T
1 he night was warmly scented with honeysuckle, which buoyed my spirits as I let myself into the surgery and went straight to the little flat behind. All I could think about was the dreamy, creamy warmth of my husband’s embrace. I was burning up with need — the need to feel Rory close to me. That was my matrimonial mantra. Rory wasn’t back yet from his home visits so 1 crashed into the spare bedroom, determined to wait for him, but after a couple of hours, I passed out, fully clothed, face down on the bed. In my light-headed relief at having escaped from folly, the last frivolous thought on my mind was that it had been so long since I’d seen my husband I was frightened I’d shoot him as a burglar. But I was the one hell-bent on theft. Emotional break and enter. I would steal my way back into my husband’s heart.
I woke in a mist of adrenalin and angst. The dawn gave the surgery bedroom a melancholy, vanquished look. Much like me.
The pillow beside me was empty. Where was Rory.^ I felt the zig zag of doubt go through me as the pendulum of suspicion swung back and forth. Clambering off the bed, I searched the room for clues. I prodded at the message button on the decrepit answerphone. The tape was so old that the message which had been left was scratchy and warped, but the voice was definitely female. And it was arranging a time to meet. I frantically tried to come up with other excuses for why my husband would be meeting a female. Perhaps his mother had come back from the dead? Perhaps he’d developed Dr Doolittle traits and could talk to the animals — and they could talk to him? Perhaps Rory was a cross dresser making an appointment with his seamstress? All these excuses were more palatable than the fact that he might be having an affair. Especially when logic dictated that there was only one possible candidate.
I wanted to call the police and get them to throw fingerprint dust all across her naked body, because I was now imagining my husband’s hands all over her. Bands of anxiety circled my ribcage, tighter and tighter. Nervousness beaded my lip with perspiration as I fell into psychological quicksand. Men are creatures of habit. They don’t leave the comfort of their homes unless it’s for another woman. Terror slammed through me. Of course he was falling in love with her. One encouraging word from the Husband Rustler and he’d fled from our marriage so fast he’d left nothing but the outline of his body in the wood of the front door as he went through. Why had it taken me so long to admit it? 1 was a Mensa candidate, obviously.
As I blundered my way out of the veterinary practice, I felt sure the animals were mocking me from their cages. Can rabbits smirk? Because I was convinced I saw one chuckling snidely.
★
The Dickensian houses of Camden cast tombstone shadows across my car as I sat outside Bianca’s flat. I felt oppressed by fear and wound down the window for a blast of oxygen. It was 8 a.m. Rory opened the surgery at 8.30, so if he was here, he’d have to appear soon. Sure enough, a heart-stopping moment later, Bianca’s yellow front door squeezed open and they were there, together, on the doorstep. Peering between the suctioned feet of Jenny’s Garfield doll, I saw him kiss her. I strained my eyes until they stung, watching them. Oh. I clutched the steering wheel and despaired. My skin prickled as though I was being secretly watched, instead of the other way round. Rory looked so muscular and handsome. Yes, the entire world loves a lover — unless he’s your bloody husband.
T thought it was experimentation?’ I was out of the car and screeching across the street before I knew what I was doing. I gulped in air as tart as she was. T thought it didn’t mean anything?’ I felt as though I’d been hollowed out by the wind. ‘Rory, I want you to get in the car and come home with me right now.’
Rory stood stock-still. Bianca, however, nuzzled his ear, no doubt whispering her spells. She was wearing a pink silk camisole with lace scanties. Her hair was fetchingly tousled and she was sporting false eyelashes which would have been more at home on a giraffe. Just the way all working mums look in the mornings. Not.
‘Rore?’ But Rory just stood there, staring. ‘When I say I’d like your answer soon, what I mean is, within my lifetime.’ It sounded bold, but I could feel a great floodtide of grief behind my tonsils.
‘Actually,’ answered Bianca, ‘we’re moving in together.’
Pain came, rapid and intolerable, like opening the blinds on a
summer’s day when you have a hangover. A malicious smile shrieked across her face.
‘Where to? Your eco-sensitive igloo? Rory, she’s a fake. Can’t you see through her?’ The street, the world, seemed to tilt and start sliding slowly toward some dreadful abyss. Fear began to ooze from me. I looked at my nemesis. Bianca had obviously been to the Eva Braun School of Mistressing. ‘Don’t you care about the family you’re destroying?’
‘I care about Rory, in all his complexities,’ Bianca cooed in her creamy tones. ‘I can fulfil his needs in a way you never can.’
‘Gee, how many years of yoga did you have to do, to be able to kiss your own ass like that? It’s quite an achievement.’ I could feel my blood coagulating with rage.
‘J can nurture his creativity and tap into his untouched potential. You have done nothing but smother him.’
I wanted to make a Wildean quip, a Shakespearean reference, a caustic aside. But instead, I just smithereeened into tears. ‘Rory!’ If he didn’t hold me, 1 was going to fly apart, like an exploding landmine. ‘Can’t you talk to me alone?’ As addled as I was, I knew that it was a sure sign that your marriage is not going well when your husband has a loaded woman pointed at your chest. ‘Stop pointing that thing at me.’ I gestured towards Bianca. ‘It’s making me nervous.’
