The Open Marriage

by Flora Kidd

  She broke down then and two nurses hurried into the room. For a while everything was confused and they told her later that she had had a relapse. For a while there were no exercises, no visits from Dr Mehta, only rest and drug-induced sleep until she was tranquil again. By the time she had recovered the few leaves clinging to the branches of the trees she could see were brown and withered, and in the next few days they were blown away. November had come.

  The physiotherapy exercises were started again, but she made no attempt to walk, seeming to be content to sit in her wheelchair and read mystery novels. One day when Anthea visited her, she brought roses; red roses still in bud, misted by a delicate fronds of maidenhair; a bouquet arranged by a skilled florist. There was a card with them, and Jessica took it out of its envelope. The message written on it was simple. See you soon, Alun.

  She stared at the name. Alun. The mists swirled in her mind and lifted a little. Into a bright clearing swam the image of a man's face, lean and dark-browed With a mockingly slanted mouth and eagle-gold eyes. Alun, her husband. She looked up at Anthea.

  'Where is Alun now?' she asked.

  'Still in Wales, dear, but coming to see you as soon as he can,' replied Anthea, watching closely.

  Jessica looked down at the roses that were lying across her lap. She touched one of them with a fingertip.

  'I went to Wales to see him,' she murmured. 'But I can't remember why I went.' She looked up at her mother again. 'Do you know why I went?'

  'No, dear, I don't. You just decided to go—left me a note to say where you'd gone and when you'd be back.'

  'Does he know I was in an accident?'

  For a moment Anthea looked acutely uncomfortable as if she had been caught out doing something she shouldn't.

  'He knows now. I ... I wrote to him telling him when you had that relapse. These flowers and a letter to me from him arrived today. He'll be here tomorrow.'

  The mists swirled again, thickening. Jessica stared at the name written on the card again hoping it would trigger off more memories of Alun, but nothing happened.

  Yet she recognised him as soon as he stepped into her room the next day and felt her heart leap in her breast with excitement. Dressed in a suit made from beige corduroy and a cream-coloured shirt, he looked dark and intense. He approached her warily and then went down suddenly on his knees beside her chair.

  'Jess—oh, Jess, I'm so sorry,' he murmured, and kissed her cheek. 'I didn't know you'd been hurt. All these months, and I didn't know until last week. I wasn't told. Why wasn't I told?'

  'I don't know,' she whispered, holding his hands and gazing at him. 'But I'm glad you've come. I've been longing for you to come. Please kiss me again.'

  He bent his head and kissed her offered lips. Closing her eyes, she let the warm comfort of the sweet caress flow through her. When it was over he stood up and brought a chair over so he could sit close beside her.

  'Have they ... I mean, has Mother told you I have some sort of amnesia and I can't remember much about my life before the accident?' asked Jessica. 'I can't remember why I went to Wales. Mother told me I went to visit you. Was she right?'

  'Yes. But you remembered me when I came in just now. You remember that we're married to each other?'

  'Oh yes, I remember that. I remember most of my life before the accident,' she said, smiling at him. 'About us getting married and living in the flat together. What were you doing in Wales?'

  'Writing a book about my father. I've finished it now and it's with the publisher.' Alun's eyes narrowed he studied her closely. 'You don't remember anything about coming to see me there?'

  'Nothing.' She shook her head and her hair, which had grown thick and long, shimmered in the light from the window. She looked right at him, her eyes clear and wide. 'I can't remember anything since the last time I saw you.'

  'And when was that?' He was frowning now, dark eyebrows slanting downwards.

  'At the flat. You'd just come back from an assignment I think you'd been to South America again.' Her brow wrinkled as she struggled to remember. 'I remember being glad you were back and were safe. I think I didn't want you to go away again, but ...' She broke off, shaking her head again. 'I ... I can't remember any more, and it makes me very tired trying to see through the fog in my mind.' She looked at him appealingly, turning to him for help as she always had done. 'Oh, Alun, what am I going to do? I can't remember part of my life. I can't remember two whole years of it.'

