The Missing Husband

by Natasha Boydell

  They made small talk until the waitress came over to take their order, with Dan asking after the girls and Kate enquiring about his family. As soon as the waitress had gone, Kate went straight to the point. ‘Dan, thanks for arranging to meet me, I know this is difficult for you but I need you to tell me what you know.’

  He nodded, already resigned to his fate. He’d obviously decided to tell her everything and she was grateful to him for it, he was a decent guy. Perhaps he’d discussed it with Laura, Kate thought, and she had urged him to do the right thing. Despite the fact that she hated everyone knowing about their personal life, she had to get to the truth.

  ‘Her name is Claire. She worked on reception for a few months. I don’t know much about her, she kept herself to herself and didn’t socialise much. I’ve asked around in the office to see if anyone is still in touch with her but no one is. As far as anyone else knows, she was a temp and she left.’

  He paused for a minute as their drinks arrived before continuing. ‘Pete told me about the affair a few months ago. I think it had been going on for a while by then. He told me that he’d decided to quit his job and move to France with her. I told him he was making a mistake, but he wouldn’t listen. The last time I saw him was at his leaving do a couple of weeks ago. He told me that he was going to tell you everything before he left so I am as shocked as you are that he didn’t.’

  And there it was. The truth. She realised her hands were shaking and she wrapped them around her coffee cup to steady them.

  ‘Who else knew about this?’ she asked.

  ‘Only one other person, Carl from work,’ Dan replied. ‘There were rumours about Pete and Claire flying around the office but no one knew anything for sure. When they both left at the same time, people gossiped but Claire was a pretty private person and no one could get any information out of her.’

  ‘Do you know Claire’s full name? Or anything about where she lived?’

  ‘Her last name is Robinson. I think she lived in south London but that’s all I know.’

  Claire Robinson. Not a particularly unusual name, there was no way she’d be able to find the right one on social media, she thought.

  ‘Are you friends with her on Facebook or anything?’

  ‘No, I’m sorry, I’m not. I didn’t know her well. None of us did, she wasn’t there very long and like I said, she kept herself to herself. I could find out the name of the temp agency she came from if you like, although I’m not sure if they’d tell you anything. I know HR won’t give me her details, they run the department like Fort Knox.’

  ‘Thanks, Dan, that would be helpful if you don’t mind. I’m not sure yet if I’ll do anything with it but it would be good to have it nevertheless. Do you know where in France they were going to?’

  ‘No, he didn’t give me any details. He just said it was a property that Claire’s family had owned, somewhere rural. He was going to work remotely but he said he’d come back to London regularly for meetings and to see the girls.’

  ‘Did he tell you where his new job was?’

  ‘He might have done at some point but I can’t remember. I’m sorry. It was a tech firm, I think.’

  Now that she had the answers she’d been looking for, Kate realised that she didn’t want to stay any longer. There was no point prolonging the agony for them both. She drained her coffee and stood up. ‘Listen, Dan, thank you for your honesty, I really appreciate it. If you hear from him, will you let me know?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said, standing up to give her another hug. ‘And if you need anything at all, Kate, you or the girls, please let me know.’

  ‘Thanks, Dan, I will.’ She smiled sadly at him one last time and left.

  Outside she checked her phone and saw a message from Nadia inviting her to lunch with the ladies. It was, quite literally, the last thing she wanted to do. They had all been lovely, the others, but she knew that they were probably talking about her behind her back and it made her feel sick. It was at times like this that you realised who your real friends were, she thought, not the ones who send sympathetic text messages and then bitch about the state of your relationship with other people over coffee, but the ones who genuinely offer to help. And, apart from Erin who had been amazing, there didn’t seem to be too many of them left anymore. When had she lost touch with all her real friends, the ones who really cared about her?

  At university she had attracted friends like magnets. The girls she’d lived with during her three years in Leeds had become like sisters to her and they had stayed in touch throughout their twenties. Some were living in London like Kate and Pete, others had moved to different cities or countries, but they always made an effort to meet up regularly. She’d also made some good friends in her job, although looking back now they were good-time friends – great fun for work drinks on a Friday night or a hungover brunch the next day, but not ones to come flocking in a crisis. And when everyone hit their thirties and started having babies, things changed. Even her beloved uni girls drifted away – the non-baby ones having amazing adventures in far-flung places or working their way up the career ladder and the baby ones so absorbed in the daily challenge of parenting tiny people that they didn’t have the time to keep up with old friendships anymore.

  Perhaps if she’d got more involved in the children’s school lives she’d have made more friends but Rachel did most of the school runs so she’d never really had the chance to mingle, other than with the antenatal mums who she already knew. They must all think she was a terrible snob, she thought, the mum who doesn’t work but still has a nanny. No wonder she didn’t have any bloody friends. Unless you counted Nadia and the others but she wouldn’t exactly call them close. Pete had never liked them that much but they all adored him. At Sunday lunches in the local pub or occasional dinner parties, all arranged by Nadia, they had cooed over him, enthralled by his sharp wit and easy banter. Oh, he could put the charm on when he wanted to and they’d all fallen for it.

