Twenty-two

When Vanessa woke, her head felt heavy, as if she’d swallowed a double dose of sleeping tablets. There was a weight on the side of the bed, and she forced her eyes open. Andrew was sitting watching her.

She twisted her head towards the clock: 09:48. Just over an hour and he’d be here. She struggled to sit up. ‘Why aren’t you at work?’

‘I’m going now,’ Andrew said.

It was impossible to tell from his voice if he knew. ‘Where’s Jake?’ she asked. ‘And the girls should be at school.’

‘Jake’s gone to nursery, and I dropped Cordelia and Esme off before nine.’

‘Why didn’t you wake me?’

‘I didn’t have the heart.’

Vanessa’s eyes flitted about the room: Andrew’s painting of the house on the wall opposite the bed, her pink robe thrown over the chair, her bracelets and beads hanging from the swivel mirror on the chest of drawers. It was so familiar, the fabric of her life: why did it all look artificial, like a stage set?

She took a deep breath. ‘Andrew, I need to tell you something.’

‘What?’

‘Last night, when the girls got back from the meal …’ Her eyes slid away from his. ‘They said Gerald had suggested – ’

‘Esme told me.’

He knew. He knew Gerald would be here soon to take her out. He was going to stop her. He wouldn’t let her go. Her chest squeezed with panic, as if giant hands gripped her. ‘What? What did she say?’

Andrew took Vanessa’s hand and placed it on his knee. He ran his fingers over the back of it, and then turned it over and circled her palm. ‘She’s upset. Says she wants to go on holiday with Gerald, but doesn’t want me to be left behind.’

The holiday. It was the holiday Esme had told him about. ‘Of course she doesn’t. She loves you. You’re the only father she knows.’

‘I’m glad someone in the family still cares about me.’

Vanessa pushed herself up on to her knees. She clasped her arms round Andrew’s neck. ‘Don’t say that. We all care.’

‘Do you? Cordelia couldn’t get out of the car quickly enough this morning. She was desperate to tell her mates her father is taking you all to Argentina.’

Vanessa tried to smooth the ridges in Andrew’s forehead with her thumbs. ‘She’s excited to see Gerald again. You know how she’s built him up in her mind to be super-dad.’

‘It’s easy to be super-dad if you’re never here.’

‘We both know that, but she’s sixteen.’

Andrew pulled Vanessa’s hands from his neck. He placed them firmly in her lap. ‘I’ve got to go to work now. We’ll talk about it tonight.’

Vanessa wrapped herself in a towel. The bath water had been as hot as she could stand, but she couldn’t stop shivering. What should she wear? The top she’d bought last week, in a vivid peacock blue with lacy ruffles at the neck and cuff, caught her eye, and her hand lingered on the silky material. No – she wouldn’t dress up. She pulled on a pair of jeans, and an old shirt of Andrew’s that she wore for housework.

She sat down at her dressing table and smoothed on foundation. The two bright spots of colour on her cheeks refused to be covered. She leant towards the mirror to outline her eyes with black, but her hand was shaking. The line smudged and she had to clean it off and start again.

In the kitchen, she looked at the clock: ten-forty five. He would be here in fifteen minutes. She knew he would arrive on time. Their reunion would be carefully planned, exactly executed. He probably already knew what they would eat for lunch, the words he would use to seduce her, how she would extricate herself from Andrew. She’d seen him apply the same attention to detail to his work, to exhibitions, business meetings. It was his technique for getting what he wanted. But she was prepared. He wouldn’t get what he wanted this time.

She opened the door of the washing machine and began unloading the wet clothes into the laundry basket. She pulled out a blue shirt of Andrew’s, the one she bought for him last Christmas. He’d worn it at the weekend, when they went into Oxford for dinner. They didn’t go out very often, but it was the anniversary of the day they’d met again in the art gallery. ‘When I got lucky,’ Andrew had said, grinning at her across his glass.

Carrying the basket into the garden, she started hanging the clothes out: a jumper of Jake’s and some little dungarees, a top of Cordelia’s and Esme’s school skirt, Andrew’s shirt. As she pegged the clothing securely to the line, it was as if she was fixing each member of the family in her heart. If she pegged them to her, she couldn’t lose them.