  'Perhaps that part wasn't worth remembering,' he pointed out, holding both her hands in his. 'Perhaps it's best forgotten. Don't try so hard to remember. Let it be. Concentrate on getting well enough to leave this place. I want you out of here as soon as possible to take you away with me. We'll go far away to a place I know where I can look after you. We'll have a holiday together.'

  'But . . . but . . . they won't let me leave here until . . . until I can walk properly,' she replied, gazing at him adoringly. He was back, her knight errant who had always come to her aid, who had always helped her when she had had a problem.

  'They will when they know I'm going to take care of you. They've already told me they can't do much more for you. Physically you're healthy. It's just something mental that's preventing you from walking and from remembering.' Alun paused and gave her a wary glance. 'You would like to go away with me, wouldn't you? You always used to say you would.'

  'Oh, yes. I'd love to go away with you. But where? Where will we go?' She felt again the sudden excited leap of her heart.

  'You'll see when we get there.' he said teasingly, and rose to his feet. She felt panic streak through her. He was going, leaving her, and she felt she couldn't bear the pain of parting from him. She reached out, grasped his nearest hand and clung to it.

  'Don't go,' she pleaded.

  'I must. Visiting time is over.'

  'But you'll come again? Tomorrow?'

  'You want me to come?'

  'Yes, yes, I do. Please come every day . . . until I can leave with you.'

  'I'll do my best,' he promised, and bending, kissed her again, lightly on the lips. When she opened her eyes after the kiss had ended he had gone.

  After he had gone she sat quietly for a long time thinking about him. Strange that she could remember meeting him and falling in love with him and marrying him quite vividly, but whenever she tried to get beyond his return from South America she came up against thick fog.

  Next day at her session with Dr Mehta she told the psychiatrist what had happened when she had seen Alun the day before, how she had remembered him immediately and how she remembered the first two years of the marriage. The psychiatrist listened as she always did with her sleek dark head tilted slightly to one side, her large brown eyes soft with compassion.

  'Something must have happened at that point that you didn't like,' she said after a while. 'Something that hurt you, and now your mind is refusing to face up to that painful reality. How did your husband react to your amnesia?'

  'He told me not to try so hard to remember, to let it be.'

  'That was good advice. Is he coming to see you?'

  'Yes, he is. He wants to take me away on holiday with him, if the hospital will release me.'

  'He won't have any trouble in getting the authorities here to do that. We've done all we can to help you, and since he has shown a desire to look after you I think we can let him take over your rehabilitation. But I must have a few words with him about your loss of memory. It's important that he doesn't tell you anything of the happenings during the past two years of your life and your visit to Wales. You must be given every opportunity to remember what happened naturally. Only in that way will you be sure that your memory has really returned to normal and further shock can be avoided. Do you understand?'

  'Yes, I think so.'

  'As the days go by and you see your husband more often it's possible you'll remember more and more. It was a good idea of your mother's to send for him.' Dr Mehta stood up. 'I'll see you again, the day after tomorro
w if nothing happens before then to make it necessary for me to talk with you.'

  The doctor left the room, and Jessica sat as if turned to stone staring out at the wind-tossed bare branches of the trees. Her mother had sent for Alun; he hadn't come of his own accord. Why not?

  She was restless all that night, thinking about Alun, wondering why he hadn't come to visit her sooner. Questions about their relationship tormented her and remained unanswered because her mind refused to find the answers. They were there somewhere in the mist that shrouded her memory. Determined to ask him about the state of their marriage, she felt frustrated when he didn't come to see her the next day, and when her mother arrived at visiting time, instead of greeting Anthea with pleasure as she usually did she demanded irritably,

  'Where's Alun?'

  'He had to go up to London to see an editor at the publishing company that's publishing the book about his father'. He sent his love to you and said he'll see you tomorrow for sure.' Anthea settled into her chair. 'It was my idea to send for him, you know,' she continued. 'I felt sure you'd begin to get better as soon as you saw him. You're looking much brighter today—more like yourself, not so vague and listless.'

