My body aches with the loss of running from my life. My limbs are cold and barely responsive, my torso feels solid and leaden, my head is a mass of cotton wool. Physically, I am like a classic car kept on the driveway that is stiffening, seizing up because it hasn’t been taken out for a long drive that will blow away the cobwebs, will encourage the parts to work as they are lubricated, oiled and forced to move.
My husband has been having an affair with my best friend.
That is why I want to run. I want to escape from all of this.
However, fear and shame and gossip are holding me hostage in my house. We are being studied, scrutinised, observed. Those who saw Mr Challey being carted off are probably waiting for the next instalment. The voices of a dozen whispers – speculating, wondering, condemning – are deafening in the still of the street. I’m not sure how it doesn’t bother Scott, when he is now so obsessed with the outward appearance of things, but it doesn’t. He’s taken the girls to school today and is going to drop into his office to pick up a few files. He told me this when the girls were there so I wouldn’t tell him to fuck off, speaking to me like everything was normal. To stop behaving as if anything could be all right between us ever again.
The gossip bothers me. It bothers me enough to stop me running and to have me doing this necessary clear-out of my workspace. It bothers me that people might have seen him going into her house and thought it odd. It bothers me that people out there might have known what was going on and looked at me pityingly. Tami Challey, the pathetic wife who knew nothing.
DING-DONG! KNOCK-KNOCK! Then the metallic creak of the letterbox, followed by a call of ‘Hell-oooh!’
Beatrix.
She’s on her second ‘Hell-oooh!’ as I run down the corridor, down the stairs to the front door. I snatch it open before she’s had a chance to straighten up and she almost falls through the door, barrelling into me. I stumble backwards, but manage to keep my balance. I throw myself at her, forcing her to take me in her arms.
‘I take it you’re pleased to see me, then,’ she says, as I practically swamp her slender frame.
‘You have no idea,’ I say.
‘Oh dear,’ she replies. ‘This doesn’t sound good. Come on, cup of char and a sit down then you can tell me everything.’
Instead of letting her go and walking through to the kitchen, I hang onto my friend. She’s the one sane person in this whole mess. It takes seconds to soak through her shoulder and she doesn’t even complain.
‘This is horrific,’ she says. ‘My goodness, Tami, it’s a wonder you’re still standing. You should have called me.’
I shake my head. ‘What could you have done?’
‘Lots of things,’ she replies. ‘Look at my shoulder, for instance, it’s perfect for soaking up tears. And I could have had the girls for sleepovers so you could talk to him. Where is he, by the way?’
‘Work, picking up files.’
‘At a time like this? When he should be here trying to talk to you?’ She shakes her head. ‘I’ll tell you what else I could have done, I could have warned off her ladyship.’
‘I don’t want that,’ I say. ‘And, if there’s any warning off to be done, I’ll do it. There’s no need for you to fall out with her, too.’
Her green eyes bulge out of her head. ‘No need to fall out with her?’ she shrieks, but quietly as if there is someone in the house. ‘She’s practically ruined your family. There’s every need to fall out with her. I can’t think of a time when there’s ever been more of a need to fall out with someone.’
My mouth curls upwards in a smile of sorts, I feel so heavy and sad. Bereaved, almost. ‘Scott did that,’ I say to her. ‘He’s ruined this family. Whatever’s gone on, it’s all down to the choices that Scott’s made.’
‘I hear you.’ Beatrix reaches her arms across the table and carefully wraps her long slender hands over my hands. ‘I totally understand.’
I’m not sure I do, to be honest, I think as I watch her hands. Her fingers are about two-thirds the width of mine so her hands are smaller, narrower. It seems odd to get comfort from someone who seems so much less substantial than me.
‘What do you think happened then?’ she asks, picking up her mug and tipping it to take a sip. She’s doing that to avoid making direct eye contact but still watching me and my reactions.
‘I don’t know what I think any more,’ I say to Beatrix. ‘This whole thing is trashing my life. I keep thinking that I don’t deserve this.’ Or do I? Is this the price I pay for not listening to my parents? Is this what I deserve for marrying someone from a ‘bad’ family who none of my family approved of, and for not going to university, and for not staying in London, and for taking pride in having gorgeous children who are the light of my life? Is this what happens when you think you know best and try to live your life as you please? You’re forced to live with the consequences, as huge or insignificant as they may be. In this case, those consequences are ginormous-antic, as Anansy would say. They are so huge they blot out the solar system, the stars he once wrote my name in.
