8. He kissed her back again, and then suddenly they were enmeshed in a full-on, breathless grope under the tree, and then against the tree, and then almost behind the tree until a passing gardener screamed ‘Hey, get a room!’ and they separated, giggling, covering their mouths and their cheeks with mock shame and agreeing, wordlessly, like age-old lovers, to retreat to the blanket and act with some propriety.
It was perfect. Beyond perfect. It was television perfect. (Though Bunty did notice, somewhat to her annoyance, that it later lost something in translation. Kat merely raised her eyebrows, nodded knowingly, and said, ‘It’s been a looooong time for that soldier.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ said Bunty crossly. ‘You know,’ replied Kat, making lewd rocking motions in her chair. ‘He’s not done it in a while.’
‘Well, neither have you, and you don’t kiss anyone like that, I bet.’ Bunty stopped for a minute. ‘You haven’t, have you? With Dan?’ At which Kat had laughed.
‘I told you! I wouldn’t do that to Simon.’ And somehow the conversation had turned to her long distance relationship, and the agony and ecstasy of Bunty’s illicit romance had been side-tracked.)
‘Got a bit carried away there,’ said Ben. He bit his lip in his embarrassment and inadvertently made Bunty’s thighs tingle.
‘It’s really nice to see you.’ Bunty busied herself with the picnic blanket and handed Ben a lamb sarnie before he could make another move. Keep him wanting.
Keeping him talking was the other technique she tried to concentrate on. That was on the advice of Kat, who now considered herself something of an expert having held down a relationship with someone on the other side of the world for over a year. In ‘Men According to Kat’, the one thing men liked to do almost as much as sex was to talk about themselves. ‘That can’t be right,’ said Bunty, although she did have a vague recollection that Adam had seemed most animated when the discussion was about him. ‘Graham doesn’t want to talk about anything, hardly ever.’
‘But that’s not a man,’ argued Kat. ‘That’s Graham.’
Ben bucked the short trend in her life at least a little. While he was very happy to talk about his kids – Jarred who was nearly five and Shanti who was two – and about the yacht, he was very careful to ask questions of Bunty, like ‘So what do you do with your time now Charlotte’s so grown up?’ and ‘How far did you get in your fencing?’ Mostly Bunty tried to change the subject back to him, because it was more important to make Ben feel relaxed than to think about such matters and lie. Wasn’t it?
Once more they snogged like teenagers at a drive-in, and Ben rang next morning to see if he would be allowed to send flowers. ‘I know it’s not very spontaneous and romantic, but I have to ask you for your address if I’m to send them.’
‘Meet me with them!’ suggested Bunty, so they met for a quick lunch in a pub garden in a nearby village, and Ben arrived with a bunch of gerbera.
Graham looked askance at the vase as he threw down his bag that night. He was late. Again. ‘Where did you get those from?’
‘I treated myself,’ said Bunty, so aglow with delight that she beamed, even at her husband.
Graham sighed. ‘Are they in the budget?’
He did actually work out a household budget at the beginning of each year, and if Bunty had to decide she would probably have to put the flowers under the heading of ‘miscellaneous treats and outings’ for which she was allowed 100 pounds a month. But this time she had ammo. ‘Don’t think so, but then I figured, What’s going to cost more – cut sperm tubes, or cut flowers? I didn’t think a tenner would blow the budget too much.’
‘You’re still mad about that?’
‘I’m still mad, Graham,’ she said, picking up his bag pointedly, ‘about everything.’
And suddenly she meant it. She wasn’t just mad about the vasectomy. She wasn’t even mad that he was seeing someone else behind her back. It was bigger than that now, she realised as she kicked his bag into the utility room. Now she was angry that she’d married him in the first place, that she’d given up her chance of an interesting life to be with someone who budgeted for bunches of flowers, and who wouldn’t in a million years dream of shoving her up against a tree and kissing the life out of her with a passion that made her feel constantly thirsty. Passion. That was what she was mad about. The lack of passion. She turned the tap on to fill the vase with such ferocity that water sprayed all over them both on either side of the sink.
