How to Fall in Love Again: Kitty's Story

by Amanda Prowse

  ‘If they don’t turn up, I’ll get the modelling clay out,’ Kitty offered.

  ‘Now that’s not a bad idea! I think we might still have some of your old Play-Doh around somewhere.’

  They both folded with laughter.

  ‘I’ve been digging a lot of your baby stuff out for the bairn.’ Marjorie was a little misty eyed.

  ‘That means the world to me.’ Kitty calmed and caught her breath. ‘How’s Mum doing?’

  Marjorie averted her gaze. ‘Oh, you know, hen… good days and bad.’

  ‘And how is she today?’

  ‘Not good.’

  ‘And yesterday?’ she whispered.

  ‘Not good.’

  ‘How about the day before that?’

  Marjorie shook her head and reached for her hand, which she took into both of her own. ‘Don’t let anything spoil your sunshine.’

  ‘I’ll try, Marjorie. And thank you for our beautiful cake. I do love you.’

  ‘Och, away with you. I need to crack on!’ she mumbled as she reached for the hanky in her pocket and dabbed at her eyes.

  With all those staying overnight ensconced in the library, where whisky flowed and the noise levels rose in direct proportion to the amount consumed, Kitty decided to sneak out. She rummaged in her old chest of drawers until her hands fell upon a rather raggedy swimming costume with enough slack in the old elastic to accommodate the swell of her bump and her growing boobs.

  Having grabbed a towel, she slipped her feet into a spare pair of wellingtons from the boot room, fastened her dressing gown and made her way to her beloved pool.

  It was a beautiful evening, with the unseasonably warm wind making the leaves dance overhead. The pool lights were on and as Kitty placed her towel and dressing gown on top of her wellington boots by the side of the water, she felt very much at peace. Forgoing her dive, she slipped into the water and felt the familiar shudder of pleasure ripple along her skin. With a sudden appetite to cover ground, she began her lengths, concentrating on finding her breathing rhythm, exhaling with her face in the water and taking a full, deep, sharp inhalation each time her face lifted under the arc of her left arm. She ploughed through the water, length after length, her thoughts clearing and her whole body feeling properly alive. With her breath coming fast and having done thirty-odd lengths, she lay back in the water and let it lap over her ears. All she could hear were the murmurs from her watery world and the loud beating of her heart.

  She stretched on the surface, wiggling her toes even though she couldn’t see them. At that angle, and looking straight ahead, her bump obscured just about everything. She loved it. She placed her hand on the safe pouch where her baby nestled. If it was a girl, they would call her Sophie; if it was a boy, Oliver. They had decided on Montgomery Thompson. She was still unsure if this was a brave or stupid decision, but if, as agreed, they were going to be open with the child, then this name would acknowledge its heritage and should help it feel like it belonged, strengthening its identity. Angus hadn’t flinched at the idea. He was still calm and appeasing, and in response, Kitty was quiet and grateful.

  They had stopped having sex a while ago. Angus had said he was worried about hurting her or hurting the baby and even though she had tried to reassure him that if they were gentle it would be fine, he was adamant. Kitty ran her hand over her body and wondered if the real reason was, as she suspected, that her swelling form repulsed him in some way – whether because she was pregnant or because of how it had happened, she wasn’t sure. Either way, she didn’t feel very good about herself, even though she understood. When she raised it with him in the most delicate way possible, he assured her it would be business as usual once the baby arrived. She truly hoped so.

  She felt lonely, missing the way sex bound the two of them, reminded them that they were facing the world together. This lack of physical contact made their home feel cold. She tried not to think about that afternoon with Theo, which physically had been so much more. Her body tingled at the memory of his touch, the unhurried ease with which she had been lost to him. It played in her head like a symphony and in her more fanciful moments she was quite unsurprised that something so perfect had produced this little miracle.

  Kitty righted herself in the water and shook her head, wiping her face. This was not good enough! She should not be thinking about Theo on the night before her wedding – not on any night! It was unfair on Angus; kind, forgiving Angus, who was working hard, recently promoted and doing his best to build a wonderful life for the three of them. Life with Angus would be steady and calm, and this she knew was where happiness lay.

