Past Present Future

by Alexander, N J.

  ‘I have told you over and over that there had been nothing from the FSA warning us about it.’

  ‘I know, and I’m really sorry. I’ll tell you something else; Northern Rock’s collapse was down to Mervyn King,’ I said, thinking I’d now tracked down the King in my own story. ‘King refused to put any money into the banks when they froze on my birthday in 2007. When the banks stopped lending to each other, because they realised they were all holding a big fat nothing on their balance sheets, King refused to bail them out. Trichet did it for the French. King thought it was the wrong way to go…so it was King’s decision which collapsed Northern Rock. If Northern Rock hadn’t gone down on that precise date, Ilex Drapes would not have been closed down on the 15th of February 2008. It may have still failed, but the dates would have changed.’

  Richard continued to put away the shopping, while I voiced my thoughts.

  ‘My quadratic equation wouldn’t have balanced. But it was the 9th of August 2007, which set the chain of events in motion. Well, no, actually, it goes back further than that; it started from William’s birth. But the real key was turning 37 and me remaining 37 as we passed through 08/08/08.’

  ‘So the book’s been useful to you then?’

  ‘God, yeah…thank you. You know what, I don’t feel guilty about the bank losing out on that overdraft, now that you’ve gone bankrupt.’ I took a punnet of blueberries out of the fridge and started to eat them. ‘The banks had us all building our lives on a false economy. All of the new builds, home renovations and conservatories being added – none of the money for them really existed. We were looking at sandcastles. The banks lent money for it all, only to disintegrate our castles in front of us. Then they went and pulled the plug.

  ‘Hmmm…I don’t know what to feel about this…’

  ‘Just think about it – our bank encouraged two of its customers to merge their businesses and they allowed you to throw money in. Had they told the truth you would never have done that.’

  ‘Well it’s history now…and when this is all over, I’m going back in, fighting all the way,’ he said, as he closed the fridge door.

  ‘You sound like Steve, wanting to get out and rebuild his empire,’ I laughed. ‘Greed has put us all in a sort of jail-house, even Lorna and Bruce wouldn’t be in trouble had they not blown their all their money on unnecessary things.’

  ‘What you going to do now?’ Richard asked.

  ‘Write my book.’ I said.

  There was no way I could back out of writing it now. After Richard’s bankruptcy, I started to trawl through all of my research, and, as the nights drew in, I spent less time on Facebook. I was slowly facing the fact that Anthony was never going to email me in any form.

  The last message I left for Anthony, said that the book will always be there for him, if his fairy tale ever ended; I was starting to think I could only write the book with his non-cryptic permission. I was still writing but morally no longer knew what to do with it.

  I typed in his name at the top of my screen.

  But he wasn’t there.

  My heart jumped to my throat and my head felt hazy.

  He had defriended me, deleted me.

  I wanted to climb into my PC and stand in an empty, black space, where he once was – and shout for him to come back; beg him not to leave me.

  If only it was like a game on William’s DS, where there was a button I could press to view from another angle, just so I could read his face.

  He must have felt something when he did it.

  I didn’t know whether this made him stronger or weaker than me.

  I repeatedly typed his name, hitting the refresh button, praying it was either my computer playing up or another one of his pranks, but he still wasn’t there.

  I managed to find his Facebook page, via his girlfriend’s. His photo was sitting amongst all of her friends. I clicked on his name and could see that all his other friends were still there. It was only me he had removed.

  I read his quote: Make the most of what we have. It felt like his parting words. I printed off the page and tears pricked my eyes.

  ‘Mummy look,’ I heard Elyse say.

  ‘Yes, Elyse, in a minute,’ I didn’t even look at her.

  ‘Mummy, look,’ and I felt her small body by my side. ‘I got you Daddy’s torch,’ I felt the tears trickle down my face. ‘It’s so you can see in here,’ she added.

  I hadn’t found the time to replace the spent study light-bulbs, and had been managing with just the light from the PC.

