The Scent of You

by Maggie Alderson

  She paused, looking down at her hands, gathering her thoughts. She had to get this right.

  ‘I want to be with you Chum, but as my full self – not with part of my head wondering about what might have been going on with my husband. As you said, we’ve been given this amazing second chance and I don’t want to mess it up with unfinished business elsewhere. Does that make any sense?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Chum, nodding. ‘You’re in a very strange situation, Hippolyta, and it’s bound to affect everything. I thought my life was complicated, with all the legal stuff, but at least I know exactly what I’m up against. It must be so difficult not knowing what’s actually happening.’

  ‘Well, that’s the thing,’ said Polly. ‘I’ve got the means now to find out what it’s all been about. Lucas went to see his father yesterday—’

  ‘I thought you didn’t know where he is.’

  ‘We didn’t,’ said Polly, ‘but my brave son followed him from work, to the flat where’s he living . . .’ She made a decision not to complicate things by telling Chum all the other stuff about that. ‘And he made him talk.’

  ‘He’s a good man, that Lucas,’ said Chum. ‘But that must have been very hard for him. His dad . . .’

  Polly nodded.

  ‘Yeah, Lucas has grown up a lot this year. He’s had to. So my husband – David – told Lucas that I had his permission to ask his shrink to tell me what it’s all about.’

  ‘His shrink?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Polly. ‘It seems he’s been seeing someone for over a year, at least – and the really nuts thing is I know his therapist. She comes to my yoga class – or used to.’

  ‘Gosh,’ said Chum. Didn’t she know her patient is your husband?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Polly. ‘That’s one of the things I’m going to ask her. I’m dreading that conversation, but I have to do it. I can’t carry on living in limbo like this.’

  ‘I don’t think I can either,’ said Chum, ‘just to be selfish. But seriously, it must be awful for all of you, and at least you’ll know why. When are you going to do it?’

  ‘As soon as possible,’ said Polly. ‘I want to get it over with.’

  ‘Promise me one thing,’ he said. ‘When you make that appointment, you’ll tell me? I want to be there for you, in case you need someone afterwards.’

  ‘Thank you, Chum,’ she said. ‘That means a lot. I’ve felt more alone at times than I thought was possible since this all started, and knowing you are there for me now is just . . . well, it’s wonderful.’

  He pulled her close and she climbed onto his lap, looking out over the lake into the deepening twilight, relishing the peace.

  Chum broke the silence first.

  ‘There’s one more thing I have to tell you, Hippolyta Masterson-Mackay,’ he said, lifting her chin up with his finger, so he was looking into her eyes.

  ‘Whatever it turns out is going on with David, you need to know this. If he decides after all is revealed that he wants to come home to you again, it’s not a done deal any more. He’s going to have to fight me for you.’

  Monday, 4 April

  It was Monday morning and Polly was sitting at her desk feeling numb.

  She’d called Maxine’s office half an hour ago, and the earliest appointment they could offer her had been in six weeks’ time. Then the receptionist had rung back to say they’d been able to find an unexpected ‘emergency slot’ for her and she could come in at 1 p.m today.

  She’d been going to ask Clemmie and Lucas to come with her, but now she had no choice: it was going to be her, solo. Remembering what Chum had said about telling him when the meeting was happening, she sent him a quick text. He replied immediately:

  Be strong, my beauty. It will be difficult – but it’s always better to know what beast you are fighting xxx

  Polly’s brain felt scrambled. It was all happening too fast. She’d only gone to David’s flat and found Maxine’s card four days before; she needed more time to process it all. But then again, she reminded herself, she’d had over three months to get used to the idea that something had gone very peculiar with her husband. Chum was right: she needed to know what.

  She slumped onto the desk, putting her head in her hands. Then she sat up again and clicked on the world clocks on her computer. It was 10.30 a.m. in London, 8.30 p.m. in Sydney. The perfect time to ring Lori, to tell her what was going on and why she’d been avoiding her calls.

  Polly hit FaceTime on Lori’s contact and Lori answered immediately.

