by Alex Lake
‘I’ll call the police,’ Dr Singh said, through gritted teeth. ‘This is assault.’
Alfie shook his head. ‘No, you won’t,’ he said. ‘There’s no evidence of any assault. And when they get here I’ll say you fondled me when you examined me. I’ll tell everyone. And they’ll believe me, because people believe that kind of thing.’
He tightened his grip and lowered his voice to a whisper. ‘And I will kill you. One night, when you’re all alone, you’ll wake up and wonder what the noise in your house was, whether there even was a noise, and then you’ll look up and I’ll be in your bedroom and it’ll be the last thing you ever see. Understand?’
He could see fear in the doctor’s eyes. He relaxed. This was going his way.
‘I asked you a question,’ he said. ‘Answer it, you piece of immigrant shit. Do. You. Understand?’
Dr Singh nodded, his lips pressed together to suppress the pain.
‘I understand,’ he said.
‘Good,’ Alfie replied, and let go of his finger.
Claire
Claire’s phone buzzed and she glanced at the screen. It was a text from Alfie. The meeting was in full flow, but she had to read his message.
Can you call?
Her stomach balled up. There was something about the text message which didn’t seem right to her. He’d have his results by now. She’d been expecting a breezy no problem or all fine down below, but not this. Not a request to call her. She started to type a reply – call you back soon – but before she could finish it, she became aware that the room was silent. She lifted her head. Vicki Turner, the senior partner and founder of the firm, was looking back at her.
‘Claire?’ she said. ‘Your thoughts on the last question?’
Claire swallowed. She had no idea what the last question was.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t catch the question.’
Vicki Turner – tall, late-fifties, hair groomed into a static pile, pencil skirt and expensive jacket – looked pointedly at Claire’s phone, and then spoke slowly.
‘The question,’ she said, ‘was about the relationship with the client. If we have a strong relationship then maybe we can resolve the matter without pursuing legal action. Since you manage this contract, I was wondering whether you might be able to provide an opinion on the matter.’
‘Right,’ Claire said. ‘Of course.’ She searched for something to say but her mind had gone blank. She felt the heat rise in her neck and cheeks, felt herself flush. It was ridiculous; she was a grown woman, but here she was, her mind frozen.
‘It’s …’ she began, ‘it’s fine, I think. No, it’s better than that. It’s good.’
Vicki nodded. ‘Do you think we may be able to resolve this payment dispute without going down the legal route?’
‘I’m not – well yes, maybe.’ Claire smiled. ‘Maybe I can talk to someone there. Test the temperature.’
‘OK,’ Vicki said. ‘Let’s do that. Perhaps by the end of the day, if possible?’
‘No problem,’ Claire said. ‘End of the day it is.’
Back at her desk, she picked up her phone and called Alfie. He answered on the second ring. She could tell immediately it wasn’t good news.
‘Alfie,’ she said. ‘What happened?’
There was a long pause. ‘It turns out,’ he said eventually, ‘the problem is me.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well,’ Alfie replied. ‘I have a very low sperm count.’
‘But you took that test! It was fine.’
‘I know. That’s what I thought. But it must have been faulty.’
‘OK,’ Claire said. ‘It’s not the end of the world. There are things they can do even if you have a low sperm count. We can try those.’
‘Not in my case,’ Alfie said. He sounded worse, flatter and more exhausted, than Claire had ever heard him sound before. ‘I have no sperm, Claire. None at all. It’s impossible.’
‘No,’ Claire said. ‘It can’t be! I’ll talk to Dr Singh. See if—’
‘Claire!’ Alfie’s voice was almost a shout. ‘Please don’t make this any worse than it needs to be. It’s time to move on.’
She was about to argue, but she caught the words on her lips. Now was not the time. And besides, Alfie had no doubt explored all the possibilities with Dr Singh, and so if he said it was impossible it must be. He wanted this as badly as she did; there was no way he would leave any stone unturned.
‘OK,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry, darling. I feel for you.’
‘I don’t care about me. It’s you. This is your dream. You deserve better.’
‘There is no one better,’ Claire said. ‘And this test result doesn’t change how I feel about you one bit. I love you as much – more – than I ever did. This will only bring us closer.’
‘Thank you,’ Alfie said. ‘Thank you for saying that. It means a lot. I love you.’
She looked at her watch. It was ten a.m. ‘I’ll see you tonight. What time are you home?’
‘I don’t know. I’m a bit behind. But I don’t want to be too late. I need to see you.’
‘Get back as soon as you can. We can have a drink and talk about how to deal with this. OK?’
He agreed and she put her phone on her desk. She pushed it away from her, then rubbed her temples. So there was a reason she couldn’t get pregnant, and it was this. Although she’d wanted him to go and see Dr Singh she hadn’t really thought there was a problem. It was more for peace of mind than anything else. But now this had happened.
And as it started to sink in tears came to her eyes.
She shook her head. She could cry about it later. For now she needed to get her thoughts straight. Firstly, Alfie would be devastated, so she needed to be sensitive to him. Secondly, there were still avenues they could explore. If she wanted to have her own baby then they could use a sperm donor, or they could adopt. She’d often thought that, after she had a couple of her own and built a family home, she would like to adopt a child. There was something about the idea of sharing what she had with someone in need that appealed to her.
