A Gift of Poison

by A Gift of Poison (retail) (epub)

  She’s insulted, but worse, she can’t help thinking that if Felix could hear all this he would roar with laughter and make some extremely rude remark about David’s prose style. God knows why they gave him that prize, Felix would say, but it certainly wasn’t for his dialogue. So now she feels the scene they are having is comic and yet she knows David is in pain and she has caused it, so she feels guilty as well as for thinking of Felix making a joke at David’s expense.

  ‘Don’t let’s talk about this now,’ she says gently. ‘It’s so difficult and you’re upset about the divorce. We’re only going to offend each other if we go on. We can decide about Christmas another time, there’s no rush. I know you don’t like the way I live but I can’t change everything overnight.’ Perhaps if she can placate him now, on another day, in another mood, it can all be different. She has noticed before, over smaller things, that if she is patient the danger often passes. What was a big issue can simply fade away.

  ‘I can’t go on propping up your marriage indefinitely,’ he says. ‘I thought I could but I can’t. I had so much pain with Kate, I can’t bear any more. If you leave me at Christmas, I can’t be sure I’ll be here when you come back.’

  * * *

  Jordan says, ‘When are you planning to tell me?’

  It’s a shock. They are lying side by side in his big bed and she had thought he was nearly asleep. The sounds are different at his place: river sounds instead of traffic. Earlier tonight there have also been lots of bangs from other people’s fireworks and they watched some of the coloured lights exploding across the water as they had their supper. Now it is late and quiet again.

  They haven’t made love tonight; they often don’t these days, just curl up together like an old married couple. She’s both pleased and sad about that. She values the affectionate familiarity but misses the first rush of excitement, the overpowering desire, the all-consuming appetite: it will come on again, she knows, but perhaps only at intervals, like a thermostat. It’s probably in inverse ratio to how often they meet, she thinks, and she wouldn’t want to meet less often. They blame working, or failing to work, or lack of sleep; she secretly blames her secret, too. Sometimes they don’t bother to assign a cause, just hug each other and turn over.

  ‘Tell you what?’ she says cautiously, in case it’s not what she thinks.

  ‘About the baby.’

  She feels silly. She’s glad they’re having this conversation in the dark. It’s too important to have face to face, easier just to lie there touching. ‘I’ve been meaning to but I kept putting it off.’

  ‘So I see. I’ve been wondering if I could say nothing indefinitely, just watch you swell up and ignore the whole thing, you know, whether we could actually get into the delivery room without either of us saying a word about it. Be a bit of a joke now, wouldn’t it?’

  He sounds so casual and cheerful that she can feel herself relaxing, and yet at the same time she would like it to be more of a big deal for him. She says, ‘When did you realise?’

  ‘Oh, about September. Don’t forget, I’ve had five goes at this, I probably know more about it than you do. April, is it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘There you are then.’

  Is that all there is to it? She’s somehow disappointed. He’s known all this time and he’s pleased. Can it really be that simple? ‘You’re being very good about it,’ she says.

  ‘Well, I just love having children, I told you that. And I didn’t think I’d be having any more. You do want to have it? I’m assuming if you didn’t you’d have got rid of it by now.’

  How casually brutal that sounds. Is that how she made Sally feel? She says, ‘Yes, I do want to have it. I’m quite surprised how much. I never thought I would. But I didn’t know how to tell you. You might have felt enough was enough, or I was the wrong woman, or it was too soon.’ She is aware of fishing for compliments now, and a bit embarrassed at herself.

  ‘It’s fate,’ he says matter-of-factly, not taking the hint.

  ‘No, it’s coil failure actually.’

  ‘Same thing. That’s happened to me before too. And it didn’t happen to you with Richard now, did it?’

  ‘No,’ she says, ‘it certainly didn’t.’ She thinks he sounds smug.

  ‘Poor old Richard. How’s he taken it by the way?’

  ‘What makes you think I’ve told him?’

