More to Life Than This

by Carole Matthews

  She sped back down the stairs, across the cobbles again and slid into the reception area. A queue of people were waiting to pay their bills and Kate hopped and hovered and barely hung onto her patience until she was at the head of it.

  ‘Can you tell me if Mr Mahler’s checked out, please?’ She leaned over the desk and tried to read the list upside down. ‘Ben Mahler.’

  The receptionist trailed her finger slowly down her computer screen. ‘Yes,’ she said finally. ‘He’s already left.’

  ‘Is it possible for you to give me a contact telephone number for him?’

  The smile took on a brittle edge. ‘I’m afraid I can’t divulge confidential information about other residents.’ It’s more than my job’s worth.

  ‘This isn’t confidential,’ Kate said in a lowered voice, aware that the queue behind her was building up to lunchtime-in-a-post-office proportions. ‘We promised we’d keep in touch. It’s just that with all the rush to pack up and vacate the rooms…’ Her voice tailed away.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ the receptionist said.

  Kate’s Chi sank to her sandals.

  ‘But you’ve only just this second missed him. If you rush, you might catch up with him in the car-park.’

  It flew back up to her throat.

  ‘His wife came to collect him a few minutes ago.’

  There was a loud ringing in her ears. ‘His wife?’ Kate stammered. Now her Chi didn’t know where the hell to go. ‘Mr Mahler isn’t married.’

  ‘Isn’t he?’ She didn’t look convinced. ‘I assumed it was his wife. A very pretty blonde.’ She lowered her voice and leaned towards Kate like a co-conspirator. ‘She certainly wasn’t old enough to be his mother—though she could have passed for his daughter.’ The receptionist turned back to her computer screen, chuckling at her own joke.

  A very pretty blonde. Not just a plain ordinary pretty blonde. But a very pretty one.

  ‘You’ll need to hurry,’ the woman prompted. ‘Or you’ll miss him.’

  I’ll miss him. Kate knew that already.

  ‘Next, please!’ the receptionist said and the queue shuffled forward.

  Kate’s feet had rooted to the ground. Never had the Standing Firmly posture been executed so perfectly. Nothing would move. Her entire body was immobilised with shock. Ben’s wife? She had to be wrong.

  chapter 49

  ‘Where have you been?’ Fiona complained. ‘I’ve been waiting for ages.’

  Ben lugged his case to the car, trying not to inspect it too obviously for newly acquired dents and trying not to trawl the car-park to see if Kate’s car was still there. He looked back at the priory. It was a harsh building in the wrong light. There were damp patches on the walls where the gutters leaked and the glorious stained-glass windows looked drab now in the rain.

  He could see his bedroom window from here and the fire escape, and his eyes wandered the track they had taken across the grass and up into the woods. A vision of Kate naked, offering herself to the sky, burned from the back of his eyes. This week would stay with him as long as he lived.

  ‘I asked at reception, but they hadn’t a clue where you were. I was about to send out a search party…’Fi halted mid-flow. ‘You look terrible,’ she said. ‘Truly terrible.’

  ‘I feel terrible,’ Ben answered.

  Her face creased with concern. ‘Put that down,’ she instructed, wrenching his case from him, ‘and come here.’ She flung her arms round his neck and hugged him to her. He slid his hands round her tiny waist.

  ‘You’ve lost weight,’ she said.

  ‘I haven’t, Fi,’ he insisted. ‘You’re being melodramatic.’

  ‘I thought this course was supposed to relax and regenerate you?’

  ‘The exercise has done wonders for me,’ Ben said. ‘It’s the workout of the heart that’s causing me grief.’

  Fi gave an exasperated huff. ‘What am I going to do with you, Ben?’

  ‘Treat me gently,’ he suggested.

  ‘I phoned Chris in the office and I have some particularly awful jokes to tell you to make you laugh,’ she said.

  He grinned in spite of himself.

  ‘By the time we’re halfway to Hampstead, you’ll have split both of your sides open and will have forgotten all about little Miss Perfect. Mrs Perfect,’ she corrected.

  Ben’s face fell.

  ‘Sorry,’ Fi said apologetically.

