Victims

by Richardson,Robert

  ‘At last.’ She sighed with relief. ‘I really was getting tired of driving round the block.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘My teeth are fine, no one’s ill, and even I don’t shop this much. Didn’t you realize?’

  ‘It crossed my mind a while ago, but … I spoke to Jacqueline who said you and Oliver had a good marriage.’

  ‘We do … and it has to stay that way.’

  ‘Then why …?’ He tried to pull his hand away, but she tightened her fingers to prevent him.

  ‘Please … Two understanding men would be farcical. Just finish your coffee, then take me back to your flat.’

  He looked confused. ‘I’m missing something here, aren’t I?’

  ‘Yes, but I’ll explain after … Oh, for God’s sake, ask for the bill. It’s all right … honestly.’

  Now Jonathan had become part of a parallel life, unconnected with Fay’s role as chairman’s wife. On family holidays in Tuscany she and Oliver would drink wine, perfect their Italian, discuss books and drown together in Renaissance splendour. Contact was no more than holding hands or a simpatico brush of cheeks as they said goodnight and went to their separate bedrooms. She would send Jonathan postcards from them both. Joyce, the only other person Fay had told, still recalled controlling her hysterics at the party to celebrate their twentieth wedding anniversary, when Oliver’s best man had said theirs was a perfect marriage and everyone had applauded.

  Chapter Eight

  Joyce told herself it was just another commonplace day … with an added personal agenda that would almost certainly come to nothing; thinking like that meant there would be no disappointment — anticipation of something happening virtually ensuring that it would not. So she would cycle the three miles to Sutworth Cross for a salad lunch and gossip with Christine, collect her report about the riveting activities of St Osyth’s for the parish magazine and then home. And why not choose the slightly longer return that would take her past Windhover? She was free all afternoon, and the stretch through the tunnel of trees would be pleasant. If his car wasn’t outside the cottage … No, that wasn’t the point. If it was, he still might have gone out, and even if he was in … She laughed and rang the bicycle bell for no reason.

  *

  The MGF was there and three of the cottage windows were open. It would have been better if he had been sitting outside and she could have casually called hello, but there was no sign of him. She braked and stood across the bicycle for a moment, suddenly hesitant. If I don’t, I’ll always wonder and may regret it; if I do, I’ll know — and might not regret it. I’ve faced tougher choices. She wheeled the bike through the gate and round to the back, conscious of leaving it where it would not be seen by anybody passing on the road.

  ‘Hello? Are you in?’ The back door was also open, but she never entered the cottage without permission when someone was renting it.

  ‘Who is it?’ He sounded startled.

  ‘Only me. Mrs Hether … Joyce. I was on my way home and wondered …’ She stopped as he appeared out of the sitting room into the passage that led from front door to back. ‘I promise I haven’t come from Porlock. Just the next village.’

  ‘Oh … Hi.’ He was wearing a peppermint-green Fruit of the Loom T-shirt and shorts, strong legs dark with hair, bare feet in sandals. ‘Come in.’

  ‘Thank you.’ The threshold felt curiously like a frontier. ‘It was the thought of cycling up the hill that got me. It’s absolutely boiling out there. I’m dying of thirst and thought that you might …’

  ‘Of course … but I’ve only got beer. Lager.’

  ‘If it’s cold, you’ll save my life. Do you mind?’

  ‘No, but …’ He glanced back into the sitting room. ‘We can have it outside.’

  ‘Don’t bother with glasses. I’ll drink it from the can.’ To suggest I’m not that old and know how young people behave? I’m confused.

  She remained just inside the door as he went into the kitchen, then stepped back into the garden. One deckchair was set up on the grass and she hesitated before sitting in it. As she waited, she tried to rationalize her thoughts. This is nothing more than a return for my hospitality; people who’ve stayed here before have invited me in for a drink … Liar. The sight of the glasses disappointed her slightly, as though he was too conscious of her status, of her age.

  ‘I’m afraid I’ve taken your chair.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’ He handed her the drink and sat on the grass. ‘Which is the next village?’

