The Accidental Proposal

by Dunn, Matt

  I peer uneasily across the street at the café. It’s one I’m never likely to go in to, particularly with Muffin To Declare so close by. And anyway, Sam thinks I never go to Muffin To Declare, because, of course, she thinks I don’t eat muffins any more, so she’s going to assume I’d have no reason to be in this neck of the woods. While that’s not unusual in itself, she usually meets new clients in the café on the seafront, because that’s where most of the training takes place.

  Almost immediately, I dismiss my fears as ridiculous. Sam’s not going to be up to anything – and certainly not so close to the wedding. I feel bad about being suspicious so, with a shake of my head, start walking back to the office, only to stop after a few paces. What if she is up to something?

  For a second, it occurs to me that maybe I should just pop in and say hello. See if she introduces him to me. But what will that prove? If I was her, and there was something suspicious going on, I’m sure I’d have a cover story worked out for such an eventuality. And what happens if it is all innocent but I, to use Dan’s words, ‘get the wrong end of the stick’ again, and end up making a scene and costing her a client? Not a smart move, particularly since (given my recent jewellery expenditure, and the cost of hiring the Grand ballroom) we could do with all the new clients she can get.

  Keeping on the opposite side of the road, I walk back to where I can get a clear view through the coffee-shop window, lurking behind a lamp post while I peer inside, and after a few moments I spot the two of them, sitting at a corner table.

  Every now and then, Sam glances out of the window, which I can’t help but assume is due to nervousness in case she’s caught – although I’m feeling pretty nervous that she’ll catch me too, as the lamp post’s not providing much cover. I’m wondering whether I should move, but don’t know how to do it without being seen until, fortunately, a van comes and parks in the space in front me.

  Using the van as cover, I walk along the pavement a little and take up a better position, crouching behind a postbox, while wondering why I feel so uneasy. Am I jealous because he’s good-looking? Is there something I don’t like about their body language? Is it because she’s meeting him in an out-of-the-way place? Or am I simply transferring my own guilty feelings about seeing Jane the other day onto Sam?

  I know I’m probably being stupid. Let’s face it, there are a hundred and one other reasons why Sam might be meeting him. Okay, maybe not a hundred and one, but at least, well, two that I can think of, although one of those is the fact that she’s having an affair.

  While it’s hard to see Sam and her mystery man clearly, given that they’re sitting as far away from the window as possible, one thing I can make out is the way Sam leans in towards him as he speaks. What’s worse is how every now and then he touches her; not somewhere intimate, but just an occasional hand on the arm. Immediately, I hate him.

  From what I’ve seen so far, it certainly doesn’t look like a meeting with a new client, and now I think about it, he doesn’t look like he needs a personal trainer in the first place. And then, something happens that really sets my alarm bells ringing. A waitress walks over to their table and sets down a plate of what, to my experienced eye, looks like various slices of cake.

  I watch, horrified, as the man picks up a piece, holds it out to Sam, and . . . Noooo! She’s taken a bite. The kiss on the cheek I could just about deal with, but this? Sam and I never eat cake together. I turn away in shock, unable to watch any more. I feel cheated – and on more than one front. After all her lecturing, Sam’s not only eating something bad for her, but she’s doing it with another man.

  I can’t believe what I’ve seen, especially after all those things she said about me in front of Dan and Madeleine the other night. There’s a strange feeling bubbling up inside me, and it’s the one I remember all too well from back when I found out that Jane was having an affair: jealousy.

  I pull myself up to my full height, look left and right, and start to cross the road, mentally rolling my sleeves up, then stop suddenly on the edge of the kerb. This is Sam, I tell myself, who’s never, in all the time we’ve known each other, given me any reason to doubt her. And besides, would she have suggested we get married if she’d been having an affair? Of course not.

  Unless . . . Unless he’s married. You do read about these people – or rather, Dan’s read about these people, thanks to his regular subscription to Cosmo, then told me all about them in admiration – who lead these double lives, even getting married, and bringing up a family, while having another partner stashed away somewhere else.

  But not Sam, surely? We live together, so how could she have kept it a secret from me? Unless . . . Being a personal trainer is the perfect cover. Who knows what she’s wearing under that tracksuit – her best lingerie, perhaps? And when she disappears off at strange hours in the morning, or comes back home all flushed and perspiring, then heads straight for the shower . . .

  Fighting the waves of nausea that are rolling over me, I turn my attention back to the two of them. Sam’s on her second slice now, nodding appreciatively as she chews, and I can hardly stand it. Every now and then, in-between bites, she leans back in her chair and laughs loudly at one of his jokes – a little too often for my liking. In fact, given the frequency, Sam seems to think he’s some kind of comedian, although I’m not finding any of this in the slightest bit amusing. Does she ever laugh with me like that? I wonder. Or has she been laughing at me all this time instead?

