Behind Closed Doors

by Catherine Alliott

  ‘Is he all right?’ I breathed. I realized my heart was pounding somewhere up near my throat.

  She made a doubtful face and wobbled her hand horizontally. She shut the door behind me and spoke quietly. ‘He’s getting there. But he’s been super rotten. Really ill. Burst appendix. I only heard because I thought it was odd he hadn’t been in touch. He’d asked me to make him something and I needed to deliver it. I kept texting, but then I rang and he eventually answered. He could barely speak, so I knew something was up. I barged my way in here with a bucket full of chicken soup, although he’s not very hungry.’

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked, as we went down the hallway.

  ‘Well, believe it or not, he’s in the garden. Wrapped up in hundreds of blankets, obviously. And I was a bit nervous about it, but he says he feels worse inside. I’ve literally just trundled him out, but he’s only staying there for ten minutes, then I’m bringing him back in again. We don’t want pneumonia on top of everything else.’ She gave me a wry smile. ‘I’ve designated myself head nurse, by the way.’

  ‘Good for you,’ I told her as we went into the kitchen.

  She stopped short of the open French windows. ‘I’ll let you go out,’ she said quietly. ‘He won’t thank me for letting you in.’

  ‘Oh – because …?’

  ‘Doesn’t want anyone to see him like this. I don’t count, obviously.’ She grinned and went back to the cooker where she was heating something pleasant-smelling on the hob. She gave it a stir.

  I looked out. I could see him, seated at the end of the garden with his back to me. He was on the lawn, under the old pear tree. I went out on to the terrace and stood, watching him for a moment. Then I tiptoed down the garden. He was sitting in what looked like a hospital wheelchair, blankets dripping down from either side. I popped my head around, tentatively. His eyes were shut. His face was very pale and waxy: unshaven and gaunt. He’d tilted it towards the dappled sun which was heroically staging a comeback through the leaves: it made mottled patches on his white face. He didn’t hear me, and I crouched down beside him. Studied him. His cheeks were sunken and he looked dreadfully thin, the stubble of his beard quite grey. I gazed at him for a long moment. I realized it was a face that brought a lump to my throat. Tears to my eyes. I touched his arm gently. He was asleep. I was about to straighten up and tiptoe away when he slowly opened his eyes. I saw some faint shock in his eyes. He gave himself a moment.

  ‘You.’

  ‘Yes, me. Hello, you.’

  ‘Hello back. Who asked you in?’

  ‘Tilly. She tells me you’re being a difficult patient.’

  ‘She’s the worst sort of nurse. Hectoring. Bullying. Tell her she’s fired for opening the door.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t she open the door?’

  ‘I look like shit.’

  I smiled. ‘You don’t. You look pale and interesting. How are you feeling?’

  ‘Better.’

  ‘Don’t lie. Peritonitis is serious. Why are you even home?’

  ‘I escaped. The hospital was beyond dreadful. I couldn’t stay there, not another minute. I thought I’d die.’

  ‘Well, you probably will, now you’re home. Were you on intravenous antibiotics? Getting fluid through a drip?’

  ‘What makes you such an expert?’

  ‘Ned had a burst appendix which briefly became peri tonitis. He was in hospital for two weeks. Do you have medical insurance?’

  ‘Don’t be fucking stupid, I’m a teacher.’

  ‘Oh well. We’ll manage.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘Tilly and me.’

  He met my gaze. My eyes were frank and honest and his were too. What was the point of being otherwise? I saw his well up slightly. Realized he couldn’t speak. When his voice came, it was thick.

  ‘I couldn’t possibly reply to your thank-you text. Not mentioning it would have been lying through omission, and mentioning it … would have looked too much like a cry for help, however cheerily I composed it. “Oh, by the way, I’ve got galloping peritonitis.” I tried a few times and deleted it.’

  ‘How very British.’

  ‘Didn’t want you charging up if you didn’t – you know …’

  ‘What?’ He didn’t answer. ‘Feel it?’ I asked softly.

