My pulse quickened. ‘Yes, that was the day of my work sales conference.’ Silly to pretend I didn’t remember when I’d already suggested I’d discussed details of Fi’s interview with her.
‘It took place here?’
‘No, it’s always off-site. This year it was at a hotel down near Gatwick.’
‘What time did it finish?’
‘It would have been about five, maybe a bit earlier.’
‘That was when you left?’
Don’t second-guess him. Just answer each question as it comes.
‘Yes. Some people stayed on for drinks, but I had to get home.’
‘You drove yourself in the Audi, did you?’
‘Actually, no.’ I pulled a sheepish expression, hesitated as if embarrassed to admit the truth. ‘I didn’t drive at all around that time.’
‘Why was that?’
I sighed. ‘If you’re investigating our car, then you probably already know, do you?’
‘Know what, Mr Lawson?’
‘I’ve got a driving ban. It happened back in February. I was caught speeding a few times. So my wife has been the only driver since then.’
He did not react, which encouraged me to continue.
‘She didn’t mention it when you spoke to her, did she? That’s because she didn’t know. She still doesn’t, I hope.’ I paused, as if taking a moment to grapple with my own shame. ‘We’ve split up, you see, and I’ve found it’s not always helpful to tell her everything I’ve done wrong. And if you’re speaking to her again, I’d be grateful if you didn’t let on.’
It was too much to expect a law enforcement officer to collude with me in marital subterfuge, but I thought I detected the faintest flicker of sympathy.
‘I don’t expect to have to speak to her again,’ he said, and I felt like punching the air. This could only be routine, then, part of the police’s painstaking process of elimination.
Get through this and you’ll be off the list!
‘So how did you travel home that Friday, Mr Lawson?’
‘I got the train. The station was right near the venue.’
True.
‘Which station?’
‘I can’t remember the name, one or two before the airport, on the slow line. But the hotel was called Blackthorn something. I can look it up if you like?’
He didn’t ask me to do so, which I took to mean he did not intend to waste manpower on this particular line of inquiry.
‘So, you left before five and were home by, what, six o’clock?’
‘No, I had to change trains at Clapham Junction, so I stopped for a couple of pints. I was desperate for a drink, to be honest, it had been an exhausting day. I was due at the house at seven, so I got the connecting train at about six forty. It’s only a couple of stops from Alder Rise.’
‘Which pub did you drink in?’
This seemed less good. If he accepted that I’d taken the train, then why probe the drinking? Perhaps because it was extraneous detail I had introduced. Why would I feel the need to say I’d been desperate for a drink? Stop asking why and just answer the bloody questions! ‘The one right next to the station. Is it the Half Moon, maybe?’
‘See anyone you knew there? Talk to anyone?’
I narrowed my eyes as if straining to remember. ‘I was on my own, like I say, and it’s not really a regular haunt. I flicked through the Standard, probably. Oh, that’s right, I chatted to a guy at the bar for a bit. He seemed to be well known there, was a bit of a character.’ Don’t give any more detail – too obvious! ‘Then I had to get home. I take over with the kids at seven o’clock.’
You’ve already said that. Calm down.
‘When you got home, do you remember seeing your car parked in the street?’
‘I don’t. I mean, that doesn’t mean I didn’t see it, it’s just I’ve walked home from the station a thousand times, I can’t remember every distinct occasion. I do remember I’d cut it a bit fine, so I probably wasn’t noticing much, just rushing to get there. Sorry, I know that’s not very useful.’
He nodded. ‘Okay, well, perhaps we’ll have something more useful for you when your car is found.’
Useful for me? Or for him? I could hear my pay-as-you-go start up in my pocket, felt the Pavlovian opening of my pores as I began to sweat. My thoughts turned wild: I can’t let them find the car! Maybe I should go back to it, move it out of London. Where’s the second key? Has Fi still got it?
Then: No, no, if you do that, you might get stopped. Remember the police use Automatic Number Plate Recognition, you see those ANPR signs all over the place. Maybe—
‘Your phone’s ringing,’ the detective said, rising. ‘I’ll let you take it.’