  ‘Pete is SO lovely,’ Nadia had gushed to him on one of their meet-ups in the park. ‘Such a doting father. And you two are just, like, the perfect match.’

  And despite how she was feeling on the inside, Kate had loved it. The idea that everyone thought they were this amazing couple, the epitome of family life: it was all she had ever wanted and if it couldn’t be real it was a close second that at least it looked like that to the outside world. Looking back now, she realised how shallow and ridiculous that was. What did it matter what everyone else thought when your husband was having an affair with another woman and doing everything he could to avoid coming home to his family? If she’d worked harder on their marriage and less on making the house, the children, everything look so perfect they probably wouldn’t be in this situation.

  Still, Pete wasn’t here and Nadia was and she needed all the friends she could get, so she replied to say she’d be there and headed back to the station, pausing for one last minute to savour the bustling anonymity of the City before reluctantly getting on the train that would take her back to reality.

  10

  Pete

  Pete jumped off the Tube at Paddington Station and headed towards the coffee shop where they had arranged to meet. A little frisson of excitement ran through him. Today, instead of going to work, he and Claire were going away together. It was only for one night but he felt like a kid breaking up for the summer, as if time stretched endlessly ahead of him, with nothing but fun and carefree abandonment to enjoy.

  He’d booked them into a trendy inn in Oxfordshire, one with a Michelin-starred chef, so they could go for country walks, eat and drink fine food and hopefully have lots of sex in a boho chic room. He’d felt under pressure to organise something trendy for Claire, she was that type of girl. He’d spent hours on the internet at work, when he was supposed to be doing the budget for next year, researching suitable venues. According to The Sunday Times this was one of the hippest mini-break destinations of the year and judging by how much it cost, it better be bloody excepti
onal. Thank God he had an Amex card that Kate didn’t have access to.

  The train was leaving in fifteen minutes, so he ordered a couple of coffees to go and stood outside the café, waiting for Claire.

  A couple of minutes later she rocked up, looking unhurried and effortlessly sexy as she always did, wearing her signature oversized sunglasses and clutching a small holdall. Her face lit up when she saw him and she walked over to give him a kiss. ‘I’m so excited, Pete,’ she said with a grin.

  He grinned back. ‘Me too.’

  It was the first time they’d been on a proper date, if you could call it that. It was a bit of a risk which was why he’d decided to go out of town, to a county where they didn’t know anyone. The chances of bumping into another mini-breaking Londoner on a Tuesday during term time were slim to none. They headed for the platform, instinctively staying apart from each other while London rules still applied. On the carriage he looked around furtively, making sure that they didn’t know anyone, before sitting down next to her.

  As the train pulled out he felt himself relaxing and he reached towards her and kissed her. ‘I’ve been looking forward to doing that for days,’ he said.

  ‘I hope it was worth the wait.’

  ‘You’re always worth the wait, Claire.’

  They regarded each other for a minute, the tension building between them, and she looked pointedly at the toilets and back at him. Was she suggesting what he thought she was suggesting? Train toilets were bloody disgusting. And there was always someone waiting outside, making you feel like you had to pee as quickly as possible. But already the thought was beginning to turn him on. This girl was something else. He nodded and they stood up silently and made their way to the toilet.

  Inside, he locked the door and pushed her up against the tiny little sink. It was early enough in the journey that it didn’t smell of piss yet but Christ there was barely enough room for one person, let alone two. This was not going to be the most comfortable sex he’d ever had. Yet the sheer recklessness of what they were doing almost overwhelmed him and after only a few seconds of kissing he was shoving her underwear to one side, using his fingers until she shuddered with pleasure before pulling down his flies and pushing himself into her with such urgency that he thought he was going to explode. It was quick, it was dirty and it was amazing.

  Afterwards they made their way sheepishly back to their seats, avoiding eye contact with everyone else in the carriage.

  ‘Well, that was a first,’ he whispered to her after they’d sat back down.

  ‘Me too.’

  ‘Possibly a last too,’ he added with a laugh. ‘Not the most luxurious experience of my life.’

  ‘But pretty hot, right?’ she replied, raising her eyebrows at him.

  ‘Pretty hot,’ he agreed.

  The rest of the journey was somewhat less eventful. They bought another coffee and did a crossword together. When they got to their stop they jumped into a taxi and arrived at the hotel with a couple of hours to kill before lunch. Donning their wellies and waterproofs they prepared to go out for a walk.

  ‘Jesus, we look like a right pair of Londoners on a day out in the country,’ he said with a laugh, observing their pristine Barbour coats and Joules wellies in the mirror before they went out. Without warning he had a flashback to the first country weekend away he’d been on with Kate. They’d been skint students at the time so they’d stayed in the cheapest B&B they could find. It was the ugliest room they’d ever seen and the en suite they’d been promised had turned out to be a toilet in a cupboard and a shower cubicle in the actual bedroom. They’d laughed so hard they’d been rolling around on the floor crying. But they didn’t need fancy bedding and expensive toiletries to have a good time back then: all they needed was each other. They’d gone for a long, lazy walk, broken up by pints in the pub, until they were so pissed that Kate had fallen over on the way home and ended up head to toe in mud. Then she’d had to wash it all off in the ‘en suite’ while Pete sat on the bed, merely inches away, laughing so hysterically that he had almost wet himself. It had been one of the best weekends of his life. How long had it been since they’d laughed like that? It seemed like a whole lifetime ago.

