by Susan Lewis
‘Heavens, Laurie can’t even think about anything except Elliot,’ she’d more or less scoffed. ‘It’ll be a long time before she gets involved with anyone else.’
‘Yes or no?’ Sherry persisted. ‘Do you think there’s anything going on between her and Nick?’
‘Sherry, you know the answer, so I’m not even going to go there.’
She’d skirted the issue, and they both knew it. ‘So why is she avoiding me?’ Sherry had countered.
‘She’s not. I don’t know why you’re saying that.’
‘I know they’ve seen each other. I think it was the night Elliot should have gone round there.’
Rhona’s eyes widened. ‘What makes you say that?’
‘It’s just a feeling I have.’
‘Well, if he did, I know nothing about it.’
Sherry might have believed her had she not then gone on, unprompted, to say, ‘I don’t know why you’re doing this to yourself. You’ve seen him since, haven’t you? He came over and spent the night. Everything was all right then – wasn’t it?’
Sherry had only nodded in response, but of course it hadn’t been. She didn’t want Rhona to know that though, she didn’t want anyone to. She just wanted to go back to a time when everything was all right, even though she couldn’t actually think when that was.
Nick hadn’t been in touch since he’d left the next morning, and she was certain now that he wouldn’t be again. Which meant that somehow she had to make herself accept that he didn’t feel the same way she did. He might have, if it weren’t for his ex-wife Trudy, and his ex-girlfriend Elaine, and his new love, Laurie. He’d allowed other people to distract him, not realizing that with her he could have had something so special, so unique he would never have needed anyone else. Why hadn’t he understood that? It had always seemed so plain to her.
Maybe she’d got it all wrong about him. Maybe he wasn’t the man she’d always believed him to be. He obviously hadn’t been thinking about her all these years, longing to get away from a loveless marriage so he could be with her. He’d been happy with his wife until she’d left him. Then instead of rushing out to find Sherry, he’d moved in with another woman whom he’d spent a whole year with, presumably not giving a second thought to Sherry, whose life was on hold for him.
And now? What was going on now? Was he falling for Laurie, or was she just someone else who needed rescuing, the way Sherry once had? Maybe that was how he operated: find a woman in distress, take advantage, then leave as though it had never happened.
How could he be so like her father without her noticing it before?
She shifted restlessly. It was exactly how her father had seduced his starlets – search out the vulnerable one, ply her with champagne and promises of stardom, then, when she held no more interest for him, he returned to his wife. And all the time her beautiful, delicate and devoted mother just carried on loving him with all her heart and forgiving him with all her soul. It hadn’t been hard to understand why, for he was the easiest man in the world to love, and no-one, not even Sherry or her mother, could ever be in any doubt that, in spite of everything, he loved his wife above all other women, with the possible exception of his daughter, whom he sometimes claimed to love even more. And throughout her life Sherry had never loved anyone as much as she loved him. Ever since she could remember he was their world. Her mother came alive when he was at home, and when he wasn’t there, they just waited for him to come back.
Nick wouldn’t come back. Not because of Laurie, or because he didn’t love or care for her, but because, in his heart, he was guilty of the very prejudice she’d always feared: if the mother was a murderess, maybe the daughter could be too.
She didn’t blame him for feeling that way, she even understood it, she’d just believed he was different. With him she’d thought there could be a chance, a way of putting it all behind her so that the sacrifices would have been worth it. That could still happen, if she were able to convince him how vital he was to her in so many ways.
Reaching for the phone she dialled his mobile number. To her surprise, for she’d expected him to avoid her, he answered.
‘Hi. I was just thinking about you,’ he said, sounding pleased to hear her.
So like her father, always warm and friendly, no matter who was calling or what it was about. ‘I have a question,’ she told him. ‘Please answer me honestly. Is there something going on between you and Laurie?’
The beat before he answered was answer enough, but she waited, having to be certain, needing to hear him say it. ‘Not exactly,’ he finally replied. ‘But I won’t lie, I’d like there to be.’