  He tried to give a light-hearted shrug, but couldn’t make his shoulders move at all.

  ‘What can I say to make it right?’ she asked.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Shall I tell you a bad joke instead?’

  Ben laughed. ‘Go on.’

  ‘Get in the car then, while I try to remember the punch line.’

  He put his arm round her shoulders and hugged her to him. ‘What would I do without you, Fi?’

  ‘That is a question I often ask myself, Benjamin,’ she said, breaking away from him and heading towards the car.

  ‘I take it you’re driving?’ Ben asked, leaning on the roof.

  ‘Well, I’m not in a rush to swop this for Old Faithful.’

  ‘Ah.’ Ben slid into the passenger seat. ‘There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you…’

  It may not be his wife, Kate thought, but whoever it is, he’s certainly very fond of her. She stood at the entrance to the priory, next to the revolving door half-hidden by a tumbling Clematis Nelly Moser. It was all woody and bare at the bottom and would need a good pruning when it had finished with its candy-stripe burst of colour. You had to be very careful with clematis, they were touchy about being chopped at the wrong time and would as soon drop dead as look at you. Jeffrey would know exactly when to nip it in the bud.

  The receptionist was right. She was a very pretty blonde. And tiny. And young. And Kate was watching Ben laughing, joking, and cuddling her.

  Could Ben have been married and not told her? Kate heard about people like that all the time—men who went to conferences, removed their wedding rings and all memory of the wife and children they had waiting at home. Was Ben really like that?

  How could he have been holding her and swearing undying love for her only minutes ago and now be draped—yes, draped was a good word—round this rather nubile girl. Wouldn’t she have been able to tell? Even if he wasn’t married, they were clearly what the Daily Mail would call ‘an item’.

  Emotionally, she felt very naive in the ways of the world. Having spent half of your life with the same person didn’t equip you very well for the slings and arrows of the modern mating game. He was probably having a good old laugh at her—the dowdy bird with the blue eyeliner who was good for a summer-school shag, but nothing more. Kate closed her eyes.

  When she opened them, she saw that Ben had got into the car with the blonde at the wheel, and they were driving away.

  Kate trudged back to her tiny bedroom where, for a while, she sat staring blankly at the wall. The beautiful white rose that Ben had so gallantly given her had finally died. Its velvety bruised petals were scattered on the dressing table. It had bloomed so briefly and now it was dead. Perhaps everything was like that—only perfect, as fresh as a daisy, for a very short time. What was the old game? He loves me, he loves me not? Did it work with roses as well as daisies? She held a petal to her lips and gulped back her tears. There were only twenty-four petals. He loves me not. She counted them a second time and then checked behind the dressing table to see if any had fallen down. Twenty-four. Ben had said that every rose had twenty-five petals. She had trusted him and he had lied to her after all. What else had he lied about?

  chapter 50

  ‘Fi, can you stop the car?’ Ben said. They were at the end of the drive, waiting to join the stream of traffic on the main road. ‘I need to make a call.’

  ‘I’ve got a mobile. The wonder of modern technology means that while I drive, you can talk.’

  ‘Just pull in over here,’ he begged. ‘Only for a minute. It’s personal and I need
some fresh air.’

  Fiona viewed him suspiciously. ‘You cannot fail to have noticed that it’s raining small domestic animals.’

  ‘I won’t be long,’ he said and, grabbing her phone, jumped out of the car. He leaned on the back of the boot and put the phone to his ear, hitching the collar of his jacket up against the pelting rain. Pretending to talk animatedly, he smiled broadly at Fi, who was watching him through the rearview mirror, a disdainful expression on her face.

  After a few moments, Kate’s BMW appeared in the driveway. She was inching along in a queue of other cars. Ben held his head down and, thanking God for the congestion on rural backwaters, watched her furtively. She had been crying again. There was a noise beside him. The clearing of a throat. And, as he tore his eyes away from Kate, Fiona nudged his arm, making him drop the phone. He scrabbled on the ground to pick it up out of a puddle.

  ‘I suppose you realise you were making that call with my sunglasses case,’ she said sardonically.