  Banishing the thoughts to the back of his mind, he took Claire by the hand and shut the door behind him. Time to focus on the now, he told himself.

  ‘Tell me about your children?’ Claire asked him. They were sitting opposite each other in the inn’s restaurant having just eaten one of the best meals of his life. He felt full and happy as they drank the remainder of the red wine they’d ordered with dinner and the question threw him. He raised his eyebrows at her.

  ‘There’s no point pretending they don’t exist, Pete. They’re a big part of your life and I want to know about the things that matter to you.’

  ‘Well Lily is seven, Maggie is five,’ he began. ‘They’re like chalk and cheese, the pair of them. Lily is the serious one, very conscientious at school and a heart of gold. Maggie is a cheeky little mare but she doesn’t half make me laugh.’

  ‘Did you always want children?’

  He considered the question for a moment. ‘I guess it was just something that we always assumed we’d do. It’s not like I had a burning desire to be a dad but it was the standard pathway, you know? Not that I’m saying I don’t like being a dad, I love my girls, but it wasn’t something I’d dreamed of all my life, if that makes sense.’

  ‘Are you close to your own family?’

  He shook his head. ‘Not at all. My dad left when I was young and I have no idea where he is. I don’t want to know either. I never really got on with my mum. She’s the sort of person who always has a chip on her shoulder. Not the most supportive mother in the world. When I told her I wanted to go to university she just didn’t get it at all. “Why don’t you just get a job like everyone else?” she asked me. I think she was expecting me to contribute financially rather than swan off for another three years of studying. I couldn’t wait to get away. How about you?’

  ‘The total opposite,’ she said with a wistful smile. ‘My mum was my best friend. When she died it hit me really hard. But me and my dad, we got through it together and it made us closer than ever. When he died, I felt totally on my own for the first time in my life. It was hard.’ She paused to sip some of her wine.

  ‘I’ve not been back to my dad’s house in France since he died. I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. But recently I’ve found myself thinking about it more and more. Maybe it’s time to go back. Perhaps you could come with me?’

  ‘I’d like that,’ he said, already mentally calculating how it would be possible to get away for a few days. He could easily fabricate a business trip. ‘I’d like that a lot.’

  Afterwards they went back to their room. Lying next to Claire in post-coital bliss, a nightcap glass of whisky in his hand, he allowed the warming effect of the drink to overcome him and he drifted off into a contented sleep.

  The next morning she was already in the shower when he woke up. She came out, rubbing her wet hair with a towel and perched on the bed next to him.

  ‘Morning, sleepyhead,’ she said, giving him a kiss.

  ‘What time is it?’ he asked her.

  ‘Just gone nine thirty.’

  Bloody hell, I haven’t slept that late since… he couldn’t even remember when. ‘I slept like a log,’ he said, stretching and sitting up.

  ‘Nothing like a bit of country fresh air for a good night’s sleep,’ she said. She smiled at him but she seemed a bit distracted.

  ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine, just a bit sad that it’s all over and we have to go home. I’ve had such a glorious time.’

  ‘Me too,’ he said, reaching out to pull her towards him. But she resisted.

  ‘I’m sorry, Pete, it’s just, oh I don’t know, most of the time I’m absolutely fine with the fact that you have this whole other life. I knew what I was getting myself into. But sometimes I just wish that it could be someth
ing more.’

  Oh shit. His heart sank. This was the first time she’d brought it up after months of their no-ties agreement. He’d been lulled into a false sense of security that she was totally, 100 per cent fine with the arrangement. She’d been so cool and undemanding about it up until now. Had he been naïve? She was a woman after all, emotions always came into it in the end. He thought back to the conversation he’d had with Dan at the pub, when he had told him about the affair. He’d told his friend he was smitten with Claire. Did he mean it or did he just say it in the heat of the moment? You have to make a decision, Dan had said. He just wasn’t ready yet. Why was she bringing it up now? They’d had the most amazing day and night and now she was totally ruining the vibe.

  As if she could read his mind, she immediately leant in to kiss him. ‘Oh, just ignore me, Pete, I’m only being silly. Forget I said anything. Now, where were we?’

  She dropped her towel and crawled into bed with him, pushing her warm body up against him. He relaxed and reached for her, running his hands up and down her body and allowing himself to get lost in the moment again. But her words stayed with him for the remainder of the trip.

  11

  Kate

  Pete, it’s me, again. I don’t know why I keep emailing you, it’s clear that you’re either not checking your messages or that you don’t want to respond. But I can hardly just forget about you and pretend you never existed. Is that what you want me to do? I keep waiting for you to get back into contact. Every day I wait for a call, a text, anything that tells me that you’re okay, that you’re thinking of us, that you’re coming back.