How Was It For You?

by Carmen Reid

  ‘They drive to Norwich and go to John Lewis,’ Pamela informed her.

  ‘John Lewis?’ Alex crossed her hands in front of her.‘Aaargh John Lewis, get thee away from me.’

  ‘What’s wrong with John Lewis?’ Pamela asked.‘They have some very good basics.’

  ‘Basics? Basics? What is it with basics? I don’t want basics. I want un-basics. I want things that have romance, a history, a patina. When I buy an evening bag I want to be able to think about the 15-year-old girl who had it before me . . . her mother who bought it for her on the day of the big school dance . . .’

  ‘For goodness sake, you really are a big soppy romantic. That’s probably why you’re alone. No-one can live up to these romantic ideals. Come on, we really have to go. My bum is cold.’

  ‘Better phone secret lover, get him to warm you up . . . Take you to the Polytunnel of Love.’

  ‘Please shut up!’ Pamela shrieked.‘Why did I even imagine telling you anything about this would be a good idea?’

  Chapter Twenty-six

  ‘YOU CAN’T GO out tonight. You can’t,’ Rosie raged, out of all proportion to the situation.‘What on earth do you have to go out for tonight?’

  Lachlan did not like to lie too specifically to his wife. He thought it was dangerous. But then, the whole situation was dangerous. What exactly was safe about driving around the countryside in your great big conspicuous 4 x 4 looking for a place to have sex with someone else’s wife? Somebody was going to find out. Someone was going to notice . . . whisper it to someone else . . . word would get out and then everything would unravel. He knew this. The stakes were far too high. He had to stop this. Thought every day about when he would stop it . . . how he would tell her . . . and still he was planning to see her again.

  ‘Look it’s OK,’ he was telling Rosie now.‘It’s nothing I can’t put off till tomorrow. I’ll stay here.’ But even as he said the words he felt the crush of disappointment weigh on him.

  ‘Let me just finish up in the office,’ he said, turning out of the crowded sitting room, noisy with telly, his boisterous boys and baby. He’d send her a text. Tell her ‘last-minute hitch’. It had happened before.

  Rosie watched him go out of the room and burned with the knowledge that he was going off to tell Pamela he couldn’t see her tonight. She didn’t know how she knew, she didn’t have one shred of evidence and sometimes wondered if she had turned into an unreasonably jealous and paranoid wife, but the feeling of knowing couldn’t be shaken off.

  She turned over and over the idea of confronting him but if he just denied it, how would she know if he was lying or not? Her mind would never be set at rest . . . but then, what if he admitted it? What would she do? She didn’t know if she had the courage to face an admission.

  Better right now to half pretend to herself that there must be another explanation for her husband’s absent-mindedness, complicated new reasons to be away from the house, frequent trips to the cottage for ‘progress updates’ and, most damning of all, his six pairs of new, white, Lycra-enhanced trunks.

  ‘You’ve got new underwear?’ she’d asked from the depths of the laundry basket, unable to keep the surprise from her voice.

  ‘Yup,’ he’d answered, not looking up from the farming paper he was reading in bed.‘Other ones were falling apart.’

  So matter-of-fact. But this had never happened before. She bought his clothes, his shoes, his work boots, even.

  ‘I’m going out tonight. In fact, I’m going to go now,’ she told him when he came back into the room, enjoying the surprise on his face. She hardly ever went anywhere, on her own, at night.

  ‘Where are you going?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh you know, just work stuff . . . got to see a man about a machine,’ she dared him in an imitation of the vague kind of excuse he’d been making lately.

  ‘Oh . . .’ He pushed his hands into his pockets and surveyed the domestic chaos in front of him, which he would be in charge of tonight.

  ‘Is there . . .’ he began but broke off, maybe thinking better of it.

  ‘Anything for supper?’ She tried not to sound too vitriolic.

  ‘Well,’ he backtracked, ‘if you haven’t got anything in mind, I’ll sort something out.’

  ‘There is a pot of mince on the hob, you just need to do potatoes and veg.’ She was standing up, determined to go now, wondering why she hardly ever let Lachlan do this on his own, the whole supper, bath, bedtime evening thing, and why she never went out at night.

