knew. No. Her hair laced through your hand, your mouth on her mouth. I can’t bear it. On her tits, on that fucking belly. Please make it stop.

  The shoes dropped to the ground. My hands felt for my head. Each finger grappled chunks of my hair, tangled in tight fists. As you’d be doing to her. I released the matted locks and bent down to retrieve the shoes. Rose again. The left one swung off my index finger. The right gripped by the middle of the arch. The metal-tipped spiked heel faced the side window of your car.

  And I shattered it.

  Like you’d shattered me.

  By the time I’d put my key in the door, I just needed to sleep. To wake on a different day. Shut it out. The unmistakable sound of breaking glass triggering windows to light up around me. Not yours. You were too busy. Me hiding under a monstrous Range Rover, inhaling dirt from the road, until prying eyes returned to bed and I could run to safety, barefoot, holding on to my shoes, my sanity.

  As I entered the hall half dead, I was surprised, delighted, by the distorted sound of a TV coming from Dale’s bedsit. After the initial relief at his return, finally having my friend back, I once again removed the shoes from my grazed, soiled feet and tiptoed towards my room to ensure he didn’t see me in such a state. Filthy. Oil and dirt smeared on every visible part of my skin.

  Despite my efforts, he opened his door.

  ‘Jesus. Good night?’ He soaked in the mess. ‘Where’ve you been? What the hell happened to you?’

  ‘It’s . . . it’s a long story . . . A party.’

  ‘A party? What was it? The annual Chimney Sweeps’ Ball? Why are you always bloody injured or in a total state whenever you go out?’

  ‘I . . . I fell.’

  ‘Down a chimney at the Chimney Sweeps’ Ball?’

  I dropped my head. ‘Trust me, you don’t want to know.’

  ‘Oh, but I do. It’s fascinating.’ He raised his arm and leant against the door frame.

  ‘So you’re . . . Are you back now, then?’ But as I looked beyond him into his room, I noticed cardboard boxes in various states of construction scattered around the floor.

  ‘Actually, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you—’

  ‘What’s going on? What are the boxes for . . .? Are you really going?’

  He took my cold, greasy hand in his. I wanted to cry. It was the kindest he’d been to me for some time.

  ‘Constance . . . are . . . are you a member of Fight Club?’

  I pulled away from him.

  ‘Sorry . . . I know . . . I know . . . The first rule is you can’t talk about it, but—’

  ‘Are you really moving out?’

  He looked down and rubbed his nose with his finger, spoke to the floor. ‘I . . . It’s for the best.’

  ‘It’s not. It’s not for the best . . . I don’t want you to.’ I couldn’t look at him.

  ‘Jesus, Constance . . . you’ve left me no choice.’

  My eyes fixed on the hinge of the door, but I could see he’d stopped leaning. He was drifting backwards into the room. My words barely formed a whisper. ‘Please, Dale. Don’t leave.’

  The interlocking metal of the hinge twisted as the door shut.

  I removed her dress. Put it with the red one in the dirty linen basket. Naked, I was at least free of the physical connections to the evening.

  In the shower, I stood under the scalding water, watching the grey liquid fall at my feet. Scrubbed shampoo so hard into my scalp that red appeared under my nails. Knowing I’d never be clean enough.

  Back in my room, I dried myself off apart from my hair and threw myself into bed. Pulled the duvet over my head, burying myself in a safer world. Terrified at the possibility of police visiting soon. Squeezing Blusha and kissing the hole where her eye had once been. Until, thankfully, my brain cut off and I fell asleep.

  The scream of metal on metal like a rusty machine grinding to a halt.

  It was outside our house on the estate. They were all out. Those people who’d avoided me. Cath and Ian next door, George from number six, the Patels.

  She was wearing the black dress. Her arms slung around a lanky, moustachioed man, whispering hollow honey into her ear. They gathered and watched. I used the small knife. Scratched and scratched and scratched the white car. She giggled as the man’s hand disappeared under her dress. I stepped back to view what I’d done. They all applauded me. Until the claps slowed to silence as red paint dripped from the marks.

