The Husband Who Refused to Die

by Andrea Darby

  ‘Great for when I’m legless then,’ Mark says, holding up one of the pub menus to scribble on.

  ‘Or during sex,’ Tash says with a shriek. Pete squirms, but Barbara’s on her second gin and tonic and giggles like a schoolgirl.

  After Pete and Barbara leave, and while Tash heads to the ladies, Mark gives me a present that renders me speechless. Somehow he’s found a copy of my favourite joke book, the one Eleanor ruined and has been out of print for years.

  ‘You can think of me when you read the really bad ones,’ he says. Then he pulls another gift from his case – a Marge Simpson air freshener to put in my new office.

  ‘Perfect. Thanks.’ I giggle.

  I’m prepared for a teary goodbye, but Mark decides to share a taxi with Tash, who’s extremely tipsy, lolling in the back seat and exchanging jokes with the driver that snap the tension.

  ‘Bye,’ I say, giving Mark a big hug before he climbs into the front seat. ‘Let’s make sure we keep in touch.’

  ‘Absolutely.’

  ‘Eleanor would like another sixties night soon – without the singing,’ I say. Mark flashes a huge smile that soaks his eyes.

  I get home to another lovely surprise. Imogen has sent an exquisite, embossed leather journal, with a message on the inside page: ‘Congratulations on your new job. Bonne Chance, My Lovely’. And, tucked in the back, I find a note saying she has a gift for Eleanor, too, but will be hand-delivering it when they come to Tetford in September.

  YES! Imogen’s coming to stay – for two bloody weeks.

  I’m so thrilled. I’ve never needed to see her more.

  I call Ashley three times that evening. Finally, he answers. It’s nearly midnight. He’s sorry he’s been difficult to get hold of, he’s had a hell of a few days and, to top it, the house sale’s fallen through. But he can catch an early train to Tetford in the morning. He could do with escaping. I bristle a little. I want to say ‘no’, he can’t just spring it on me, expect me to drop everything.

  ‘Eleanor will be here, but, yes; OK, great,’ I say instead.

  I hardly sleep and get up early but Ashley misses his train, so our time together’s cut short again, and plans for lunch at a rosette restaurant become afternoon tea in a new café in Tetford High Street.

  I’ve prepared for a serious talk about our future – I have no choice now – to tell him things can’t go on in a meandering, non-committal way with us. But while I select words and rearrange sentences in my head as we munch our way through carefully cut sandwiches, dainty drizzle cakes and multi-coloured macaroons all arranged on a silver-stemmed stand, I lose my nerve. The time isn’t right. Ashley looks exhausted and nerves are suppressing my appetite, something that doesn’t go unnoticed.

  ‘Come on, keep up. You’re at least three cakes behind,’ he jokes, dropping more crumbs from a heavily-iced French Fancy down the gap at the neck of his linen shirt.

  Passing through the park, a jazz quartet’s playing on the recently refurbished bandstand; four accomplished musicians – average age seventy, we guess – framed by decorative cast iron columns and ornate balustrading.

  A large audience has gathered, so we settle in a couple of vacant deckchairs, soaking up the music, along with a bit of intermittent sunshine that takes the edge off the damp breeze, and my weariness. At one point, Ashley dozes off and I startle him by leaning across to jolt his chair. An elderly lady sitting the other side of him chuckles as he shoots me a well-honed mock glare.

  Back at home and Ashley stifles several yawns as we walk through the front door.

  ‘Sorry, I’m so tired. I think those cakes are sending me into a sugar coma.’

  Eleanor gives us a ten-second greeting, then disappears back upstairs.

  ‘Well, not long before you’ll get some proper time off,’ I say, settling next to him on the sofa. I can’t wait. I have lots of plans, which include introducing him to Imogen.

  ‘Actually, that might not work out. They want me to start the project earlier.’

  ‘Oh no,’ I exclaim, failing to hide my dismay.

  ‘Bloody nuisance, I know,’ Ashley says, ‘but what can I do?’ He wraps his arm around me, trying to pull me close, but my shoulders resist.

  ‘What’s up?’ He turns and I shake my head, taking time to calm the swell of frustration and get a grip of the words flying around in my inner ear. ‘Look, I’m disappointed too, but—’

  ‘There’s always something, though. I just want to know where we’re going, to have some idea about what you want because you don’t make …’ I falter, flustered; searching for the right words.