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘I feel it.’

  After a moment he spoke. His voice was blurry with emotion. ‘I feel it too.’

  I wanted to cry. I felt my eyes well up. I took his hand which was cold and dry: enclosed it in mine. We both squeezed but his grasp was weak.

  ‘Thank God,’ he muttered. ‘I thought I’d got it wrong. I’ve got so much wrong, in this department, over the years.’

  ‘Oh, me too.’

  ‘Don’t get competitive.’

  ‘I’d win hands down.’

  He gave me a sad smile. ‘We each have our own narratives. Unhappy ones. But important to get it right eventually, I feel.’

  ‘I think so too.’

  We stayed like that for a moment. Then I felt his other hand. ‘I’m taking you in, you’re cold.’

  ‘I feel like Mr Rochester.’

  ‘And I feel far too much like Jane.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  I hesitated. Wondered whether to go ahead with it. But then I did. ‘Well, in the spirit of full disclosure, which seems to be our theme, I was worried you were too much for me. That I was punching above my weight. And that now I’m only in with a chance because you’re an invalid.’

  He looked astonished. Then he tilted his head back and hooted a cracked laugh to the heavens. ‘Rochester was blind, wasn’t he?’

  ‘My point entirely.’

  He was still smiling as his face came back to me. ‘Are you always so honest?’

  ‘Fatally so,’ I said ruefully. ‘It’s a problem. Emotional incontinence. But I’ve learned to hide it, over the years.’

  ‘Please don’t. I think it’s your supreme attraction. I’ve been used to so many closed hearts. So much coldness. I long to say what’s on my mind the moment it arrives. Have longed to, for years. Like you just did. Please kiss me, Lucy, I can’t reach.’

  I did. Gently. His lips were cold. Too cold. In another moment I’d turned the chair around and was whipping him inside.

  ‘That didn’t last long,’ he grumbled.

  ‘You’re freezing.’

  ‘I’m not, and I feel better than I have done for days.’

  When I’d shut the French windows, I went around to crouch in front of him. My eyes scanned his face. I had to admit there was a slight colour in his cheeks and a light to his eyes. That may have been the fresh air, of course. I like to think not. We smiled at one another, communing silently.

  Then I straightened up and darted to feel the radiator, which was on. Good girl, Tilly, she’d overridden the heating. On the stove, the soup was doing a little more than simmering, Tilly having tactfully removed herself. I took it off the hob and was about to get some bowls out when I heard a few coughs from down the hallway. Having announced herself, Tilly appeared.

  ‘I was going to make sure he ate it,’ she said hesitantly, ‘but since you’re here …’

  ‘Oh yes, do go,’ I beamed at her.

  ‘OK, great.’ She looked relieved. She came around to bend down in front of him. ‘Right then, Mr Bolshy,’ she grinned. ‘I’ll be off. Don’t give Lucy as much trouble as you gave me, or I’ll be telling Mrs Goodfellow.’

  ‘Oh God, not her,’ he said weakly.

  ‘The Goodfellows don’t know?’ I asked.

  ‘No one knows. Apparently recovery from this particular strain of peritonitis is extremely rapid and no one needs to know.’ She eyed him beadily: gently prodded his chest. ‘Behave yourself, Joshy. No more toys out of the pram.’ She straightened up and then, flashing us both a winning smile, shrugged on her little jacket. She promised to be back tomorrow, with more soup. Oh, and she was charging him double. He’d been double trouble.

  ‘Than
ks, Tills,’ he muttered gratefully as she left.

  When she’d gone I poured the soup into two bowls and let it cool for a moment as I set the table. Then I wheeled him up and made him eat it. He did, actually, quite successfully. Although his hand shook and he got a fair bit down his dressing gown, which made him bark with rage as I wiped it off with a dishcloth.

  ‘Like a fucking baby!’ he roared, or tried to.

  I shrugged. ‘I suggested I do it for you, or put a napkin in your neck, but you wouldn’t have it. What would you normally do now?’

