by Ruth Heald
‘I’ll be out of place. I won’t know anyone.’
‘Where else can you go?’
‘I don’t know.’ I don’t want to change things now, not when I’ve got everything planned. ‘We wouldn’t need to stay with you for long. Just for a few days, then we could find somewhere else.’
‘It’s against the rules. I’m sorry.’ She sounds frustrated. But it’s my life that’s about to be turned upside down. Not hers.
I don’t know what I’m going to do.
‘Look, you have to leave him,’ she insists. ‘You have to go to the shelter.’
I reach up and touch my face. My eye smarts from where he hit me this morning. I don’t have a choice any more. I need to leave.
‘Promise me you’ll go.’ She seems genuinely worried for my safety and for a moment I soften towards her. Perhaps it really is against the rules for me to stay with her. Perhaps she does care.
‘OK.’
‘When?’
I sigh, resigned. I’ve run out of options.
‘I’ll leave on Tuesday, as planned.’
Twenty-Eight
When I wake, I’m surprised to see I’ve slept for four solid hours. I’d been so sure that I wouldn’t be able to sleep in the cottage any more, but exhaustion must have overwhelmed me. The day stretches endlessly ahead of me. I’ve no idea what to do with myself and Olivia. For once, she’s still asleep. I browse through baby groups on my phone. The nearest ones are in Oxford, half an hour away. It doesn’t seem worth it.
I wish I wasn’t alone. If only I’d been able to stay with Emma. It’s moments like this that I long for Matt beside me.
I check my phone and see I’ve got a new email.
From the editor of the paper.
I think of the conversation Emma and I had yesterday. She’s right. There is a way out of the mess I’m in. If I could start over again in London, escape the village, I’m sure I’d be happier.
I hold my breath as the email loads.
It’s short and to the point and it takes me a moment before I realise that it’s not what I’m expecting and the smile slips from my face. The two polite lines of text tell me there are no vacancies at the moment, but he’ll keep me in mind and wishes me luck.
I sigh with disappointment. First Emma and now this. Yet another door has closed, another escape route blocked.
I’m not moving to London any time soon. I’ll need to find somewhere else to live.
Olivia wakes and her cries pull me out of my racing thoughts. As I lift her out of her cot, I hear a key in the door. I freeze, looking down at my unwashed pyjamas in alarm. I’m in no state for visitors.
‘Hello?’ I call out tentatively.
I hear voices downstairs. A man and a woman. I’m sure the woman is Ruth.
I put Olivia back down in the cot, quickly brush my hair and run downstairs to the sound of Olivia’s screams.
Ruth is muttering under her breath as she moves my washing up from last night away from the sink and into the corner. A suited man sits at the kitchen table, fiddling with an expensive camera.
She glances at me. ‘That’s the tenant,’ she says to the man.
He holds out his hand to shake mine. ‘Ryan,’ he says. ‘Estate agent.’
‘Hi,’ I say, feeling exposed and vulnerable in my dressing gown.
I glare at Ruth. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Ryan’s just here to take a few photos for the listing and then we’ll be out of your way.’
Anger rises in me and I flush. They have no right to come into my house early in the morning and take photos without asking.
‘Could you come back another time? It’s not convenient.’
Ryan’s voice is as smooth as silk. ‘It will only take half an hour.’ He turns away from me, towards Ruth. ‘We can get some really good photos of this place. It’s rustic. Lots of original features. I already have a few buyers on my list who I know will be interested.’
Olivia’s cries from upstairs are getting louder, more urgent.
‘This isn’t a good time,’ I say.
Ruth turns to me. ‘Do you want me to go and get your daughter?’ she says pointedly, glancing at the ceiling, Olivia’s screams echoing from above.
‘I’ll go,’ I say quickly. There’s no way she’s going near my daughter. Not after the note and the smoke alarm.
As I go up the stairs, I can hear snippets of Ruth’s conversation with the estate agent. ‘Volatile,’ she says. ‘I’ll be glad to be rid of her.’
