Jam

by Jake Wallis Simons

  This had to be figured out, and figured out now. The confusion had gone on long enough; he would not leave this copse, he decided, until he had it all straight in his mind. Right. What was required to make sense of all this was cool-headed reason. That, he thought, was where he had been going wrong; his emotions had been clouding his judgement. Proceeding, then, with the basic facts. First: the male homo sapiens is evolutionarily predisposed to have multiple partners. This seemed to him to be self-evidently true. Although he could recall a time when he had eyes only for Ursula, that was when they had been in the very first flush of love, when they had been worlds unto one another. This phenomenon could be explained, he was certain, scientifically; something to do with the amygdala or dopamine, something to do with the evolutionary need to commit to a single partner long enough to mate. And before long the infatuation wore off, as it always did – as it was designed to – and his male instincts took over. The whiff of pheromone, the flash of a cleavage, the curve of a woman’s hips, stole his mind and pricked his desire. So far as he could tell, it was the same for all men. It was the power of the basic urge to reproduce, to spread one’s seed as widely as possible to ensure healthy fertilisation, healthy progeny. To chase down and conquer a sexual quarry; to dominate her; to impregnate her; to chase down and dominate another. This was his incontrovertible nature, and to restrict it, even with the very best of intentions, was to fight the tide.

  Second: the female homo sapiens is biologically predisposed to attract a mate for life. Again, this seemed to him self-evident. Women did have affairs, of course, and sexually could be as profligate as their male counterparts, yet he had a strong sense that beneath it all, their essential nature was to make the home, to feather the nest, to nurture the children, and because a man was an essential precursor to all of this, and a very handy – if not, strictly speaking, essential – addition, it followed that within the feminine nature was inscribed the need to find a man and keep hold of him. He supposed that in terms of evolution, it was beneficial for a woman to be attractive to a wide range of men, for if her principal mate proved unable to deliver the goods, so to speak, she would need the ability to attract a replacement. She needed to make men of all sorts wish to chase her down, dominate her, penetrate her, impregnate her. This explained her preoccupation with maintaining her attractiveness, which was instinctive even in old age. Essentially, however, she demanded only one partner, only one, to have and to hold. Which, obviously, was at odds with the nature of the male.

  Third: his duty was no longer to Ursula alone. It was also to Carly, and whatever actions he took now would impact on her to the extent that they defined the entire future direction of her life. This was his responsibility.

  This, he thought, was what it meant to be a man.

  It was then that the breakthrough occurred. He could feel a thought rising like a bubble from the mystery of his unconscious, and he held his body very still to allow it to fully develop. Love and duty. How closely intertwined these were! He had thought, for a time, that they were polar opposites. He had thought that the love between Ursula and himself had faded, and that duty was all that bound them now; that meanwhile, a new love was blooming between himself and Nicole. Now, however, he realised that the driving emotion that turned his mind daily to Nicole – a woman he barely knew – was the primordial lust. The bonds that connected him to Ursula – of devotion, of nurturing, of fondness, of duty – were not animal. They were of a purely human order, a civilising, compassionate force. If all members of a society were dominated by their lust, how would it survive? And if an individual allowed himself to be dominated by his lust, how could his personal harmony remain intact? It was obvious.

  The conclusion, when he arrived at it, was stunning. That companionship, that stability, that affection? That quiet, unremarkable, special thing? That willingness to endure the difficult times? The arguments? That, in fact, was love. He’d had it back-to-front all along, and he was on the brink of ruining everything.

  He raised his head from his hands and looked through the trees towards the road. His eyes were swollen, and he felt at once profoundly tired and ready to take on the world.

  He reached into his pocket for his phone. It nestled in his palm, a pat of butter, a pebble. He awoke it, scrolled to the number, paused, got to his feet. The signal was strong here. He took a deep breath, exhaled slowly. Then he dialled the number. It rang for a long time; he was almost certainly waking her up, and he didn’t care.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Max?’

  ‘Yes, it’s me.’

  ‘Do you know what time it is?’

  ‘About three, I’m told.’

  ‘Is something . . . wait a moment.’

  At the sound of her voice his heart quickened, he was starting to feel intoxicated; they got to speak so rarely. Was this really only lust? Was it not something more, something celebrated in the poetry of the greats? He heard her walking up some stairs, entering a room, closing a door.

  ‘OK, I can speak now,’ she said. ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong,’ said Max. ‘I just had to speak to you.’

  ‘You shouldn’t call out of the blue like this,’ she said softly. ‘Especially in the middle of the night. We agreed. Text first.’

  ‘I know. Sorry. I just . . . I had to speak to you.’

  ‘OK. I think Mark’s still asleep. Go on, then.’

  Her voice was warm, lilting downwards, like champagne being poured into an empty flute. He had woken her up, yet still she was completely devoted to him, not angry at all. He knew her now. He knew what she was expecting: a proposal for another encounter. The words stuck in his throat, and he screwed shut his eyes. A moment ago, it had been so clear. But now? Emotions were strangling his logic. Perhaps it was a mistake to eliminate emotion. Perhaps it should be reason that bowed in the face of genuine, overwhelming love . . .