  Ben stood up and examined the metal case. ‘Oh.’

  Fiona took it from him and wiped it dry on the side of her jeans. Then she slid her Ray-Bans out, putting them on even though it was still raining. ‘Here’s the phone,’ she said, offering it to him. ‘At least, you haven’t ruined it.’

  Ben patted his pocket sheepishly. ‘My own’s in here.’

  ‘Get a life, Ben,’ Fi suggested. Her eyes followed Ben’s gaze to the blue BMW. She pulled her sunglasses down to the tip of her nose and stared at Kate, who was stuck behind a Range Rover. ‘That’s her, is it? In the Bavarian bollard bruiser?’

  Ben nodded miserably.

  ‘She looks sweet,’ Fi said in surprise.

  ‘She is.’

  Fiona leaned against the boot of the car next to him. ‘Does she know how you feel?’

  ‘Yes.’ Ben swallowed hard. ‘I love her.’

  They watched Kate in silence.

  ‘So what are you going to do about it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘If you love her, you should let her go,’ she advised.

  His jaw set tightly and he kept his eyes fixed ahead. ‘That’s why I’m standing here like a complete prat watching her drive away.’

  Fiona put her hand on his arm.

  ‘You’ll survive. After a fashion. We all do. Physically, you’ll be unscathed, but emotionally you’ll be permanently crippled.’

  Ben sleeved the raindrops from his nose. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘If it’s any consolation, she doesn’t know what she’s missing.’

  A gap in the traffic appeared, which coincided with a gap in Ben’s breathing. It was time for her to go. Hope seeped out of him into the puddle at his feet. Don’t go! his brain screamed. Look round! See me! Love me! Change your mind! I have no weapons to fight this! And then Kate pulled out into the road, swung the car away from them and was gone.

  ‘Let’s get back in the car,’ Ben said shakily. ‘We’re getting wet through.’

  Fiona didn’t move. ‘This is probably totally the wrong time to say it,’ she gulped, ‘but I still love you, Ben.’

  The rain was running down her cheeks and he brushed it away with his thumb. ‘I know.’

  ‘Life isn’t fair, is it?’ she asked quietly.

  He looked down the road, but Kate’s car had disappeared. ‘Never,’ he said, and held on to Fi as if his life depended on it.

  chapter 51

  Kate lasted as far as the dual carriageway before she had to find a lay-by. Swinging in by the bright blue P for Parking sign, she stopped next to the concrete bin overflowing with takeaway cartons and dented lager cans, and cried for a solid five minutes. In an attempt to make it more constructive, she tried to turn it into the aaah sound to heal her broken heart, but it came out like aaargh and just made her feel stupid.

  Afterwards, she dried her tears, tidying the smears of mascara with a damp tissue in the rearview mirror. The pain was like cutting yourself, she thought. You had to put a bit of plaster on it and carry on regardless. The scar would always be there to remind you, but soon you’d forget just how much it had hurt when it happened. Eventually, it would fade to a mere hint of a blemish that you only noticed from time to time.

  It was time to be getting back. Back to life. Back to reality. She cast one last look at her blotchy face and decided that no one at home would take a blind bit of notice anyway. Perhaps this had all been a dream. A fantasy romance created by a bored brain that was tired of busying itself baking bread and battling with bed linen as if it really mattered. Now, more than ever, she needed something else to think about other than the daily domestic round that had dragged her down to this level of discontentment in the first place. She was disappointed that there had been no blinding flashes of inspiration on the job front, no sudden urge to rush into the Bradford & Bingley and start that dizzying climb to become Building Society Cashier of the Year, no brain-tingling certainty that opening a tea-room would make her feel a vital part of the human race or no yearning to turn her dining room into a home factory and churn out mohair teddy bears for dreary Sunday craft fairs. But then she hadn’t really given it due consideration; instead she had given in to a dangerous distraction, when she was a woman not known for her flights of fancy.

  Kate slid the BMW into gear and accelerated away from the squalor of the lay-by. She forced herself to smile, snuffling away the last of the tears as she did so. It had been fun meeting Ben. She would have treasured memories of him—the white rose that started it all, the picnic, the night on the ridge, the way he had laughed, the way he looked at her, the way he had loved her. Had he loved her? For a short while she had believed it.

