‘Did Sam seem depressed from his most recent messages?’
‘I wouldn’t know. What about his girlfriend? Wouldn’t she know better than me? Sam and I have been split up for a while.’
‘Yet not divorced?’
Unfortunately not.
‘Like I said, he was in Mexico. It made things more complicated.’ I pause. ‘How is his girlfriend?’ I’m trying to shine the attention back on her.
‘She is being reassured and looked after by her family.’
‘Did they have an argument?’ I persist. ‘I’m wondering if she is a suspect?’
‘She is a witness.’
It doesn’t answer my question but I don’t want them spending too much time on me.
‘Sam had a temper,’ says Lewis.
I wish he wasn’t here. He isn’t helping.
‘I should offer you some tea or coffee,’ I say, hoping that Lewis will take the hint and make it for them.
‘No, thanks,’ both officers say simultaneously.
I hope it means that they won’t be here much longer.
‘Was he ever violent towards you?’
‘No,’ I lie.
Silence.
‘It doesn’t make any sense,’ I say. True. ‘Sam wasn’t stupid.’ Also true. ‘He was experienced in sea life. He wouldn’t have gone near a cliff-edge in the dark and the rain.’
I stop. Had it rained recently? Yes. I remember seeing the drops beneath the Narnia lamp.
‘He was a croupier,’ I add, as though that explains something.
The police officers look at me. I can’t remember what they said their names were. Their impassive expressions suggest that they are mentally studying me to see if I give anything away. Good luck to them. I spent years walking through customs not attracting suspicion. Sam helped me to perfect my poker face.
Yet, I can’t help picturing the scene. I know from ‘man overboard’ drills that if Sam did go over a cliff into the sea, the odds are against survival, however much I used to try to reassure passengers that the crew would do everything they could, should the worst happen. ‘Just don’t try to climb the railings,’ I would always advise. ‘Especially after a cocktail or two.’ Ha, ha type of thing.
The reality was that unless someone saw a person fall in (preferably in daylight, of course), it would be near-impossible for rescuers to locate the right spot – even with a floating dummy.
‘I’m really sorry that I can’t be of more help,’ I say now. ‘If I could think of something useful to add, I would.’ Untrue.
I know a lot that I can never tell.
After the police leave, with a promise to keep me informed that feels more like a threat than a goodbye line, I feel . . . numb.
The truth is, I never wished Sam any harm. I just wanted him to go away. Wanted him to pay me what he owed and to find gradual disillusionment with someone else. Someone who was a match for him; someone who would keep him in line. I wanted him to be someone else’s problem. We made a big mistake. We tried to tame each other. It was never going to work.
I accept the glass of vodka that Lewis hands me and down it, the burning sensation in my throat giving way to the warmth of numbness. He drinks his quickly too and pours us another.
‘Oh my God,’ says Lewis. ‘That was unreal. I am sorry about Sam, though. How are you feeling? It must all be a real shock.’
I wish I could tell Lewis the truth, what I’m truly afraid of. But I can’t for fear of seeing the shock in his eyes. Of losing my oldest friend.
He stays up late with me, dissecting the news. Sam has hundreds of online friends. His posts were always fake. Still, I click on the comments.
Mate, get in touch. Let us know you are safe.
Thoughts and prayers.
Anyone up for setting up an independent search party?
I find his girlfriend, Penny. She has posted a picture of a broken heart, and has been inundated with comments of love and support. She kind of looks like Ingrid, but Sam . . . he never had a type.
No one mentions me, which is good. Sometimes, I wonder how many people even knew Sam had a wife. I search for Ingrid but cannot find any matching profiles. I do another search for Alexandra while I’m at it. Again, nothing new.
Lewis offers words of comfort and advice, unaware that there is nothing he can say or do to help me. He has no idea that I do not want the police digging into Sam’s past. The very thought fills me with terror.
I pretend to be fine. Lying to Lewis does not make me feel good about myself.
