Our Kind of Cruelty

by Araminta Hall

  I thought of my own house and it made me feel itchy. ‘You could invest it.’

  ‘I could,’ she said, although her tone was harsh.

  A faint smell of burning reached us and Kaitlyn jumped up. ‘Come into the kitchen. We can eat there.’

  I followed her through to another white room, with white units running along one side of the wall and a round white table encircled by white chairs in the centre.

  ‘Open another bottle.’ She motioned to a laden wine rack in the corner. I went towards it and picked out a fine bottle, easing the cork out with a satisfying sigh.

  We sat next to each other again, with the plates of steaming shepherd’s pie, and I filled our glasses. It smelt as good as home.

  ‘I’m thinking about jacking it all in actually,’ Kaitlyn said. ‘Buying a business on the coast somewhere and living a better life.’

  ‘Whereabouts?’ V had taught me not to blow on my food, so I was waiting for the steam to subside.

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t really care. I fancy the sea.’ It smelt too good to wait so I forked at the food, bringing it to my lips. Kaitlyn did the same, blowing hard on it before putting it in her mouth. ‘Why are you smiling?’ she asked.

  ‘I was always taught not to blow on my food.’

  ‘My mum told me that as well. But, you know.’

  ‘What business?’ She looked better animated, I thought.

  ‘I don’t know that either.’ She laughed. ‘An old-fashioned sweet shop maybe, selling things like white mice and rhubarb and custards, in those big glass jars. And you have to scoop them out and weigh them.’ The food was as good as I had expected and it landed in my grateful stomach like a kiss. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve never thought about jacking it all in?’

  ‘I plan to retire by forty-five.’

  ‘But that’s ages away.’

  ‘Fifteen years.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  And it did sound like a long time when she put it like that.

  ‘Did you know anyone when you went to New York?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How was that?’

  ‘Awful.’ There was something about Kaitlyn which made being honest with her very easy.

  She laid down her fork even though her plate was still half full. ‘Why was it awful?’

  ‘Mainly the loneliness. I missed Verity terribly.’

  Her cheeks coloured slightly. ‘I don’t understand why you went in the first place. I mean, if she couldn’t go with you.’

  ‘I … We …’ But I stumbled over the words, not entirely sure what the answer to that was. I had momentarily forgotten why V had thought it such a good idea. ‘I don’t know. It was good for my career.’

  Kaitlyn kept her eyes on me. ‘God, don’t you think there’s more to life than that. It’s like, what are we all waiting for?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I poured us both more wine.

  She sat back, holding her glass against her chest. ‘I know this sounds like a terrible cliché, but I saw an interview with Joan Collins once and the interviewer asked her if she looked that good every day and she said of course she did, because life isn’t a dress rehearsal.’ She took another deep sip of her wine and when she looked up at me her eyes were glistening. ‘I mean, I spend all my life behaving like it’s a bloody dress rehearsal, waiting for the real bit to start. And it’s such a fucking waste.’

  We sat in silence for a bit and I could feel my heart through my cotton shirt, pounding along its own godforsaken path. I thought of V in her life, sitting with Angus no doubt at their kitchen table, while I sat here with Kaitlyn, and it all suddenly seemed appalling. Because what were we doing? Why were we pretending like this?

  I felt Kaitlyn lay her hand over mine and I looked down at the paleness of it against my pinker skin. She was so translucent I could see the blue of her veins pumping her blood round her body and I was struck by how fragile she was, how easy she would be to break.

  I pulled my hand out from under hers. ‘I guess I’d better be heading home.’

  ‘Sorry. I was just …’

  ‘No, it’s not you.’

  She smiled lightly. ‘Oh no, Mike. I mean, I really like you, but not, I mean …’

  ‘I can’t …’ I started.

  ‘I know you’re still in love with Verity.’ She looked up at me and her eyes were quivering. ‘But from where I’m standing she doesn’t seem to make you that happy.’

  ‘She makes me very happy,’ I said, although something about the words sounded faintly ridiculous.

