The Dream Wife

by Louisa de Lange

  He gets a small black notebook and a biro out of his pocket and sits with it in front of him, poised. Johnny, realising that nothing interesting is happening, slides off my lap and goes to his toy box, where his cars live. He extracts a small black-and-white American-style police car, placing it on the floor and looking back at the officer.

  ‘Um …’ I stop for a moment, thinking back to the morning. ‘Nothing out of the ordinary. I got up, and Johnny and I went downstairs to make breakfast.’

  ‘Where was your husband at this point?’ DS Coleman interrupts.

  ‘In the other bedroom, asleep,’ I say. He raises his eyebrows but says nothing. I continue. ‘I made him his coffee and took it in, then I could hear David get up and use the bathroom, and then this thump, and then nothing.’ I look at DS Coleman, scribbling in his notebook. ‘I went upstairs to see what had happened and saw David on the floor, so I called 999.’

  ‘Did you attempt CPR?’

  ‘I don’t know how to do that sort of thing,’ I reply.

  He pauses for a moment, and makes another note.

  ‘And how would you describe your marriage?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  He hesitates and clears his throat again. ‘I mean, does your husband always sleep in a different bedroom to you?’

  The noises in the kitchen stop and the other policeman comes back in, cup of tea in hand. He has used the good china, our wedding china. He hands me the cup and I sit with it in my lap.

  DS Coleman looks at me pointedly.

  ‘Um, yes, he does. He has a busy job and doesn’t like being woken by me in the night if I have to get up for Johnny. There is nothing wrong with our marriage,’ I add.

  A paramedic appears in the doorway, and DS Coleman gets up to speak to him.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I say, standing up and spilling a bit of tea on the carpet. ‘Can you tell me what’s happening with my husband?’ My voice rises an octave in a satisfying way, and Johnny looks at me in alarm.

  DS Coleman leaves the room with the paramedic and I can hear whispering outside. ‘He’ll be back in a moment,’ says the other officer. He is still standing on the far side of the room. He shifts his weight from his left foot to his right and back again, desperate to be involved in the big-boy conversation.

  I sit down heavily and take a sip of tea. It’s weak and sugary, obviously taught on the most recent soothing-the-hysterical-wife course; it’s disgusting. The police officer taps his foot.

  DS Coleman returns and takes a seat next to me on the sofa. He’s big and heavy and it makes me lean slightly towards him. He smells of a flowery aftershave, and I wonder who bought it for him; who did he leave behind at home this morning?

  ‘I’m really sorry, Mrs Sullivan. The paramedics have done all they can, but they were unable to save your husband.’ He pauses. ‘Unfortunately they think the injuries he sustained were too serious for him to recover from.’

  ‘He’s dead?’ I say quietly, and DS Coleman nods. I don’t know how to react. ‘How could he be dead? He was just here a minute ago.’

  ‘We don’t know, I’m sorry.’ He is sorry for a lot of things, this policeman, none of which are his fault. ‘We will need to take the body away to find out exactly what has happened.’

  ‘The body,’ I repeat. ‘Right. Can I see him before you go?’ I ask quickly. I need to be sure. I want to see it with my own eyes.

  ‘Yes, of course, follow me,’ says DS Coleman, gesturing to the other policeman to watch Johnny.

  We go up the stairs slowly. Past the paramedic waiting at the bottom, past the wedding photos on the wall, me leading the way and DS Coleman following behind. A second paramedic stands on the landing, packing equipment away in a large green bag. At first I can only see David’s feet, and then gradually more of him comes into view. His suit trousers, perfectly dry-cleaned, with a crease down the front, still neatly fastened. His shirt, pin-striped blue, ironed by me, ripped open at the front, revealing his pale white stomach, the little scattering of chest hair, pads stuck on where I assume they have tried to revive him. Then up to his neck to his perfectly shaved chin, his open mouth, his nose, eyes, his hair in disarray. Not the David I know, not the David I remember. This isn’t the man who terrorised his wife, scared his son, fucked every woman in sight and threatened his friends. This man is no danger to me any more; he is unmistakably, most emphatically, dead.

