A Suitable Lie

by Michael J Malone

  ‘Absolutely,’ I said. And meant it. Sure we’d had a couple of moments recently, but as I looked into her eyes I realised that I loved her more than ever. I pushed my chair back, stood up, walked over to Anna and kissed her on the top of her head. Then I looked at Jim and Paula.

  ‘Coffee or more wine?’

  Paula said. ‘Coffee.’

  ‘Wine,’ both Jim and Anna said. They laughed and high-fived.

  ‘Oh, ok then,’ said Paula with mock reluctance. ‘Wine it is.’

  ‘Comfy seats?’ Anna asked and stood up.

  We ushered our guests to the living room and poured the wine. Watching Jim I was reassured by his total involvement with Paula. Perhaps my brother was growing up at last? He would have wrapped himself around her if he could. He laughed at her every witticism and rarely lifted his hand from hers.

  ‘Pat is at your mum’s, Jim tells me,’ said Paula. ‘Must be nice to have such a willing babysitter.’

  ‘Oh aye, Mum would have him every day if we’d let her, wouldn’t she, Anna?’ I said.

  ‘Yes, but we’ve little need for a babysitter. We’re hardly ever out.’ said Anna.

  ‘Well, we’ll have to do this again,’ said Jim. ‘I’ve really enjoyed myself. Next time we’ll do it at my place.’

  ‘That would be nice,’ said Anna.

  The conversation then split into two. The women paired up and Jim and I spoke together.

  ‘You playing this year?’ Jim asked.

  ‘Nah.’ I shook my head. This was the first rugby season I would miss. I had retired from the team, partly because the work promotion meant I had less free time to train, partly because I didn’t think my knees could take any more punishment, and partly because the need it used to fill no longer existed. After Patricia died, the Rugby Club had become my lifeline to the world. A change from the demands of a baby son and a demanding job. Now, though, I had Anna, and I felt that outlet was no longer necessary.

  Of course I said none of this. Jim would have looked at me as if I had a pink dildo growing out of my forehead.

  ‘How’s the knees?’ I asked Jim.

  ‘Oh you know, fucked,’ laughed Jim. ‘But some strapping and I’m good to go.’

  ‘That’s cos you’re a real man, bro.’ I snorted. Jim had a tendency to ignore injuries. Better to take the chance on permanent injury than to admit weakness.

  I heard Paula ask Anna about any plans she had for redecorating. Colours and fabrics then floated over our gammy knees and scrums. Now and again Paula would try to draw me into their conversation, no doubt wishing to assess if she had made a hit with big brother.

  ‘What do you think? Gorgeous, eh?’ Jim asked in a low voice.

  ‘Good taste must run in the family, bro.’

  Paula then tried to draw me back into her conversation.

  ‘Have you guys made plans for any holidays, Andy?’

  ‘No, not yet. We’ll probably go to the Med. Anna’s a serious sun worshipper aren’t you, sweetheart?’

  ‘What about you two, any holidays planned?’ Anna asked mischievously, knowing that they had just got together.

  ‘Nothing for me yet,’ answered Jim.

  ‘Nor me,’ said Paula. ‘Although I fancy a skiing holiday. Have you ever skied?’ She was looking at me as she asked this.

  ‘Yes, but not for a few years.’

  ‘I’ve skied before too,’ Anna joined in. ‘But it was a long time ago – on a school trip. I’d love to try it again.’ Had I heard a slight edge to her tone?

  ‘Excellent,’ I said. ‘That’s just what we’ll do. Pat would love it.’ I looked over at Anna and tried to gauge her mood. Everything had gone smoothly so far, hadn’t it?

  ‘Right,’ Jim announced abruptly, rubbing his hands. ‘Time for us to be off. Let these lovebirds get their beauty sleep.’

  No doubt he was anxious to be alone with Paula. He exaggerated a yawn. ‘Jeez, I’m tired. All that good food.’

  ‘Aye, me too,’ I said. But I found myself surprised by the need for them to stay longer. Anna’s mood had definitely cooled in the last few minutes and judging by the shape of her brow I was in for a hard time as soon as the door closed.

