Tiny Acts of Love

by Lucy Lawrie

The room had been ‘turned down’ and the long, thick curtains drawn against the evening. The bedspread had been folded back to reveal crisp white linen sheets, and a pair of white towelling slippers waited by the bed. There was a decanter of whisky on the table in front of the fire, and a plate of handmade shortbread.

  I sat down carefully, anxious not to make any squeaking or squelching noises in my swimsuit, still wet from the steam room. Malkie poured me a drink. A cashmere throw in smoky grey and blue tartan lay folded over the arm of the chaise longue; I held it against my cheek for a moment, as soft and warm as kitten fur.

  ‘Look, do you think I could borrow a t-shirt, Malkie? And maybe some trousers or something if you have any?’ I was beginning to feel chilled and shivery under the bathrobe.

  Malkie pulled open the wardrobe and rummaged around in a sports bag. Then, over his shoulder, he flung a white cotton t-shirt followed shortly by a pair of tartan boxer shorts.

  ‘Sorry, I don’t have any other trousers. I’m wearing my kilt tonight.’

  I went into the bathroom to change. I dried myself off on one of the thick fluffy towels, then held the t-shirt up to my face and breathed in, curious to see if it smelt of him. Then I pulled it on, sat down on the edge of the bath and hid my face in my hands.

  ‘Here you go,’ he said when I re-emerged into the bedroom, offering me a glass with an inch or so of whisky in the bottom. ‘I think you need this.’

  ‘You know, I never asked you,’ I began. ‘When we did the psychology experiment. The guys that took part . . . were those all your t-shirts that Jo stuffed into those jars?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Malkie, finishing a mouthful of shortbread. ‘And I take it that those were your tights?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Uh-ohhhhh,’ said Malkie, a smile spreading across his face. ‘You never realised, did you?’ His voice squeaked up in characteristic ‘Malkie excited’ style.

  I shook my head. When Malkie had finished splitting his sides laughing, or rather, when he was able to draw occasional breaths between paroxysms, he continued.

  ‘When Jo came round to my flat to ask me if I would be in the experiment, I noticed afterwards that one of my t-shirts had disappeared – it had been lying on my bedroom floor. Kevin admitted later that Jo had nicked it as part of the experiment, that she was nicking everybody’s stuff. That’s why she had to give up her Masters – because her tutor found out. Did you never know?’

  ‘No. So let me get this right, all of the guys who were doing the experiment had to go into a room beforehand and sniff . . . oh God.’ I covered my face in my hands.

  ‘Mmm-hmm,’ said Malkie, trying to look apologetic but unable to conceal the cheeky delight in his eyes at having been the one to break the news.

  I sat there, unable to think of anything to say. I hoped my cheeks were still red from the steam room, so that my flush of humiliation might be less noticeable.

  ‘Were any of the tights . . . did they smell nice?’ I finally asked in a tiny voice.

  ‘Mmmmmm-hmm,’ said Malkie wiggling his eyebrows in a ridiculous manner.

  I threw my shortbread across the room, hitting him on the shoulder. He squealed and dived behind the sofa, from where, a moment later, another piece of shortbread appeared, flying in a perfect arc towards me.

  I had an inkling of where this might be leading – probably a tickling match on the floor, if history was anything to go by – and decided not to retaliate.

  A moment later, Malkie popped up from behind the sofa. ‘Ms Headley,’ he said in a low, stern voice, using my maiden name. ‘Are you trying to get us evicted from the Fairview Suite?’ When I ignored him, he threw another piece of shortbread at me, then laughed gruffly. ‘Look, I need to go and get a bath and get changed.’

  He poured himself another whisky and went into the bathroom. I heard whistling and running bathwater. I sat and leafed through one of the Scottish Life magazines on the table, and tried to concentrate on the snapping and hissing of the fire, rather than the sound of Malkie’s ablutions in the next room.

  Finally, he came out, wearing nothing but a white towel wrapped around his waist. He poured himself another whisky, and turned on the television, flicking through the channels until he found a football game to watch. He sat down, leaning far back in his chair, knees stretched apart underneath the towel, feet planted firmly on the floor. Just as he’d always used to.