  I put my hand over my mouth quickly and dive into the bathroom, locking the door. My body shakes and tears run down my face. Tears of anger, of joy, of relief, of shock. How has this ridiculous plan worked? But whatever the bizarre circumstances, one thing is clear: David is dead and Johnny and I are free.

  29

  Luckily, the sound effects of a good old bout of hysteria are similar whether they are tears of joy or sadness. When I emerge out of the bathroom, a bit of toilet roll clutched to my face, DS Coleman and the paramedic are waiting for me.

  ‘Mrs Sullivan,’ the officer says, ‘can we take him away now?’

  I nod. ‘Yes, yes, please do.’ Can’t just leave him there on the carpet, I want to add, he’ll make a hell of a stain. Instead I say, ‘What happens next?’

  ‘We’ll take the body to the hospital for a post-mortem, to find out what happened to him. We can do all the official stuff there,’ he says.

  The body. How quickly someone moves from being a person, to the patient, to a body. I nod again, and go back downstairs. The paramedic there pulls the same face DS Coleman’s been wearing all morning: a rumpled forehead, lips pressed together in a thin smile, more of a grimace. Head tilted slightly down. The I’m-sorry-for-your-loss face.

  In the living room, the uniformed policeman has Johnny enthralled. He’s down on all fours, police car in hand, running it over the coffee table and floor, making a loud brmming sound. Hardly the sort of behaviour normally taught at police school, but heart-warmingly sweet, especially when Johnny’s own father never did anything remotely similar. Upstairs, I hear talking and instructions being dictated, then a few thumps and the sound of men struggling to lift the body. I don’t envy them. David isn’t a light man: all that wine at late-night posh dinners with his mistresses.

  Out of the front door they go and into the ambulance, under the prying eyes of everyone on the street. DS Coleman follows and shuts the front door behind them, gesturing me back into the living room. The police officer jumps up quickly and guiltily hands the car back to Johnny.

  ‘What’s the best number to call you on?’ DS Coleman asks me, and I tell him; more scribbling in his incomprehensible handwriting. As an afterthought he adds: ‘Is there anyone you want us to notify?’

  Oh Christ, I think, Maggie. Her only son. How would I make that call?

  ‘Could you tell my mother-in-law? Margaret Sullivan?’

  DS Coleman nods, and I give him her address and number.

  ‘We’ll be in touch,’ he says and gestures to his colleague that it’s time for them to leave. ‘We’re sorry again for your loss.’

  The front door closes and Johnny and I watch their car through the living room window.

  ‘Police car,’ Johnny says, looking at me.

  ‘Yes, it was, little man,’ I say, and pull him onto my lap for a hug.

  The house is quiet again, save for the drone of Fireman Sam. Johnny is transfixed by the images on the screen, completely unaware of the emergency playing out in his own life.

  But what now? I haven’t thought beyond this point; I didn’t know if it would work. I don’t even know if we have life insurance, or any way to support ourselves. Have I been crazy? I know David had money, but where the hell is it? I only have access to my pathetic little allowance, but I guess I can always sell the ring, if I can find it again. As I feel the stirrings of panic begin to build in the pit of my stomach, I think at least this is a normal reaction for someone who has lost her husband, rather than hysterical laughter or a smirking grin.

  I get up, placing the cup and saucer on the side in
the kitchen, ready to be washed up delicately by hand, then reconsider and bung it in the dishwasher. Johnny still engrossed, I go back into the hallway, observing the scratches on the hall paint made as our visitors left. I notice a piece of David’s smashed coffee cup hiding behind the hallway table, and pick it up, turning it over in my hands. I put it on the table, then gather up the disconnected battery and shell of his BlackBerry, piecing them back together. The battery cover has smashed, but I press the on button out of curiosity. Lights come on and it springs to life.

  Standing next to the front door, I hear the chatter from a mum and daughter walking by the edge of our drive. As I look their way, I notice David’s BMW is blocking in my Audi and wonder where the key is to move it. I pick up his briefcase and place it in front of me on the hallway table. I open pocket after pocket, looking for his keys, eventually finding them in the front, a big ball of metal and importance.

