The Good Heart

by Helena Halme

  * * *

  TO DO:

  1. Find a job

  2. Find a flat

  3. Forget about men

  * * *

  Kaisa stared at the piece of paper and immediately did the opposite of the last item on the list: she thought about Peter. She could almost feel his strong arms around her, and hear his husky voice murmuring ‘I love you,’ just before falling asleep after making love with her, his arm heavy on her waist. The last time they’d made love was on the day of the fight between Peter and Duncan. Their bodies fitted so well together, it was almost mechanical, had it not been so wonderful and awful at the same time. Kaisa had wanted to hold onto Peter tightly, wishing the love-making would last forever, wishing they could shut out the rest of the world and stay in bed, entwined in each other’s arms. Afterwards Kaisa had cried silently into her pillow, while Peter turned over and fell sleep. She hadn’t been able to settle and had marvelled at Peter’s capacity to go into a deep slumber so quickly, so effortlessly. Now, after four weeks of not hearing from him, she began to wonder if her initial worries, long before they married, were justified after all. Perhaps he couldn’t really commit, couldn’t really care about her.

  Kaisa looked at the note again and shook her head. What had she just written? ‘Forget about men!’ She tiptoed back to bed and willed herself to sleep.

  * * *

  The next day Kaisa received another letter. This time she recognised the handwriting straight away.

  * * *

  Dear Kaisa,

  I hope you are keeping well and enjoying having some time with your mother and sister. Life here in Helensburgh hasn’t changed much; spring is on its way, they say, but the slightly warmer temperatures seem to have brought us even more rain! There is the odd daffodil out in our garden, bravely fighting the wind and rain, but otherwise the landscape is as miserably grey as ever. Nigel is away again – you perhaps know that the boat is on patrol now until who knows when? I have been told that we might see the boys sometime early summer in June, but you know how it is, ‘I have to kill you if I tell you’ and all that. My pregnancy seems to be going well, the due date is June 22, by which time Nigel should be back. Wish me luck that everything goes well this time! Especially as I don’t have you to look after me and lean on if the worst happens again.

  A new family has moved into your old married quarter, but the wife, Phyllis, is utterly dull. She has a little girl of three and a boy who’s just about to start school. All she talks about is which public school is best and how her son is allergic to nuts. Oh, how I miss you, Kaisa!

  I hear Peter is doing alright in Plymouth. I hear he’s living on the base, which I presume is a temporary solution until he finds you two a married quarter down there. Nigel and I had a very happy few years down south – Plymouth beats Helensburgh hands down, I tell you.

  But the reason I wanted to write to you – apart from to ask how you are – is that I have heard some disturbing news. Now, this may just be gossip, and most probably is, but I really felt that as your good friend I ought to tell you. Before he went away, Nigel heard a chap say in the wardroom that Peter is seeing someone. Of course, he told the guy off, and said not to spread silly gossip like that, but the fellow was quite certain. You see, he is a distant cousin of this girl, Jackie, and he said he’d heard straight from her at a party in London that she and Peter were an item. I’ve been really disturbed by this piece of stupid gossip, and didn’t know what to do, but felt that you should know. I’m not sure who this Jackie person is, and if there is any truth in it (which there most probably isn’t!), but if I were you, I’d get myself back to Plymouth sharpish.

  Sorry to bring you such silly gossip, and I hope I haven’t done the wrong thing by telling you.

  Your friend,

  Pammy xx

  * * *

  Kaisa looked at the heavy yellow Basildon Bond paper, where Pammy had, with a neat hand, written the deadly words. Had Kaisa understood the English correctly? To be sure, she reread the letter three times, and each time she scanned the paper her chest grew tighter. At the end of the final read she was struggling to breathe, and got up to get a glass of water. She was on her own in her sister’s flat. Sirkka had gone to see a friend – it was her day off.

