by Maggie Ford
She was conscious of her voice sounding strained. ‘But it’ll serve you to no avail, you know. You do know, Matthew?’
She felt her heart shrink as he turned on her. ‘What do you know about it?’ Immediately he caught himself. ‘I’m sorry, Jenny, I didn’t mean that to sound like it did,’ he said, then justified it by repeating himself in a different way. ‘But you can’t know how I feel about her.’
‘Perhaps I do,’ she countered softly, only to reap more bitter reaction.
‘You sound like my mother.’ This was accompanied by a cynical curl of his lips.
She had no reply to that. Something inside her was growing angrier by the second. Usually she curbed it, waited until he calmed down and tried to vindicate his hurtfulness, but this time her patience had no power and the anger exploded before she could catch it to hold it back. She turned on him, her grey-green eyes blazing.
‘That’s it, Matthew. Go on feeling sorry for yourself.’ At her raised voice, the squirrel dropped its piece of stale bread and scurried back up the tree, but she did not see it go. ‘I’ve just about had it up to here, Matthew. I do try to see your point of view. I do feel sorry for what’s happened to you and I know I’m being unfair, that no one who’s not suffered what you have can know what it was like, for all the stories and pictures we’ve seen. And now this on top of everything. But I’m only flesh and blood. Now do I sound like your mother? I want to help and I feel so useless, and I love you so much, Matthew. Yes I do know exactly what it’s like to love someone who doesn’t love you, when nothing can be done about it. I know it like mad.’
Tears were springing from her eyes. They rolled down her cheeks. ‘I wish I was small and dainty and had someone to be crazy over me, as you are with her. But I’m not the sort of girl you fancy, am I? I’ve never been the sort of girl you fancy. Well, if she’s the sort you fancy then you’re welcome to her. That’s what I say. But is that supposed to alter what I feel inside? You’d rather run after someone like her and let your heart be torn out of you while you grovel at her feet, pleading for her to come back and hurt you all over again. Well, honestly, Matthew, if that’s what you want, I might as well just give up. No point me being your friend forever and ever. Damn what I feel.’
He was staring at her, the expression on his thin, handsome face one of confusion. Surely he couldn’t be so naive as not to have some inkling of how she felt about him? She had said too much, had revealed her heart to him when she hadn’t intended to. She felt exposed, but she was too angry with him to care. And now she fought to recover her composure, savagely sweeping the tears away with the back of her hand.
‘What does it matter anyway? I’ve got a good career in nursing and that’s all right with me. I don’t suppose I’ll ever marry, not now. I’m not the wife type. I’d only start bossing him about, whoever he’d be. I’m the bossy kind, you said so yourself. Like your mother. I suppose if I was like your wife you’d be letting me wipe the floor with you. I don’t think I could ever bear that – from you.’
He was looking at her in a strange way, studying her, his dark brows drawn together. ‘Jenny, I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to upset you.’ He was always being sorry.
She shrugged and looked away from him as he went on inadequately. ‘You’re the last person I’d want to hurt, you know that.’
Jenny said nothing, very much in danger of refuting the statement. He didn’t seem aware of it.
‘I’ve only been thinking of myself all this time. I never once stopped to consider how you feel in all this. Even when you said you loved me, I could think of no one else but Su …’ he hesitated over the name, but plunged on. ‘Susan. All I’ve ever done is abuse your friendship. Your real friendship. Using it and giving nothing back, especially knowing how you felt about me. Jenny, I wouldn’t hurt you for the world. You’re the only decent thing that has ever happened to me, and …’
As he broke off, she turned to see him still gazing at her, realised he hadn’t once ceased looking at her, even though she had turned away from him. Now he put his hand out and laid it on her upper arm. She could feel the warmth of the hand penetrating the thin material of her summer dress.
He was drawing her gently towards him, his voice husky. ‘I couldn’t have gone on without you. I know the thought of her still consumes me, and I know I’ve got to fight it. But I know you’re worth two of her, Jenny.’
