The House Swap

by Rebecca Fleet

  It’s almost an hour before I get him home, and I already know from the nine abortive calls I have made to his mobile that Francis won’t be there. Sure enough, the hallway is dark and cold, and I don’t even bother to call out his name. I peer at Eddie, checking that he’s asleep. He is tightly curled up, his knees drawn against his chest and his head drooping lazily to one side, blond hair ruffled against the fabric of the buggy. When he is sleeping, he looks so like Francis it gives me a confused pang of love and longing, sorrow and loss.

  I park the buggy in the hallway, then go to turn the thermostat up and peel myself out of my sodden clothes. I put on my fluffy dressing gown, light the candles in the lounge to try to make the room feel cosy, and do myself a hot chocolate. I drink it slowly, curled up in a blanket, feeling warmth seep gradually through me.

  I lean my head back against the cushion, and as I do so something catches my eye – a long, white envelope poking out from beneath the basket next to the sofa. There’s something about it, the way it seems to have been hidden, that makes me lean across and pull it out. It’s bulkier than I expected, and inside are several metallic strips, each containing ten little blue pills. No prescription slip, no official packaging. Source unknown.

  I weigh the envelope in my hand, and it isn’t shock that I feel, nothing as sharp as that; a blunted weight of nausea pressing rhythmically at the back of my throat. No, no, no. I’ve known for weeks now, expected it, but it still hurts to be confronted with the reality.

  I think about throwing the pills away, maybe confronting him, but in the end I push the envelope back where it came from. I know by now that throwing them away achieves nothing; there will always be more. And besides, if he doesn’t know that I know the envelope is there, I can monitor it. See how fast they disappear.

  I force my thoughts down, turning away, and I see that my mobile is blinking greenly on the sofa beside me. At first I think Francis may have texted, and my hand tenses as I pick it up and jab at the screen, but it’s a WhatsApp message from Carl. Hey there. Good weekend? Looking forward to tomorrow? X

  I stare at the text, unsure about what it is that bothers me, and then my eyes drift to the kiss at the end of the message. I scroll back through our conversation, confirming what I already know. It’s the first time either of us has ever ended a message this way. Ridiculous though it is, I can feel my heart fluttering lightly, a knee-jerk teenage reaction. I know I shouldn’t be feeling like this. It reminds me of the early days with Francis, when it seemed I was always waiting with bated breath for a communication from him. I remember those days, and the memory is bittersweet, shot through with guilt and sadness.

  Slowly, I type a reply. Crap weekend, actually. Had a row with F and feel like shit. But yes, am looking forward to it! Should be good. Grant from the office is playing a gig with his band in a local pub after work, and Carl and I have promised to go and support him. I hesitate, then type an X. My finger lingers over the send button as I look at the kiss, unsure if I’m doing the right thing, unsure of exactly what message I’m giving out. I’m on the point of deleting it when I hear the key in the lock, the front door pushing open, and in a panic I hit send, then stuff the phone into my dressing-gown pocket and stand up.

  I brace myself, gathering myself together and standing quite still in the centre of the room, waiting to see the look on Francis’s face. He appears in the doorway, and there is a dazed, shameful apology in his eyes. ‘Sorry,’ he mutters.

  ‘That’s OK,’ I find myself saying. It’s cold comfort, but it’s something. Enough to make me feel a pang of guilt about the message I’ve just sent, and to make me want to try and claw this day back to normality. I go over to him and slip my hand into his, and so it begins.

  The next morning in the office, Grant is a ball of nervous energy, full of talk of his gig and his fears over how the new tunes will be received. He checks more than once that Carl and I are still coming, and we assure him we’ll be there. I can’t help but look forward to it, especially since Eddie is staying with my parents for the night. I don’t have to worry about anything or anyone, not today. The knowledge is seductively light and freeing.

  I can’t concentrate on my work, and when the clock hits midday I decide to go out early and pick up lunch. I slip out unnoticed and hurry along the high street, hugging my jacket around me for warmth and ducking my head down as rain starts to spit lightly. I’m waiting at the traffic lights, shivering, when I feel the pressure of hands around my waist, a quick, hard squeeze before the release. ‘Boo.’

