The Runaway Wife

by Rowan Coleman

  “You’re hilarious.” Rose laughed, finding it easy to warm to the young man who seemed intent on mischief, his eyes dancing with suppressed laughter. “Life around here must be very dull if you have to throw yourself at old ladies like me. Or is that how you get extra tips?”

  “I work under the basic delusion that I am irresistible to all women.” Ted grinned at her. “I won’t lie, it mostly leads to disappointment, but I’m a glass-half-full sort of bloke. And you are not old. You are very pretty.”

  “Do you mind?” Rose snapped, turning her face away from him, feeling suddenly acutely uncomfortable under his gaze, trained by years of disapproval to shy away from any kind of male attention.

  “Sorry!” Ted apologized, caught off guard by her discomfort. “I didn’t mean to fluster you. I was just trying to have a laugh. I’m an idiot. Everyone says so.”

  “I’m not flustered, I’m thirty-one,” Rose assured him, angry more at herself for overreacting to his lightheartedness than she was at him. Richard always got so angry if he thought other men were paying her attention, furious if he even suspected that she liked it. The fear of being seen talking to any male had been drummed into her so hard that it was difficult not to react now in exactly the way that Richard had taught her. Taking a breath, she steadied herself. “I’m just not here to flirt with a boy like you, that’s all.”

  “I’m twenty-four,” Ted told her, tipping his head to one side, perplexed by her strong reaction. “Seven years, that’s not too big an age gap, is it? Look, I’m sorry. I’ve obviously upset you. I never meant to. I’m not evil, really; I’m a nice bloke.”

  “Don’t believe the hype,” Albie said as he returned, clutching a piece of paper. “Ted here is all talk and no trousers. I keep waiting for him to leave and get a proper job, but he still seems to be here.”

  “You love me.” Ted grinned at Albie, patting him on the back. “The day me and the band finally go to London is the day your takings drop like a stone.”

  “I’ll risk it,” Albie said cheerfully.

  “Seriously, though,” Ted told Rose, his dark eyes sparkling with a charm he was acutely aware of, “anything I can do to help while you’re here—show you round, put you in touch with people, take you out—then let me know. I don’t bite, I promise. Not unless you ask me to.”

  “I don’t think so, but thank you,” Rose said, utterly at a loss as to why Ted would be so interested in her.

  “Here you go, love.” Albie handed out a page torn from a notebook, which Rose took with trembling fingers. Along with a couple of contact numbers and an email address, Albie had written: “Frasier McCleod—Dealer” and “Agent in Fine Art—Edinburgh.” “But I was thinking, you don’t have to go over the border to see him. He’ll be at your dad’s later this week.”

  “What?” Rose blinked, any trace of color that Ted’s clumsy attempts at flirting had ignited in her complexion quickly draining away.

  “Oh, yeah. Frasier’s up there most weeks, more sometimes. He’s his agent, isn’t he? He keeps old John on the straight and narrow. It was Frasier who found him Storm Cottage and helped him get sober. I’m not going to say that wasn’t a sad day for me—I never get any pleasure out of serving a man a glass of tap water—but still Frasier takes care of him. And he often pops in here for some refreshment, so you’re bound to run into him sooner or later.”

  Chapter

  Three

  The day that Rose first and last met Frasier McCleod, the house had been quiet, as it always was midafternoon. Richard would be at the surgery until at least six, if not much later, and Rose found herself with very little to do now that the maternity leave had kicked in and she was only a few weeks away from becoming a mother. Rose had wanted to go on working part time as his receptionist for longer, but Richard was adamant. Every day he checked her blood pressure, her urine, looking for signs that she was doing too much. In the end it had been neither of those things that had compelled him to send her home for what might quite possibly be for good, if he had his way. It was her swollen ankles.

  Richard said he refused to be the kind of man who worked his pregnant wife so hard that her ankles ballooned up like an old woman’s. What would people think of him if she looked all puffy and swollen, when they must know that she didn’t need to work? Rose had thought that actually she did need to work, she did need to do anything that wasn’t being at home, walking around the house looking for something to polish. But she hadn’t said anything out loud, because she knew that Richard was only trying to do what he thought was best for her and their baby, and that was something she should be grateful for.

