This Charming Man

by Marian Keyes

  ‘It was a long time ago,’ Damien said quietly. ‘Marnie’s married now, the mother of two children. She mightn’t want any of this made public. She mightn’t want anything to do with him.’

  ‘And then again she might.’

  ‘Perhaps you should talk to her before you go any further.’

  ‘I’ve already said I’ll do it.’

  He shrugged. ‘You can change your mind. You haven’t signed anything?’

  ‘No. I know. But I just feel I have to do this… It was such a big thing to happen to Marnie and me,’ I said. ‘I know you can’t understand because you weren’t there, but this feels like a chance, I don’t know, to… Oh I don’t know, Damien!’ I sighed heavily. ‘To undo something bad.’

  My words fell into silence. How could I make him understand? The hook was in my flesh. Despite my suspicions and my fears of disloyalty, I had to do this.

  ‘Don’t look so sad,’ I pleaded.

  Damien gave a rueful little laugh – he knew all about my teenage thing for Paddy.

  ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Okay, okay. Ifyou really don’t want me to do it, just say it and I won’t.’

  ‘Grace…’

  Then I felt ashamed. Damien would never make that sort of request, he wasn’t that kind of man. Shaking his head, he began to walk away.

  ‘The money’s good,’ I called after him.

  ‘Great.’ His voice floated back to me. ‘We’ll buy lots of things.’

  Our first session, to discuss the structure of the book, was held at Paddy’s office. I’d forgotten what it was like to be within breathing distance of him. His size. Those eyes. That presence… charisma, whatever you want to call it. Such a perfect powerful physical presence. There was so much of him, concentrated into just one human being – like really strong coffee or dark dark chocolate – it was almost unbearable. He shook my hand and kissed me lightly on the cheek. ‘I’m delighted we’ll be working together.’

  ‘God, you’re such a politician,’ I complained. ‘Where am I sitting?’

  ‘Wherever you like. On the couch, ifyou want.’

  ‘Your casting couch?’

  ‘My couch.’

  I took a hard-backed chair, muttering under my breath that it was probably safest. Paddy sat behind his desk and I opened my yellow pad. Defiantly I said, ‘First things first. Will we be including the episode where you hospitalized my sister?’

  ‘Still the same Grace,’ Paddy said, but without rancour. ‘Always championing a cause. But I think it’s best ifwe draw a veil over that youthful episode.’

  ‘Oh I see. That’s why you asked for me?’ As I had suspected. ‘If you think I’m going to protect you, you can so forget it.’ I stood up to leave.

  ‘Not to protect me – sit down, Grace, would you? – to protect Marnie. You think she’d want that printed in a book?’

  That’s what Damien had said…

  ‘Would she?’ he asked again.

  I didn’t know. I hadn’t asked her.

  Slowly I sat back down. But ifI wasn’t doing this project as Marnie’s champion, why was I here?

  ‘The money’s good,’ Paddy said, reading my thoughts. ‘Come on, Grace, we’ve both got a job to do. Let’s do it.’

  The money was good. I’d recently bought a new car and the repayments were high.

  I picked up my pen again and, to my surprise, we worked for three hours and made good steady progress. This was just a job, I realized, and it was going to be fine.

  Our second session was five days later and once again the work was productive. We’d covered his childhood and had got as far as the death of his mother – when all of a sudden Paddy stopped talking and bowed his head. When he looked up again, his eyes were swimming with tears. Normally I would think, A man crying, how funny. But, perhaps because I’d known him back then, in the aftermath of his mother’s death, how lost and wild he’d been, I felt unexpectedly sad for him.

  I passed him a Burger King napkin from my bag and roughly he wiped his eyes. Within moments he was himselfagain.

  ‘Well, that was embarrassing.’ He laughed. He looked at the napkin. ‘Hold the front page. Grace Gildee was kind.’

  ‘I am kind.’ I was defensive. ‘To those who deserve it.’

  ‘I know you are. You know, Grace’ – he gave me the full benefit of his blue gaze – ‘I came to Palladian because of you.’

  What? Talk about an abrupt change of subject.

