Soldiers' Wives

by Fiona Field

  ‘Please stay,’ said Seb, ‘I don’t want you to feel you ought to go.’

  ‘No, I need to stretch my legs. It’s no bother.’ She strode off.

  Seb grimaced at Lee. ‘I really don’t want to disturb you.’

  ‘Seriously, boss, it’s good to see you. Don’t get me wrong, I love me mam, but…’ He paused and gave Seb a lopsided smile. ‘Let’s just say, this is the third time she’s visited me in about twelve hours and I’m running out of things to say.’

  Seb nodded in sympathy. ‘Mums, eh? How are you? How’s the shoulder?’

  ‘I’m good, the shoulder is a mess. The surgeon’s had a look, says they’re going to have to operate to get it to mend properly. Apparently there’s a lot of bits of bone messing around where bones shouldn’t be. They need to clean all that out and then try and fix what’s left with pins and plates. Sounds like it’s in clip state.’

  ‘But they think they’ll be able to sort it out?’

  ‘They say they can. Don’t suppose you’ve seen anything of the missus, have you, boss?’

  Seb felt his heart sink. What could he say? He took a deep breath. ‘It was me who broke the news to her. And Maddy, my wife, has been round since. She was very upset, naturally.’ But not half as upset as she was about being caught in flagrante delicto.

  ‘I was afraid of that. Poor old Jen. And not much fun for you either, boss. Not a great job to have to do – breaking bad news.’

  ‘It’s sort of what I get paid for,’ said Seb, trying to make light of the task.

  ‘It must be worse for the wives – getting the visit, not knowing the details.’

  Seb nodded. ‘Well, we gave her as much detail as we knew. So,’ he added casually, ‘she’s not got here yet?’

  ‘Boss, I don’t know what’s going on. I’ve left voicemails, I’ve tried Skype, I can’t get hold of her. I’m worried, sir.’

  ‘I think she’s got a new job. That’s what she told Major Milward and my wife. Some work with a catering company. Maybe she’s having trouble getting time off.’

  ‘Maybe, although the job’s news to me. What happened to her hairdressing?’

  ‘Um,’ said Seb, ‘I think she and Zoë had a falling out.’

  ‘Jenna can be a bit of a firecracker. Bonny, but tricky like.’ He sighed. ‘I wish I knew what was going on.’

  Believe me, chum, thought Seb, you don’t.

  Lee studied the end of his bed morosely. ‘Still, I’ve got to look on the bright side – I’m better off than my mate Johnny Flint. He lost a foot.’

  Seb nodded. ‘I heard that ambush was a total clusterfuck. And the medic rescuing you got wounded too, didn’t she?’

  ‘Chrissie Summers.’ Lee nodded.

  ‘You knew her?’

  ‘She was from 1 Herts too, boss. She worked in the medical centre. The one who raced the RSM and won,’ added Lee, helpfully.

  Seb knew about her, the woman who had already gone down in regimental legend. He nodded. ‘Small world.’ There was a pause while they both considered the unlikelihood of coincidences and the fact they happened regardless.

  ‘Sir?’

  Seb knew this form of address didn’t bode well. ‘Yes, Lee.’

  ‘Sir, can you tell me something?’

  Seb looked dubious. ‘Well, I will if I know the answer.’

  ‘It’s a bit tricky, to be honest.’

  Seb nodded sympathetically. ‘Am I the right person? I can get a padre if you’d rather.’

  ‘Fuck… Sorry. Erm, no. I think you’ll be much more help, if I’m honest, boss.’

  Seb’s heart was so low it was down in his boots. So had Lee heard rumours about Jenna already? ‘Shoot.’

  ‘I got to look at my bank account a while back. I had to go back to Camp Bastion from the compound so I managed to get online.’ Lee looked at Seb, a crease of worry over his nose. ‘Sir, my bank account has been rinsed. And I don’t think it’s fraud or anything, I think it was Jenna. Do you know what she’s been up to? It’s just… Shit, sir, my bank account is overdrawn and all my savings have gone.’

  Even Seb wasn’t expecting that and he almost felt relief until he realised just how much more destruction Jenna Perkins had wrought on Lee’s life. An affair and taking his money. Shit. ‘Bloody hell, Lee. How much?’

