My Husband the Stranger

by Rebecca Done

  Like the waters aren’t already murky as ditchwater.

  It’s not long before Eve has to head home to see the kids before they go to bed, so she settles up our bill, insisting on paying for both of us. ‘It’s my treat,’ she assures me. ‘I’m really sorry to spoil your night, Moll. I feel terrible about it. Please don’t let it ruin your weekend.’

  Well that’s easier said than done, but I certainly don’t blame Eve for any of this mess.

  ‘So, do you think you’re going to talk to Sarah? About the job?’ she asks me as we hug goodbye on the pavement.

  Half an hour ago, I’d have said no. Now, I’m not so sure. Maybe she’s got a point about irons in the fire. Because if Alex is getting close to Nicola, what’s really left for me here? If I lose Alex to Nicola, I lose everything.

  I think about it for the entire drive home – about what it would mean to me, to discover that Alex and Nicola were engaged in something illicit. How would I ever know if it was as a result of his injury, or whether he still would have done it, in another life?

  The thought of that brings tears to my eyes, and suddenly, I do know. The Alex I knew back then, the old Alex, would never have done that to me.

  It seems I don’t know much any more – but I do know that.

  It’s been a habit for so long now, to give Alex the benefit of the doubt – to put a bad temper down to his condition, to excuse carelessness, to convince myself he would never have talked to me in a certain way before the accident. But now, as I stand outside the front door to our tumbledown cottage, I am starting to question myself. Maybe he has been getting close with Nicola – clearly he’s completely capable of lying to me, as he did when I asked him what he’d got up to yesterday and he told me ‘not much’.

  I push open the front door and head into the living room, drop my bags, take off my jacket. He should have eaten by now – there was microwaveable curry in the fridge, labelled, a note written for him on the side.

  But he’s not in the living room, so I head through to the kitchen and peek into the fridge – the curry box is still in there, untouched. On the countertop is a mess of crumbs, a jam jar with the lid off, butter dish uncovered, bread bag wide open with the remaining slices falling out of it like dominoes. Smears of jam and butter decorate the surfaces.

  I check the garden, almost expecting to see Alex and Nicola sitting in it, sharing a sundowner and memories of good times. But they are not there.

  Pausing at the foot of the staircase I notice Alex’s sketchbook on top of a pile of newspapers. Catching my breath, I bend down, flick it open to halfway, to the section of blank pages he gradually fills. Am I about to discover one of Nicola? Is that how I’m going to find out? But there is nothing like that, just a still life of some golf clubs and another sketch of Buddy.

  I swallow back disappointment. If you’re drawing things that make you happy, then why am I not there, Alex? Why do I do this, if I don’t even make you happy?

  I turn and head upstairs, my heart suddenly pounding in anger and irrational fear – or is it irrational? I don’t even know any more. Is Nicola here, with him, now? Am I going to push open the bedroom door and discover them …?

  I half anticipate Nicola springing out from behind the door to take me out with some precisely timed karate move as I enter the room.

  Gotcha!

  Alex is propped up (alone) on the bed, reading a fitness magazine. It’s warm up here, but once again, no windows open – just Alex bare-chested against the pillows, looking a little sweaty.

  Breathless from the fevered sequence of events in my head, I lean against the doorframe, but say nothing.

  ‘Hi, Molly,’ he says, looking mildly interested in my presence, which might mean he’s noticed that I’m panting and verging on hysterical. Well, there’s a first time for everything, Alex. Should we call this progress?

  ‘What are you doing?’

  He holds up the magazine but says nothing.

  ‘A fitness magazine?’ I say, with more curdle to my voice than even I was expecting. ‘Why are you reading that? You’re not interested in the gym any more.’

  ‘I am,’ he says, which is news to me.

  I smile, shake my head. As if it has come to this. After all the heartache of the past three years, the struggles, the sacrifices, the heart-wrenching sadness – as if Nicola could just skip into his life again, take him to lunch and transform him once more into the man he was. I’ve been trying to pique his interest in the gym for years. And the closest I’ve got is golf. Golf.