  ‘Sutworth Cross … Well, it just about qualifies as a hamlet. I had to visit someone.’ She didn’t say why; for an inexplicable reason, she didn’t want to mention the church. ‘Were you writing?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s all right. I was finding it difficult.’

  ‘Writer’s block, I expect. I wonder if Dickens ever suffered from it? You’d never think so. If he’d had a word processor, God knows how much he’d have churned out.’ She sipped the beer. ‘Mmm, this is very good. Have you been working all day?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m going to the Wheatsheaf later for something to eat. I had lunch there the other day.’

  ‘The Shoulder of Mutton’s better. Ask for Maggie’s special.’

  They were both aware that they had little to talk about; they knew almost nothing about each other and what Joyce had calculated was an age-gap of at least fifteen years was barren of meeting places. As before he seemed reluctant to talk about his book and the humdrum chronicle of what she had done since they had sat together in her own garden was irrelevant. Authors crafted openings in such circumstances; the reality was mental fumbling, uncertainty and fear of embarrassment. She stared at him until he felt the attention of her eyes and looked back; the contact held neither the blankness of strangers nor the warmth of friends. He looked away again, and she knew nothing would happen unless she made it happen.

  ‘Don’t you ever get lonely? Writing must be so … solitary,’ she said. Go on; your turn.

  ‘Not really. I live on my own.’

  Thank you for that. ‘But that’s because you choose to?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I can remember when I could choose. I just made wrong decisions.’

  ‘We all do.’

  They returned to silence, like skaters moving cautiously back to the safety of the shore when they saw dark water swirl beneath ice. Distantly, the church clock chimed four; she would have to be home by five-thirty, the end of another afternoon of waste. But if neither of them could find words, she would have to leave within a few minutes, and their fear would have built a barrier. So they would just drift out of each other’s lives … Joyce reached down and placed her glass on the ground. He must have half seen the movement, but did not look at her again, even when she stood up.

  ‘I wasn’t really thirsty,’ she said, and waited. He sighed, but whether from relief or apprehension she couldn’t decide. Come on, I’ve taken a step for both of us; either follow me or make me feel foolish by walking away from this. I can cope with that. He ran his fingers up and down the can, watching them smear the film of condensation.

  ‘So perhaps I ought to leave now.’ Jesus, am I that unattractive? Are you another one who’s going to put me down?

  He shook his head, but still did not look up at her. Joyce felt an urge to explain. She sat down again, making him look at her.

  ‘Can I call you Randall? Thank you. I’ve never done anything like this before, and to be honest I can’t completely understand why I’m doing it now. But it’s not just because I’ve got a lousy marriage. If that was the reason, I’d have done it ages ago. OK?’

  He nodded, but remained motionless. Joyce plucked a long stem of grass from the lawn and began to twist it in her fingers.

  ‘I can’t leave my husband, because …’ She sighed. ‘Eight years ago my father died and my mother came to live with us. She’s turned seventy now — and she thinks Ralph is wonderful. But he’s been having an affair in town for years. She wouldn’t
believe it if I told her — well, even if she did, she’d probably say it must be my fault. And she’d be devastated. Really. It would … well, breaking her heart’s over the top, but it would hurt her dreadfully.’

  ‘So what can you do?’

  She shrugged. ‘Nothing … until she dies. Obviously I don’t want that — I love her — but it’s the only way out.’ Unexpectedly, she smiled. ‘And she comes from a very long-lived family.’

  ‘Why are you telling me?’

  She could no longer resist laying her hand over his. ‘Because I want you to know why I’m here, and … well, I’ve cut off all my lines of retreat now, haven’t I? Have I embarrassed you?’

  ‘No. I’m … I enjoyed talking to you before. In the garden. It was good.’

  Joyce squeezed his hand. ‘I enjoyed it too. That’s why I came today. To talk to you again and …’ She looked down. ‘I promised myself I wouldn’t lie to you. I would like us to talk more, but … well, I’m just so grotesquely out of practice at this sort of thing. Sorry.’

  Fearful of rejection, however sensitive, she remained totally still until he turned his hand and tightened it on hers as he stood up. Her mind was blank as they walked into the house.