Quite unexpectedly, Graham grabbed her hand across the breakfast bar. ‘Don’t be … Don’t. It’s all going to be over soon, and then you’ll see that it’s all for the best.’
‘What is?’ she yelled, then catching Charlotte’s eye from where she was lying across her homework at the dining room table, she reeled herself in. ‘What is?’ she hissed.
‘My plan.’ Graham blinked at her, as if she should have known all along what his strange male, budgeting brain was working out. ‘The plan.’
‘Like the plan that we wouldn’t have any more children? The plan to take up … extra-curricular activities? Well, just as soon as you decide what my part in this plan is, Graham, you let me know.’
‘Mum, can you help me with this maths?’ bleated Charlotte.
Bunty wiped her hands on the tea towel and threw it over her shoulder to land on top of Graham’s bag. ‘Your dad will help you,’ she said, staring him down, daring him to say otherwise. ‘I’m going out.’
‘Now? Who with?’ Graham peered round at the oven, which was ominously empty.
‘With … me.’
Grabbing her coat and bag, she rushed out to the car. It was 6.30 p.m. Too early to meet Kat, too short notice to call Ben (plus she’d noticed he was no longer using his New Zealand mobile and now had another local phone, for which she couldn’t get the number.) But actually, it suddenly occurred to her that she’d just said who she wanted to go out with. Herself. Her beautifully painted ecru walls had closed in on her, and she needed some quiet.
On a whim, Bunty headed out of the city and shot up an A-road to the next market town. The cinema was housed in a converted church – just two screens, often showing independents rather than blockbusters, and sometimes, if she was lucky, something old and black and white. On this particular night she struck gold: a big screen version of Some Like It Hot. It was so far from her world that she felt suddenly revived, and the sheer pleasure of buying a ticket for one, and sweets for one so she could dunk her Maltesers in her glass of chardonnay, and getting a seat for one wherever she liked, was a surprise to her. She sank into the seat with an audible sigh. This was better. Here was relief. Peace, in the racket of a machine-gun massacre in downtown twenties Chicago.
Before she could slide down into her seat completely and drop a chocolate into her plastic wine glass, there was a tap on her shoulder, and someone whispered her name.
Oh God, was her first thought. Graham’s followed me. Or Jason? She turned around with some trepidation to find Dan’s smiling face a few inches from her own. ‘I thought that was you. All right?’
‘I’m fine. One of my favourite films,’ she whispered back.
Dan pointed back along the row. ‘My mum’s too. We’re just over there if you want to join us.’
‘You brought your mum to see her favourite film? Dan, you have got to be gay.’
‘No. Just nice,’ said Dan with a smile. ‘We do exist, you know.’
Bunty nodded, and then indicated that she wanted to stay put. Giving her a thumbs up, Dan shuffled back to his mum’s side, where Bunty could hear the two of them chuckling together like a pair of geese, Dan’s booming honk to his mum’s gentle titter.
It was only nine o’clock when the film finished. Bunty waved to Dan and his mum, then got into her car and drove halfway around the M25. Then she filled up with petrol and drove back along the other half. Driving. That was one of the things she could have said on her resumé. Fencing and driving, particularly at this time of night when she could get her foot down, l
et her imagination wander and cover ground for no other reason than it was there to do. She walked into the house at midnight, about as calm as she had felt in weeks. Charlotte was asleep on the sofa, with Graham next to her in the armchair, and the television repeating the latest box office news.
Graham opened one eye. ‘I can’t pick her up any more,’ he said sadly, and Bunty suddenly understood why Charlotte was still there. He’d let her fall asleep as they used to on Bunty’s rare nights off and out of the house, when he would carry her upstairs at bedtime. Now she was so grown up that she probably had more chance of carrying Graham upstairs, possibly even the two of them together, Dad under one arm, and Mum under the other. It was the first time he’d realised their little girl was really not so little any longer. Despite that, there was such an uncommon air of peace in the room that Bunty couldn’t bear to disturb anyone. She gathered the duvets from upstairs, snuggled down next to Charlotte, and went to sleep to the sound of Graham’s snoring.
