Before I Knew You

by Amanda Brookfield

  ‘No, we’re fine, thanks,’ Andrew replied briskly, once the handshakes were done with.

  ‘Sure, okay.’ Carter rubbed his hands together, backing away. ‘But any problems and you get directly in touch, you hear? I promised Beth and William I’d look out for you. Anything at all. We’ve got a pool, which the both of you are welcome to use – just say the word.’

  ‘That’s so kind,’ Sophie cried, feeling the need to make up for Andrew, who had gathered several bags and was heading for the front door. ‘Thanks so much, Mr …’

  ‘Carter. Call me Carter. And don’t take any nonsense from that darn cat of theirs either.’ He chuckled, wagging a teasing finger as a vast Persian cat, with fur like thick beige feathers and a wide, flat, comical face, appeared round the side of the house. It paused to study them for a few moments, curling its extravagant boa of a tail round a tendril of ivy before stalking back the way it had come. ‘She’s a princess and no mistake.’ Carter shook his head as he set off towards the trees separating the two properties.

  ‘Well, they could have told us,’ Sophie muttered, wheeling the last of the suitcases to the front door. ‘I mean, one of us could have been allergic or something, like Tamsin – remember how allergic she was?’

  ‘You mean the cat?’ said Andrew, with deliberate obtuseness, more concerned with the keys, which didn’t seem to be working, and having no desire to embark on a discussion about Sophie’s sister, whose tragically difficult, handicapped life had been brought to an end by an asthma attack ten years before. ‘They did mention it, actually. I didn’t say anything because I was afraid you wouldn’t be keen … Ah, there we go.’ He pushed the door open with his shoulder and then dropped his bags, cocking his head and frowning. ‘Something should be ringing, shouldn’t it … or at least beeping?’ He pulled a crumpled piece of paper from the palm of his hand.

  ‘You knew there was a cat to look after and you didn’t tell me?’ Sophie exclaimed, aware that she was over-reacting but unable somehow to resist it. ‘You knew and didn’t tell me?’ she repeated, when Andrew didn’t bother to turn round.

  ‘There’s no need to make an issue of it.’ He crammed the piece of paper back into his pocket. ‘I didn’t tell you because I guessed you wouldn’t like it –’

  ‘Well, you were wrong,’ Sophie snapped. ‘It’s not being told that I don’t like.’

  ‘Look, sorry, okay?’ Andrew wiped the sweat off his temples with his forearms. ‘It’s called Dido. It requires feeding. It’s no big deal.’ He turned away from her, releasing a low, appreciative whistle at the wide hall, with its polished wooden floorboards, high ceiling and fresh creamy walls, glowing gently in the dim light. ‘I’ll get some of these shutters open, shall I? Let in some air and sunshine.’

  Sophie said nothing. She was too busy pulling into herself, a trick she had mastered in recent months, like tightening a drawstring over her head, closing up, hunkering down inside an invisible bag. She headed for the stairs with her wheeled suitcase, registering but feeling no connection to Andrew’s eager darting between windows, or the lines of honey light falling across her path.

  Once safely out of view on the landing, she paused to lean on the banisters, fighting a sudden sensation of physical sickness at the thought of trying to coexist with Andrew in this strangely perfect place, trapped in the spotlight of whatever it was that had so mysteriously come between them, all their hollow efforts to enjoy themselves, with nowhere, nothing – no one – behind which to hide.

  The passageway was lined with trellised wallpaper, adorned at orderly intervals with tasteful prints and shelves of small china ornaments. A deep pile toffee-coloured carpet ran the length of it and into each of the rooms, as soft underfoot as mossy grass. Everything looked fresh and expensive, and yet Sophie couldn’t help thinking the place felt more like a hotel than a home, falsely pristine, impossible to relax in. Although the girls might like it, she conceded, marvelling – as she continued to poke her head round doors – at the kind of woman who had the time, the energy to ensure that her curtain ties matched her scatter cushions. In the bathrooms the synchronicity of the décor was especially overwhelming: pink and lilac towel sets and shower curtains, mirror frames harmonized with floor tiles, while the gleaming chrome fixtures looked large enough to start world wars.

  There were no poky spaces anywhere, none of the let’s-put-that-there-for-the-time-being approach that had governed the evolution of so much of the space in her own home – the blue wardrobe that didn’t quite allow the spare-room door to open properly, or the umbrella stand that lived in the music room because of the narrowness of the hall, or the boxes of LPs that had somehow become a support-stand for four mud-encrusted pairs of wellingtons in the cupboard under the stairs.