  Upstairs their movements were hesitant, arabesques of cautious exploration. Joyce drew the curtains, heavy orange cotton turning white-painted stone walls amber, and spent a moment ensuring they were completely closed; when she turned he was standing by the bed awaiting permission, and remained motionless as she unbuttoned his shirt. There was a scar, a pale flaw shaped like a tiny bow, just beneath his collar bone, and she ran her fingers across it gently, concerned that he had been wounded. Rupert had a scar from the day at the playground when he had … She placed his hand on her hip, then looked at his eyes as she pushed the shirt off his shoulders. Any time, any place, she remembered. Fay would have been excited by now, expectation flared, clothes spilling off her body.

  His hand remained where she had put it; no exploring movement of fingers, no pressure. As she kissed him, she made a little pleading noise in her throat. Help me, this is difficult. If you don’t want me, I can’t do this on my own. I’ve forgotten the rules for playing the tart — and I don’t want you to want a tart — but you have to want me; I need your matching hunger. All right?

  She stepped back and breathed in deeply, putting her shoulders back as she took off her shirt and twisted both arms behind her flicking metal hook and eye apart. They’ve suckled two children, but they’re not shot to hell and I can just about remember when I used them to tantalize and provoke. It’s a long time since I did this other than simply to get undressed … there. Still worth seeing, still worth fondling, arousing, kissing. There are dozens of men who’ll never touch them, but would love to if I would let them; it’s a privilege I’m granting you. There haven’t been that many before … Christ, do I have to do everything here?

  She felt perspiration on his palm as she took his hand again, placing it over warm smoothness broken by the puckered thimble of flesh. She pressed herself against him, trapping his hand as she kissed him again, throat-song now deeper, urging with promises; then he trembled and his fingers squeezed as though in relief.

  ‘Come on,’ she whispered. She wanted to pass the point where a voice that said no became one demanding yes. To where hesitation and surprise and the delicate dances of approach became the tempo of gasping urgency, inflamed, irresponsible. She comprehended only their bodies, clawing the muscles of his back, rigidity entering softness, of desiring the end and not wanting it to finish, of nothing else existing. To the final exquisite rush to a primitive height and a slow, spinning fall back to awareness.

  So great a reckoning, she thought, in so small a room … and so swift, so desperate on both their parts, gratification grasped at as though it would vanish in an instant. They both still had their watches on. How different from fictional passion, playful and perfect, repeated ecstasy, lust without complications. Reality was clumsiness, a creaking bed, a fleeting twinge of cramp in her calf, that terrified moment of wanting to stop and flee back before complete surrender. Reality was trying to think of what to say.

  ‘Thank you.’ A phrase open to mean anything. Thank you for the pleasure, for finding me desirable, for not being brutal or hurting me.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  Please, not that. Suggesting this was your seduction makes me the stupid middle-aged woman who lost control; I was in the driving seat first.

  ‘I’m not.’ Why did men always need flattery? ‘You’re very …’ A little laugh to leaven … ‘very satisfactory. Come here.’

  She cloaked her body with his again and felt the dampness of tears against her chest. Stroking his hair, she noticed the time; Annabel would be back from school soon. Back to boring but dependable Mummy, who would ask about her day, nag about her room. Who cuddled her when she was unhappy, washed and cooked; who had once been young, but wasn’t now.

  ‘I really ought to go.’ Regret was echoed in retreating caresses. Sleeping together really meant what should happen after sex, in the indulgent latitudes of an uncomplicated affair or the comforts of a good marriage. Remaining in bed, relaxed bodies slipping into slumber of contentment, lightly touching, waking up with the warm realization that someone was still there; affection, love and renewed delights. Sleeping together was not permitted when one’s daughter was due home.

  ‘Yes … all right.’ She felt pleased as he kissed the palm of her hand, a tiny token of affection. ‘Will you be able to …? If you don’t want to, I’ll understand.’ His tone suggested he would be hurt.

  ‘Well, one of us has got to be sensible about this, but …’ She grinned. ‘Frankly, I’m pissed off with being sensible. Right now, I’d like to spend the next three weeks in this bed with you and we’d have pizzas delivered. I hope you’re not shocked.’

