Violet leaned over and gently kissed the top of Richard’s head and as she touched him, Richard jolted. He lurched up into a sitting position, reaching out for her hand and staring at her with wild, dark eyes.
‘I can’t do this,’ he’d croaked at her. ‘I can’t carry on. I keep thinking of him, out there in the water . . . his little body battered and bruised from the waves, being pummelled against the rocks, or’ – Richard’s voice cracked – ‘or dragged along the bottom of the ocean. I close my eyes and I see his skin being torn by the reef, his beautiful face all white and swollen. Fish nibbling at him . . . crabs tugging at his hands and feet . . .’
Helen shuddered. Her heart was in her mouth. She couldn’t bear to hear Richard’s nightmares, but she couldn’t tear herself away either.
‘I can’t talk to Helen about it. I don’t want to upset her any more than she is already. It’s not fair to her. Oh God,’ Richard sobbed, ‘I just want to hold him. I’d give anything to hold him one more time . . . to smell his skin . . . to touch his hair. My beautiful boy. My beautiful boy is gone.’
With that Richard had let out a cry and thrown himself at Violet. He put his arms around her, leaning his head onto the curve of her shoulder and let out loud, primitive sobs that made his whole body tremble with grief.
It was clear that Violet did not know what to do. She sat utterly still and helpless as Richard held onto her. Then, slowly, she raised a hand to Richard’s head and began to stroke his head. As her hand moved, backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, she murmured comforting shushing noises, over and over, until Richard’s weeping subsided. The two of them sat like that for a while. Then, as if sensing Helen’s presence, Violet looked up towards the door. The two women locked eyes over the top of Richard’s head; they stared at each other, frozen in the moment, until Helen mouthed a silent ‘thank you’ and turned on her heel.
Violet left an hour later, and an hour or so after that Richard had wandered downstairs in his dressing gown. He’d walked into the kitchen and put the kettle on. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ he’d asked Helen, as if the last seven days of self-imposed isolation had been nothing more than a surreal dream.
She decided to follow his cue and pretend that this was nothing out of the ordinary. ‘Yes. Yes, that would be lovely. Thank you.’
‘I think I’ll go back to work on Monday,’ he’d added as he rummaged in the crockery cupboard for mugs.
‘Oh, OK, if you’re sure?’
‘Yes,’ was all he’d said.
And that had been that.
Helen shook herself. The memories were still fresh more than two years on. Just like her grief, just like her guilt. She glanced once more at the devastated painting hanging on the wall, sighed and then lifted herself wearily from the arm of the sofa. It was cold outside and her joints were stiff and sore. She felt tired, old and tired. Pulling her dressing gown around her body protectively, she walked through the chilly hallway, bracing herself for the confrontation she now knew was coming.
As she walked through the dining room, she averted her gaze, as usual, from the framed family photos spread across the sideboard, memories of a happier time. They hadn’t thought to capture any moments on film since Alfie’s disappearance. It was as if life had stood still in the Tide family; as if life now held nothing worth celebrating; a sad state of affairs but she hadn’t had the energy to put things right. She’d been trying her hardest just to keep herself functioning, on some basic level.
After Richard had returned to work, Helen hoped things might settle down. The girls had gone back to school and Helen had steeled herself and returned to campus for a new term. It was as if some strange force, some inevitable momentum pushed her onwards. She woke. She dressed. She went to work. She bought groceries. She made dinner. She brushed her teeth. She went to bed. She felt like an actress playing her part on a vast, empty stage, day after aching day.