Although he may not know everything about me, he does understand the pain of disadvantage. He gets what it must have felt like not to be able to see properly as a child whenever my glasses broke, or were deliberately broken. I don’t need to explain the agony of picking up bent metal frames from the playground, knowing that I would have to deal with the vulnerability of semi-blindness. OK, maybe that’s a bit dramatic, but that’s what it felt like at the time – until they were mended or on the rare occasion I got a new pair. I didn’t want to cause my mother any ‘stress’. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I knew that stress was bad.
Lewis’s thing was soggy socks when the holes in his shoes grew so large that the cardboard patches leaked.
The sheer joy of being able to buy new items will never leave me.
At midnight, I try calling Sam again. I don’t believe for a second that he is dead. I don’t believe he went over the side of a cliff. I believe he did it on purpose to hide from Whoever It Is, to throw them off the scent. Or, even worse, to send them my way. If I’m gone, there are no witnesses to what we did. No one who can spill the beans about Sam’s true nature.
My thoughts scatter in an explosion of catastrophic scenarios: prison, death, a life on the run. Maybe I left it too late for any intended new leaf.
Sam is out there, somewhere, reinventing himself. I’m sure of it. If it has got that bad, then he will want me to take sole blame. But he has made an error. I am not the woman he married.
Utterly exhausted, I finally give in to sleep.
When I come round, it is to the familiar early-morning traffic noises, which, on the whole, are pretty universal unless I’m out at sea. A pang of homesickness permeates my consciousness. The sounds of being on land are a constant reminder of all I have lost.
There’s no hiding from the truth. I have been in constant denial as I have tried to readjust, lying to myself and telling myself that this life is fine. Every time I have to change my own bedding, put out the bins, go to a supermarket, travel to work, decide what to wear, clean, do admin, deal with the mundane necessities to make my life merely liveable – then I realise how perfect I had it. Even the bad bits. Being at sea meant not having to deal with anything. I need a better plan because my values ebb and flow according to the level of danger I am in.
Unwelcome memories from yesterday flood back. My phone rings. Unknown number.
‘Hello?’
Silence.
Just as I’m about to hang up, I hear a deep voice.
‘You haven’t responded to my request.’
‘Who is this? What are you talking about?’
‘Blood money,’ says a robotic, distorted voice. ‘Haven’t you ever heard of retributive justice?’
Icy fear forms in the pit of my stomach.
‘Wrong number,’ I say as I disconnect, but not before I hear the voice say:
‘An eye for an eye.’
I don’t like the sound of retributive justice, which is clearly the point. It conjures up all sorts of horrible, violent images.
The call disconnects. Hands shaking, I call Sam again. No ring tone, nothing. It is as if he truly has disappeared, leaving me to fend for myself.
My phone rings again. My hands are still shaking as I pick it up to tell Whoever It Is to leave me alone, but it is my sister, Louise. Relief.
I tell her about my visit from the police as a distraction. Louise never met Sam but said that he sounded like a snake. She would kn
ow. Upon my return, I was cagey about why we had split up but she said that it had all sounded like a true case of ‘Marry in haste, repent at leisure’. Again, she would know. She is stuck with Deceitful Drew.
‘There was a plant left here for you,’ she says. ‘On my doorstep.’
‘A plant?’
‘Yes. There’s a card addressed to you. Shall I open it?’
‘OK,’ I say, even though I have a bad feeling about it.
‘No place to hide,’ Louise reads out. ‘Strange. It doesn’t say who it’s from. It’s an expensive-looking potted plant though,’ she adds. ‘I’ll send you a picture. Wait . . .’
I open the photo. My screen fills with the magenta and pale pinks of an orchid. The exact type Sam used to buy me as an apology when he had done something wrong or had something to hide.