I resist the desire to go back down and have it out with her. I pick up Olivia and start her morning feed. Thinking of the mess downstairs, I feel embarrassed that it will be displayed online in the photos on the estate agent’s listing, for all to see.
When I come back downstairs, Ryan is in my living room, taking pictures. All my photos from the mantelpiece have been taken down, and my picture of the Vietnamese motorcyclist has been put out of sight of the camera.
‘Where are my photos?’ I whisper to Ruth angrily.
‘In the sideboard in the dining room. They needed to be moved out the way for Ryan.’
‘Why didn’t you let me know he was coming round?’
She turns and looks me right in the eye. ‘If you won’t respect my things, then I won’t respect yours.’
‘I’ve always respected your house.’
‘Have you? Then why did I find bin bags of my mother’s things in the study when I was clearing out the wardrobes?’ She turns to me, her eyes bitter.
‘I – I – it was only opened toiletries, old tights. That kind of thing. Rubbish.’
‘Rubbish?’ She raises an eyebrow. ‘So my mother’s belongings are rubbish?’
‘No – that’s not what I meant. I just wanted a bit of space for my things.’ But my mind is racing. She found her mother’s things the same day I found the scarf. Could she have planted it as revenge? That would mean Matt hadn’t cheated on me. That he’d been telling the truth all along.
* * *
When Ruth is gone, I start to put the house back in order. I put the picture of the motorcyclist back up and go over to the wooden sideboard to find my photos. The drawers are overfull, jammed shut and I struggle to get them open. I see my framed photos have been shoved in carelessly, on top of a pile of other family photographs belonging to Pamela. Curious, I pull out a few. Mostly they are of people I don’t recognise in black and white. Weddings. Birthdays. Grinning faces, long dead.
Then I see a familiar face, smiling out from the bottom of the pile in colour. Matt. I pull it out. He’s with Sarah, at a circular table, arms around each other, smiling happily. A bride stands behind them, her hands resting on the back of their chairs, beaming into the camera. Matt’s sister.
They’re at Matt’s sister’s wedding.
I gasp.
The wedding took place just before Matt and I got together. I remember, because when I first met his sister, she showed us the photos from her honeymoon. Were Matt and Sarah a couple when his sister got married?
He told me they’d split up when they were teenagers, but that can’t be true. He was with her just before we got together. Why would he lie? Had he two-timed her with me?
That would explain why Sarah has always been hovering around Matt since we moved here. They clearly have unfinished business. The job at the surgery. Befriending Ruth. Was it all to get closer to him?
And eventually it worked. He cheated on me with her.
I swallow. I can hardly believe that just a few hours ago, I was starting to believe Matt, to think there might be another explanation, that Ruth might have planted the scarf.
I feel sick. Nothing is going my way and there’s no escape. Matt cheated on me and Ruth wants me out of the house. I can’t move in with Emma and there’s no job in London. I’m trapped.
I need to get out of the cottage. I can’t think straight.
* * *
I grab Olivia’s coat from the hook and push her arms through the slee
ves. It’s too small and I can’t do up the zip. I find a jumper a few sizes too big for her and put it on over the coat. Olivia squirms as I strap her in the buggy and leave the house, locking the chaos inside.
Outside, the air is fresh, and grey clouds are threatening to burst. My trainers pound on the wet pavement, as I speed through the streets, hoping to miss the rain. In my rush I’ve forgotten my umbrella.
The threatened rain comes and I tilt my face up to the sky, letting the drops bounce over my skin and run down my cheeks like tears. Olivia’s pram is getting wet, and the footmuff is already soaking. I pull the canopy over her so she’s partially covered. I hope the rain doesn’t seep through into her clothes.
I’m rubbish at this. Rubbish at looking after Olivia. Rubbish at life.
I keep walking, as fast as I can. I feel the urgent need to escape. To run away to anywhere but here. Outside the confines of the countryside. Outside the confines of my family.