  ‘What’s normal?’ he growled. ‘I only escaped yesterday. Gardening, probably. Or tennis. Yes, tennis.’

  I ignored him. ‘Sleeping. How do you get upstairs?’

  ‘We’re going to bed?’

  My mouth twitched. I waited. He sighed. ‘I walk. I’m quite capable of walking, it’s just that wretched girl went to the hospital and got me a wheelchair. Came home on a bus on my own.’

  ‘Idiot. God knows what you caught on that. Come on, let’s give it a whirl.’

  I pushed the chair down the hall to the bottom of the stairs and then helped him haul himself out of it. Together we made a very slow and shaky ascent, me with one arm around his waist, and him holding the banister tightly. In that way we made it to the bedroom. I knew he wouldn’t want any help from there on in, so I diplomatically went to the loo while he got slowly into bed. When I came back, he was under the duvet, tucked in up to his chin.

  ‘How d’you feel?’

  ‘About six. Go away.’

  I grinned. ‘I’m going. But sadly for you, I’ll be back. Have you got water?’

  He didn’t answer so I poured a glass from the bathroom and put it on the bedside table. ‘OK. What’s Tilly’s number?’

  He sighed. Then jerked his head in defeat to his phone on the side. I gave it to him and he scrolled down and handed it back to me. I tapped it into mine.

  ‘And Trisha’s?’

  He groaned. ‘Is that really necessary?’

  I assured him it was, and actually, he was getting very drowsy now. I knew he wanted me to go. His eyes were shutting, so when I’d got the number I drew the curtains, shut the door and went downstairs. I sat on the bottom of the stairs and rang Trisha. She was in a meeting, but she came straight out. She was appalled and furious with him at the same time. And clearly worried. We decided I should go, and that she and Tilly would manage, and that she, Trisha, would not take no for an answer.

  ‘He won’t want you nursing him at this stage,’ she warned me. ‘It’s too demeaning for him. He’s proud.’

  ‘I know, that’s what I thought. It’s why I rang.’

  ‘So you disappear. And I’ll keep you posted regularly. I’m coming round now, can you leave me a key?’

  ‘I’ll put one under the flowerpot.’

  ‘Stupid fool. Imagine if Tilly hadn’t persisted? If he were coping alone?’ I shut my eyes. I didn’t like to imagine, actually. Knew, from nursing Ned, how serious the condition could be, how easily it could turn into sepsis, be fatal. ‘Some men think no fuss is honourable,’ Trisha went on. ‘Not mine, of course. Mine’s in bed if he so much as gets a tickle in his throat. Go, Lucy, and I’ll be in touch.’

  I rang off, loving the way she took my presence here for granted. My need for regular updates. She’d already been leaps and bounds ahead of me at that Sunday lunch, I just hadn’t dared to go there. And now it appeared Josh hadn’t dared either. Hadn’t dared to be vulnerable. Neither of us had, in case we got – you know. Hurt. More hurt. Which neither of us needed. So I’d gone briefly for the safe option. I shut my eyes. Dan. I knew I’d led him up the garden path, but in a way, I hadn’t. I just hadn’t been brave enough to say no. To go for the other path. Hadn’t been bold enough to text Josh and say – ‘You’ve gone a bit quiet, what’s up?’ Like the young would. Imo. Helena, back in the day. I hadn’t wanted to be rebuffed. I knew I had to go and see Dan, explain, and I knew that would be hard, for both of us. Most of all, for him. But at least I was doing it now, and not in three or six months’ time, when I was feeling stronger, less unstable, and when I knew I’d got it wrong. Or I might have been in too deep and unable to: might even have been living with him at my parents’ house. With them in the bungalow. A cosy little set-up.