I recovered myself. ‘No, it’s fine, I’ll see you out.’
And that was it. Bar my needless reference to the pub and that last-minute attack of nerves, it had gone as well as I could have hoped.
I waited a safe half hour before checking the phone and finding news from Rav: there were two offers on the house.
‘Fi’s Story’ > 02:07:21
You asked when it was that I got properly worried about Bram. Well, it was in early November at about the time of an upsetting incident with Toby, which I’ll tell you about now. I remember thinking I had absolutely no idea what he was going to do next, that I’d lost the natural instinct I’d always had for his actions, his reactions. For him.
Toby had been consumed by work and had seen his kids the previous weekend, so when he told me he was free only in the early part of the week I made the decision to relax – all right, break – the bird’s nest rule about third parties at Trinity Avenue and invited him for dinner there on the Tuesday. I asked him to arrive at 8.30 p.m. so the boys would already be asleep. I wasn’t ready yet for introductions.
‘Nice place,’ he said, following me into the kitchen and, as I took his coat and handed him a glass of wine, I was more than usually charged by his presence, as if I were the forbidden guest and not him.
‘Thank you. It’s a shame you can’t see the garden properly.’
He moved to the kitchen window, wine glass in hand, and peered out. At the bottom of the garden, fairy lights traced the roofline and doorframe of the playhouse like lines iced on a gingerbread house.
‘Is that the famous playhouse?’ he said. ‘Looks innocent enough.’
‘It does.’ It surprised me sometimes how much I’d told him about my break-up with Bram. The traumas of marriage, like those of childhood, are a permanent point of reference, I suppose. They hoard themselves within you, fuse into your body tissue.
‘Want to get even?’ he said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘You, me, the bottom of the garden . . .?’
‘Seriously?’ I was genuinely nauseated by this idea, not because of the discomforts involved in al fresco intimacies in November, but because of the thought of Leo and Harry upstairs, trusting in the protection of their mother while she sneaked out to their den like some primitive woman in heat . . . What Bram had done that night in July was and remained unconscionable, whatever impulse I’d had to the contrary that night in Kent, whatever my mother hoped I might come to excuse.
‘It’s a bit damp out there. I think I’d rather stay in the warmth and have another one of these,’ I said, raising my glass, and Toby accepted my demurral with an easy laugh. Interesting, though, to know that he had this daring in his personality, when I’d taken him to be a conventional, risk-averse sort of person like me.
Anyway, it wasn’t long after, just as I was serving dinner, that the doorbell rang.
Bram, Word document
Though I’d invited Saskia to the house, I’d reasoned that it had been in the boys’ absence and so not strictly breaking the bird’s nest rules. What was breaking them, however, was my decision to visit Trinity Avenue on one of Fi’s nights.
The impulse had been gathering since the police interview that morning and my state of distraction had become notice
able enough for Neil to send me home from work early. ‘Sort it out,’ he said, not without feeling.
And then there was that message from Rav. In spite of Mike’s frequent texts pressing me for updates, I’d decided not to tell him about the offers on the house, not yet. Instead, agitation grew into a mania to jump off the ride – or at least to dangle myself over the edge – my thinking being that if I could keep his repulsive face from my mind, his serpent murmurs from my ear, and focus instead on Fi, I might be able to do it. I might be able to confess, do the right thing before the wrong one possessed me entirely.
‘Fi’s Story’ > 02:09:56
The bell was already ringing a second time as I reached the door. I expected to be greeted with an after-hours sales pitch or a local councillor on the campaign trail. It’s a bit late, I’d say, mildly reproachful but also sympathetic because everyone had to make a living (my main objection was the doorbell waking the children).
What I found, however, was the one man who had a key of his own. ‘Bram!’
‘Sorry, I know I’m not supposed to come on a Tuesday, I—’
‘That’s right,’ I cut in, ‘you’re not. It’s too late to see the boys, anyway, they’re already asleep. It’s almost nine thirty.’
‘I know, but I needed to see you.’
