Elsie waited three days.
Three days had passed since Thomas returned from the fishing trip and found her and Aida asleep together in their underwear – three days during which Elsie turned down invitations to afternoon teas, paced loops of the house, ran rags over shelves without thinking, dropped endless stitches in her knitting, listened to the wireless and didn’t hear the music. Intermittently she bit back tears and then embraced bouts of messy, heartsick sobbing.
And then on the fourth morning, Thursday, Elsie managed to get Thomas to glance up at her over his coffee. She told him she would attempt to make meatloaf for tea.
‘I do like meatloaf,’ he’d said.
Elsie’s heart swelled. Meatloaf. She would make him a meatloaf to show him how much she loved him. The only problem was, her meatloaf tended to be more like a dried and tasteless, loosely packed meat crumble than a loaf.
Elsie spent the morning rifling through her stack of magazines. She found several recipes, but nothing that looked or sounded really superior. If she was going to reassure her husband that she loved him dearly, despite the fact that her friendship with Aida had become something . . . ineffable, she needed the kind of meatloaf that men told their workmates about, wrote to their grandmothers about and reminisced over to their children and grandchildren. Elsie needed a meatloaf that said, You matter more to me than I have the words to say. Was it possible to say that with only a splash of Worcestershire sauce, a handful of stuffing mix and a teaspoon of Keens curry powder?
By mid-afternoon, Elsie was frustrated. She had been to the shops and bought beef mince but no other ingredients – because she didn’t know what else she would need.
The tea she served to Thomas when he arrived home certainly didn’t say, Yes I love our neighbour, but I also love and need you. The message Thomas received from his plate of savoury mince and peas was more along the lines of, I’m sorry and I’m lost.
‘I couldn’t find a good recipe for meatloaf,’ she explained, as she watched him gingerly insert his fork. A fat tear rolled down Elsie’s cheek, hung from her jaw and plopped into her mince. At her sniffling Thomas glanced up, but looked quickly back down at his own plate.
When they went to bed, Elsie pressed her hand onto the expanse of mattress between them, and it felt cool to her touch.
*
The quandary that presented itself to Elsie on the fifth morning – Friday – was this:
Should she tell Thomas?
If she told him, the surprise might be ruined. But if she didn’t tell him, his sense of mistrust and anguish would only be heightened. If she explained, after the fact, that the reason she had gone to see Aida really was because Aida would know a recipe for exceptional meatloaf, that would only sound like an excuse. But if she told Thomas that morning, before he went to work, that she intended to go to Aida’s . . . would that offer her some semblance of integrity? Trustworthiness?
Was it possible to be trustworthy when only days after one’s husband had forbidden contact with one’s admitted paramour, one was begging for clemency on account of meatloaf?
Elsie set two fried eggs in front of Thomas.
‘There’s something I want to ask you,’ she said.
He looked up and her stomach twisted to see that his expression was faintly terrified.
‘I’m determined to make this meatloaf that I promised you, only I’m having trouble finding a good recipe.’
‘Would you like me to pick you up a new recipe book from town?’
It felt like a step forward; the ice was broken. ‘Thank you, darling, but no. I . . . I was thinking of going next door. To ask Aida.’
A forkful of egg and toast stalled halfway to Thomas’s mouth. He set the fork down. ‘I think it’s best if –’
‘I’m only getting a recipe. That’s all. Look, I know it’s been difficult,’ she went on, carefully, ‘but I think it’s also important that we try not to brush this under the carpet. Together we can face this, my love. We can face anything. For better or worse, remember?’
‘Seems a little ironic for you to be quoting our wedding vows at me.’ He picked up his fork again. ‘What about “love, honour and obey”?’
‘None of that has changed.’
The kitchen went silent. Elsie could tell Thomas was thinking – properly, seriously considering – and with this realisation she could have leapt from her seat with joy.
He said, ‘I don’t want a meatloaf that badly.’
‘But with the right recipe –’
‘No.’ He said it so quietly she strained to hear.
‘Thomas,’ she said. ‘I want you to trust me.’
‘It’s not that I don’t trust you. It’s that . . . I don’t know what it is. What is this, Elsie?’ He dropped his fork; a piece of egg white rocketed across the table. ‘What do you want from me? To accept your affair? To look the other way while you cavort with the woman next door? Who, by the way, I’m not altogether convinced is married to an absent miner.’
‘It’s not an affair.’ Elsie looked him in the eye. ‘And you’re right, she isn’t married. That was a cover.’
‘A cover for what?’
‘For living alone, pregnant.’
His mouth opened soundlessly a couple of times. ‘But she’s not . . . anymore. Where’s the baby?’
‘Given away,’ she said quietly. ‘It happens.’
‘Jesus Christ, Elsie.’
Time stilled between them. Egg yolk congealed on the edge of Thomas’s plate; steam dwindled from their cups. Outside the wind plucked at a loose piece of tin on the garden shed. They both heard the echo of it: It happens.
Finally Elsie said, ‘She’s a kind and loving person, Thomas. Forget about the made-up story. It’s only for protection – people do it all the time. It’s . . .’ she searched for the words, frustration and anger mounting. ‘I don’t bloody know either. But I love you and we’re married, and she’s my dear friend and I love her too.’ Helplessly, she tossed her hands. ‘Has anything changed that badly?’
He stared at her, mouth agape. ‘Other than you being attracted to women?’
‘I’m not attracted to women.’
‘Just the woman next door.’
‘Precisely!’ she shouted, surprising herself. ‘Only her.’ Elsie breathed in and out. ‘I know you’re hurt. Believe me, I am, too. But will you please let me talk to her? I promise, nothing else. Only talk. About meatloaf.’
Thomas said, ‘Meatloaf.’
‘Okay?’
‘I . . .’ He blinked furiously. ‘I can’t tell you what to do. I don’t own you.’
They stared at each other, neither knowing what else to say, neither any closer to understanding.