Chapter 9: Miscalculations

Kent, January 1976

Anya pulled the silver trunk out of the cupboard in the room that she called her study and Geoff called the spare room. She unlocked it and looked at the volumes, carefully choosing one from almost exactly three years before.

Tuesday 9th January 1973

Well here we go then. G’s off to his second day at work and I’m alone for the day. It’s been two weeks since we said goodbye to the flat, goodbye to Liverpool, goodbye to Anya Cave. I must learn to be Anya Philips somehow. The house was ready to move into when we came down but it’s just a house not a home and that has to be my job. But I will not be just a housewife. Unless I can make a life for myself I will grow to resent G so much for tricking me into this position. I will not be a Stepford wife. I will make a life for myself.

Christmas Eve at the Oak T and I talked. It was good to talk. I was probably so tired after the drive I gave too much away I told him we’d moved down. He talked about his problems I talked about mine. He said although he fancied the pants off me (his words) we couldn’t do the sex thing (his words again). But he said I wasn’t to worry about being alone. He understood how difficult it would be for me and he’d always be there to talk to, so I’d always have someone on my side. Did he think already that G wouldn’t be?

I think about Dr Hill a lot. He really was a friend. I went to see him before we left, just to say goodbye. I said I’d come and see him whenever I could but we both knew we’d never meet again. How melodramatic is that. I promised I would never forget what Dot had said and never forget what they had done for me. I think he realised what I had already realised, that it was a mistake to have married G. We should have just lived together, and then I could have upped sticks and escaped at any time. Marrying G has meant I’ve lost control of my life.

Anya looked up from the diary and stared out of the window at the garden, her garden.

It was Sunday and Geoff had gone to his mother’s for lunch. As had been usual for most of the previous three years, she stayed at home. She had joined him on Sundays for the first few months despite it being obvious she was not welcome. She had listened politely to the conversation, answering the few questions that were directed her way, usually by Geoff, and trying to be part of the family. Despite his promises to be her ally, Tim seemed to do his best to ignore her. Irrationally, she had felt betrayed. The visit that was to be her last was spent discussing plans for the increasingly imminent birth of Margaret’s baby. Kathleen had commented ‘of course that’s something Geoffrey will never have to worry about unless he comes to his senses and divorces the woman.’ Anya had looked towards Geoff expecting him to remonstrate with his mother but he kept quiet and avoided meeting her eyes. The next week she cooked Sunday lunch expecting that they would both stay at home but his mother’s hold on him was too strong.

She looked back at her diaries and flipped through Anya Philips 1974.

Sunday, no need to date it, it’s just the same as every other bloody Sunday

Woke up half an hour before the alarm. Lay in bed waiting for G to wake up. Sex, excellent, as ever. Breakfast always the same on a Sunday scrambled eggs, orange juice, freshly ground coffee. Second coffee no later than 10 while reading papers. 11.30 G leaves for T & M or K (alternating weeks). Why does he keep going without me? He said his mother said I wasn’t to darken her door any more. I said he should tell her it was his fucking door. And when it’s at T & M’s why doesn’t T make them include me? He said he would be my friend and he’s done nothing. But still G goes off every Sunday for lunch with the family and muggins here stays at home. Why do I put up with it? No idea. G gets back 5ish. Always awkward for a bit as he tells me how awful it was, what M said, what T did, what the children got up to. Doesn’t he realise? He just doesn’t think. He wouldn’t do it if he knew how much it hurts. Rest of the weeks are OK. But Sundays I can do without.

She put Anya Philips 1974 back in the box and pulled out Anya Philips 1975. She held it unopened in her hands as she stared out of the window. The garden looked lovely as the sun melted the frost from the lawn. She watched as the area of white slowly receded as the sun rose higher on the clear January morning. The flower beds were empty apart from carefully located perennial shrubs which gave some colour and she noticed the first signs of bulbs sprouting signalling that spring would inevitably arrive. Discouraged from finding a career, Anya had found she had a talent for gardening and enjoyed writing irregular articles for the local newspapers. She would miss the garden when the farce that was her marriage was finally brought to an end. She knew she had to leave Geoff but she still loved him and just looking at him when he was unaware of her scrutiny always softened her resolve. She knew that, had they not moved to this house, in this area, they would have been happy. But they had and they weren’t.

She wanted to understand why he was letting his mother change him into a man she knew he didn’t really want to be. She wanted to understand so she could forgive him. But she could do neither.

She wrote Anya Philips née Cave 1976 on the cover of a new volume. It was only eight years since she had left school with a briefcase full of exercise books from the stationery cupboard for her diary. It felt so much longer than that.

