The Woman At The Door

by Daniel Hurst

  ‘I like your shirt, Sam,’ Ally says. ‘It’s very dapper.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Sam replies before taking a large glug from his pint glass. He’s going to need another drink soon if he keeps going like that, but I think that is the plan. I really hope he doesn’t get too drunk tonight and do something embarrassing, but then I’m in no position to criticise. I’ve been knocking the drinks back as well, and we’re only on our starter. There’s a long way to go in this meal yet, but it’ll be over quickly if hubby and I keep drinking like fish.

  ‘So, how’s your week been?’ Ally asks me. ‘Any funny things happen on site?’

  ‘Just the usual,’ I reply.

  ‘Ally tells me you’re an engineer,’ Phil says, looking impressed. ‘That sounds cool.’

  ‘I get to wear a bright green jacket and boss some men around on a building site. It could be worse, I suppose.’

  Phil laughs at my joke, and Ally does the same. But Sam doesn’t. He just picks up his pint glass again.

  ‘I can’t imagine you working on a building site,’ Phil says to Ally. ‘But I’d love to see it.’

  ‘Hey!’ she cries, playfully hitting her partner on the arm. ‘I’d look great in a hard hat and boots, I’ll have you know!’

  Phil gives her a wink, and I smile because it’s clear that these two are very happy together, although I already knew that from what Ally has been telling me over these last few months. She really likes this guy, and while I’m not getting carried away, I have a feeling she thinks he might be the one.

  It’s about time she found ‘the one’.

  She’s spent the last ten years trying almost every other ‘one’ in town.

  I’m happy for my friend, but I’m also a little sad because seeing the pair of them like this is reminding me how bad things are in my relationship right now. In normal circumstances, Sam and I would be teasing each other and having a laugh too, but these are not normal circumstances.

  I don’t know what’s going on anymore. I had really been hoping that he was going to give me a plausible explanation as to why there was lipstick on his shirt collar earlier, but he wasn’t able to manage it. He didn’t even give me an explanation of any sort, which only served to make me angrier, as well as more anxious.

  That makes two things that he hasn’t been able to explain now. The woman at the door and the lipstick. Am I right to be concerned? Should I have been more understanding? Or should I have cancelled this meal and told him that he had to get out of the house unless he gave me a better explanation about the troubling events?

  I don’t know. I’ve never had to deal with something like this before. I’ve had relationships before Sam, but they ended because we drifted apart, not because anybody strayed. It wasn’t something that I ever spent much time worrying about then, and I hadn’t expected to start worrying about it when I got married either. Cheating, lying and secrets are things that happen between couples on TV shows I watch, not things that happen in my marriage. But unlike those TV shows, this can’t be sorted out by a scriptwriter who can make things up as they go along. This is real life. This is my life. So why do I feel like I’m losing control of it?

  ‘So what kind of projects do you work on?’ Phil asks me, clearly very keen on what I do for a living. But I’m happy to chat about it. It’s not as if my husband has been a font of conversation since we sat down at this table.

  ‘All sorts, really. We’re currently building a new drainage system for excess stormwater to run off into.’

  ‘Cool,’ Phil says, and I’m not sure if he really means it, but I appreciate the effort.

  ‘It’s not that cool,’ Sam mumbles before finishing his pint and looking around for the waiter so he can order another one.

  ‘What?’ I say, unsure what he means.

  ‘I said it’s not that cool. You almost died the other day.’

  ‘You what?’ Ally cries, almost knocking her wine over as she sits forward in concern.

  ‘I didn’t almost die,’ I say, batting the air and trying to play it down, mainly because I don’t want to concern my friend, nor do I want everybody to know what happened on site last Monday. But it seems like Sam does.

  ‘Yes, you did. You walked behind an excavator when it was reversing, and you would have been squashed if you hadn’t been pulled out of the way.’

  ‘Oh my gosh, Rebecca! Really?’