  A few hours later, I removed the privacy settings on my page and typed in a message.

  Please add me back as your friend

  It was pitiful and pathetic and, within minutes of me typing it, he was gone.

  He had taken down his entire page. He had left Facebook.

  It was as though he’d been sitting waiting for my response before he did it. Why had he singled me out first? Why had he taken down his page now?

  That night I danced around my bedroom with William and Elyse. The music lifted my spirits and stopped me from crying and I knew that I would survive life without Anthony Hope. He’d gone but I was still living.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  I stepped out of the bath, being careful not to slip on the tiled floor; it was still wet from William and Elyse having bathed earlier on.

  I grabbed the towel off the rail and wrapped it round my body; I grabbed another and rubbed my hair as I walked into the bedroom to find Richard walking through the bedroom door.

  ‘I came to see where you were…’

  ‘Sorry…you looked like you were asleep on the sofa and I didn’t want to disturb you,’ I sighed. ‘I need to speak to you…about my book.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘I haven’t put you fully in the picture and things are eating away at me…I can’t write it unless I tell you the truth.’

  ‘The truth?’

  ‘There’s something I need to show you…’ and I pulled the Simon Dale novel from behind a messy row of DVDs in the wardrobe. Maddy had done what she had said she would do and bought the book for me, but it wasn’t until Anthony had deleted me that I let her give it to me.

  The cover was charcoal grey, and if you looked closely you could make out a wooded area with a small boy sitting at the edge of water. The name Hope dominated the cover; Anthony was in smaller text beneath.

  I saw Richard’s eyes flicker suspiciously.

  ‘Why have you hidden this book?’ He sounded genuinely confused.

  ‘This is at the root of what has been driving me mad…I’ve been playing around with Anthony Hope on my Facebook,’ I blurted out, knowing this was not going to be as forgivable as my crush on James. I couldn’t even look Richard in the eye.

  ‘Were you…were you having cyber-sex with him? An online sexual affair?’

  ‘God no – not online sex. Not even an affair. In fact, I don’t really understand what it was. Plus you know Anthony has a girlfriend,’ I said, finally brave enough to meet his eyes.

  ‘You don’t know what it was or what it is?’ His eyes were on fire.

  ‘He deleted me. It is all over now. It was just a silly game on Facebook,’ I said, choosing to sit on the bed, making Richard tower over me. I deserved to feel small.

  ‘What sort of game? I thought you said you didn’t fancy him?’

  ‘I lied. I’ve always been attracted to him. I can’t even explain why, not really…but something draws me to him.’

  ‘So, you’re saying you want to be with him?’

  ‘No! Yes…oh, it doesn’t matter now. It was nothing more than a game, it wasn’t sexual, we were playing with words. But I’ve told you it’s over now…he’s deleted me. Besides, I always knew I could never be with him. I’m just saying I have always been attracted to him…but realised eight or so years ago that he would be dangerous for me and there is nothing more alluring than what you can’t have.’

  ‘So…you can’t have him – so you m
ight as well have second best. Me! Is that it?’

  ‘No…I’m saying it doesn’t matter. None of it. It is all irrelevant. What I feel doesn’t even matter. Besides which, he was too young for me and would not have wanted to take on the chil—’

  ‘Oh my God! And what about your feelings for me? You’ve not once said that the reason you are with me and not with him is because you love me more!’ Richard looked wounded.

  ‘I’m giving you reasons of why I couldn’t be with him…he is just a fantasy.’

  ‘Great, so now I’m second place to a fantasy. Nicole…do you love me?’

  ‘Of course I love you and I’m sorry, I’m really sorry. I only added him to my Facebook so that I could see what had happened to him, he then started playing a game with me, and I got sucked into it, I couldn’t pull myself away…I tried, I even sent an email telling him I couldn’t ever be with him.’

  ‘You sent him a fucking email telling him that! What did it say?’