  It was as she dried her skin and stepped into the wellingtons that she became aware of someone coming through the hedge.

  ‘Mum!’ She ran forward in the cumbersome footwear and into her mum’s arms.

  ‘My darling girl. Oh you look wonderful!’ Her mum breathed into her damp hair, kissing her scalp. ‘Big day for you tomorrow, for us all.’

  Kitty pulled back to look at her pale face with its dark half-moons of worry sitting beneath sunken eyes. ‘Mum, if it’s too much for you…’

  ‘I’m fine. And no matter what, I’ll be there, darling, because I am here.’ She touched her fingers to her daughter’s chest. ‘And it will be the same for you with your child. Whether I am standing by your side or miles away, I am always here.’

  ‘Yes.’ Kitty could do nothing to stop her tears. ‘You are, Mum. Always.’

  Her mum slipped back through the laurel hedge like a spectre, almost as if she had never even been there.

  Kitty knew she should be getting an early night, but with all the guests now either asleep or in the kitchen tucking into Marjorie’s pork pie and chutney, she decided to sit in the library for a bit, with Champ sprawled across her lap and the fire crackling. Not that it was cold, but she wanted the comfort and distraction of the flames. She stroked Champ’s silky ears and thought about her mum, reassured now, after their brief chat by the pool.

  She yawned and was finally thinking of calling it a night. Isla was coming early in the morning to help with her hair and make-up, and she knew the boys’ drinking around the kitchen table might go on until the early hours. Champ nestled appreciatively against her bump. Suddenly the door swung open and Angus came into the room.

  She sat up straight, causing Champ to leap up. It was a shock to see that Angus had been crying. His nose was running and his eyes were puffy and red. He was a man of cool emotions and she’d never seen him like that before. Her heart raced, and she could only assume that this level of distress was because he’d decided to call off the wedding. Ridiculously, her first thought was, Oh no, Marjorie’s cake! What a waste!

  He sank down onto the rug and placed his head on her lap. Kitty ran her fingers through his hair. ‘What’s up, darling? What on earth is wrong?’ she asked with a warble to her voice, waiting.

  ‘I do love you, Kitty, and I want to marry you. I want you to make me the man I need to be.’

  She felt a flood of relief and kissed his head, guessing that the reality of marriage and fatherhood was hitting home on this night before the big day.

  ‘Oh, Angus! You are going to be a fine husband and a wonderful father! You are! We will do it together.’

  He nodded and gripped her arms, and they sat like that for a while with the fire leaping and the logs hissing. And Kitty saw the image of Theo fade. This level of concern, this dedication to their future no matter how rocky the start, this was what marriage was all about.

  Moving Home

  Kitty pulled the cardboard box from the cupboard under the stairs and knelt on the floor to open it, ignoring the slight creak to her knees. She smiled at the rather dusty collection of Sylvanian Families characters – mice in pinnies, rabbits in dungarees and dogs in frocks. She lifted them out and was instantly taken right back to when Sophie was three.

  ‘Mummy! Mum! I need you here now!’

  Sophie did that: she called out, hollering fit to burst, until Ki
tty went running to see what the emergency was. It was usually a matter of life-altering importance for her three-year-old, like she couldn’t find the bed for her Sylvanian Families rabbit or she had a lolly stick, formerly attached to an actual lolly, stuck in her hair, or she had switched on the television but The Raggy Dolls wasn’t on and she needed her mum to fix the scheduling.

  ‘What’s up, Sophie?’

  ‘I finished!’ She held up the small round melamine plate featuring Babar the Elephant in his green suit and tiny gold crown.

  ‘Oh, well done!’ Her daughter responded well to praise, even if it was only to acknowledge the fact that she had devoured a whole slice of cheese on toast cut into squares.

  ‘I want Daddy!’ Sophie had asked suddenly and just like that the moment had seemed right to Kitty.

  ‘He is on his way home, darling and you know, you are a very lucky little girl.’ Sophie had stared at her. ‘You are very lucky because most little girls only have one daddy, but you, you are so special that you get two!’