Well, maybe that was going to happen sooner than she’d thought.
She closed her laptop. She needed a coffee. As she got up, Jodie called.
‘Hey,’ Claire said. ‘How’re things?’
‘Good,’ Jodie replied. ‘You? Want to meet up tonight?’
‘I can’t. And I thought you were locked into Pippa world.’
‘I was. But, amazingly, she’s going out tonight. We were supposed to be watching a movie, but she called and said she had plans. She sounded quite happy, actually. Maybe she got asked out on a date. Either way, I thought I’d take advantage and see if you were free.’
‘Sadly not,’ Claire said. ‘I have plans with Alfie. But I’m glad Pippa is off your hands, for a night at least.’
‘Me too. See you soon.’
Claire put her phone in her bag and headed for the main doors. She needed to get some fresh air. She could get her coffee somewhere nearby.
As she left the building she noticed that the busker was gone.
Alfie
Alfie put his phone down – his Henry Bryant phone – and stared out of the office window.
He was in trouble. Big trouble.
Just before he’d given Claire the bad news, Pippa had sent him a text message – We need to talk – which he’d ignored, as usual. He hadn’t been able to ignore the next one she sent, though, since it contained his name. His real name.
You’ll have to answer this one, Henry, it read. Or should I say, Alfie?
She knew who he was. How, he had no idea, but she knew. And if she knew, then others might. She was right; he had to answer, so he had called her.
Well, well, she said. Nice to hear from you, Henry.
She put a heavy, sarcastic emphasis on the ‘Henry’.
Look, he said. I can explain.
Can you? she replied. I doubt it. Although I suppose you’re trapped in an unhapp
y marriage and Henry Bryant was your way out?
Yes, he said. I know it’s a cliché but it’s true. And this is true, too – I was falling for you too deeply and I knew that if it carried on I’d be in trouble, which was why I had to end it.
You texted me, she said. You didn’t even have the decency to call.
I knew if I did you’d persuade me. I’m weak, Pippa, when it comes to you. I would have heard your voice and I would have been unable to do it.
She paused and he sensed her soften. He was telling her what she wanted to hear. It was amazing how easily people would believe you when you did that.
Pippa, he said. I knew that if we stayed together I’d eventually have had to choose between you and my marriage, and I’d have chosen you. But that’s impossible. My wife is vindictive. The divorce would have been messy and she’d have made sure I was left with nothing. And that’s not all … she’s violent. There’s no telling what she would have done. So I couldn’t let it come to that.
I’d have helped you, Pippa said. We’d have been OK together.
You couldn’t stop her. No one could.
It wouldn’t have mattered. As long as we had each other, everything else would have been irrelevant.
Oh, Pippa, he said, injecting real longing into his voice. I want to see you. Can we meet? Tonight?
I don’t know, she said. You hurt me.
Now she thought she was in the driving seat, she was playing hard to get, but that was all it was.
Please, he said. I miss you.
I miss you too, she replied, her voice almost a whisper.
Will you meet me? he begged.
Yes. I’ll meet you.
Tonight?
Tonight.
And so they had arranged to meet later. Claire would be expecting him home, but he’d have to come up with some reason he’d stayed out later. For now, Pippa was the priority. He had no idea what he was going to do, but he knew he had to find out how she knew, who else she had told, and then he could start to figure out how to fix this.
He took his car from the office car park and drove to Barnes, where they had arranged to meet in a pub. They hugged and he was struck by how, even at an emotional reunion, there was a limpness and passivity in the way she embraced him. A shudder of disgust ran through him.
They ordered two glasses of wine and sat at a corner table.
‘So,’ he said. ‘It’s great to see you. How’ve you been?’
She looked at him, her eyes wide, almost fearful. ‘Not good,’ she said. ‘I was going a bit crazy.’
‘Me too. But I’m here now.’
‘And you’re not Henry Bryant,’ she said. ‘You lied to me.’
‘Only about that. Not about how I felt about you.’
‘How do I know that? It’s going to be hard for me to trust you again.’
Going to be, he noted. In her mind, they were already back together.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘Truly I am. And not that it matters now, but how did you find out?’
She smiled a sly smile. ‘A friend.’
Shit. So someone else knew. This was getting worse. ‘Which friend?’
‘Jodie.’
He froze. If Jodie knew then it was only a matter of time before she told Claire. They were best friends. He was surprised she hadn’t called already. ‘How did she find out?’ he asked.
‘She didn’t. Not exactly.’
‘Then what happened?’
‘She was showing me some photos on her phone, and one came up of her with you. And your wife. Who I’ve met, by the way, a while ago. There was another photo of you singing a song. A romantic one, I assume. Of course, I was more than a little surprised to see you, so I asked who you were and she told me. Alfie Daniels, husband of the lovely Claire.’
‘She isn’t so lovely.’ He shook his head. ‘And it wasn’t a romantic song.’ There was an important piece of information he needed. The most important piece. ‘You told Jodie about us?’