  ‘Hang on. You’re surely not blaming me.’ Ashley shuffles forwards. ‘I want to see more of you, make firm plans – course I do.’

  ‘Really? It doesn’t seem that way at times, that’s all. You can be …’ I stall, panicking that the conversation isn’t going as planned, ‘… remote; hard to get hold of at times.’

  He frowns. ‘Look, I have other commitments, and being an actor isn’t office hours, as you know. We’ve been through this – I didn’t expect to have to explain again—’

  ‘Of course, I know that, but there’s all the other complications, and we never talk properly about the future. Us.’ I feel cross; defiant. I find his eyes. ‘I was hoping you might talk me out of the job, try to persuade me to move to London.’ I wince at my words. They sound crazy spoken out loud, seem to echo around the room, gathering momentum and magnitude. Yet I felt I deserved the romantic gesture, after what Ashley did to me last time.

  Ashley looks irritated, squeezes a cushion. ‘I wouldn’t ask that of you. I didn’t want to get in the way of your career.’

  ‘Is it really about my career?’ I scoff. ‘Some evidence, some show of commitment would have been nice – after what you did ...’ I stop. I’ve said more than I intended to, let the past bully its way into the present. He tugs on his beard, lips pursed.

  ‘Look, this isn’t going to work if you’re going to be like this. Life’s not like it was when we were students.’

  ‘Don’t you think I know that?’ I shake my head in disbelief. ‘But you don’t make it any easier. It’s as if you’re avoiding things – just like you did back then.’

  Ashley throws the cushion aside; leaps to his feet. ‘Well maybe I can make it a bit simpler for you then.’ He heads for the door.

  ‘That’s your speciality isn’t it – walking away?’ I’m dismayed as soon as the sentence leaves my lips. I shouldn’t have said it – I’d kept those words locked securely inside – but I’m so angry, I’ve unleashed the most painful barb I can think of.

  He stands in the doorway, head moving slowly from side to side. I see several emotions fast forward across his face, stopping at what looks more like disappointment than indignation.

  Then he leaves.

  ***

  I lie in bed, a damp Mr Fluff pressed to my face, fur feeling coarse against my wet skin. He hasn’t called. I can’t call him. Maybe in the morning. Another wretched, groggy morning. But what can I say? I’ve said enough – more than enough.

  I lift the letter from the pillow by my side. I read: ‘To My Leading Lady.’

  I’d had a second chance to be Ashley’s leading lady, but this time it’s me who’s ruined it. If only I could rewrite the horrible scene that unfolded earlier, edit the dialogue, modify the sentiments, add back in the control and air of calm to my character that I’d planned.

  Despite the dark, I leave the curtains open in hope.

  CHAPTER 32

  ‘I can’t wait to see you. You must stay here.’

  ‘Great. I’m just stoked you’re taking the job, lovely,’ Imogen gushes down the phone. ‘I thought for a while there that you were going to back out. I’d have worn my highest stilettos over to England and kicked your arse.’

  I switch the subject, updating her on how dire things were with Ashley, how I’d done with the weeping – my tear ducts on a drought alert – but was still livid with myself for mes
sing things up and being such an idiot; so needy. We’d spoken, briefly, on the phone, both apologised, but nothing had really been resolved and I’d not heard from him for three days.

  ‘I think we’re well and truly over.’

  ‘I’m not so sure. I think you can still work it out.’

  ‘No, I’ve blown it, just as …’ I have to stop myself saying too much. I need to talk to her face-to-face.

  We move on. I’m glad to hear things are still improving with Ben. Imogen thinks the testosterone’s helping.

  ‘And I haven’t sprouted a tash yet, although I keep craving the remote and picking fluff out my belly,’ she says. We roar.

  Bethany’s staying with us for a few days to give her dad a break, and Freya’s keen to show off her new two-tone hair when she joins us for a Chinese takeaway that evening. She breezes in, swishing her locks around, wide grin sewn on her face. The three girls are breathless with chat, whispering and giggling into their sweet and sour every time their mobiles ping.

  I find myself tipping away a half-empty bottle of wine left in the fridge – or is it half full? I rinse it over and over. No one likes the taste when it’s been opened for more than a week, I assure myself. No one.