  That morning had been the end of Rose’s second week at home, and after she’d cleaned the already spotless house, prepped for dinner, put away the laundry, and made herself walk down to the seafront and back, in the searing heat of a late August day, she still found herself with several hours of nothing to do except trying to imagine the house, her childhood house, which had become hers when her mother died, full of a child’s—her child’s—laughter again. Somehow it seemed impossible that this place, where she had once been so happy, would ever be a place of light and love again. The deep sadness that was never very far from the surface welled up inside her once again, quiet tears rolling down her cheeks, and she cradled her belly, simultaneously longing for her baby to hold in her arms and yet wanting to keep her safe from all the unpleasantness that the world could contain, that this house could contain.

  When the doorbell sounded, Rose hesitated, wiping the tears away with the edge of her sleeve, peering out the living room door to look at the silhouetted figure behind the stained glass. Richard did not like her to answer the door to cold callers, who he said were con men at best, or downright predators and thieves at worst. Nor did he like people to see her upset, telling her their private business was theirs alone and not to be shared with gossips.

  And yet it was only just gone three; Rose had hours of silence stretching ahead of her before Richard got home. Hours more like this, overwhelmed and helpless by the emotions that racked her body. And, after all, before Richard had sacked her, she had, in her time, maneuvered drunks, drug addicts, and determined old ladies out of the surgery, so what harm could a salesman do her? Richard underestimated her, Rose was all too aware of that. It wasn’t exactly that she wanted to show him he was wrong—far from it—but she liked to show herself every once in a while, just to remind herself who she really was.

  Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, she squared her shoulders and opened the door, shielding most of her body, allowing just her head and shoulders to show. And there were several seconds when she and Frasier just looked at each other, as if they had each just come across a very old friend. That’s how it was in her memory.

  “Are you OK?” were the first words that Frasier McCleod ever spoke to her, his soft well-spoken Scottish accent melodic and gentle. “Have you been crying?”

  “Oh?” Rose touched her hand to her face, caught off guard by his unfamiliar concern. “No, no. Not crying. Not really. I’ve got a cold, that’s all.”

  Frasier studied her face for a moment longer, his clear green eyes so compelling that Rose did not turn away from his gaze, as she was used to doing with men. Instead she let him look at her, as she looked at him, finding some solace in the concern on his face. How long had it been since anyone had regarded her that way?

  “Can I help you?” Rose said after a few moments, prompting Frasier to collect himself as if he were waking from a trance.

  “I’m sorry to bother you, I’m an art dealer . . .” He handed her his card. “I’m trying to find the whereabouts of an artist called John Jacobs? I don’t know if you are aware, but he lived here for a while, in the late eighties. It’s a bit of a long shot, but I was hoping perhaps you might have some contact details for the previous owners?”

  Rose looked at the card. “You’ve come all the way from Edinburgh to knock on my door?” she asked him, looking up with a tentative smile.
It seemed so ludicrous, and yet here he was, and she discovered she was glad of it. Glad to hear his voice, and see his face, its expression that reminded her she still existed in the world beyond these doors.

  “Yes.” Frasier smiled ruefully in return. “I found a piece by him recently, picked it up at auction. Sold it on for ten times what I paid. I’ve been looking into him and there’s a growing interest in his work, so I know it sounds mad but, believe it or not, this is what I do. I chase hunches around the country hoping to make that one great find that’s going to change my life.”

  Rose remembered the ease with which she could look into his pale green, almost aqua eyes. There was something about him that seemed inherently decent and kind. Which were strange things to notice first about a man—the kindness, the gentleness that showed in the contours of his face, the way he spoke, softly, hesitantly—when there were so many more obvious things to admire: his flaxen hair, his height and broad, safe-looking shoulders, the fullness of his mouth, the easy elegance of his hands. But all those things seemed secondary compared to the qualities that Rose discovered she was unexpectedly drawn to, taking enormous pleasure in feeling so instantly comfortable with another person.

