by Sarah Duncan
'I'm really enjoying working for you,' she said.
'Despite my terrible temper?'
She nodded happily.
'Well, I suppose we'd better go back and get some work done.' He drained the last brandy. 'Although it's practically going-home time for you.'
'Oh no!' Isabel leapt to her feet, banged her knee on one of the table legs and sat down again sharply. 'I should have gone ages ago.'
'You've plenty of time. I'm glad you haven't been put off working for me.' He nodded at her, then strolled to the bar to settle the bill. Isabel rubbed her knee, then got up more carefully. Her shoes seemed slippery on the carpet, as if her knees weren't properly connected to her lower legs. Patrick returned and they left the pub.
Isabel blinked as she went outside, hit by fresh air and eye-achingly bright sunlight. She felt she'd had a troglodyte's lunch rather than a ploughman's.
'Are you okay?' He was frowning at her.
'I'm fine.' Isabel squinted up at him, suddenly aware of how much she'd drunk. 'I don't think I should drive, though. But it's okay, I can walk to the school and then we'll take the bus.'
'Sure?'
'Absolutely,' she said carefully, so as not to slur the word. She was conscious that Patrick had his hand on her elbow and was gently steering her down the pavement.
'I'm fine,' she said. 'Really.' She caught her toe on a cracked paving stone and stumbled, wrenching her ankle. Patrick caught her before she could fall, his hands steady.
'Sorry,' she said, out of breath. 'Thank you for saving me.' She smiled up at him, and realised that he was bending towards her. He's going to kiss me, she thought just before his mouth met hers.
Caught by surprise she didn't think to protest, to exclaim, to push him off. Her head buzzed, she felt the blood rush to her cheeks. His mouth felt strange, his hand was warm and rough as he held her head firmly, the other round her back, holding her to him. He tasted of brandy and coffee. She was so surprised she let him kiss her for several seconds before her brain kicked in and she opened her eyes. But before she could react, he released her.
'I shouldn't have done that.' He let his hands drop from her arms. 'What can I say? I can't keep on apologizing to you.'
Isabel stared at him. Her brain seemed to have seized up and the only thing she was able to register was the taste of him on her mouth.
'Look, treat it as a moment of madness. See if you can forget it happened.' He paused and looked at her uncertainly. 'D'you think you could?'
Isabel nodded, then added, 'Could I do what?'
'Forget it happened.'
'Oh.' She straightened her back and slung her bag over her shoulder. 'It's fine, you don't need to say anything more. Well, I'd better be on my way.' She held out her hand.
'Thank you for lunch.'
He shook her hand formally. 'You're welcome.'
'Well. See you tomorrow morning.'
She walked carefully up the street, trying to keep in a straightish line and feeling his eyes on her back, but when she turned the corner and checked, he'd gone.
- ooo -
Isabel kept on losing things in the kitchen later that evening. The wooden spoon in particular seemed to have a life of its own, vanishing and then reappearing in unlikely places. It was tiring having to search for things all the time, especially when you kept on forgetting what it was you were looking for. She tried to have the house reasonably tidy and supper waiting for when Neil came back, but today they'd had to wait ages for a bus and nothing was ready. If Neil wanted a Stepford wife he should have married one, she thought, banging the saucepans. She gave the chicken an unnecessarily vigorous push round the pan so the sauce slopped over the edge and sizzled onto the electric ring. Drat. She knew she should wipe it off immediately before it burnt itself indelibly onto the enamel but all the clean cloths seemed to have disappeared.
What was she going to tell Neil?
Neil, Patrick took me out to lunch and then kissed me outside the pub.
Neil, would you believe it? Patrick kissed me today, but we've decided to pretend it never happened.
Neil, the good news is I'm really getting on with my employer. The bad news is he kissed me.
Neil, my boss kissed me outside a pub and I did nothing to stop him and now I can't get him out of my mind.
She couldn't remember when she had last been kissed like that. If she had ever been kissed like that. She and Neil must have, at some point, surely? But kissing Neil had been like coming home, a safe haven, not the start of a dangerous voyage. Not that this was going to be the start of anything. She replayed the moment, the feel of his mouth pressing down on hers, his arm about her, the way his hand had cupped her head. Her eyes closed, her lips parted.