  The buzz of the commentary became almost hypnotic. The luxurious surroundings seemed to melt away, and it was as if we were in his musty flat again on a dark wintry Saturday afternoon. I could even imagine a vat of Secret Recipe Bolognese bubbling on the stove, and the ping of the timer he used to set to remind us to stir it every five minutes.

  He roared, as one of the strikers on his team scored a much-anticipated goal. My phone beeped, announcing a text message. It was from Jody:

  SORRY! Shona got called into office. Tom came back from golf and we got a little bit carried away in the room! Hope U have been enjoying the facilities? Where are U? Want 2 hav drink B4 U go? Then Tom will drive U to station if U like?

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘It’s okay, Jody and Tom’s shag-a-thon is over. Tom’s going to give me a lift to the station. I’ll get going – you need to get ready for the Burns Supper anyway.’

  Malkie didn’t seem to absorb any of this. ‘God, I’m actually drunk,’ he declared. ‘Come and sit next to me.’

  ‘I can’t Malkie,’ I said, in a tight voice. I didn’t get up to leave, though.

  ‘I know. I’m sorry,’ he said with a sigh, dragging his hands down the sides of his freshly shaved face. ‘I just find it difficult to be around you without . . . I don’t know. I just keep expecting something else to happen. It just seems such a waste, that’s all.’

  ‘Malkie, you’re the one that dumped me. Four times. You feel bad that you can’t have me now, but I felt bad for years, and in fact am still feeling bad. So just . . . shut up.’

  ‘Cassie, you’ve got to understand. I had to end it because you scared the life out of me.’

  ‘Why? Why did I scare you? That’s ridiculous. I’m the least scary person in the whole world!’

  ‘You were so intense. I felt like you were always wishing I would recite poetry or something.’

  ‘No. When I was with you I felt like I was living poetry. It was like living life at another level. I felt like there should be a soundtrack playing, wherever we went.’

  It had been a long time since Jonathan and I had had a soundtrack moment, I realised, with a hollow feeling. Lots of happy times, yes, but no soundtrack moments.

  Malkie looked at me strangely.

  ‘It felt like a story,’ I went on, suddenly realising I had put my finger on it. ‘I felt like it was my story – our story – about to happen. And when you dumped me, and nothing happened, not ever again, well . . . it was just emptiness, I suppose. It was – I don’t know – hard to bear.’

  A story without an ending. Could I make the ending be now, I wondered. Could I? Malkie came over and sat next to me on the sofa, snatching Scottish Life out of my hands and thumping it down on the coffee table.

  ‘Cassie. Look, we never had a chance back then. And I know we don’t really have a chance now, but what I’m saying is . . . we need to finish this properly.’

  Yes, we needed to finish it. But to hear him say it – how bleak that made me feel.

  ‘How about you just . . .’ He paused and looked at me with pleading eyes.

  ‘What?’ I shook my head.

  ‘How about you just give me one more day.’ He mumbled it in the direction of the floor, as though he didn’t want to see my reaction.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Remember the time we went to St Andrews for the day?’

  I laughed. ‘The coldest day of my life.’

  ‘I know,’ he smiled. ‘I know. But let’s have just one more day. I’m not asking you to be unfaithful here. I just want to spend the day with you. We could go to the beac
h, look at the shops, have some lunch. Then I would drive you home and that would be it.’

  ‘And how exactly would we engineer this? I don’t think Jonathan would be too pleased if I just announced I was going off to spend the day with you in St Andrews.’

  ‘I have a client there,’ he said softly. ‘I go up there from time to time. They’ve talked before about needing employment advice. It wouldn’t be difficult to arrange.’

  I thought about wandering along the beach, our hair getting whipped about in the wind, or clambering over the old weathered stones at the cathedral ruins. I thought about going back to that greasy little café and ordering bacon rolls, warming our hands around mugs of strong coffee. I pictured how we would linger over the walk back to the car park on the outskirts of the town, how it would feel as we drove home in the failing light. Would it somehow be easier to say goodbye this way? Would it be easier to get all this longing wrapped up in a little ball, squeeze it into one short day, and then throw it away?

  ‘He will have you every day for the rest of your life.’ His voice was gravelly with emotion. ‘Can’t I have you for just one? You and me, one more time, for one more day. One more day in this life.’