  ‘Did Nicola give you that?’

  It occurs to me as I say it that I don’t really have a strategy for confronting any of this, which as anyone who knows Alex would say is a Bad Idea. I imagined on the drive home that I’d at least try to handle it delicately, as I do any awkward situation with Alex that’s likely to make him fly off the handle. But now it’s come down to it, I am just so furious that I don’t even care. I’m going to say how I feel, exactly as he always does – I’m going to be rude and furious and impatient and outspoken, and for once – for once – he’s going to be the one left reeling. Because we haven’t come this far to be destroyed by Nicola, Alex – we haven’t gone through everything we’ve gone through just to succumb to her shallow flirtations. That’s not how this is going to end. I won’t let it – I won’t. And if you decide you want to be with her, then that’s your call, your catastrophic error – but you’re going to hear from me first. I’m going to tell you exactly how I feel about it. And, this time, you’re going to be the one listening and I’m going to be the one ranting and raving.

  ‘Have you eaten? Why is there toast and jam and butter smeared all over the kitchen? It looks like you’ve been in there and thrown everything around.’

  Two questions, subtly different, and a statement close together. I watch his mind trying to catch up with my words, unscramble my sentences.

  ‘And answer the question.’ The third question, the one I asked a few seconds ago, I’m throwing that one into the mix for you too. ‘Did Nicola give you that magazine?’

  I allow him a few moments, during which he hesitates – to catch up with what I’m saying, to try and remember, or to invent a lie? ‘Nicola? No.’

  He’s attempting to throw me off, I’m convinced of it. ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘What?’

  I’m inviting his rage as I stand here throwing accusations and questions at him, I know that, but I am so furious I cannot stop. ‘Do you know what it takes for me to do this every day, Alex – and all the time, you’re with her? I know you were with Nicola at the golf club yesterday – Tom saw you! But you told me you were here all day.’

  Alex stares at me, open-mouthed. He’s shocked, I can see that, but I can’t work out why – because I’m so angry, because I’m exposing his deception, or because he doesn’t follow?

  The fury is tumbling out of me now, unfiltered, unedited, in just the same way Alex speaks to me. ‘I’m not stupid, Alex, I know what she’s capable of! I’ve been trying to get you to go to the gym for years and now suddenly you’re up here reading a fitness magazine! Why are you meeting her? Why? She’s your ex-girlfriend, for God’s sake! Why would you do that to me?’

  But my last sentence collides with his reaction, which comes characteristically swiftly. Hurling the magazine against the wall, he gets to his feet. Ordinarily I’d feel unbelievable guilt for riling him up like this while he’s relaxing and calm, but tonight I don’t care. Tonight you get to experience a little bit of what you put me through, Alex.

  ‘What the fuck are you going on about? Shut up, Molly – shut up!’

  And then he heads for the door. In an instant he’s through it, thundering down the stairs away from me. But I won’t be silenced. I won’t swallow away my feelings or resist reacting as I’m so practised in doing. I am too angry, and there is too much at stake.

  I find him in the kitchen, where he swipes the bread bag, jam jar and butter dish from the worktop in one smoot
h, effortless motion. I watch them smash on to the concrete, smatter more detritus across the floor, and for once I allow myself to think – Well, this time, I’m not going to clean that up.

  ‘I know you were with Nicola yesterday, Alex!’

  Finally, he turns towards me, his face clouded over with confusion and rage. ‘So what?’

  ‘So I asked you what you did yesterday and you said, nothing!’

  ‘I forgot!’

  ‘You were hiding it from me! Why were you meeting her? Why, Alex?’

  ‘It’s none of your business!’ he shouts, his voice by now a thunder in the confines of the room. ‘You’re always trying to control me! You can’t tell me who I see!’

  ‘You shouldn’t be seeing her!’

  ‘She understands me!’ he shouts then, raising a finger to jab it towards my face. ‘She listens to me, she doesn’t nag me like you do, Molly!’

  ‘You know, I’ve been offered a job in London, Alex – I could walk out of here right now and never come back!’ I shout, a cruel final attempt to make him care, so desperate for him to feel something.