As she picked up the last item, Andrew’s painting sweater, she heard the click of the gate at the bottom of the garden. She closed her eyes. She’d been asking Andrew for months to replace the gate with a fencing panel. ‘It’s handy for the girls,’ he’d said, ‘if they forget their key.’ ‘It makes me feel vulnerable,’ she’d told him.

She opened her eyes. He was on the path next to her. ‘Hello, my butterfly,’ he said.

She swayed, as a surge of vertigo hit her. She was in the old studio at college again. The smell of turps was in her nose. ‘Vanessa. I like the name,’ he said. ‘Where does it come from?’ ‘Jonathan Swift made it up,’ she remembered announcing with absurd pride. ‘Do you know it’s also a type of butterfly?’ The times coalesce: then and now. Now or then: which one made more sense?

‘Why are you in my garden?’ she asked.

‘I knocked at the front door.’

‘Perhaps I didn’t want to answer.’ She pegged the last of the washing on to the line. ‘Had you thought of that?’

He took the peg bag from her hand. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think that.’

‘How do you know I was expecting you?’

‘I met Cordy outside school this morning. She said she’d told you.’

Vanessa snatched the bag from him – it was one Cordelia had made at school and she hated to see his fingers on the PEG BAG carefully embroidered on the side – and marched back into the house. She felt him at her heels. She put the laundry basket on the table and turned round.

He was standing in the doorway. ‘So, this is your domain.’ His eyes raked the dresser where books, mugs, some knitting she’d been doing, Andrew’s sketches were jumbled together. The kitchen suddenly looked too small, too neat, too suburban under his gaze.

‘What are you doing here, Gerald?’ She tried to make her voice hard, but even as she asked the question, she loved hearing herself say his name, the sensation of the sounds pushing against the roof of her mouth, lingering on her tongue.

‘You know exactly why I’m here.’ He took a couple of steps into the room.

She waited for him to circle the table. To stand in front of her. To reach out and take her in his arms. She prepared herself, dreading and longing for the moment.

He didn’t move. He remained the other side of the table. She felt his eyes appraising it, assessing the quality of the wood, as if he might be planning to carve something from it. But this was a horrible thing, some cheap chipboard piece that was already here when she arrived. Despite his keen eye for the perfect landscape for his watercolours, Andrew was indifferent to his everyday surroundings. It was one of the few things they argued about.

She forced herself to meet Gerald’s eyes. They had that same glittering light in them that meant you were never sure if he was amused or mocking, or if the light was like some reverse form of lightning, predicting a storm.

‘I’m here to take you out to lunch, so you’d better get your glad rags on,’ he said. ‘The table’s booked and the taxi will be here in fifteen minutes.’

‘I’m not coming,’ she said.

He laughed. ‘Okay, we’ll play it your way.’ If he was put out at her reply, there was no sign of it. ‘We’ll have lunch here.’

‘Sorry. I’m going shopping later. There’s nothing to eat.’

He laughed again. That wonderful sound that raised an echo deep inside her. ‘I thought you might say that. I’ve brought lunch with me.’ He must have noticed her glance, because he said: ‘I’ve left the bag at the front door. Back in a sec.’

She followed him into the hall and watched him walking to the front door. Now that she couldn’t see his face, couldn’t feel the warmth of his eyes on her, the distance between them was interminable. What if he kept walking? What if he opened the door and went down the path, and carried on walking – out of her life again?

‘Here we are. Goodies to eat and drink.’ Gerald appeared in the doorway again, a carrier bag in each hand. From the gloomy hallway, he was silhouetted against the light from outside. It lit him up, as if he was an angel come to rescue her from the darkness.

In the kitchen, he put the bags on the table. ‘I told the girl in the delicatessen to include the most enticing things in the shop.’ He rifled through one of the bags. ‘Ah, champagne, most important.’ He handed her the bottle. ‘Put that in the fridge.’

She took it from him. The cold stung her fingers. ‘It’s already chilled.’

‘In that case, we’d better open it.’ He delved into the bag again. ‘I’ll just get this lot out.’

Vanessa stared as he unloaded food on to the table: smoked salmon, a crusty loaf, some brie – she could see it was soft and runny just as she liked it – a jar of olives, slices of ham and chicken … ‘How many people are coming to lunch?’ she asked.