Bad move. She snapped her eyes open and shut her mouth firmly, heard the television churning in the sitting room and thought of Neil sitting immobile in front of it in his special leather armchair. They'd never watched television abroad - nothing to watch - but since they'd been back Neil had taken to it. Sometimes she thought he was unconsciously imitating his father's behaviour, but that seemed mean. Poor Neil, he was shattered after a hard day working, while she...
She filled a pan with water and put it on to boil. Think outrage. Think horror. Think disgust. She played the scene again in her head, this time concentrating on her feelings of outrage. How dare he? The trouble was, she kept sliding back to the shock, the unexpectedness of it, the delicious sensation of melting that started in her toes and flowed up her body. I should have slapped his face. Or done something. She gripped the wooden spoon in exasperation. It was all so sudden, she told herself. You couldn't have done anything about it. Better not to have made a scene. Better to be British and polite and shake hands formally and pretend nothing happened.
She turned the heat down to simmer under the chicken pan and watched the bubbles subside. She knew what she should do. I shouldn't upset Neil, she thought, I should just say I've decided the job isn't what I wanted, and forget about the whole incident. I could get something else, other jobs will come along. After all, I was hardly going to make my fortune doing it.
She stirred the chicken thoughtfully. On the other hand, I could carry on and pretend the kiss never happened. And if it happens again? No, I'd make it clear that it must never happen again. I'd have to tell him. She thought of Patrick's face, could picture the amused smile, could picture her starting confidently on her prepared speech then faltering and then... No, she'd have to pretend to be someone else when she told him. Someone bossy. Like that Mary woman, at the new parents' coffee morning. Unconsciously she straightened her back and thrust her chest out. Now look, Patrick. I want to work, but that's all I want. Right? She could imagine Mary saying it. No monkey business. He'd do what Mary wanted, she was sure. She clunked the lid onto the pan firmly. That's what she'd do.
The rice water was starting to boil, bubbles pricking the surface. She started counting in handfuls of rice. Three per person. Was that four or five that had gone in? Or six? She shook the pan and peered in. She wasn't very good at judging quantity. She added another handful for luck. And then another, just in case. Patrick's hands were long and elegant, tanned with short fingernails. The hands of a sportsman. A sailor perhaps. One had wrapped around her holding her close to him while the other had tilted her head towards him, his skin firm and warm and rough against her neck.
Stop that. She clamped another lid onto the rice pan and turned the extractor fan on full. Lay the table. Get the cutlery. Knives. Forks. Spoons. There wasn't anything for pudding. Put the spoons back, lay out side plates and knives for cheese and biscuits. She moved quickly round the table, putting Michael's precious drawings carefully to one side and bundling the playdough into a plastic bag. A knife sat in an opened jar of peanut butter, like Excalibur waiting for King Arthur. She tidied it away, then laid places for herself and Neil so they faced each other across the table, salt and pepper marking the neutral ground in the middle. Napkins. She rummaged in one of the drawers and
found a couple of paper napkins, slightly crumpled but better than kitchen roll. As she smoothed out the creases she had an image of Patrick spreading his napkin over his knee, his fingers strong but delicate. What if she had responded? What if his hand had slipped down into her shirt? She shivered. It was impossible. She couldn't carry on working for him. It would be tantamount to agreeing to - what? She resolutely threw him out of her mind. Concentrate on supper.
She checked the rice, which would be ready in a few minutes. There seemed rather a lot of it. Still, she could always make a rice salad with any leftovers. Or fry it up into a paella. Perhaps this time she would actually do it. She sighed. She used to be able to do it, used not to be so useless. It seemed so effortless for other women, that was the problem. If everybody struggled like her she wouldn't feel so hopeless. Carefully she drained the rice and arranged it round the edges of the dish, ready for the chicken to go into the middle. She put the dish on the table. If she was honest she didn't want to eat, having finished off the children's tea earlier and had two alcohol-mopping peanut butter sandwiches at home, but she had to keep Neil company. She glanced at the clock. It was nearly nine. How did it get so late: she must have been dreaming. Dreaming about Patrick. No, don't think about him. Think about Neil's supper. She started to spoon the chicken into the dish, making a small but mountainous island in the middle of a lumpy white ocean.