  ‘Hello, darls,’ she said. ‘So you’ve finally remembered I’m alive. I’ve tried you so many times.’

  ‘Sorry, Loz,’ said Polly.

  She hesitated for a moment, then took a deep breath in.

  ‘Things have been a little difficult,’ she said. ‘I’ve wanted to tell you, but—’

  ‘All this shit with David?’ said Lori, the picture of her on the phone showing her raising a large glass of white wine to Polly. ‘Cheers. I’m surprised you haven’t got one of these on the go yourself, after what you’ve been going through – even though it is ten in the morning or something over there.’

  ‘You know?’ said Polly. ‘How? What?’

  ‘David rang Rich last week,’ said Lori.

  ‘What did he say?’ asked Polly. Lucas had told her David had rung Rich, but she’d assumed it was to fob him off with some lie about being away on a research trip while they were over.

  ‘He said you two were having a trial separation,’ said Lori. ‘So he wouldn’t be at your place when we come next week.’

  ‘He said what?’ said Polly, springing to her feet she was so outraged.

  ‘That you’d decided to have some time out. Now the kids are gone, there’s no glue between you any more and all that, he needed some space – the usual male mid-life crisis shit. What’s your take on it?’

  Polly sat down again, too stunned to say anything. Was this what Maxine was going to tell her? That David felt they should have a trial separation now the kids had left home? Surely he could have told her that himself?

  She laughed bitterly.

  ‘That’s almost hilarious,’ she said. ‘It’s a long story and I’m really looking forward to telling you in person when you get here next week – with bottles of wine involved, if not crates – but I can’t stand to go into it all now.’

  And I need to decide what I’m going to leave out first. Like Chum, for instance.

  ‘But suffice to say,’ she continued, ‘that’s absolutely not the story as I see it. We never discussed having a “trial” separation, he just told me he was going and left. He hasn’t spoken to me – well, not willingly, or normally – or the kids, since 20 December. He’s living in the apartment he had when I met him. Turns out he’s kept it on all these years, without telling me.’

  Lori looked uncharacteristically fazed for a moment.

  ‘Are you frigging kidding me?’ she said eventually. ‘That’s seriously messed up. Poor Polls. What a sneaky bastard. He hasn’t had another woman in there the whole time has he? Or a bloke?’

  ‘That would be the obvious explanation,’ said Polly, ‘but I can’t see any evidence of it. I went to the flat when he was out – I still had the bloody keys, which I’d kept all these years for sentimental reasons, like the dope I am – and it was very much the sad, overly tidy apartment of an anally retentive bachelor.’

  ‘So do you reckon he’s just gone, you know, kookalooka?’ said Lori.

  ‘Yes,’ said Polly, laughing. ‘I’d say that was the appropriate clinical term. He’s gone kookalooka, and I’m going to see his shrink this afternoon, so she can tell me all about it.’

  Lori shook her head and took another sip of wine.

  ‘Sure you don’t want to get a glass?’ she said, with her head on her side and her eyes screwed up, one of the characteristic expressions that Polly had always loved.

  ‘When you’re here, I’ll be happy to drink white wine from the moment we wake up
,’ said Polly, ‘but today I’ve got to keep my head on straight, to hear what his therapist has to say.’

  ‘Are the kids going with you?’ asked Lori.

  Polly shook her head.

  ‘It’s all very last-minute, so I’ll have to go on my own, there isn’t time for them to get here. But it will be fine.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ asked Lori. ‘Couldn’t you put it off until someone can go with you?’

  ‘I’ll be OK,’ said Polly. ‘I just want to get it over with. I’ll ring them straight afterwards and tell them about it.’

  And Chum, she thought. I’ll ring Chum too.

  They talked a bit longer and Polly rang off feeling much stronger, and very happy that she was going to be seeing her best pal in just a few days.

  All she needed to do was to get through that afternoon.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  Those were the first words Maxine said when Polly sat down in her office.

  ‘Sorry for what?’ asked Polly.

  ‘Sorry that I couldn’t tell you what was going on with your husband,’ said Maxine.