She looked at the empty page and decided to write a letter which, like her mother’s, would never be posted.

Sunday 11th January 1976

Darling Geoff,

Tomorrow I go to a solicitor and get our divorce under way. While you’re with your mother I’m spending the afternoon preparing to end our time together.

Geoff I love you so much. We started this marriage wrong, you really should have told me what you were planning, but I did try to make the best of it. It would have helped so much if you could have been more on my side. Whenever there was a choice to be made between ‘them’ and me ‘they’ always won. You and I were happy before we were married, but we were fooling ourselves weren’t we? As soon as we moved down here your mother got her talons into you. I did see it coming that first Christmas. Family. Tradition. It was so important to you all and I could never be part of that. I should have known that, sooner or later, Family would be more important to you than I could ever be. I should have realised that it would become important to you that we couldn’t have children. You could have children, but you couldn’t if you stayed married to me. Your mother was right after all.

Why did you tell her about me? When? How? I wish we could talk about the things that matter. But we have never done that have we? You’ve never believed that the ring was my Mum’s but you never talk about it. Your resentment just festers. You probably think the locket has some sordid explanation but I’ve never told you where it came from because you never asked. You’ve certainly never been brave enough to ask me why I can’t have children.

We never talk about anything that matters in our lives. We can’t speak about your so important, hush hush work at the Ministry of Defence and you’ve never told me anything about your father’s business and all those meetings you go to, all the papers you read, you never tell me anything. You never encouraged me to do anything other than look after you and the house. When I found an agent who believed in me and had begun to get some of my stuff published you didn’t once say you were proud of me. You didn’t once give me any encouragement. I’m as clever, as quick witted, as intelligent, as bright as you but you go to work and I stay at home doing the bloody gardening. Why don’t you understand how miserable that makes me? It’s as if you don’t trust me out in the big wide world. At least it seems like that.

I’ve never been accepted into your family, not really. Not at all really. Every Christmas, every Easter, every family birthday was celebrated and every celebration seemed to have the sole function of making me feel inadequate. Children, the next generation, the Family, it was so important to you all and I couldn’t contribute anything. I always wanted to tell you about my mother, where I came from, why at times I hate being me so much, but you never asked. Not once. If you had I’d have told you all my fears and worries. Maybe you tried. You must have tried. Probably, if I’m honest, a lot of that was my fault.

Could we have made it with perseverance? Or luck? I doubt it, not with the persistence and the sheer bloody-mindedness of your mother.

If I don’t leave now it’ll be too late for us both. I’m sure you don’t want a divorce. But it’s inevitable now isn’t it? How am I going to explain to a stranger how difficult the past three years have been and how impossible it is to continue like this when I can’t even make you understand? You don’t see there’s a problem do you?

I think you’re as scared of change as I am.

I think I’ll never love anyone else as I’ve loved, and still love, you.

She turned back to the window and watched the lengthening shadows as she waited for Geoff to get home.

“Now, Mrs Philips, you say you want to discuss a divorce from your husband. Have you any idea of the grounds?”

Anya sat in Stuart Benthall’s office trying to overcome the feeling that this boy was far too young to be a solicitor and wondering whether she was making an awful mistake.

“Oh yes. Adultery.”

“Your husband has been unfaithful to you?”

“Of course, but I have no names or any idea who they were. But I’ve been unfaithful to him. I’ve got the details of that. Can’t we use that?”

“I’m not entirely sure that it works that way round Mrs Philips. You’d have to get him to divorce you.”

“I don’t think he wants to divorce me, at least he’s never mentioned it.”

“So we’ll have to find other grounds.”

“I’m quite happy to be the guilty party.”

“But then your husband would have to start the proceedings.”

“I can’t see him doing that.”

“So,” the young solicitor repeated slowly and with laboured patience, “as I said, we’ll have to work out other grounds. Let me take some details.”

Anya gave him the details he requested, her name and address, the date of their marriage. “Have you any children?”

“No. There are no children.” Her tone told the young man that that was not a subject for discussion.

“Do you still live together, in the same house?”

“Oh yes.”

“Are you still, um, do you still, um …” He was obviously so embarrassed she interrupted.

“You mean do we still sleep together? Oh yes.”

“So the marriage is, shall we say, on-going?”

“On that front yes.”

“May I ask why you want a divorce then?”

“Several reasons.” Anya answered defiantly. “I can’t stand always having to ask him for money, his family hate me and I really want a fresh start while I’m still young enough.”

“In my understanding of the law I’m not sure those points are sufficient grounds for divorce.” He replaced his glasses and peered at the paper in front of him. “You married quite young I see?”