  I glare at my husband, annoyed that he has told this story because I didn’t want anybody outside of him or my work colleagues knowing about it. The last thing I need is the story getting back to my parents because they’ll only worry, and I know they already feel anxious about me spending my time on building sites. They’d be much happier if I worked in a warm, cosy office somewhere away from big machines and burly men, but I wouldn’t be, which is why I chose the career I did. But it’s not helping my cause having Sam telling people how I almost died in my dangerous workplace.

  ‘It sounds worse than it was,’ I try, but Ally isn’t buying it because she knows me well enough to tell when I’m playing something down.

  ‘I’m so glad you’re okay. How did it happen?’

  ‘You don’t want to know, trust me,’ Sam says with a chuckle that irritates me. He only does that chuckle when he is drunk and in a mischievous mood, but the mischief on his mind tonight is not of the fun variety.

  ‘What happened?’ Ally asks again, taking the bait that Sam has given her.

  ‘It’s nothing. Seriously,’ I try, but Sam is happy to carry on the conversation even if I’m not.

  ‘It’s because she was thinking about me and some other woman and wondering if I had cheated on her,’ he says, sending the atmosphere at this table in a very unpleasant direction.

  Poor Phil has no idea what to say to that, but he’s not the only one. Ally is looking at me like she can’t believe what she has just heard.

  ‘What’s he talking about?’ she asks me.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ I say, but Sam just gives that chuckle again.

  ‘Of course it matters,’ he tells the table. ‘My wife thinks I’m cheating on her, which I’m not, by the way. But she doesn’t believe me, and I’m not sure what else I can do. Phil, have you got any tips to help a guy out?’

  I glare at my husband while he just sits there with a stupid grin on his face. Phil and Ally don’t know what to say or where to look, and it’s only the arrival of the waiter at our table that cuts through the tension and gives us all something else to focus on for the time being.

  ‘Another pint, please, my good man,’ Sam says. ‘Make that two, actually. You look like you could do with another one, Phil.’

  Phil nods his head. He definitely looks like he could do with another drink. Ally says she wants another one too, and now everyone is looking at me to see what I am going to order.

  But what I want isn’t on the menu.

  What I want is the truth from my husband.

  How do I ask the waiter for that?

  19

  SAM

  Well, that meal was a shambles. To be fair, I played a part in that, but I’m not the only one to blame. Rebecca contributed to the disastrous dinner too, and I’d feel sorry for Ally and Phil if I wasn’t feeling so sorry for myself. I accept that I had too much to drink tonight but can anyone blame me? I feel like I’m not in control of my life lately, and I had to do something to make myself feel like I was, even if that thing was to drink too much and let off some steam.

  But did I go too far? Possibly. I regret mentioning Rebecca’s near-miss on site the other day to her best friend. There was no need to bring that up and cause undue concern and worry, and Ally looked very troubled when she heard about it. I also regret going one step further a few moments after that and explaining why Rebecca had been so distracted on site.

  I told Ally and Phil that Rebecca thinks that I’m cheating on her.

  Poor Phil. He seemed like a good guy, and tonight was supposed to be about us meeting him, but in the end, it turned o
ut to be all about us while he was just a witness in a car crash of a meal. He was probably a little nervous about meeting his partner’s best friend and husband for the first time and possibly worried about saying or doing something wrong. But he need not have been so concerned. I did everything wrong for him. I knew I’d gone too far when Rebecca got up from the table and stormed off across the restaurant, leaving me sitting there awkwardly with Ally and Phil until Ally got up and went after her friend. That just left us two guys, and neither of us really knew what to say then. I tried to make a joke about women and how hard it can be to keep them happy, but poor Phil wasn’t really in the mood for jokes, and he just stared hopelessly in the direction of where Ally had gone, no doubt praying that she would come back soon and extricate him from the uncomfortable meal.