  Taking the mobile and case with me, I stand outside David’s study, trying key after key until one fits and turns easily. I open the door, and the smell of David hits me like a blow – cigars, whisky, stale sweat and testosterone. I go over to the window and push it open, letting the breeze billow the curtains out and knock over an award on the windowsill. It’s a cheap block of engraved plastic; it falls off into the waste-paper basket and I leave it there.

  I put his mobile on his desk and it starts vibrating angrily. I look at it impassively and it stops. Somebody misses him at least.

  I feel kind of blank, rather than a loss. Something has fallen away from me, to be replaced by a big gap, a gaping void. Someone has erased a small part of the picture of me, but hasn’t decided what colour to fill in the space.

  Everything feels different. I am a widow now. Not officially, as I realise there are still a hundred calls to make and forms to fill in, but technically, I am a widow. No husband. I am single – a single-parent family – and Johnny has no father. Instantly I am reminded of Jack’s words about his own lack of a dad. It must be hard growing up as a boy with no man in your life, but better, surely, than the alternative. Maybe I will find another male influence for Johnny; maybe Adam, or perhaps someone new is round the corner. Maybe not. That will be fine too.

  I place the briefcase on the desk and start pulling open the expensive leather sides and the pockets, placing piles of paper and folders on the desk. There is his laptop, and a sheaf of boring-looking documents with numbers and columns and rows on them. A few project proposals, one with a big red cross carved on its front. I feel sorry for the poor soul who had to present that to him, and relieved that he or she might never know its fate.

  Out of pure curiosity, I carry on looking through the papers, interested in what my husband did with all the time that he was supposedly at work. None of it looks that complicated or impressive – an excess of perplexing PowerPoint and Excel documents, a few dog-eared copies of the Financial Times, stray Post-it notes with messy scribbles in a handwriting I have seen before and assume to be his PA’s.

  A red folder at the back catches my eye. Unlike the rest, which are battered and manhandled, it is neat and pristine. The hairs on the back of my neck bristle as I open it and look inside. The top page is a form, with a large logo of a stag in the right-hand corner. That school, that bloody boarding school again. He was planning two years in advance to put our little boy in boarding school.

  I can feel my hands shaking, and sit down in the plush leather chair on the other side of the desk. I take a deep breath, then slowly rip every page in the lovely red folder into quarters, putting them in a small pile in front of me. This done, I place my hands on the desk, palms down, and take another deep breath. In and out, in and out.

  The phone in front of me buzzes again and I pick it up. The green answer button leaps around excitedly, wanting to be selected. Answer me, it says. I do.

  ‘Hello?’ says the voice at the other end of the line. I am silent. ‘David, are you there?’

  ‘Who’s this?’ I ask, slowly and calmly. ‘This is David’s wife, Annie.’

  A very long pause. ‘This is Jane,’ says the voice, and I imagine her pretty young face from when I saw her on screen being screwed doggy-style by my husband.

  ‘Hi, Jane,’ I say. ‘How can I help?’

  ‘I’m looking for David,’ she says. I can hear the uncertainty in her voice. The wife answering the phone is not something she has ever encountered. ‘Do you know where he is?’

  ‘He’s dead,’ I say, without hesitation. ‘Died this morning.’

  ‘Oh God, oh Christ, oh my dear Lord.’

  ‘Easy on the blasphemy,’ I say, my voice dry and still.

  ‘What happened? Oh my God, what do I do now?’ Jane says, hysteria starting to creep into her voice.

  I sigh. ‘Get over it, Jane, you’ll find someone else to fuck you soon,’ I say, and put the phone down.

  30

  In the back of my mind, I know I have to face Maggie. I did the cowardly thing by sending the police officer over to tell her the bad news, and now I am hiding in my house, avoiding her. We have had lunch, and Johnny is down for a nap. I am standing in my own bedroom, contemplating a sleep myself to see if Jack is doing the same, when I hear the sound of a car on gravel and go to the window to watch Maggie’s BMW 1 Series park up on the drive. From upstairs I wait for her to get out of the car, and eventually the door opens and she totters to the front door.

