Nesta wasn’t trying to make it obvious. She was trying to talk about him in a matter of fact way, at times even being mildly disparaging. But this was just a throw-you-off-the-scent tactic. There was that gleam every now and then which was probably unintentional, her ego gaining control just momentarily, wanting to be boastful. Roni felt quite proud herself, knowing her friend so well she could spot these tell-tale signs. What she didn’t feel was shock. There was something else, something unsettling, but it wasn’t alarm or disappointment or disgust. It might have been at least partially surprise, since Nesta was generally so on the level, so dedicated to her family. However, there was no sense of loss, no feeling that Nesta had let herself and everyone else down.
Perhaps this was because Roni realised the power of Hunter was bound to strike one of them. Perhaps because she could see the connection between him and her best friend, the way it had grown and animated her. Some of this joy Roni had even absorbed, by osmosis, and with it came the desire, the flood of private rude contemplations beyond anything dreamed of before. Also, there was the feeling of retribution gained. Husbands historically cheated on their wives with impunity. That seemed to be a fact wherever and whenever you were in this world. Perhaps for the sake of equality all women should feel this same lack of guilt, don those same moral blinkers. If the female equivalent of Hunter had turned up in their street, how many of the husbands would have made a beeline for her bed, given half the chance?
Not that she had any solid proof of wrongdoing, Roni had noted the way Nesta’s husband acted around Eva, and how Eva reacted back. It was just little things, little looks here and there. The husband crawled and flattered around Eva, which he wouldn’t have done if he thought there was nothing in it for him. Then there was the touching - maybe just the odd hesitant fingertips, but husbands don’t touch pretty single females unless there is some established familiarity, and simply being a neighbour did not constitute that. If Roni was forced to make wild declarations, she would suggest that Eva was not the lesbian she made out and that Mr Nesta already knew this.
It was not something Roni would ever share with anyone. That was one hell of an applecart to upset! It wasn’t just him either. She could see how all of them looked at her, the hunger. They would do it in an instant if they could. Maybe they had. Even her husband, usually so trustworthy, liked to sidle up and joke with her. He did it on instinct, forgetting he could be observed. Roni had seen the shoulder to shoulder nudges and other body language that indicated familiarity.
The boundaries just didn’t exist these days, but the freedoms most certainly did. Temptation was never far away and humans have such little resilience. The sexes mixed all the time without modern society having a massive intake of breath. There were texts and social network sites and emails; so many ways to interact and to be secretive. It was there on a plate and even those who you wouldn’t think capable of infidelity could be drawn in. She, of all people, had considered the ease and the thrill of it. That’s why she couldn’t be shocked that Nesta had succumbed to the sin. No, it definitely wasn’t shock she could feel in the pit of her stomach, nor disappointment. So what was it?
Then something overtook Roni. Normally she was the soul of discretion, the least likely to gossip. But she needed this out there, not for reasons of malice or self-righteousness but because she wanted to share in the excitement of it. That would doubtless be as close as she would get to experiencing it for herself. She almost got away with it, only giving in just as Nesta was about to leave. She stunned herself with what she blurted out almost as much as she stunned her friend.
‘So, are you going to tell me all about how you slept with Hunter?’
The colour momentarily drained from Nesta’s face only to be quickly brought back with a rush of blood that turned her cheeks crimson. ‘How did you know? Is it that obvious?’
Sadly, it was. Her friend just wouldn’t have it in her to brazen such things out. Only those with hard hearts could carry such things off. So the fuse was already lit and the bomb primed to go off. The only question was when.
‘I didn’t really know, until then. I don’t expect you to tell me anything. I know it’s private.’
Nesta looked too shell-shocked to discuss anything in detail. ‘I suppose you think me horrible now?’ she said. Suddenly that crystallised exactly what Roni felt about it all - an emotion so generally alien to her that she hadn’t been able to recognise it before. It was a measure of how much she had changed since their new neighbour moved in that she could think of sharing her thoughts.
‘No. All I feel is jealousy. The strange thing is I don’t know who I feel most jealous of: you, or him.’
Her best friend stared at her for many moments, chewing on her lip as she processed that last statement, her cheeks still flushed. ‘Well,’ she said, just before she turned away. ‘We can’t have you feeling jealous, can we?’
Roni watched her friend hurry back home. She closed the door, her heart pounding. It was probably just something to say, a light-hearted tease carrying more implications than were meant. Still, it was one of the most promising things Roni had ever heard, one of the most exciting too. It felt like the roof had come off her house, like the front had just opened up to reveal a land of opportunity. It would pass, for sure. The next time it would all have been forgotten and she certainly didn’t have the guts to prompt any reminders, but for now it was all she wanted to think about, however wrong it was.
