The Pretence

by Linus Peters

  The only thing that caused me any disquiet, to again start worrying about her and who she really was, and it’s such a small thing you’ll wonder why, happened the very first morning after she moved in. I awoke just as dawn was breaking, opening my eyes to see her sleeping face only inches from mine. I didn’t shift a muscle, nor make the slightest sound. Just stayed where I was, looking across the pillow, to tell the truth, feeling like the luckiest bastard in the whole world. I even lifted the duvet a few inches and peered down the length of her naked body. God Almighty, what had I ever done to deserve this?

  I don’t know how long I stayed there, studying every square centimetre, the tiniest feature, of that perfect face. Yet quite suddenly her eyes blinked open, she stared at me, and I saw ... nothing. Not just nothing, not just a total lack of recognition of who I was, but an awful emptiness, an azure void, and on the far side of it, pain.

  It didn’t last for long, maybe only a split-second, but it was there for sure. I was going to say something, yet she finally broke into a smile, leant across and kissed me, and for some reason I decided to let it go.

  That was it. That was all. And maybe you’re thinking it’s nothing to worry about, that she was just disorientated in new surroundings. But you didn’t see her expression. I swear to you, any number of tortured souls, of ghost ships and screaming hearts, could’ve gone missing in there and never been seen again.

  Eventually, of course, she had to go back to Amsterdam to close down her life there. Almost three weeks had elapsed, so she presumed she’d already lost her job, but she still had an apartment and other things to take care of. In her absence, I took the opportunity to meet Luca. I was feeling pretty guilty about the fact that I’d been avoiding him ever since she’d moved in. Not just in the way that love has a tendency of making us all selfish, but more, I suspect, in the knowledge that those that know us best, know better the risks we’re taking, and care more how much we might get hurt.

  I invited him for a game of squash. I didn’t want to make it anything too static, not a meal or a drink, more something that made conversation an option rather than a necessity. Naturally, he beat me. He always does. Any man who’s as successful with women as he is, is bound to be a little bit competitive, and it’s pretty obvious I’m not. I mean, I prefer to win, who doesn’t, but as long as the whole matter’s conducted with good grace, really, I’m not that bothered.

  I don’t think I imagined that little bit of extra needle on court, bearing the brunt of a few more digs, his dallying and endless repetition of the score. He was pissed off with me and I guess he had every reason. As a result, after we’d showered and changed and were making our way to our respective cars, I felt compelled to invite him back to my place for a drink.

  “To meet ‘Frances’?” he rather sneered.

  “No. She’s away. In Amsterdam.”

  “Oh. I see,” he said, making a face that confirmed, if I didn’t know already, that it was an issue. “Okay.”

  When we got to the flat, he entered as if it was the first time he’d been there: kind of sniffing the air, going from room to room, smirking at a coat of hers left hanging in the hallway.

  I poured us both long glasses of orange juice and slumped down at the kitchen table, not aware of the sigh I gave, only that suddenly I was grateful he was there, and that the subject I’d been so desperate to avoid was now crying out to be discussed.

  “Oh no!” Luca groaned.

  “What?”

  “Oh no!”’

  “What?”

  “I know that look.”

  “Don’t worry. I’m not going to talk about her.”

  “Yes, you are,” he sighed, flopping down opposite me, suddenly the very picture of long-suffering patience.

  “I’m not!”

  “Simon! ... Please!” he asked, very theatrically. “How are things with you and your new love?”

  “Fuck off, Luca.”

  “How is Frances Mark 2?”

  I gave a long sigh. I mean, really, I had no right to burden or bore him with this anymore. None whatsoever. But, of course, I did.

  “I told you, she’s incredible,” I replied. “Everything I’ve ever wanted in a woman.”

  “Really?” he asked, with slight doubt in his voice, as if surely then that made this conversation superfluous?

  “But ... “

  “Yes?”

  I paused for a moment, then sighed. “I don’t know.”

  Eventually I told him the whole story. How happy I was, how wonderful this new Frances was, how idyllic everything seemed - the background preamble, the paradise setting - but then went onto the things that wouldn’t stop tunnelling away below the surface. The extraordinary way it began, the scars on her arms, not being able to find any evidence of who she really was, that terrible haunted expression I’d seen on her face when she awoke.

  “Sorry. Am I missing something here?” he asked, as if the answer to all these questions was perfectly obvious. “Why don’t you just ask her?”

  “I can’t!”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s gone too far! We’ve built things. It wouldn’t be just a matter of her telling the truth and us carrying on as if nothing had happened. We’d have to tear everything down before we could rebuild again.”

  “But that’s better than this surely?”

  For a moment I couldn’t bring myself to reply. “What if it means I lose her?”

  Luca gave a long sigh, and, as if in response, I went to the fridge and switched us both from orange juice to beer.

  “So you’re just going to carry on? With her being Frances?”

  “For the moment, yes.”

  “Never knowing who she is, where she comes from, her background, nothing?”

  I just nodded, not having it in me to say it again.

  “It’ll have to come out one day.”

  “All I know at the moment, all I can be sure of, is that I love her.”

