Walthamstow, 10 December
Dearest Bel,
I’m so sorry to be writing this. I know what I’ve done will shock you to the core, but I felt I had no choice. Things have been hell recently, for both of us. But you’re so much better at handling it than me. I’ve been feeling as if my head would burst. I know the restaurant is history. And I know I’ve been in denial about the situation. But recently it’s begun to sink in that my lifelong dream for 83 is over. You’ve known for some time, of course. For me, realizing this was the last straw.
Something crazy has happened to me, Bel. I hoped you would never find out about this – I’m not proud of it – but back during lockdown I started dropping in on Trinny sometimes when I went for my run. (As you know, she lives near the park.) It was just sex at first. I like her, obviously, we all do, but I was really just being incredibly selfish and sounding off at what was a difficult time for us all. Then two weeks ago she told me she was four months pregnant. (Christ, even writing this is painful, as I know how I treated you in the past, faced with the same situation, and how devastating it was for you when things didn’t work out back then.) Anyway, Trinny wants to go back to her family – who live in south-west France, as you may remember. And it seemed like the ideal opportunity for a new start. So I’ve gone with her. I know what I said about being a father again, but somehow this feels different – maybe it’s my age. I can get work there easily, I imagine.
I realize you will hate me for this. And I deserve everything you throw at me. But neither of us has been particularly happy for a long while now, Bel. I partly blame my obsession with the restaurant – I haven’t been easy to live with, or very nice to you at times because of it, and I truly apologize for that. Things just seemed to fizzle out between us, didn’t they? Maybe working together, and the financial strain of 83, killed it for us, I don’t know … Anyway, sell the place, take what’s left. I relinquish my share of the flat and the business.
I wish you all the very best in your life, Bel. I will remember what we once had with love and great fondness.
And so, goodbye.
Louis xxx
As Bel sat, letter in hand, on the dusty step leading down to the street from their Walthamstow flat, emotions surged through her body, like a typhoon hurling everything about in its path. Shock, disbelief, excruciating hurt and contempt vied for pole position. But it was pure, uncontaminated rage that won out. Her whole being seemed electrified by it, to such a degree that she was catapulted upright, swinging the hand holding the letter round so hard in the narrow hallway that it hit the wall with brute force and she screamed. But instead of nursing her bruised hand to her chest, she ignored the pain. Instead Bel, who had never screamed in her life, just screamed some more, and louder. Unembarrassed, barely herself, she flopped over, knees bent, back arched, hands balled into fists, and allowed the sound to pour unfettered from her open mouth: an ear-shattering, visceral howl of agony.
No one heard, the blare of the London traffic drowning her out. If anyone did hear, like most city dwellers they would barely have registered it – just someone messing about. Finally she ran out of steam, the noise weakening with every breath until it was just a breathless squeak.
The letter was still in her right fist, crumpled into an angry wad, Louis’s small writing fractured by the heavy creases in the paper. But she unfolded it, smoothed out the single sheet with shaky fingers as she tried to get her breath back.
What shocked her almost more than his words, on this second reading, was his unwavering air of complacency. Yes, she’d hate him, he was saying, But, hey, it is what it is. They hadn’t been happy, after all. And what’s a guy to do, given this wonderful opportunity to dump all responsibility for the collapse of his business – plus his partner of nearly fifteen years, of course – and walk off into the sunset with 83’s pouty French waitress, their baby and a brand new life?
Their baby … That was a step too far. Bel could not deal with that particular agony right now.