  She bent down towards the Lego world being created by her sons to say good night. They nodded, shrugged, didn’t like the distraction from the intensity of the game.

  ‘Mama—’ Manda’s face was at her knee, hand clutched tightly to her jeans, ‘Mama.’ Little insistent voice able with one word to break Rosie’s heart. The baby radar had been alerted.

  How had Rosie forgotten? This was why she never left home on her own, because it meant Manda in hysterical tears being prised from her, finger by tiny finger.

  ‘Mummy’s just nipping out, back in a minute,’ she said, hating the lie.

  ‘No,’ Manda insisted.‘NO!’

  ‘You’re going to play with Daddy and the boys.’ She picked her girlie up.

  ‘NO!’ came out again, roared this time, deafening.

  Rosie tried to hand her daughter to Lachlan, but Manda gripped at her hair, screamed, flailed her legs.

  ‘She’ll be fine,’ Lachlan said, unconvinced, catching a kick in the face.‘Oww . . .’ The boys looked up to laugh at him.

  ‘Just go. She’ll be fine.’

  Rosie, almost in pain now, went out of the room, pulling the door shut like a traitor. She hurried to the cloakroom, scrambled her coat, boots and bag together and fled the house.

  When she’d slammed the door of the Isuzu shut behind her, she stared at the wheel blankly. Where the hell to now?

  Where did you go when you were running away from your family for a night? When you were trying to run and hide from the possibility that your husband was cheating on you and your life could very possibly be about to turn to shit?

  For a moment it crossed her mind to turn up on Ingrid and Harry’s doorstep. But she almost blamed them. They’d sold Linden Lee, hadn’t they? They’d brought her into their lives.

  Maybe if her dad wasn’t in an old people’s home with senile dementia, she would go to him . . . Maybe if her brothers weren’t living on the other side of the world she would go to them. But they were farming in Australia, had resented working for their father so much, they’d shipped out years ago and now managed 400 head of cattle hundreds of miles from the nearest town.

  ‘Don’t worry, we’ll send you back a ranch hand,’ they’d promised and three months later Lachlan had arrived with a holdall, rattlesnake-proof boots and a wide-brimmed hat. Rosie, newly 22, alone in the house most of the time with her ailing father, missing her brothers desperately, frazzled with farm management, had, of course, fallen in love overnight.

  ‘Strewth, Rosie,’ her older brother had joked, his laughter echoing down the long-distance line.‘You were meant to give the guy a job, not bloody marry him!’ And no, far too busy, they didn’t think they would make it back for the wedding.

  But they’ll be back for the funeral, she couldn’t help thinking now. When Dad dies, they’ll be back and then will come the reckoning. The long-awaited will. The dividing up of the farm and all the heartache it would bring.

  She turned the key in the ignition and fired up the engine. She would head out for the dual carriageway, blast music from the stereo, wind down the windows even, drive at 75 m.p.h., maybe even 80. See where it took her.

  She only ever listened to tapes in the car, well didn’t listen, let the children listen while she tuned out. The five-CD player was entirely Lachlan’s thing. She didn’t even know where the discs went in.

  She glanced over, flicked CD one on, didn’t recognize it, tried two and three, again nothing she warmed to. Unusually soft girl
and guitar stuff. For Pamela? she thought with a lurch. Disc four kicked in: Lou Reed. No. All hopes pinned on the fifth and final.

  Blasting electric chords and energy. For a moment she struggled to place the familiar but long-unheard music. Jimi Hendrix, of course. She pushed the volume up higher, sped on towards the main road, pressing down the accelerator, beginning to enjoy the ride.

  She thought about Lachlan. He would be trying to boil potatoes and broccoli with Manda hanging like a baby monkey from his neck, desperate to poke her doll’s arm into the bubbling pots. Willy and Pete, crazed with hunger by now, would probably be drop-kicking each other’s toys across the kitchen, then wrestling in a murderous fury. Oh well . . . She deserved an evening off.

  On she sped, listening to Jimi promise that when he made love he wouldn’t cause any pain.

  Good grief? Was that the best he could offer?