  “Which is what makes this conversation such a waste of time,” he said, sounding more sensible, or perhaps a little less patient, than I was used to.

  “If you met her, you’d understand,” I told him.

  “Simon, there are a lot of beautiful women out there. Intelligent, interesting, honest. Why do you need to involve yourself with someone like this? Who can apparently love only through the means of creating a fantasy world for herself? Who has such bad psychological problems she’s attempted suicide?”

  I shrugged, suddenly feeling like he might’ve found his way into somewhere where he could do a lot of damage.

  “It’s madness,” he persisted.

  He was right, of course. In his position, I would have said exactly the same thing. I issued a long hopeless sigh, and almost as if he could feel me beginning to give way, that I was weakening, he began to weigh in.

  “Do you really think a sane person could do what she’s doing? Coming over here pretending to be your ex-girlfriend?”

  “You don’t know her,” I said wearily.

  “I don’t have to know her to know that. I mean, I’m sure she has her moments of sanity - she’d have to, to convince you to go along with this - but really ... “

  I paused for a moment, feeling more troubled by this conversation that I cared to admit.

  “Do you have her phone number?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “She calls me.”

  “Okay, the next time she does, finish it. Now, while she’s out of the country, while you still have a chance ... Please, Simon. For your own sake, and maybe hers, too.”

  I guess that was it. My last opportunity to save myself. I mean, we all say that we have no choice, that we couldn’t help ourselves, but the truth is, we do. There’s a brief moment just before we make that call, before we take that glass to our lips, before we allow that thing, whatever it maybe, to get its hold on us, when we can still resist. But most of us don’t. We’d rather give in. We prefer to tell ourselves it makes us more human. As if fallib
ility is laudable, to go astray more loveable.

  I knew what Luca said was right, that I should finish it, but equally, I knew I couldn’t.

  ‘Frances’ called no more than twenty minutes after he’d left, after he’d secured my promise that I’d finish it, as if she sensed something was wrong, that a breach had opened up somewhere. Yet as soon as she started to react to my change in attitude, to sound hurt by my tone of voice, I immediately caved in, denying all my doubts to her and myself.

  She returned the very next day laden down with several big suitcases. And I have to admit, when I went down to help her, when I saw her standing there at the door, when she grabbed hold of me and kissed me and I felt her in my arms again, I almost phoned Luca and told him to mind his own business. I mean, what did he know about such things, for chrissake? His record with relationships was nothing to be admired. I was the luckiest man alive, and that was an end to it. And as for her past, who she was, did it really matter? If one day she decides to tell me, then fine. But if she doesn’t, if it’s never important enough, then what’s to stop us going on the way we are?

  We made love just about all night. The following day Charlie sent me home because he was sure I was coming down with something, and, of course, I went back to bed to catch up on my sleep, and she joined me. It took me three days to get back into the office. It was so intense, so intoxicating, it completely took us over. Several times we warned each other that it couldn’t carry on like this, that one day things would calm down and we’d be grateful for it, but I don’t think either of us meant it.

  Occasionally she did seem to try that little bit too hard. As if it was everything to her that we repeatedly proved that what we had was special. Real love, that other people wouldn’t understand, nor indeed, were capable of. She continued to worship me in a way that at times had me cringing with embarrassment. Holding me up as something other men could only aspire to. Honest, caring, unselfish. Do you want me to go on? It was very flattering, but I’d be the first to admit, not entirely consistent with reality. However, if I ever tried to dismiss it, to laugh it off, she would get so angry with me, in the end I just smiled and said nothing.

  She started to look for a job, though she was far from sure what she wanted to do, and didn’t seem that worried anyway. The interesting thing was that money was never a problem. She always had plenty, and frequently insisted on paying for more than her fair share. Rich family maybe? Certainly no-one I know has ever made that sort of money working for a small theatre company.

  There were still moments when we got it wrong. Pretending to be utterly familiar with someone who, in fact, you’re learning about all the time, isn’t exactly easy. Usually it was explained away as a change that had occurred over the last few years, but some of those changes were pretty radical. She joined a local gym, coming home all red and sweaty, glowing with exercise, taking showers that I frequently joined her in - pink angels and pale elephants. But it certainly wasn’t something the original Frances would’ve done. As far as she was concerned, dancing and screwing should be enough exercise for anyone.

  Yet what really illustrated to me how different the new Frances was, what proved I still had a lot of potentially disturbing discoveries to come to terms with, was the evening I finished having an after-work drink with Charlie earlier than expected, and decided to pick her up from the gym on my way home.

  I walked in rather tentatively. I mean, these places are alien to me. All that panting and grunting, people behaving like animals, the veneer of civilisation cracking away with the surface of their deodorant. There was a reception area and juice bar, then a room where the heavy swagger brigade were encouraging each other into lifting weights that, as far as I was concerned, might as well be welded to the floor, and, at the far end of the hall, a large open area that I would guess was normally used for aerobics. However, not at the moment. A boxing match was in progress, and by the amount of shouting and cheering that was going on, it was creating a good deal of excitement.