His other hand took hold of her, he was pulling her closer to him. When his face was inches away from hers, she felt his lips touch her cheek.
No, it was too much. He had no right. He was taking it upon himself to offer comfort with a kiss on the cheek. She made to turn her face aside from the insult of that friendly peck, the sudden move causing her lips unintentionally to brush his.
All at once she found herself unable to break away as the pressure of his lips on hers became instantly firm. In that second all her love for him poured out to encompass him. With a small choking sob, Jenny let her arms wrap themselves about his neck as if they had a will of their own, and to her astonishment his arms encircled her in response. The squirrel in the tree ceased scratching at the bark to look down at a young couple in a close embrace, the girl crying, the man holding her, kissing her gently now, and murmuring soft words of comfort.
‘It’s all right, Jenny. It’s all right.’
‘I’m sorry, Matthew. I shouldn’t have …’
‘No, you should. I’ve been damned stupid, selfish.’
‘But you don’t love me. You can’t. You love …’
‘I don’t really know any more what love is. What I do know is I can’t imagine being without you, Jenny. You’ve become part of my life.’
The squirrel, looking down, heard only a meaningless chatter of human sounds and went on exploring his own world, seeking food and, instinctively searching for a mate with whom to procreate his own species.
Below, if Jenny was expecting the words, ‘I love you, marry me?’ she was doomed to disappointment. The kiss had been emotional but an accident. She knew that later he would be embarrassed at having been carried away on a wave of brief, profound affection. She knew that too. She’d ruined everything in a weak, thoughtless moment. In the meantime they would walk home together as though nothing had happened.
What she didn’t know about were the new feelings she had awakened in him.
Jenny took the envelope her mother held out to her: ‘It’s addressed to you, dear,’ and stared at the unfamiliar handwriting. She rarely received mail other than The Nursing Journal. Her friends were local nurses with no need to write, seeing them every day. Her first thought was that it was from one of the old group in the QAs but the postmark was local. It was the small uneven handwriting that gave her the first clue as with the edge of a thumbnail she slit open the flap to withdraw a single sheet of cheap, blue-lined notepaper. She cast her eyes to the foot of the letter, noting the name.
‘Who’s it from, dear?’ queried her mother with interest.
‘Matthew’s wife. Why should she be writing to me?’
‘Odd.’ Mrs Ross moved to lean over her shoulder. ‘She won’t be his wife for much longer. The divorce comes up in two weeks’ time, so I hear.’
Jenny nodded, already reading, ignoring the misspellings:
Dear Jenny, I thought I’d write to you becaus I need some advise from you if its possible. Im ever so worried and I don’t know what to do. As you know the devorce comes threw in a couple of weeks time and Geoffrey. Thats the man I am living with. Geoffrey is acting very strange. I think he’s worried about the devorce but he is not as nice to me as he used to be. Im getting ever so worried. I wanted to talk to Matthew but I cant very well ask him direct after all this time and I was wandring if you could have a word with him on my behalf so as to pave the way so to speek. I know youve always been a good friend of his and perhaps you can act as a go between like. I will be waiting for your reply and hope you can help me. Thank you. Susan Ward.
‘Well I never,’ bre
athed Mrs Ross in Jenny’s ear. ‘That’s a cheek if ever there was. You’re more than friends with him nowadays from what you’ve told me.’
Jenny had told her about the incident in the park several weeks earlier, full of hope that in voicing it she could make love come true. What she hadn’t mentioned was Matthew’s reticence since then, just as she’d predicted but hadn’t wanted to believe. His true feelings remained a mystery, leaving her alternately filled with hope and despair: perhaps he was battling within himself as to whom he needed most, perhaps needing to come to terms with it; or again perhaps his inane pursuit of that worthless cat dominated him still and he hadn’t the heart to tell her she must forget what had happened. Maybe he’d been too taken up with the finalities of the approaching divorce to think of anything else as yet, but would once it was all over. Then again, maybe he still had hopes of the divorce never taking place and hadn’t the courage to tell her that either. Time and time again a flood of anger would pour through her at the unfairness of being strung along. He was not man enough to tell her the truth and still her churning soul one way or the other.