  ‘Two daddies?’ Sophie had asked with a little wrinkle of confusion on her button nose.

  ‘Yes!’ Kitty grabbed a daddy rabbit and a daddy squirrel and a baby hedgehog. She placed the unlikely trio on the table and pointed at them. ‘There are all kinds of families, Soph. And you have me, your mumma and you have Angus daddy and there is this other daddy,’ she touched her finger to the rather portly looking rabbit, ‘you have Theo daddy too and even though you haven’t met him and you might not for a very long time, he is your dad too!’

  ‘Is he going to put me to bed?’ Sophie took the daddy rabbit into her pudgy little palm.

  ‘No. Daddy will put you to bed, just like he always does.’

  ‘Will daddy Theo get me a present?’

  Kitty laughed, knowing it was typical of her child to be thinking along these lines. ‘I don’t think so and you might not meet him until you are much older, but I know him very well and I can tell you that he is,’ she paused, trying to control the catch to her voice, ‘he is really lovely.’

  Kitty cradled the small animals to her chest and enjoyed the wave of nostalgia that came over her. That day lived in her memory. She had dreaded having to tell Sophie and yet it happened easily, naturally and this was how it had always been. Not that she had time to sit and procrastinate any longer – the day was marching on and she had scarcely made a dent in her list. She popped the creatures back inside the box and moved it to one of the stacks by the front door. She went back to the cupboard and placed her hand on the wooden floor. Reaching for another box, she felt the dust and dirt with her fingertips and the sensation took her back to another day, when her heart had begun to splinter. Those fragments had lodged in her mind, so much so that with just this touch to the floor of the cupboard, it took all of her strength not to sob.

  8

  1996

  Kitty ran her hand over her daughter’s dark curly hair as they sat together in the square kitchen at the back of the Georgian terraced house where they now lived in Blackheath, southeast London. Angus’s promotion when Sophie was a toddler had meant they were able to take on the hefty mortgage. It had been a thrill, putting the key in the black front door of what she’d felt would be their forever house. The sitting and dining rooms had been knocked through by the previous owner, creating a vast open-plan living space with glorious floor-to-ceiling windows at each end. Light flooded first one half and then the other as the day progressed. Kitty loved to watch the sun dapple the wooden floor and rarely felt the need to look at the clock on the mantel, knowing exactly where she was in the day by the way the light fell. It was just one of the magic secrets of the storybook house.

  Two matching fireplaces sat along the outer wall and bookshelves nestled in the alcoves on either side. An old dining table and six heavy chairs with ball-and-claw feet, which her parents had consigned to their basement, had made their way down the motorway in the back of a cow trailer and now dominated the dining area, the burnished mahogany having been given a new lease of life. Kitty was more than happy to have part of her beloved Darraghfield around her every day. Angus had drawn the line at her suggestion of oil paintings and ornate mirrors, which she thought might have worked very well. He favoured lighter watercolour seascapes, which she had to admit looked elegant against the blue-grey painted panels. She had reluctantly rewrapped the antiques and left them in the basement with the other treasures.

  Keeping the house running smoothly and looking after Sophie and Angus were pretty much Kitty’s entire world. That and swimming. Three times a week she took herself off to the pool in nearby Greenwich, relishing the chance to float and dream. Things with Angus were stable and comfortable, but he worked hard, came home late and quite often seemed a bit remote. It was her adorable, effervescent daughter who brought the fun into her life, but now that Sophie had turned eight and was well established at junior school, Kitty had taken a part-time job in a local art gallery. It was good to have something else to think about.

  ‘Can I make a cake?’

  ‘Urgh.’ Kitty pulled a face; the mess her daughter created when cooking turned a simple cake-making exercise into an hour of post-cookery deep-cleaning.

  ‘Pleeeese, Mum! I want to make one for Dad!’

  ‘All right, Soph. I’ll get your apron, otherwise your uniform will be covered.’