  I spin round and Carl is there, grinning at me. ‘You bastard,’ I say. ‘You startled me,’ but I can’t help laughing.

  ‘Sorry,’ he says, not sounding it. ‘Saw you duck out and thought I’d follow you. Thought you might want to grab a sandwich.’

  ‘Yeah, all right.’ We fall in step together towards the nearby café. I can still feel the sensation of his hands on my waist, the electric jolt it gave me. In the weeks since that night at the bar, it’s as if something has been unlocked. We touch each other more often, brief, teasing connections that I would see as no more than friendly if they were with anyone else. I tell myself I’m being stupid. I’m a married mother, eight years his senior – hardly fantasy material for him. As for me, it’s not the first time I’ve had one of these little crushes, and Carl fits the mould; married to a man eight years my senior, it’s probably no surprise that I gravitate towards the novelty of uncomplicated younger men. These crushes always pass. There’s no reason it should feel any more dangerous than before.

  We go into the café and choose and pay for our sandwiches, then settle into a table by the window, watching the steady increase of the rain. ‘Lovely weather,’ Carl remarks. ‘Really lifts the mood, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ I agree. ‘I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be.’ We deal in this kind of sarcasm on a regular basis, but it strikes me that, right now, shielded from the rain in this cosy cocoon, and hanging out with someone with whom everything comes so easily, there’s more than a hint of truth in my words.

  ‘I’m getting a bit worried about tonight,’ Carl says, as he attacks his sandwich. ‘I don’t know if you’ve ever actually heard Grant’s stuff, but it’s not what people around here might expect.’

  ‘You’re saying it’s crap,’ I state.

  ‘No.’ He frowns, feigns offence. ‘Of course not. It’s just a bit, well, a bit alternative.’ He catches my eye, and we’re laughing together uncontrollably, hunched over the table in incoherent mirth. My body aches with the release.

  ‘For God’s sake,’ I say, wiping my eyes as I straighten up, ‘I’m not going to be able to keep a straight face now. Come on, eat up. We should get back, I’ve got a shitload to get through.’

  We wander back to the office, and when we get there something makes me say that I’m going to the toilet first, leaving him to go in alone. I barely want to voice it to myself, but I don’t want anyone to see us come in together. In the bathroom, I look myself in the eye, squaring up, telling myself to snap out of it. No one would think anything of it, anyway, if they knew that Carl and I had been out to lunch. We’re friends. Friends.

  Back at my desk, the afternoon passes slowly. I work on autopilot, my thoughts elsewhere – shifting, rationalizing. It’s almost four o’clock when I look up and across the office to where his desk is. His eyes are already on me and, when he sees my gaze catch his, he doesn’t look away. He isn’t smiling.

  Grant sets down two pints of lager and a glass of white wine on the table, then flops into the chair opposite mine. He’s flushed with recent exertions, sweat shining on his forehead. ‘Tell you what,’ he says, ‘that was a pretty good one. I think the crowd went for it, didn’t they?’

  ‘I think they did,’ I agree. Underneath the table, I feel Carl’s knee nudge briefly against mine and when I turn my head to glance across at him he’s smirking down into his pint. Ten minutes earlier, we had been laughing about the fact that we had never seen a cr
owd of pub-goers so perplexed by what was going on in front of them. As Carl had predicted, Grant’s band is a fairly radical departure from the usual folksy, gentle outfit this venue generally attracts: a lot of wordless shouting, a lot of discordant guitar and seemingly random bursts of percussion. ‘As did we,’ I elaborate.

  ‘Certainly did,’ Carl chips in. ‘When’s the next one? Gotta get our tickets booked.’

  ‘Oh, no need to book,’ Grant says modestly. ‘Just turn up. I think we’re playing in Kentish Town next Friday, actually. And after that …’

  He starts to recite his diary, ticking off dates and venues on the fingers of his hand, complete with a precis of what to expect from each night and some background on the other bands that might be playing. I struggle to concentrate, but all I can focus on is the sudden sense of bodily warmth at the edge of my left hand as it rests on the bench beneath the table. Carl’s hand is next to mine, only millimetres away, and then, somehow, some movement is made – I have no idea by whom – and our fingers are touching lightly.