  ‘Happiness is so odd, don’t you think? I mean, sometimes we can mistake feelings for happiness or love, when sometimes they’re the exact opposite.’

  It sounded like a terrible thing to say, but I supposed women like Kaitlyn were used to feeling that way. I stood up. ‘Look, thanks very much for dinner. It was delicious.’

  Kaitlyn laughed.

  ‘No, really, I’m sorry. Please, can this not ruin our friendship?’ I didn’t know why I was saying such soppy words, why I cared even. But there was something unbearable about seeing Kaitlyn’s tiny figure seated on the chair, Snowdrop snuffling by her feet. I felt an odd need to put my arms round her shoulders and give her a hug, but obviously I didn’t as I didn’t want to encourage her in any way.

  She stood as well and the movement seemed to compose her. ‘No, I’m sorry, Mike. I think I’ve just drunk a bit too much. Of course we’ll still be friends, don’t be daft.’

  She walked me to the door and we kissed awkwardly on both cheeks, raising our hands in stupid farewells and tripping over our words.

  I breathed deeply when I reached the outside world and looked up at what I could of the stars behind the hazy pollution. My body felt jangly and so I began to walk, not admitting to myself where I was going at first, but in the end accepting that my feet were taking me towards Kensington. I trampled along the messy, chewing-gum-littered streets, stepping over what looked like people wrapped in filthy sleeping bags, lying on thin strips of cardboard. Never mind the women on the stage, it was much more likely that one of these homeless people was my mother.

  Kaitlyn’s words slid around my brain like a ball bearing in a slot machine. I knew she had said things that were worth listening to and yet their meaning eluded me. I couldn’t work out if she had been giving me advice or, if she had, if it had been worth heeding. I couldn’t work out if she was right or wrong. I couldn’t work out what I thought. I needed V to tell me, because only she could make sense of the world for me.

  V’s house was dark, except for the gleaming light in the porch. The shutters and curtains were all drawn, apart from in the kitchen, but this room was dark as well, the moonlight glinting off all the steel and concrete. I knew V was inside, although I stopped my mind from wondering at what she was doing. I checked my watch and it was nearly midnight, which made me feel better. V got tired and she would no doubt be asleep, dreaming maybe of me.

  I walked to the opposite side of the street and leant against the ivy-laden wall I had stopped in front of before. I looked up at the window where I had seen V draw the curtains and felt her presence so strongly it was like I could have flown through the window at that moment. I imagined the shattering glass and the screams of Angus; I could feel her as I took her in my arms and we flew away, back to our nest at the top of the mountains. I thought it had started raining, but then I realised I was crying, hard and fast.

  Anna, the gardener, rang me the next morning and asked if I’d had a chance to look at the various planting options she’d sent me. I admitted I hadn’t, but said I would get right on to it, clicking on to her email as we spoke. I had no idea of the names of any of the plants she suggested and spent an annoying hour googling each one for pictures which yielded little joy. The exercise depressed me anyway, as I should have automatically known what flowers V preferred. In the end I told Anna to go with what she thought. How about colours, she asked, I was thinking pinks and yellows. I thought immediately of Susan’s
mother-of-the-bride dress and told Anna absolutely no yellow. We agreed instead on blues and whites.

  Kaitlyn blushed when she saw me and kept her eyes down every time she walked past, which was also unduly depressing. Without Kaitlyn, I realised, I had almost no one to speak to.

  After lunch I messaged her:

  Thanks for supper last night. I had a really nice time.

  No worries. I probably shouldn’t have said so much.

  Don’t be silly. It’s all forgotten. I just don’t want it to be awkward.

  Of course it won’t be.

  Thanks.

  But I think maybe you should consider how healthy a relationship is where one person holds all the cards.

  ????

  I just mean, she has quite a hold on you. You should trust yourself more.

  I do.

  Sorry, not my place to comment.

  It’s fine. Friends?

  Friends x.

  It was odd because what Kaitlyn was saying should have irritated me, but I found myself strangely elated by her words.

