The Trailing Spouse

by Jo Furniss

  “And then what?”

  “I say good night.”

  “After all that flirting?”

  “Not flirting—listening. But it’s true, once or twice a woman has been angry or even tearful because she assumed I would hit on her sooner or later—because that’s what men do, isn’t it, given half a chance? It’s such a cliché.”

  “Some clichés exist for a reason. So what do you get out of it?”

  “Business travel is boring. People think it’s glamorous, but it’s boring and lonely. So sometimes I talk. When I feel like it. I never get to be honest at home. Not without causing aftershocks that might hit the next day or in a month’s time. But talking in a bar with a woman I hardly know who just wants to hear the truth—it feels like freedom.”

  “I bet you don’t tell your wife.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “Because you’re emotionally unfaithful. Which is a little sociopathic, to be honest.”

  “There’s no betrayal. No ulterior motives. No power play.”

  Camille reached out and wiped a shadow of blood from his chin. It was odd, she thought, but despite being alone in a hotel room in a strange country with a man she barely knew who was covered in blood, she felt quite safe with Ed. The air between them was crystal clear. He caught her wrist and tucked it around his back. His other hand pressed her brow, so that her face turned sideways against his chest.

  “You won’t get angry or tearful if I don’t seduce you?”

  “No, I’m okay,” she said.

  “Let’s stay like this for a while then. Unless you want to order room service?”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  Her breathing steadied as her muscles softened to his shape. They stood on the balcony with the muslin curtains swaying like the thin membranes of a cocoon, the lights and sounds of domestic life far away on the street below.

  Chapter 46

  The painted fingernails of the check-in girl picked through the dog-eared pages of Amanda’s fake passport. Not Amanda: Elizabeth Arina Skye.

  Pleased to meet you. My name’s Liz.

  Hey, call me Lizzy!

  How do you do? Eliza.

  Hi there, I’m Beth.

  Amanda checked her watch—she’d made the evening flight by the skin of her teeth—and saw her hand trembling. The check-in girl inspected a visa for Mongolia, a country Elizabeth Arina Skye had visited for three weeks the previous year. Amanda had googled Mongolia in the taxi on the way to the airport in case she was questioned. Ulaanbaatar: coldest capital city in the world. Intrepid traveler, this Elizabeth Arina Skye. What would she do in this situation? How would she steady her nerves? Lizzy Skye would brazen it out. Amanda felt herself pull up taller, her hips loosen inside her skinny black jeans. Lizzy Skye only wears black. She goes on holiday to Mongolia. If I can channel Lizzy Skye, I might get through this. Changi Airport was the perfect place to adopt a new identity. It never seemed real anyway. The passengers were too artful, posed; their diversity was too exact. It was like being inside one of those computer-generated images of a future hotel development. So, Amanda decided, Elizabeth Arina Skye can do this.

  Two policemen in blue-black uniforms strolled past with their hands resting on automatic weapons. She stiffened again. Lizzy Skye would never have fallen into this mess. The passport lay open on the check-in desk, spread-eagled beneath a keyboard that pressed down like an officer’s knee in its spine. The woman tapped a lacquered nail on a key. The two policemen turned at the end of the row and sauntered back.

  “Ms. Elizabeth?” The painted lips were speaking to her.

  “Yes.”

  “Sorry for the delay, ma’am. It says in our system that you are a gold privilege member?”

  Amanda made a sound that might be taken for affirmation.

  Is there a photo on the system? Has she seen that it can’t be me—

  “I have upgraded you, ma’am. Here is your boarding pass. Have a nice flight.”

  When Amanda finally sat in seat 1A, she closed her eyes. Her heart clattered around her chest cavity like a bird sucked into an aircraft engine. She knew she would be able to do nothing more than sit, holding herself together, for the short flight to Burma.

  None of the signs were in English. Burmese appeared to be a collection of circles, like an ancient depiction of waves. They took her mind to her mother. She reached for her phone and remembered with a jolt that she shouldn’t use it; her location would show up on the phone records. Stupid. She double-checked that she’d left it switched off after the plane; but didn’t people in movies take the battery out? How can you take the battery out of an iPhone?