  I glanced all round, and seeing no sign of Frances, began to shuffle a little closer to what was going on, thinking she also might be sufficiently curious to watch for a while.

  I don’t know a great deal about boxing, the two contestants seemed to have an unnecessary amount of protective gear on, but I thought that was just the way it was. It took me a long time to work out there was something a little bit different, a touch awkward, about their movements, and that they were, in fact, women.

  I don’t know why - this is the 21st Century, for chrissake - but I have to admit, it slightly disturbed me. Women boxing, punching one another, trying to do each other damage, I just don’t feel comfortable about it. I know that’s very old-fashioned of me, that it stamps me out as yesterday’s man, but I can’t help my gut reaction. Especially when one of them got in a really heavy crunching shot to the other’s stomach, flooring her, leaving her gasping for air on the canvas.

  “Come on, Kerry!” screamed the woman next to me.

  “Get up, girl!” shouted a large man, who, the way he was dressed, how concerned he seemed, I guessed was her trainer.

  A lot of others joined in. Everyone seemed to be supporting Kerry, and I looked to her opponent, standing motionlessly in a neutral corner, wondering what she’d done to incur such unpopularity.

  Why I hadn’t realised before, I don’t know. I mean, she had protective headgear on, decidedly unfamiliar clothing, but now that she was standing still and I got a good look, I couldn’t believe I’d missed it. Frances stood there, that beautiful face of hers running with sweat, those blue eyes narrowed and solely focused on her opponent.

  I can’t tell you how astonished I was. I just stood gaping as Kerry, encouraged by the shouting of, what I guess was, the more established members of the gym, pulled herself to her feet and resumed the bout. Immediately Frances hit her again, hard to the side of the head, a really vicious blow that, if it hadn’t been for the protective headgear, would’ve done real damage; and suddenly that beautiful lithe body, that had always appeared so essentially feminine, seemed brutal, dangerous, and most of all, utterly alien.

  The odd thing was I really didn’t know how I felt about it. Disturbed? Embarrassed? Excited? My partner, the love of my life, was fighting with someone of her own sex, openly hitting her in front of all these people. A woman displaying aggression in a way I would never dream of; in a way I wouldn’t care for in anyone, male or female.

  There was another flurry of blows, nothing too harmful to either party, then Kerry somehow managed to land one right on the tip of Frances’s jaw. Her long legs buckled for a moment, the spectators screamed - Jesus, this was obviously some kind of grudge match - and immediately the stocky Kerry waded in.

  She hit Frances with everything she had, pummelling her defenceless body, more with a succession of blows than a knockout one. I felt sick. I wanted to shout out that that was enough, to stop it, yet instinctively knew this was a different world. One where I didn’t know how to act, where such behaviour might be a mistake, and all I could do was to stand and helplessly watch.

  There was another seemingly endless series of smacking blows from Kerry, over and over hitting Frances about the head, down to the stomach, then back to the face. And it went through my mind that that was what she really wanted, to spoil those looks somehow, that was what the grudge was all about. The cheering, the screaming for her to finish it, built to a crescendo, and for a moment it felt a bit like Frances and I were aligned against the world.

  She held on tiredly for a while, trying to wrap her long limbs round the awkward bulk of her opponent, causing a certain amount of irritation. And suddenly, where only moments ago I’d been disturbed by discovering her strength and aggression, now I found myself praying she had more.

  Kerry grunted angrily and managed to untangle herself, pushing Frances away, swinging several wild blows that missed their target. Yet slowly you could see a change coming. Frances collecting herself, regaining her composure, her oppon
ent punching herself out. She stood there for a moment, measuring the distance, then swung her right fist so hard, the sound it made as it connected with the side of Kerry’s face made several spectators gasp.

  “Jesus Christ!” I heard her trainer mutter.

  Kerry staggered backwards like a large animal that had been shot, that was too shocked to realise how badly hurt it was, and Frances chased after her, raining in blow after blow. Two more to the side of the head, one to the face, blood beginning to appear, either from Kerry’s nose or a cut on the cheek. The referee rushed over, decided he’d seen enough, but Frances wouldn’t stop until she actually had her opponent down, repeatedly clubbing her till she was finally laid out on the canvas.

  “All right! All right!” shouted the referee. “That’s enough!”

  He didn’t even bother to count her out. There was a stunned pause. I mean, I hate to admit it, but there’d been a kind of awful beauty about Frances’s performance that left you feeling breathless. Like seeing some big cat dragging down its prey. Several people got into the ring to help the dazed Kerry up, but she proudly waved them away. I don’t know who she was, but I’d hazard a guess she was at least the club champion.

  Eventually her trainer had the good grace to lead the applause for her conqueror. “Fair play,” he said, as if actually sickened by events. “Fair play.”

  For some reason I couldn’t bring myself to alert Frances to my presence. Instead I hung back in the shadows as she went, almost totally ignored by everyone, to the changing room. She looked so different, that wonderful body of hers running with sweat, soaking her vest and shorts. There was a kind of confidence, an athletic prowling sureness in her stride, I’d never seen before. I also swear she was quietly smiling to herself, that she’d really enjoyed what she’d just done.