  I feel exhausted, energy depleted to a level that leaves no option but the chaise. I make a coffee, stretch out in my bleached leggings, propping the laptop on the table, a sensible – yet uncomfortable – reach away. I check my phone, but, of course, there’s nothing from Ashley. I find an email from Sheena:

  Hi Carrie. I just had to tell you. I KNOW GEOFF IS DEAD. It was Molly’s 18th birthday yesterday. For years, he’s been desperate to give her the antique ring passed down to his mum by his gran and great-gran before her. He decided to keep it a secret and wait until she turned 18 – it’s in a box in his bedside cabinet. We’d often talked about what a special moment it would be. If he didn’t come back for that, then I know he must be gone forever. I’m sorry you’ve had to hear this, but I hope you’ll understand why I’ve told you. I had to tell someone. I won’t say anything to the girls, I want to keep their hopes up as long as they need or want it. In a way, it’s a bit of a relief. At least now I know. Sadly, it’s another five years before the authorities will declare him dead in absentia …

  I can’t read on. It feels like someone’s punched my chest wearing a steel glove. I hope Sheena is wrong. But she sounds so sure.

  Five years is such a long time. I contemplate how different our lives will be then. Eleanor will be nineteen, an adult, making her own way. I’ve never really allowed myself to look that far ahead before.

  But now I have to.

  I go to sip my coffee, but Sheena’s words swim in the liquid: ‘I know Geoff’s dead’, ‘I know he’s dead’.

  ‘Dan’s dead too,’ I say out loud. I know Dan’s dead. Even Sunny’s saying goodbye. And I have to.

  From nowhere, my mind conjures up an image of Pippa, my best friend from primary school, and a day I’d made myself forget. We were only about seven or eight and had gone to her nan’s house for sweets. Pippa was a ‘little devil’, according to my mum, a bad influence. ‘Your nan’s not here. She’s popped next door,’ Pippa’s granddad had said. ‘There’s been a passing’. We were both shocked when we breezed into the neighbour’s house to find a big oak coffin in the middle of the living room. We couldn’t stop looking at it, and the smell in the air was so vile, I could still conjure it up in my nostrils. I’d always found Pippa’s nan so scary, with her cap of dirty grey hair and loose skin hanging from her cheeks. She explained that her friend’s husband had died and she was minding the house while the lady visited the priest.

  The family were Catholics and it was a wake, she’d said. I didn’t understand and remembered wondering why someone in a coffin would be ‘awake’. For some reason, Pippa’s nan left the room and that’s when we did it. We dared each other with our wide eyes. We lifted the lid, both gasping as we saw the old man lying there, dressed in full military uniform – shiny war medals perfectly pinned on his chest. Maybe he was ‘awake’, I’d thought. He looked alive. I don’t know what I’d expected a dead person to look like – diseased and mangled; some blood perhaps – but not like that. I half-expected him to sit up and speak. It totally spooked us both. It’s one of those things you do that you immediately, and wholeheartedly, wish you hadn’t. I think I had some of the daring knocked out of me that day.

  Pippa had dropped the lid at the sound of her nan’s footsteps. Then we’d giggled until our sides hurt, although we both knew that neither of us really found it funny. ‘It’s no time for laughter is it, girls?’ Pippa’s nan had said sternly, black eyes glaring. No, it wasn’t. We both knew it. The clothes had done it, and the perfectly neat hair. They’d made him look alive.

  With Dan it was different. I’d slipped off his gold wedding ring while he lay in the hospital bed, the curtain drawn around him so other patients didn’t have to see a corpse while they slurped their thin soup. But there was no life in that finger; nor in his legs, his arms, his face … not anywhere, not a sign. He didn’t even smell like Dan. He’d gone. Gone.

  Yes, I KNEW now that Dan was dead. And forever. Cryonics couldn’t save him – of course it couldn’t. I’d always known it, really. Now I had the confidence to state it; had ‘the courage of my convictions’ as Dad would say. And if I was wrong, if he got the second go at life he craved, I wouldn’t be here. Like Gordon, I’ll have moved on, taken a different path; leaving the guilt behind now.

  I’m jolted back by a ping – as if someone’s added the ‘lightbulb moment’ sound to my epiphany.

  Another ping.

  I take my phone from my handbag. It’s from Ashley: Hi.

  I text back: Hi.