  The taxi sputtered to a halt outside the Oriental. The hotel looked romantic with its long shuttered windows and muslin curtains drifting in the breeze. After changing into harem pants at the airport, Amanda blended in with the backpackers sweating on the street. Even inside the hushed foyer, pods of tourists lingered to photograph the colonial splendor as a cover for enjoying free air-conditioning. Amanda could have been one of them right up to the moment she went to the reception desk and checked in to a river-view suite.

  While a man tapped her details into the computer and prepared her room key, she folded a note into a thin column and tucked it inside her fist. Like a conjurer, she flicked her fingers forward, and the money appeared. She closed it inside her grip again and laid the hand on the reception desk. “I have a business meeting with a guest later,” she told the receptionist. “I wonder if you could tell me his room number? It’s Mr. Edward Bonham.”

  “Oh, Mr. Edward!” The receptionist laughed. The antics of Mr. Edward were obviously well celebrated among the staff of the Oriental. “Mr. Edward went out.” He held out her room card on two palms like a blessing. “With his wife.”

  “His wife?” Amanda forced her arms to move and her mouth to smile. “I’ve never met Mr. Bonham’s wife. What’s she like?”

  “At first I thought she is his daughter”—the receptionist giggled behind his hand to signal he meant no offense—“but no, he said she is his missus. Pretty. And shy. Like that famous actress in the film. The little one.”

  Amanda tried to think of shy little actresses but decided she didn’t want to pin down exactly which famous beauty Ed’s missus—had the receptionist misheard “mistress”?—most resembled. “Right. Good to know. And if you could tell me his room number . . .” She conjured the folded note from her fist.

  But the receptionist was already tapping on his keyboard. “Room 513, ma’am.” He glanced down, confused, at the money. Amanda also looked at the note as though surprised by its appearance. “For the bellboy. Where is he?” The receptionist summoned an ancient porter, who picked up Amanda’s half-empty backpack without comment. Inside the gilded lift, he pressed the button for floor five, and Amanda’s stomach jolted in time with the elderly cables. She and Ed were on the same floor. That could be useful, but it also increased the risk of him seeing her. Maybe she should complain about her room, kick up a fuss, insist on a higher floor? She’d already asked too many questions. Better to stay under the radar.

  “This is it, ma’am,” said the porter, as the elevator doors slid back. She walked into a sleepy corridor. Nothing moved, not even the air, not even her breath as she passed 513. Her room was a few doors farther down. The porter took an age to fumble the card into the slot—Amanda eyed the lift, willing it not to open and deliver Ed into the corridor—until a green light flashed, and she pushed past the old man into a darkened room. While she held out the folded money, he fussed over every individual light switch. When he finally left, she fell onto chilled white linen, her hair mussing up an arrangement of orchid petals, her hot skin soothed by the cool stream of a fan. But any tranquility was broken by stabbing thoughts. What now? If Ed already has a woman lined up, what do I do to stop him?

  She took her phone out of her bag and almost switched it on before she remembered: Amanda Bonham must stay at home in Singapore; she has turned in for the night
. The only flaw in the plan was Josie. The farewell sleepover at Willow’s would keep her out of the apartment all night, so long as she didn’t bail out and come home. If Josie reported Amanda missing . . . It made her nervous that she couldn’t check on Josie.

  She rolled off the bed and picked up her key card. There was a business center. Ed had a laptop, so he wouldn’t be there. She slipped into the corridor, her fingertips easing the door into its frame, as though Ed were a sleeping monster who might stir. She headed away from the lift, following the fire escape plan on the back of her door, and found the stairwell. A few minutes later, she was in a windowless room, where an ancient PC fired up with a loud complaint. Once online, she hesitated over Facebook; might it show her location? Instead, she decided to check Josie’s website. The countdown timer showed 00 days, 02 hours, and 55 minutes remaining.