  But it was the Stapletons’ main bedroom that depressed Sophie the most – this time for not being like a hotel. Three times the size of the others, it was decorated in soft blues and gold, with a miniature chaise-longue, upholstered in velvet, parked along the bottom of the widest bed Sophie had ever seen. Covering the bed itself was an exquisitely embroidered Oriental silk spread and two cream taffeta cushions balanced on top of the pillows, stitched, respectively, with the words HIS and HERS. It was laughably twee, of course, but what Sophie found hardest to bear was the unmistakable tenderness of the attention to detail, the atmosphere of loving care, of a space devoted to restfulness and intimacy.

  They were newly-weds, after all, she reminded herself, putting her bag down and perching on the edge of the bedspread. A moment later she sprang guiltily to her feet, feeling like a trespasser – a voyeuristic trespasser – as images of the Stapletons locked in limb-knotted acts of mutual pleasuring invaded her mind, inspired by what was obviously a wedding photo, pinned above the headboard: William so tall and angular, Beth so slim and petite, the pair of them tossing their heads back in a mist of confetti. And suddenly the room was spinning, firing pricks of light into the corners of Sophie’s eyes. She leant against the wall, wondering if dizziness was to be a new symptom of her nameless malaise or whether, more probably, she had got up too quickly and was just hot and overtired. Once the world had steadied, she slowly made her way into the sumptuous en-suite and held her face under the blast of the basin’s colossal cold tap, letting the water bounce out of her mouth and splash up to the edges of her hair.

  Downstairs, meanwhile, Andrew had unleashed the afternoon light into the house, searched in vain for an air-conditioning panel and begun riffling through a stack of instructions, composed in what he now recognized – from the bundle that had been left for them in the glove compartment of the Lincoln – as the sloping, smooth handwriting of Beth Stapleton. There was a whole page for the cat.

  Dido loves to be stroked! She would also like a groom from time to time as she has trouble getting all the tangles out for herself. Her brushes are in the wicker box at the bottom of the tall cupboard next to the fridge. Pick a time when she is sleepy – first thing in the morning – or after she has eaten when she will be self-cleaning anyway and therefore in full grooming mode! She likes to eat twice a day: breakfast, which is two scoops of Kitty-Flakes and a saucer of milk, and supper (usually around 6 p.m.) when she will have one of the pouches of food (store cupboard next to the freezer) and some water. (I don’t like to give her too much milk as, although all cats are famous for loving it, it is apparently real bad for their digestive tract.) If you could shake out the woollens on her bed (under the TV in the kitchen) from time to time I would so appreciate that too, as with her long coat they do get badly furred up. If you have any concerns, please don’t hesitate to give us a call. Dido says a big THANKS!

  PS The number of our vet in Stamford is on the list of emergency contacts.

  PPS There is a cat-door, but as you will see, Dido only goes out when she absolutely has to! (Years of living in an apartment, I guess.)

  Underneath the sign-off there was a smiley face, sprouting feline whiskers and two pointy ears.

  Hearing Sophie’s s
teps in the hall, Andrew hastily shuffled the piece of paper to the bottom of the pile and continued exploring the kitchen, a magnificent geometric jigsaw of limed-oak cabinets, gadgets and slabs of glittering black marble. An oval island of a worktop-cum-breakfast-bar with two tall stools sat in the middle of this splendour, but there was also a dining table, positioned between large glass doors overlooking the garden, and a fridge the size of a small car.

  Andrew strolled over to the doors and peered outside, pressing the edge of one hand on the pane as a visor against the blinding brilliance of the sun. The yard, was how William Stapleton had referred to it in his email, summoning for Andrew images of dusty concrete fringed with scrub. But what presented itself through the window was a well-tended rolling, irregular-shaped lawn, dotted with the heads of sprinklers and beds of flowers. The grass petered out after some fifty yards, giving way to the tall, verdant trees that seemed to smother every acre of Connecticut not otherwise occupied by a road or a building. Although there was water too, Andrew remembered, peering harder at a distant silvery glimmer and recalling mention of some kind of pond.