Charlotte, of course, found it all a huge adventure when she woke up in the morning. ‘Did Grandma and Grandad come?’ she said with a yawn. That was usually when they – or at least, Charlotte – were turfed out of bed. And they all laughed, even Charlotte, at the truth of the matter whereby Graham couldn’t carry her despite his new-found biceps, before she suddenly said, horrified, ‘You don’t mean I’m, like, fat, do you?’ and they all laughed again, because she was actually skeletal.
Later that day, Ben asked to meet her for coffee, and she related the tale to him, as he’d lovingly told her tales of his kids, only it got rather broken up with her having to leave Graham out of the picture, and making it sound for a moment as though the babysitter had spent the night in the armchair. Rather like telling Kat about the kiss with Ben, the point of it became somewhat lost and she noticed his eyes glazing over just a fraction. Bunty kicked herself – keep him talking about himself. Mental mantra. Keep him talking.
‘Well, this is four days on the trot I’ve seen you now,’ she teased. ‘Haven’t you got a job to go to? Oh, of course. You’re on your yacht.’
Ben shrugged and nodded modestly at the same time. Cally had told Bunty about the Kiwi art of self-deprecation – Ben had definitely managed it.
‘So how … is this a rude question? How did you actually make your money? You haven’t mentioned your job or anything.’
Ben studied his coffee cup. ‘It’s … well, it’s family money, I suppose. I don’t talk about it.’
And he didn’t, so that was that. Bunty, feeling a little chastised, watched a couple walk into the cafe with two small children. The woman was stunning, and Bunty wondered how she’d kept her figure with two kids so small and so close together in age. Ben squinted in her direction too, but she could see that he was looking at the children. How he must miss them. Then without any preamble he said, ‘Shall we go for a run?’
He was staring at the woman’s tanned legs. Bunty looked at them and then down at her own, which would only have come up to the other woman’s knees.
‘Sorry?’
‘A run. I mean, we keep meeting and eating, don’t we?’ Ben laughed. ‘You must be fit from all that fencing and stuff. How about we meet up for a run tomorrow?’
Bunty paused. Was she going to lie still further? She decided not to. ‘I hate running,’ she said at length. ‘Sorry, but with legs as short as these it’s pretty much a given that I was intended to drive everywhere.’
‘Well, there’s always …’ Ben leaned over and stroked one of the offending thighs. ‘There’s always other exercise.’
Bunty swallowed hard. There was. There was definitely other exercise. And the length of her legs really didn’t matter for that. Ben’s black eyes were boring into her own; she manoeuvred her way out of the beam and kissed his cheek. ‘Soon,’ she whispered. God knows she didn’t really want to be so coy, but the ‘talking about himself’ thing was definitely working, and she had to assume that the ‘keep him wanting’ adage was working too. Weekend, she told herself, nuzzling his earlobe. I’ll allow myself to … at the weekend.
*
It was five days away. Four. A little chat with Ben, looking forward to their next meeting. Three. Two. An early phone call, even before Graham had made it out of the house, where Bunty had been forced to be a bit evasive, and Ben had sounded a bit tense. Or terse. The tone reminded her of something. And then it was the day, D-Day, Drop-em Day as Kat had started to call it. But before she’d even left the house a terrible foreboding had filled her chest cavity. And sure enough, he didn’t show up. That was what it had reminded her of – the terseness. It was the tone he’d used when getting worried about the children. As if it were somehow her fault.
At least this time she didn’t wait around for hours, hoping. She knew he’d gone. But she blamed herself. Again, and again, and again.
*
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Dear Bunty,
Just to inform you that I have this morning deducted four hundred GBP from your VISA card as the Love Lottery payment. The lovely Ben tells me you have now been on several dates so this is quite within the terms of the agreement.