The Crush
It was a week until Nesta saw him next. It wasn’t about either one avoiding the other. It was simply a case of everyday life and opportunity. It was fair to say that any emotional turmoil she might have predicted before stepping off the edge of fidelity and falling into the world of cheats was infinitesimally underestimated. Her heart no longer seemed to have a normal rhythm, paced now by elation, by stomach-scrunching moments of guilt, or by cold, sweeping rushes of panic. Nothing though, neither the remorse nor the fright of being found out, could stop the drive to want to see him again.
Before, there had at least been moments when her thoughts weren’t consumed by him and day to day life could continue. Now, everything was a mental kaleidoscope. Sometimes she could barely function at all - her, the person many others thought the epitome of sensible. Those same people would almost certainly never have described her as weak, or reckless, or selfish, yet here she was proving them wrong. Worst of all, the shame of this could not outweigh her pride. She pushed aside the dark thoughts with indulgent images of the two of them together on some long deserted beach, outside his delightful cottage on that exotically-named wild island - that place she had needed to look up on the internet to assure herself it really existed, since it sounded so fancifully romantic.
It could never happen, of course. No matter how wonderful the images or how intricate the scenarios developed around them, in reality it could never happen. She had a family for a start. The complexities and heartache of deconstructing this were too awful to begin to contemplate, nor did she want to. She wasn’t right for him either. The attraction was mutual, the sense of humour shared, but she didn’t have his vision on life, or his freedom of spirit. It made her heart sing that he had chosen her above the legion of others he could pick from, but she knew part of the reason was because she was safe - a wife and mother unable to make any commitments outside of a set domestic situation, however caught up she was in the excitement of a fling.
Maybe if she had been single they could have made it work. She liked to think so. She could have been the one to let him find his bearings within a relationship again, to help him learn to share lives. It would take time and time was something they didn’t have between them. Just eight months was all that had passed since his arrival. It wasn’t enough. No matter how hard you fall, the strength between you is only ever borne out by time.
You cannot just swan off to far flung places with someone you haven’t yet known for thr
ee full seasons, no matter that you are fully aware you only have one life to live and are convinced that they will be the best thing in it. You have to know them, to have a shared history, to even get to a point when some of the original excitement has worn off, to be replaced by predictability. She didn’t know Hunter at all, even now he had been inside her. She remembered all he had said about knowing people but it didn’t now feel solid enough. If he just ignored her next time he saw her, if he turned out to be a liar or the Manipulator Supreme, she couldn’t honestly say it wasn’t the last thing she expected. She only had gut feelings and hope, not assurances, that he liked her anywhere near as much as she liked him. She couldn’t claim to innately know his true feelings because she simply didn’t know him that well.
It’s not enough to simply recognise their scent, or know which smile and laugh they use at given times. These are the peripheral things, not the ones that bind you forever. They are heart-capturers - quickly learnt and soon adored but with no substance. Only time can breed trust, that most important of qualities when giving your heart away. Yet here she was behaving as the most untrustworthy of all. It was horrible knowing you were a cheat, but more withering still was the fact that it didn’t instantly cure her desire for more. She still wanted to see him.
She had vague notions of telling him it had to be a one-off, but this instantly changed to naughty images of him stripping her and securing her wrists. She couldn’t recognise the rationale that had let her slip so easily towards infidelity. She knew nothing could come of it yet still she had not done more to resist. Her shameful lack of moral fibre seemed somehow unfeminine, done with an impunity you would expect more from a man - not her husband because she was sure he wasn’t capable of such low acts, but the male of the species in general. That’s what burned her most: the thought that a woman should know better, should be able to fend off the temptation. She had committed an act merely frivolous and selfish, unpicking the close weave of all those years with her husband and partner in an instant, done something no words could justify.
She met him at his. He hadn’t snuck out which meant at least he wasn’t trying to evade this next opportunity. He hadn’t come to hers but then he would know a wife would never cheat in her own home, most particularly in her own bed, unless she truly hated her husband. He gave her a warm smile but there was something other than humour or gladness in his eyes - caution, perhaps - and the door wasn’t immediately flung open to give her quick, sneaky entry. He showed her into the lounge. In normal circumstances this is what most polite humans would do: take you to the most comfortable room in the house. Here it seemed like a coldness, a deliberate distancing from the rooms were the action could take place, the one least secret. The butterflies increased. They had been fluttering because of what he might do but now they went mad at the thought of what he was planning not to do.
She tried to guess what his excuse would be, so that she could form a counter-argument. She couldn’t. She didn’t know what went on in his head in all those hours he wasn’t with her. They existed almost exclusively apart. Despite their brief closeness they were essentially remote from one another. His life went on when she was not around. She didn’t have to mean anything to him when she was not at his side. It didn’t matter about all the thoughts, the endless hours he had been with her in mind at least. These could not be telepathically transmitted. They did not mean togetherness. What went on in her head was a replaying of events morphing into embellished scenarios of shared times. It was more fiction than fact; dreams rather than reality. It was an imagined picture of good times and exciting secrets and harmless fun.
‘I have to leave,’ he said, before she could get cosy beside him. ‘I have put my house on the market today, to either sell or rent, whichever proves easiest. Either way, in one month I will be gone.’