  Would Jeffrey be able to tell that she’d had an affair, just by looking at her? The way you were supposed to be able to tell if someone likes butter by holding a buttercup under their chin? Was there a special glow that would give her away the minute she walked through the door?

  chapter 52

  Number 20, Acacia Close hadn’t changed at all. Though why she had expected it to in the mere space of a week, she wasn’t sure. Was it because she had changed? Kate was a different person from the woman she had been seven days ago. A stranger in her own body, a stranger in her own home. She was a woman with a secret. Someone who had strayed from her given path and had found the excitement of the woods both thrilling and scary at the same time. Now she knew for certain that once you had ventured into the unknown, you could never feel quite the same. You might have the security, the knowledge that the route you were treading would hold no surprises, but the sense of adventure would always be missing.

  The rain had all but stopped and the sun was nudging the clouds out of the way. The gravel drive squelched rather than crunched to herald her arrival. Bright pink Chinese peonies peeped out from the herbaceous border, stems stooped with the effort of keeping their heavy heads upright. They were interspersed with the bright yellow punk-spiked heads of dandelions and she knew that, if the rain held off, she should spend the afternoon gardening. A light bulb pinged on in her brain—perhaps that was where her vocation lay! What if she took a course in horticulture and trained to be a landscape gardener? She could tell a daisy from a Dianthus at fifty paces. And she certainly had enough experience of the dirty end of a spade. Wouldn’t it be rather nice to be paid for wrestling with someone else’s weeds for a change, rather than continually losing the fight with her own? It was a thought.

  The front door swung open and her husband appeared. He was rubbing his hands together and twitching from foot to foot, like he did when he was nervous, or when they were going on holiday, or doing anything that couldn’t quite be classified as ‘routine’. And there was something different about his appearance. She couldn’t believe how much Jeffrey’s hairline had receded in one week for a start and his face looked tired, older. Perhaps it was the strain of coping with the female version of Skippy the bush kangaroo. Kate grinned wickedly to herself. Maybe Natalie wasn’t the angel that Jessica had made her out to be. Jeff
rey was smiling, too, but it wasn’t his usual easy grin. This was the insincere rictus of a game-show host, painted on with orange stage makeup. She almost waited for him to shout, ‘Kate Lewis, come on down!’

  Instead, he sauntered over to the car and said, ‘Hi.’ ‘Good grief,’ Kate replied as she got out. She stared at him open-mouthed.

  His hair hadn’t receded at all, it had been shaved within an inch of its life.

  ‘It’s…’

  ‘Radical?’ Jeffrey supplied.

  ‘For you. Yes.’

  Jeffrey did a twirl. Which was a particularly strange thing for Jeffrey to do. ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘I love it,’ she said. ‘I’m just a bit stunned. What on earth possessed you?’

  ‘I thought it was time for a change.’ She saw a hint of a blush in Jeffrey’s fair cheeks. ‘A new me.’

  ‘Well, it’s certainly that.’

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s get your bags inside. The kettle’s only just boiled.’

  They went round to the back of the car and she opened the boot.

  ‘Kate,’ Jeffrey said hesitantly. His eyes searched her face. Could he see her betrayal writ large? Was the evidence there in her expression? He took her hand and squeezed it gently. ‘I have missed you.’

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘Yes.’ He slipped his arms round her waist and kissed her full on the mouth. His kiss was warm, comforting, familiar and yet, not Jeffrey at all. This kiss was bordering on the realms of licentious behaviour. Whenever they started doing this sort of thing on the television—which they did frequently—Jeffrey sprang into action, hurdling the coffee table in one fearless leap and switching it off before it corrupted the children. Kate resisted the urge to look round and see if the neighbours were watching. It couldn’t be classed as usual behaviour for her to be snogging in the street, let alone Acacia Close. But then she’d done quite a few things in the past week that weren’t like her at all. What had come over Jeffrey, though? Had Natalie been giving him too much red meat? He broke away from her, smiling his sweet, guileless smile.