by Mason, Carol
‘Well thanks Rob, but that sounds too rational and simplistic to me. And another reason why this is my business—Leigh made it my business by putting me in this position. She’s forcing me to take her side because I was in on the whole thing from the start. She thinks that gives her a right to my vote, or something.’
‘Well sod her! She thinks wrong! But I really can’t believe that you knew she was having an affair and you went along with it.’
‘How do you make that out? That I went along with it? I didn’t stand there and cheer her on!’
‘It’s the same thing though, isn’t it? If you don’t disapprove, they think you support them. I mean I wouldn’t sit there with any of my mates and listen to them talking about screwing around on their wives, would I? Or it would look like I approved. Maybe it’d look like I even do the same thing myself.’
Make me feel like crap why don’t you. ‘But I didn’t know it was Neil, did I? She said it was somebody called Nick.’
‘No but you knew he was married with a family. You knew he was somebody’s husband. Somebody’s dad. He was somebody who was loved and depended on and was highly-thought-of in somebody’s life.’
We sit there registering my silent shame. Rob yawns. Even the dog groans like he’s clean out of sympathy.
‘I’m sure he never loved her. He probably just wanted to get his rocks off.’
‘Don’t say that! God you’ve got such a way of reducing everything!’
‘Well he must be hard up, that’s all I can think. And some blokes, when they just want to get action, they’re not too picky.’
‘I know you always say she’s poor to look at -’
‘- A mutt.’
‘Don’t have to use that word about her!’ I suppose because I know and love my friends I always see them as beautiful. ‘And how can he be hard up? He’s married! I can’t believe he said to Leigh that Wendy didn’t give him everything he needed!’
Rob lies back in the chair, clasps his hands behind his head. ‘Well, I’m sure he just added that to get it signed and sealed. You know, the sympathy vote. But maybe she didn’t give him what he needed. Maybe she’s spent her life resenting not having a career and a life of her own. You don’t know what their marriage was really like, Jill. There’s three sides to every story. His side. Her side. And the truth.’
‘There’s only two sides to this story. And hers is both of them.’
‘Well there you go.’ He looks like he’s moving to get up.
‘Where’re you going?’ I pin him there with my eyes, before he has a chance to get any ideas. ‘It’s so disappointing though, Rob. I mean, I always imagined he’d be so upright. I thought they were the perfect couple. I thought I’d actually encountered one.’
‘As opposed to us of course…’ he says sarcastically.
‘You know what I mean.’
‘Well, them buggers are the worst, aren’t they? The upright ones. But he’s a good-looking bloke, I’ll give him that. I’m sure it’s hard for him to stay faithful.’
‘But just because somebody’s good-looking doesn’t make them more likely to cheat, does it?’
‘I don’t know,’ he cocks his head and studies me with interest. ‘You’re good-looking and you’ve not cheated. Have you?’
‘Well see what I mean.’ I look at the dog.
We go on and on. Forwards, backwards and in circles. The room grows darker. The dog slides off the sofa to the floor. Rob slinks farther down the chair. ‘Tell me what to do,’ I plead.
‘I have. Seventy-five times.’
‘That’s not being helpful.’
He yawns again. ‘Well, like I’ve said—seventy-five times—you can’t tell Wendy, that would accomplish nothing except destroy her. Some people would rather not know. Your only choice is to try to talk some sense into Leigh. Now can we go to bed and stop talking about this?’
‘But I’ve tried talking to Leigh.’ In the few days I’ve known this, I’ve done nothing but. And she’s not budging.
‘Well, I’m starting to sound like a stuck record but like I’ve said you’ve done your bit then.’ He yawns again, only his yawn has an ‘oh Jesus’ tacked onto the end of it. He moves to get up. Does he think this conversation’s over? I still have another ten miles of it to run.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Oh I was just leaving the country.’ He looks at me. ‘I’m going to get a drink of water.’
‘Well can’t you wait until we’re finished here?’ I know once he leaves the room I’ll never see him again. He’ll be like one of those men who go missing and all they find at the shoreline is their shoes.
He groans, sits on the floor beside the dog.
I begin my rant all over again, with renewed enthusiasm. The clock ticks loudly above the mantelpiece. Eventually there is only one voice in the room. I’m even getting sick of hearing it. ‘I can’t believe it Rob. I can’t believe her.’ Rob’s responses have trailed off to the odd jerky grunt. ‘All these years and then they suddenly start having an affair.’