  ‘I’ve always followed your progress, I’ve always known which paper you were working for, I’ve always read your stuff.’

  ‘Why are you telling me this?’

  ‘Because in all these years I’ve never stopped thinking about you.’

  An involuntary thrill flamed from my toes to the roots of my hair.

  ‘I’ve thought about you every single day. You’re the only woman who could ever match me.’

  I didn’t want to be, but I was flattered. I was excited. Just like that, I was right back in it.

  The teenage me had been reactivated and I was dreamy and distracted and halfblind with lust for Paddy.

  But that night I couldn’t sleep. There was no way round the truth: my attraction to Paddy was a bad, bad thing; dangerous and dirty.

  It was a long time ago, maybe he’s changed.

  What about Damien?

  What Damien and I had was rare and good.

  Instinctively I knew what had to be done: I would end my involvement in the project.

  But when I met Paddy to tell him to find another writer, it was as ifhe’d been anticipating it. Before I got to open my mouth he closed his office door and said, ‘Don’t, Grace. Don’t abandon me.’

  ‘But – ’

  ‘Please. You’re the only one I trust to tell the truth. I need you.’

  I couldn’t help it – he made me feel too important to him to resign.

  That day’s work and our next session, two days later, were conducted in such a state of sexual tension that I couldn’t think straight. Our early progress had slowed to almost nothing, but I didn’t care. I was locked inside myself, in a process of constant negotiation. I just wanted one night. One night I had been owed from eleven years earlier. Or eighteen years earlier. It wouldn’t mean I didn’t love Damien.

  At home Damien watched me and said nothing and I managed to convince myselfthat he hadn’t noticed anything. Until one evening at home after work when a new-age catalogue had come in the post and we were picking out the courses we’d most hate to do.

  ‘Tribal Drumming would be horrific,’ I said, laughing with cringy glee. ‘Imagine the types you’d get.’

  ‘For me,’ he said, ‘my very, very worst one would be… let’s see… Here we are! Release Your Locked Emotions Through Song. An entire weekend of it. Jesus!’

  ‘Now I know what to get you for your birthday.’

  ‘Grace, I’ll just say one thing.’

  Alerted by his sudden change oftone, I looked at him. ‘What’s up with you?’

  ‘Ifone of us cheated – Christ, I hate that word,’ he said. ‘We might survive it, but things would always be different. The trust would be gone. The innocence.’

  ‘I – ’ The obvious reply would be to ask what had prompted his statement. But I couldn’t go down that road. He hadn’t accused me of anything, that was what was important, and in fairness I hadn’t done anything. ‘Okay, Damien. I know that.’

  ‘Good, good… because I’d hate to think…’ He seemed about to say something else and I willed him not to. ‘Because I love you, you know?’

  My usual response when he told me he loved me was to ask him ifhe was coming down with something. But this time I just said, ‘I know you do.’ Then swept along by a sudden deep rush of love and gratitude, I said, ‘I love you too.’

  ‘Careful,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to turn into Hart to Hart.’

  We both laughed, a little nervously.

  The following day I had another meeting with Paddy. The sun was bursting f
rom the sky and he was waiting outside for me, watching me whizz into the allocated parking space. I got it first time, one smooth confident swerve, my car landing exactly equidistant from the four white lines, a perfect bit of parking in my perfect car on this perfect day.

  ‘Nice work,’ Paddy said, not even pretending to hide his appreciation.

  ‘All down to the car.’ I laughed.

  ‘You love your car?’ he asked.

  ‘I love my car.’

  In his office I sat at the desk to start work and Paddy said, ‘So what about you and Damien?’

  ‘What about us?’ I couldn’t help sounding defensive.

  ‘Still in love?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You wouldn’t think of breaking it off with him?’

  ‘Why would I do that?’

  ‘So you could be my girl. We’d be fabulous together. Look.’ He scribbled a number on a piece of paper. ‘This is my private mobile number. My private private number. Only my personal trainer has it. Have a think about what I said.’ He shrugged. ‘If you make any decisions, ring me any time, day or night.’