He turned to her, grinning. ‘Perhaps I’ve gone over the top. I wanted to spoil you.’

‘I’m not hungry,’ she said, expecting his face to darken: his lips to pout, eyebrows shoot together.

Instead, he winked at her. ‘Love affects the belly, doesn’t it?’

They carried their glasses of champagne into the sitting room. It faced north, and most evenings, Andrew lit a fire and they sat in there, when Jake had gone to bed, and Cordelia and Esme were in their room. Today the air struck cool, almost damp. Ashes were still in the grate, and a jigsaw puzzle she and Andrew had been working on covered most of the coffee table.

Gerald sat on the sofa facing the fireplace, and she went to an armchair on the other side of the fire.

‘Wouldn’t you like to sit here with me?’ he asked.

‘No.’

‘And why is that?’

‘I’m fine where I am.’

‘I see.’

She waited for him to persuade her, but instead he raised his glass. ‘What shall we drink to?’

You going. You packing up all that ridiculous food and getting out of here. ‘I don’t know,’ she said.

‘To us,’ he said. ‘To you and me. The future.’

She took a gulp of champagne without answering. It fizzed in her throat.

Gerald reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and drew out a small leather case. He opened it and took out a cigar. He held it under his nose and breathed in deeply. He let out a long sigh. ‘Mm, aroma of heaven.’

‘You can’t smoke it in here,’ she said.

‘Why not?’

‘I don’t like the smell.’

‘Ho, ho! Time was when you couldn’t wait to try my cigar!’

She glared at him. ‘Maybe. But that was then.’

‘Okay. Okay. I give in.’ He tucked the cigar back into his pocket and held up his hands. ‘Anything to please.’ He nodded to the wall above the mantelpiece. ‘Whose is the painting?’

She couldn’t see it from where she was sitting, but she could visualise the scene, the sludgy greens and browns of the countryside round the cottage, where she and Andrew liked to walk. She hesitated. Andrew would hate to think of Gerald studying his work, the cool assessment of those dark eyes. ‘It’s one of Andrew’s,’ she said.

‘Andrew is the boy from college, right?’

‘You know exactly who he is.’

‘You met up with him again?’

‘I told you in the letters – we met by chance at a gallery.’

‘Must have been fate.’

‘We think so.’

She saw a flash of something in his eyes. Anger? Jealousy? The old Gerald still lurking beneath this affable exterior.

‘He left college early, didn’t he?’

She swallowed some more champagne. Like interference on the television, white stuff filled her head. ‘He left after I married you.’

‘Couldn’t stand the competition?’

‘He was hurt,’ she said, hating the fact that Andrew needed defending. ‘We were together when I met you.’

‘I remember him. He was a child.’

‘So was I. You took advantage of that.’

Gerald let out a great shout of laughter, his mouth wide open. She could see his tongue, red inside the blackness of his beard.

‘You fell into my arms, darling.’ He leant back against the sofa, hands behind his head. He crossed one leg over the other, and she noticed his shoes. They were made from soft brown leather with stitching across the toe. He’d always had beautiful shoes, hand-made from Italy. When he went, he left behind a pair in the wardrobe. She could almost see his foot in the shoe. She remembered being on her knees, cradling them, the smell of the leather.

‘Vanessa, are you okay?’

She nodded. ‘Why?’

‘You seemed far away.’

‘The champagne’s getting to me.’ She stood up. ‘I’d better have some food.’

Vanessa took plates from the cupboard and arranged the cold meats. She sliced the loaf, and set the brie on the cheese board. They sat down at the kitchen table. She cut off some cheese and spread it on her bread.

Gerald piled food on to his plate. He finished his champagne and poured them each another glass. He raised his. ‘To you, Vanessa. You don’t know how good it is to see you again.’

She studied the bubbles in her glass. She could feel Gerald’s eyes on her. The bubbles jumped and popped on the surface of the liquid. Her cheeks grew hot.

‘I had a great evening with Cordy and Esme,’ he said.

She smiled. ‘They enjoyed it too.’ This felt like safer territory.

‘You’ve done a marvellous job with them. You must be very proud.’