  ‘But when did you know he was my husband?’ said Polly. ‘That’s what’s been driving me nuts. Well, one of the things. Have you been sitting in my kitchen all this time, knowing what’s going on with David and not telling me?’

  ‘No,’ said Maxine. ‘I only made the connection a couple of weeks ago, when we were having that breakfast with your kids and Guy and it all came out. That’s why I haven’t been back to yoga since then. I didn’t know what to do, it’s so awkward.’

  Polly mulled it over for a moment, taking a sip from the glass of water Maxine’s PA had given her.

  ‘But I still don’t understand how you didn’t realise I was your client’s wife right away – surely there aren’t many yoga teachers in North London called Polly,’ she said, trying to keep her voice steady. ‘Married to a historian called David, with kids called Clemmie and Lucas? I would have thought that would have narrowed it down from the very first time you came to yoga.’

  Maxine sighed very deeply.

  ‘That’s one of the distressing things,’ she said. ‘He’s never talked about Polly, Clemmie and Lucas.’

  ‘What?’ said Polly, wondering if she would ever find her way out of this maze of complications. ‘He’s pretended he’s not married for however long he’s been seeing you?’

  ‘It’s over two years now,’ said Maxine. ‘And your GP referred him to me, if you’re wondering how he came to be my patient. She sends a lot of people to this clinic And he didn’t pretend he wasn’t married, but he always referred to you as Jane, and the children as Susan and John. I did think they were unusual names for modern kids.’

  Polly sat for a moment trying to take it in. Susan and John? Jane? It was almost funny. Almost.

  ‘And I didn’t even have the clue of your being a yoga teacher,’ Maxine continued. ‘He said you were an aromatherapist.’

  ‘What?’ said Polly. She felt a sudden flash of anger and had to restrain herself to avoid taking it out on Maxine. It was David who had denied her very identity, Maxine was just the dupe.

  ‘Once again, I can only say I’m sorry,’ said Maxine.

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ said Polly, ‘and maybe there is a tiny crumb of comfort for me in this, because it means it’s not just me he’s lied to, he’s lied systematically to the therapist he was paying to see. Is this something people do when they see a psychotherapist – lie about every aspect of themselves? Doesn’t that defeat the purpose?’

  ‘It’s never happened to me before, as far as I know,’ said Maxine, ‘but it’s not unheard of, particularly with conditions like David’s. When there’s a lot of shame, they try to block out everything that matters most to them by not talking about it. Giving you and his children false names would have allowed him a sense of separation between you three and what he came to me for help with. But I should have picked up on it, and I’m very disappointed in myself that I didn’t trust my instinct that those names sounded odd.’

  Polly licked her lips. Her mouth had gone dry and the glass of water wasn’t helping. The false names had really brought it home to her.

  ‘Is he very ill?’ she asked quietly.

  Maxine sighed.

  ‘He’s not great, Polly,’ she said. ‘What I have to tell you is difficult – but I know that what you’ve been living with since he left like that has been very hard too.’

  ‘It has been a testing time,’ said Polly, feeling the tears prickling.

  Not again, she thought. I’m turning into a human fountain. Who haven’t I cried on recently?

  Maxine pushed a box of tissues towards her.

  ‘I’ve been doing a lot of this,’ she said, pulling one out.

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ said Maxine.

  ‘I should have come to see you when you offered that time, to talk about my mum. We might have found out this connection a lot sooner.’

  Maxine smiled sadly.

  ‘I don’t think we would have,’ she said. ‘David is a very smart man, as you know, and he covered his tracks impeccably. He didn’t slip up on those names once. I’ve checked all my notes.’

  They sat there for a moment. Polly felt she could hear the the blood rushing in her veins. It was her last moment of not knowing, and she felt as though she were standing on the edge of a cliff about to jump off.

  ‘So what is it, Maxine?’ she said. ‘I need to know now – what is the big deal?’

  ‘He suffers from intrusive thoughts,’ said Maxine slowly. ‘It’s a clinical term for a form of obsessive–compulsive disorder in which the patient can’t control unwelcome thoughts that come repeatedly into their head.’