'So how did you spend your day?' Neil, gin and tonic in one hand, leant against the doorjamb of the kitchen.
'Oops.' A bit of chicken shot off, skittered across the table and onto the floor. She stooped to pick it up and chuck it in the bin under the sink, keeping her face hidden from him so he wouldn't see her cheeks, scarlet at the thought of how she'd spent the day.
'Perhaps we should get a dog.'
'You've always said you didn't want one.' Isabel gripped the edge of the sink.
'It's not been practical before. But if we're staying in the UK we could get one. A Westie maybe.'
Neil's parents had an ancient West Highland terrier with accusing black eyes and a matted coat, yellowed with age to a pee-stained shade of white. It would be like having a spy in the house. She turned round to face Neil. 'A dog would need walking every day.'
'It'd be company for you.'
'But I'm busy. Working.' I ought to chuck in the job, she thought. I ought to tell Neil what happened. I ought to look around for something else.
Neil sat down and smiled at her. 'Are we going to eat? I'm starving.'
'Help yourself.' She pushed the serving spoon towards him.
'This looks good,' he said, as he said every evening regardless of what it was.
'I made too much rice. Neil, about this job...'
'You could never make too much for me. I've always liked rice.' He was spooning great forkfuls in, rice grains catching in his moustache. Isabel looked at her empty plate and reached out to serve herself.
'This job...'
'You're finding it too much.'
'I didn't say that.'
'I wouldn't blame you if you found it too much, you know, on top of everything else.'
'It's not that.'
'I expect you're finding it a bit dull. Why don't you chuck it in and find something a bit more interesting.'
'It's not dull,' she said, images of Patrick whizzing through her head. 'Anything but.'
Neil smiled indulgently. 'Ah, I see the novelty value hasn't yet worn off.'
She didn't know what to say to that. She didn't think the novelty value of Patrick kissing her would ever wear off.
'If you don't want to carry on, that's fine by me,' he said.
'You don't want me to work, do you?'
He frowned. 'I thought we'd been through that. I hope I've made it clear that I've no objection to you working, if that's what you want to do.'
'You make it sound as if you're giving me permission to work.'
'Let's not start this up again,' he said in his kind-but-firm headmaster voice.
She pressed her lips together. It was like being fifteen and her father forbidding her to go to some party that she didn't really want to go to at all. She'd snuck out anyway, eyes heavily ringed with black kohl pencil, and had been bored to tears by boys discussing Fender guitars, then drinking too much and being sick. No wonder Neil had seemed so grown-up and sophisticated compared to the competition. She looked at him now, chasing the last few bits of rice round his plate.
'That was delicious. Is there anything for pudding?'
'Cheese and biscuits.' She indicated with her head. 'They're on the side.'
'If you don't mind, I'll take them through. There's a programme I want to watch.'
She sat quite still as he chose some biscuits and cheese, and left. A few seconds later the television kicked into life. She stayed sitting, watching the sauce congeal and the rice form cold sticky lumps. Is it me, or is it him?
She got up and cleared the dishes, scraping the remnants of their meal into the waste bin. Kitchen tidy, she went upstairs and got ready for bed. She turned the light off and lay straight under the duvet, feeling the cool cotton settle around her. Downstairs the television went off and the staircase creaked as Neil came up. He undressed quickly in the darkness and got into bed beside her. She stiffened, waiting.
'I've got a headache,' she said as soon as he touched her. The hand paused, then carried on.
'You just need to relax.'
Isabel screwed her eyes tight. Yes was easier than no.
'No,' she said, pushing him away. 'I have a headache.' It was true, her temples were throbbing with daytime-alcohol-induced pain.
'Darling, you'll feel better -'
'I won't.' She said it louder than she meant and paused to regain control. 'I'm tired, I have a headache, and I want to go to sleep.'