  Kaisa sat down at the kitchen table and put her head in her hands. Peter with Jackie? It couldn’t be true. But she was reminded of the time early on in their marriage when Peter had taken her to a party at Jackie’s beautiful apartment in London. She’d asked Kaisa how it was to be married to Peter in a way that had made Kaisa suspicious and jealous. She’d also told Kaisa that her hard-won degree from Finland would be worthless in England. It was obvious the girl didn’t like Kaisa, and thought Peter had made a mistake by marrying her. Of course, Jackie didn’t say as much, but as her cold eyes peered at Kaisa, her manicured red nails holding a cigarette, Kaisa knew immediately that Jackie had history with Peter. Peter and Kaisa had had a fight later, during which Peter admitted that Jackie used to have a crush on him. He’d not admitted to a relationship, but now Kaisa wondered if he’d lied to her then? Had Jackie and Peter been together before he’d got to know Kaisa – or even when they’d decided to be ‘free to see other people’ while Kaisa was finishing her studies in Helsinki? To have an open relationship, Kaisa reminded herself, had been Peter’s idea, and his suggestion had nearly broken her heart.

  Kaisa looked at her sister’s wall calendar, pinned above the kitchen table. She’d been in Helsinki just over four weeks. In just one month Peter had already found himself a girlfriend.

  It was also news to Kaisa that Peter was in Plymouth – he hadn’t even bothered to write to tell her where he was living.

  Kaisa slumped down at the table and cried. She was sobbing when she heard the doorbell.

  Outside stood her mother.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ She walked through the door and past Kaisa.

  ‘Why aren’t you at work?’ Kaisa managed to blurt out between sobs.

  ‘I have the day off, you know, because of the conference this weekend.’

  Kaisa nodded. She’d forgotten. Her mother had said she’d be at home on Thursday and then travel to some work-related weekend in Eastern Finland on Friday. She was wearing smart white running pants and a matching jacket with red and blue stripes on the side of the trousers and top.

  ‘I came down to see if you fancied going for a jog.’ Pirjo’s clear blue eyes were on Kaisa, ‘But what’s happened?’

  Kaisa made some more coffee, sat down and translated the letter for Pirjo.

  ‘And this Pammy, who is she?’

  Kaisa glanced at her mother. She noticed that Pirjo was wearing make-up to go for a run, and in spite of the hollow feeling she had in her stomach, and the utter despair she was feeling, her lips lifted into a smile.

  ‘She’s a friend, a good friend.’

  ‘You sure about that?’

  ‘Yes!’ Kaisa said impatiently.

  Her mother straightened her back. ‘No need to be so irritable. I’m just saying that good friends don’t usually …’

  ‘She’s a really, really good friend!’ Kaisa tried to keep her voice level, ‘that’s not the issue here. Peter has found someone else!’

  Pirjo was quiet, and put her arms around Kaisa.

  Kaisa allowed herself to be hugged and comforted by her mother for a while.

  ‘The worst thing is, I think they’ve been together before,’ she whispered.

  Her mother let go of Kaisa. ‘What?’

  Kaisa told Pirjo about the breakfast party, and about Peter’s confession that she’d had a thing for him.

  ‘That doesn’t mean that they’ve been together,’ Pirjo said. Her eyes were kind, and she took the tissue from Kaisa’s hand and wiped away her tears.

  Kaisa let herself be comforted by her mother. She put her head on her shoulder and Pirjo hugged her hard. ‘I know Peter. He is a very good boy and he would most certainly write and tell you this himself.’

>   Kaisa didn’t say anything. She wanted to believe her, but she also knew Peter. Hadn’t he left the girl he was seeing when they’d first met simply by ignoring her letters? And that girlfriend hadn’t committed the ultimate sin and been unfaithful to him.

  Nine

  Since being in Helsinki Kaisa had avoided the bank on the corner of South Esplanade and Erottaja, where the ladies had followed the long-distance romance between Kaisa and Peter closely. It’d been one of her former colleagues who’d organised the invitation to the British Embassy party where Kaisa had met her Englishman. But now that she was looking for a job, a natural place to start was the KOP bank. She’d telephoned her old bank manager and he’d agreed to see her.