  ‘Well, you must have told someone. Even you couldn’t have kept it entirely to yourself. And you’d hardly wait till he noticed, now would you?’

  ‘He was very upset,’ she says. ‘Jealous, I think. Then he offered to stand by me if you did a runner.’

  ‘I say.’ He puts on an upper-class accent, theatrically exaggerated, almost submerging the Welsh and the American. ‘Jolly decent of him, what?’

  She doesn’t like him making fun of Richard, although the offer had irritated her. But it does occur to her that he may feel ever so slightly threatened. She hopes so. She thinks it would be good for him not to take her so much for granted; then she is shocked to find herself even tempted to play games. ‘Yes, I thought it was very kind. But a bit encroaching as well, like trying to take me over.’

  ‘Well, no danger of me doing that,’ he says.

  No, she thinks, and it would be all the same if I wanted you to.

  ‘You don’t mind about not living together, do you?’ he says after a pause, adding before she can answer, ‘It wouldn’t work.’

  ‘No,’ she says carefully. ‘I’ve never said I wanted to live with you.’

  ‘We’re all right as we are, aren’t we?’ he says. ‘I don’t think I could live with anyone ever again. But I can help. You won’t be poor the way you were with Carey, and that makes it easier, doesn’t it? I can throw money at you. I’m good at that.’

  ‘I’d like that,’ she says. ‘That would make a nice change.’

  ‘We can hire people to do all the hard work and you and I can just have the fun.’

  She says, ‘How simple you make it sound.’

  ‘Money makes everything simple,’ he says comfortably. She remembers Carey telling her only two years ago, although it seems like another lifetime, that money would have made all the difference to them too. She thinks of Jordan’s recent paintings, the ones she felt were tipping into self-parody, and wonders if he knows what a high price he is paying for money. Perhaps he thinks it’s worth the sacrifice. Or maybe he doesn’t think it is a sacrifice. Perhaps she is wrong about his work. Anyway, it’s not her business. She has more important things to worry about.

  ‘Money won’t make Sally come round,’ she says.

  ‘Ah,’ he says, ‘is that what you’re sad about?’

  ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘very sad.’

  ‘When did you tell her?’

  ‘A month ago. Just before she went back to college.’

  ‘And it was bad.’

  ‘Very bad.’

  ‘D’you want to tell me about it?’

  ‘No. I want to forget it but I can’t.’

  He puts his arm round her then and she wishes he’d done it sooner. ‘She will come round,’ he says. ‘All my children did, after I went away. Just give her time. Children are very forgiving.’

  ‘They have to be, don’t they,’ she says bitterly, ‘the things we do to them. Sally’s lost her father and her step-father and her baby, and all thanks to me.’ But she is also thinking of him and wondering how she can trust a man who has already left two wives and five children. How can she want to have a baby by such a man, when there are no guarantees that he won’t go off and leave her too? And yet she does want to, very much. She doesn’t trust him but she loves him. She has gone right back to her other self, her younger self, the Helen she thought had gone for ever.

  ‘You did your best,’ he says. ‘You did the right thing at the time. Didn’t you?’

  ‘I thought so, I really did. But we were just getting over it and it’s taken so long and now this. Even the dates are the same. It’s like
a slap in the face, as if I’d done it on purpose, as if I’m saying to her, I wouldn’t let you have your baby but you can’t stop me having mine.’

  There is a long silence. ‘Well,’ he says, ‘I don’t think I can make you feel better about it, any more than you could make me feel better about having that woman while Hannah was dying. But I can almost promise you she’ll come round.’

  ‘Almost promise,’ she repeats. ‘That’s the best we can do these days, isn’t it?’

  ‘Don’t spoil it,’ he says. ‘We’re going to have such a lovely baby. Born with a coil in one hand and a brush in the other.’

  In spite of herself she laughs. ‘I feel it’s fallen rather flat, my big news. There was I dreading telling you and you knew all the time.’