  Polly said nothing, trying to take it in.

  ‘You know when you get an ear worm from a catchy song?’ Maxine continued.

  Polly nodded.

  ‘Well, intrusive thoughts are like that,’ said Maxine, ‘and just as you don’t want to keep hearing that wretched song in your head, you don’t want to think the thoughts. But they keep coming back and back and back until you can’t think about anything else. The more you try not to think them, the more they occupy your mind.’

  Polly thought for a moment.

  ‘Like when you’re a teenager and you can’t stop thinking about a boy?’ she asked.

  Or a grown woman, for that matter, thinking about a man.

  ‘A bit like that,’ Maxine replied, ‘but these are very disturbing, unsettling thoughts. Ideas that the person who has them doesn’t want to share, or impulses to do things they really don’t want to do, but they can’t stop thinking them.’

  ‘What kinds of things?’ asked Polly, starting to feel more uneasy.

  Maxine shifted in her seat now, looking really uncomfortable.

  ‘Sometimes it’s very offensive racist thoughts. Or another example might be for a woman who has been triggered by post-natal depression to have uncontrollable intrusive thoughts of wanting to harm her child.’

  ‘Oh, my God,’ said Polly, her hand flying up to her mouth.

  Maxine patted her knee in a gesture of reassurance.

  ‘She doesn’t really want to harm the child, and she won’t harm it,’ she said. ‘She loves the child as any mother does, but she still can’t stop the intrusive thoughts. That’s what’s so awful about it for the patient. These thoughts are completely disconnected from their true feelings. It’s a very distressing condition.’

  ‘Are those the kinds of thoughts David’s been having?’ asked Polly. ‘That he wants to harm our kids?’

  ‘No,’ said Maxine. ‘It’s nothing to do with you or the family, but his line of intrusive thinking is particularly difficult and it’s made him very unhappy. He went to live on his own in an attempt to get over it, and because he doesn’t want it to affect you.’

  Polly shook her head.

  ‘And he didn’t think going away under mysterious circumstances would affect me?’

  ‘He’s not t
hinking straight about anything, Polly,’ said Maxine, ‘that’s the whole thing in a nutshell.’

  Polly sat and thought for a moment before speaking again. She needed to digest it all.

  ‘So he’s having these awful thoughts,’ she said eventually, ‘whatever they are, but he’s not going to act them out, so he’s not actually a psycho, he just thinks like one. I think I’m glad he went away.’

  Maxine topped up their water glasses from a jug on her desk.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea, Polly?’ she asked.

  Polly shook her head. She felt nauseous from it all.

  ‘Did you know that flat he’s run away to is where we lived when we first met? It turns out he’s held on to it secretly for twenty years. Did he tell you that bit?’

  Maxine nodded. ‘He said he’d lived there with Jane.’

  ‘So has he had this problem all that time?’ said Polly. ‘The whole of our marriage?’

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ said Maxine, ‘but not so badly, it’s got much worse recently. He had a very bad episode when he was younger – before he met you – and knowing what that was like, he kept the flat on in case he ever needed somewhere to escape to. He has used it from time to time over the years, whenever he’s had a relapse.’

  Polly put her hands on her head and shook it from side to side.

  ‘So all those times he was supposed to be at conferences, or on a research trip, he was probably just hiding out in Holborn?’

  ‘Some of them, yes,’ said Maxine. ‘It’s been his way of dealing with it. Isolating and burying himself in work until he could control it again.’

  ‘Did he do anything else?’ asked Polly, finding it increasingly strange to talk about her husband as a third party. ‘Drink and drugs, the usual escape stuff?’

  ‘No,’ said Maxine. ‘Although that is a very common response in people with this condition. There’s also a tendency to be obsessed with rituals, routines and order, the more classic OCD symptoms, being very tidy—’

  Polly’s head snapped up. Tidy? It was practically David’s middle name, and while she wasn’t aware of any ‘rituals’, he did do things like lay out all his clothes the night before in the order he’d put them on and he always left the house at exactly the same time every morning. She’d always thought of that as just part of who he was – being professional about his job.