  ‘Max? What is it?’

  ‘I . . .’

  ‘I miss you, Max. I’ve been thinking about you.’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about you too.’

  ‘When can we see each other properly?’

  They had fallen so quickly into the familiar pattern. Her voice was so low, so charged with sex, that it seemed to slip down from the phone and caress his groin. The fog that surrounded him felt like an expression of his mind. He knew what he was supposed to say. He was supposed to suggest a place, a time. He opened his mouth.

  But then, in the middle of all this, two synapses in his brain fired, and his capacity for clear thinking returned momentarily to him. He did not think he was a brave man. But he knew that he was a man.

  ‘We can’t,’ he said awkwardly. ‘I’m worried that . . . we’re both putting our families on the roulette wheel.’

  ‘I know,’ she sighed. ‘I know exactly what you mean. I feel like such a fraud.’

  ‘I’m just really worried that someone will see us. I’m . . . I don’t think any man deserves this much happiness. It’s all the deception, I can’t live with all this deception.’

  ‘Has something happened? You’ve got me worried.’

  ‘No, no. God, no. At least, I don’t think so.’

  ‘You don’t think so?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You haven’t said anything to anybody?’

  ‘Christ, no.’

  ‘Ursula hasn’t raised any suspicions?’

  ‘No, no. I’d tell you if that were the case.’

  ‘What then?’

  ‘I’m just worried that something bad is going to happen.

  There are only two ways this is going to end. Either we’re going to end it, or we’re going to be discovered. There can’t be another way.’

  ‘I know,’ she said, with sudden, unexpected decisiveness. ‘I don’t think we can ever see each other again.’

  Something within him howled. ‘We could be friends,’ he said, ‘don’t you think?’

  ‘We can’t,’ said Nicole, ‘not after this. We’ve
started something. Either we manage it or we cut it off.’

  ‘Manage it?’

  ‘Sorry. That doesn’t sound very romantic.’ She paused. ‘I miss you.’

  ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ he said. ‘Cold turkey is the only way.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘You’re sure about this? There’ll be no going back.’

  ‘I . . . there just isn’t any other way.’

  ‘This is so sad.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be sorry. You didn’t do anything wrong. In fact, you did too much that was right.’

  ‘I’m sorry it has to end like this,’ said Max. ‘It feels so unnatural. It’s so cruel how love singled us out like this. It just feels so . . . right. But it’s not. It’s wrong. Or is it? Oh God, I don’t know. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t apologise,’ she said. ‘It’s just . . . this is the way the universe is.’

  ‘You’re right,’ said Max. ‘I think you’re right.’ Another pause. ‘Well, goodbye, then,’ he said, his voice sounding, he thought, like the voice of a child.

  The line went dead.

  Max stood still for a moment, then sat heavily on a tree stump. He pressed his fists to his eyes. What had he done? What had he done? This had been the most beautiful thing that had happened to him. And now he had ended it? Just as it was entering its prime? For the sake of what – duty? Some vow he had made years ago, on the basis of a relic of a relationship? Was this what it meant to be alive? To deny oneself happiness for the sake of an echo of a promise, that was made in such a different time? Did he not owe it to himself, to Ursula, to be honest and acknowledge that happiness lay elsewhere? That they were millstones round each other’s necks?

  Why had he been so narrow in his thinking? Were there not so many other possibilities? That he was in love with both women, but in different ways? That the force of lust actually belied a deeper truth of love? That for a man to be fully satisfied with his wife, he must also have the indulgence of a mistress? That for a wife to be fully attended to by her husband, he must have the indulgence of a mistress? The possibility of leaving Ursula for Nicole? The chance that this encounter with Nicole had represented a forking path; that if he were to part ways with Ursula, although profoundly painful and traumatic, they would both end up with better lives in the end?

  But what about Carly?

  At the touch of his thick thumb, the phone lit up. He scrolled down to Nicole’s number. In his mind’s eye he could see a vision of an ocean-going boat moving slowly away from the shore; the gap was narrow enough to be leaped, but it was widening all the time. His thumb hovered above the call button. It lowered towards it, but did not make contact. Then, just as he was screwing up his courage, and his eyes, and readying himself to throw caution to the winds, to try to reclaim what he had lost, his phone buzzed in his hand. A text message. He opened it. From Nicole. No text, just a picture; her in her underwear, a half-smile playing across her lips, hair tousled sexily from sleep, sitting on the side of a bath. And he knew.

  Methodically, he deleted first her picture; then her messages; then her contact number (which he had saved under ‘Nick’). At the press of a button, the phone went dark.

  He closed his eyes, turned his face into the breeze. For a long time he sat like this, as the ocean-going ship moved off into the waters, further, further. Almost out of sight. Out of sight. My heart is down, my head is turning around, I had to leave a little girl in Kingston town. Now there was only himself; his body; the feeling of the breeze on his skin; the trees around him like sarcophagi; the night. How simple life really was, and how complicated desire made it. He felt, suddenly, like a boy again, as if the gift of innocence had been returned to him. For the first time in a long time, he wanted to buy Ursula some extravagant present, to take her away for a long weekend to the most expensive hotel he could find. He wanted to be near her. He wanted to take her in his arms, whisper how much he really loved her, make love to her. He got to his feet, vertiginous at the narrowness of his escape. The future rose up before him.