  ‘So when did you come back?’ Mr Heinola’s handshake was firm. Kaisa felt her resolve to appear confident and ambitious about a career in the bank melt under her old boss’s direct gaze. Kari Heinola wore clear-framed glasses over a round face. He was slightly shorter than Kaisa, and she noticed his fair hair was thinning on top. He asked her to sit down on the opposite side of his large desk.

  ‘About a month ago.’ Kaisa looked at her hands.

  ‘And you’re settling back here?’

  ‘Yes.’ Kaisa’s voice broke, even though she’d tried hard to keep it level.

  The bank manager leaned back in his leather chair and placed his hands in front of his face, fingers tapping against each other.

  Kaisa kept her eyes on Mr Heinola, and waited.

  ‘It was hard going in England, was it?’

  Kaisa found herself telling her old boss how difficult it was to get a job, not just as a foreigner, with a foreign qualification, but also as a Navy wife. She poured out the frustration she’d felt during the long six months she’d spent, bored and frustrated, looking for jobs, first in Portsmouth and then in Scotland, where her career prospects were even worse. She told him about the job at DMS, and how her duties had increased there, but how she had then been refused a permanent job merely on the grounds of her marriage to a Navy officer. She also told him about the job offer on a magazine in London, and how she’d had to turn that down due to Peter’s job on a nuclear missile-carrying submarine.

  ‘Leave it with me, Kaisa.’ Mr Heinola got up and reached out his hand. ‘I’ll see if there are any opportunities within our bank. You’ve always been a smart girl, and a good worker, so although I can’t promise anything, I will try my best.’

  Kaisa left her old boss’s office the same way she’d entered, by the staff door on the side of the building, which led straight onto Erottaja. She’d not been brave enough to go downstairs to the banking hall to meet her old colleagues. Explaining how she’d ended up back in Helsinki to her old boss had been demanding enough for one day; she couldn’t go through it all again with the friendly ladies.

  Still, Kaisa felt jubilant that she’d managed that much. For the first time since her short-lived marriage ended on the day of the fight in Faslane, Kaisa felt in charge of her own life. This was, after all, what she had envisaged she’d do before she met Peter. Kaisa decided to celebrate with a coffee at the nearby Fazer café. She walked briskly across the Esplanade Park, not looking at the statue of Eino Leino, where Peter had given her sweet kisses and she had fallen firmly in love with him. Peter was now history; whatever her feelings towards him were, they could not be together, Kaisa could see that clearly. She needed to sort her life out, move on, get a job. Besides, she was fast running out of money. She was ashamed when she thought of the £100 Peter had insisted she take with her when he left her at Glasgow station. At first, Kaisa wouldn’t hear of it, but Peter had insisted, saying, ‘It’s my duty to look after you. You’re still my wife.’ But everything in Helsinki was much more expensive than in Helensburgh. She’d calculated that if she continued to spend at the same rate she’d run out of money completely in a matter of days. Luckily, Sirkka had refused to take any money for rent, but Kaisa felt she needed to buy the odd bag of groceries, even though Sirkka often brought food home from the hotel.

  Inside the Fazer café, while waiting to be seated, she stopped to dig out her purse from her handbag, to make sure she had enough money to pay. When she looked up, she saw the smiling face of a man looking down at her.

  ‘Hello,’ Tom said, ‘lost something?’

  Kaisa had forgotten how tall Tom was. The guy was positively towering over her. His eyes were dark and his light brown hair was a little shorter, and tidier, than she remembered. He was wearing an expensive-looking dark grey overcoat, which was open, revealing a suit underneath.

  ‘No,’ Kaisa felt suddenly as flustered as she had at Hanken when the two of them had played their cat and mouse game. ‘This is ridiculous, pull yourself together,’ Kaisa thought, straightening up.

  For a moment neither said anything. Kaisa had turned away from Tom to watch a waitress clearing a table that had just been vacated by an older lady in a fur coat. The waitress was wearing a black dress and a frilly white cotton pinafore with a matching head band. The Fazer uniform. The whole place looked as if it was from the 1930s, which is why it was popular with the Helsinki upper classes. It made sense that Tom would come here for his lunch; it was one of the most expensive places in town. Kaisa cursed her frivolity; really, she couldn’t even afford a coffee at the cheaper Happy Days Café opposite. There was, after all, no guarantee that her old boss would find a job for her. She should have gone straight home to Sirkka’s flat after the interview and raided the fridge there. Now she was stuck here, having to deal with this rich boy. Although he looked like a man now, Kaisa still thought of him as a spoiled brat. He’d only ever been interested in her because he couldn’t have her. But she couldn’t leave now; behind Tom the queue had increased; if she left, it would look as if she was running away from him. She didn’t want him to think he had such an effect on her.