She did her best to avoid him, but Tobias pursued her. He arrived at her office unannounced and begged her in urgent, hushed undertones to return to him. He would leave flowers and notes on her desk, and messages on her voicemail, but Helen ignored them all. She simply couldn’t face him, or the thought of the destruction their affair had wreaked. Each scribbled word he left her, every wilting bloom he plucked and presented as a symbol of his affection now served as nothing more than a painful reminder of her raging guilt. Alfie’s death had sucked every ounce of passion from their relationship, just as a raging fire sucks oxygen from the air, and losing Alfie only served to highlight an inevitable truth, one she had been too foolish to see: it was Richard she wanted. Only Richard. Only now did she realise his dependability, his fierce principles about family and duty and his fundamental goodness weren’t signs of weakness or things to irritate and annoy, rather they were qualities to be admired, qualities to cling to.
Yet Richard was strangely absent. Business trips kept him away for longer and longer periods, and when he did return, he would drift about the house aimlessly, or take long solitary walks up onto the Cap, returning hours later mud-spattered and windswept yet with the same distracted look in his eyes. And at night, after they had completed their familiar round of locking doors and turning off lights, they would retreat to their bedroom, only to dress chastely in nightwear before turning off bedside lamps and slipping silently under the covers.
‘Goodnight, dear,’ he would say primly, the words and tone of a man much older than his forty-odd years.
‘Goodnight,’ she’d reply, turning away from him and pulling the sheets up underneath her chin, all the while silently yearning for the warmth of his touch. She couldn’t remember the last time they had made love. She had spent nineteen years in a marriage she had convinced herself did nothing but stifle her, only to find that she now longed for its security, its safe dependability. It was more than ironic; it was perverse. But she knew it was nothing short of what she deserved. With Cassie, troubled and in hiding up in London, and Dora closeted away in her bedroom or out of the house at every seeming opportunity, Helen found herself wandering around Clifftops like a ghostly, lost soul. The echoing, empty house was her cross to bear, her punishment, and she knew it was being meted out in full force: purgatory.
Yet, through all the pain, and all the sadness they had inflicted and endured, she still dared to hope that Richard loved her. She just needed to give him time, she told herself; time to let go of his grief, time to heal, and time to find her once again, this time, waiting for him.
She paused outside the kitchen. Perhaps now the affair was out in the open they could begin the necessary steps to healing their marriage. There didn’t need to be any more secrets or lies. Perhaps this was the fire they needed to walk through to cleanse their marriage. It had been the worst two years of her life yet she could still hope there was a future for them; for really, what else did she have left?
She braced herself. Then, with a deep breath, she pushed open the door and walked in.
Richard was seated at the kitchen table. He had his back to her but she saw him stiffen as she entered the room and he spoke before she had a chance to address him.
‘How long, Helen?’ He didn’t look at her. His voice was gravelly, like sandpaper, as though he’d been crying. ‘How long has it been going on?’
She swallowed. ‘Two months . . . maybe three, but it’s over; it has been for a long time. It was nothing, Richard, it meant nothing.’ Her words sounded clichéd, even to her ears. She moved around the side of the table to look at him but he avoided her gaze, turning his head to look out of the window instead. There was a scrap of paper on the table in front of him. She peered down at it, and sensing her interest, he pushed it across at her.
‘You’ll probably want this little memento.’
She looked at the scrap of paper lying in front of him. It was a simple sketch, drawn in charcoal, of a naked woman reclining under the shade of a tree. She had been captured in a blush-inducing pose by the artist’s expert pencil. He had
even taken the trouble to sign and date the piece, in the bottom right-hand corner. Helen stared at the image with horror.
‘You look lovely,’ Richard said.
‘I . . . I had no idea . . .’ she stammered.
‘Don’t try to deny it, Helen. It’s clearly you. As you told me yourself all those years ago when you brought that hideous painting home, he’s a “genius artist”. The likeness is uncanny, don’t you think?’
Helen swallowed again. Discussing the affair was one thing, but coming face to face with such graphic evidence was both unexpected and wholly mortifying. Poor Richard.
‘How . . . where did you find this? Did he give it to you?’ Helen’s mind was racing.