  ‘About five grand in savings and then there’s a two grand overdraft, plus all my pay for about a month.’

  Seb was stunned. Seven grand? Eight? Sheesh. He took a deep breath. ‘Look, I don’t know the details, but I do know she wanted to set up a hair salon in your quarter. I think she might have paid to have some alterations done.’

  It was Lee’s turn to be shocked. ‘Alterations? In a quarter?’

  ‘’Fraid so. But she didn’t get permission first, so the housing commandant wasn’t best pleased and her venture upset Zoë, and I think the wives decided to side with Zoë, sort of out of loyalty, I suppose…’ Seb looked at Lee sympathetically. ‘It’s been a bit of a mess, I think.’

  Lee rolled his eyes. ‘Nothing like a bit of understatement. And that sounds nothing like a bit of a mess. Total fuck-up, more like, if you’ll pardon my language. No wonder the wife doesn’t want to face me. And to be honest, boss, I’m not sure I want to see her. Not at the moment, anyway.’

  33

  Chrissie stood at the door to the ward and watched Lee and Captain Fanshaw talking earnestly. Bloody hell, she thought, if Lee didn’t have one visitor he had another. First his mum, now his platoon commander, when was she going to get the chance to have a chat with him?

  Her heart was in tatters, she thought, as she watched him. She’d fallen head over heels, and for a married man at that, and she’d given up fighting it. It had started in the field hospital at Bastion and the slide from friendship into love had been inevitable. After all that determination not to get involved, not to get into a relationship… how had it happened? She sighed. She didn’t have a clue, but it had. Except falling for a married man was totally wrong and she was not, never, going to be a home-wrecker, so that left her in a pretty bleak place. She sighed. That’ll teach me, she thought, teach me to get involved. She turned away, resolving that, if nothing else, Lee must never know.

  Miserably, she trundled off to the café, where she saw Lee’s mum sitting morosely on her own, supping tea and reading the Mirror. She thought about saying hello but decided against it, as she wasn’t sure she could chat about Lee and give nothing of her own feelings away. In her limited experience, Chrissie felt that mothers had an uncanny knack of picking up on sub-texts, where their own children were concerned.

  Instead, she grabbed a cup of tea for herself and took it to the opposite corner of the café and got her phone out. She needed cheering up and knew just the person who could do it.

  ‘Hi, Immi, how’s tricks?’ she said as soon as Immi answered.

  ‘Same old, same old,’ answered Immi. ‘And I miss you, hon. There’s no one here that I get on with like you.’ Chrissie felt better already, Immi was instant sunshine. ‘I mean, the others are OK,’ continued her friend, ‘but Keelie and Gillie never seem to be about, certainly not at weekends, and although I appreciate having the room to myself—’

  ‘I bet you do,’ said Chrissie with a dirty laugh, remembering the succession of male friends Immi had entertained there.

  ‘—but I get lonely,’ finished Immi.

  Chrissie giggled. ‘Really? That’s not what I remember.’

  ‘I do, honest. I get lonely for female company. Blokes are OK, but you can’t share the goss with them like you can a girlfriend. Well, not unless they’re gay, and there aren’t many of those around here.’

  ‘Well, there are a few gays,’ said Chrissie.

  ‘A few,’ conceded Immi, ‘but being a soldier is a pretty macho thing, isn’t it? It can’t be your default career choice if you’re gay, can it? I mean, I can’t see the lovely Gok Wan in a tin hat and multicam.’

  Chrissie giggled again. ‘No, I see your point.�
��

  ‘Anyway, talking about gossip, do you want to hear a really juicy bit? I feel a bit disloyal passing it on, but it’s all over the garrison here, and if you were around you’d know.’

  ‘Ooh, tell me then.’

  ‘It’s Lee’s missus. You know I went round to hers, to hold her hand after she got news that Lee had been injured?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, it seems that, as I was going in the front door to do my Good Samaritan bit, there was a random man legging it out the back.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Truly.’

  ‘Poor Lee. I mean, how could she?’ Chrissie felt a wave of disgust well up inside. Lee didn’t deserve that, and they’d hardly been married five minutes – well, a few months, but it was hardly the seven-year itch. More like the seven-month itch. ‘He doesn’t know?’

