I spent the next few days almost feverish with excitement. I replayed those last words that Nick had said at every opportunity: as I fed the twins, as I cleaned the bath, while I helped Dad to deadhead the roses… as I lay, tossing and turning in bed, hugging Nick’s sweater that still held the faint lemon tang of his aftershave.
I left it two days, three days, a week and then, on the ninth day – a Saturday – Lilian agreed that it might not be a bad thing to walk down the lane again. She’d been down the lane earlier with the dog and said that Nick’s car was outside the farmhouse, that he appeared to be at home.
This time I took a long time getting ready. I needed to pull out all the stops. Needed Nick to realise he wanted to come home. To be with me. I showered and then spent ten minutes dithering about what to wear, pulling out outfit after outfit, teaming skirts with tops, trying shoes and then kicking them off before replacing them with another pair. The whole bedroom was beginning to look as if we’d been burgled, ransacked. This was silly. I was reading too much into what he’d said.
I finally plumped for a pair of jeans and white cotton shirt, the new flat white sandals I’d bought the previous week and the single gold chain Nick had given me for my last birthday.
‘You look lovely,’ Lilian said, and then added conspiratorially, ‘Sneak out when India isn’t looking or she’ll want to walk down with you.’
‘My sneaking about days are over,’ I said ruefully. ‘Everything I do now needs to be above board.’
‘You just get down there and see your man. India and I are going to watch a new programme about celebrities tumbling in half an hour.’
‘Tumbling? As in acrobatics? What’s that all about, then?’
‘Tumbling, I think.’ Lilian beamed. ‘It’s going to be grand.’
I was even more nervous than when I’d walked down the lane nine days earlier. But Nick had held my hand, hadn’t he? Spoken to me without anger in his voice? Said that I should give him time? How long did he need? Was I pushing it at nine days? Did he mean nine weeks? Nine months? Nine years? I was beginning to break out in a sweat and nearly turned round… back to the safe haven of home, Lilian, the kids and Bruce Forsyth or whoever doing handstands and double backflips. I took a deep breath, waved to Derek who was out on his tractor doing something farmerish in the bottom field and climbed the stile before walking down the field that led to Nick.
Disappointment hit me like a sack of potatoes: Nick’s silver Audi wasn’t there.
But a rather sporty little number was. A red, jaunty little two seater, its soft top down to greet the evening warmth, was sunning itself in the space next to where Nick’s car usually stood.
My new white sandals seemed rooted to the spot – unsure whether to go forward or make a hasty retreat back up the lane from where they’d just come. Because all I could think of was that terrible evening at university when I was told that Nick, who I had just met and with whom I had fallen deeply in love, was actually involved with Anna Fitzgerald. What were my flatmate, Sara’s, words? ‘Anna Fitzgerald is that gorgeous, upmarket blonde who zooms around the university campus in a little red sports job…’
My heart had gone into overdrive. Shit. Who else could it be? But then, I reasoned, if Nick’s car wasn’t there they must both be out. I could just go down and have a little sneaky peek through the window. I held my head up. You no longer do sneaky, Harriet. Everything above board. Nick is your husband.
I snuck down the lane, pressing myself into the hawthorn hedge, trying to avoid nettles and dog shit but, unfortunately, without success on both counts. I swore, stopped to rub the white weals on my foot with a dock leaf and my sandals on the long grass. Shit. Literally, this time. I climbed over the wall, hugging it all the way down so as to be out of view from the house, stepping over lacy cowpats old and fresh, and finally climbed over the wall that separated Nick’s garden from Derek’s field.
Like a Marine on a mission, I broke cover and ran over to the French windows, shading my eyes against the evening sunshine as I peered into the kitchen. A woman’s handbag ‒ the latest Mulberry, if I wasn’t mistaken – sat brazenly on the granite; a woman’s cream cardigan was flung wantonly over the back of a chair. And then the woman herself. She looked up, started and jumped up as our eyes met.
‘Rebecca,’ I shouted in delight as I realised it wasn’t Anna Fitzgerald. ‘It’s me. Let me in.’
Rebecca opened the French window and I went in. ‘God, I’m so glad it’s you,’ I smiled. ‘When I saw the car I thought it must be bloody Anna Fitzgerald back up to her old tricks again. When did you get back? Fab car. When did you get it? I suppose you can have a two seater for a while until the girls are back. Grace says they’re not coming back until Christmas…’
Rebecca hadn’t said a word, hadn’t made any attempt to hug me ‘hello’. ‘Sorry,’ I laughed, as I saw her face, ‘these sandals stink. Dog shit.’ I unbuckled them and strategically placed them outside the French window before going over to the sink to wash my hands. ‘Where’s Nick? Have you just popped in to see him?’ I turned to face Rebecca. It suddenly seemed a bit strange that she was here and he wasn’t.
‘He’s gone out to get wine. We seem to have run out.’
We? I looked carefully at Rebecca. She was very pale, but her eyes held mine. Defiantly.