'But -'
'No!'
A pause. Then, 'All right, keep your hair on. Anyone would think I was about to rape you, instead of being normally affectionate.' Neil heaved himself over so his back was towards her. In the darkness she could sense his hurt, but also his sulkiness. She knew he expected her to give in, to make amends, to stroke his back and apologise. Two weeks ago she would have.
Instead she buried her head under the pillow and willed herself to sleep.
Chapter 7
Isabel rapped on Patrick's front door the next morning. Over the last two weeks she'd learnt that the doorbell didn't work consistently and that Patrick was sometimes still asleep when she came round. He'd open the door sleepy-eyed and yawning, with that warm-from-bed smell, hair tousled from a sweatshirt casually pulled over his head. She leant against the side of the house and rested her forehead on the cool brick. She wished she could stop thinking about Justine's parting shot, but it still haunted her. She wished she could stop thinking about Patrick kissing her. I shouldn't be here, she thought, not moving.
Isabel!'
She looked up. Patrick was leaning out of the window above, his shoulders naked.
'You caught me in the shower. Catch!' He threw the keys down to her, then disappeared back into the house.
She looked at the keys in her hand. Post them through the letterbox and run, her mind said, but that seemed ridiculous. So childish. I'm a grown-up; I can handle this, she told herself. Just act as if nothing happened, and if he mentions it or does anything, be like Mary. Be dignified. Calm.
'I'm here to work,' she muttered as she turned the key in the lock and let herself into the house. She could hear Patrick moving about upstairs as she picked up the post from the floor and started to sort through it. Invoice, airmail letter from Italy, electricity bill, computer magazine - what was he doing upstairs? Had he gone back into the shower? No, she could hear a door slam shut. Then footsteps on the landing. She dropped her head down as if trying to decipher the address on a letter so he wouldn't see that she had been watching for him.
Patrick clattered down the stairs. 'Good morning, good morning. Sorry about that. Perhaps I should send you out to get some more
batteries for my alarm clock.'
'What?'
'You're right, not your job to do that. I'll get some when I pick up the paper. Hang on to the keys, by the way. Save dragging me out of the shower another time.' He stretched out his arms. 'I should have given you a set before. Mmm, time for coffee, I think.'
Isabel followed him into the kitchen. 'You're in a good mood,' she said.
'Am I?' He spooned coffee into the cafetière. 'Just a good night's sleep, I expect.'
Obviously, he hadn't lain awake half the night worrying about the kiss. Isabel watched him as he made his coffee, quietly humming, his hands deft.
Anything interesting in the post today?'
'Not really. Maybe this.' She handed him the airmail letter.
'Ah. Mama.' He felt the thickness of the letter. 'New boyfriend, I expect. Anything else?'
'You look.' Isabel shoved the rest of the post at him and stomped upstairs to the office, not caring if she'd been rude. It's too much, she thought. It really is. I don't have to be here. I could be doing something else. She turned on the computer and waited for it to boot up. I could be doing all sorts of things. Not faffing around here with stupid Patrick Sherwin and his stupid business.
'Here.'
A mug of tea was placed on the desk beside her.
'Thanks,' she muttered, not looking at him.
She could sense him standing beside her, not going away.
He cleared his throat. 'Um, is there a problem?'
She looked up at him then, but before she could say anything she was struck by the glaring truth of the situation. He had completely forgotten. He'd completely forgotten the kiss.
'No, no, there's no problem. It's fine. Really.' She stretched down for her bag and rummaged in it, finding a hair-band. As she tied her hair back, she managed a quick smile up at him. 'Thanks for the tea.'
'Anytime.' He paused, then went, shutting the office door behind him.
As soon as he had gone, she dropped her head into her hands. What a fool I've been. She blushed, thinking back to how she had drifted through the morning rush at home imagining this moment, telling Patrick how she had decided to ignore his disgraceful behaviour outside the pub and that it was never going to happen again. Then Patrick would say something like "But how can I help myself?" And then he would come close and... Most of the time she managed to stop herself at that point. The one thing she hadn't imagined would be that he would have forgotten her, forgotten the kiss.