  I gathered myself together, looked him in the eye. Having a day together wouldn’t do, of course it wouldn’t, and I would have to tell him so. But . . . his hand. I could take his hand, and have just a few seconds. I could kiss his fingers, one by one, and then say goodbye. Surely that would hurt nobody.

  I began to reach for him, but then stopped. I couldn’t let my life – not to mention Jonathan and Sophie’s lives – be tossed around on these waves of helpless emotion. I had to navigate these waters with a steady hand, even if I didn’t have a steady heart.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘No. It’s not going to happen.’

  There was a knock at the door.

  ‘That’ll be my shirt,’ said Malkie. ‘I sent it for pressing. Hang on.’ He strode over to the door and opened it.

  It was Jonathan.

  *

  He took one look at Malkie, then turned to me.

  ‘Who is this?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s Malkie.’ There was no other possible answer.

  ‘Ahhh yes. Malkie. Hello. Sorry, I couldn’t place you for a second there. But of course, how could I forget you after Workplace Phantoms? And would you care to enlighten me, Cassie, as to what you are doing here with Malkie?’

  ‘I’m stranded!’ I appealed, dramatically. ‘But how did you know I was here anyway?’

  Jonathan took his mobile phone out of his pocket, pressed a couple of buttons and then tossed it at me. A text message was displayed on the screen:

  I’m in the Fairview Suite, rather tired of waiting around in this bathrobe. Come and get me!!!

  I gasped. ‘This was meant for Jody!’

  Jonathan raised his eyebrows sharply. ‘And I’m supposed to be relieved about that? Good God, woman.’

  ‘I’ll . . . leave you to it,’ said Malkie, slipping out of the room.

  ‘Are those . . . his boxer shorts you’re wearing?’ asked Jonathan, pulling back one side of the bathrobe and letting it fall in disgust.

  ‘Yes, but I . . . Nothing happened.’

  ‘I just cannot believe this. It’s fucking unbelievable.’

  ‘Honey, honey,’ I said. ‘Listen. You need to listen to me.’

  Suddenly I felt sheer panic, impossible grief, at the prospect of losing him. I looked up at him, tears in my eyes. I wanted to hold him. But his face was a brick wall.

  ‘I’m not listening to anything,’ he said. ‘I’m tired and I’m going home.’

  *

  Jonathan drove. We purred along dark country roads, through woodland and moorland, past farmhouses with lights glowing in the windows, and holiday cottages empty for the winter.

  ‘Nothing happened,’ I said again, scanning his face for a reaction.

  There was a T-junction up ahead, and he nudged the indicator on. The ticking was loud in the small space of the car, in the silence where his response should have been.

  ‘But I know that’s not the point. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry about it all.’

  A few moments passed, and I thought he’d chosen to ignore me.

  But then, when he’d checked the traffic and moved out onto the main road, he spoke, his voice soft: ‘These things happen.’

  Then he turned on Radio 4, and asked if I wanted the heater on higher.

  I realised, then, the enormity of this and felt sick to my stomach. It wasn’t that there was tension between us – rather the opposite. We should have been pulling against each other, twisting and tugging over what had happened, what I’d done and hadn’t done, and what it might all mean. But Jonathan, instead of pulling, had simply loosened his hands and let go.

  27

  The venue for Jean’s grievance hearing was a meeting room in a travel lodge not far from Edinburgh Zoo. She was full of conspiracy theories about this and interrogated me in the taxi as to what I thought it could mean.

  ‘Maybe they don’t have a big enough meeting room at Brand New You?’

  ‘No, dear,’ she cried. ‘It’s designed to intimidate us!’ She leaned forward in her seat, and her plump, powdery face seemed to fill my field of vision. Gerry was with us, so I was perched on one of the fold-down seats facing the rear of the taxi, feeling nauseous and buzzy-headed.

  I’d clocked up only two hours’ sleep the previous night, what with Sophie’s antics, and my worries about this hearing. Jonathan had left our bed at about two a.m. and had gone to sleep in the spare room. I’d followed him, thinking it might be another sleepwalking episode, but he’d stepped away from me when I tried to take his arm, and said I should get back to bed.