“I was 22, is that young?”

“Quite. Can you give me some background? How you met, that sort of thing?”

“We met at university, we got on well together. I had no family. It seemed like a good idea at the time.” She blurted out not sure whether it was explanation, reason or excuse. Realising that she should perhaps show Geoff up in a less positive light she added “He tricked me into saying yes when he proposed.”

Seeing a look something like relief on the young solicitor’s face she elaborated. “I come from Liverpool, we lived there and I wanted to stay there but he’d already got a job down here when he asked me and he hadn’t told me.” She watched as he wrote careful notes.

“That’s not much to go on Mrs Philips. You came south and you live in a nice house in a nice area. Many would say you were lucky indeed to have such a secure financial life in these recessionary times. I gather your husband has supported you financially throughout the marriage?”

“I always wanted to work, I’m well qualified, but all I’ve been allowed to do is some freelance writing. That’s brought in a little money but Geoff says I should keep it for myself. Geoff’s inheritance from his father was enormous so we never had to worry about that sort of thing.”

“But your husband has a career as well as his family money?”

“Oh yes. He works with computers and he’s done really well. He’s very clever you know.”

“So what has been your contribution to the marriage?”

“That’s a funny question. I look after the house, look after him. What else is a wife who isn’t allowed to have a job supposed to do?”

“You say you haven’t any children?” The solicitor left the question open.

“I can’t. I was sterilised as a child.”

Stuart hid his feelings well. “And your husband knew this?”

“Geoff has known since the beginning though he doesn’t know why. He didn’t just accept it, he thought it was great because we didn’t have to worry about contraception or anything. He’s never asked why.”

“So,” He paused and looked carefully through the notes he had taken. “So, you had an intimate relationship before you were married and your husband was fully understanding of your, shall we say, circumstances, yet he married you anyway?”

“Yes.” There seemed little else to say.

“That’s unfortunate. Had he not known, had it been new information so to speak, it could have been an acceptable reason for him to bring an action against you.”

“But I’m sure he won’t. He doesn’t want to divorce me.”

“We must find something he has done wrong, nothing you have done, or have not been able to do, will help.”

Anya became more challenging. “I could cite his unreasonable behaviour with his mother. He meets her at least twice a week and I’m never invited to join them. He goes on holiday with her, for Christ’s sake, making sure I don’t go with them. It’s perverted.”

Stuart was somewhat taken aback by Anya’s sudden vehemence but he was determined to stay professional. “When they go on holiday do you have any indication of…” he paused to find the right words, “any indication of intimacy between them. Such a relationship between mother and son is not unknown but we would need some proof.”

“Oh no! They don’t sleep together!” Anya grimaced at the thought.

“But you said they were very close.”

“Too close for comfort but not in that way.” Stuart was obviously relieved that he didn’t have a case of incest to deal with and concentrated hard on his notes as Anya gave him some background. “Geoff’s father died in an accident the day he was born and ever since that day I think she has been very confused about things. She gave her son the same name as her dead husband. That was really weird. I think, as Geoff has got older, and he does look very like his dad, I think she wishes…” Anya couldn’t finish the sentence. “Anyway she hates me. She has done from the beginning. She always considered me unsuitable for her son. Mind you, no one could ever be good enough for her Geoffrey.”

“It must have been difficult.” Stuart began to have more sympathy for his client. Up until that point he had put her down as a spoilt rich girl who was bored with her husband and wanted to explore pastures new.

“It has been.”

“But you have found… comfort … elsewhere?”

“Oh yes.” Anya agreed enthusiastically. “Geoff has always encouraged me to have sex with other men. In the early days it turned him on. When we were first married we had a year or so when we were faithful to each other but since then we’ve had a very open marriage. Sex really isn’t that important is it? It’s just for fun, at least it should be.”

The young solicitor tried to hide his shock, not so much at the promiscuity she spoke of, but of her willingness to admit to it. “How many partners would you say you have had then?”

“I have absolutely no idea. Everyone slept around then. Everyone did in the 60s, we just carried on into the 70s.” She felt that was explanation enough.

“What about your husband? Has he had many partners?”

“I really don’t know. When we were in Liverpool he was pretty wild but now he doesn’t tell me when or who he’s been with. I never ask.”

“To divorce him you’d have to name a particular person who has destroyed your marriage. More than a one night stand you understand?”

“Other than with his mother?” She asked with half a smile.

“Obviously.” He nearly grinned back.

“I don’t think there’s been one more important than any other. I leave him to it. As I said, the act of sex isn’t important. It’s a biological thing, nothing to do with how good a relationship is. Why does the law think otherwise?”