‘Right then!’ he says. Meaning right, that’s it. I’ve heard enough. He gets up.
‘But we’ve not decided anything yet!’
‘Oh yeah? Maybe you haven’t but I did ten hours ago.’ He stretches his arms over his head and does another oh-my-God-this-has-been-an-agony-worse-than-being-eaten-by-Rottweilers groan. ‘Kiefer and me are going to bed.’ He gently stirs the sleeping dog with his foot. ‘Just keep your big nose out of this Jill. That’s my last word.’
I nod. ‘You’re right,’ I watch the dog pad after him across the floor. ‘I’ll stay well out.’
~ * * * ~
A few days later I ring Neil.
Thursday lunchtime I am seated opposite him in the stately oak-panelled dining room of the Stannington Hotel. Where businessmen lunch. Or come to have affairs. It feels peculiarly appropriate. The place was his suggestion when I rang him and said I wanted to meet him.
Across a white linen tablecloth decorated with white place settings and silver, I say the immortal words. ‘I know about your affair with Leigh.’
I could just as well have said I know where you buy all your socks. He is unflinching. Everything I’d rehearsed I was going to say evaporates into the green walls with their oil paintings of the Tyne Valley. And I see a Neil I’ve never seen before. A curious, cold bastard. Cold, like those glacial eyes.
‘And?’ is all he says to me. He quickly drinks back his scotch and soda and waves the approaching waiter away. I take it that means we’re not ordering lunch now.
‘And?’ I repeat back at him, defensively. I can suddenly picture him as a cop. If I were a person in his custody, I’d rather just skip the interrogation and be sent down for life with men who might put unpleasant things in my bottom while I was bending over to do the laundry.
‘…And you’ve come to tell me to stop seeing her.’ He adjusts his tie then sits back confidently in his chair, crosses his hands at his chest, turning the tables on me with just a stare. ‘It’s stopped already,’ he surprises me by saying. ‘I mean, it was never really started as far as I was concerned.’
This isn’t the Neil I’ve known all these years. Been on holiday with for God’s sakes!
He looks at me now. Seems to note my speechlessness, shrugs. I run my eyes over him. I’m having a hard time picturing this man with his face up Leigh’s skirt. In his own house. Bathroom. Bathtub.
‘That’s not how she sees it. She’s in love with you.’
His eyebrow shoots up, as though he’s mocking the very idea. ‘In love with me?’ Something in his expression seems to humanize again. ‘Argh, well that’s her misfortune.’
I pick up my wine glass. It feels weird sitting here drinking with him, but I need the Dutch courage. ‘You are still seeing her. She said you are. So there’s no point in saying it’s stopped.’
‘Well, frankly my friend that’s none of your business,’ he says, with a smug flippancy, and I hate him. I’d rather
he’d said Keep your nose out. There’s a lone and crusty-looking bread bun sitting on my side plate and I feel like pelting it right between his eyes.
‘Do you know your wife might not be well?’ Around me I hear the chink of crystal water glasses being filled by up-arsing waiters. Two creases form between his eyes; the only two imperfections on his blank, impenetrable, handsome face.
‘I don’t know what you’re on about.’
My pulse pounds in my temples. ‘She’s been for tests. Did you know that? Why don’t you go home and ask her how she is, how she really is.’ I bet he never does. I suppose I’ve always sensed she loved him more.
He knows I know he didn’t know. But again he doesn’t flinch. But this time his Mr Cool act seems just a touch less convincing because I can see a twitch under his left eye. ‘She’s never said anything to me about any tests.’
‘No, because she didn’t want you or the lads to worry. That’s how strong and unselfish she is. But while you’ve been busy with Leigh, she’s been seeing doctors.’ I’m exaggerating, and that feels wrong, even cruel, but somehow necessary.
He flushes under his eye sockets. It comes and goes quickly. He studies me for moments, as though he’s thinking what to say, then he says, ‘Well then it’s good she’s got such a good friend in you, isn’t it.’ And I don’t quite know what that’s supposed to mean. Then he leans to one side, slides a hand in his pants pockets, pulls out money. Then he stands up. And I realise I’ve lost. Rob was right. I shouldn’t have done this. You can’t play cat and mouse with Neil.