  ‘Not unless Jenna’s told him herself. Although, when he gets back here, I can’t see how he’ll avoid finding out. Honestly, the world and his dog is in on the news. He’s going to be heartbroken.’

  Chrissie wanted to cry for Lee. Shit, he didn’t deserve this, not on top of everything else.

  After their conversation ended, Chrissie went back to her own ward and waited for visiting time to end and the next ward round to start. She had been promised that, when the doctor saw her next, he’d be able to tell her when the op to tidy up the wound on her arm would take place.

  It wasn’t until later that evening, when the hospital was finally empty of outsiders, that she got her chance to go and say hi to Lee. Although, as she approached his ward, she worried about how on earth she was going to talk to him and not let slip what she knew. She would just have to put out of her mind that she’d had any news at all from the barracks.

  ‘Hi, Lee.’

  Lee looked away from the TV screen at the sound of the familiar voice. He hadn’t really been watching it, anyway. He’d been thinking about what Captain Fanshaw had told him about Jenna and her failed business plan, and the alterations to the quarter, and the way she’d blown all his savings, and it was all such a fuck-awful mess and he couldn’t see any way out of it and… and…

  Round and round it churned and churned, and with each circuit the problem became bigger, knottier, more intractable. But now, thank God, Chrissie was providing a distraction.

  ‘Chrissie. Good to see you. How’s the arm?’

  ‘They’re going to operate on Monday. The medics told me it’s really simple and they can do it under a local anaesthetic. What about your op?’

  ‘I’m down for Monday, too. Must be their day for patching up soldiers.’

  ‘Or maybe the golf course is shut on a Monday so the surgeons have to come in,’ said Chrissie. ‘Anyway, as soon as they’ve sorted me out I’ll be good to go. Lucky old me, eh?’

  ‘That’s great news. I’ll be stuck here for a bit and then I’ll be off for rehabilitation. Lots of physio and exercise. And I’ve heard the place they send you to is gleaming. Like a holiday camp: pools and tennis courts and gyms and everything.’

  ‘That’s good. I think I’ll get some sick leave and then it’ll be back to work for me.’

  ‘But the sick leave’ll be ace, and won’t you get some post-tour leave too? Just think, days and days of being paid to loaf around.’

  Chrissie shrugged and sighed. ‘Think I’d rather go back to work. The trouble with having no family is I don’t really have a place to go to. It’s not like I’ve got a mum who’s going to spoil me rotten. I suppose I’ll just hang around the barracks for a couple of weeks.’

  ‘Chrissie, that’s a rubbish plan.’

  ‘It is, isn’t it, but, you know, when you don’t have a better hole to go to…’

  Lee was about to suggest that maybe Chrissie would like to stay with Jenna, when he realised that it was an even more rubbish plan than the other one. He changed the subject.

  ‘So how’s Phil?’ he asked.

  Chrissie shook her head. ‘No idea. He’s back in Bastion.’

  ‘Bastion? You mean, he went pretty much straight back?’

  Chrissie nodded.

  ‘I thought maybe he came back on the flight because he was going off on R&R or something.’

  ‘No, he just came along for the ride. I don’t think he’s due R&R for another month or so, right near the end of his tour. That’s the trouble with the draw for rest and recuperation, isn’t it? Some people get it right at the front end of their tour, when they’ve hardly begun, some get it right at the arse end and only the lucky few get it slap bang in the middle. I doubt even bloody Goldilocks would strike lucky.’

  Lee laughed. ‘Mind you, she was one picky moo.’ He gazed fondly at Chrissie. She was so grounded and normal. Lucky old Phil. ‘Will you be seeing him when he gets back?’

  ‘I expect so. Why shouldn’t I? I mean, he works at the medical centre.’

  ‘Of course he does, I’d forgotten.’

  ‘You were hardly a regular there, though, were you?’

  ‘I will be now.’ He glanced at his shoulder. ‘Do you give out loyalty cards?’

  Chrissie smiled and shook her head.

  ‘Well you should, think of all those gifts I could earn: coffee maker, toaster…’

  ‘Cuddly toy.’

  ‘Blow-up dolly.’

  ‘Lee!’