“I really don’t know Mrs Philips.”

Stuart again checked through his notes. Anya looked around the old fashioned office, the bare floor boards were wide and highly polished, the bookshelves were filled with volumes which all looked the same but had different years on the binding. She had chosen this firm because it was the first in the list in the phone book. The receptionist had said that ‘Mr Benthall is our divorce specialist. We don’t get much call for divorce so he’s not too busy.’ Anya couldn’t help thinking that that wasn’t the sort of information the receptionist should have been giving out.

“You seem to have had a very free, open and modern marriage Mrs Philips.”

“I suppose it looks like that, sexually at any rate, but in every other way it has been horribly traditional. Husband goes to work leaving wife at home to do all the housework, plan the meals etcetera. In any time that is left she is allowed to develop her career, but that is not encouraged. Husband comes home in the evening expecting his meal, his slippers warmed and his marital comforts. Wife is dependent for all things on her husband. It’s really very traditional. Have you seen the film Stepford Wives, read the book perhaps? No? Never mind.”

“I’m not sure I understand what you want me to do. Do you want to divorce your husband using his many extra marital relationships as reason for the irretrievable breakdown? If that is the case I think our main problem is the openness and freeness of your marriage. You say he doesn’t want a divorce in which case he could argue that you agreed, with no pressure whatsoever from him, to have had this openness in your relationship, even before your marriage. I think that might be tricky. You wouldn’t consider leaving him and then suing for divorce on the grounds that you have lived apart for five years?”

“I’m 26 soon. I need to start my new life now, not when I’m over 30.”

“Well how do you think you might persuade your husband to divorce you? You’re obviously happy to admit adultery.”

“I don’t think he will, he really doesn’t seem to think there’s a problem. Why would he want anything to change? Life’s great for him he’s got everything he wants or needs. Perhaps he’s still fighting his mother. She never wanted him to marry me in the first place, perhaps he would think she had won the battle between them if he divorced me. I’ve often wondered why he’s never mentioned it, I’m sure his mother does every week, though maybe she’s torn between wanting to get rid of me and the social stigma of a divorce in the family.”

“I’m afraid divorce is not the stigma it was a few years ago, Mrs Philips.”

“But still, in her circles, at the Golf Club, it is probably something not to be taken lightly and she is a dreadful snob.”

“I think I have understood that from what you have been saying, but divorce is something to be taken as seriously as marriage.”

“I’m not taking it lightly, Mr Benthall. I just see it as the best option for both of us, the only option really.”

“If it’s really what you want to do…”

“It is.”

“Then I’m afraid we’ll have to get proof of a serious adulterous relationship, one that is far beyond what you have always seen as acceptable, and then sue him for divorce on those grounds. I’m afraid nothing else is likely to succeed, though he’ll be advised to counter the charge and, I should warn you, it could get very messy.”

“I’ll face that if I have to.”

“Can you think of anyone who would stand out from the usual casual affaires you both seem to have had and accepted in your marriage?”

“There’s only Fiona. They go back a long way, she was his girlfriend before we met. Their families have known each other since time began.”

“Ah, there we may have something.” Stuart sat back in his chair and made an arch with his long fingers.

Ten minutes later they had their strategy. Anya would issue divorce papers naming Fiona Shepherd. Geoff would undoubtedly object on the grounds that it was untrue and prepare to fight but Kathleen would throw their hands up in horror at the scandal. After some discussion Anya would reluctantly agree to be the guilty party to save Fiona’s good name. Knowing it would never happen, she would provocatively suggest they name Tim. That would serve them all right for treating her so badly for three years.

That afternoon Anya sat and wrote her diary, spending more time thinking about what she was to write than actually writing.

Monday 12th January 1976

Solicitors today. So many things I didn’t say, couldn’t say. He asked why Geoff and I married. I couldn’t say. If I could go back to that morning in the Lakes I would say No and No and No again. I knew it was the wrong thing to do, especially when he told me he had a job, and wanted a house so he could be near his mother. I should have known I could never win in a straight fight between the mountain and Mohammed.

I couldn’t tell the solicitor why I keep going with other men. I’m annoyed with Geoff. I’m annoyed with me. I’m annoyed with Tim. I really thought Tim & I would get together a lot but we haven’t since his wedding day. He gave up far too easily in the face of Margaret’s obvious trap, she knew exactly what she was doing. Tim, the father, would never play away, let alone leave her. He said he would be my friend, my ally, but he hasn’t been. He just left me to fight them all on my own.