Pippa shook her head. ‘No. I wanted to speak to you first.’
Alfie fought to stop himself shouting in relief. ‘Did you tell anyone?’
‘No. Like I said, I wanted to give you a chance to tell me your side of the story.’
‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘That’s very fair. And it’s one of the reasons … it’s one of the reasons I love you.’
She blinked. There they were, the three little words that made all the difference.
I.Love.You.
‘Oh my God,’ she said. ‘I love you too, Alfie Daniels.’
Hearing her words also made all the difference to Alfie, but not the ‘I love you’. It was hearing his name.
It reminded him that she knew who he was, and that she held his fate in her hands as a result. And it made everything clear to him. He knew exactly what he had to do.
‘Let’s go,’ he said. ‘I have my car. We can book into a hotel. I can’t wait any longer.’ He took her hands in his and stared into her eyes. ‘And then I’m going to tell Claire it’s over. Tonight.’
She blinked rapidly, her lips pressed together. ‘Do you promise?’ she said.
Alfie nodded. ‘I promise.’
He told Pippa there was a hotel he had in mind in Tunbridge Wells, a hotel that was special to him and that, although it was a long drive, was worth it for what was, after all, a special occasion. He had no intention of going to a hotel there, but it sounded good. It was the kind of place where girls like Pippa imagined illicit assignations took place. He switched off his iPhone; he had a plan for what he would tell Claire later and it involved her being unable to get in touch with him.
As they approached Tunbridge Wells he turned on to a B road heading east. Pippa glanced at him.
‘Is this the right way?’ she said.
‘Yep. It’s a quiet little place. It’s in the countryside. Hardly anyone knows about it.’
Which was all true. Hardly anyone did know about their destination. The only thing he had failed to mention was that it wasn’t a hotel.
Ten minutes later he pulled into layby. It was on the edge of a dense forest. He switched off the engine, then put his hand on her knee. Her jeans were soft and expensive. He ran his hand up to her crotch.
‘Alfie,’ Pippa said. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m getting desperate,’ he said. ‘I can’t wait any longer. I want you. Now.’
‘How far is the hotel?’
‘Not far. But I thought’ – he turned and placed his hands on her cheeks and pulled her towards him – ‘we could get started early.’
She twisted in her seat and kissed him. As she did, he put his hands on her cheeks and held her face. She gave a slight moan and, for a second, he hesitated.
Then he slid his hands down her face and around her neck, and began to squeeze.
‘Alfie,’ she gasped. ‘What are you doing?’
He squeezed harder, and she squealed as the pressure increased and her windpipe began to narrow.
‘You silly little girl,’ he muttered. ‘Did you really think I was in love with you? Then you’re more stupid than I thought. But that’s good for me, because it made this easy.’
He looked at her. Her eyes were beginning to bulge in their sockets. Strangely, he felt nothing. Just a deep calm. He pressed harder, felt the flesh yield.
‘I couldn’t have you wandering around knowing that Henry Bryant and Alfie Daniels are one and the same,’ he said. ‘You understand that, right?’
In her eyes he saw that she knew she was going to die. She grabbed his wrists and tried to pull them away. She was surprisingly strong. He supposed she was desperate.
He focused on putting as much pressure on her throat as he could. Gradually, her attempts to pull away his hands grew weaker – he had some scratches which would need some explanation – until they stopped entirely. Slowly, he relaxed his grip, ready to tighten it at the slightest sign of movement.
There was nothing. He examined her face. She was wide-eyed
, her mouth slack and open.
She was, without question, dead.
And Alfie felt great.
Claire
Claire looked at the call log on her phone. She’d tried Alfie eleven times since she’d got home from work. Eleven calls, none of them answered. She’d been expecting him home, expecting a quiet night together as they talked through their options.
She had not been expecting an empty house and eleven unanswered phone calls, or the intense and deepening worry. She imagined everything that could have possibly happened to him: hit by a car, mugged, stuck at work.
Suicide.
It was this that brought her out in cold sweats. He was a sensitive, caring man who had found out he couldn’t have his own children, which was what he wanted more than anything else. He hadn’t ever said much about his childhood, but she got the impression it hadn’t been all that happy even before both his parents had died. She thought that was part of the reason he wanted to be a father so much; like her, he wanted to put right some of what had gone wrong in his own life.
So it was entirely possible he had killed himself. She loved him, but she knew he was not the strongest of men, and that made this situation all the more worrying.
She picked up her phone and glanced at the time. Nearly midnight. That was it. She’d call him one more time, and if he didn’t pick up she was calling the police.
It turned out there was no need to call the police after all. Five minutes later he was back, assuming that it was him stumbling around in the hallway.
The door to the living room opened. She watched Alfie walk in, the top two buttons of his shirt open. His hair was dishevelled and his face was red. The harsh smell of whisky came off him in waves.
He stared at her, his mouth an unhappy line. He looked close to tears. Claire felt her anger – along with the worry – melting away.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ she said, her tone much softer than she’d been imagining it would be for the last few hours.
‘Went for a drink,’ Alfie said. His words were slurred and indistinct. He was not a big drinker and she had never seen him like this.