A compliment. She looked across at him. Was he mocking her? ‘I am,’ she said. ‘But I couldn’t have done it without Andrew. He’s helped bring them up.’

Gerald’s eyes gleamed. ‘Ah. A reprimand, if I’m not mistaken.’

She chewed at the bread in her mouth. It felt solid and indigestible. She wasn’t going to let him goad her.

‘Their father wasn’t here, so wonder-boy took over,’ Gerald said.

At last she managed to swallow. ‘There’s no need for cutting comments. Andrew’s been a rock.’

‘Maybe. But I’m back now, aren’t I?’

‘That changes nothing. I love Andrew. We’ve got a son.’

‘Jake. That hurts, you know.’

‘You can see the girls from time to time,’ she said. ‘But that’s all it will be.’

‘Really? Are you sure?’ His voice was soft.

She kept her gaze on the brie oozing across her plate. From the corner of her eye, she could see his hand circling his glass. A line of black hairs ran across his fingers just above the knuckles. There was no sign of the ring she gave him the day they married. The hand wasn’t that far away. If she stretched out, she could touch it.

‘Do you remember the day we got married,’ he asked.

She shivered. He’d always been good at reading her mind. ‘How could I forget? The day you persuaded me to lie to my mother. Have a secret wedding.’

‘Don’t say it like that.’ He sounded hurt. ‘You make it sound underhand, furtive.’

‘It was.’

‘No.’ The word was vehement and definite. ‘It was the most romantic, wonderful day of my whole life.’

If she didn’t know better, she’d have thought his voice trembled. She wanted to look at his face, but she didn’t dare.

‘That night when I went … ’

He hesitates, and she waits, hardly wanting to breathe.

‘… I didn’t think for one minute that it was all over.’

‘But you’d had enough. You said.’

‘I was pissed. Angry. Angry with the world. You, as well, but mainly with the world. I couldn’t believe it when I realised what I’d done.’

‘Why didn’t you come back?’ she asked. ‘I longed for you to come back.’

He laughed. Not the usual joyous sound, but a sad whimper of a laugh. ‘I was too pig-headed at first. By the time I was desperate to come home, I didn’t know how to. Didn’t know what to say.’

‘You could have tried ‘sorry’.’

He didn’t answer, and she looked across at him. His head was cradled in his hands. ‘I was never any good at sorry.’ His voice was so quiet, she had to lean over to hear the rest of his words. ‘But I am sorry, Nessa. Sorrier than you can ever imagine.’ He rubbed the back of his hand under his nose, just like Jake did when he was upset.

God, he was crying. She reached out and caught hold of his hand. It was so familiar. Hard, rough from his work. It felt as if she’d never stopped holding it.

His fingers tightened over hers. ‘Come back to my hotel with me, Nessa.’

Her legs started trembling, and she pushed them against the floor to steady them. ‘I can’t,’ she whispered.

‘Please,’ he said. ‘There’s something I want you to see.’

The hotel was in the centre of Oxford. The corridors were lined with thick carpets, and there were huge displays of flowers everywhere. From the window of Gerald’s room, she could see tall spires reaching into the sky. She figured it was All Souls College.

Gerald came to stand next to her at the window. ‘You can come and look now.’ He took her hand and led her to the low table at the foot of the bed.

On it stood a small sculpture carved from wood. The central section was a woman, with a mane of hair cascading down her back, almost to her feet. Her hands were raised against the chest of a male figure. Ragged trousers flapped around his calves. A small child clung to the man’s back, and a baby lay on the ground between the two figures.

Tears pushed at her eyes. ‘It’s us, isn’t it?’

‘I did it in the first months after I left,’ he said. ‘I thought it might show you how sorry I am.’

‘I can’t bear you to be so sad.’

‘Come back to me, Nessa.’

He was kissing her eyes, her cheeks, her throat. Little darting touches of his lips. Each feathery sensation merged into the next. Flames of heat licked her skin. She fumbled with the top button of her shirt. He pulled the shirt open, and she shrugged it from her shoulders. She felt it drop to the floor. He reached behind her back and unhooked her bra. His gaze fastened on her, greedy, frantic.

‘Beautiful,’ he murmured. ‘So beautiful.’ He bent his head, and she felt his mouth on her nipple.