When I was 16, even when I first went with Geoff, fucking around had seemed so rebellious, so adventurous, so modern, but now all it seems is rather sad and sordid. In the past four years Tim and Margaret had Matthew two years after Maggie. Dave had a boy five months after his wedding and then John’s twins came two months later. All of them. But not me. Geoff never understood what that felt like. If he did he never bothered to make me feel any better about it. But then perhaps I should try to understand a bit more about what he feels about it now, but it’s so difficult to talk. I say he has never asked me why I can’t be like every other bloody woman in the world but then I suppose I’ve never sat him down and made him listen. Well divorce will be the best thing for both of us and then he can get married ‘suitably’ and join the rest of them breeding the next generation of the toffee-nosed middle classes.

“Do you ever see anything of Fiona?” She asked innocently enough at breakfast the next morning.

Geoff looked up from his paper. “Fiona? Whatever’s made you think of her?”

“I thought I saw her in the town last week and wondered what she was up to. Has she ever forgiven you for stealing her virginity?”

“Probably not.” Geoff made a show of concentrating on his paper.

“Has she ever forgiven you for dumping her?”

“I did not dump her. There is, was, nothing to dump.”

Anya knew when Geoff was hiding something. He was a very bad liar. Perhaps she had accidentally hit on something that was actually going on. “Is, was?” She asked suspiciously.

“Anya what’s all this about? You haven’t thought about Fiona for years. Why bring up the subject now. Anyway I’ve got to go.” He folded his paper, stood up, and left without kissing her goodbye.

“Guilty as charged me lud.” Anya said to his departing back. She thought of all those days he said he was with his mother, that week in the Spring when he had said he had gone to Germany with her. She knew with utter certainty what was going on. Kathleen was throwing them together and he was going through the motions because he could not tell his mother he loved his wife. How naïve she had been.

She went upstairs to her study, opened her steel box and took out a new exercise book. She wrote Fiona Shepherd, January 1976 on the cover. She was going to follow Fiona and log everything she did for the week, a month, for as long as it took.

It wasn’t difficult for Anya to find out the bare bones of Fiona’s life. Looking through their Christmas cards, so recently taken down, she found the one signed Bonnie, Richard and Fiona with their address printed ostentatiously in gold italics underneath the traditional seasonal greetings. Fiona was 26 years old yet was unmarried and still lived with her parents. Feeling like a character in a television police drama Anya filled a thermos flask with coffee and, collecting a rug to keep her warm and her notebook to record everything she saw, she set out to follow Fiona.

She spent every day that week sitting in her car outside the Shepherd’s house or following the red mini through the lanes to the stables where Fiona kept her horses. When Fiona set off to ride around the bridleways and through the woods there was nothing Anya could do but wait in her car. Anya was frustrated as she could have no idea what Fiona was up to on her rides, or who she might be meeting.

After a week Anya realised there was a pattern to Fiona’s day. Whatever time she left her home she would always set off for her ride within five or ten minutes of 12 o’clock and she always returned to the stables between 2 and 2:30. In Anya’s suspicious mind that meant she was meeting someone for lunch but she had no way of knowing who that someone might be and where an assignation might take place.

Anya spent one of her day’s vigils looking at the Ordnance Survey map. She wished she knew more about horses and how far one might travel in, say, half an hour. Thinking it couldn’t be much more than two or three miles from the stable she decided not to follow Fiona but to spend Friday lunchtime parked outside a pub that was less than two miles from Fiona’s stables and also happened to be close to Geoff’s work.

She wrote her report as soon as she got home.

Friday 16th January, 1976

Sat in car park at The Chequers wondering why I was wasting my time when three cars arrived. None were Geoff’s but he was a passenger in one. I hadn’t seen him that relaxed and carefree for months. There were eight or nine of them, obviously going for their Friday lunchtime beer. I would like to have had a job where we all went out to the pub on a Friday lunchtime. I didn’t recognise anyone. He had always kept his life at work completely separate. I wondered what he would say if I joined him in the pub. Would he be embarrassed or angry? I felt stupid spying on him so I was about to start the car and leave him to his friends when I saw the horse. Fiona. I left it a few minutes before going into the bar. It was a small country pub and it was packed, the Friday lunchtime crowd was noisy so I stood near the door wondering whether I hoped he would see me or not. Fiona was standing next to Geoff, she seemed to know the others as they were all laughing and talking at the same time. She was a regular part of this separate life of his. I left.

I know that this was exactly what I had wished for, what I thought was the best for both of us. Well, what do they say? Be careful what you wish for in case it comes true. The bastard. The absolute fucking miserable toe-rag of a bastard.

Anya sat staring out of the window. She had wanted a divorce, she had wanted a new start in life, but as soon as she was faced with the very real prospect of losing Geoff she wasn’t at all certain she was doing the right thing.