  I take a few deep breaths, trying to fight a creeping sense of despair, unable to believe it’s happening to me again. In hindsight, I can recognize some of the same tell-tale signs from when Jane cheated on me: the unusual Saturday-morning meeting, abruptly ended phone calls, even shutting the laptop quickly when I’ve walked over to where she’s been sitting, but they’re hardly proof Sam’s having an affair. And anyway, I trust her enough to let her have coffee with whoever she wants. Whenever she wants. And wherever she wants – even somewhere she knows I’m unlikely to catch her. Besides, maybe he’s just an ex-client. Or an ex-boyfriend – although I have leafed through her old photo album in a moment of insecurity, and I’m pretty sure he’s not one of them.

  With the greatest of efforts, I decide not to confront her, so just turn around and start walking back towards my office. The first few steps feel as if I’m wading through quicksand. But I know it’s the right thing to do.

  And even though I tell myself that’s because I’ve got absolute faith and trust in her, in reality, it’s because I’m way too scared to find out if my suspicions are true.

  2.13 p.m.

  I’m in the office, trying to concentrate on work, but unable to get this lunchtime’s events out of my head. When Natasha comes back from lunch, it’s about two minutes before I can’t help but ask.

  ‘Tell me something, Natasha. What are your views on fidelity?’

  Natasha finishes applying her lipstick in the reflection of her monitor and swivels her chair round to face me. ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘I just wondered, you know, as someone who’s, er . . .’ - this is tricky to word without having something thrown at me - ‘been involved with a few other . . . well, involved people, what your overall view of the subject was. As a consumer.’

  ‘What? Is it over-rated, you mean?’

  ‘Not really. I was just curious as to whether it was ever . . . acceptable. Cheating.’

  Natasha considers this for a moment, then shrugs. ‘That’s hard for me to answer. Because while most of the men I’ve gone out with have cheated on their wives to see me – which of course I’ve accepted – that of course means they’re the cheating type, so even if they had left their wives and moved in with me, I’d still have worried what they’d been up to.’

  ‘So, there’s a cheating type?’ I say, suddenly feeling a bit brighter. As far as I know, Sam’s never cheated on anyone. Or not admitted to it, anyway.

  Natasha nods. ‘Oh yes. Just like there’s a faithful type.’ She leans back
in her chair and crosses her legs. ‘There are those who would never do it, because it’s just not in their nature. Like you, Edward.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘And then there are those who have had it done to them, and it makes them feel so utterly horribly bad that they’d never dare do it to someone else, because they know how it feels and would never inflict that on another person.’

  ‘Right. That’s me again. In terms of being cheated on.’ While I didn’t tell Dan back when it happened to me, I’d had to admit it to Natasha. It was hard not to, given that she found me blubbing like a baby in the office one morning. ‘By, you know, Jane.’

  Natasha stares at me until she’s sure I’ve finished. ‘Then there are those people who do it the once, find it’s not such a big deal, and realize they’re quite happy to do it again. And again.’

  ‘Like Dan, you mean?’

  ‘Oh no.’ Natasha laughs. ‘Dan’s completely different.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘Because he doesn’t think what he’s doing is cheating. Even though most women assume because you’re sleeping with them, you won’t be sleeping with anyone else . . .’

  ‘Sort of like a given?’

  ‘Exactly. But in Dan’s mind, he’s never made a commitment to these women in the first place. And while for most normal people, sleeping with two different women at the same time wouldn’t be on, as far as Dan’s concerned, it’s just what he does. And that’s why he doesn’t think it’s a problem.’

  ‘So would you forgive a . . . lapse?’

  Natasha raises one eyebrow. ‘What’s brought this on, Edward? Been up to something you shouldn’t?’

  Even though I’m sitting down, I’m aware that I have to think on my feet. ‘Nope. I was just thinking about, er, Jane. Whether her cheating on me was my fault. And whether I should have, well, forgiven her.’

  Natasha looks at me sympathetically. ‘You know, sometimes people tell you that their cheating was your fault. That you drove them to it by your lack of attention – that kind of thing. But as far as I’m concerned, that’s rubbish. If someone wasn’t paying me enough attention and I still wanted to be with them, then the last thing I’d do would be sleep with someone else.’

  ‘Yes, but I suppose it shows the other person is desired, doesn’t it? Like sometimes when we’re trying to get one of our candidates a job offer from a particular company, we tell that company that someone else is interested in making them an offer to try and spur them into action.’

  ‘But this isn’t the same, is it?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because our candidates don’t actually speak to anyone else. We make it up. Whereas Jane did. Or at least had an oral interview.’

  As I shudder at the memory, Natasha smiles. ‘Someone who’s so unhappy in a relationship that they go and have relations with someone else shouldn’t be in that relationship any more, because any normal person would try and fix what was wrong before you got to that point, surely? The men I have my affairs with – well, they’re different, in that they usually can’t leave because of the kids, or the house, or the fact that the wife will take them to the cleaners, which is why they do what they do. But someone like Jane or Dan? What’s to stop them heading for the hills?’

  Nothing, in Jane’s case, obviously. Not even a ten-year relationship. Although as I think about it, it does make me feel a little better. Unless . . . Unless Sam was feeling so frustrated that I hadn’t asked her to marry me that she decided to do the asking – maybe even as a drunken mistake, and in turn, those feelings of frustration maybe had already led her to look for someone else. Or maybe she was just starting the affair, while at the same time trying to sound me out as to whether I was ever going to ask her to marry me, hoping my answer would be no, which would give her a reason to leave, and instead, I’ve – as Dan first thought – mistaken her question for a proposal, in which case she finds herself in a rather awkward situation with me and him – whoever ‘him’ is. But that still doesn’t answer the question as to why she felt the need to start seeing someone else in the first place.