  ‘It doesn’t matter what it said, other than I said I could never be with him.’

  ‘So is this why he’s deleted you?’

  ‘No…I sent the email over a year ago and he kept on playing this game with me. I couldn’t stop myself from responding, because I could never really work him out; work out his motivation, and all this weird number stuff was linked to him.’

  ‘So what did he say to your email?’

  ‘He basically denied playing a game with me, but carried the game on regardless.’

  ‘So why has he chosen to delete you now?’

  ‘I don’t know? It could be because of my book. It could be that he simply decided he really did love his girlfriend and was finally committing to her. I can’t work it out. But he deleted me just hours before taking down his entire Facebook page.’

  ‘Or his girlfriend found out what he was doing on Facebook more like it, and made him do it. He could have been playing games with loads of women on there, for all you know, and she’s got wind of it.’

  ‘I don’t think so, not unless Anthony confessed to her. She couldn’t see what I put on my Facebook.’

  ‘Don’t call him Anthony.’ I could still see flashes of anger in Richard’s eyes. ‘Use his full name.’

  ‘Look, if it makes you feel any better, Maddy reckons he wasn’t even playing a game with me, but there were too many coincidences, right down to the day he deleted me,’ and I tried to explain the bizarre game.

  ‘So that old book, in your hand…what’s that got to do with the real Anthony Hope?’ he said as he turned off the main lights, leaving the soft glow of the bedside lamp.

  ‘I found this book after I was tapped on the shoulder on Halloween night…it’s connected to the numbers. This books starts with the three divine numbers of seven, whereas my book has the three eights…’ I began and I explained the story to him. I reminded him about Nell Gwyn being an actress and courtesan but he got cross when I likened myself to a courtesan.

  ‘I haven’t read the whole book yet…but I know that Nell dies in it and that Anthony Hope’s main character marries another woman. Since it’s been in the house I’ve been terrified you will find it.’

  ‘So, if you are saying that being with Anthony Hope is just a fantasy…are you saying you fantasised about him?’

  ‘I can’t believe we are even discussing this.’

  ‘So…what did he do to you in your fantasy?’

  ‘You’re asking me ridiculous questions…you might as well ask me if he was better in bed than you…in my fantasy,’ I added sarcastically.

  ‘He’d probably be crap in bed anyway – I don’t even get what you see in him. He loves himself; and he’s just a rubbish singer. What would you even want with a singer?’

  ‘Look I told you…I can’t explain what it is that draws me to him; I don’t even care what he does for a living. I feel another side to him, a much deeper, more complicated side and that draws me in.’

  ‘Perhaps you should just fuck off with the wanker, it would be interesting to see how long he’d put up with you. A week, if you’re lucky, but then you probably deserve each other.’

  His words made me flinch. Then I felt a wave of anger.

  ‘That’s good coming from a man who cheated on and then dumped his wife for a younger model…and I’m not sticking up for him.’ I needed to calm down, this wasn’t helping my case. ‘I’m trying to explain it all to you…but it’s this book, this book feels like part of it. Don’t you understand that I’m not fated to be with him, I never was…and he’s not a threat to you.’

  ‘Is this my fault…have I made you feel unloved? Is he why you won’t marry me?’ he said, calming back down again.

  ‘No. But…when you first left your wife you kept going back to her and you killed a tiny part of me each time you did it.’

  ‘And I still came back to you…you know, it was the guilt…the minute I went back to her the guilt disappeared and I wanted to be back with you.’

  ‘Yes, but each time you did it, I became emotionally harder. I built a wall around me and threw myself further into my studies. And it was only a year or so after that, that Anthony came on the scene, and then within the next year I fell pregnant…All I’m trying to say, is back then it was never about me. It was all about you and your wife, and whether you and she were coping with the trauma of a break-up.’

  Richard shook his head.

  ‘I forgot about me. I didn’t matter and I didn’t deserve to matter because I was the other woman, and since running a company and looking after William and Elyse, I’ve never had the time to really think about me.’