  ‘I don’t think flat’s quite the word,’ he says. ‘Not for a baby. But as I’ve known since September and you must have known since August, you might say we’ve had plenty of time to get used to the idea. Still, it’s not too late to celebrate. Shall I get up and open a bottle of champagne, would that help?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so,’ she says. ‘It’s a nice idea but it feels a bit over the top.’

  ‘Well, how about this,’ he says, moving her hand, ‘how does this feel?’ And presently, to her surprise, in a gentle, leisurely way they start to make love, as if to seal a bargain.

  Part Seven

  In December a letter arrives at the flat from Sally.

  Dear Felix,

  I thought we said goodbye on fairly good terms back in April and I was even starting to feel okay about you again as an important part of my growing up. But now I’ve finally got your book from the library and I’m very upset. I can see why you never sent me a copy. It’s so obviously about me and full of really crude details that I thought were private. I don’t understand how you could do a thing like that to me when I’ve never done anything to hurt you, even when I could have done. Why do you have to write about me at all? Haven’t you got any imagination? It really hurts to know I’m there for everyone to see, as if you had taken pictures of me naked and published them. It’s not fair and it makes me very angry. Sally.

  He hesitates before replying. He is already busy planning the script and the holiday is almost upon him. He even wonders if a dignified silence might be more appropriate. But the letter seems to demand an answer, so he forces himself to write. He does so hate letters.

  Dearest Sally,

  I’m so sorry you’re upset about the book. If we’d still been together I’d certainly have sent you a copy because I really thought you’d be flattered. I would never write about anyone I didn’t care for deeply; it is much too hard work. Any details in it that remind you of us are written with love and intended to be a tribute to you. But to send it to you after you left me would have felt like an attempt at getting you back and I know you don’t want that.

  Let me also explain that although it may seem to you to be all about us, a lot of it is in fact fiction. This is not the time or place to go into that torturesome process whereby life becomes art (or often the reverse), but taking a few details from someone you love for a novel is not at all the same thing as presenting a naked portrait of them to the world. If you think it is, then you must admit I have exposed myself just as blatantly, and in a much more unflattering light. But in fact there are only a very few people who even know that we were together for those unforgettable months and they are people already close to us both.

  I hope in time you may come to see the book as I do, an attempt to create something new out of a vital spark of life, as well as to give some important memories a measure of permanence. It may be an unworthy attempt, or even a failure, but it was certainly never meant to hurt you, rather to remind you how precious you were and still are to me.

  With love,

  As ever,

  Felix.

  A week before she is due to leave on holiday a huge basket of flowers arrives. Felix, looking at them, says, ‘Persistent little chap, isn’t he?’ She opens the envelope and reads:

  ‘The pain of loving you Is almost more than I can bear.’

  And below David has written: ‘I don’t think DHL can help me any more, if indeed he ever did.’

  She feels a loss, a missed opportunity, a friend turning his back, and yet what can she do? She puts the card in her handbag to avoid ridicule but she must be looking sad because Felix, with a victor’s generosity, puts his arms round her and says, ‘Not coming then?’

  She shakes her head.

  ‘What a shame. He’d have done much better just to pack his bags and sort out the small print later. Never mind, we’re going to have a lovely time, you and I, and when you get back you can tell him what he’s missed.’

  She can’t bear to admit it’s over: it will weaken her position. And perhaps it isn’t over, she thinks, to give herself courage. Perhaps he will change his mind.

  * * *

  Kate invites him for supper at the end of term. It’s a week before Christmas and they’re both exhausted from school and aware of having done no shopping.

  ‘I suppose it’ll happen anyway,’ Kate says, slumped at the kitchen table. ‘Christmas, I mean. Sometimes I have this fantasy that if I do nothing at all, just sit here in a stupor staring at the wall, it’ll all happen without me and I can turn up one morning and say, “Well, fancy that, it’s Christmas again, terrific.”’

  ‘She means if I do it all instead,’ says Annabel.

  ‘She likes it really,’ Thomas says.