‘Have you slept with her?’ she asked.
He was silent.
‘You have, haven’t you?’
‘Sherry …’
‘It’s OK. That’s all I need to know. Goodbye,’ and she rang off.
She got up from her desk and walked out to the balcony to begin tending her flowers. She wouldn’t be like her mother and let them die while she waited for the latest passion to burn itself out. She would keep them alive, because she didn’t want anything in her life to die ever again. It would of course, she knew that, because everything did – relationships, friendships, hopes, dreams, in the end everything turned to dust. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. She pictured herself standing at her father’s graveside. She was overwhelmed by a longing for him that could have filled an ocean and reached to the sky. She wished she knew how to keep everything alive, but she didn’t. It was all going to die, everything and everyone. There was only ever one end, and that was to die.
Suzy sat half-turned in the passenger seat, looking at Danny. With no make-up on her face and her hair scrunched into a bun she seemed so youthful and fresh it was hard to credit what she did for a living.
They’d been parked on this cobbled, lamplit street for a while now, knowing they were in the right place and that all they had to do was just go and drop the note off and it would be over, but so far neither of them had made a move to get out of the car.
‘Remember, you drove me here,’ she said, breaking the silence.
He threw up his hands. ‘What, you think I’m going to tell someone?’ he cried.
‘No. I just want you to remember, we did this together.’
‘Just fucking do it,’ he said irritably.
Suzy’s fingers closed more tightly on the note. ‘How are we going to get paid?’ she demanded. ‘I don’t have no job no more, remember?’
‘Barry’s going to take care of it. Now, just go.’
She was on the point of getting out when something else occurred to her. ‘I know what Eddie had done to your old man,’ she said, turning back, ‘but as far as I know he’s always been good to you …’
‘Yeah, like fucking threatening to chop off my dick if I as much as look at his daughter.’
‘You better hope he never finds out you poked that little slag,’ she warned.
‘You got a way with words, Suzy, anyone ever tell you that?’
‘So what are you going to do if this finishes him?’ she asked. ‘You’re on a nice little earner, so why would you want to screw it up now?’
‘I got other things happening,’ he told her. ‘And you can come wiv me if you just get out of this bollocksing car and deliver that note.’
Suzy was watching him carefully. ‘Where are you going, Danny?’ she asked. ‘Where’s the next stop, after Eddie?’
He flicked her a glance, then continued staring ahead.
‘You’re not talking about the Turks are you?’ she said. ‘Please tell me you’re not talking …’
‘I might be, but then again, I might not. Now, you just go and do what we’re here to do, and then we’ll drive somewhere else and have a little chat.’
Tearing her eyes from his face, Suzy turned to look up at the moonlit façade of Dunbar Wharf. Somewhere in there Sherry MacElvoy, she of the cheap blonde wig and book full of questions, was presumably sleeping. No nightmares, Suzy hoped
, because she’d quite liked the woman in spite of her bossiness. Even if she were submerged in some kind of Jungian weirdness, she’d have a nice surprise waiting for her when she woke up in the morning, presuming an anonymous note containing a secret address was still something she wanted.
Laurie was much calmer waiting for Elliot this time than the last. She wasn’t sure why, because her feelings hadn’t changed. She still missed him and wanted him back in her life almost more than she wanted to breathe, yet there had been no frantic preparations in the hour leading up to his arrival. She wasn’t wearing expensive underwear in the hope of seducing him, nor was there a CD on the player waiting to bring back precious memories. She didn’t even stop for a last-minute check in the mirror as she went to open the door.
She wondered if it had something to do with allowing herself finally to hit rock bottom last night, to take that flight without wings, that horrible descent into the deepest, darkest despair she had ever known. Nothing in her life had ever felt that bad. She had found herself imprisoned by the bleakest, cruellest part of her mind, where nothing could exist, not even the tiniest flicker of hope, or whisper of a prayer. It was as though there was no point to life, nothing that followed and no God to care. She’d looked through old photos, listened to their favourite operas and reread his letters. She’d wanted to destroy everything and still wasn’t sure why she hadn’t.