This time she held it in, so as not to give him even more reason to fend her off. Outwardly they behaved as they had always done, still talked about all sorts of things – everything but the one thing that mattered to her. Her pent-up emotions were doing odd things to her. One minute she saw him as weak, the next she swept the thought aside in a fit of remorse, for whatever he was, she loved him. And he wasn’t weak. He wasn’t. He was merely terribly confused. Once this divorce was over he’d have to forget Susan.
But now she must hand him Susan’s letter, stand by and watch his reaction; felt she knew already what it would be.
These closing hot days of summer they had continued to frequent the park together. He seldom wanted to go anywhere else, but now as they sat on a bench or on the lawn watching other late-summer sun-worshippers, picnicking families, children, people walking dogs, they didn’t touch. They spoke of trivial things. Matthew never spoke of his wife now or the imminent divorce. It was as though neither existed and she hadn’t dared bring up the subject lest she drive him further from her.
There seemed to be a dull, flat ache in her soul as she folded Susan’s letter and put it back into its envelope.
‘I’d better hand it to him straight away,’ she said defeatedly. It went without saying what his reaction would be. A ray of hope. Jenny would be forgotten in an instant as he embraced the marvellous knowledge that Susan at the eleventh hour wanted him to take her back. He would forgive her all she had done to him and Jenny Ross would be put aside, told of his wonderful good news, thanked for all she’d done for him, and forgotten.
‘He’ll be pleased,’ she said simply as she slid the envelope into the pocket of her nurse’s dress to hand to him on her way to work. Then she would hurry off before seeing his reaction and get on with her day, get on with her own life, as she had vowed so many times before. But this time it held all the characteristics of finality.
Chapter 29
It was Saturday night, nearly ten o’clock. Little Trevor, in his cot since eight, had waited for his father well past his bedtime, and Geoffrey’s key was only now just turning in the street door lock.
She stood waiting for him, the whole of her slight, small body quivering with fury.
‘What bloody time do you call this?’ she attacked him as he came into the cluttered living room, still innocently pocketing his keys in the jacket he’d already taken off to drop over a nearby chair.
He looked at her astonished, his jovial, ‘Hello, love,’ frozen on his lips. ‘You know I always see the boys on a Saturday.’
‘Not until this bloody hour of the evening. And you already see them twice during the week too. You never used to. So what’s so special about them now? You used to come home before eight so you could see your own son before he goes to bed.’
He glared at her now, his jacket hanging by its collar from one finger. ‘They’re my sons too, don’t forget. I owe them some of my time.’
‘Not every bloody day of the week.’
‘It’s not every bloody day of the week.’ Angered now, he flung the coat at the chair, which it missed. It slid to the floor to lie in a crumpled heap. ‘It’s twice a week and once on a Saturday.’
‘That makes three times,’ Susan stormed, standing her ground on the rug before the empty firegrate. She had no intention of moving from the spot to welcome him or go off to get him cups of tea as once she always did whenever he came in the door. This time she was going to have it out with him, one way or the other.
‘I’m not putting up with this, Geoffrey. Not for much longer. Why do you have to keep going to see them three times a week? It was four times last week.’
‘Four?’ he blazed at her.
‘Yes, four. What about Monday? You went there on Monday as well.’
‘For an hour, that was all. You’re begrudging me one hour with my own boys, now?’
‘It’s one hour too many, Geoffrey. What about me waiting all hours God sends for you to come home and give me a bit of your time? I mean, I’m important to you too, aren’t I? You used to think so. You used to be a lot different to what you are now. I need to have you here.’
‘You’ve got me, haven’t you? Nearly all the time.’ He went and threw himself down in one of the pair of sagging fireside chairs. It creaked under the sudden violent weight. ‘Don’t start an argument, Sue,’ he sighed. ‘I’m tired.’