‘Oh,’ she replied, trying to sound normal, although it felt like her chest was being crushed. ‘I was that bad, was I?’
He gave a little laugh but looked down at his hands. ‘Eva saw you coming out of my house last week. She assumes we were up to no good.’
The lurch inside was instant, followed by the cold sweep from the top of her head down. It was different from the shock of his announcement. It was the sickening, bowel-loosening alarm of being found out. Eva of all people! That reckless, vindictive witch!
‘So I’m not allowed to visit my neighbours now?’ She sounded too self-righteous, considering they both knew the truth.
‘She has a big mouth. Careless words cost lives.’
‘And you think I’d just have to admit to it? There could be any number of reasons I came and saw you.’ She was sounding edgy and indignant, although in her head she already knew it was over. If even the hint was given all eyes would be upon them. The scrutiny would make them have to do the opposite, to avoid each other, just to give the reverse impression. It seemed massively unfair. They hadn’t actually been caught in the act but just that one sighting, that one suspicion raised in the one person who would just love to blow it into something massive and damaging, and it was over.
‘You shouldn’t tell lies,’ he said. ‘They always get found out and that just doubles the sin. Anyway, it’s more complicated than that. Eva rather joyously confessed to me that she has slept with all the husbands in this street, on numerous occasions, barring one. She plans to use all her womanly charms to rectify that one oversight. I would suggest that remaining husband is far from safe with her.’
This revelation was not as shocking as it would have been had Nesta not seen Eva coming bare-bottomed from Number Five that night. That she wasn’t a lesbian was already proved, and if she could seduce that one husband then she could seduce any of them. The only mystery was, having had undoubtedly the best-looking, probably the nicest husband in the street, why had she felt the need to bag the others? Still, Eva really was a heartless, destructive bitch, so she probably just did it to cause the maximum trouble. Then the guilt hit in spades. The instant assumption had been that her husband was the one referred to. It never even crossed her mind otherwise. She just knew he would never do such things, and yet she had done this to him.
‘What makes you think the husband will give into her? Not every man is a cheat,’ she said. Then the realisation dawned, the secret Eva could use to stir up trouble, to make it seem like an act of revenge rather than betrayal. ‘I see. You think she will use her presumption, reveal her little secret about us as a bargaining tool, if flashing her tits doesn’t work.’
‘I don’t think there is anything she wouldn’t do to get her way, regardless of the cost to others.’
‘And even if she doesn’t get her way she will ensure she spreads her rumours. So what does she gain from doing this? What does she want from us?’
‘Nothing, she just wants the joy of causing trouble. She plans to do it for sheer spite, although she did hint that she might reconsider if she had other people to aim for, namely me. I think she is more than a bit annoyed that I haven’t fallen for her.’
It was nice to hear from the horse’s mouth that Eva hadn’t got her teeth into him. It filled Nesta briefly with a sense of triumph, although there was still one glaring hole in his plan. ‘So how does your leaving solve things? It gets you out of her clutches but it doesn’t leave the remaining husband safe. It doesn’t stop her spreading her gossip.’
‘That’s why I am going to take her with me. I’ve got another house and enough money to get by so it’s easy for me. I’ve told her that in one month I am leaving and if she wants to be with me then she has to leave too. It gives her just enough time to hand in her notice at work - which apparently she was going to do anyway - and to make arrangements with her house and the contents. It is the only way to keep everyone safe. There will still be lots of secrets left in this street, but the one most likely to spill them will have gone. You can all go back to normal again.’
‘But it means you will be with he
r!’ Nesta gave him a little punch in mock anger, but inside she really did feel the jolt of the thought of him with anyone other than herself.
‘Don’t worry. She will drop me once she realises I’m just a boring old artist who likes peace and quiet and keeping himself to himself. I told her she could be with me. I didn’t say anything about sleeping with me. The main thing is, once she is gone she can’t come back.’
Nesta smiled but it was the unsaid parts of his plan that caused her heart to sink. He would have to play along with Eva at least for a little, just to make sure. He would take her to that cottage on the desert island and then she would never want to leave. If it was just about getting her out, he could have done so and then come straight back to them and pick up where he had left off, but he wasn’t going to. He was part of the secret, so to protect Nesta he had to go and stay gone. She might never see him again.
All because her husband hadn’t got himself seduced! Typical of him to be so unforthcoming when it came to matters of sex. All the others probably jumped at the chance. Suddenly, terribly, it seemed like a good trade-off: wishing her husband was a cheat so that she could be with Hunter without a guilty conscience. The break-up of the family home was another matter but that had never been part of the fantasy. Of course, Hunter hadn’t actually named her husband, so it was only assumption that he was the innocent party referred to. She could ask outright, since by his sworn oath Hunter would not lie to her, although in her heart of hearts she already knew the answer and didn’t really want to hear it out loud, as this would only compound her remorse and rubber-stamp the need to put Hunter’s plan into action.
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