  I rush downstairs and open it before she has a chance to use her key. She grabs me and holds on; I realise she is shaking. Her tiny body contorts with sobs, her face thrust into my shoulder, her legs weak and collapsing under her.

  I stand half in, half out of the doorway, unable to imagine what she must be going through. Her husband is dead, her only son is dead. I can empathise but am unable to summon any tears.

  After a while, I manage to manoeuvre her through the doorway and into the living room, sitting her down on the sofa. She is still gripping onto my arms with spindly fingers. She looks up at me with bloodshot eyes and I see her for the old lady she is. Her grey hair is like cotton wool, soft and spun into a neat chignon; her skin as thin as tissue paper – I can see her arteries and the veins on her hands.

  ‘My darling, I’m so sorry, what must you think of me? You’ve just lost your husband and here I am sobbing in your doorway.’ She smooths down her blouse and mops delicately at her eyes with a white handkerchief.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea, Maggie?’ Now I’m doing it, all these cups of tea.

  ‘Earl Grey,’ she says, as if she hasn’t met me before.

  I stand up to go through to the kitchen, picking up Johnny’s discarded toys on the way.

  ‘Where is David Junior?’ asks Maggie, perching on the edge of the sofa.

  ‘Johnny’s having a nap.’

  ‘Of course, Johnny. I just thought … I don’t know.’ She looks down into her handkerchief, then sniffs. ‘Does Johnny know about his father? Was he … was he here?’

  ‘He was, Maggie, but I don’t think he knows what happened. I’ll sit him down soon and make sure he understands. I’ll go get your tea.’

  I click the kettle on. The top cupboard door where the tea bags live is open slightly and things have been rearranged as the police officer tried to find what he needed. The used tea bag sits on the draining board, perched on a teaspoon. Strange to have someone you don’t know touch your things in that way. Disconcerting.

  The kettle clicks off and I make the tea just how Maggie likes it. The proper cup and saucer. Handle to the right, lemon slice cut in half on the side, with a teaspoon. Normal builder’s tea for me, in a big ugly mug. No sugar this time.

  I hand her the teacup and she sets it down on the table next to her. She looks at me. She’s pale and her cheeks are sunken. ‘I can’t believe my beautiful boy is gone,’ she says, dabbing at her eyes. ‘It was such a shock when the policeman came round, such a nice man, so understanding. Of course, it would have been better to have heard it from a family member rather th
an a stranger.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Maggie, but I was no use to anyone, and I had to stay with Johnny.’

  ‘Of course, of course. Did you see him?’

  ‘When …?’

  ‘When he died, were you with him when he died?’

  ‘We were downstairs. He was unconscious by the time I got to him.’

  ‘Oh, my poor little boy.’ She starts crying again in great racking gasps, her head in her hands. I move to sit next to her and put an awkward arm around her shoulder.

  Your poor little boy indeed, I think, running through the time when he fucked that woman over the boardroom table, or half murdered me with a pillow. Your poor little boy.

  She looks up at me, pleading. ‘Of course, you’ll come to stay with me now. David mentioned you were having some problems, so I’ll be happy to support you both.’

  ‘Problems?’ My voice has taken on a strange squeaky tone.

  ‘He said you had been sleeping all the time, that you were,’ she clears her throat, ‘depressed,’ she adds in a theatrical whisper.

  ‘No, Maggie, I’m fine. There is nothing like that.’

  ‘I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it, just that David mentioned it to me. We are family after all,’ she says with the smile of a snake weighing up its ability to digest a small pig. ‘I wouldn’t want you to be alone, and for Johnny to have any problems.’

  ‘Johnny won’t have any problems. We’ll be fine, Maggie. We’ll come round all the time, and you can see for yourself.’

  ‘Yes, yes, and I’ll pop round regularly.’

  We finish our cups of tea in silence, conversation over. I feel for the old lady, I do, honestly, but I can’t wait to get away from her. With her there, a part of David lingers, haunting me. Why did he tell her I was depressed? I will have to get my daytime naps under control.

  Maggie sets her teacup down on the coffee table and places her hands on her knees.

  ‘Well, make sure you keep me updated on any news. The policeman said he would phone me, but you can’t be too sure, can you?’