The next Sunday morning Anya followed Geoff when he left for lunch. She had wondered whether he would be meeting Fiona, maybe even having lunch at her parents, but he drove directly to his mother’s house pulling into the drive as Anya parked on the road, out of sight. She wasn’t sure why she was so suspicious, there was no reason why this should be any different from every other Sunday lunchtime. It was, she told herself, a family Sunday lunch just like every other week. She started the car and did a three point turn ready to return home when she saw a Jaguar she did not recognise turn into the drive with Fiona sitting in the back. She slammed on her brakes and cradled her head in her arms on the steering wheel. Fiona, with her parents, was invited to Kathleen’s Sunday lunch. Anya bit her lip. It was all arranged. Kathleen had won. Geoff and Fiona were seeing each other. They were simply waiting for her, Anya, to be out of their way.

The next morning she phoned Tim at work.

“Does Geoff want a divorce?” She asked without preamble.

“Ask him not me.” He was obviously annoyed to get the call.

“I’m asking you.”

“Of course he doesn’t.” Tim didn’t sound convincing.

“Then why is the sainted Fiona having Sunday lunch with the Philips family? Why are her parents there? Why is everyone there but me?”

“How do you know about that?”

“I followed him.”

“You what?”

“I followed him. I parked the car at the end of the drive and watched everyone arrive for the cosy Sunday family lunch. How do you think that makes me feel?”

“It’s Kathleen you know. Geoff’s only doing what his mother wants him to do.” Tim sounded almost apologetic.

“What? Divorce me and marry the sainted Fiona? Have lots of little Philipses? Keep the tight knit little group of snobs together free from outside infestation?”

“That’s not exactly fair.”

“You’ve given in haven’t you? After all that rubbish about being my friend and ally against Kathleen you’re really just the same as them. Margaret trapped you with her pregnancies and you’ve just given up haven’t you? You’ve just given in for an easy life.” He didn’t reply for just long enough for Anya to realise she had hit home. She continued, letting her anger and frustration surface. “You promised me you’d help me when I needed it and now I need it. You’ve got to help me get out of this with a little dignity.”

“Keep me out of this.”

“So why doesn’t he do it? I bet the families are all in agreement and the mothers are already planning wedding number two. Why doesn’t he kick me out? Why doesn’t he divorce me?” Tim didn’t answer so Anya answered for him.

“I’ll tell you why, it’s because he still loves me. He doesn’t want to do what his mother wants. He’s holding out against them isn’t he?”

Still Tim said nothing.

“What a fucking joke! I want a divorce and I’m more than willing to be the guilty party but he won’t do it!”

In contrast to Anya’s rising hysteria Tim’s voice was calm, almost sad. “In time Kathleen always gets her way and she wants your nose rubbed in the dirt. She wants you humiliated, she will make sure as many men as she has evidence for will be named. She wants your reputation so destroyed you won’t go near any of us again.”

“She has evidence for?” Anya quoted back at Tim.

“She’s had a private detective follow you for months.”

Anya took that news in her stride even though she wondered what Kathleen would make of the reports detailing the following of Fiona. “But still Geoff doesn’t want to do it?”

“Kathleen and Fiona will win in the end. You know that.”

“Then make it easy for everyone. Be my single co-respondent. Sign the papers and everything will go through quickly and easily. No blood on the carpet.”

“No Anya I won’t do it. It would wreck my reputation and my family.”

“So it’s your reputation or mine?”

“You have nothing to lose. I have.”

“That is so unfair. I’ll name you anyway. I’ll make sure you’re on the list.”

“If I hear you naming me I’ll say you’re delusional.”

“That’s hateful.”

“I mean it Anya.”

“So you’ll leave me to the wolves?”

“Goodbye Anya.”

“I can’t believe you’d be so hateful. After all the promises you made.”

“I made no promises to you Anya.” And he put the phone down. She thought he almost sounded sad.

Friday 23rd January 1976

For months I’ve thought I’m unhappy, I’ve thought the only way out is to leave Geoff and make a life of my own and now it’s about to happen I don’t want it to. I look at him and I love him. But it’s all too late now. I made myself read back through the last year’s diaries. I can’t possibly carry on like that. Can I? No.