  “John Jacobs is my father,” she told him, secretly thrilled by his expression of amazement and delighted to be so connected to his object of interest. “He lived here, with me and my mother, until I was nine. When he left, Mum got the house, and when she died, her life insurance paid off the mortgage and it became mine.”

  “Rose.” Frasier breathed her name in wonder, making the tiny hairs on the back of her neck bristle. “You must be Rose. I never expected to find you here.”

  “You know my name?” Rose felt a little unnerved.

  “Know it?” Frasier smiled at her. “I’ve dreamt your name every night for weeks.”

  There was a moment between them, a moment when Rose thought that maybe he’d come here to find her after all, and, perhaps seeing the hope in her face, Frasier had been anxious to put her right.

  “Here.” Frasier reached into a briefcase he was carrying and drew out a photocopied sheet. “It’s a sketch. I bought it on eBay for a few hundred pounds. A sketch of a painting by your father.”

  A little reluctantly, Rose reached through the gap in the door and took the piece of paper, looking at the drawing, a tangle of thick, black, chaotic lines that somehow came together as a drawing of a small girl, leaning her chin on her hand as she peered out of the window. The title of the drawing was Dearest Rose.

  “It’s drawn with such love,” Frasier said, taking a step closer so that they could look at it together. “I assumed that Rose had to be his daughter, although there is barely any biographical information about him. I only know that he lived here because I found a clipping in the local press about an incident where he was arrested for being drunk and disorderly.”

  “That sounds like Dad,” Rose said, unable to look at the image anymore. “Look, come in. I’ll tell you what I know about John Jacobs, but honestly, it isn’t very much. I haven’t heard from him since the day he left.”

  Rose pulled open the door and saw the look of surprise on Frasier’s face when he saw the swell of her belly.

  “You’re pregnant,” he said quietly. “Very, very pregnant. Congratulations.”

  “Thank you,” Rose said, feeling self-conscious of her girth as she led him toward the kitchen. “I can’t say I really believe it, even now. I’m not sure I will know what to do or how to be a mother. Everyone says it’s instinct, but I don’t know how it can be. I don’t feel any instinct now. Just . . . oh, so many things. I get overwhelmed sometimes by it all.”

  “Is that why you were crying when you opened the door?” Frasier asked her carefully, as he studied the generic prints with which Richard lined the walls of the hallway as they made their way to the kitchen at the back of the house. The house, as it was then, was so different from the one of Rose’s childhood. Then, it had been an explosion of chaos and color, her father’s work very often painted directly onto the wall, as well as hanging in every possible space. Now each room was painted in varying shades of beige, white, and cream. It had been one of the first things that Richard had done after they were married, as if he were determined to erase any trace of Rose’s life before she became his wife, and Rose had been glad of it, glad of the serenity of the blank canvas that her husband had made for her. Wrinkling his nose a little, Frasier redirected his gaze to her once more. “Were you crying because all of this overwhelms you?”

  Rose nodded, sensing she didn’t need to explain to Frasier what “all of this” was, that somehow he just knew; he simply understood her. It was the strangest feeling to be standing in her kitchen with a man she’d only just met and feeling the strongest sense of peace and belonging that she’d had since she was a very small girl. It had to be that her aching heart was clutching at straws, clinging to any glimmer of kindness, even polite concern, and blowing it out of all proportion. And yet that wasn’t how it felt. To Rose it felt like she had somehow discovered her soul mate standing on the doorstep.

  Feeling strangely elated, Rose filled the kettle, gesturing for Frasier to take a seat at the table. She thought of Richard, sitting in his office at the surgery, nodding sympathetically at old ladies, diagnosing the common cold over and over again. If he could see her now . . . Rose found herself smiling at her act of quiet rebellion, at the joy she was finding in this unexpected encounter.

  Sitting down, she passed a cup of tea to Frasier.