She touched his hair, weaving her fingers through it. It was soft and springy, just as she remembered. She leant backwards, and rocked from side to side.

He straightened up and put his arms round her, pulling her to him.

‘Take your shirt off,’ she said.

It took a moment for him to ease the shirt over his head, but it felt like forever, waiting to touch him. He wrenched free the buttons at his wrists and threw the shirt on to the bed.

She rested her head against his chest. She breathed in the sweet musky smell of his skin. The hair on his chest curled against her cheek, and she turned and buried her face in it.

She felt his hands move to her waist, and then he was fumbling with the zip of her jeans. She undid the button and pushed them down over her hips. She stepped out of them and kicked them away. He caught hold of her knickers and slid them past her thighs, her knees.

‘I want you so much.’ His mouth was against her hair. ‘Do you want to?’

‘Yes.’ The word was scarcely more than a breath.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes.’

He put an arm round her shoulders and hooked the other under her knees. She circled his neck with her arms and laid her head against his shoulder. He carried her over to the bed. The quilt was cool against her skin.

She watched as his hand went to the buckle of his belt. He snapped it open.

Vanessa felt her head vibrate with sound. It took her a moment or two to realise what it was. The phone next to her was ringing. She saw Gerald’s eyes dart to the bedside table and away again. She saw his hands tighten on his belt. Neither of them moved as the ringing went on and on.

‘Are you going to answer it?’ she asked.

‘Bollocks to that!’

‘Who do you think it is?’

‘How the hell should I know?’

The ringing stopped.

‘Thank Christ for that.’ Gerald sank down on to the bed. He clutched his head.

She sat up and folded her arms over her breasts. She pulled her legs up underneath her. She didn’t have enough hands to cover herself up.

‘Who knows you’re staying here?’ she asked.

‘No one.’

‘Did you tell the girls?’

‘No.’

‘Perhaps it’s reception asking if you want afternoon tea.’

The phone began to ring again. Its shrilling tone made her teeth ache in her jaw.

‘I can’t stand it,’ she said. ‘Answer it.’

He stretched forward. She stared at the muscles in his upper arm, powerful and well developed.

‘Gerald Blackstone!’ he snapped into the phone. ‘Who is this?’ He was silent, listening. ‘No, she’s not here,’ he said at last. ‘No, I haven’t seen her.’ … ‘I’ve got no idea.’ …. ‘How did you know where I was?’ … ‘I see.’ He replaced the phone in its cradle and turned to look at her. ‘That was Andrew. He’s checking all the hotels in Oxford.’

Shards of ice seemed to explode on her skin. ‘What did he want? Why ring you?’

‘Guessed you might be with me. Apparently the nursery school phoned him when you didn’t collect your son. He’s been trying to find you ever since.’

‘I thought Sally was picking Jake up. She always does on Tuesdays.’

He stood up and crossed to the window. ‘I don’t know who the fuck Sally is, but it’s Wednesday today.’

‘Oh my God.’ She scrambled off the bed.

Gerald stared out of the window. ‘Wonder-boy’s going to give it another hour or two, and then ring the police.’

She retrieved her knickers from a chair and pulled on her jeans. She scanned the room for the rest of her clothes. Her bra was flung on the bed, her shirt on the floor.

‘Gerald.’

He swung round. ‘Yes?’

‘Don’t be angry with me.’

He came towards her and put his hand under her chin. His eyes searched her face. ‘Darling, I’m not angry. I’m disappointed, upset.’ He took his hand away. ‘If anything I’m angry with myself. I thought I’d got you. Found you again, and now … ’ He shrugged.

She put her hands to her hair, trying to comb it flat with her fingers. ‘You told Andrew you hadn’t seen me.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Why?’

‘He’ll know soon enough you’re coming back to me, but I don’t want him to find out like this. I’m not that much of a bastard.’

‘But he’ll realise,’ she said.

‘How? He might suspect. But he can’t prove anything.’

‘We left all that food on the table.’

He started to laugh. But for once she didn’t want to join in. There was nowhere for a laugh to start. Just a horrible emptiness in the pit of her stomach.

‘You’d better start thinking of a plausible story,’ he said. ‘I’ll phone for a taxi for you.’