I was walking past a bookshop on the main boulevard when I saw a bowed head I recognised, behind the reflections of the passing traffic. I walked inside and it was her, Sarah, fingering some paperback with her face towards the shelves. I could take time there to see what a picture she made and to comprehend how any random passer-by might admire her, and possibly desire her. She seemed untouched by the heat, wearing the same light summer dress that she had left the house in, and I moved closer, and tried to pretend to myself she was a stranger. Her weight was on her left foot and the canvas sandal with the raised heel was hanging loose on the right. The thin muscular calf and the ankle, swinging lazily back and forwards, with the sandal making the slightest of sounds on the wooden floor. And I was almost behind her, inhaling her scent, when she turned and looked at me without any surprise whatsoever. She grimaced, then smiled.
Are you checking on me? she asked.
Yes, I told her. I’m an obsessive-compulsive wife-checker.
And you’re funny, for once.
I’m on my way to pick up Jenny, I said. It’s her music time. And what’s your excuse?
I’m on a break, she said, between lectures.
She thumbed the book then, and for the first time I noticed her nails. They were varnished, red.
New nails, I said.
Yes, she said. There’s a place that does them round the corner.
She thumbed the book again.
It’s called Nine Suitcases. About a couple who got stuck in a city like this, during the war. Because the wife wouldn’t travel without her nine suitcases. They ended up in separate camps. But they survived.
Separately or together?
I’d have to buy it to find out.
She turned her head to the book, and I moved my face near to the nape of her neck. I inhaled her hair, and felt how different it was, how real. It almost had a taste, like vanilla. And she said, without turning round, I want to be with you when we’re older, Jonathan. When we get through all of this.
I let him go, I said.
Oh God, she said.
Wasn’t the situation kind of untenable?
Maybe, she said.
We both thought so, I lied. And I wondered why I was lying.
And maybe you’re right. It’s just so . . .
So what?
So obvious. So vulgar. Unmanly.
And there was that word again. I had to do something about it.
You used to be strong, my dear, she said.
Isn’t a sacking better than a throttling?
Are you so sure?
I’m sure.
Yes. You’re sure about everything, now. Aren’t you? She turned and looked at me and there were tears in her eyes. And we’re not through it yet.
No?
No. We’re in a plane. Over some strange city. In a holding pattern.
She looked at her watch.
And doesn’t one of us have to pick up Jenny?
Me, I said. I have her music in the car.
Go on then.
And her hand reached out and squeezed mine, briefly. I turned it and saw again the newly painted nails.
I envy women, I said.
Why?
These strange rituals, all this beauty stuff.
I brought the red nails to my lips.
Gives us time to think, she said. I could paint yours sometime.
Or would that be too unmanly?