  The contact sends a small, decisive shiver through the length of my body. This isn’t like the other times. I look across at him again. He’s scratching idly at the side of his face with his free hand, ruffling his dark hair. His attention is seemingly entirely fixed on Grant; he’s nodding, making the occasional humorous interjection. The words flow over me like water. All I can think about is the tiny circle of warm air where my hand is touching his, and all at once I realize, with a clarity that shakes me, that this could really happen. It could happen tonight.

  I try to work out how this makes me feel. I try to think of Francis, and the home we share with our child. But the happy pictures I want to conjure up feel so far away, and all I can think of now is the rising tension in my chest whenever I step through the front door; the clutter that neither of us can find the headspace to clear up, our jagged nerves that brush up against each other whenever we are in the same place for more than a few minutes and the unbreakable wall the pills are building up between us.

  I had assumed that, if this situation with someone like Carl ever got out of hand, then I would pull myself back from the brink as easily and smoothly as breathing. Now that it is happening, I find that I can’t. I catch Carl’s eye, and he looks back at me with a flash of intensity that makes me catch my breath, and I know there is trouble brewing and I feel it in waves, closing over me and dragging me down, impossible to resist.

  Grant is gathering his stuff, fumbling with his coat. ‘Anyway, sorry,’ he says amiably. ‘I’m going on and on about this shit. You’re probably bored stiff. I’m going to head off – busy day tomorrow, right? Are you coming?’

  I hesitate. ‘I probably should, yes,’ I say. ‘Carl? What do you think?’

  Carl shrugs, draining his pint glass. ‘Can do,’ he says. ‘Or I wouldn’t mind staying for one more, if you want.’

  I find that I am nodding casually and automatically. ‘Sure.’

  ‘OK. Well, I’ll be off, then,’ Grant says, buttoning his coat and slinging his guitar on to his back. ‘Thanks a lot for coming, guys. See you in the office.’ And then he’s gone.

  We sit in silence for a few moments. Despite what we’ve said, neither of us makes a move towards the bar. I can feel the pulse of my heartbeat, battering lightly and insistently against my skin. His hand has slid fully into mine and our fingers are loosely linked. It is the most innocent caress that we could be sharing, but it feels shocking, almost dirty. I can’t remember ever having been so conscious of touching someone, of the nakedness of my skin.

  ‘So,’ he says eventually, ‘this is interesting.’

  I nod, staring intently at the tabletop. I can see the shadow of his reflection in the smeared glass, the lines of his shoulders and his face turned towards me in profile. ‘Interesting,’ I agree, ‘and not very sensible, eh?’

  ‘Well, we can stop it if you like,’ he says.

  ‘Do you want to?’ I fire back.

  He sighs, leaning his head back against the bench. ‘Oh, Caro,’ he says. ‘What do you think? You know I …’ He trails off deliberately, letting the echo of the words linger. And as he speaks, it comes to me that of course I do know, that I’ve been lying to myself for weeks now. The offhand tone is belied by the dampness of his hand in mine, the glimmer of uncertainty that sparks in his eyes as he takes in my reaction. He is not sure either, I realize, exactly what is happening here, or how it will go.

  ‘I don’t know what to do,’ I say softly, and I mean it, no matter how pathetic it sounds.

  ‘Nor do I,’ he replies. His voice is low and gentle, almost sad, and it strikes me that this may be difficult for him, too. Whenever I have tried to talk myself out of my thoughts in recent weeks, I’ve told myself that he’s nothing but a youthful sexual predator, wanting to carve another notch on his bedpost, but right here and now, nothing seems further from the truth. He cares about me, I think – he likes me. The thought is simple and incredibly powerful. Heat flushes up inside me, making me flushed and dizzy. The music emanating from behind the bar seems to swell and rise, vibrating through the walls.

  ‘I can’t hear myself think,’ I say. ‘Let’s get out.’