  She skipped forward to ‘Crosstown Traffic’ which egged her on to hit the dual carriageway, gun down the fast lane and keep going, get out of here. At least for a night.

  An hour later she was out of the county, on the motorway, wondering what she would do, when the lights of an out of town retail park beckoned her in like a landing strip.

  Ikea, open till 10 p.m., the billboard informed her. Ikea? She’d heard of it, of course, but never been because she and Lachlan saved every spare penny they earned for the day when they’d have to buy their own farm. Decorating the house they lived in, which wasn’t theirs and might never be, didn’t seem sensible.

  But she’d wanted to rebel for months. She’d had enough of living in a dull and dingy place when there was so much money in the bank. And tonight, she decided, pulling into the huge car park, she was going to start the rebellion. Too bad, Lachlan . . . If you want me to ask before I spend the savings, stop chasing every available woman who crosses your path . . . She was facing her suspicion that this had happened before. That this wasn’t the first time he had cheated on her – but, dear God, it was going to be the last. She didn’t know how . . . she didn’t know what was going to happen next . . . but she was definitely not going to let this pass quietly, without a fuss. No way, no. She would make the most incredible fuss.

  Once she was inside the glittering, cavernous showroom, Rosie found the biggest trolley she could and began to shop for the new, improved home that she and her three children, at least, were going to live in from now on. A home that would have luscious sheepskin rugs, metal lamps, wacky bedlinen, clever items of cunningly disguised storage – hell, two new sofas . . . kitchen chairs . . . She was laughing to herself at the names: Snorig this, Hemmlig that, Fartsor? Surely not? Fetid, Friskie . . .

  Fresh new office equipment was piled in. No more writing desk chaos, she would have metal in-trays, a small pink filing cabinet – Lachlan would loathe that, she thought with satisfaction. She could split up with him if she had to, it was dawning on her. She used to run the farm all on her own, she could do it again, just as well as he did. The needy, needy small children phase of her life was coming to an end. Her boys were in school, Manda could go to nursery in the mornings. She could do it all, if she had to. Employ another full-time worker . . . or a home help . . . to let her get out there instead. She could do everything a farm worker could: drive a tractor, a combine harvester, manage a picking squad.

  It would be very hard work and it would be lonely. That was the catch. Lachy was always around, had been around for years now . . . and she loved him. Comfortably. Was that so bad? He loved her too. She was sure of that. Loved her comfortably too. And he loved their children.

  But that didn’t mean that he wasn’t a big, selfish shit sometimes . . .

  She didn’t know what the answer was yet . . . but it would come.

  Almost 7 p.m., but still Pamela stayed in the cottage, nursing the text message from Lachlan saying that he would try and come round, although he’d called off yesterday evening at the last minute. She cleaned up slowly, looking around every room, admiring her work. Not much left to do now: flooring, plumbing, tiling and it would all be finished. Then surely she and Lachlan would be finished too? It would come to a natural end. She wouldn’t be around and it was all too obvious that this couldn’t go on. What if his wife found out? It would be far worse, far messier than if Dave caught her out. Wouldn’t it?

  So why didn’t she just tell Dave? End the marriage? Move on? She swirled her brushes in the smudged and cloudy jar of white spirit. That question again. What was she waiting for? Was life without Dave too frightening? Too unthinkable? If they had just been able to have children . . . that was what it came down to, she was sure. If they had had a family of their own, it would have been perfect. None of this would have happened.

  Now every other solution seemed unworkable: stay together without a child, stay together and bring up someone else’s child, or split up, have a child with someone else, help someone else bring up their own child. None of these was what she wanted.

  But then you didn’t always get what you wanted, did you? Usually you had to make the best of what you had. Wasn’t that the art of living?

  She heard the door and knew, with more excitement than she should feel, that at least one thing she wanted was here.

  Lachlan’s face appeared round the freshly painted sitting room door.

  ‘Watch out, it’s still wet,’ she warned him, feeling a burst of happiness just at the sight of him.

  ‘D’you want to come for a drive?’ he said.‘Take your car, follow mine. We’ll go . . .’ he paused, considering: ‘somewhere.’