  It gave me a sudden jolt of horror, that vision. Because I knew I’d be back on my feet soon, now that the bogeyman had gone. I knew that my nightmare of a life was receding, like an ever-decreasing tide, away into the distance, and that I wouldn’t need him. Thanks to Ingrid. Thanks to that remarkable woman in the house behind. And I’d never say a word about what she’d done. Not even to Josh. I’d take it to my grave. I’d made her a solemn promise, and I’d keep it. And I would forever be astounded, humbled and grateful to her. Hope that one day, I could do the same for someone else, another woman like us. I adjusted my position on the stairs and adjusted my mind back too, to Dan. Back to what could have been. It would have been very wrong to be with a man I liked very much but didn’t love, and whose protection I didn’t need any more.

  And if I’m honest, in a corner of my mind, Dan’s level of protectiveness had worried me. It reminded me too much of someone, in the early days. It was awful to even suggest it, but a couple of things had brought to mind the old Michael. The way Dan would appear, unexpectedly. At the hospital. At my parents’ house. Like Michael, in his blue MG, outside a girlfriend’s supper party. The way Dan – sweetly, no doubt – assumed I needed support. I was tarring him with a horrible brush, and no doubt his motives were completely kind, but it felt too similar. That level of care for his mother, too. Was it control? Would it only be a matter of time before he was calling me Little Luce? And I’d thought him the safe bet. I’d thought Josh was the risk. Too attractive. Too cool. Too amusing. Too clever. But he was more vulnerable than I could ever have imagined. And I don’t mean the illness. And nor was I pleased about it, that vulnerability. I didn’t chalk it up in a smug, same-as-me-mate sort of way. It was more that the glimpse I’d had of it, of his thirst for proper, spontaneous love, reminded me of my own. If I dared unleash it. If I loosened the reins on my emotions. That glimpse had been salutary. A lesson in using more than one’s eyes, or one’s brain.

  And over the years, throughout my married life, I’d trained myself to use those two very forensic, scientific senses. It went against the grain, however, and I’d spoken the truth when I’d told Josh that, by nature, I was emotionally incontinent. But guilt over the things I’d done – Liam, and then giving my children Michael as a father – had persuaded me my gut instincts were poor. So I’d tried hard to use my head, to get things right. But not this time. This time I was using my heart. And although I wasn’t naïve enough to think I’d definitely got it right, this … thing with me and Josh, whatever it was – I didn’t even know what to call it, we were so very much at the beginning – I knew I was choosing life. Hope. Daring to be me. And not, by dint of having been through so much, just plumping for a soft, safe landing. I blinked. Or not, as the case may be. I could have been heading for the rocks – who knows? No one can glimpse the future, however much they rack their brains, weigh up the pros and cons, write comparative lists. But by listening to the heart – my instincts, which I’d once written off – by consulting those, I reckoned I at least stood a fighting chance.

  I got up from sitting on the stairs. I was standing by the hall mirror. My hall mirror, the overmantle, with the gilt frame. It was one I was used to seeing my reflection in a lot. My cheeks were flushed and my eyes bright, reminding me of someone. I realized it was myself, years ago, when I was young. When I had my own light, my crushes, my possibilities. Could it be that light was back? I went to get my coat from the kitchen and put it on. Then I plucked my phone from my pocket and sent Josh a text, which he’d get when he woke up, saying I’d gone, but bad luck, I’d be back. Then I sent Dan one, saying I needed a chat, and could I pop round tonight. I pocketed it and headed for the door, shutting it behind
me as softly as possible.

  I tucked my key under the flowerpot for Trisha. As my feet tripped down the steps, it seemed to me they were lighter than they’d been for a very long time. Indeed, I wondered if I’d ever so much as tripped down these steps in my life. Like a dancer, almost. That made me smile, as dancing used to be a strong suit, and had come naturally once. Still smiling foolishly, I passed a young guy in the street. He grinned back, surprised. I was embarrassed and glanced down at my feet, but as I rounded the corner out of sight, I threw my head back and laughed softly to the heavens, much as Josh had done in the garden. Then I hastened away to my car.

  THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING

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  First published by Michael Joseph in 2021

  Copyright © Catherine Alliott, 2021

  The moral right of the author has been asserted Jacket images © Getty Images and © Alamy ISBN: 978-1-405-94076-4

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