  I shook off the feeling. I was tired. Stressed from work. It was no more than that.

  Like the perfect hosts, Anna and I shook hands or kissed the pair goodbye. As I kissed Paula’s soft cheek I was sure I felt Anna’s focus on me. But then, drawing back, I saw she was in a warm hug with Jim. My mind was playing tricks with me again.

  We stood, Anna’s head leaning against me, her arm around my waist, my arm over her shoulder, and waved to Jim and Paula as their car drove down the road. But while one of Anna’s hands waved extravagantly, the other was nipping at the flesh above my belt. My smile never wavered. But I was now certain that I hadn’t been imagining things. There was trouble coming; and it was approaching fast.

  As soon as they were out of sight Anna headed for the living room.

  ‘I’m just going out for a wee walk. I need to clear my head after all that wine,’ I said and quickly hopped out of the door. If I stayed out for a while, hopefully she would have either calmed down or even better fallen off to sleep by the time I got back.

  I plucked a jacket off the coat-stand and closed the door firmly behind me. Reaching the gate, I paused, my fingers rubbing the metal catch. What was I doing? I was running away from a woman half my size. I was being chased out of my own home by my wife. A home that I had spent a lot of hours and effort in making. Avoidance was the easy option. The only way to resolve this was to face up to it.

  Walking back to the door I fumbled in my jacket pocket, hoping that I had left a set of keys in their when I last wore it. I was in luck. Filling my lungs and gritting my teeth I slid the key into the lock. The hall light was out, but enough light filtered in from the street for me to see a round object speeding towards me. My arm lifted up in reflex. The sound of metal filled the room. I grunted in pain and with my other hand caught Anna’s wrist as she aimed a blow at my head.

  ‘You’re useless, I hate you. I hate you,’ she screamed. ‘Don’t know why I married you, you tosser.’ She dropped the frying pan and began to flail at me with her arms and legs.

  Unsure of what I could do, I wrapped her in a bear hug and held on, hoping that she would tire. Her feet aimed at my shins and she aimed her face at mine. Her teeth flashed past my nose.

  ‘Anna, calm down. For fuck’s sake, calm down.’ I would not hit her, I would not.

  ‘You’re a bastard, you don’t love me. Couldn’t take your eyes off her. You make me hit you, you make me … it’s all your own fault … your fault.’ Her voice faltered with exhaustion. Her eyes cleared, she went limp as a rag in my arms, tears replacing the fog of rage in her eyes.

  Her limp body slipped out of my grip, until she knelt on the floor, her head resting against the wall.

  ‘Oh Andy, what have I done? What am I doing?’ she sobbed. ‘I’m so sorry, so sorry.’ Her tightly wound features had melted into a puddle of guilt.

  The sudden switch in mood caught me off guard. I found myself wanting to help her.

  ‘Don’t worry, it won’t happen again.’ I was on my knees before her now. Pushing back her hair from her face. But somehow also standing above myself, as if watching from afar, confused by my own behaviour. ‘You were just stressed about having visitors,’ I said. I scooped her up and carried her like a child through to the living room couch, where I laid her down. I was as if she were in a faint. ‘Can I get you a glass of water?’

  ‘No, don’t leave me.’ She looked into my eyes. ‘Please, don’t ever leave me…’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ I soothed her clammy brow with my hand. ‘I’ll never leave you.’

  ‘But I’m terrible. I’m a terrible woman. How could I attack you like that? What gets into my head?’ She reached out for my hand, her eyes imploring me to understand.

  ‘You’re not terrible,’ I was keen to calm her down. ‘It was all m
y fault anyway, I was talking to Paula too much. You were bound to get jealous.’

  The tears stopped, but her eyes translated the anguish in her mind.

  ‘Make love to me, Andy. Show me you can still love me.’ She kissed me deep and hard, hungry with need. While my mind reeled, my body responded.

  ‘In the morning … we need to talk …. in the morning.’

  ‘Yes … in the morning … yes.’

  We didn’t talk over that fight the next morning though. Anna woke up as if it hadn’t occurred at all. And for my part, I had accepted her instant apology, and decided that should be the end of the matter.