  I also sent an email to Daniel Palmer, offering my sincere apologies for everything I had said. I explained that the stress of the job sometimes got to me and that firing people was a terrible consequence of what we did. I said I’d been having some personal issues and that I’d said things to him that I really wanted to say to myself. I hoped very much he could forgive me and that we could move forward and find the best solution for him and his employees.

  An hour later the chairman called me and said he was pleased I’d had a good session with Dr Ellin. He wanted to reassure me that my work was of the highest standard and that they liked to think of themselves as more of a family than a business at Bartleby’s. The only reason he had referred me to Dr Ellin was that they wanted the best for me. Our working relationship was not, he hoped, short-term, but something we were both in for the long haul. He understood that I was going through some personal issues, and maybe I hadn’t had the best start, but he was impressed with how I handled myself. It took a big man to apologise, he said. I mumbled and acquiesced in all the right places and I got the impression that he left the conversation satisfied.

  Everything is a game, V used to tell me; only stupid people forget that.

  V was wearing her blue dress with the white flowers on it when she left work that evening and it made my heart surge for two reasons. Firstly, I had been with her when she bought it from a little shop in Brooklyn. And secondly, I had been right to tell Anna to go with blue and white planting, which meant I clearly knew V’s tastes better than I realised. Or maybe we were simply telepathic. Maybe she had spoken to me as I sat at my desk without me even realising.

  ‘V,’ I shouted, bounding across the street from my bar.

  She turned and her face contracted slightly. ‘Mike, what on earth are you doing here?’

  ‘I just wondered if you had a moment. If we could perhaps have a chat.’

  She looked round. ‘Have you come here to see me?’

  ‘Yes. I really need to talk to you.’

  She stayed standing, her feet resolutely where she had placed them. ‘What about?’

  I hadn’t anticipated it being hard to get her to agree to a simple chat. ‘The emails. And other stuff.’

  ‘I …’ She looked down, then up again. ‘I’m not sure that’s such a good idea, Mike.’

  ‘Please, it won’t take long. There are just some things I need to say.’

  She bit the side of her cheek as she always did when she was thinking and twisted her mouth to one side. ‘Just quickly, then.’

  ‘There’s a Lebanese restaurant round the corner.’

  ‘That bar’s fine.’ She pointed to my bar across the street. The thought of going back in there with her was horrible, mixing my thoughts of her with the reality of her, but I sensed the tenuousness of the situation, so I let her lead me across the road. She asked for a vodka and tonic, so I had the same and carried both our drinks to a table in the corner, far away from my usual one in the window.

  As we sat I saw she was wearing the eagle round her neck and my heart did another tiny jig. Her hair was loose and her beauty left me slightly light-headed. It made me want to reach out and touch her, made me want to check she was made of the same flesh and blood as the rest of us.

  ‘So?’ She sounded tired.

  ‘I just wanted to apologise for that email I sent you when you were on honeymoon.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘The first one, obviously.’

  ‘So you don’t think you need to apologise for the second one? The one in which you talked about me leaving Angus?’

  ‘I know you think you love him.’

  She laughed, but the sound was hollow. ‘I know I love him.’

  ‘I don’t think you do. I think you still love me.’

  We looked at each other across the table and I thought that from the outside we must have looked like lovers. We always shared a bubble, V and I, we were always a unit against all those awful people outside our Crave.

  ‘Mike,’ she said. ‘I love Angus.’

  ‘I know I hurt you very badly and I will go on saying sorry till the end of time, if that’s what it takes. But you don’t love Angus. You’re using him to get over me.’

  I saw her eyes flicker. ‘Are you OK, Mike? I’m worried about you.’

  ‘If you can’t admit you love me now, will you admit to loving me once?’

  She sipped from her drink, leaving an almost invisible layer of lip salve on the rim. I had to stop myself from reaching over and licking the mark. ‘Of course I loved you, you don’t have to ask that.’

  ‘But love doesn’t stop. You must love me still.’

  She kept her eyes down. ‘But love changes, doesn’t it?’

  ‘I still crave you,’ I tried, because I didn’t know what she meant. Love never changes.