  ‘So all those excuses about women feeling so unloved, or having such low self-esteem that they simply wanted to go and find out whether someone else found them attractive are just that? Excuses?’

  Natasha lets out a short laugh. ‘That’s such rubbish, Edward. Any time a woman wants to feel attractive she just has to undo a couple of buttons on her blouse and walk past a building site. An affair? That’s different. Because what you’re actually doing is testing what it’s like to be with someone else. And don’t forget, the fact that you’re already with someone means you can dip a toe in the water without the new person having too many expectations.’

  ‘So fundamentally, people have affairs because they’re not sure about the relationship they’re in, and want to see whether the grass is greener?’

  ‘Sometimes. Or sometimes they just want a little excitement. But also, perversely, they might just want to find out what they really feel about the person they’re already with.’

  I think back to Dan telling me the same thing while trying to justify his bad dating reputation a while ago, and shake my head slowly. There are times when he and Natasha seem to be singing from the same hymn book.

  ‘And that’s . . .okay?’

  ‘Well, not usually if you ask the person who’s being cheated on.’

  I’m still a little confused. ‘But Jane said it was a cry for help,’ I say, as the office phone starts ringing. ‘To get some attention.’

  ‘Aha!’ says Natasha, picking up the receiver. ‘And maybe it was. Trouble was, in her case, it was someone else’s attention she really wanted.’

  As Natasha takes the call, I realize the problem I have is this: if Sam is actually having an affair then, according to Natasha – and if I extrapolate from the Jane situation – it might just be to make sure she wants to be with me, and while that’s not necessarily okay, I can kind of see how it works.

  Jane, on the other hand, was probably testing the water from the security of our situation, in that, having been with me for ten years, she wanted to see what life was like on the outside. And I’m afraid if that’s what Sam’s doing, then in my book, it’s just not the done thing.

  But the biggest problem I have in all of this, and why I can’t work it out, is how I’ve let this happen. Jane leaving me was such a harsh lesson in how not to be a boyfriend, that I kind of think I know what I’m doing now, as though I’ve graduated from some kind of intensive course, and I’m determined to remember what I’ve learned. Plus I’ve got Dan as a role model in terms of how not to behave.

  Plus I know Sam, and she just doesn’t give in to temptation. That second biscuit or third glass of wine isn’t something she allows herself to have. So why should this be different? Unless . . . Perhaps it is the marriage thing. Maybe she does feel someone’s said to her, ‘Here, these rice cakes are the only kind you’re going to be able to have. Ever.’ And surely it’s natural to want to sample a different type just before you commit to that.

  It could, of course, simply be that she and I are coming at it from completely different angles. Even though I’m crazy about her, I’m also so relieved to be settling down with her after my Jane experience that I can’t wait for it to happen. But Sam’s not the same. She’s not had the kind of nightmare loneliness I’ve experienced, so she’s maybe not as desperate as me to be with someone. And if that is true, then maybe she does just need to be sure about what she’s doing.

  But I do know one thing. If I’m going to challenge her about it, I need to be sure about what she’s doing too.

  7.01 p.m.

  When I get home and flop down on the sofa, I’m a little surprised to see Sam’s not in, especially since I don’t seem to have received a text from her telling me she’s going to be late.

  I switch on the TV and flick through the channels in an attempt to stop my imagination running wild, but even a particularly funny episode of You’ve
Been Framed doesn’t stop me from wondering exactly where she is. I still don’t want to believe she’s cheating on me, but seeing as I’m unable to come up with any other explanation for what I saw earlier, and of course was too much of a chicken to actually ask her about it when I spoke to her on the phone this afternoon, I don’t seem to have any choice. What’s more, I can’t think how else I can find out what she’s been up to. That is, until I switch the TV off and gaze forlornly round the room, and spot Sam’s laptop on the dining table. Where she has her email account.

  I sit up quickly, wondering whether I shouldn’t take a little peek just to put my mind at rest, then get up and walk nonchalantly past the dining table, casually glancing at the laptop screen. Her aquarium screen saver is running, so I ‘accidentally’ bump against the table in an effort to jog the mouse, but end up just banging my hip painfully.

  For some reason, I can’t quite bring myself to do it, so head into the kitchen instead and switch on the kettle, wondering why I feel so nervous. After all, I’ve used Sam’s laptop a hundred times – so she’s hardly going to be suspicious if she comes in and finds me and, anyway, I’m used to the odd quick ‘screen close’ from the office. Besides, this should take no more than a few seconds.

  I flick the kettle off, then go and sit down at the dining table, grabbing the mouse purposefully and giving it a quick jiggle. Once the fish have disappeared, I click on the Internet Explorer icon, then the Hotmail bookmark, and as the page loads in front of me, take a series of slow, deep breaths, trying to calm what feels like an angry fist thumping the inside of my chest.