  ‘It’s you I chose to be with. And if he really wanted you, he would have come after you.’

  ‘Why would he have? Look at it from his perspective. I was with a rich, older guy driving round in a fifty thousand pound sports car. He’d arrived here virtually penniless. To him I probably looked like a gold digger. How was he supposed to know the car was partially financed and that I never tried to drag you up the aisle? When a woman is with an older man, people almost always assume it’s about nothing but money…I fitted into a perfect stereotype.’

  ‘Makes no difference, he still would have come after you. Anyway, he smokes and you hate smoking…cigarette smoke makes you ill.’ He paused. Then a flicker of recognition. ‘Ah…I’m getting it now. It’s your ego – he has bruised your ego, so to hell with the fact that he smokes. He doesn’t want you now. He has turned away from you and the game.’

  Richard was right. Anthony had been destroying me, and now the last, tiny piece of my self-esteem was getting kicked away by Richard.

  ‘I love you, I always have – no one will ever love you like I do; he would never love you like I do. Well, I suppose that fantasies are harmless. And…if you really want to write your book…then write it.’

  I felt like even Richard was playing clever mind games with me now – he’d taken it so well. Perhaps it was the wisdom of age. I knew for a fact that I would have been sitting by the roadside by now had it been an ex-boyfriend that I had confessed to.

  ‘Just thought you should know this fact – I now hate Anthony Hope,’ I said, sullenly. ‘Because of what he’s turned me into – a selfish, deceitful liar with zero confidence; I also hate him for not being open and honest with me.’

  ‘I wouldn’t say you have zero confidence, but selfish and deceitful is probably accurate from where I’m standing right now. I’m seeing a side of you that I never knew existed. Look…write your book.’

  ‘Sometimes I don’t even know why you love me…you would have been far better off staying with your wife – she’s caused you far less trouble than I have.’

  ‘Well…I do love you, but you have hurt me very much. I don’t really know how I’m supposed to compete with a fantasy man.’

  As Richard started to undress he asked me if this was why I had felt trapped and, after thinking about how to answer his question without hurting him anymore, I replied: ‘It’s partly because sometim
es I’ve felt as though I would be better off being on my own for a while – you know, to sort out my head and get things back in perspective. If I was on my own, Anthony still wouldn’t be a possibility. I needed a reality check.’

  Richard moved into the bathroom and started to brush his teeth. Sitting on the side of the bath I continued to explain.

  ‘And…William and Elyse would have hated me for taking them away from you and dragging them into squalor. No one can live up to a fantasy, but no one can live up to you either. So, instead I’ve had to work things through differently.’

  Richard spat into the sink and spun round. He had toothpaste all over his chin.

  ‘William and Elyse? You are assuming I’d let you take them.’ Richard’s words left me speechless for a few seconds.

  ‘You’d fight me for our children? I can’t believe you would do that to me. But I really would understand if you didn’t want to be with me anymore, because of the way I’ve behaved.’

  He wiped his mouth and then spoke, ‘Of course I want to be with you, I don’t want you to go anywhere…but you must talk to me more, can’t you see that?’

  ‘I keep telling you that I’m trying to…but everything I have to talk about it so wrong and hurtful, so it has been far easier to say nothing and bottle it all up. I suppose, in one way, my book will be the best explanation you’ll ever get!’

  8 th December 2009

  15:00 and I sat at the kitchen table with my study books. The constant shifting between writing and studying was making my brain feel like it was being hit with a sledgehammer. But this was my last exam and I wanted to get it out of the way, so I could focus fully on writing.

  The change from the garden room to the kitchen was helping slightly. I heard Richard’s car pull into the drive and a few moments later, he walked through the door with his mobile in his hand and his reading glasses on.

  ‘Have you seen this text?’

  ‘What text? I can’t see it from over here,’ I said, reaching over to hold his phone.