by Debby Holt
We have since discovered that the gardener was a twisted individual who told me a pack of lies. Since you are sensible people, this won’t surprise you, and, in a way, that’s not important. What mattered was that I believed him. In the months after the balloon debate I decided I could no longer live with what I assumed was Freya’s infidelity. I arranged to go on a work trip to Spain on the weekend of our thirtieth wedding anniversary. The night I left, I told Freya I no longer wanted to live with her. I gave no explanation. I went off to Spain. Freya being Freya went off to London and found a new admirer almost at once. I came home to an empty house and knew I had ruined my life.
By this time you will all say I deserved everything I got. I agree. Why would Freya ever take me back? Well, I have to tell you this is my speech and my fantasy. So yes, Freya has forgiven me and this is why:
She knows I love her. She knows I will always love her. She knows I will devote the rest of my life to making her happy. She knows I will never forgive myself for my past behaviour. I am far too high-minded to resort to emotional blackmail so I have restrained from pointing out to her that our girls would like nothing better than for us to be together again. What I have told her – and since this is my fantasy, she instantly agreed – is that I firmly believe that our best years are yet to come. On our fortieth anniversary, I look forward to telling you all that we have a strong marriage based on honesty, respect, affection, tolerance on her part and boundless love on mine.’
Freya raised her eyes from the document and gazed at her screensaver: a photo of the family at the wedding of Felix’s nephew in Cardiff in March. There was Felix in his best suit surrounded by Freya and their daughters, all of them smiling at the camera, blissfully unaware of the dramas waiting to engulf them.
Felix arrived home at six on Sunday evening. He turned off the ignition and climbed slowly out of the car. His muscles ached. He stared at his home. All the lights were on and smoke was rising from the chimney which meant that Freya had lit the fire. This was his last evening with her and he was determined to be positive. He would talk about Tess. He would not dwell on his imminent exile. He would refrain for the time being from trying to persuade her to take him back.
He took his hold-all from the boot and let himself into the house. He could hear Freya in the kitchen and called, ‘I’m back! I’ll just take my case upstairs.’
When he got to his room, he stopped and then slowly put his bag down on the floor. His bed had been stripped. His clothes lay on neat piles on the mattress. He couldn’t believe it.
When he went downstairs, he took his bag back down with him. In the hall, he took out the present he’d bought and went through to the kitchen. Freya was at the sink. He could smell chicken cooking in the Aga, so presumably he’d be given dinner. It was easier to attend to Serge who gave him a rapturous welcome. At last, he looked at his wife.
‘Hello, there,’ he said. ‘I’ve bought something for you.’
She took it without speaking, opened the paper and pulled out the jersey.
‘It’s cashmere,’ he said. ‘Tess took me to her shop in Gasterlethen. We chose it together.’
‘It’s lovely,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’
He said, ‘I saw the bed. Do I take it I am leaving tonight?’
Freya pulled off her plastic gloves. ‘I have something to show you. Won’t you sit down?’
‘I’ve been sitting in the car all day. I’d rather stand.’
She went across to the dresser and held up the anniversary folder. ‘I found this.’
He put his hands in his pockets. ‘Ah.’
‘Did you mean me to see it?’
‘I hoped you might.’
‘Well, I did. And it made me angry. Even now, after everything that’s happened, you still couldn’t bring yourself to look me in the eye and explain it all to me. You had to write it down.’ She threw the folder on the table.
‘I wanted to…’
‘I know what you wanted to do. Why couldn’t you just tell me? If there’s to be any hope for us, you have to start talking. If you get depressed, you tell me. No more painful silences. No more long, lonely cycle rides into the darkness. I can’t take that now. I love you, Felix, but I will walk if you shut me out. I don’t deserve that. I’m better than that. It’s taken me a long time to see it but I do deserve better.’
‘Freya…’
‘How can I trust you if you don’t change? How do I know that in another fourteen years you won’t tell me you’re leaving because I slept with Neil Lockhart? We haven’t talked about him. I’ve been here for weeks and we still haven’t talked about him.’
‘I didn’t feel it was my place to bring him up. I quite understand why you went with him. I’ve lost any right to be jealous.’ He took his car keys from his pocket and put them on the table. ‘I did ask Tess about him.’
‘What did she say?’
‘He told me he was tall, dark and handsome. I think she was quite cross with me at the time.’
‘He was all those. He was also an idiot. I think I’ve told you that already.’
‘It’s great to hear it again though.’ Their eyes met for a second and then she looked away.
‘I’ll tell you about him sometime. Felix, we’ve spent fourteen years living a lie. Secrets in a family are… they’re like moths in cashmere. They dig themselves in and eat their way out. Our family has been torn to shreds because of secrecy. In future, if you have anything… anything at all on your mind… then you tell me. Do you understand?’
‘Yes.’ He nodded. He didn’t understand anything except for the extraordinary possibility that she might take him back.
‘And there’s something else. If we are to get back together, we will have an anniversary party and I want the speech. You’d have to edit it, in fact you’d have to rewrite nearly all of it, but I want the speech and I want champagne and I want some fun. But most of all, Felix, I refuse to go back to how we were. If you can’t accept that, I’ll give you supper and then I’ll drive you down to Percy’s.’ She unfolded her arms and went over to the fridge. ‘Although, actually, you’ll have to drive, because I need a large drink.’
He watched her take out a half-empty bottle of wine. He walked across to the cupboard and took out two glasses. ‘Fill them up,’ he said.
She stared at him. Then, very deliberately, she filled them to the brim.
Later, he would tell Freya – and he would tell her – that this had a profound effect on him, that – and he would struggle to describe it – he felt as if his heart shook off the last embers of doubt and jealousy and self-flagellation But, now, at the moment, all he could do was to smile and smile. He was where he should be. He felt as he should feel. He was home.
How far would you go to feel safe again?
An emotional and evocative story about the deepest bonds of friendship.