  I was unable to speak. The nerve of him! And yet I was shamefully flattered. Unless he was just playing games…?

  ‘I’m completely serious,’ he said. ‘I know you don’t believe me, but I’m going to keep on saying it until you do – you’re the only woman I’ve ever met who can match me.’

  I nearly puked. With longing and shame and shame and longing.

  Three days later the news broke that Paddy was getting married and – I admit it – I felt like I’d been jolted with a stun gun. He owed me nothing, no promises had been made, but he’d behaved as if…

  The dislocating shock was compounded by the discovery that his bride would be Leechy.

  It was my ego, I told myself. That’s what it was. Wounded because I’d thought I was special to him.

  He rang me.

  ‘Is it true?’ I asked.

  ‘Grace – ’

  ‘Is it true?’

  ‘Yes, but – ’

  I disconnected.

  He rang again. I switched my phone off.

  Then I found out about Lola. While interviewing ‘Captain of Industry’, Marcia Fitzgibbon, for ‘My Favourite Insult’, she complained that her stylist was on drugs, screwing up work left, right and centre and insisting that Paddy de Courcy was her boyfriend. ‘If you could see this woman,’ Marcia told me. ‘I mean, her hair is purple!’

  It was easy to track Lola down. She wouldn’t confirm that she’d been seeing Paddy and – paradoxically – that was proofthat she had.

  Feeling more and more stupid, I rang Palladian and told them I was out of the project. They kicked up but there was nothing they could do because the contract hadn’t yet been signed.

  For the next two or three weeks Paddy continued to ring me and I never answered his calls – until one day, on some whim I didn’t understand, I did.

  ‘Just hear me out,’ he said, and although I hadn’t a clue how he was going to talk his way out of things, my curiosity – as always – was what did for me.

  ‘My office?’ he suggested.

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘I’ll send Spanish John.’

  ‘I’ll walk.’

  Paddy’s assistant showed me into an empty room. He wasn’t even there waiting for me; I shouldn’t have come. I lit a cigarette, the flame of my lighter trembling, and decided to count to sixteen. (Why sixteen? No idea.) Ifhe hadn’t appeared by then I was off. One, two –

  There he was. Firmly he shut his office door behind him and his presence filled the room.

  ‘Congratulations.’ I stood up. ‘On your forthcoming marriage.’

  ‘Look, I know.’ He looked abject. ‘But it doesn’t have to change anything, Grace. I don’t even love her,’ he said.

  Much as I despised Leechy, I wondered how anyone could be so callous.

  ‘I’m a politician, Grace. I need a suitable wife. I’m sorry for not telling you personally. What happened was, I asked to see some rings, the jeweller leaked the story, it was out there before even I knew it. We can carry on as before.’ He had stolen closer to me, close enough to take the cigarette from my hand and put it in an ashtray. Softly he said, ‘Better than before. When are you going to put me out of my misery? I want you so much it’s killing me. Sleep with me, Grace, sleep with me.’

  He put his hands on my hips and, bending his knees slightly, pressed his erection against my pubic bone and murmured into my ear, ‘That’s how you make me feel. Always, all the time.’ He whispered, ‘Think of us in bed together, Grace.’

  Like I thought of anything else these days.

  It was as ifI was hypnotized and I was suddenly certain that I was going to sleep with Paddy. The moment I had fantasized about for years was upon me. But why now? Now that he was getting married to someone else? That, strangely, was the reason. The shock news had showed me how much I wanted him.

  We moved closer. The heat of Paddy’s breath was on my mouth. He was going to kiss me… But Damien… My body was opening in response to the look of intent in Paddy’s eyes. Almost swooning from his nearness, I closed my eyes, then his tongue was in my mouth and mine was in his and we kissed… What about Damien…? Paddy’s hand was on my breast, his fingers seeking my nipple, his body hard and warm against mine…

  Damien… My knees were buckling with desire – then in my head I saw Marnie, her face purple and swollen.

  I opened my eyes and wrenched myselfaway. ‘No, Paddy, I’m not doing this.’