I walk and walk and walk. Faster. Faster. Pensioners mill around in the village centre, ignoring me as I weave in and out between them with the buggy. I’m invisible.
When I reach the outskirts of the village, I go down tree-lined streets, rows and rows of identical semis with tarmacked driveways. I peer through the windows at the lives inside. A woman ironing. A child playing. A television flickering. Glimpses of domesticity. Lives that radiate warmth through the double-glazed windows.
This is not my life. This is not me.
I need a drink.
The welcoming amber glow of a pub window casts light into the heavy air.
The sign swings in the wind.
I realise I’m starving. I never got round to having breakfast. These days I keep forgetting. I haven’t been on the scales lately but I can feel my clothes getting looser. My jeans hang off me and my belt is on the tightest setting. A while back I would have been pleased with this development, but now it worries me. It’s not healthy. I’m tired all the time. I need the energy from food, but I can’t seem to remember to eat, or when I do remember, I’m just not hungry. I grab the occasional sandwich here and there, some ready meals from the supermarket, but I have no interest in cooking. Without Matt I can’t seem to maintain any sense of time or routine. The days roll endlessly into each other. Just me and Olivia. Battling through, waiting for the time to pass to when she’s old enough to leave home and I can have my life back.
* * *
I go into the pub. There must be an office nearby because inside there are tables of suited men and high-heeled women. I’m an anomaly in my joggers and trainers, and yet again I’m invisible. They’re immersed in their chatter, their deals and their sales targets, their banter and their ambition. I’m an aside, a woman alone in a pub with a buggy and a baby.
I park the buggy at a table by the window. Olivia’s sleeping, so I leave her there, and squeeze past an overflowing table of office workers to get to the bar.
‘What will it be, love?’
‘A glass of white wine. Sauvignon please.’ I love the way the word sounds on my tongue. It’s like I’m trained to say it. Years and years of the same order. The after-work release of a glass of Sauvignon. The dinners in a restaurant with a bottle or two. So many good memories. How could I have ever stopped? I need this. All along I’ve needed this.
‘It’s a bottle for a tenner on Wednesdays. Do you want to upgrade? A large glass is six pounds anyway, so it’s not much extra.’
‘OK,’ I say, strumming my fingers on the bar agitatedly.
I watch as the barman goes to the fridge and pulls out a bottle. I could stop him. I could call him back and ask for just a glass. He places the bottle in front of me and unscrews the cap.
‘How many glasses?’
He’s assumed I have company. Of course he has. It’s Wednesday lunchtime and I’m ordering a bottle of wine.
‘Two,’ I say quickly. I wonder if he’s humouring me, if he’s seen me coming into the pub on my own with Olivia.
‘My friend will be arriving shortly. We’re meeting for lunch.’ I’ve overdone it. Over-explained. He wasn’t even asking. But now he looks over to the buggy and I see a slight rise of his eyebrows. He knows. I need a drink so badly, I don’t even care.
I tap my card to pay and then take the bottle in one hand and the glasses in the other.
‘Thanks,’ I say cheerfully, as if it’s just another day.
He’s already at the other end of the bar, washing glasses.
I make my way back to the table, telling myself I’ll only have one glass and then take the rest of the bottle back home. I can have a glass or two this evening to wind down.
I sigh with anticipation as I pour the wine slowly, watching it tumble into the glass, and listening to the glug glug sound of the glass filling. I swirl it round and breathe in deeply through my nose like a seasoned wine taster, forgetting for a moment I’m just in the local pub. I let the wine sit on my tongue for a moment, feeling the sharp tang of cheap alcohol. I swallow, feeling better already.
I look at the people around me. The office workers on the table beside me are already drunk. The conversation has risen to a crescendo of laughter that seems to surround me and Olivia on our lonely island table.
But I feel more at home in the pub than in the cottage.
I think of Sarah, how pleased she must be now she’s finally got what she wanted. I wonder if Matt will eventually move in with her. I wonder why he hasn’t already. Surely he’d prefer to move in with his mistress than his domineering mother? Perhaps she lives too far away.