  In the week that had passed since the Glenallan House episode, Jonathan hadn’t so much as mentioned it again, not even when he’d found me in the kitchen the next day parcelling up the bathrobe in brown paper to send back to the hotel (anonymously, of course). I wished he would say something, wished he’d have a go at me, fight with me. Fight for us.

  ‘Are you all right, dear?’ asked Jean. ‘You look a bit peaky.’

  ‘I’m fine. Just thinking about the case.’

  When we arrived at the travel lodge, a girl from reception showed us in to the meeting room. At the far end of the room was a long desk, behind which sat ‘the panel’ and Chantal-Marie, the HR Manager.

  I recognised Wilf from Jean’s description; he had a long thin face and a wispy goatee. He wore a black waistcoat over a loose, beige and brown striped shirt. Chantal-Marie was dressed in a red power-suit, with a bright slash of lipstick.

  The second panel member was an elderly Japanese gentleman.

  ‘Who’s that?’ I whispered to Jean.

  ‘Oh, goodness, that’s Mr Kishimoto. He’s Wilf’s business partner – owns sixty per cent of the business, actually. I’ve only seen him once before.’

  She narrowed her eyes, as if to check that it was really him, and not an impersonator.

  ‘He doesn’t have any day-to-day involvement, but keeps up to speed with the financials, and all that. And I suppose Wilf involves him in some of the bigger strategic decisions. I’m surprised they’ve brought him into this . . . oh, my! Look who it is!’

  A young woman had entered the room and was walking to­wards us; a tiny, thin woman with short dark hair and wide eyes, just as Jean had described her. I stood up and held out my hand.

  ‘Nina Deneuve? Thanks so much for coming.’

  ‘Hello, dear!’ said Jean, then turned to me. ‘Now, Cassie, why didn’t you tell me you’d found Miss Deneuve?’

  ‘I didn’t know I had until about an hour ago. She’s not an easy lady to get hold of.’

  ‘I’ve been away travelling,’ said Nina by way of explanation to Jean. ‘I just flew in from the States last night, and came back to a dozen answer-phone messages from Cassie. When she explained the situation, I was only too pleased to come along and . . . well, offer some dam
age limitation, if I can.’

  At the front of the room, Chantal-Marie stood up and cleared her throat.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for attending our hearing today. Before we start I’m just going to run through the procedure. Mr Weeks, Managing Director, and Mr Kishimoto, our Non-Executive Director, will be deciding the outcome of the grievance hearing today. My role is to help set out the facts of the case as I see them, for the benefit of Mr Weeks and Mr Kishimoto, and provide background as to the legal position, and best practice.’

  The door opened again, and in walked Murray Radcliffe. Without acknowledging me, he sat down on a chair at the back.

  ‘First of all,’ went on Chantal-Marie, ‘we will give Mrs Forrester the opportunity to state her case, giving us full details of the facts and circumstances surrounding her grievance, and the reasons why she feels she has been treated unfairly by the Company. Thank you. Mrs Forrester – over to you.’

  Jean looked at me. I gave her an encouraging nod.

  ‘Do I have to stand up?’ she whispered.

  ‘Not if you don’t want to,’ I said. I wasn’t going to let this set-up intimidate her. ‘Just read out the letter we wrote to them, if you like.’

  She did so, while Gerry sat with his arms crossed, adding the odd ‘hmmph’ for emphasis.

  As she spoke, a calm feeling settled over me despite the presence of Radcliffe in the room. It was a sort of confidence – a readiness. I’d felt it before, on occasions when my own convictions had fallen into alignment with what I was trying to achieve professionally. And now, with Jean faltering through her statement, and Gerry sitting so trustingly at my side, it was combined with an almost maternal ferocity.

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Forrester,’ said Chantal-Marie. ‘Mr Weeks, Mr Kishimoto, if I could just set out for you the reasons why a decision was taken that, regrettably, it would no longer be possible to accommodate Mr Forrester on the premises. First of all, there are health and safety issues . . .’

  She bleated on through her list of reasons. Then she paused, a cruel gleam creeping into her eyes. ‘However, the most serious example of Mr Forrester’s unsuitability was when he accosted one of our customers, causing her to cancel a treatment regime, an outcome which cost the business thousands of pounds of lost revenue.’