  'But I still can't remember why I went to Wales to see him and what happened there,' grumbled Jessica. 'Why hasn't he visited me before? Why didn't he know I'd been in an accident? Why didn't you tell him? Why didn't the police tell him instead of telling you?'

  'Well, they told me first because the address of the Beechfield house was on your driver's licence and they assumed quite rightly that you lived there,' replied Anthea evasively. 'You had nothing on you that indicated that you're Alun's wife. You didn't change your last name when you married, you know.' Anthea looked disapproving.

  'Oh, didn't I?' That was something she hadn't remembered. 'Why not?'

  'Because it's the fashion nowadays for a woman to keep her last name when she marries, especially if she has a career she wishes to continue,' replied Anthea coolly. 'I can't say I think much of these new-fangled ideas about marriage, this being married but living apart business that you and Alun have always gone in for . . .' She broke off suddenly with a gasp, her hand going to her mouth. 'Oh, dear,' she muttered, 'now I've done it! Dr Mehta said I wasn't to mention anything to you that you couldn't remember yourself.' She looked worriedly at Jessica. 'I didn't tell Alun you'd been in an accident at first because I wasn't sure, you see, how things were between you and him. Your relationship seemed so strange to me,' she added with a sigh. 'When I did tell him he wrote back to say that as long as I kept in touch with him and kept him informed about your progress he would stay at the farm to attend to some business he had to do in Wales.'

  'I see.' Jessica felt suddenly miserable. His business had meant more to Alun than she had. 'So we weren't living together when I went to see him in Wales.'

  'No, you weren't.'

  'Why not?'

  'I really can't answer that, darling,' said Anthea. 'You and he have your own arrangement. You always have had. Freedom to come and go as you both please—very necessary when you're married to a free-spirit like Alun, you once told me, although I'm not sure what you meant. Freedom for me came when I married your father, and at last I was able to do the things I'd always wanted to do. His love and support freed my spirit. But I don't expect you understand that.' She rose to her feet. 'I can't stay any longer. Alun will be here again tomorrow. He's taken over the care of you, thank goodness. He's really turned out to be a much more reliable and sensible person than I had ever thought him to be—quite responsible and mature. And he's going to take you away on holiday for a while.' Anthea smiled. 'And that's the best thing that could happen to both of you, and it proves how much he cares for you and how much he wants you to get better.'

  'Yes, I suppose it does,' said Jessica, but she didn't feel at all assured that all was well between her and Alun.

  Next day when he visited her she refrained from asking him questions about their marriage, sensing instinctively that she might find the truth painful. While she couldn't remember what had happened during the past two years she could pretend that their marriage had been happy and normal. Yet during the next and last week of her stay in hospital she became more and more convinced that Alun was only visiting her because it was something a husband was expected to do when his wife was ill. She felt he was only there with her because she was having difficulty in learning to walk and was suffering from loss of memory. Once she could walk, once she could remember perfectly, once she was independent of support he would leave her again. And so she made no effort to improve her walking, made no attempt to remember.

  Arrangements were made for her to leave hospital. Her mother brought clothes for her to wear the day before.

  'Alun will come for you and you'll go straight to Heathrow,' she said, 'to fly to New York.'

  'New York?' exclaimed Jessica. The name of the city jolted her. For some reason she didn't like it. The mists in her mind lifted a little. She saw herself with Alun in a room and she was shouting at him: You're always going to New York. You're going to see her, aren't you?—that woman. You're having an affair with her! 'Why are we going to New York? It doesn't appeal to me as a place to have a holiday. Alun said we'd go somewhere quiet, where we would be alone together.'

  'Well, you are. From New York you'll catch a plane to an island in the Caribbean. Alun has been lent a villa there by a friend of his. Sounds wonderful, on a cliffside, overlooking a beautiful beach. Quite secluded, he said. And it has a swimming pool so you'll be able to swim and strengthen your spine and legs.'