I started talking about it in a really reasonable way after we’d eaten. I said we needed to talk. He knew what it was about. I said I’d name Fiona as I’d seen them together. He laughed and said that was silly. They were just old friends. So I said I’d seen them last week, with all his friends from work. He said it was her birthday so he’d asked her up. And I said that was why she was at lunch with them on Sunday was it? He had the grace to look sheepish and I was trying to keep my cool. I said I was going to divorce him and name Fiona. He said couldn’t we be civilised. He seemed quite sad when he said that he loved me, had always loved me, but he realised now he needed children more. I said no, he didn’t, his mother did. I said I loved him too. This is so fucking stupid! We made love one last time. I said could we have an affair after he’d married her. He said he didn’t think that would be a very good idea and we went to sleep in each other’s arms.

I woke up in the night so I got up and came in here to write it all down. I know I’ll want to remember how sad I feel about it all. One day.

Anya was amazed at how quickly life could change once the decision was made. The next day she went into a letting agency to find a place to live. There were problems to be overcome, Anya had, as the girl in the agency pointed out with a singular lack of interest, no job and no regular income. It took some explanation of her circumstances and a down payment of six month’s rent in advance, over and above the deposit of three month’s rent, to secure her a home. She could move in in a week’s time, subject to satisfactory references. She hadn’t even seen the house, a two up two down cottage in a terrace of five in a tiny hamlet three miles from the town, but as she looked at the photograph she realised she knew the layout of the house without seeing it. It was identical to Tennyson Street.

Tuesday 3rd February 1976

I’ve just jumped off Beachy Head without a hang-glider, crossed the Rubicon and that bridge that’s burned down behind me, and all the other metaphors, analogies or historical/ hysterical references to having acted with no possibility of going back.

I knew I shouldn’t leave the family home. I phoned SB and he said it’s the wrong thing to do but I couldn’t stand it anymore. G was being so nice to me, helping me pack, pointing out stuff that was mine that I’d missed and all I could do was scream at him. He went off to stay with K while I moped around cleaning the house, tidying the garden, packing what little stuff I wanted to bring with me. I really didn’t want to go but it’s not down to me. I kept re-reading the diaries, trying to remember why I had hated living with Geoff so much but that didn’t work. Hoist by my own petard etc etc. I almost suggested we stuck it out and tried to adopt but when I really thought about it I realised that would never work. K wouldn’t accept the wrong genes.

So here I am alone in a Tennyson Street look-alike cottage. I’ve never been alone before. Not really alone. There were those weeks in Hall after Mum died and a few weeks here and there but never alone like this.

Monday shopping for all the things I need but didn’t think to bring.

Tuesday putting everything away, in its place. Wondering what G was doing. Thinking what I would be doing if I hadn’t left. Wondering if G was wondering what I was doing. Oh Shit.

She stopped writing and looked around at the tiny living area that had been her home for just over a day. Would she ever get used to it? It had taken only one journey, in the car that Geoff had agreed she could keep, to transfer all her belongings. It had taken one visit to town to shop for kitchen essentials and she felt she had enough. The house was small but even so it seemed remarkably uncluttered.

She was about to turn back to her diary when she saw the light flashing on her telephone answering machine. She’d only told Geoff her number. She pressed the button to rewind the message to the beginning and the second button to replay.

‘It’s Kathleen Philips.’

Why did she bother to say that, Anya thought, the voice is unmistakable. Anya spoke out loud to the tape, her voice reverberating in the enclosed space of the small room. “Can’t your precious son make his own phone calls anymore?”

‘I understand you have left my son.’ What subtleties were in that voice Anya wondered: relief? satisfaction? victory? ‘You forgot to leave the rings. I’m sure it was only an oversight.’

“How could you say that! You so clearly don’t believe it.” Anya argued with the tape recorder.

‘As you are aware those rings were only on loan to you as long as you were my son’s wife. You will now return them.’ Anya had intended to return the emerald to Geoff when the divorce was finalised, but she did not expect what followed. ‘Do not forget that sapphire engagement ring my son gave you. Both are family pieces.’

“You lying bitch! That’s not any fucking family piece. It’s my ring, my mother’s ring. Her brother gave it to her. What made you think he’d given it to me? You can fucking whistle.”

Kathleen’s voice continued, slow and deliberate. ‘Geoffrey will require the rings to be returned immediately. He has found a suitable partner with whom to raise a family and he will be giving them to her.’

“You cow! Suitable! What’s bloody suitable? No one will ever be bloody suitable enough! And ‘raise a family’. Oh you do know how to hit below the belt don’t you Mrs Kathleen fucking Philips.” Anya was yelling at the tape. But Kathleen had not finished. She had paused simply for effect.

‘You will return the rings to Atherton’s offices by Friday. Is that clear?’

That was it. There was just a click to end the message.