Beatrix nods sadly. ‘I know what you mean,’ she says. ‘When my husband left after giving me the old “I love you but I’m not in love with you” speech which was actually a lie, he was simply shagging somewhore – I mean, someone else – I wished more than anything that I could have another reason for the end of my marriage. I wanted him to have had a knock on the head so he wasn’t himself, or something, anything that would mean the man I knew and loved wouldn’t be capable of cheating on me and then leaving.’
‘I hate him for what he’s done to me,’ I confess. ‘I hate both of them for what they’ve done. Sometimes I get so angry about it all, I swear I could kill them both with my bare hands.’
Beatrix nods. ‘I felt like that, too. It’s all normal. When my husband decided to come back for a while because he thought we could make things work – in other words his whore got cold feet about leaving her husband so he panicked – I remember wishing as I was making him dinner one night that I had time to grind up some glass and mix it in his food. I was being the perfect wife, you know, so that he wouldn’t leave me again, but I still had these flashes of intense hatred and anger where I could have murdered him. So I get what you’re saying, totally.’
It’s hard to think of Beatrix as someone who would feel such rage. She’s always been so calm and fun, she fills her world with dating and fine wine, yoga and zumba, Pilates and football. Her existence is the perfect balance of the single life interspersed with a taste of family life with us, which I think she must sometimes crave from the way she looks so hungrily at the girls. Plus she lives in her huge flat she has decorated exactly as she’s wanted. No ugly fireplaces for her. It’s difficult to imagine her having thoughts as murderous as mine have been over the past few hours.
I look her over, imagining myself feeling that comfortable again. Her features that are as fine-boned as the rest of her body, giving her a china-doll-like appearance; her complexion that’s always had that strawberries-and-cream look to it with or without make-up, her hair—whoa!
‘What happened to you?’ I shriek. Her hair used to be a mass of shiny red curls that spiralled all the way down her back, now she has a platinum blonde, chin-length bob. How did I not notice that? I must be so mired in my problems I didn’t even look at her.
Her face creases with a grin. ‘You like?’ she says, scrunching her fingers through the silky length of her tresses.
‘Yes, yes, I like,’ I reply. ‘When did that happen?’
‘This week. I walked past a hairdresser’s in Glasgow and I thought, I’m going for a change. I’ve been a bit flat lately so I thought this might liven me up. It’s worked a treat.’ She scrunches her fingers through her hair again. ‘You really like?’
‘Yes, I really like.’ I reply. She’s a different person, of course. You don’t go from red and long to short and blonde and stay the same. But it’s not a bad thing, at all. ‘It really suits you.’
‘I did a Skype call with Mum the other day and she hates it. But I told her, “Gentleman prefer blondes don’t you know, Mother? I’ve listened to what you said about me needing a man and it’s the only way to get a man.” Soon shut her up. Her husband couldn’t stop laughing.’
‘How is Mrs Beatrix’s Mum?’
‘Fine. She drives me potty, and I wish she didn’t live all the way over there in Sydney but she’s happy and I can’t wish for more than that, can I?’ Beatrix says, a huge smile on her face.
‘No,’ I reply.
‘It’ll be all right,’ she reassures me. ‘All this stuff with Scotty and Mirabelle will work itself out for the best and everything will be OK.’
‘I hope you’re right,’ I say.
‘It will, but let me say one thing. Don’t let yourself be pushed around on this. If you need Scotty to leave while you get your head together, you make him do that. My biggest regret from when my husband did this to me was that I didn’t throw him out the second I found out. He might have come back then, if I removed that option.’
‘We’ll see.’
‘I’m not saying you should do it, I’m just saying if that’s what you want, don’t be afraid of doing it. It’d serve him right.’
‘Enough about me,’ I say to her because making him leave is not something I’ve even considered. ‘Tell me everything about your date and the man from the plane.’
‘You are so going to regret saying that,’ she says.
For the next two hours, she takes me away from here and everything going on, and carries me on the waves of her words to another life that has nothing to do with me. It feels like the best two hours I’ve had in months.
Beatrix
You have a lot of explaining to do. Call me as soon as poss. Bea x
I LOVE Tami. She’s like the sister I never had. She’s such a warm, giving person. That makes it all the harder to say this, but I think she’s brought a lot of this on herself. Urgh. I feel awful even thinking that. But – hear me out now – if you look at the facts of the matter, it’s true. I wish it wasn’t. I wish I could look at their relationship from the outside and say it was a surprise, that he was insane to stray, but I can’t say those things without my pants instantly catching fire.