I don’t want to think about Matt and Sarah, I just want to enjoy the sensation of the cold wine gliding down my throat. But my curiosity gets the better of me, and I pick up my phone and load up my subscription to a site that tracks the electoral roll. I find Sarah easily. She lives on her own in a flat in the village. One of the new builds that Ruth says ruin the look of the place.
I look up the address on Google Maps and then on Street View. It’s just an ordinary flat. Going back into the address listing, it tells me who’s lived there in the last twenty years. Sarah’s been there ages, mostly on her own.
But not the whole time.
Seven years ago, the year Matt met me, Matt was registered at the address too.
Matt was living with her when we first met. He lied to me.
Twenty-Nine
When the doorbell goes late the next afternoon, I know it’s Matt. He’s looking after Olivia while Emma and I have our night out. It’s an arrangement that works for both of us. Matt gets the access to his daughter and I get a night off.
I’m not sure what I’ll say to him. Now I know he’s been lying to me from the very beginning of our relationship, the trust between us has completely gone. He should have told me about Sarah right from the start.
I open the door hesitantly. Outside, the weather is bleak. The rain pours down behind Matt, a sheet of grey, accentuating his shadow across my doorway. The water droplets in his hair reflect the light. His deep brown eyes bore into mine and, despite myself, I can’t help but feel the familiar surge of affection. But I push the feeling down, remembering the photo of him and Sarah at the wedding.
‘Come in,’ I say.
He nods, and steps into the cottage.
He reaches over to hug me awkwardly, and as we embrace I breathe in the scent of his wet leather jacket, his aftershave. His face is close to mine, his breath hot on my cheek. I want to bury my face in his neck, to forget everything. But I can’t.
‘I brought some toys.’ He holds up the carrier bag in his hand.
‘You shouldn’t have.’
I should offer him a drink, but I don’t. He knows where the coffee is. I leave him with Olivia while I go to get ready.
Upstairs, I strip and critique my body in the mirror. It’s far from perfect: I’ve lost weight and yet my stomach still protrudes over the top of my knickers. My breasts sag. I run my hands over the white stretch marks that curve over my stomach and thighs.
&nb
sp; I reach into the cupboard, take out a dress and pull it on over my head. It looks dowdy, mumsy. Too long. Too floral. I take it off and take out another one. Shorter, silvery. It looks good. I look good. I smile at myself in the mirror and then pout, projecting a confidence that belongs to someone else. I do my make-up quickly and go back down the stairs to the living room.
Matt looks me up and down.
‘You look beautiful,’ he says.
‘Matt, don’t.’
‘Claire––’
‘You know where everything is,’ I say. I point to the pile of sheets I’ve placed on floor by the TV. ‘The sheets for the sofa bed are over there.’
‘Can’t I just sleep in our bed?’
‘No, you can’t. I’m sleeping there when I’m back. There’s food in the fridge or you can order takeaway. Bottle of wine in the fridge.’
‘Mum was right. You’re drinking again?’
‘It’s none of your business.’
‘It is my business. You’re my wife. I’m worried about you.’
I feel a flush of shame. He can see through me, see that I’m struggling.
He reaches out to touch my shoulder. ‘It’s OK. It must be hard for you on your own. Listen, I could move back in here for a bit. It doesn’t have to be forever. Just for a little while. To help you out with Olivia and get you back on your feet.’
A part of me desperately wants to say yes. After all, I still love him. But I can’t ignore all the lies he’s told me.
‘No, Matt.’
My words sit heavy in the air between us.
‘I’ve got to go and meet Emma,’ I say.
‘Claire, you’ll be careful, won’t you? With alcohol?’
‘Of course.’ I’ll just have one or two drinks. I won’t go overboard.
He reaches out, embracing me. ‘You promise?’
‘Yes.’ For a moment, I let myself lean into his strong chest. I feel tears welling up in my eyes. I long to stay in his arms forever. To pretend everything’s OK.
But I can’t.