  Kitty made her way to the large cupboard under the stairs, where alongside boxes of toys and books there were tennis racquets, walking sticks, wellington boots and trainers lined up on the floor. Coats, hats and scarves hung on the sturdy coat-rack on the wall and the Hoover lived next to the ironing board, long broom and dustpan and brush. Kitty lifted her daughter’s apron, dislodging Angus’s heavy coat as she did so. It fell to the ground. Various business cards, receipts and a handful of change clattered onto the polished wooden floor.

  ‘Shit!’ Kitty cursed.

  ‘I heard that!’ Sophie reprimanded from the kitchen.

  It was as Kitty straightened up and prepared to shove the bundle back into the coat pocket that her eye was drawn to a shiny red card that seemed to stand out from the others and a receipt. Pulsing in her palm, it invited her to look further.

  ‘The Anvil, 88 Tooley Street, London Bridge,’ she read under her breath. She raised the card to her face and studied the image of a moustachioed man in a peaked leather cap with a large cigar clamped between his teeth. She fingered the receipt, for two beers and two tequilas, and the date, a Tuesday evening, the week before last.

  ‘Come on, Mum!’ Sophie called out impatiently.

  Kitty painted on a smile and restored the items to her husband’s pocket, trying to ignore the dull feeling of mistrust in her gut. But she couldn’t forget it; her mind kept returning to the ostentatious card and the niggling sense that something wasn’t quite right. Finally she remembered: that Tuesday had been parents’ evening at Sophie’s school and Angus had been all set to come. But at the last minute he’d phoned from work, saying he had to go for a drink with an important client. She’d thought nothing of it – his job was demanding and being social was part of it. He was often out late. But a gay club…?

  Some three hours later, Angus arrived home and strolled into the kitchen.

  ‘Dad!’ Sophie yelled. She pointed at the plate which proudly displayed her rather flat creation, ‘I made you this! Carrot cake!’

  ‘Wow, Soph!’ He bent down and kissed her face. ‘That looks marvellous. Is it really for me?’

  Sophie smiled. ‘Yep, I wanted to do a practice, we are making one at school next week.’

  ‘Well, how wonderful, thank you, darling.’ He winked at his wife over Sophie’s head. Kitty felt her heart lift; he really was the very best dad.

  ‘Pasta?’ she lifted the saucepan and carried it to the sink to drain.

  ‘Ooh yes, lovely. And a glass of red if there’s one going.’ He took a seat next to Sophie who was already enjoying her supper. ‘So how was school?’

  ‘Bit shit.’
/>
  ‘Sophie!’

  ‘Oi!’

  Both she and Angus shouted in unison.

  ‘Mum said it earlier.’ Sophie loaded up her fork with pasta.

  Kitty poured the aromatic ragu, which had been simmering for hours, over the twists of pasta and ladled a healthy portion into a shallow bowl for her husband.

  ‘Well, Mum can say it if she wants, you on the other hand…’

  He smiled at his wife. ‘This looks lovely. Thank you, Kitty.’

  She smiled thinly, took a slug of wine and sat at the table.

  ‘Are you okay?’ he asked, studying her face.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she offered curtly, jerking her head towards their daughter, the code for ‘We’ll discuss this when she’s asleep’.

  Angus nodded and tucked into his supper. The atmosphere in the room changed, charged now with unspoken anticipation and a certain wariness on both their parts. It turned the delicious ragu into something quite flavourless and the pasta stuck like paste to the roof of Kitty’s mouth.

  With Sophie finally packed off to bed, Kitty stacked the dishwasher and turned off the light before making her way into the sitting room. Angus was watching the news, sitting on the sofa with his stockinged feet resting on the edge of the coffee table.

  ‘So what’s up?’ He wasted no time in getting to the point, as was his way.

  She sat in the chair by the fireplace and curled her feet under her as she took a deep breath. ‘I found something today and it’s kind of bothered me.’

  He made the little ‘T’ sound and gave a small laugh. The noise she had once found so endearing irritated her tonight. ‘Sounds ominous!’ He swallowed. ‘Come on, Kitty, talk to me!’

  ‘It was a business card in your coat pocket.’

  ‘What business card?’ He wrinkled his nose, his eyes never leaving her face, his expression open, the look of a man who had nothing to hide, and she felt the flare of embarrassment at any awkwardness that she might be about to cause.