  Another text arrives: No – Hi. Aren’t you gonna let me in? I’m confused, still dazed, still with Sheena, and Pippa, and …

  I climb off the chaise and make my way, tentatively, to the front door. Surely not. I open it slowly.

  ‘Hi.’ Ashley’s standing there, white shirt bright against a sepia sky, grin stretched wide. ‘I thought I’d come to see you in my new motor,’ he points to a pale blue hatchback, ‘surprise you. Maybe I could stay …’ he holds up the Gola bag, ‘… or I could stay at a B&B, or in the car, it’s got amazing recliners …’

  ‘God, yes, I mean … come in.’ I cringe inwardly as I catch a glimpse of my horrendous leggings. ‘You’ve certainly surprised me. Eleanor’s got friends here.’ Three inquisitive heads appear over the bannister.

  ‘Who is it, Mum?’

  ‘Ashley,’ I say.

  ‘Oh hi.’ It’s Eleanor’s voice. ‘Hi,’ Freya and Bethany chirp.

  Ashley goes ahead of me into the living room, while I fetch a beer from the kitchen. He’s acting like our row never happened. I stand at the fridge for a few seconds, trying to gather my composure and recover from the shock, let the galloping giddiness pass. I wonder if this is just the friendly first scene – the verbal post-mortem of our row yet to come.

  I walk into the living room to another surprise, the sight of Ashley sat in Dan’s chair, cradling the lumbar cushion on his lap.

  My mind corrects itself: no, not Dan’s chair any more! The chair Dan bought. The chair I was planning to move to the spare room, where he loved to do his work and exercise. I could think of him there sometimes, like Gordon on his beloved wife’s bench. But not in the living room. Not the room for living in.

  ‘I’ve got a day off tomorrow, the only one for a while – thought I could take you out,’ Ashley says. ‘I hope you haven’t got any better plans?’

  ‘No, I mean yes … to going out,’ I say, clumsily. He opens his bag, pulls out a bottle of bubbly.

  ‘Thought we could celebrate our future.’ I flash an uncertain smile. ‘And here …’ He holds up two tickets. ‘Would be great if you and Eleanor could come to the project’s launch night. We’re knocking up a one-act play.’

  ‘Sound great. Thanks.’ I perch on the chaise, heart clattering.
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  ‘I hope I’m showing you …’ he pauses, ‘… proving how I feel.’ I smile.

  Then he tells me that now things are more sorted in his life, he wants us to be together more.

  ‘We can make it work. It might not be ideal, but I’m not going away or giving up.’ He taps his fingers resolutely on his trouser pockets.

  I don’t know what to say. I’m not going to move to London, make the sacrifice. Not this time. But he’s come today, on impulse, unannounced, despite my harsh words, and being with him, however, whenever, could be so right, especially now I’m ...

  He stands, slips his thumbs from his pockets, pulling me to him. He kisses me gently on the forehead.

  ‘I love you.’

  ‘I love you too,’ I say, gasping inwardly, butterflies going hyper, ‘… but …’

  ‘What?’ He stares, shoulders dropping. I move his hand to my stomach.

  ‘I’m pregnant … we’re … pregnant.’

  ‘Woah … my God … wow.’ He smiles, head darting, eyes huge. He looks at my face, then down at my middle. ‘Really? ... I mean … that’s really … great … fantastic. When, I mean, how long?’

  ‘The due date’s March.’

  ‘Are you sure? Course you are.’ He hugs me briefly. ‘I’m shocked – pleased though, stoked. It’s just … wow …’ he stands back, touching my stomach again, ‘… I can’t take it in.’ He meets my eyes. ‘What about you – how do you feel?’

  ‘Same as you, I guess. It’s a big shock.’

  ‘What about the job?’

  ‘I’m not sure now. It certainly complicates things.’

  ‘Yes.’ He bites his lip. ‘We can make this work,’ he says resolutely, holding both my hands and staring deep into my eyes. He steps back. ‘We can make it work. Where there’s a will …’

  I see my eleven-year-old Joseph standing there, declaring that there’s no room at all the inns, but one innkeeper’s kindly offered us a stable.

  Stood in the middle of our creaky school stage, he’d delivered that sentence with such confidence. And, as I’d braced myself to throw my big line out into the sea of smiling mums and dads in the audience, all eager to hear what Mary had to say, he’d tipped me a reassuring nod of his gorgeous head that made all the stage fright rise out of my C&A robe and float off into the starry sky.