  ‘Sorry.’ He grinned. ‘One of me mates in Nad-e Ali got sent one with a puncture repair kit. It still went US in a matter of days – or so he said. We reckoned even she didn’t fancy him.’

  Chrissie giggled. Lee is so lovely, she thought, and he has so much shit going on. She hoped that when he found out just how bad things were back home it didn’t make him all bitter and moody, but how could it not. How could he stay so nice when he found out the true extent of what Jenna had done?

  Jenna swung her little car into the visitors’ car park and got out. She sighed heavily and hoped Lee appreciated her visit. What a journey – over four hours of stop–start traffic and she was probably going to get the same on the way back. What a waste of a Sunday, for just a couple of hours at his bedside. All she needed now was for bloody Sonia to be there and her day would be complete.

  She sashayed into the hospital, aware of the admiring glances from the patients and staff as she made her way to reception and then along the corridors, her stilettos click-clacking on the polished lino.

  And there he was, his shoulder swathed in bandages. A lot of bandages. But no Sonia. That was something to be thankful for.

  ‘Hiya, babes,’ she said as she neared the bed.

  Lee looked up. ‘Jenna. You made it.’

  ‘Of course, hon.’ She leaned over and gave him a kiss on the lips. ‘I’d have come earlier,’ she lied, smoothly, ‘only this new job of mine is a bugger to get away from. Anyway, how are you?’ She put on her concerned face – she was good at looking as if she cared. She used to do it all the time in Zoë’s when her customers were telling her about their badly behaved kids or their battles with getting repairs to their quarters.

  ‘Not so bad,’ said Lee. ‘I’m pretty much off the painkillers, although I expect I’ll be back on them again for a bit tomorrow.’

  ‘How come?’

  Lee gestured with his good hand to the sign over his bed that read Nil by mouth. ‘They’re going to operate on it tomorrow. Pin it together with a whole bunch of metal. It’ll make getting through airport security a bastard.’

  Was that a joke? She smiled just in case. ‘Poor you. Still, at least you’re in the right place and getting the best treatment.’

  ‘Yeah, the treatment’s been Gucci from start to finish. And after the op, I’ll be getting moved closer to you, to this rehab centre in Surrey.’

  ‘Rehab? What, like the Priory?’

  ‘Not like that. This is for the guys who’ve got to learn to live with their injuries. I mean, I’m lucky, I’ll just need physio. Most of the others will be learning to walk again or how to use false hands, stuff like that.’

  Jenna wrink
led her nose. ‘It all sounds a bit gross to me.’ Lee gave her a funny look, but she couldn’t help how she felt, could she? People with bits missing was gross. ‘Where’s your mum?’

  ‘She’s gone back home. She’s coming down again next week again, to see how I am after the op.’

  Good, thought Jenna. No chance of running into the old biddy. ‘I’ll see if I can get up again, only this new job means it might be tricky.’

  ‘Catering, isn’t it?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Sorry, Jen, but what the fuck do you know about catering? I mean, you couldn’t even cook a turkey.’

  ‘I don’t have to cook, I do waitressing at events. I can even do silver service now.’

  ‘So what happened to your hairdressing business? The one you set up after I left.’

  So how did Lee know? Had that interfering busybody Alan Milward said something? ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘Captain Fanshaw told me. He said you’d tried to start your own business.’

  ‘Did he now.’ What was it with army officers that they felt they had to interfere with every sodding thing? First Milward had pretty much put her out of business and now Fanshaw was telling tales to Lee.

  ‘He said you’ve had work done on the quarter.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So, you didn’t have permission.’

  ‘And?’ God what was this – the Spanish Inquisition?

  ‘Jenna, you can’t do stuff like that. It’s not our house.’

  ‘Really? So we don’t pay the rent or anything? Of course it’s our house, Lee – we pay for it, we live there.’

  ‘The army doesn’t see it like that.’

  ‘Then they bloody well should.’ She sighed. She hadn’t come here to argue with Lee, and there was no denying he’d obviously been in the wars. Duh – the Afghan war! ‘Anyway, let’s not talk about stuff like that.’

  ‘Why, because you think I might ask about what happened to my savings?’

  Jenna went cold. How the hell…? She swallowed. ‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she lied with a bright smile on her face.

  ‘Jenna, I’ve seen my bank statement.’