  When Max emerged from the copse, he saw that the fog had cleared. Below him the traffic jam stretched, coiled, vanished. He could see people running about on the opposite side of the road. He could see lorries, vans, a bewildering variety of cars. His eyes, however, came to rest on one vehicle. Unremarkable to most, remarkable to him. I am a lucky man, he thought.

  The visitor

  Harold, at the wheel of his camper van, had lost his concentration again. He had already abandoned his reading, changed into his pyjamas and attempted to sleep on the sofa in the back; but he couldn’t sleep, not like this. So he had put on his dressing gown and gone back to the driver’s seat to resume his study, but it was three o’clock, he was tired and couldn’t concentrate. What else to do? Both sleep and study were closed to him. Frustrated, he ballooned his bearded cheeks. There was a quotation, he thought, wasn’t there? (There usually was.) Something about how discipline is nothing more than remembering what you want. He had a head like a sieve these days, particularly when it came to little bits of trivia like this. That was the ageing process, he supposed; it robbed one of one’s capacities, beginning from the outer reaches and creeping gradually to the core, but offered in exchange the gift of contentment (albeit which usually preceded, in one’s ultimate dotage, silliness. If not something worse). Young people, he thought, had no access to true contentment, for in that fiery period of one’s life, which lasts perhaps until the age of forty, it is necessary to strive after various goals. Thereafter, whatever the levels of one’s achievement, one begins to take one’s foot off the accelerator and enjoy what one has. And one has other things to deal with at that time, anyway. The paying back of mortgages. The breakdown of relationships. The old age and death of parents. (That final, horrible event drives home the fact that the family tree is being gradually pollarded, and that oneself is now ripe for the plucking at the top. Is it possible to be termed accurately an orphan at the age of sixty-three?)

  But now, lacking discipline, he had nodded off again. He awoke and looked, bewilderedly, about him. The camper van. Ah yes, the traffic jam. Still hasn’t moved! His paper was lying curled in the shadows of the footwell. He took a minute to allow his consciousness to right itself. Waking up, he had often thought, should be like getting out of the bath. It should be done slowly and gradually so as not to shock the system. His body felt profoundly limp, as if only part of him had awoken. He moved his arms, made a few gentle attempts to brush some stray crumbs of Mr Kipling’s cake from his stomach. For a moment he felt lighter than air. Then the old solidity seeped back. This wasn’t just about three o’clock in the morning. These days he could never tell when he was going to nod off.

  It was then that Harold noticed a ghostly figure outside the window. He gave a start, peered closer. It had one hand raised in greeting, like the drawings that Man sent into space for the benefit of aliens in the Seventies. But this was no man. It was clear, even in this light – and even with the fog’s misty tentacles at the van window – that this was a woman.

  With some effort he wound the window down, rubbing his eyes.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Hsiao May from the cold, from the darkness. ‘I saw you were still up and I thought, well, you know. If we both can’t sleep.’

  ‘Aye, right enough,’ said Harold, blinking with recognition. ‘Come in. I’m so glad, I’m so glad. Let’s have a cup of tea. Round the back. I’ll let you in.’

  She hoisted her cool bag over her shoulder and made her way round the old-fashioned lozenge of goodness. So far, so good, she thought; she was feeling tired, and rather tense, and was finding eye contact awkward, but that was only to be expected, and on the scale of things her anxiety levels were negligible. Once she got into the vehicle, she thought, she’d be OK. This camper van seemed to speak to her of everything that was wholesome in life. Hers was an existence in which affairs of the intellect overshadowed this world and all its pleasures. So, when she ca
me across something like this – something so impractical, so joyful, whose sole purpose was to create a little simple happiness – she was charmed.

  Through the back windows she could see Harold silhouetted against the desolate motorway, listing awkwardly as he clambered between the seats and neatened his dressing gown. She smiled. He sat heavily on one of the sofas and shunted along sideways, puffing like a steam train, stimulating in her an overwhelming affection for him, this man she knew only in passing. The fact that he would put himself in the position of such interminable awkwardness, such downright impracticality, for the sake of pootling around the country at fifty miles per hour in a charming old, clanking old, cramped old machine! Straining, he reached over and opened the door.

  Inside, the atmosphere was highly private and personal; everything was laid out precisely, everything was in its place. And, Hsiao May noticed, a great deal of thought had been put in to ensuring that nothing would fall over when the camper van went round corners. She put her cool bag carefully on the sofa and sat down. It was bobbled, springy, spongy. Harold busied himself with the preparations for tea, glancing back at her occasionally, holding his head at an angle as if it were horribly stiff, talking over his shoulder.

  ‘What’s in the bag?’ he asked. ‘Did you come bearing gifts?’

  ‘Diet Coke mainly,’ Hsiao May replied. ‘But there are some snacks as well, yes.’

  ‘Oh goody. What’ve you got?’

  ‘Let’s have some tea first. Then we’ll see.’

  ‘It all sounds very mysterious.’