In the cold light of day she wondered how effective or wise it had been to make herself suffer so much, though she couldn’t deny that she’d woken up this morning feeling slightly different from the way she had before. It was hard to put into words how different, except she had just gone through an entire day without experiencing a single attack of the awful, heart-wrenching panic that made it seem impossible to go on.
The big test, however, was going to be when she opened the door.
She wasn’t afraid, though she had to admit she was nervous. She wondered if he was too. How strange it was to think of him standing outside his own home, waiting to be let in.
His back was towards her. Seeming to sense rather than know she was there, he turned round. As their eyes connected the jolt in her heart dismayed her, for it was far worse than she expected. His dark, glowering features were so familiar, everything about him was so known to her that every part of her seemed to yearn towards him. Didn’t he feel it too? Could he really stand there, gazing into her eyes, and feel nothing at all?
‘I hope I’m not late,’ he said.
She shook her head and stood aside for him to pass. ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ she told him.
He didn’t attempt to kiss her, even in a friendly way. In four days they would have been getting married, and now they couldn’t even embrace.
They walked along the short hallway together, past their studies, into the sitting room.
After a difficult pause she said, ‘Can I get you a drink?’
‘Only if you’re having one.’
Deciding she would, she left him standing there and went to the kitchen. She wondered what he was thinking as he looked around. Did he have any regrets, was it painful for him too?
She started as she almost dropped the glass she was holding. He turned at the sound.
‘OK?’ he said.
‘Yes, fine.’
They smiled politely.
‘I’m sorry about last week,’ he told her, sliding his hands in his pockets as he came to stand at the counter.
She wondered how true that was, and if it would be any truer if he knew what had happened as a result. Would he be jealous if she told him about Nick? She never would, for he might think that made it all right for him to be with Andraya, and nothing would ever make that all right.
‘Rachel tells me you’re going to Hydra,’ he said, as she pushed a glass of wine across the counter top.
‘On Thursday,’ she confirmed. ‘The same day as you go to New York, isn’t it?’
‘We go on Friday,’ he said.
The ‘we’ hit her hard. Had he really needed to say that? Couldn’t he just have said ‘I’?
‘Cheers,’ he said, raising his glass as she came round to join him.
She raised hers too, then went to curl into one of the big armchairs. ‘You can sit down,’ she told him.
He perched on the edge of the sofa, looking as uncomfortable as he obviously felt.
As she watched him she knew both anger and longing. She remembered the hell of last night, and wondered what he would say if she told him about it. ‘So,’ she said, ‘here we are, the week before the wedding that’s not going to happen.’
His eyes went down. Her words had stung, she could tell, but when he looked up again all he said was, ‘I sent your father a cheque to cover expenses …’
‘He got it, thank you, but there was no need. We just haven’t quite figured out what to do with the dress yet.’
To her surprise, he continued to look at her. ‘How are you?’ he asked. ‘You look good.’
‘I’m great, thanks,’ she replied. ‘I won’t ask how you are, that’s more Andraya’s concern now than mine. Did you have a nice time in Tuscany, by the way?’
Leaning forward he put his glass on the table, and linked his hands.
‘Do you make love to opera, when you’re with her, the way you did with me?’ she asked brightly.
His expression closed down, telling her he didn’t appreciate the question.
Well that was too bad, because she didn’t appreciate anything about this, but she was having to live with it anyway, so he could too.
‘How long are you going to Hydra for?’ he asked.
Refusing to be distracted, she said, ‘Does that mean you do make love to opera? The fact that you didn’t answer – is that a way of avoiding a lie?’
‘I don’t see how discussing my life with Andraya is going to be helpful here,’ he responded.