  ‘There’s a piano, did you see?’ said Sophie, appearing in the doorway. She was barefoot and wearing a T-shirt and shorts, both visibly crumpled from their sojourn in a suitcase. Her long blonde hair was in its usual loosely clasped ponytail, although the shorter strands at the sides had broken free and were dangling round her ears. ‘In a room next to the study. The girls might be glad of that. And you, of course.’

  ‘Possibly.’ Andrew tugged open one side of the fridge. ‘This thing’s full of beer, do you want one?’

  Sophie shook her head.

  Andrew took out a bottle for himself, exclaiming in delight at the bottle-top remover handily set into the fridge door. ‘God, the Americans certainly know how to do things, don’t they?’ He slumped into a chair, pressing the cool glass of the bottle to his forehead. ‘I can’t find where to turn the air-con on.’

  ‘We should go shopping probably.’

  ‘Or we could have a walk-about. The pond-lake thing appears to be over there.’ He gestured at the glass doors with his bottle. ‘Through the trees. What are all these bloody trees, anyway? Birches? Beeches?’

  ‘Maples, I think. But we don’t know when the shops shut.’ Sophie could feel strands of hair sticking to her cheeks where the water had dried. She felt gritty-eyed, dogged, exhausted.

  ‘We could eat out. They’ve recommended loads of places – they’re on one of that woman’s endless lists, numbers, addresses, types of food … I tell you, she is scarily thorough.’ Andrew rolled his eyes, enjoying the lovely feel of the beer snaking down inside, slaking his thirst, lifting his mood.

  ‘But we’ll need stuff for breakfast anyway. And I’m not sure it’s a good idea to go out on the first night when we’re so tired – and bound to get lost trying to find our way back in the dark.’

  Andrew swivelled his head to look at her, his blue eyes dark. ‘Do you remember what I said about trying to have a good time? Do you remember that, Soph? Chilling out, maybe?’ He took two more bottles from the fridge and held one out to her, but she shook her head, confessing in a small voice that she would prefer a cup of tea.

  ‘Well, there’s no milk, so I guess we’ll have to go shopping, won’t we?’ Andrew kicked the fridge door shut and flopped back into his chair. ‘If I might be allowed to relax with a drink first?’ He ran a hand through his hair, feeling its lankness in the heat. As the silence between them thickened, he squinted, with feigned interest now, in the direction of the garden, reduced to a blur of white and green in the unrelenting slant of the afternoon sun. It occurred to him in the same instant just what an ordeal these temperatures would be: sun cream and his own sweat – the awful sticky mess of it, for four weeks, every time he set foot outside the door.

  Sophie watched him down the second beer, weighing up what she could manage, what she still had the energy to care about. In England it would be ten o’clock at night – teeth-cleaning and lights out – the bliss of sleep. ‘I don’t mind driving if you’re tired. It would be good practice – get me used to the wrong side of the road. I saw there’s another smaller car in the garage, but we’re not insured for that, are we?’

  ‘Nope, just the Lincoln.’

  Sophie was aware of her hot feet squeaking as she crossed the tiled floor to the stack of information next to the phone. ‘Was there anything in this lot about a supermarket?’ Glancing up, she spotted a dial on the wall and turned it towards an image resembling a snowflake. A quiet whirring started up at once, bringing with it an instant and delicious coolness, a stroking of invisible icy gossamer that seemed to float down from the ceiling.

  Andrew threw back his head with a groan. ‘Sophie, you angel, you clever angel.’ He leapt from his chair and slipped his arms round her waist. ‘I’m insufferable in the heat, aren’t I?’

  ‘Yes,’ Sophie whispered, wishing she could engage with something beyond the sweet beery smell of his breath and the familiar acidity of his sweat. He was being nice, he was nice. ‘Always,’ she added, in a bid to sound playful, leaning back into him in a show of the desire for which she knew he so yearned. ‘For a big shop we need to go to Stamford.’

  She could feel him shrink, not just physically – in the swift release of his light hold on her waist, in the audible clamp of his jaw – but inside too, some soft part of him closing in a reflex against hurt. It was her fault, of course. It was always her fault, these days. She could no longer feel the right things, the things that had once made life so effortlessly sweet. How could an illness do that? she wondered despairingly. How could it alter feelings?

  ‘The shopping … indeed …’ Andrew muttered bitterly. ‘Heaven forbid we should forget the shopping. But nothing big today – we’ll find somewhere local. Now, where did I put the car keys?’ He patted his pockets, pulling out his phone, which promptly started ringing.