  “I haven’t seen Dad since he left us,” she repeated. “When he went, the house, the studio at the back, was full of his work. One night Mum had a bonfire. It was the first Christmas after he went, I think. She put all of his stuff that she could find in a huge pile in the middle of the lawn, poured a load of lighter fuel over it, and burnt it to a crisp. There was nothing left, and if this painting was in that pile then it’s gone now.”

  The look of pain on Frasier’s face as he listened to her story was palpable.

  “All that work, up in flames, it’s sacrilege,” he said quietly.

  “I suppose you would see it like that,” Rose said. It hadn’t occurred to her before how sad it was that all she had left of her father had been so wantonly destroyed, but then she’d never seen him the way that Frasier obviously did, as a talented, intriguing man. A man to be admired and revered. Rose had only loved him and lost him, been left with the destruction he’d dealt in his wake. Suddenly, she wanted very much for Frasier to understand why her mother had done what she had. “Life was very difficult for us, alone. For Mum especially. She loved him so much; she gave up a lot to be with him—her life, her family, who never approved of him. When he left, when he threw all that back in her face, he hurt her so badly she never recovered. She’d put a brave face on it—or at least she’d try to every now and then—but in the end she just couldn’t go on without him. I think she started to kill herself the day he left. It took her eight more years to finish the job, but she did it in the end. Burning the paintings was part of that. An expression of her pain.”

  As she finished speaking, Rose unconsciously rested the fingers of her right hand over her mouth, unable to remember the last time she’d spoken so many words at all to anyone, even Richard, let alone words of such an intensely personal nature. She felt she’d better stop herself from talking somehow, before she said more than she should to this strange man she felt so compelled by and frightened him away.

  Frasier was silent for a moment, his long fingers wrapped around the mug of tea. “Are you saying your mother died of a broken heart?” he asked Rose quietly.

  “I suppose I am,” Rose said from between her fingers, her gaze directed inwardly as she remembered that last day with her mother. Marian had been so happy, as if the weight of the world had suddenly been lifted off her shoulders, and she was finally able to be at peace. She had persuaded Rose to skip school, and the two of them had gone for a walk along the seafront, stopping for ice cream and
to play the games in the arcade. Rose had gone to sleep that night believing that at last the storm clouds that had plagued Marian for so long were clearing, sleeping truly peacefully for the first time in months. When she’d got up the next morning and found Marian had already gone out, Rose hadn’t given it much thought. And she hadn’t been that concerned when her mum still wasn’t home when she got in from school. It had been just after eleven that night, just as Rose was wondering about whether or not she should tell someone her mother hadn’t been at home all day, when the doorbell sounded, and a very kind policewoman told her that her mother’s body had been washed ashore a few miles down the coast. She was wearing a swimming costume; there had been no note. So they had every reason to believe it was a simple, tragic accident. But Rose knew that her mother had walked into the sea that morning without ever planning to come back, and she realized that the final perfect day they had spent together was Marian’s goodbye gift to her daughter.

  “I’m so sorry, Rose.” Frasier’s voice made her start, as his fingers slid across the table towards hers, stopping millimeters away from making contact.

  “Don’t be.” Rose smiled weakly, retrieving her hand from the proximity of Frasier’s and resting it on the crest of her tummy. “The way I look at it, the best thing I can do for this baby is to make sure that I don’t live life like my mum, don’t let my circumstances beat me down. Don’t get me wrong, she was an amazing person and a really great mother—no one could have loved me more than she did—but I never wanted to be caught forever in the things that have happened to me. I don’t want to be the victim. My dad is a prick and my mum is gone, but I don’t have to be ruined by that. Not at all.”

  Neither one of them spoke for a moment and, a little flustered by the unexpected passion that had overtaken her as she spoke, Rose looked away from Frasier, feeling the heat in her cheeks. Everything she had told him was true, but she hadn’t known exactly how she felt until just that moment. She certainly had never had the guts to say it out loud. Here she was, trapped in this immaculate kitchen, with Richard’s baby in her womb, and the rest of her life, a successful life, mapped out for her. And yet Rose wanted to scream out loud, she felt so imprisoned.