  In the end, I apologised to Phil and stood up before also apologising to the waiter who had just brought me a fresh pint of lager before making my way out to try and find my wife.

  Rebecca was outside the restaurant crying into Ally’s shoulder when I found her. It takes a brave man to approach his wife when she is upset with him, but it takes an even braver man to do so when her best friend is present too. But I was drunk, so bravery was in my armoury on that occasion, or at least false courage was.

  I had tried to calm Rebecca down as well as tell Ally that this was all one big misunderstanding and that I wasn’t cheating on my wife. Of course, Ally took Rebecca’s side. She had to. It was her duty as her best friend to do so. I get that. But I was persistent and refused to go back inside the restaurant until I was able to speak with my wife alone, and thankfully, Rebecca gave me that opportunity in the end. She had told Ally that she was okay, even though the mascara running down her cheeks told a different story, and the friend had gone back inside, leaving the pair of us to try and have an adult conversation.

  That wasn’t an easy thing to do considering that we were both drunk and standing in a public place, but I did my best by going first. I apologised to Rebecca for spilling our secrets, and I apologised for drinking too much and making things worse. I told her that I had been out of order at the table and shouldn’t have told Ally and Phil those personal things. They were secrets, and they were for her to share with her friend, not me. And then I ended by sharing a secret of my own.

  I told Rebecca that I had contacted a private investigator to try and find out who that woman at the door was.

  I’m not sure what kind of reaction I had been hoping to get from my wife by giving her that news. Maybe I had hoped that it would prove to her how innocent I was and how determined I am to get to the bottom of all the weird things that have been going on lately. But if that’s what I had hoped to happen, I was wrong. Again. Rebecca erupted at me as soon as I mentioned the PI. She took it really badly and made out like I was doing anything to avoid coming clean and telling her the truth. She begged me to just be honest with her and admit to whatever I had been doing so she could at least make a decision based on all the facts.

  It was clear then that my wife fully believes that I have cheated on her.

  But I couldn’t admit to something that I hadn’t done. I’m innocent, at least as far as being a faithful husband goes. That’s why I was adamant when I again told her that I had done nothing wrong and that I didn’t know how many times I was going to have to say it. But she wasn’t having any of it, and maybe it was the alcohol, or maybe it was just because she was sick of all the fighting, but she told me that she needed a break.

  She told me that she didn’t want me to stay at home tonight.

  That was hard to hear, and it was even harder when she moved away from me as I tried to console her and change her mind. But Rebecca was adamant. She needed some space to think. She needed time to do that thinking.

  Basically, she needed me out.

  What choice did I have? Stand and continue a drunken argument outside a restaurant or listen to what she wanted and go home and get my toothbrush. I decided to do the latter, and that’s why I’m now sitting here, in this rubbish hotel room that I have been forced to book for the night so my wife can have that space and time that she needs. I haven’t brought much with me because I’m hoping this will be the only night that I have to stay here, but I guess I’ll find out about that in the morning. Of course, I could have gone to a friend’s place, but that would have meant having to explain to them why my wife wasn’t letting me stay in her bed at the moment, and I couldn’t be doing with that. This is between the two of us. That’s why I regret that Ally and Phil know all about our troubles now. But it’s too late to put that cat back in the bag as far as they are concerned.

  I don’t know if Rebecca went and finished the meal with her best friend or not because I just left the restaurant and went home, throwing a few things into a bag and then taking a taxi to the nearest hotel. Now I’m lying on my rented bed for the night, sipping from a can of warm lager that I picked up down in the hotel bar just before they closed for the night. I should go to sleep, or at least stop drinking and start sobering up so I’m ready for tomorrow, but right now, all I want to do is keep drowning my sorrows.

  I grimace at the warm alcohol as it slips down my throat and wish that it was ice-cold like it was meant to be consumed, but I’m wishing for a lot of things recently, and none of them are coming true. I wish that Rebecca believed me. I wish that I was still at home. I wish I knew why there had been lipstick on my shirt collar. And I wish that I knew who that woman at the door was and why she had planted that seed of doubt in my wife’s mind.