NINE
Then
The Caribbean
Sam pulled more strings by using his anonymous contacts and we transferred to a different ship, one that was less than two years old. My position was still in retail, this time in the largest gift shop. Nearly five thousand passengers were on board by the time we left Southampton for the Caribbean. The décor gleamed. Slate and silver dominated, but it didn’t feel dark or oppressive. The furniture still smelled newish and fresh. All the staff seemed to take extra pride. We had our own cabin – a rarity, and a relative luxury, despite the bunk beds. Sam knew some of the staff, and he’d arranged for us to accidentally sneak into unoccupied suites. Strictly forbidden, a sackable offence – utterly addictive.
The penthouse suite, with its split-level living space and floor-to-ceiling windows with endless ocean views, was my favourite. We would swing in the hammock chairs on the balcony, sunbathing or drinking coffee at sunrise. Sam and I also loved sitting in the Jacuzzi, drinking fine reds or port while planning our future. We would dream of owning our own yacht, hiring our own staff, the world really, truly, being our oyster.
Although it wasn’t ideal, not yet, we had each other. But even then, I should have known that it wouldn’t be enough for Sam. Nothing ever was. So when he took his petty schemes to the next level, I shouldn’t have been surprised. But somehow, I still was. That’s the thing I don’t always take into account when I look back: Sam’s timing was impeccable. He always knew exactly when to push us to the next stage. Actually, that’s not entirely true. He knew exactly when to push me.
‘There’s this woman . . .’ he said, late one night.
At first, I wasn’t sure if I had heard him correctly above the noise of the water jets.
I couldn’t see the horizon. It was dark, but we had the patio doors open so I could still sense the vastness. Sometimes, lying with my eyes closed, warm water bubbling around me, alcohol relaxing my mind, I would imagine the ocean below us. I would picture the world unfolding in my mind – the different types of fish, coral, dancing green and blue seaweed, sharks seeking prey, crabs skittering across the seabed.
Sam’s words crashed into my dreams.
‘Her name is Betty,’ Sam continued. ‘Her husband, Jim, he seems like a nice man. He was in a car accident several years back and has trouble walking off the beaten track, so to speak. We were all chatting in the casino last night and I offered to take Betty sightseeing in Aruba tomorrow. She loved the idea. You’re down to work all morning, but how about you offer to take Jim to the games room and play cards with him in the afternoon?’
‘Why don’t I join you and Betty?’
A flicker of annoyance crossed his expression before he smiled at me.
‘Because she feels bad about leaving Jim. She’s fed up with en-masse guided tours on her own. I thought I could take her. She’s keen on the donkey sanctuary and the butterfly farm.’
‘Is she, now?’
‘Don’t be like that,’ he said. ‘They are loaded – the real deal. We’ll be helping them out and they’ll be appreciative when it comes to cash tips at the end of their cruise. Think of the money. Think of our future.’
‘I just have a bad feeling about it,’ I said. Sam took my champagne glass from me, placed it on the side. Then he kissed me.
‘Trust me,’ he said. ‘I’m doing this for us. We have talked about this. There’s no way we can earn enough between us to set up on our own unless we have the odd harmless sideline or two. We’re not hurting anyone. We’re not doing anything wrong. Jim is a nice man, seems really interesting. What’s the harm in keeping him company over a game of canasta?’
‘What? Just me and him? I get little enough downtime as it is.’
Sam always had one of two strategies. He either embellished details or over-simplified them. There was rarely a middle ground.
I broke away from him, stepped out of the Jacuzzi and began to towel myself dry. We always brought our own towels from our cabin. We had gotten into a routine. Sam’s friends would be understandably annoyed if the rooms were left anything other than pristine. He had an agreement with them (among the many agreements and arrangements Sam made with people): he usually brought a small towel to wipe down the Jacuzzi or any marks we had left on any surfaces; we would wash up the glasses, put them away, and take away our own bottles of fizz, or wine, or whatever we had brought. Sam’s secret skill was towel art – he would often re-model the ones on the bed or by the side of the bathtub. No one else ever knew we’d been there.
After Sam had dried himself and dressed, he took out his phone and began tapping while I cleared up. I hated it. I hated having to wipe away all evidence of my existence.