  ‘And if anyone in the shops says, “Oh, are you on holiday again?”’ says Kate, ‘I may just do violence to them.’

  Kate has made a stew. She serves boiled potatoes and cabbage with it and it is all truly disgusting. He doesn’t understand how anyone can make such a simple meal turn out so badly. And he is forced to assume this is one of Kate’s best efforts, since he has been invited specially to share it. The children eat it calmly, matter-of-factly, even with the appearance of routine enjoyment. Richard wonders if it is time for him to invite Kate to supper. He has been too ashamed of his bedsit and unsure about the relationship, but he knows he can do better than this on his two burners and grill. He thinks Kate needs him to cook for her. And he would like to have someone to cook for again. They finish with baked apples. Something has gone wrong with them too, but he is not sure how Kate has achieved it. They are burnt on the outside but hard on the inside and they taste of soap.

  ‘Bath, Thomas,’ Kate says after supper.

  ‘Oh, Mum.’

  ‘I know, you had one last Friday. Bath, Thomas. Before I come and scrape the dirt off with a knife.’

  ‘She’s an awful bully,’ Thomas says. ‘’Night, Richard.’

  ‘Goodnight, Thomas.’

  Annabel lingers, helps with the washing up, watches some nonsense on television. He and Kate sit and chat about school. There’s an odd mixture of tension and relaxation in the atmosphere. When Annabel goes to bed she hesitates as she passes him, then kisses him swiftly on the cheek for the very first time. ‘’Night, Richard.’

  ‘Goodnight, Annabel.’ He’s quite unnerved, touched, even moved to tears. He blinks rapidly, aware of Kate watching him.

  ‘Have another drink,’ Kate says. She pours two more glasses of wine. The silence is suddenly awkward. She seems embarrassed about something, fidgeting, hesitant. ‘D’you have any plans for Christmas?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  ‘Only we were wondering, the kids and I… if you’d like to spend it with us.’

  This is so unexpected he doesn’t know how to answer.

  ‘Only if you’ve nothing better to do,’ she goes on hurriedly. ‘We just thought it might be more fun than being on your own. And they’ll be going to see David part of the time, so I’ll be on my own a bit as well. Anyway. No need to tell me now. We just had a sort of family conference and I promised them I’d ask you.’

  ‘It’s a lovely idea, Kate. I really appreciate it.’

  ‘I’d better
go up and say goodnight to them. Inspect Thomas’s ears and all that.’ She goes out of the room very quickly.

  He knows he must think fast to be ready with an answer when she comes back, but he is still so surprised that his brain moves slowly. Christmas with Kate and the children. It doesn’t seem like a casual offer: it feels heavy with significance. And in a way he is tempted. He is not looking forward to Christmas alone. Helen has made it clear she doesn’t want to see him over the holiday and may even be going away, presumably with her lover; Inge has invited him to call in but somehow made him feel that this year it is she who is doing him a favour. After being loved by both of them for so many years he is finding it hard to accept that neither of them loves him any more. It is a bleak, unreal feeling, like a physical chill, a psychic shiver at the withdrawal of so much warmth. He had relied upon both of them more than he realised. And the pain of knowing that Helen is having a child by someone else is sometimes almost more than he can bear. He feels exhausted and bereft; he knows he needs someone but that doesn’t necessarily mean that Kate is the right person or even if she is that he is ready for her. Is she expecting him to make love to her? How can they go on working together if Christmas doesn’t go well? And is there any way he can manage to eat a turkey cooked by her?

  ‘Well, that’s them settled,’ she says, returning. ‘They wanted to know what you said but I told them I hadn’t asked you yet, so there’s no hurry to decide. Honestly. It was just a thought. I won’t be at all offended if you say no. I won’t throw a tantrum in the staff room next term or anything like that.’

  Felix would say she is protesting too much. Why should he think of Felix now? Another aching loss. He can’t afford any more. He says, ‘Kate, I’m grateful, I just don’t know what to say. I’ve got to see Inge and the boys but —’