  ‘Don’t,’ she said, but the word sounded stretched, desperate even. Her chest was moving up and down, up and down.

  ‘We could try the Kitten Club again. Angus won’t go with you, but I would.’

  ‘For God’s sake, Mike,’ she said, but her breathing had quickened.

  ‘What we had doesn’t just vanish. I know you remember what it felt like to be in bed with me.’

  ‘Stop.’ I knew I had gone too far. The eagle swung annoyed round her neck.

  ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.’

  ‘You need to stop this, Mike. For both of us.’

  ‘Do you ever Crave with Angus?’ I asked, a mist rising through me.

  ‘For God’s sake. Don’t be ridiculous.’ She stood up but I grabbed at her wrist and she sat down again.

  ‘Sorry, sorry. I just want you to be happy.’

  ‘I am happy.’

  ‘No, I mean properly happy, with me. Not this pretend happy with Angus.’

  ‘Why do you think it’s pretend?’ she asked and I saw a real question in her eyes.

  ‘Because you’re not the sort of person to fall in love so quickly, or have that big stupid wedding.’

  She drew a pattern in the table with some of the spilt vodka. ‘Maybe you don’t know the person I am. Maybe I didn’t know the person I was until I met Angus. Maybe you don’t know yourself yet.’ I didn’t like those words and they shot through me in a way which made me want to look down and see if I was bleeding. ‘I’m not your mother, Mike. I didn’t abandon you. What we shared was amazing and special, but it’s over now. You have to move on.’

  My hand was tight around my glass and I felt my eyes sting with tears. ‘Don’t say that.’

  She swallowed hard and the eagle bounced. ‘Look, Angus is going away for a few days, but when he gets back you should come over and we could talk to you together. Maybe then you’ll understand this isn’t some fake marriage.’

  ‘No thanks.’ I couldn’t think of anything worse than talking to the monkey man Angus.

  She sighed and stood up, but more slowly this time. ‘I’m going
now.’

  I let her walk away while I sat and looked into the vibrating liquid in my glass. I’ve always hated vodka and how it can sneak up on you. How it looks like water but is really very potent. I gulped at it and it shot through my system, waking and charging it.

  It was clear that V had constructed an impressive fantasy around Angus to shield her from the pain I had caused her with Carly. She seemed to have even herself fooled and that thought scared me because how do you show someone that what they believe to be true is really not the truth?

  I had finished my vodka so I took V’s and downed it. And she must have left part of herself in the glass because as I drank it was like she was opening my eyes and my ears. I realised that I’d been an idiot. Angus is going away for a few days, V had said. And if that wasn’t an invitation to be there when he wasn’t I didn’t know what was.

  The next day was Saturday and Elaine rang first thing to say she was coming into London and could she take me up on my offer and pop in for a cup of tea. It was slightly annoying because I had been considering visiting V that day, but Sunday was probably better anyway, so I said yes.

  She arrived just after lunch, carrying no visible reason for a trip to London. She walked all round the house, exclaiming at every room. I realised that she was the first person, apart from myself and the builders and decorators, who had ever been upstairs since I’d moved in. It made me wish that I’d made an excuse and pretended to be busy, because surely V should be the first person to see her new home, not her sort of soon-to-be mother-in-law. But Elaine lingered in every room, running her hands over the furniture and opening cupboard doors, turning on light switches, and even once bizarrely running the taps. If she could have waited just a few more weeks, I thought, V and I could have shown her round together, which would have been a far more pleasant experience.

  Predictably she wasn’t so keen on the garden, which was still a mess. I could see how much better it was going to look, but Elaine is one of those people who can’t bear to change things for the sake of it, or throw things away. There were always cellophane-wrapped plates in the fridge at her house, unfranked stamps steamed off envelopes in drawers and so-called scrap paper which had to be written or drawn on both sides before she’d buy any more. The motto Waste Not, Want Not was pinned by the clock in the kitchen, which was, I realised, nothing more than an early version of Kaitlyn’s wild horses, a thought both pleasing and disconcerting at the same time.