‘And I’m tired,’ she railed on at him. ‘Tired of being a doormat for you. For you to come home any old time you please. And I suppose you expect to make love to me, as always, as if nothing’s happened.’
‘You like it.’
‘That’s got nothing to do with it. You come home from her and your blessed sons, and clamber on top of me and make love as if you’ve not had it for weeks. How do I know you haven’t been making love to her as well?’
He sat bolt-upright. ‘That’s not fair, darling. You know I don’t have nothing to do with Emma and she don’t have nothing to do with me. It’s just for me to see the boys, that’s all.’
‘What proof have I got of that?’ she continued to blaze. ‘And don’t darling me straight after you’ve seen her. What’s going on between you two?’
Geoffrey shot out of the chair and stalked about the room, flinging irritated, disbelieving glances at her. ‘This is getting bloody silly. I thought our row in the week was bad enough, and over the same bloody thing. But you’re going right over the top again. Nothing’s going on between Emma and me. Can’t you get that straight? She’s just the mother of my sons and they live with her. Of course I have to see her when I go there, but she don’t have nothing to do with me.’
‘But you wish she did.’
‘Of course not, darling. I love you. I left her for you and that’s not changed.’ His voice had grown softer, more persuasive. ‘It’s you I love, Sue, and no one else.’
‘Huh!’ She moved at last to the window to straighten the already moderately straight gold-patterned curtains. ‘Love me? You don’t care anything about me, only to get your oats, that’s all you care about me. It’s all I’m good for.’
‘Don’t be silly. And don’t be selfish.’
‘Selfish!’ The curtains received a tug, almost dislodging the pelmet they hung from. ‘Me? Selfish? I should think you’re the one who’s selfish, leaving me alone half the week.’
‘You are bloody selfish, Sue, sometimes.’
‘I’m not. I’m not selfish.’
This was how it was lately, arguments going round and round, silly and pointless, ending up unsolved unless she gave in, threw herself at him and burst into tears. Before, he would kiss her better, take her to bed to assuage his need with her. She adored being made love to in that way, the rougher the better, with her the object of his lust, the helpless recipient. But these last couple of weeks, he hadn’t made love to her after any row; he had merely extricated himself from her pleas for
him to forgive her and had gone sullenly to bed; he would be asleep or apparently so by the time she came to him. Any attempts to wake him up had been met with a deep snore and a mumble of protest. Many a night she had lain awake beside him, her eyes wet with what she hated to admit were self-induced tears. Her sniffling and snuffling sounded loud enough to have disturbed the devil, but not Geoffrey, even though to her mind he must have heard but ignored the noise. The next morning he would leave for work after breakfast, through which he said little but read the morning paper that fell through the letter box at six thirty. His departing peck on the cheek seemed a condemnation of her attitude of late and left her to weep silently the rest of the morning as she got his son from his cot to feed him.
Slowly she was coming to feel that their relationship was beginning to fall apart, that he was tiring of her. But why now? In less than a couple of weeks her marriage would come to an end. She couldn’t let Geoffrey lose interest in her now, not after all that had happened. She was being silly of course. He hadn’t lost interest in her. His lovemaking said as much, or had done until lately. It was her fault. She was being selfish. He did need to see his sons by his wife. Soon she would be his new wife when his own divorce came through. This wouldn’t be for several months yet; Emma had only filed for it a little while ago.
Tomorrow she would have him all to herself, all day. She would make up for her foolish, groundless tantrum by being all sweetness and light, and on Monday would run to get him his evening tea, for that evening he’d be home at the proper time. Last Monday had been the exception, because of his middle son Percy’s birthday.
Sunday passed blissfully. They made love in the afternoon, with Trevor safely asleep in his cot. She bit back the cries of ecstasy Geoffrey forced from her in case she awoke the child and put an end to the unbelievable climax to which her lover was capable of bringing her. And they made love again that night with her happy cries ringing out abandoned enough to wake the neighbours.