He was charged with an energy I couldn’t diagnose, though my guess was that he’d been drinking. ‘Is something wrong?’ I said, not masking my impatience.
‘I just need to talk to you, Fi. Can I come in?’
I felt exasperation run through me in a way I recognized from when we were together. (Perhaps there was also an undercurrent of relief that he had not let himself in and caught me in the playhouse in a grisly re-enactment of his own sin.) ‘It’s not the best time, actually. I’ve got a friend here. We’re just eating.’
‘Oh. Any way you can get rid of her? This is important.’
Before I could register relief at his gender assumption – I didn’t want to have to admit to breaking a condition of our bird’s nest agreement – the matter was taken out of my hands. Toby had followed me to the door, clearly ready to offer his protection:
‘Everything all right here, Fi?’
Mid-breath, before making the introductions I would have preferred to defer, if not avoid entirely, I could only watch, stunned, as Bram barrelled past me, knocking me off balance, and launched himself full throttle at Toby. The two of them crashed violently into the stair panelling, the back of Toby’s head smacking against the spindles.
‘Get the fuck out of my house!’ Bram yelled, making an unsuccessful attempt to grapple Toby towards the front door. Tall though he was, he was a terrier to Toby’s mastiff.
‘Come on, mate,’ Toby groaned. ‘Get off me and let’s talk about this.’
‘Bram!’ I rushed forwards and clawed angrily at his jacket. ‘What are you doing?’
His eyes frightened me: protruding, unblinking, fixed with savage intensity on poor Toby. ‘Keep away from her or I’ll fucking kill you!’
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘Stop this, Bram! Stop it now!’
Inevitably, the boys, woken by the commotion, were soon at the top of the stairs. ‘Daddy!’ Harry shouted.
‘Daddy’s just leaving,’ I called up. ‘Aren’t you, Bram?’ Again, I tried to haul him off Toby, succeeding only in getting a fingernail bent back, which caused me to cry out in pain.
‘Mummy? Are you all right?’ Leo was on his way down the stairs and I abandoned the men to cut him off halfway.
‘You go back to bed, sweetheart. I’ll come up in a second.’
‘Is there a burglar?’ Harry asked his brother and as Leo spoke to him I could hear the alarm in his voice.
‘Nothing like that,’ I called, but my voice was shrill, frantic, exposing my own panic.
At last Bram released Toby, who retreated to the kitchen, rubbing his head and swearing.
‘Wait out front,’ I instructed Bram and hurried upstairs to settle the boys. Lights blazed in Leo’s room, where they’d taken refuge, their faces pale with fright. ‘Who was Daddy fighting? Are the police coming?’ they asked.
I hugged them close. ‘No, it was just a disagreement with a friend. Try to forget about it and get some sleep.’
‘Remember to lock the door, Mum,’ Leo said, when I left, and I could have sobbed at his innocent trust in a locked door, in me.
Sorry, I’m getting upset. I can’t stress enough how this was everything I’d been striving to avoid: a scene between estranged man and wife, the children disrupted and scared, uncertain who was in the house and where the crucial loyalties lay.
Deep breath. Anyway, when I joined Bram in the front garden, I was hot with anger. He was pacing the paving stones, cigarette smoke rising through the stripped branches of the magnolia. Nine thirty on a Tuesday in November was practically the dead of night on Trinity Avenue and in every visible window the curtains were drawn; it felt as if the whole neighbourhood’s allotment of drama and rancour had gathered in my house. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ I spoke through clenched teeth. ‘Are you drunk?’
He glared at me, clearly as enraged as I was. ‘Of course I’m not. We agreed no dates, not here.’
‘How do you know that’s what he is? That he’s not just a friend?’
‘Is he?’
I paused, torn. ‘I am seeing him, yes, but that doesn’t mean that what you just did wasn’t completely out of order.’
He sucked the cigarette, its tip firing. ‘The boys are here.’