‘Am I missing something here, Rebecca?’ I continued to hold her eyes until she looked away and went over to the table to pick up the remains of her glass of wine.
‘You left him, Harriet. You went off with that Alex bloke.’
‘No, Rebecca, I did not leave Nick. What I did was make the biggest mistake of my life. Something that I will regret for the rest of my days.’ And then, when she still didn’t say anything I said, carefully, ‘What’s going on, Rebecca? Why are you here?’
‘I thought that was fairly obvious, Harriet.’ She did have the grace to look embarrassed. ‘Look, I’m sorry, but…’
‘Sorry? Sorry? Rebecca, you were my friend. You are my friend.’
‘Yes,’ she said, defiantly again, ‘and Nick was your husband. And you messed up, Harriet.’
‘Nick is still my husband. God, I don’t believe this. Do you immediately jump into the breach when all your friends’ marriages are in trouble? No wonder you’ve been married three times…’
Two pinpoints of colour had appeared in Rebecca’s otherwise pale face. ‘It’s not like that. I’ve always loved Nick…’
‘Loved him? Rebecca, what are you talking about?’
‘Always thought he was the most wonderful man I’d ever met. I used to go home after I’d been at your house, and cry for what you had with him and that I’d never had. He was always so funny, so kind, so generous. And then you, you stupid bitch, threw it all away for that little wanker, Alex Hamilton. How could you do it, Harriet? How could you do it to Nick?’
The possessive way she said Nick sent an icy shiver down my spine. This woman was no longer my friend. She was my rival. ‘And you say you’ve always loved Nick? And, tell me, does he feel the same?’ The icy shiver seemed to have morphed into one huge block of ice. That was steadily taking over my heart.
‘I think he needs me at the moment. If you think anything of Nick, if you have any love for him at all, you will leave him alone. Don’t mess this up for him. Let him decide what he wants. Because, you need to know, Harriet, I won’t…’
‘You won’t, what? What, Rebecca?’
I knew exactly what she was saying she wouldn’t do. My friend Rebecca had always loved my husband, apparently, and she was determined to have him. I saw, for the first time in years, the fourteen year old Rebecca. The Rebecca determined to win every game of netball, every game of hockey… and then the woman that Rebecca had become, who hit the local headlines with Local Businesswoman Sets New Ironwoman Record: the Rebecca who started new businesses that were so successful she was able to sell out and start another the next day.
I know when I’m beaten. I’d battled Amanda Henderson’s crush on Nick; fought off Anna Fitzgerald. I couldn’t start again with Rebecca Martin. I was tired of it all. All the excitement at the thought of seeing Nick that evening, all the adrenalin which had coursed through every vein and which had so rudely come to nothing, had left me without any fight.
Through a haze of tears I stumbled back through the open French window and made my way back up the lane.
*
‘Harriet, Harriet. For God’s sake, Harriet, stop.’
I didn’t. I didn’t want to stop. I could hear Nick’s voice shouting from behind me as he tried to catch me up. He’d obviously arrived back just as I’d set off, blindly, up the lane and away from Rebecca.
Rebecca in Nick’s house. Rebecca with Nick.
I didn’t want to stop and listen to what he had to say about her. It was too much to bear after he’d been so nice to me on the previous occasion, when I’d thought there might yet be hope for us. How wrong could I have been? I just wanted to go home to Lilian and the kids. I needed some peace. Something was hurting horribly. Was it just my heart? When hearts keep breaking up into little pieces do they make the rest of your body feel as though that’s all broken up too?
Nick grabbed my arm. ‘For fuck’s sake, Hat, look at your feet.’
I’d walked up the stony, rutted lane barefoot, and now, halfway home, my feet were bleeding, scraped and torn. Nick held my sandals in his hand.
‘Thanks,’ I said dully, taking the shoes but not putting them on. I turned in the direction of home once more, set off again.
‘Harriet, stop this. Put your shoes on,’ Nick said gently.
I looked him straight in the eye. ‘You said to me a couple of months ago that you couldn’t do this any more. And I know now what you mean. I can’t carry on like this. I’m tired of it all. I made the biggest mistake in my life, Nick, and I asked you to forgive me.’ I indicated the farmhouse where Rebecca’s car still sat. ‘You obviously have no intention of doing so now.’
Nick took a sandal, pushed me gently on to the broken down wall and kissed my scraped and bleeding toes before easing the sandal on to my foot. ‘Is this the action of a man who can’t forgive his wife?’ When I didn’t say anything, he took the remaining sandal, kissed the other dirty, bleeding foot slowly and, like some sort of Prince Charming, eased that one on too.
Nick took my hand. ‘The one saving grace in all this mess, Harriet, is that I know you do love me.’ He helped me off the wall and took me in his arms. I breathed in his wonderful Nick smell.
‘I love you, Lofflee Cap,’ he smiled, taking my hand. ‘Come on, let’s go home.’