‘I have to get back to the station, Jill,’ he says, almost with affection. ‘Don’t worry yourself. Leigh and I…’ He doesn’t finish. He tosses the money on the table, glances at me with finality and shakes his head, as though he just can’t be bothered to finish the sentence, or he doesn’t feel he should have to.
I watch his confident, unfaltering walk as he cuts a path around tables. A few faces look up as he passes them.
The next day comes and goes and the wrongness of my confrontation takes roots and grows in me. Go to see Neil! Why did I do that? Rob was right. What did it accomplish? Nothing, except to infuriate Leigh. Because I’m sure he’ll tell her. And this makes me nervous.
Rob keeps asking me what’s the matter. ‘Been up to anything?’ he’ll say, narrowing his eyes. I go into work and am useless. The good thing is Swinburn is off on holiday. Torquay is being blessed with his presence. (I hope he’s staying in one of those Fawlty Towers guest houses with Basil after him, doing the goose-steps walk). So at least I don’t have him glaring at me with those large, Nazi eyeballs. Only a lot of phone calls, and a lot of accounting to do, and a couple of urgent billing matters that he’s left instructions for me to handle. ‘He discovered you made an accounting mistake just before you went off sick,’ Leanne whispers, as though she shouldn’t be telling me.
‘Mistake? Shit. I did make a couple, but I’m sure I fixed them. What sort of mistake?’
‘No idea. He wouldn’t say.’
‘Well, what did he look like? Was he furious?’
She shrugs. ‘If he was he didn’t say anything. But I’m sure he’ll let you know about it, if it’s anything.’
Damn it. I’ve never made mistakes in my job until recently. I’ve always had such pride. Well, I suppose if it’d been anything major he’d have delighted in telling me.
Rob and I seem to heal. Or rather, since the news of Leigh’s infidelity we haven’t had a wrong word between us. He doesn’t look at me strangely. All that business about the mobile phone and my mood seems to be off his mind. And, strangely enough, the business behind the mobile phone and my mood, seems to be off mine. Even though I still have the dim feel of him in my body. And he’s there, waiting to be my next thought, if I let myself.
When I come home in the evening, Rob’s got dinner made. He heaps spaghetti alla puttanesca onto two plates. The M&S box sits torn up on the counter. I love him for it. But the pasta, me, him… it all feels too easy, this returning to normal. Affairs are easy, didn’t Leigh say?
We’re just eating and I am counting my blessings yet again, when the phone rings. I pick up and I hear two words. ‘You bitch.’
‘Leigh!’ My heart falls. He’s wasted no time telling her.
‘You unimaginable, double crossing bitch! And to think I thought you were my friend and I could trust you!’
This verbal hail of bullets sends me collapsing onto the kitchen chair. ‘Oh, Leigh I…’
‘Don’t Leigh me you cow! You went to see him to tell him to leave me! After I’d told you I loved him! That I was ready to leave my family for him! You went to break us up!’
‘It wasn’t like that…’ I’m cut off by her screaming.
‘Like you’ve got some right to start telling people how to lead their lives, you hypocritical little cow. You of all people!’
She goes on bawling me out, but I’m thinking only one thing. I knew I should never have told her. I feel the need to say nice things, to get on her right side again.
‘He’s ended it now!’ She’s sobbing. ‘Do you realise what you’ve done? He’s gone back to them. Doesn’t want to see me again. Won’t even give reasons. He was furious that I told you, and even more furious that I hadn’t told him about Wendy and the tests.’
‘Well, maybe that’s his reason. I mean, the possibility that his wife has cancer and you knew about it while you carried on with him—it is a big enough one.’
I feel her seething. ‘Even Wendy’s says it’s more than likely not cancer.’
My refusal to dignify that makes her silent. Then she says, ‘Well I suppose you’re happy. You’ve really done it for me, haven’t you? Tell me Jill, what am I supposed to do now?’
‘Forget about that idiot! Start focussing on your marriage. Start appreciating Lawrence instead of plotting ways to cheat on him.’
‘I can’t,’ she says. ‘I’ve already told him I’m leaving him.’
~ * * * ~
‘That was Leigh,’ I tell Rob when I put the phone down.
‘Glad you clarified that. I was wondering.’
Rob opens his arms for me, holds me till I stop shaking. ‘She’s already told Lawrence she’s leaving him! She was screaming. She hates me.’