  ‘Geoff!’ He swung away from Sophie, tipping his head back and flexing his legs in an involuntary display of delight. ‘Yes, mate … bloody fantastic.’ He flicked his eyes at Sophie. ‘We can’t believe it – total bloody luxury. What the poor sods are going to make of our place I can only imagine … Yes, yes, I know, it does fit the bill exactly, so hopefully they won’t be suing for compensation … Of course … We’d love to meet up but need a few days to settle in … Yup … Friday? Hang on.’ He held the mobile away from his ear and cocked his head at Sophie, his eyes fierce with the challenge of daring her to refuse.

  Sophie managed a smile and a nod before quickly turning away to let the inevitable darker reactions flood in. Geoff and Ann: not seen by her since Andrew’s thirtieth, jolly, energetic, Americanized – just to think of it made her feel faint. Behind her Andrew was still talking, sounding now so jolly and energized that it occurred to Sophie that if she had any residue of love for the man she should probably leave him. Yes, she should leave. Better that than become a millstone of misery, whittling away whatever feelings he had left for her in the process. The girls were so much closer to him, these days, anyway, with their music, and being wary of her, so out of sorts. She had been putting on as good a show as she could, but it was hard, what with the tiredness and having given up her job and the sometimes public harshness of Andrew’s impatience.

  Leave Andrew. Poised now with pen and paper – torn off a block next to the phone – in preparation to compose a list for the supermarket, Sophie almost wrote the two words down. It took some concentration to write teabags instead, followed, after some consideration, by milk.

  ‘Good start,’ Andrew quipped, peering over her shoulder, all his good humour restored by the phone conversation. ‘They’re going to meet us at Grand Central Station next Friday, for lunch, seeing the sights and so on?’ He turned the sentence into a question, so Sophie nodded, trying to mirror his enthusiasm. ‘But right now, before we hit the “mall”’ – he stretched the vowel, turning it American – ‘I thought I might just take a look at that piano you found.
’ He trotted out of the kitchen, tossing his phone from hand to hand and whistling – some intricate classical tune, as it always was with Andrew; vibrato, perfectly pitched, a sign of total, self-absorbed contentment. It had been one of the earliest things to snag Sophie’s heart.

  William had declared his intention to sleep for as long his jet-lagged body desired, but Beth, determined to adjust as quickly as possible to the new time zone, had set her cell-phone alarm for seven so that she could go running, as she liked to do on most mornings back home. When the phone trilled, however, it was all she could do to summon the energy to turn it off. Her body and mind felt leaden, thanks to the patchiest of sleeps – initially not being tired enough and then not liking the spongy softness of the mattress, which seemed to suck her downwards rather than offering support. William, a famously efficient and deep sleeper, had been more than noticeably restless too, murmuring a response when she said his name in the small hours but not following it up with the physical comfort for which she had hoped.

  Swinging her legs out of bed, Beth sat upright and rubbed her eyes. Through the Chapmans’ loose-fitting bedroom curtains there was a promising segment of blue in the screen of grey cloud. She padded to the window for a better look, thinking, as she tweaked the faded fabric, how much fun it would be to take the entire cosy shambles of this borrowed home in hand and give it a thorough face-lift. Thinning carpets, washed-out furnishings, patches of limescale round every accoutrement connected to water – William, at the same time as offering reassurances, had been sweetly concerned that she might be disappointed – but Beth had seen at once the natural elegance of the place and pronounced herself enchanted. Original patterned floor tiles, high ceilings, cute cornices, sash windows: it was like stepping back in time, even if it was all crying out for the chance to shine as its Victorian creators had intended.

  Beth dropped the curtain and picked up a blackened silver-framed photograph from among the ornaments crowding the chest of drawers. It contained a picture of the Chapman family – a strikingly beautiful picture – taken, by the look of it, at some classical ruins. The two girls and their parents were sitting on a wall against the backdrop of what appeared to be a Roman amphitheatre, the daughters bewitchingly thin in tiny shorts and strappy tops, one fair-haired, like the mother, the other with the soft, almost rusty hair and startled blue saucer eyes of her father. What a handsome group! And they were clearly having such a good time too – laughing, mouths wide, their heads tipped at different, unrehearsed angles, as if a good joke had been told a second before the click of the camera.