Richard gave a little snort. ‘Someone took pity on me and decided to post it to me at work. I received it yesterday. I should think his wife took it upon herself to inform me; poor cuckold that I am! I imagine she’s sick to death of her husband’s philandering and decided to take matters into her own hands.’
Helen bit the inside of her cheek. She couldn’t bear to think of Richard opening an envelope containing the crude sketch, and in the office of all places. ‘I don’t know what to say . . . it’s over. You have to believe me. It’s been over for a long time. Since the funeral. There was no way I could . . .’ Her words trailed off as Richard looked up at her. There was a genuine disgust in his eyes.
‘No way you could sleep in another man’s bed, a married man at that, when your own son was out there, lost? Dead? How very decent of you, Helen.’ His voice dripped with sarcasm. ‘How very noble.’
‘I’m not proud of myself, Richard. I’ve lived with the guilt these last couple of years. I wanted to tell you – I really did.’
‘Then why didn’t you?’
‘I didn’t want to add to your burden, Richard. We were grieving for our son. The affair was over. I thought it was best . . .’ Again, her words faded away.
They sat across the table from each other. Richard gazed at her blankly, and then shook his head with incomprehension. All the while, the little scrap of white paper sat between them, staring up at them like a glaring reminder of all that had gone wrong for them over the years.
‘Do you love him?’ Richard asked finally.
‘No!’ she exclaimed. ‘God, no! He was a mistake; a fling.’
‘When did it start? I want to know everything. Don’t spare me the details. I don’t want any more lies, do you understand?’ His voice was grim.
Helen nodded. ‘It was a flirtation at first. We met that first time in Bridport, when I visited his gallery and bought the painting.’
Richard nodded.
‘We flirted with each other, but it was nothing more at that point. We hadn’t been in Dorset that long. It was a difficult time. Remember?’
Richard gave another little nod and turned to look out the window again. She could see tears welling at the corners of his eyes. She longed to move across the table and hold him, but she held herself back. She owed him an explanation.
‘Then I got pregnant with Alfie. Tobias just . . . he just faded away; it was one of those things that never happened. It wasn’t meant to be. You and I, we were happy. You must remember?’ There was desperation in her voice. It was important he remember what they had, what they could be.
‘So when did you first sleep with him then? What changed?’
‘It was my second year lecturing at Exeter. He’d been appointed as Artist in Residence at the university.’
Richard nodded, ‘Go on,’ he said.
‘We’d occasionally bump into each other on campus. Then at the end of the summer term he invited me out to lunch.’
‘So you went for lunch and just happened to fall into bed with each other, is that it?’
‘No! It wasn’t like that. We were friends for a while before.’
Richard eyed her suspiciously. ‘No lies, remember?’
‘OK, we were more than friends. We flirted with each other, for a few months. I liked the attention,’ she sighed. She knew it was better if she were completely honest. ‘I was lonely and bored. I was sick of only being seen as a wife and mother; I was sick of small-town life. You and I, we never talked about anything except the kids, about school runs and packed lunches, bills and laundry. Tobias made me feel special; he made me feel attractive, and desirable. I liked that. I liked him.’
‘So it was my fault, is that it?’ Richard asked with scorn. ‘I didn’t make you feel like enough of a woman? I didn’t pay you enough attention?’
‘No! It wasn’t your fault; of course I’m not saying that. I’m just trying to explain how I was feeling. And you have to admit, we were going through a rough patch back then. There was the move . . . adjusting to this house . . .’
‘Oh yes . . . this dreadful house . . . of course.’ There was a flatness to his voice, but something else too, a hint of bitterness.
Helen ignored it. There was no point rehashing that old argument, not now. ‘We started sleeping together just before the summer break, just before the holidays; you know, the summer Alfie died. And I ended the affair as soon as we lost him. It was a matter of weeks, two or so months at the most. It was a horrible mistake. We had lost Alfie. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you or the girls as well. I still can’t.’ Helen’s voice cracked and she struggled to keep her composure.