  ‘Well, go on then! Why don’t you? At least then I wouldn’t have to listen to you nagging me all the time!’

  ‘How many times have you met her?’ I scream at him now, so worked up there is literally saliva bubbling from one corner of my mouth. ‘How many times?’

  And it is then that it happens.

  I don’t feel pain so much as heat and shock, though I do crumple to the floor and gasp for breath. My entire head pounds from the impact, and in an instant all my anger is gone. Instinct takes over, instructs me to stay still, and I curl up like an animal, motionless. I am making myself invisible. Protecting myself.

  But though my anger has now ceased, overridden in a second by the instinct for self-preservation, Alex is still going. ‘This is your fault, Molly,’ he snarls at me, from somewhere above my head, and I tense, bracing myself for further impact. My blood is pounding at high speed; I can hear it in my ears, fast and forceful like the heartbeat of an unborn child.

  And then, finally, I hear him retreat and the back door slams. I remain frozen where I am in a ball on the floor, talking to myself in my head. You’re okay. You’re okay. Breathe. Breathe.

  14

  Molly – present day

  When I wake the following morning, even I am shocked by the extent of the bruising. It’s perhaps partly down to the unforgiving strip lighting in this ghastly bathroom, but I look as if I’ve been in a car accident.

  I contemplated calling Eve last night, but I knew she would be devastated and blame herself – and that Tom would too, come to that – so I decided against it. Besides, I could hardly turn up on their doorstep with a black eye. Whatever would that do to the kids?

  So I checked into a budget motel, the cheapest I could find, which meant a dual carriageway for a view, some really impersonal questions and tactless staring from the receptionist and a strange smell emanating from the curtain material. Still, it was a bed for the night, away from Alex.

  Not that I imagine, even now, that Alex would probably really register what happened last night. Had I stayed put and waited for him to come back inside, he would probably have done so after a while, nicely cooled off and entirely unwilling to discuss the episode at all. I’m in a good mood right now, he’d say. Why are you always trying to bring me down, Molly?

  My head is banging, and I’m well aware that it might not be only my skin tone that’s been damaged. But there is no way I can go to the hospital, face questioning by medical professionals, have to tell them all about Alex and for social services to get involved. Plus there’s a large part of me that feels horribly guilty about what happened. I pushed him too far; I was angry. I wanted to provoke him, to make him feel some of what I feel. I know he struggles to control his temper, and I know what his triggers are. It’s like an adult provoking a child. I should have known better.

  Besides, the blow wasn’t intentional. He didn’t mean to strike me. He was aiming for the kitchen whiteboard, the one he hates so much, the one where I write down all the things he routinely ignores. And at just the last minute I turned my face, and caught the force of his punch.

  Once my breathing had steadied and I’d found my feet I threw some things into a bag, escaping before he came back inside. I called a taxi from the village and rang Charlie while I was in it, told him I had to go to London a night earlier than expected, asked him if he could please do me a huge favour and look in on Alex. Charlie, who’s as laid back as my husband once was, said of course, it was no problem, to leave everything to him. Not for the first time, I sent up a silent prayer of gratitude that Alex has good friends who stuck by him when so many others fell away.

  The motel doesn’t offer any sort of breakfast, but there is an ancient kettle and some instant coffee sachets, so I mix up a hot drink, pollute it with UHT and sit back down on the bed. The drink tastes disgusting, but I need the caffeine hit to help me think.

  I still want to go to London. I’ve been looking forward to it, and anyway – I want to see Sarah. I don’t know what I think about Alex any more, but last night has clarified one thing in my mind – I at least need to explore if returning to London is even an option. But how will I explain my face – with the truth, or a lie? Will it put Sarah off, remind her my life is inherently unstable, make her think employing me comes with too many question marks?

  Not if I leave Alex. Not if it’s just me in London, with no one else.

  The thought brings a thick glut of tears to my throat.

  No, Molly, not now. Not after everything you’ve been through. Hold on. Hold on.