‘I take it you didn’t keep your big nose out then,’ he says. My head gently bounces off his shoulders as I shake it.
In bed, Rob holds me and says I’m a good person and I tried to do the right thing. Then he scratches his chest, and says the dog’s giving him fleas. His parting words before sleep are: ‘You better prepare yourself because something tells me you’ve not heard the last of this. What do they say? Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.’
~ * * * ~
For the next few days Leigh’s call haunts me. She’s right to hate me. What sort of hypocrite am I? Me, a cheat, betrayed a friend who had an affair because I didn’t like her choice of partner. And I did it with complete disregard for what this would do to her. And despite what Rob says, I do believe she thinks she’s in love with him. And I believe her when she says she really did intend it to end and she never wanted to hurt Wendy. Some people are just naive to think they’re never going to get found out. But what troubles me most is that never for one minute did I consider that the affair might blow over, that Leigh would finally see sense, or Neil would dump her, and life would go back to normal again. I never even gave it time to happen. I just barged right on in there and messed everything up.
‘Don’t feel too sorry for her Jill,’ Rob tells me. ‘People who cheat on their partners don’t deserve you losing sleep over them.’ We’re in bed again, and he knows I can’t get this off my mind.
My heart falls. ‘But people stray for all kinds of reasons, Rob. Surely they deserve some empathy; the benefit of the doubt.’ He loosens my tightening grip on his chest hair.
‘Not when they’ve been unfaithful. You should be mad she ever told you any of this, when you were Wendy’s friend too. She shoul
d never have put you in this position.’ And he’s right. She shouldn’t have. But she did. And I can’t use that to justify betraying her. But somehow, I suppose I have.
The next phone call I get, some time the following afternoon, is from Wendy. I see her number on my call display and think Oh God.
‘Why did you tell him I’ve been for tests?’ she asks me, in a subdued tone which is as close as Wendy will ever get to telling you off. ‘He said he bumped into you in town. That you happened to mention I was seeing a doctor.’
He lied. And now, by default, I have to. Again. Neil must know that I chose to confront him rather than tell Wendy. So he’s using that. He’s using me. Expecting I’ll keep up the story. That I’ll lie to protect my friend, and somehow save his bacon in the process. So my first instinct is to stick it to him and tell her the truth. ‘Wendy…’ I take a bracing breath, then I suddenly see sense. ‘Look, I’m sorry. I know I’m a big idiot. It was inexcusable of me. It just slipped out.’
There’s a silence. I hate lies. Even the kind ones. ‘I’m not sure how it really happened actually.’
‘It’s alright,’ she says. ‘I’m not hauling you over the coals.’
‘Aren’t you?’
‘No. Worse things could have happened, couldn’t they?’
Really? Like what?
‘I better go though. I’ve got to clean this house and then get some dinner on, and there’s a job in a solicitor’s office I’m thinking of applying to. Half of Newcastle is probably going to apply for it and get rejected, so I might as well be one of them.’ Her humour sounds strained. We say bye. It bothers me as soon as I put the phone down. I know Wendy. If she were really furious with me she’d be ‘strained.’ Then she’d probably freeze me out of her life. So I quickly call her back and apologize again and check that she’s still my friend. I feel her smile. ‘It’s alright Jill. Like I say, forget about it.’
A few days later I have to go through to Sunderland to take a piece of cushion flooring I bought for my mam and dad’s bathroom, because my mam has been weeing on the carpet in there. I’m just coming back and am stuck on the A1 in traffic. Immediately ahead of me, a BMW has just rear-ended a VW hippy van. Out of the van pours a sorry sight. A fat young girl and guy who look like two packs of sausages with heads on. The father, a tattooed ball of blubber with a bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale in each hand. And the granny, one of those hardened council-estate hags with smoker’s hair, whose face is gradually capsizing into the space where she used to have teeth. And they’re ganging up and laying in to the poor, civilised victim in the BMW. I thrust the heel of my hand onto the horn. The noise feels nice. They all stop their argy-bargy and look at me, probably wondering what my problem is. I leave my hand there, blaring, staring at them with an intensity that equals the noise I am making. Then it hits me. Oh n! How am I going to explain to Wendy that Leigh and I have fallen out? What’s Leigh going to say to Wendy about it? Our stories won’t match. I stop blaring on the horn and put my head in my hands.