‘I’m sorry. But where Rory goes, I go. That’s the kind of devotion he’s been missing from his marriage,’ Bianca said with practised aplomb.
I had been hit by a psychological truck. And my husband was driving. ‘Listen to me,’ I told him. ‘You’re having a midlife crisis, obviously. But couldn’t you just worry over male pattern baldness, like other men your age?’
Rory palmed his new beard. He’d been sprouting the look of
a revolutionary leader for a few weeks now. But it was me he was revolting against. Or maybe, just me he found revolting?
T know it was my fault, dragging you to therapy,’ I went on, ‘but when I told you to show more affection, I didn’t mean you to take a lover!’
Bianca shook her head. ‘Truth is, you just don’t satisfy him sexually.’
‘Well, you know I have a sex tip for you, Rory. The way to ensure that a wife stays moist during intercourse is to keep your bloody mistress out of sight!’
‘Mistress? For your information, Cassandra, Rory and I are soulmates. We are emotionally and psychologically simpatico. But of course, we also have so much to discover sensually about each other.’ She squeezed his hand and gave him one of her velvet glances. ‘In fact, he’s going to star in a video I’m making called The Body.’
‘Oh really? How big is his part? Must be quite small.’ Which wasn’t a bad reply, considering I was in the midst of an anxiety attack. I felt an ache of disgust grip my intestines. How could she do this to me? To us? A murderous fury took hold of me. Die! Die! But all I had in the car was Jamie’s giant water-pistol. I had a sudden vision of all the brunch-crumb-coated Camden arty types, sipping their champagne and shaking their heads condescendingly as they caught sight of me chasing my husband and his mistress down the street pumping watery rounds into them from an aqua-gun.
‘Rory, what about the kids?’ I implored. ‘If you can’t think about me, at least think about them.’
‘Oh, but we are. I’ve already had a text from Jamie saying he can’t wait to meet me. Look.’ Bianca displayed Rory’s phone with a message illuminated. She sounds cool, Dad it read. ‘Aw,’ Bianca gushed, ‘thassadorable.’
I had to wait for the crashing in my ears to fade away before I could talk again.
‘Rory, don’t be fooled,’ I said desperately. ‘Bianca hates children. She makes her own kid play with gender-non-specific toys from economically disadvantaged Third World craft fairs. I mean, it’s child abuse. And before you move into Tofu Towers,’ I gestured to her flat, ‘just think about this. Bianca may pretend to be all organic, hell she’s no doubt given you your first organic orgasm, but the woman’s full of Botox. Don’t you find that a little hypocritical?’
‘And he’s taking me to meet Jenny today,’ Bianca miaowed.
I tried to answer, but what erupted instead was a cry of anguish. ‘Where?’ My life was suddenly a cracked mirror.
‘Sports Day. Our daughters are at the same school.’ Rory spoke at last. I reached for him, but he brushed me away as if I were a gnat. A gnat he wanted to swat. ‘Serendipity is a year younger, but I’m sure the girls will get on.’
‘But, Rory you never go to Sports Day! I’ve always gone. This is the first year I’ve not run in the Mothers’ Race, but the dates conflicted with my school excursion to the Science Museum.’
‘It’s okay. Bianca’s going to run.’
‘Yes,’ she gloated. 'Some of us like to keep in shape.’
Warning! Warning! Danger! Klaxons of terror trumpeted in my head.My face was pinchy with indignation. How could he do this to me? Rory might be the vet, but I seemed to be the one with a degree in Animal Husbandry. ‘So, you really do want my husband, do you? Well, just let me go and get his water bowl and chew toys. And hey, that might be a good way to get rid of you too, Bianca. If I throw a stick, no doubt you’ll run after it.’
Bianca abruptly pulled Rory back into her garden flat and slammed the door. I felt desolate at the loss of him. What really
How To Kill Your Husband
upset me was that I was the one who’d battled with and then retrained him; who’d finally got through to him the importance of birthdays and anniversaries and that there is only one answer to the question, ‘Does this make me look fatT Only for another woman to waltz off with the New and Improved Version. It was like renovating a house, making it perfect — only to be evicted. That was it. I’d been sexually gazumped by a new owner. A younger, thinner, firmer new owner, with better underwear.
And it was all my own wretched fault. Jesus Christ. By dragging him to couples counselling, I might as well have lit up a cigarette next to a petrol tanker. And soon Bianca would be meeting my daughter, and running with all the other Yummy Mummies in the Mothers’ Race.
Driving to school, I fantasized about killing her off and making it look like a lawnmower-related accident. I could see myself now on a maximum-security prison wing crocheting doilies and pleading that I suffered from Multiple Personality Disorder. Multiple? Who was I kidding? Hell, I didn’t even have one\ Well, all that was about to change.
I steeled myself. The chequered flag had been dropped. The race was on. And I would win back my hubby fair and square. Even if I had to cheat to do so.