  That’s when I remember that I haven’t checked my personal emails for a while, so I don’t know if that PI has got back to me yet. Opening up the app on my phone, I keep sipping my sickly drink as my new emails pop up.

  That’s when I see it.

  The private investigator has replied.

  I still don’t know if this person is a man or a woman, but that doesn’t matter right now. All that matters is that they are willing to meet me to see if they can help me. They ask for a suitable time for this meeting to take place. Can I do midday tomorrow at the cafe on Harvey Street?

  I look around the pokey hotel room and at the small pile of my belongings that I took from my house. I hardly have much else going on in my life, do I? That’s why I quickly email back and tell the PI that noon tomorrow is fine.

  Then I finish my can of warm lager, but I decide not to open the second one.

  I’m going to try and get some sleep. I now have a big day tomorrow.

  Not only am I going to have to try and get back into my house and fight for my marriage, but I’m also meeting the person who might be able to prove my innocence.

  I really hope this PI is as good as their website says they are.

  I really hope they can help me find out who that woman at the door was.

  20

  THE WOMAN

  The most important thing that enables me to keep doing what I’m doing is that people never find out who I really am. I use a fake name with all my clients, as well as regularly dye my hair different colours and wear all sorts of different types of clothing, so I’m not recognised or remembered. I also make sure that I work all over the country and not just in one area, increasing my chances of continuing to go undetected.

  I don’t believe that what I do is illegal. Knocking on a door and telling a lie isn’t a crime as far as I know, but I’d rather not have to find out for sure. That’s why I need to make sure I avoid any uncomfortable conversations with police officers who might be responding to reports of a woman going around ruining people’s marriages.

  But it’s not just the police that I’m worried about. It’s the targets themselves. Those husbands and wives who I am toying with for the benefit of my clients. I don’t want to ever come face to face with any of them after that first night when I have paid them a visit. I have the element of surprise on my side when I first knock on their door, and that is what allows me to say my piece and leave before they have a chance to do anything. Bu
t if I was to see them again then they would be more prepared, and I can’t be having that.

  I have no idea what some of those people would do if they got the chance.

  Angry husbands or wives, people who had done nothing wrong but had lost their partners thanks to me and my lies. They may get violent with me. They may even try and kill me. I couldn’t really blame them for hating me. I’d hate me too if I was an innocent wife who had lost her husband because of a lie and a few strategically placed ‘clues.’

  That is why I must remain anonymous.

  It could literally be a matter of life or death.

  But I also have to stay busy because this is a business I’m running, and I’m only as good as my last job. That’s why I’m back to work again today dealing with a new client. I’m in Bristol, and I’ve just had a meeting with a lovely young woman called Zara. She has told me all about her problem, and it’s a very familiar one.

  She is in love with a man who has a wife.

  Zara gave me the man’s name, the explanation of how she met him at her weekly gym class and a very impassioned description of why she likes him so much. He’s funny, he’s smart, he’s handsome. All the usual things that can make a woman drawn to a man. But he’s also loyal. Zara knows as much because she made a pass at him a month ago while they were together in the corner of a crowded bar after their class went for post-exercise drinks. He had politely turned her down based on the fact that he was married, which was commendable, as well as frustrating. Zara had apologised for her behaviour, afraid that he would hate her for trying something with him, but he had been far too polite to do that, and the pair remained friends, which was good news for my client in one way, but in another way, it was torture.

  Zara wanted him.

  And she heard that I had ways of potentially making that happen.

  I do all my advertising online, but I’m not on social media or anything like that. I simply browse message boards and forums, reading about people who are posting on subjects like unrequited love and what it feels like to find somebody perfect only to have been beaten to them by somebody else. I would sit and read these posts, as well as the comments beneath them from strangers offering their advice.