Anya spread out her fingers and looked at the familiar rings. She waggled the emerald off her finger and the simple gold wedding band without a second thought. “You can have those you bitch.” She spoke out loud. “You utter complete and absolute bitch. But not this one, no, not this one.” She turned the sapphire ring round and round on her finger. She grasped her locket and thought of Dot. Dot would have known what to say, what to do, how to help her. As she held the engraved gold oval in her hand she wondered why she had never put Geoff’s photo in it. Perhaps she had always known Kathleen would win.

The divorce has gone through remarkably quickly, Anya thought, as she took the large brown envelope from the postman, who smiled knowingly as he handed it over. Anya looked at the envelope, she had no need to open it. It was formal notification of her Decree Absolute. She was a free woman, whatever that might mean.

In the months since Anya’s first visit to Stuart Benthall there had been periods when nothing seemed to be happening and periods of near constant phone calls as Stuart reported on and responded to the demands of Geoff’s solicitor. Anya knew Kathleen was behind the extreme demands; that she should admit to infidelity with a number of men, that she should claim no maintenance and that she would move from the area. The terms were toned down only after her threat not to take the blame but to counter sue naming Fiona Shepherd. It was eventually agreed that one name would be acceptable as long as it wasn’t Tim. Anya had found it ironic that, in the face of her supposed reckless infidelities, she had had difficulty in finding one single man who would admit an affair and who would sign the necessary papers. John, going through difficulties in his own marriage, had agreed ‘for old time’s sake’ and so it was his name that had featured in the short paragraph printed in the bottom of page 7 of the local paper when the Decree Nisi was announced to the world. Anya wondered who read the legal notices and decided the women of the Golf Club Circle, like vultures, would pick everyone to pieces. She hoped John would never have cause to regret his generosity.

She had still not opened the envelope half an hour later when the phone rang.

“Anya Cave.”

“Anya?” Geoff seemed tentative, almost guilty. “It’s Geoff.”

“I know. I can still remember your voice.” She hadn’t meant to sound so bitchy.

“Sorry. Look. I thought I’d phone to tell you, so you didn’t see it in the papers first. I mean I thought you should know.” He sounded very nervous.

“Know what?”

“I’m getting married.”

“But Geoff the Absolute only came through this morning.” Anya didn’t know whether to feel surprised or hurt.

“I know. We waited until that came through before making the announcement.”

“You waited?” Hurt won.

“Well I asked Fiona to marry me, well it was sort of agreed in April.”

“April? The same April that you phoned to tell me how much you were missing me, and how much you really wanted us to get back together, and how little having a family could mean to you now you realised how much you loved me, the April you phoned to plead with me to stop the divorce proceedings and go back to you? That April?”

“Well. Yes.”

“It’s your mother isn’t it?” Anger took over from hurt. “She got together with Fiona’s mother and father who, of course, she had known since the year fucking dot and arranged it for you. Am I right? Of course I’m right. That woman is lethal. Keep her away from Fiona when and if you marry her. Keep your mother away from her or if she’s got the sense she was born with, which I doubt, your little Fiona will be divorcing you in double quick time. When that happens don’t forget to get your bloody ring back!”

“Talking of rings…” Geoff’s voice just stopped her from slamming the phone down. “Mother said you returned only the emerald and your wedding ring. She said you didn’t return the sapphire you have always worn. She’s convinced I gave it to you and therefore, since it must have been bought with family money, it should also have been returned. I told her it was your mother’s, that I hadn’t given it to you, but she just doesn’t believe me. Will you tell me now? Who gave it to you?”

She spoke quietly. “It was my mother’s. Why couldn’t you ever have believed me?”

“Help me out Anya. If I don’t give Mother a believable explanation she will just go on and on about it.”

“It was my mum’s.”

“It was your mum’s?” He sounded insultingly doubtful.

“Yes, my mum’s. My father gave it to her.”

“But… well…” He couldn’t put into words the worries he had always had about the ring, worth several thousand pounds, coming from an otherwise penniless family.

“For fuck’s sake Geoff I’ve told you over and over again. If you won’t believe me then that’s your problem. Goodbye, and good luck with Fiona, I suspect you’re going to need rather a lot of it.” She put the phone down knowing that Geoff would be listening to the cold phone tone.

She tried to work out her feelings. Was she angry that Geoff would not believe her about the ring, was she frustrated at his unwillingness to listen to her, or was she simply sad that that simple lack of trust was proof that he could never have forgotten the differences in their backgrounds.

Anya picked up her coffee mug and walked into the small garden. The day was hot already, in one way at least it was going to be a good summer. As she sat down she put her hand to her locket. Dot and Dr Hill had had so much faith in her and she had achieved only a failed marriage.

She wasn’t proud of herself and she didn’t think they would be either.