  ‘No, but you mustn’t think that —’

  ‘At the moment, my darling, neither of us should think,’ she interrupted. ‘So I’m not going to.’ She got up and started gathering her clothes in the order she needed to put them on. ‘I can be here again tomorrow, about seven-thirty. I won’t need to be home until late. All right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good.’ She thrust her feet into her sandals as she rebuttoned her shirt, examining face and neck in the dressing-table mirror. ‘Just one house rule. Nothing that leaves marks.’ Relax; I want this to be fun, not involvement. She stepped back to the bed and kissed him lightly. ‘Now get back to your writing. I know my way out.’

  And such sex brought the wicked, secret amusement of waving to someone she knew as she cycled home, the sudden wetness at the apex of her thighs against the leather saddle, the sense of having broken away, of folly without regret. For a moment she thought that it should not be repeated; she had experienced the forbidden and could now get on with her life.

  But she had promised to go back and was already imagining how it would be now that the first barriers had been breached; no fear, no guilt, eagerly, without haste … and God, he’d been so big —

  ‘Hi, Mum!’ Annabel was walking towards the house, body leant to one side to balance the red and black Headbag pulling on her shoulder, one ankle sock slipped down. ‘I’m starving.’

  ‘What did you have for lunch?’ Joyce braked and stepped off the bike, wheeling it along beside her.

  ‘Nothing. It looked awful. Have we got any low-fat cheese?’

  ‘What do you want with it?’

  ‘Water biscuits … and I’ve got to be at Wendy’s by six o’clock.’

  ‘What about homework?’

  ‘It doesn’t have to be in until next week. Where’ve you been?’

  ‘Just over to see Christine … And hang your clothes up properly.’ This to a figure retreating towards the stairs; from the bedroom came the thump of Kurt Cobain and Nirvana.

  She spooned cottage cheese, the current diet of choice, on to a plate, then scooped out a blob and licked it off her finger. Guess what Mummy’s b
een doing this afternoon. With Mr Jowett, who’s renting the cottage. In the bedroom, on her back. That’s right. Mummy was being screwed and was enjoying it, and … She closed her eyes. And thinking about it here is bringing it home, where it shouldn’t be. Macavity slid through the cat flap, trotted across the floor and rubbed against her legs, purring for attention. Feed me, like you feed them.

  ‘Is it ready?’ Annabel reappeared so quickly, she wouldn’t have had time to hang up her uniform after changing into jeans and sweatshirt, but Joyce felt it would be hypocritical to criticize so small a disobedience.

  ‘What do you want to drink with it?’

  ‘Diet Coke.’

  ‘God help your stomach. Anyway, I’m going to have a shower.’

  ‘Fine.’ The magazine she had brought down with her was more important.

  ‘Back home by eight o’clock, right?’

  ‘Sure … Can I go to a club in Ipswich on Saturday?’ The rest ran out in one carefully rehearsed sentence. ‘I mean it’s all right … There’ll be a whole crowd of us, and we could hire a mini bus … Keith can drive … and it closes at one o’clock, so I won’t be home that late … and Sara says they’re very strict on the door, they don’t let yobbos in … and there’s no drugs or anything like that … Is it all right?’

  You were little once, and it doesn’t seem that long ago. I can always remember walking into the sitting room and seeing you in your playpen, smiling in look-at-me triumph because you’d managed to stand up on your own for the first time. Now you’re going to follow Rupert, who’s already started going away, so it will be just me and Daddy and Grandma. And you’ll think I’ll be happy — if you ever think about me at all.

  ‘See what Daddy says.’ There, I’ve opted out of my responsibility; Ralph will say yes because he doesn’t care. Betrayal is my thing at the moment — but at least I may have stopped betraying myself.

  Telling herself that the sun must be going over the yardam somewhere in the world, Joyce fixed herself a long vodka and lime and took it up to the bathroom. She examined her body before stepping into the shower, as though it were novel to her, as though it mattered once more. She dried herself and smoothed on lotion by the window, opened to swallow steam, then stood sipping the drink and letting the faint late-afternoon breeze cool her. Beyond the trees a crayoned bank of purple-brown cloud stretched across a sapphire backcloth, and the feathered vapour trail of a jet spread into a delta of chalk; the ordinary had become vivid.