  It came from no where. A slap with his open hand across my face, catching my eye socket with his ring. The force of it sent me staggering to the floor. I felt wetness beneath my left eye and for one humiliated moment I thought I was crying. It was actually a reliefto wipe my hand across my cheek and find it covered in blood.

  ‘You probably won’t need stitches,’ he said, almost like an apology.

  ‘How do you know?’ I said thickly. ‘You do this often?’

  I’d intended to be sarcastic, but from the way he was considering me, as ifweighing up how much of a liability I was, I realized that actually, yes, he did do this often. Marnie might have been the first but there had been others since her. I gaped, then dropped my gaze because I thought it might be safer not to look at him.

  ‘Ifyou ever tell anyone,’ he said, ‘I’ll kill you. Okay? Okay?’ he said, louder this time.

  I was mopping the blood off my face, astonished at its quantity and redness. ‘Okay.’

  He knelt beside me; I thought he was about to help me to get up and I was preparing to shrug him away. With one hand he took my cigarette from the ashtray and with his other, clasped my wrist.

  Our eyes met and after a freeze-frame of disbelief, I knew what he wanted to do.

  ‘No!’ Frenziedly I tried to scoot backwards across the floor.

  ‘Yes.’ He pinned me down, kneeling on my forearm, bringing the burning red tip onto the centre of the palm of my hand.

  It was quick and terrible, immeasurably worse than I could have imagined. But more horrific than the physical pain, was that I’d been marked by him for ever.

  I barely remember leaving his office. Out on the street I lurched on leaden legs through the crowds of Kildare Street and, without having consciously decided to, I gravitated towards the peace of Stephen’s Green where, incapable of anything else, I sat on a bench.

  Everything had slowed down. All my thoughts were dragging.

  I’m in shock, I realized. I’m in shock.

  My face was still bleeding. Not pumping blood like it had initially, but there was a steady stream that kept using up tissues. I’d hold one against my cheek and a little while later I’d look at it and see that it was red and falling apart, then I’d get a fresh one.

  How strange that I had a packet of tissues in my bag, I thought, feeling very faraway. I’m so not a packet-of-tissues person. But when I’d looked for them in my bag, there they’d been, like… like… l
ittle helping things…

  My hand pulsed with pain, a shocking, somehow menacing pain, so severe that I thought I might vomit.

  And then my rage came into focus, red and hot and thick, gathering might and viscosity. Fucking Paddy de Courcy. I was… sickened, quite literally sickened, by what he’d done to me. It was unbearably humiliating. He had used his superior strength on me and I hadn’t been able to do a thing about it. I’d simply had to take it.

  But he was fucked now. As soon as I was able, I was going to hail a taxi and tell them to take me to the nearest cop shop – there was one in Pearse Street – and I was going to get him arrested for assault. He would regret having fucked with me, I promised myself, with bitter resolve. He’d be sorry he’d ever thought he could get the better of me. I wasn’t just some stupid girl who was so mad about him that she’d keep shtum.

  I’ve never forgotten you, I’ve always known where you were working, I’ve always read your articles. All that stuff he’d said when we were first working on the book, which had soft-soaped me into giddiness even while I wondered ifhe was just telling me what I wanted to hear, I was now certain was true. But instead of being flattered, I thought it was sinister.

  Maybe he hadn’t cared about me when I was a teenager, but I was sure now that that time, eleven years ago, when I wouldn’t go home with him, had left a barb. Paddy de Courcy probably didn’t get turned down very often. Since then he’d probably regarded me as unfinished business. Not a priority – I wasn’t that important – but something on his back burner, a grudge to be avenged, ifthe chance ever presented itself…

  Then I was on my last tissue. I couldn’t stay on the bench any longer. It was time to get up and make my way to Pearse Street.

  I got to my feet and maybe it was because I was finally in motion, putting my thoughts into action, that I suddenly understood that I couldn’t shop Paddy to the police. All the threats I’d made in my head were just bravado, because I knew the exact conversation I’d have with the desk sergeant.

  ‘Why did Mr de Courcy assault you?’

  ‘Because he was angry with me.’

  ‘And why was he angry with you?’

  ‘Because I wouldn’t sleep with him.’