  But I can’t go on like this. I think – I think – we’ve come to the end of the line.

  And now I start to weep, for the first time since last night, and once I let them run, the tears come so fast and forcefully I am afraid I might never be able to stop them.

  Stop crying. Hold it together.

  I can’t. I can’t hold it together any more.

  I lower my head, letting the tears drop on to the knees of my jeans, and just as I do, my phone starts to ring.

  It’s Graeme.

  My first instinct is to ignore it, because I’m really not ready to talk to anyone. But then I realize that, actually, the one person in the world right now who might have a shot at impartiality is Graeme. Yes, he’s Alex’s brother, but he’s always had my back too. Plus, he gets it – in a way that my parents and friends sometimes fail to.

  ‘Hello?’ I manage.

  ‘Moll, are you okay? I just called Alex and he said you’d had a fight.’

  What is it about familiar voices that makes you want to break down afresh? I take a couple of moments to respond, my chest heaving heavily with the effort of trying not to cry.

  ‘I’m okay,’ I manage eventually, my voice a strange, distorted strangle.

  ‘Oh my God,’ he says. ‘What happened?’

  ‘It wasn’t Alex’s fault. He wasn’t aiming at me.’

  There is a pause. ‘What do you mean, he wasn’t aiming at you?’

  I arrive at the London address Graeme has given me and look up at the building. It’s in a rundown area where all the houses have been carved up into bedsits and everything’s unloved. Graeme’s staying with a friend in his basement flat, and as I descend the concrete stairs to the front door I notice a tide of litter strewn around the foot of the building like it’s been washed up in some unforgiving storm. On the main road above my head, cars rush past, one after the other, relentless.

  He opens the door before I knock. ‘Oh Jesus.’

  I smile grimly. ‘Nice to see you too.’

  He doesn’t return my smile, just steps aside to let me in. The place is dark and enclosed, with no decor to speak of, just stacks of boxes and bin bags.

  ‘It’s … a bit different to that Ealing sublet,’ I say, remembering the bright, airy flat we stayed in when Alex and I last came to visit Graeme in May. To compliment this place �
�� a grimy, poky, gloomy dungeon of a flat – would be insincere. We both know there’s not a lot to love here. ‘Do you like it?’ I ask him cautiously.

  ‘God, no. But Mike’s moving out. That’s why it’s a bit of a tip.’

  ‘Are you taking over the lease?’

  ‘Nah,’ he says offhandedly. ‘The landlord’s putting the rent up, so … thought I’d find somewhere else. Anyway, this area’s not the best.’

  ‘Where will you go?’

  ‘Not sure yet,’ he says, with what I can tell is forced brightness.

  I feel awful about it, really – Graeme owns half a house, for God’s sake. He shouldn’t be having any concerns about where he’s going to live. I think again about his offer to move in, back in July, and am overcome with guilt about how I batted it away.

  ‘Anyway, never mind me,’ he’s saying. ‘Let’s take a look at you, Moll.’

  He turns me slowly by the shoulders towards the little light there is, examines my face. I swallow, move my gaze past him and focus on the wall behind his left ear like I’m at the optician’s.

  ‘Wow. That looks painful.’

  ‘It is,’ I say simply.

  ‘Have you been to the doctor?’

  ‘No.’

  He nods, understanding I’m sure why involving other people in this is not really an option if I don’t want to complicate my life even further.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ he says then.

  ‘It wasn’t his fault. I was shouting at him about … and he tried to punch the whiteboard.’

  ‘Yeah, you said. But still.’

  We are quiet for a moment. ‘Cup of tea?’ Graeme asks me. ‘Coffee?’ He pauses. ‘Gin?’

  I smile. ‘Cuppa would be great, thanks.’

  We head through to a tiny, windowless kitchen, where Graeme fills a kettle and finds two mismatching mugs in the cupboard.

  ‘So … are you getting kicked out of here, Graeme?’ I ask him. ‘You can be honest with me.’

  He shoots me a wry smile. ‘Don’t worry about me, Moll. I have irons in the fire.’