Thursday, 11 July 2013
Morning
I’m picking at the plaster on my forefinger. It’s damp, it got wet when I was
washing out my coffee mug this morning; it feels clammy, dirty, though it was
clean on this morning. I don’t want to take it off because the cut is deep. Cathy
was out when I got home, so I went to the off-licence and bought two bottles of
wine. I drank the first one and then I thought I’d take advantage of the fact that
she was out and cook myself a steak, make a red-onion relish, have it with a
green salad. A good, healthy meal. I sliced through the top of my finger while
chopping the onions. I must have gone to the bathroom to clean it up and gone to
lie down for a while and just forgotten all about the kitchen, because I woke up
around ten and I could hear Cathy and Damien talking and he was saying how
disgusting it was that I would leave the place like that. Cathy came upstairs to
see me, she knocked softly on my door and opened it a fraction. She cocked her
head to one side and asked if I was OK. I apologized without being sure what I
was apologizing for. She said it was all right, but would I mind cleaning up a bit?
There was blood on the chopping board, the room smelled of raw meat, the steak
was still sitting out on the counter top, turning grey. Damien didn’t even say
hello, he just shook his head when he saw me and went upstairs to Cathy’s
bedroom.
After they’d both gone to bed I remembered that I hadn’t drunk the second
bottle, so I opened that. I sat on the sofa and watched television with the sound
turned down really low so they wouldn’t hear it. I can’t remember what I was
watching, but at some point I must have felt lonely, or happy, or something,
because I wanted to talk to someone. The need for contact must have been
overwhelming and there was no one I could call except for Tom.
There’s no one I want to talk to except for Tom. The call log on my phone
says I rang four times: at 11.02, 11.12, 11.54, 12.09. Judging from the length of
the calls, I left two messages. He may even have picked up, but I don’t
remember talking to him. I remember leaving the first message; I think I just
asked him to call me. That may be what I said in both of them, which isn’t too
bad.
The train shudders to a standstill at the red signal and I look up. Jess is sitting
on her patio, drinking a cup of coffee. She has her feet up against the table and
her head back, sunning herself. Behind her, I think I can see a shadow, someone
moving: Jason. I long to see him, to catch a glimpse of his handsome face. I
want him to come outside, to stand behind her, the way he does, to kiss the top of
her head.
He doesn’t come out, and her head falls forward. There is something about the
way she is moving today that seems different; she is heavier, weighed down. I
will him to come out to her, but the train jolts and slogs forward and still there is
no sign of him; she’s alone. And now, without thinking, I find myself looking
directly into my house, and I can’t look away. The French doors are flung open,
light streaming into the kitchen. I can’t tell, I really can’t, whether I’m seeing
this or imagining it – is she there, at the sink, washing up? Is there a little girl
sitting in one of those bouncy baby chairs, up there on the kitchen table?
I close my eyes and let the darkness grow and spread until it morphs from a
feeling of sadness into something worse: a memory, a flashback. I didn’t just ask
him to call me back. I remember now, I was crying. I told him that I still loved
him, that I always would. Please, Tom, please, I need to talk to you. I miss you.
No no no no no no no.
I have to accept it, there’s no point trying to push it away. I’m going to feel
terrible all day, it’s going to come in waves – stronger then weaker then stronger
again – that twist in the pit of my stomach, the anguish of shame, the heat
coming to my face, my eyes squeezed tight as though I could make it all
disappear. And I’ll be telling myself all day, it’s not the worst thing, is it? It’s not
the worst thing I’ve ever done, it’s not as if I fell over in public, or yelled at a
stranger in the street. It’s not as if I humiliated my husband at a summer
barbecue by shouting abuse at the wife of one of his friends. It’s not as if we got
into a fight one night at home and I went for him with a golf club, taking a chunk
out of the plaster in the hallway outside the bedroom. It’s not like going back to
work after a three-hour lunch and staggering through the office, everyone
looking, Martin Miles taking me to one side, I think you should probably go
home, Rachel. I once read a book by a former alcoholic where she described
giving oral sex to two different men, men she’d just met in a restaurant on a busy
London high street. I read it and I thought, I’m not that bad. This is where the
bar is set.
Evening
I have been thinking about Jess all day, unable to focus on anything but what I
saw this morning. What was it that made me think that something was wrong? I
couldn’t possibly see her expression at that distance, but I felt when I was
looking at her that she was alone. More than alone – lonely. Perhaps she was –
perhaps he’s away, gone to one of those hot countries he jets off to to save lives.
And she misses him, and she worries, although she knows he has to go.
Of course she misses him, just as I do. He is kind and strong, everything a
husband should be. And they are a partnership. I can see it, I know how they are.
His strength, that protectiveness he radiates, it doesn’t mean she’s weak. She’s
strong in other ways; she makes intellectual leaps that leave him open-mouthed
in admiration. She can cut to the nub of a problem, dissect and analyse it in the
time it takes other people to say good morning. At parties, he often holds her
hand, even though they’ve been together years. They respect each other, they
don’t put each other down.
I feel exhausted this evening. I am sober, stone cold. Some days I feel so bad
that I have to drink; some days I feel so bad that I can’t. Today, the thought of
alcohol turns my stomach. But sobriety on the evening train is a challenge,
particularly now, in this heat. A film of sweat covers every inch of my skin, the
inside of my mouth prickles, my eyes itch, mascara rubbed into their corners.
My phone buzzes in my handbag, making me jump. Two girls sitting across
the carriage look at me and then at each other, with a sly exchange of smiles. I
don’t know what they think of me, but I know it isn’t good. My heart is
pounding in my chest as I reach for the phone. I know this will be nothing good
either: it will be Cathy, perhaps, asking me ever so nicely to maybe give the
booze a rest this evening? Or my mother, telling me that she’ll be in London next
week, she’ll drop by the office, we can go for lunch. I look at the screen. It’s
Tom. I hesitate for just a second and then I answer it.
‘Rachel?’
For the first five years I knew him, I was never Rachel, always Rach.
Sometimes Shelley, because he knew I hated it and it made him laugh to watch
me twitch with irritation and then giggle because I couldn’t help but join in when
he was laughing. ‘Rachel, it’s me.’ His voice is leaden, he sounds worn out.
‘Listen, you have to stop this, OK?’ I don’t say anything. The train is slowing
and we are almost opposite the house, my old house. I want to say to him, Come
outside, go and stand on the lawn. Let me see you. ‘Please, Rachel, you can’t call
me like this all the time. You’ve got to sort yourself out.’ There is a lump in my
throat as hard as a pebble, smooth and obstinate. I cannot swallow. I cannot
speak. ‘Rachel? Are you there? I know things aren’t good with you, and I’m
sorry for you, I really am, but … I can’t help you, and these constant calls are
really upsetting Anna. OK? I can’t help you any more. Go to AA or something.
Please, Rachel. Go to an AA meeting after work today.’
I pull the filthy plaster off the end of my finger and look at the pale, wrinkled
flesh beneath, dried blood caked at the edge of my fingernail. I press the
thumbnail of my right hand into the centre of the cut and feel it open up, the pain
sharp and hot. I catch my breath. Blood starts to ooze from the wound. The girls
on the other side of the carriage are watching me, their faces blank.
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