  The ensuing months spun past in happy equilibrium. Harsh words were distinctly absent, and caresses and kisses constituted all our physical contact.

  There were no more outbursts, Anna was consistently the woman I fell in love with and we were able to relax into our marriage. It seemed that Anna had gotten over that moment of fury. She was my beautiful, angel of a wife, and an easy-going, attentive stepmother, who Pat adored almost as much as I did. It niggled that we never talked over that episode, but I was grateful that there were no more signs that she might need some form of anger management. I was as happy as she was that it was over and thought that it might be better to consign that early part of our marriage to the memory bin.

  It did take some time to relax fully, however. In the days that followed her attack, I found myself taking care about how I spoke, who I spoke to or where I went in case it provoked her. But we managed to have Jim and Paula over again several times without incident. And, to my pleasure, Paula and Anna seemed to hit it off. Since I had known Anna, I was the only person in her life, so I was concerned that she would focus all of her energies onto me. I encouraged her to go out with her ex-colleagues, to take up a hobby, to make more friends, but she stated that she was happy with our little family and didn’t need anyone else. If only we could add to it, she added with a small smile.

  We were now eight months into our marriage. We had stopped using contraception almost as soon as we’d returned from our honeymoon, when Anna had first expressed her hope that we would give Pat a brother or sister. Yet, in those months we failed to conceive. The doctor said that we should give it a little more time. We were both young and healthy, if we continued to have a loving relationship, then he was sure that nature would take its course.

  Pat continued to be a joy with only the odd demonstration of petulance. His energy was boundless, his sense of fun growing daily, as did his affection for Anna. A smile never failed to materialise on my face as I watched them together. The married life that I had hoped and prayed for – the family life for Pat that I’d dreamed of – all of it was happening and I couldn’t have been happier.

  Even work had settled down. I was growing in confidence and competence in the job. Roy Campbell stayed out of my way and the problems with the cash shortages had gone. All in all life was good. Yet a faint voice itched its way into my consciousness, a voice that warned me not to be too self-congratulatory, a voice that I placed on a shelf in the darkest recesses of my mind and ignored.

  14

  The first real test of our new-found domestic content came just a few weeks before our first wedding anniversary. I was asked to work in Campbeltown for a week. The previous manager was off work with a stress-related illness and they needed someone to oversee the place while her replacement took a well-earned break.

  Some Head Office wallah probably looked at the map of Scotland, read that Ayr and Campbeltown looked relatively close and decided I would be the right man for the job. They didn’t take into their calculation a large body of water called the Firth of Clyde and the five-hour drive it took to negotiate.

  My home for that week was the Ardsheil Hotel. The room was compact and cosy, the food was filling and tasty, and the hotel bar had as good a selection of fine malt whisky as I had seen anywhere. I phoned home every night and spent at least an hour talking to Anna and Pat.

  Sitting at a table for one after work the first night, it occurred to me that eating alone in a restaurant must be the loneliest occupation that anyone could have. There were four other diners in the hotel restaurant. All men. We each nodded and grunted at the other, then fixed our attention on our place settings. Food was barely given enough time to cool by a single degree before it vanished from the plate. It occurred to me that if we’d been a group of women, we’d have known each other’s life stories by the time the main course arrived.

  After eating, my regime became a quick glass of whisky at the bar followed by a phone call home and an evening with one eye on some bank reports and the other on the TV.

  Eventually my work was done and I was able to go home. We’d had a week of brilliant sunshine while I was over in Campbeltown, but on the way home the weather broke, giving me a familiar taste of the wetter aspect of the Scottish climate.

  I debated whether to drive up the length of the Kintyre Peninsula to Tarbert and from there to take the wee ferry across to Portavadie, drive across to Dunoon, where I could take the ferry across to Gourock, and then the drive down the Clyde coast to Ayrshire.