  ‘Here you are, a table for two,’ the waitress said, looking at Tom and Kaisa.

  ‘Er, we’re not …’ Kaisa began, but Tom said, ‘Thank you,’ and indicated with his stretched arm for Kaisa to go first.

  ‘So, you’re back,’ he said after they’d given their overcoats to the waitress and been handed menus in exchange. They were sitting opposite each other in a corner table. Kaisa had been looking down at the small card, but now lifted her eyes and replied, ‘Yes.’ Kaisa examined Tom’s face. She wondered how much he knew of her situation. Surely Tuuli wouldn’t have told Ricky anything? This must just be the rich boy fishing.

  Tom smiled, ‘Well it’s nice to see you.’

  Kaisa didn’t have time to reply before the waitress was back, with her pad and pen poised for their order. Kaisa hadn’t even had time to read the menu properly, but Tom said confidently, ‘I’ll have today’s special.’

  ‘Same for me, please,’ Kaisa said and hoped the bill wouldn’t come to more than she had in her purse.

  ‘And we’ll have two glasses of the Chablis,’ Tom added.

  Kaisa didn’t have time to protest. The waitress had taken the order and disappeared.

  ‘Aren’t you working?’ she said simply, but Tom just laughed. Reaching into his pocket, he took out a packet of cigarettes and offered her one. As he brought the lighter – silver and engraved – close to her face, she saw something surprising in his eyes. A kind of gentleness that she’d not noticed before.

  ‘What are you up to in Helsinki? Visiting?’ Tom leaned back in his chair, and took a long drag from his cigarette.

  ‘Well, yes, I suppose, a long visit.’

  ‘Good, I’m in luck then,’ he said and smiled. ‘I’m just back myself.’

  ‘Really?’

  Tom told Kaisa that he’d been living in Milan with his parents for the last few months. ‘My dad got me a job in a bank there, but it didn’t work out.’ He said, giving her one of his infectious smiles.

  Kaisa couldn’t help but smile back at him. These were more words than the two of them had exchanged during the whole of the four years they’d known each other in Hanken. Yet now
it felt as if they were old friends.

  The waitress came back with their wine, and Tom lifted his glass to hers. ‘To you and me in Helsinki!’

  Kaisa raised her glass too and they laughed. When the food came, they chatted some more. Tom said he wasn’t working at the moment, but was ‘meeting someone later, hence the suit.’ Kaisa told Tom she’d probably be staying in Helsinki for a while. ‘Perfect,’ said Tom.

  Kaisa grew serious at that remark, and a for a while both of them were quiet.

  ‘Let’s have another glass, my treat.’ Tom said when the waitress came to collect their empty plates. The mystery dish of the day had turned out to be rather wonderful arctic pike with a parsley sauce. Kaisa just smiled. She couldn’t resist this friendly rich boy. Her grin widened.

  ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘You know what we called your lot in Hanken?’

  ‘No?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t think I should say.’

  ‘But you have to now! You can’t just give me that gorgeous smile of yours and then not say what brought it on.’ Tom stretched over the table. His face was so close to Kaisa’s she could have kissed those full lips.

  Kaisa grew serious and leaned back in her chair, away from Tom. ‘Rich boys,’ she said quietly.

  * * *

  When Kaisa got to Sirkka’s flat, there was a letter on the mat. This time she recognised the writing immediately. She picked up the blue Basildon Bond envelope and rubbed her hands together. She was frozen. She’d taken the wrong tram from Mannerheim Street, which meant she had to walk two blocks to Linnankoskenkatu. She’d been so confused after the lunch with Tom, which he’d insisted on paying for.