  'Oh.' Jessica felt relief surge through her. 'That sounds better. But clothes—what will I do about clothes? I don't have many suitable for the tropics.'

  'I've packed all your summer dresses and your swimsuits. Alun says you'll be able to buy out there. You're going to the French side of St Martin, and he says there are French shops in Marigot, the capital of the French side of the island, where you can buy anything you want. It sounds delightful—a little bit of France set down in the Caribbean Sea. Now I've brought your green tweed to wear tomorrow for flying to New York and you can change when you get there into the thinner clothes I've packed in an overnight bag so that you won't arrive overdressed for the climate in St Martin.'

  'But ... but how will I get on to the plane?' quavered Jessica, panicking. 'I ... can't walk very far.'

  'Don't worry about it—everything will be taken care of. You'll get preferential treatment. You'll go in a wheelchair on to the plane and be lifted out of it or helped to walk to your seat. Alun has it all arranged—you can depend on him. I'll come in the morning to help you to dress and then go with you both to the airport. Goodnight, dear.' Anthea bent and kissed her. 'Sleep well.'

  Jessica didn't sleep well; she was too excited. Her nerves throbbed and her head ached as her imagination ran riot, anticipating the flight to New York, the flight to St Martin, the arrival at a luxurious villa on a cliffside above a beautiful beach. She had never been to the tropics before, of that she was certain. She had never been further south than the Isle of Wight. She slept at last, her dreams filled with waving palm trees and tumbling white surf.

  'It will be very different from Wales,' she said to Alun, the next day when they sat in comfortable armchairs on the plane that was taking them across the Atlantic, a silvery dart in the sky demolishing time and space.

  'What will?' he asked, and although he spoke casually she felt the sudden tension in him in reaction to her mention of Wales.

  'The island of St Martin where we're going,' she replied, gazing out of the window beside her at the bank of clouds far below them, at the brilliant blue of the atmosphere around and above them.

  'You remember Wales, then,' he said quietly.

  'A little—not much. I remember the mist. White walls shining through grey mist and a plant growing in a garden—love-in-a-mist, I think it's called. There is a garden, isn't there, at the farm?'

  'A small one,' he replied cautiously.


  'It needed weeding. You don't take care of it properly,' she rebuked him. 'Too busy writing, I suppose.' She looked at him and smiled affectionately. 'Dai Jones told me it would be better if your farm was amalgamated with his. The two could be managed more efficiently then. . . .' She broke off to stare at him with wide eyes. 'Alun,' she whispered, 'did you hear what I said? I remembered something else about Wales. I remember a man called Dai Jones, and lots of sheep and two dogs. Is there such a man? I haven't imagined him, have I?'

  'No. Dai Jones is real and you met him when you were in Wales. His farm is next to mine.'

  'Oh, thank goodness for that!' Jessica sank back against the chair back in relief and closed her eyes. Remembering made her tired and now her mind was blank again. She slipped into an uneasy doze.

  A few hours later she was looking down on the great American city, its grey and white towers glittering in the pale November sunshine. She was surprised how many trees there were scattered among the buildings. Bridges leapt across ribbons of greyish-blue water linking the island of Manhattan to the surrounding mainland and to Long Island. Big freighters moved slowly under the bridges. The whole scene tilted skywards as the plane banked and turned to make its approach to the land, and then it was gliding swiftly earthwards to merge with its own shadow on the runway.

  An hour and a half later they were in another plane and taking off again into the misty blue afternoon light. For a while through the window she could see land, green and yellow fields, thick woodland and glittering rivers, then the cloud enclosed the plane and everything vanished from view.

  Jessica sat tensely, keeping her head averted from Alun. Since she had remembered Dai Jones, since she had slept on the other plane, she had remembered much more about Wales. She had remembered why she had gone there. She had gone to ask him for a divorce so that she could marry another man. She couldn't remember yet who that man was, nor could she remember how Alun had answered her request.