Richard heard the emotion in her voice and turned to look at her for the first time. Their eyes locked across the table. She could see a tornado of emotion behind the clear blue of his eyes. She reached out her hand, desperate to make physical contact with him. Richard looked down at it for a moment but didn’t move. Instead he continued with his questions.
‘Why him? Why Tobias?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. He was there. He wanted me.’
‘Were you attracted to him – from the beginning?’
‘Yes,’ she confirmed. There was no point lying about it now.
‘How many times did you meet up? How many times did you sleep together?’
‘I don’t know . . . eight, ten maybe?’ She couldn’t remember exactly.
‘Did you meet him here? Did you ever sleep with him in our bed?’
‘No!’
‘Did the kids know about him?’
‘No!’ she said again. ‘I was very careful; I would never have wanted them to find out.’
‘Did you ever think of leaving me?’
Helen paused. She thought for a moment and realised that she never had. No matter how intense things had been between her and Tobias, no matter how many silly daydreams he had concocted while they were together, she had never once truly considered leaving Richard for him. ‘No.’
‘And it’s really over?’ he continued. ‘You haven’t been with him since you ended the affair?’
‘No. I swear. I couldn’t bear it. It’s over. Losing Alfie made me realise how much our marriage means to me. Richard?’ She gazed at him. ‘Richard, look at me!’ He glanced up and she stared him straight in the eye. ‘Richard, I love you. I’ve made some terrible mistakes. I’ve caused a lot of pain. Truly, I don’t know what the future holds for us, but I do know that I don’t want to lose you. I couldn’t bear it. Our marriage may not have started well. We may have had some rocky patches . . . and some downright miserable times . . . but the one thing I am absolutely certain of, more than anything, is that I do want to be with you.’
She meant every word she said. After nineteen years together they stood staring at each other across a great chasm of misunderstanding and pain, and Helen knew now the part she had played in creating the divide. She’d always privately blamed Richard for talking her into a marriage she’d since convinced herself she didn’t want. She’d railed against his decision to move them from London and cloister them away in a small seaside town. She’d grown to resent his sense of duty to Clifftops and to the memory of his parents, and believed he had put these first, before her needs and those of their children. And yet she knew now it was she who h
ad been wrong. She had forgotten to see how good he was, how strong and true and kind. She’d been determined to resent him and all the things he stood for in order to justify her infidelity; and later, in the storm of their grief, she had allowed the chasm to crack wider and wider. She realised now that she wanted a man who respected his family heritage and felt his responsibilities deep in his being, a man who could hold his two daughters up while inside he collapsed with grief, a man who spread his butter carefully on his toast each morning and turned off all the lights at night and locked the doors and kissed her goodnight in bed each night with a gentle dependability. Because that was who Richard was. And when all was said and done, when all the dust had settled on the remnants of their life together, it was Richard she still wanted most of all.
‘Let’s try again,’ she pleaded. ‘All this time that we’ve been locked in our own private pain, feeling so isolated, so at sea . . . and yet here you are, the only other person in the world who can understand what I’ve been through with Alfie and everything that came after. And I am that same person for you.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘It could have made us stronger, not torn us apart like this.’ She held up her hands in protest. ‘I know, I blame myself. But is it really too late for us, Richard? Is it really too late to turn this around and try to find something good and decent hidden beneath the wreckage of it all?’
Richard held her gaze, staring deep into her eyes for a very long time. Then slowly, inch by inch, his hand stretched across the table to clasp her outstretched fingers. They sat together, for a moment, in complete silence; their fingers entwined.
‘I just don’t know how we move forwards any more,’ he said quietly. ‘I don’t think I can take any more punches.’
Helen nodded, tears welling in her eyes.
‘But I don’t want to do this on my own.’
Helen’s breath caught in her throat.
Richard swallowed. ‘Perhaps if we take it slowly . . .’he said finally, squeezing her fingers and closing his eyes.
Secrets of the Tides Page 31