  Amanda checked her watch; that would take her to around midnight. But then she noticed the blog had a new post. Until now, Josie had published only one a day. Like the timer itself, she had changed tempo, speeded up. The latest drawing was a nest, a bowl of thorns, with a single egg inside. The diary entry was titled “The Day She Died.” Amanda clicked and the page reloaded.

  In the future: It’s D-Day, so nothing

  In the past: As events in the present have overtaken those of the past (is that logically possible?!), I must cut to the chase and reduce to ten posts the Days That Made Me Me. So this is the penultimate. Ten is a nice round number. Though it doesn’t sound as ominous, does it?

  Post 9 of 10: The Day She Died

  We’re almost at the top of the cliff when she stops. She wants Teddy to take our photo. She’s giddy on pregnancy hormones.

  “Get closer to the edge.” Teddy ushers us off the path, and the roar of waves swarms up the cliff. The wind flings spray into my face. The sea is the color of dishwater. She pulls me back from the cliff top by my hood.

  The lady in the visitors’ center warned us that cliffs can crumble after rain. There could be a landslide. A slump. People don’t often die, she said, but sheep do. Stupid creatures sleep on the edge, and the ground falls out from under them.

  “Don’t close your eyes, Jo-Jo Sparrow. Smile.” Teddy bobs up and down to get a good shot.

  Our hair is whipping about and gets so tangled we don’t know which hair belongs to whom. We’re still fighting for control of our hair when Teddy takes the shot. The picture spits out the front of the camera as his phone rings. I smile at the famous guitar riff from our favorite band, Cold Sister, which he just uploaded. He shoves the Polaroid into my hands and turns his back to the wind to take the call. We carry on until we’re at the top. The cliff juts out high over the beach almost to a point, the shape of my tongue if I stick it right out. I go to the tip of the land and stick my tongue out and taste salt.

  “Get back, Josie. If there’s a gust of wind, it’ll take you right over!”

  “Or the land could collapse,” I say. Coming back from the edge, my legs feel numb at the thought of falling, as though I’m already weightless. She takes my hand between her warm palms and rubs my fingers so they tingle with blood.

  “I’m going to try harder this time, Josie.” She looks down into the dishwater. “You’re going to see a big difference with this child, and I hope that doesn’t make you jealous. I feel so guilty sometimes that I had to go away—”

  “You were sick.”

  “I was. I was really sick.”

  The wind punches her in the small of the back, and her hair flies up. She is smoothing it down when Teddy arrives, finished with his phone call. He grabs her shoulder and spins her around to face him, sending her dark hair flying again.

  “That was the doctor,” he says. “But you already know, don’t you?”

  She wipes wet strands of hair that are stuck to her lips.

  “Go down to the pub, Jo-Jo, where it’s warm.” Teddy hands me a fiver. He doesn’t take his eyes off her wet face. “Wait for us there. I need to speak to your mother.”

  I take the money, but it convulses in the wind and flies from my hand. The note skitters through the air and snags on a withered bush a few meters away, and I run to snatch it back, but then hunker down behind the dense knot of gorse, hidden by its yellow flowers. Teddy has his back to me, but his voice booms like falling rocks, as loud and rough as the waves hitting the base of the cliff.

  “Why did you put us through it if you knew? I told you I wouldn’t do it again.”

  She backs away, and her foot slips on the wet grass, her thick, dark hair covering her face so I can’t see her expression. Teddy moves forward, stepping after her, off the grass onto the desiccated earth that juts out from the land.

  “I’m sorry, Ed. I thought the baby was yours. Honestly, I was sure. I was only with him the once. I was drunk.”

  “How could you do this to me? And to your child—your living child?” Teddy remembers me now and glances over his shoulder, checking I have gone down the hill to the pub. The path twists out of sight, and I am hidden by the winter flowers. His hands close around her upper arms when he turns back to her. Her toes scramble for purchase on the barren ground, sending flurries of dirt over the edge, arcing through the air where they will dissolve in the water below.

  “What am I going to tell Josie?” he says.