  Instead, I drove home the long way. It would take over five hours, but the journey up to Inveraray, past the four turrets of the fairytale castle and on to Arrochar and down past Loch Lomond was its own reward. A series of views that would warm the heart of any broody Scottish émigré and one that no doubt colours the tin of a lifetime’s worth of shortbread. Mean, moody and magnificent is the best way to describe the hills that roll down to a full concrete stop at the side of the A80, before resuming their climb into the clouds on the other side. Draped in a lush cloth of green, accessorized with heather, pine and granite, the hills borrowed their disposition from the weather, but never failed to stir even the weariest, most jaded traveller. Snaking around sea lochs, ascending rocks and tumbling down the other side, the road eventually brought me to a gentler countryside, a greater concentration of houses, and home.

  I expected Pat to jump on me as soon as the car entered the drive, but nothing. Car parked and locked; luggage in my hand, I walked past the living-room window towards the door. Movement in the room caught my eye and I paused to watch my son and wife in an unguarded moment.

  Pat was holding a miniature rugby ball over his head as if he had just scored a try. Anna was mimicking his pose and they were both wearing a huge smile of triumph. I laughed at the sheer pleasure of it all, delighted they were so clearly having a great time, while a small part of me was envious. Looked like they didn’t need me.

  A second after I opened the door, Pat was at my feet.

  ‘Daddy, Daddy, what have you got me?’

  ‘Let me in the door first, son.’ I picked him up. ‘How’s about a hug for your old man?’ He rested his small head on my shoulder and patted my back.

  ‘There, there,’ he said. I kissed his head and looked over at Anna, who was standing watching us with a huge smile. She joined in the hug, wrapping her arms around us both.

  ‘Family hug,’ we all chanted as one.

  ‘What do you want for your tea?’ Anna broke the spell.

  ‘Oh, anything, honey, I’m starving. But make it plain and simple, I’ve been having hotel food all week.’

  ‘Omelette and chips?’

  ‘Sounds wonderful.’ I kissed her. ‘It’s great to see you. I really missed you both.’

  ‘Me too, I mean, I missed you too,’ Anna replied. ‘Right omelette it is.’ She ran her fingers down the front of my trousers while making sure that Pat couldn’t see. ‘And wait till you see what’s for dessert.’

  We tucked into the food, bathed and put Pat to bed in record time. With a record number of whinges.

  ‘But, Dad, I don’t want to go to bed. Anna let me stay up late every night.’ I hoped that eventually he would add the word ‘Mum’ to his vocabulary. Anna ruffled his hair.

  ‘Oh, you rotter,’ she smiled. ‘I thought that was to be our little secret.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said
Pat, head low but wearing a smile that would liquefy a stone goblin’s heart.

  ‘Bed,’ I said, injecting my voice with a stern quality I didn’t feel.

  ‘Okay,’ he dragged those two syllables out like a piece of gum from his mouth. The first one twice as long as the second. He trudged up to bed carrying his favourite bear, a small toy that fitted neatly under his arm and was covered with brown, matted fur. He was called Sam and Pat never went to bed without him. Pat turned at the top of the stairs and looked at Anna and I gazing fondly up at him.

  ‘Tuck me in, Dad?’

  ‘Of course, pal,’ I bounded up the stairs, swept him under my arm and raced through to his bedroom, to the sound of his delighted squeals.

  ‘Don’t wind him up, Andy,’ Anna shouted from the bottom of the stairs. ‘He’ll never go to sleep.’

  The ritual was that I tuck the quilt tightly down Pat’s sides and then place Sam beside him with the same service being performed for the bear. This I did with an expression that said this was my most important duty of the day.

  Regarding those large, bright eyes, I smoothed his soft fringe to the side.

  ‘Well? Have you been a good boy?’

  ‘Yes, Dad. Have you been a good Dad?’

  Yes, son.’ I bent forward and kissed his forehead. ‘Love you.’

  He reached up and mimicking my movement, pushed my fringe to the side, somewhat less smoothly than I had managed.

  ‘Love you, Dad. Night, night.’ He turned round onto his stomach, folded his arms under his body and went up on his knees, sticking his bum into the air. Since he had first gone into his own bed, Pat had adopted this position to sleep and it never failed to warm me.

  Anna was waiting for me in our bedroom.

  ‘Are you going to tuck me up in bed?’ Her face was demure, her body quite naked.

  ‘There is the small matter of this first.’ I pointed down at the bulge in my trousers, amazed at the speed of my reaction.