After sneaking out, back to our own cabin, discontent took hold. It felt like a comedown with nothing tangible to immediately look forward to. Our cabin, despite our best efforts, was dark and poky but at least we had His and Hers bathrobes, a memento Sam had taken from the hotel in Jamaica. They took up too much of our limited space, but it was the little touches in our cabin that made things bearable. Sam would bring flowers, or place chocolates on my pillow, replace the toiletries in our bathroom with the more luxurious guest ones. It made our lives feel less about work and more holiday-like. Until then.
It turned out Sam was right. Jim was at least interesting. We met in the games room. I nearly didn’t turn up but I felt guilty at the thought of just abandoning him while his wife was off seeing the sights. Jim had travelled widely. We shared stories of our favourite places. Mine was Italy; his was Japan. I mentally added Tokyo to my ever-growing wish list as we played gin rummy. He wasn’t the best card player and although I let him win occasionally, it was nice to not always lose. My mind kept drifting to Sam and what he was up to. I could picture him making Betty laugh.
Sam always played to win, was aggressive and merciless. Once, when I was getting close to winning, he pretended to lose interest in the game. He had pushed the cards off our bunk, so that they mixed up on the floor, all under the pretence that he desired me so greatly that he couldn’t wait a moment longer to undress me. I went along with it, that time. I accepted his inability to lose as a character quirk. Maybe I let too many of the little things slide in the beginning. Perhaps that was my mistake.
‘He seems like a nice young man, Sam,’ said Jim, as if he had sensed my distraction. ‘Very persuasive. Do you often spend your free time with guests?’
‘It depends,’ I said, unsure how to respond.
I glanced at my phone. Still no messages from Sam.
‘They’re late,’ Jim said, after checking his own phone. ‘Why don’t you come back to our suite for afternoon tea? I’ll order it for four. By the time the tea arrives, they’ll be back.’
‘I can’t accept, I’m afraid,’ I said. ‘We’re not supposed to visit guest cabins.’
Jim looked surprised.
‘But Sam came in for a tipple of cognac last night.’
News to me. I stayed silent. I hated being put in this position.
Jim, sensing my discomfort, didn’t push the issue.
‘I’ll walk back to the suite with you,’ I said. ‘But then I must head off.’<
br />
I wanted to get off the ship, stretch my legs on land. And phone Sam.
I walked slowly along the corridor with Jim. As he reached into his pocket for his key card, the door opened and Sam stepped out.
‘Hello!’ he said. ‘I was just on my way to find you both.’
But it was Betty, framed in the doorway, who caught my attention. Her expression was pure cat-that-got-the-shagging-cream. A sickness that I hadn’t experienced since Deceitful Drew cheated on me with my own sister, knotted my insides. I couldn’t look Jim in the eye. I quickly said goodbye and walked away as fast as I could, back to our cabin.
Sam followed.
‘What’s up?’ he said.
‘You must think I was born yesterday,’ I shouted as he shut the door behind him.
‘Don’t you want the best for us?’ he said.
‘Naturally,’ I replied. ‘But I don’t see how other women are best for us!’
He put his arms out to calm me, but I lashed out, my nails scratching him.
‘You’ve got totally the wrong idea,’ he said. ‘I’m not Drew.’
A low blow.
‘I know what I saw.’
‘No, you don’t.’
Sam denied, denied, denied, so much so that I began to doubt myself. Still, that evening, I slept on the top bunk, and he stayed on the bottom.
Over the next days and weeks, we both worked hard on different shift patterns. The slinking off to unoccupied suites ground to a halt, as did the gifts of chocolates and flowers.
Betty was a smoker. Sam and I enjoyed the occasional one too, and I found an engraved, silver lighter To Darling Betty in his bedside drawer. Another gift. I could just imagine what she’d said to Sam when he’d borrowed it – ‘Keep it, I have loads. Something to remember me by.’ I resisted the urge to hurl it into the ocean, but instead hid it away. There wasn’t anything Sam could say to accuse me, after all. It should never have been in our cabin.
The Ex-Husband Page 7