  I stand up behind the bush. Her eyes flicker from his intent gaze. She calls my name, a warning or a plea, I can’t tell. He shakes her closer to the lip of the land. The wind inflates her hood, a red sphere against the dank sky, and her face is streaked with tears and snot. It reminds me of a photograph of myself when I was a toddler, snapped after I’d picked up a lollipop from the grass and found it stuck all over with ants.

  “Go on then!” Wet fronds of hair, as dark as seaweed, slash her face. “You’ve always wanted her for yourself.”

  He twists her wrist so she bends over backward. His other fist is under her chin, hair surging through his fingers, her whole body heaving beneath him.

  “I gave you everything,” Teddy shouts. “All you ever gave me is”—he turns his face for a moment to spit out a piece of long hair that is stuck to his mouth—“sloppy seconds. Why are you such a slut?” Her head snaps backward into the cold air. Their bodies are pressed together. Beneath their feet, the bony roots of long-dead plants are all that bind the earth to the land. Cracks run through the soil, and I think of a broken fingernail that has ripped too close to the skin, no way to save it once the first crack appears. The best you can do is tear it off and hope it doesn’t bleed. Their feet dance in the dirt as they push each other over the cracks toward the end of the earth.

  Chapter 47

  Under a brisk fan, turned up high to relieve the late-night crowd at the Raffles Club, Ed ordered beer while Camille concentrated on clinging to the arms of her barstool. He mustn’t see that she was falling: a broken shard of glass, tumbling through the air, by turns shiny and dark. She vibrated with nervous energy, like a struck bell, and wished for the calm she’d felt on the balcony earlier, when Ed held her until she relaxed and then gently let her go to sit alone on the sofa while they waited for their contact to call.

  “We need to talk,” he said, offering her a bowl of peanuts.

  “No aftershocks.” She managed a smile but refused the nibbles.

  “I mean we need to talk about my contact.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “There’s a few things you need to know.”

  “Okay . . .”

  “The fact is, I’m here for self-serving reasons. I need money, and this is a job.”

  “What kind of job?”

  “A delivery. I’m a delivery boy.”

  She picked up a water glass in two hands and felt ice slide down her throat.

  “And you’re the package, Camille.”

  Under the stool, she slid her foot between the handles of her bag and pulled it toward her. As long as she had her passport and money, she could run. Just get a taxi to the airport and go.

  Ed’s phone beeped, and he
turned toward the arched doorway, the street outside flooded with golden light from the pagoda opposite. “He’s here. I’m sorry I couldn’t say more in advance and make it less of a shock. But it wasn’t my place to tell you. It should come from him.”

  “Who?” She watched a tall figure step through the archway, an outline that transformed when it was halfway across the bar from a stranger into someone she once knew as well as she knew herself. She felt herself slither off the barstool and land as softly as a tiger.

  Despite the unfamiliarity of a limp arm that swung at his side, Camille recognized his posture, his fleet glances to size up the room. Ed stood too, an honor guard between her and the new arrival. She laughed, a yelping scoff of disbelief. “This isn’t happening,” she said, “this is a sick joke.” She stepped backward, and the barstool shifted with a sharp bark.

  “Camille?” His right arm hung useless, the palm forced around so that it was open to her.

  If the body was broken and baffling, the voice was unmistakably that of her father. She closed her eyes and heard water lapping against a hull, the cries of seabirds mingling with her gleeful shouts as she and Collin jumped from the prow into a crisp ocean. Saltwater blurred her vision. She snapped her eyes open and, for the first time in fifteen years, felt her father’s gaze. Except she remembered his eyes as blue and now they were dirty ice.

  “Where have you been?” she asked.

  “In prison.”

  His appearance was a shock—he had suffered, that was obvious—but it was the look in his eyes that appalled her. His detachment, his reserve. His uncertainty. The father she remembered was suave and sophisticated. With a patter and a smile that came easily. This wasn’t the same man, even if he inhabited the same damaged body.

  He raised his good arm to her face.