‘They were asleep. At least they were until you barged in. You assaulted him, Bram. You’re lucky he didn’t fight back properly!’ I smoothed my hair from my face and throat. The chill air was astringent on my skin. I sighed heavily. ‘But you’re right, we agreed conditions and I’ve broken one of them. I’m sorry. This was just meant to be a one-off visit because we couldn’t make it work any other time. It’s dinner, that’s all. He’s not staying the night.’
‘He will never stay the night in this house,’ Bram said with a ferocity I hadn’t seen in all our years together. ‘I will burn it to the ground before that happens.’
‘Bram, stop this, you’re scaring me.’ We stood face to face, both breathing hard. His eyes were a wild animal’s. I tried again. ‘If we’re going to continue with our arrangement, then I need to know you can be a reasonable, civilized participant in this family.’ But I should have known this remark would rouse the precise opposite.
‘I’m not a “participant”, I’m their fucking father!’
‘Don’t shout,’ I hissed. ‘The neighbours will hear you.’
He tossed the cigarette end into the border. ‘I don’t give a shit who hears me, I don’t want that man anywhere near my kids.’
‘Our kids. And I haven’t even introduced them yet! If you hadn’t caused this scene they wouldn’t have known he was here. This is not Toby’s fault.’ I regretted giving his name, because Bram seized on it at once.
‘Toby, is that what he’s called? What’s his surname?’
I didn’t answer. Distraught though I was, I had the presence of mind to consider that Bram might take it upon himself to pursue Toby at a future time and threaten him. I imagined Toby phoning me and saying, ‘I’m sorry, it’s not working out. I like you, but I’m just not up for this sort of harassment.’
It was just as Polly had warned: Bram hadn’t wanted me himself enough to be faithful to me and yet he couldn’t bear the thought of someone else taking his place. Such dog-in-the-manger instincts were, I knew, typical of marriage breakdown. My mistake had been in believing we weren’t typical.
‘You’re seeing other people as well, I assume?’ I hugged myself as I began to shiver. The cold was numbing the pain in my finger, at least.
‘No one special,’ he muttered, and I saw, to my horror, that he was close to tears.
Was I flattered to see him reduced to this because of his feelings for me? Maybe. But the incident is more i
mportant, I think, because it shows how volatile he was becoming, how unpredictable. And, I’m sorry to say, how quick to turn aggressive.
‘Look, you have my word that I’ll only see him at the flat from now on.’
‘The flat,’ he echoed.
‘Yes, which is where you’re going now, right?’ To my relief he began backing away towards the gate, nodding to himself. ‘Don’t do anything stupid,’ I cautioned, which made him stop mid-step and stare at me.
‘I already have,’ he said, and of course I assumed he meant the attack on Toby. He looked so utterly heartbroken that I moved towards him, my fury easing a little.
‘Then don’t do anything else stupid. I’ll talk to the boys in the morning and we’ll see you after work as usual, okay?’
No, I didn’t find out what he’d come to talk about. If anything had been made clear by this dysfunctional scene it was that I was no longer the right person to hear it.
*
In the kitchen, Toby was standing drinking, our tuna steaks cold on their plates. I could see on his left cheekbone a red mark that would deepen to bruising.
‘Are you all right?’ He was composed, civilized, a different species from the wild man I’d just seen off.
‘Are you? You hit your head quite badly. And look at your face. Do you need ice? I’m so, so sorry, Toby. I can’t believe that just happened.’
He pulled me towards him. ‘You don’t have to apologize, Fi.’
His body was flaming, not yet readjusted after the raised temperature of the fight.
‘I do, though. I feel so ashamed.’
He took a step back and regarded me with unusual scrutiny. ‘Are you sure . . . Are you sure you’re over this guy? He obviously doesn’t want you to be, does he? It’s a complicated set-up, I know. You’re still living together but you’re not living together, you’re married but you’re not married . . .’
For the first time, I felt unequal to this, overwhelmed by the experiences I’d accrued these last six months, as if they were stacked, interlocking, on top of me, their weight deadly. Was Bram going to make life impossible for me, after all? Had I made a terrible mistake ‘still living together but not living together’?
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