  We walk to the Tube station together side by side. I fold my arms across my chest, shivering in the night air. From time to time, we chat about Grant and his band, laugh about something that happened at work last week. It is as if the conversation in the pub has not happened, and the thought strikes me fiercely that this is not what I want. I want those moments back. I want that intimacy, the meaning that buzzed between us in the silence with his hand in mine. I can’t see past it, can’t get round it. My head is so full of it I can barely think.

  We stop outside the Tube and, for a moment, we look at each other in silence. ‘Are you coming?’ he asks at last.

  I shake my head. ‘I’ll walk on to the next one, get on the Northern line.’ We face each other in the cold, the wind blowing between us. Desire is making me faint, and the whole world blurs before my eyes. He says something I don’t quite catch, but I know it’s a question and I am nodding, moving forward into his arms and tilting my face up to his. My fingers are running through his hair as he holds me against him. His lips are cold. We kiss for maybe twenty seconds. A bunch of teenagers lurch past, whooping drunkenly and appreciatively as they do so.

  He releases me, and I let my eyes slide up to meet his for an instant. ‘Don’t feel too guilty,’ he says quietly.

  ‘I’ll try.’ I can hardly form the words in my head, let alone talk. I mumble a goodbye and twist away from him, walking fast down the street. I am still shivering with adrenaline. I turn those few seconds over and over in my head, trying to understand what I am feeling. A strange sense of anticlimax is trickling through me. Whatever it was, it wasn’t enough. And it’s already gone.

  When I find it, it’s in a place so obvious that I hadn’t even bothered to look at first: a dark red notebook with nothing printed on the spine pushed in between two novels on the bedroom bookcase. Hiding in plain sight – it’s her all over. I should have made more effort to think the way she does, but it doesn’t come easily.

  I sit down on her bed and flick backwards through it, watching the dates at the top cycle back in time until I reach January, and then I read every page she has written for the next six months. The words are crammed in, crowded almost on top of one another, as if she has had difficulty squeezing her thoughts into the narrow lines. She writes from the heart, holding nothing back. And yet the first thing I feel when I come to the end is a crushing sense of disappointment. It’s so pedestrian, all of it. She’s an intelligent woman, and she can talk a good game, but when it comes to emotions Caroline clearly paints by numbers. Some of the phrases she uses are so worn and universal that it makes me wonder if she even realizes that this diary could have been written by pretty much any woman in the country. I think about him all the time. I want to be with him, even when he’s only just gone. I can’t think about anything else
, can’t even step back to understand what I’m doing or why. I can’t get enough of him and it scares me. Things like that. Put slightly differently, twisted an alternative way, over and over again, for six months.

  As I expected, the last entry comes on 8 July, and then there’s nothing. Just blank space. I read through the whole thing one more time, and then I do what she should have done long ago and light a match to the pages one by one by the open bedroom window, watching the charred black fragments drifting down to the pavement below the tower block and disappearing into nothing. It takes a long time. Halfway through, I feel a little pang of guilt, because it doesn’t sit well with me to destroy something that someone else cares about, even if that someone is her. I get over it, though.

  When it’s done, I sit there for a while, thinking again about the words I have just burned and their prosaic simplicity, how far they fall from anything that really matters. I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me. When it comes down to it, what she’s writing about isn’t important. It isn’t a matter of life and death. It’s just love.

  Away

  Caroline, May 2015

  I SEE HER coming from the top of the street; a tall, slim figure strolling in jeans and a bright blue vest top, her hands pushed casually into her pockets. I’m on the way back from my trip to the newsagent’s to pick up the paper. It’s obvious that we’re on a trajectory towards each other, that our paths can’t avoid crossing.

  I’ll just keep my head down and pass by quickly, I decide. The carrier bag feels slippery in my hand and I can feel my cheeks burning. It’s ridiculous – I don’t even know the woman. It doesn’t matter if she thinks I’m the rudest person she’s ever met, or sends a bulletin to all her neighbours saying that they should batten down their hatches and ignore me on sight. I’m only here for a week.