Yours
Priscilla
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Priscilla, you can shove your payment, your Love Lottery, and Lovely Bloody Ben. I have never been so miserable in my life. Well, I have but it was very long time ago. GIVE ME HIS NUMBER!!!!
Bunty x
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
No can do, I’m afraid.
PX
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Yeah, well I was joking. Sort of.
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
I see. Ha ha.
You have now exhausted your three introductions through the Croesus Club. If you wish to meet anyone else there will be a further 300 GBP charge and we will trawl our database again.
Do let me know if you’d like to meet someone new.
Priscilla
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
I liked the one I’d met. Don’t think I can stand any more.
Bye
Bunty x
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
With the energy and direction of a sleepwalker, Bunty ploughed on through the next few days. There seemed to be nothing to do but wait for the inevitable and try to cling on to what vestiges of a normal life she still had. As Kat had told her that she was not, under any circumstances, to trail around wondering what Ben was doing (although, of course, it was nearly impossible to do that), she took to stalking Graham instead. Might as well find out what he was really up to – when he was actually going to be moving Kylie Minogue into their home and asking Bunty to leave.
Sunday strained her nerves until Bunty wanted to weep, but she avoided it, emptied and cleaned her cupboards, and knocked herself out with a bottle of wine until Monday appeared. Everything after school drop-off, which she agreed to for want of anything else to do, seemed likely to be uneventful. She flicked listlessly through the channels, catching snippets of On the Sofa with Pearl and Finn, and ordering two different types of Supermodel face creams and an Air-Master Super-Walker that would stow neatly under the bed when not in use and give her buns of steel when it was. Ha. Bloody Kylie had better watch out. She made an over-elaborate healthy lunch for herself and then couldn’t be bothered to eat it, so instead she wandered out into the garden and peeked hopefully over the fence. Maybe Mary had a nice pie in the oven or something.
To her immense surprise, and slight chagrin, there was a party going on in Mary’s garden. Mallory was regaling Mary with some hilarious tale, at which she squeaked and squealed like a five-year-old at her birthday party. Bunty stared at Mary. She looked exactly the same in every
sense, apart from, well … a glow as tangible as a Ready Brek outline. Her aura was practically pulsating. Sex, thought Bunty. She’s having sex.
And then she heard another laugh, a fulsome honk, from behind the tree, and there was Dan, beer in hand, stamping his enormous foot on the little patch of ground beneath which Flinders used to lie. ‘He’s full of rubbish, Mary. Take no notice of him,’ he was saying, shaking his head, clearly enjoying the story even more than Mary. ‘There,’ he continued, stamping one last time, ‘no more problems there. I think it was just a bit of residual water backed up from the …’
Bunty coughed. ‘You’re not going to blame my garden, are you?’
Dan looked up in surprise and then beamed. ‘Well, Mrs McKenna. Why aren’t you this side of the fence?’
‘I was beginning to wonder that myself.’
Mary waved her over and she went to join them at the neat cast iron table. It was an unseasonably warm day, and the sunlight bounced off the golden leaves of the beech trees between their two gardens, suffusing the whole of Mary’s patio with a burnished shimmer. How had she not noticed? How had she failed to notice that it was a glorious day and that some kind of festive harvest lunch was taking place just yards from her back door? Ben had a lot to answer for, thought Bunty furiously. But then she corrected herself. Not Ben. It wasn’t his fault that she’d found herself in need of a new husband and had hoped he might turn out to be the one. It was Graham’s fault. Graham who was philandering. Creating a vacuum in the ‘husband’ area of her life.
‘I made this,’ said Dan proudly, showing her an intricate looking terrine. ‘You can have a piece, you know. I do wash my hands.’
‘Thank you, I will,’ said Bunty primly, and she balanced the pâté and a piece of French bread on her knee, and followed it with a glass of wine and a home-made Madeleine, courtesy of Mary. This was actually nice. Normal. What normal people did when they met up casually of a lunchtime and enjoyed each other’s company. It felt refreshingly unforced.
As It Is On Telly Page 13