  Somewhere like the polytunnel, maybe. She couldn’t lock up the cottage and get into her car quickly enough.

  He drove fast, in and out of the bends, dips and twists. She had to put her foot down, grip her steering wheel tight and have faith to keep up with him. But still, hurtling through the dark, she knew that right now she would have followed his car through the gates of hell. Maybe that’s exactly where she was following him.

  After twenty minutes, they pulled up in a deserted, stony lay-by on the edge of a woodland trail that she remembered passing on the way to Ingrid and Harry’s farm. She saw signposts and litter bins, but no sign of anyone about.

  He stayed in his car, turned on the inside light and beckoned her over. As she got out, he swung open the passenger door, so she climbed up inside to him.

  ‘Hello.’ But what a loaded word it was. There in the background an almost explosive level of desire.

  She closed the door shut behind her.

  ‘So . . .’

  ‘So . . .’ he repeated.‘Want to play?’

  He put his car in gear and drove out of the lay-by along the woodland trail for 100 metres or so before parking.

  And they were on each other again. Fingers opening buttons, fumbling for zips, legs scrambling over seats, the gearstick, handbrake. Had to have him . . . had to have her . . .

  Afterwards, she sat across his lap, kissed him and asked him questions. Some he answered, some he didn’t.

  ‘Ever think about going back to Australia?’ she wanted to know.

  ‘With the family?’ he said, so naturally, so unembarrassed. Sitting with her wet and naked in his lap didn’t interfere with chats about the family plans, apparently.

  ‘Maybe,’ he went on.‘The future isn’t exactly obvious. We’ll see what happens when Rosie’s old man dies.’

  ‘Why?’ Pamela asked.

  ‘He still owns the farm and she has two brothers, so it’ll probably be left to the three of them. They’ll all have to pay a whack of inheritance tax and we won’t be able to buy her brothers out, so the farm will probably be sold. We’ll have to buy somewhere much smaller and try to work our way up again.’ He sighed and leaned his head back against the headrest, ‘No farmer could just go out and buy a farm nowadays, you have to earn or inherit the money first. We’re all just living hand to mouth on overpriced land. So, yeah, I might take them to Australia, it’s not so bad over there.’

  She made no reply t
o this, so he added: ‘How are Dave’s strawberries? Even he should get a light crop this year.’

  ‘They’re fine.’ This was a conversation Pamela didn’t want to have. She thought of Dave in and out of his fields trying one thing after another, picking weeds and insects off by hand when all else failed.

  ‘Really?!’ Lachlan sounded amused.‘He’s going to have a crop?’ Without waiting for an answer, he went on: ‘Do you know what I think?’ She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.‘Harry is a friend, so I’d never tell him to his face. But organic farming is just bullshit – literally – only practised by amateurs. Only freaks want to eat tough little vegetables covered in caterpillars.’

  She pulled back out of his arms.

  ‘Farmers aren’t going to turn the clock back,’ he insisted.‘No-one wants that hard life, picking and weeding vegetables, keeping cattle for the dung, having to muck them out and feed them every day. No way. Farmers are like everyone else. They want to work nine to five, sit in machines, own more land, make a decent wage. And who can blame them? No-one in town wants to pay the price that it really costs to grow food in Britain when they can have cheap beans from Botswana.’

  Pamela scrambled off his knees and back to the passenger seat, throwing a T-shirt over herself, surprised at the surge of anger she felt.

  ‘What? Instead you think people prefer some puffed-up strawberry grown in a plastic tunnel, dusted weekly with anti-fungal agents and all kinds of crap?’

  ‘Didn’t hear you complaining about my strawberries the other night, baby,’ he smirked.

  Baby!

  ‘Look, just leave Dave out of this, will you? And leave farming out of it as well.’

  Because, apparently, it was OK for her to cheat on Dave, to slink around with Lachlan looking for quiet, countryside fuck venues, but it wasn’t OK for Lachlan to take the piss out of Dave’s noble, Green ideals. Well, just what sort of warped morality code was she operating under, exactly?

  She certainly didn’t need Lachlan to point out that not only was she cheating on her husband, but she was cheating with someone who stood for everything Dave was opposed to.