  I woke, breathless. My room pitch-black. Hair still wet from perspiration as well as the shower. I wiped my hands across my belly to remove some of the sweat, then switched on the lamp, which I didn’t think I’d turned off. The bulb had blown.

  The erasure I’d tried to achieve with sleep hadn’t worked. It was all still there. Pounding my mind. What I’d done. What you’d done. What Dale was about to do.

  I prised myself out of bed. Felt around the wall for the main switch, then searched the floor for my dressing gown and headed to the kitchen for some water. Light shone through the gap under Dale’s door. I was aware more than ever of the security that brought me. And the panic I felt at losing it.

  In the kitchen, I kept the tap running in an attempt to get rid of the usual metallic taste. Filled a glass and gulped it down. Then filled another to take to my room. The air cooled my sweat and I was shivering. But it wasn’t only from the chill. It was the physical manifestation of anxiety.

  As I made my way to my room, I remembered that night at Rupert’s. Holding on to Blusha. How I’d felt. The aloneness I’d felt. And I knew I was returning to that.

  I’d intended to walk on. I did. I swear. But somehow I’d stopped and was knocking on his door. He must have known it was me but delayed opening it to make me suffer.

  ‘What’s up?’ he said.

  I didn’t know what to say at first. But when he looked at me, so cold, distant, as if he’d already left, I knew there was only one way I could stop myself feeling like this.

  ‘OK,’ I said. ‘OK.’

  Everything changed after that night.

  For a start, I was Dale’s girlfriend.

  If I am about to tell you this, you cannot judge. I’d accept judgement from those whose relationships only ever had pure love at their core. Where no other dynamics have ever entered the equation. Not security, or money, or filling holes left from other losses. Not sex on tap or biological time bombs. Loneliness. Duty. Status. Not for the sake of the children accidentally or purposefully conceived. From those people, and God, I’d accept judgement. But not you.

  Besides, I had approval.

  When you’d called me into your office on the Monday after the party, I was so terrified I could barely make the journey from my desk. My legs belonged to someone else. My mouth, spit-free. I had no choice but to visit the toilet first.

 
In the confines of the cubicle, sat on the cold seat, my insides falling from me, I closed my eyes, put my hands together and did something I hadn’t done since my last night with her. I prayed.

  Dear God, I know I have done some terrible things, but if you let me get away with this one act, I will promise to be good from now on. I promise to let Samuel go. Amen.

  ‘Close the door, Constance,’ you said. Your chair faced the entrance, awaiting my arrival.

  I hung on to the handle to stop me falling over and gently pressed the door shut, prolonging the turn towards you.

  ‘Did you have a good time on Saturday?’

  I nodded.

  ‘Yes, me too. Sorry I didn’t get to speak to you much. I had to leave early . . . Had a callout from a patient. An emergency.’

  I remained silent. The guilt of your lies forced you to embellish. ‘No one you know . . . a Harley Street patient.’ You turned to your desk and opened a file. ‘Are you OK, Constance? You look a bit peaky.’

  ‘Yes . . . I’ve . . . I’ve just not been sleeping very well.’

  ‘I could give you something—’

  ‘No . . . I’m fine. Thank you.’

  You turned back round, looked right at me. ‘You’ll never guess what I encountered Sunday morning, though?’

  I held your eyes. My face motionless. My throat so constricted that I had to squeeze out the single word, ‘What?’

  ‘My car. It’d been keyed. All down the side and the window smashed. And we both know who it was, don’t we?’

  I placed my hand on the filing cabinet to steady myself. ‘We do? I . . . don’t—’

  ‘Course we do.’

  The room caved in around me. The walls spun. I was too bad even for God. I had nowhere to go, nothing I could do other than to beg for your forgiveness. ‘Samuel . . . I can’t—’

  ‘Bloody hell, Constance, you’re really not with it this morning, are you? It was those delinquents on the bikes back again. Must have been. The bloody bastards. I spoke to the police, explained all about them, but they didn’t give a toss, obviously.’