‘Then please tell me what is,’ she invited, ‘because I’m at a complete loss to know what else we have to discuss. Unless, of course, you’re finally facing up to the fact that something needs to be decided about this flat. Or maybe you’ve come to get your diamond ring back. As you can see, I don’t wear it any more, but I’m sure if you take it to a good jeweller he can alter it to fit any old fat finger.’
‘The ring’s yours,’ he said quietly. ‘I bought it for you.’
She turned her head away. She wasn’t going to think about how he’d surprised her with that ring. It was one of the happiest moments of her life, and happy memories weren’t going to help her right now.
‘I’d like you to keep it,’ he said.
She turned back. ‘Oh really? Well, that’s a shame isn’t it, because I don’t want it. You see, I was under the impression that it was given as a token of love, a sealing of the fact that we were going to get married, so that makes it about as worthless now as the man who gave it to me, wouldn’t you say?’
His only answer was to look down at his hands.
Several seconds ticked by, and she could feel herself getting more and more worked up. ‘Elliot, why are you here?’ she demanded in the end.
He took a breath, then let it go, slowly, deliberately.
‘I need to tell you now,’ she jumped in, suddenly afraid of what might be coming, ‘that if you’re thinking about moving Andraya in here then it’ll be over my dead body.’
‘But we do need to talk about what we’re going to do with the flat.’
‘We have to sell it,’ she said shortly, and thanked God that he couldn’t see what was going on inside her.
He looked around, his eyes travelling from the view to the paintings they’d chosen, to the kitchen they’d designed, and on round to the stairs that led up to the bedroom where they’d slept and made love. Everywhere there were signs and mementoes of who and what they were, photographs of holidays, framed posters of headlines, treasures they’d picked up on their travels, books they’d bought for each other, CDs and DVDs of their favourite music and films.
‘Y
ou’ve made it look wonderful in here,’ he told her.
‘We did it together,’ she reminded him. Then with a shrug, ‘But it’s just a flat, there are others, and I’m sure Andraya will create a magnificent home for the two of you somewhere. Do you have anywhere in mind? Rio? São Paulo? A little love nest on the Amazon? You could become your own South American correspondent.’
Not rising to the sarcasm, he said, ‘We might stay in New York.’
Her face immediately drained. The thought of him being so far away was almost as bad as the thought of him being with somebody else. She couldn’t bear it, she didn’t want to go on with this conversation, because clearly nothing was going to change his mind and no matter what she said she just ended up being hurt even more.
‘Rose is back from India on Friday,’ she stated suddenly, taking a sip of wine.
Though he obviously knew that the return had been scheduled for Rose and the rest of the crew to make the wedding, all he said was, ‘How’s it gone out there? Have they got what they went for?’
‘I think so. Rose seems quite happy with it. I’m not really involved any more. Sherry’s taken over my end.’ She looked up as the phone started to ring. Ordinarily she wouldn’t have answered, but feeling the need to escape him, if only for a moment, she reached for the receiver.
‘Laurie? It’s Nick,’ the voice at the other end told her. ‘I know I said I’d leave it for you …’
‘It’s OK,’ she interrupted, feeling a strange lightheadedness coming over her, as though some part of this was happening in a dream. ‘How are you?’
‘Great. How are you?’
‘I’m fine.’ She glanced at Elliot, then away again.
‘Listen,’ Nick said, ‘I know you’re going to Hydra on Thursday and I was hoping … Well, I’ve got a couple of friends out there who run a small boat-charter business …’
‘I’m not carrying any drugs,’ she joked feebly.
He laughed. ‘No, it’s not that. I was just thinking, I want to take Julia somewhere for a week or so, and if it was OK with you … I mean we don’t have to meet up or anything, but I haven’t seen these guys for years, and …’ He laughed again. ‘I’m behaving like a teenager here. I want to see you again, and I’d love us to get together there, but if you feel it’s an intrusion …’