They’ve been barely surviving as a couple. When I met her, she was seven months gone with Cora and glowing. Remember, I’d met Scotty before and he’d dropped into conversation his wife was pregnant? I’d been keeping my eye out for her every time I passed their house on the way to George Street, the main street in Hove, but actually saw her coming out of WHSmith down there. She was wearing big sunglasses, her hair was loose, and she was grinning at people as she walked along, her hand constantly rubbing her large baby-filled stomach. I noticed her because of her smile, always at hand, and brightened the already luminescent beauty of her face even behind the sunglasses.
She was in front of me as I wandered home and my heart sort of skipped when she turned into Providence Close because I knew by sight most people who lived there, which meant she was probably her. The woman Scotty was married to.
‘Hi ya,’ I called as she was about to push her key into the front door lock. She turned and looked at me.
‘Hi,’ she said, and pushed her sunglasses onto the top of her head, her smile back on her face.
‘You’re Scotty’s wife?’ I said.
‘Yes, and you must be the friendly neighbour, Beatrix?’ she said.
‘Guilty.’
She grinned, although I didn’t think it was possible for her smile to get any wider, or for her to look any more radiant.
‘I’ve finally met one neighbour who’s my age now,’ she said. ‘I’m Tami.’
‘Oh, yeah, this road full of old giffers. I mean that in the nicest possible way, of course.’ I added, in case she thought I was a bitch. ‘So pleased you and Scotty have moved in.’
‘So pleased to be here. Can you come in for a coffee? It’d be nice to get to know you.’
I was meant to get back to work, my sales reports weren’t going to write themselves, but I wanted to look around the house and I wanted to talk to this woman. I wanted to know what sort of woman Scotty married, and what sort of woman chose a man like Scotty.
The afternoon was lost in laughing and joking and drinking cups of tea in the shell of their kitchen which was being remodelled. We sat there for so long that Scotty came home. Her whole body seemed to light up when she heard his key in the lock, and when he kissed her after kissing the baby hello, I noticed how her hand lingered on him, wanting to keep touching him for as long as possible.
Contrast that with now. When was the last time I saw a smile on Tami’s face about something that Scotty had done or simply who he was? She didn’t become radiant and luminescent around him or when talking about him any more. Sometimes, I’d be sitting at the dinner table and she would barely glance in his direction. She would serve him his meal and there’d be no secret smile to tell him she loved him, no extra portion to show he was number one, no surreptitious wink to reveal she thought he was the sexiest man alive.
Over the years, Tami has become all about the kids. All about feeding them, getting them ready for school, homework, activities, play, development, bed, Cora, Anansy, Cora, Anansy, Cora, Anansy. Where was the space for Scotty? Where did he fit in with the grand scheme?
I’d asked them both that question once about two-and-a-half years ago, when I was trying to get them to see their relationship was under threat.
‘Nowhere, clearly,’ Scott said so dejectedly I thought my heart would break for him.
‘Where does Scott fit in?’ Tami replied. ‘Where do I or the girls fit in with his life is what you should be asking.’
‘But he feels shut out of everything here, I’m sure of it.’
‘So you think I should peel his grapes and suck his cock a bit more to change that?’ she said, shocking me with her language. That wasn’t what I’d expected from her at all. ‘What about me? I do all the housework and all the childcare as well as working. Are you saying on top of all that I’m expected to make sure he’s feeling loved and valued, too? Who’s meant to do that for me?’
I shrugged at her because she sort of had a point.
‘Scott is the love of my life. But I can’t help thinking if he was more involved with day-to-day family life – you know, doing the laundry or Hoovering once in a while, even being home in time to put the girls to bed – he might feel more a part of things. Plus we’d both have more time for each other.’
I wish I’d made her listen, I wish I’d made her see that a man like Scotty needs adulation to feel complete. He needs to feel wanted and needed. Hoovering, laundry, putting the girls to bed wasn’t going to change the basic fact that Scotty was an alpha male and alpha males need to be as close to worshipped as they can get.
He wasn’t completely blameless, oh no. He should have taken more of an interest in her. Bought her flowers, little presents, even a bit of sexy underwear. I told him this. He’d squeezed his face and said she’d flip if he bought her underwear because then she’d have to have sex with him and that wouldn’t happen. If they’d both tried, they wouldn’t be here today.
Don’t even think of ignoring me, Scotty. This isn’t going to go away. Bea x
I knew, too, that this thing with Mirabelle was going to blow up. A few weeks back, Scotty managed to get us tickets to one of the Premier League end-of-season matches up in London. We didn’t support either of the teams, can barely remember who it was that was playing come to think of it, but they were corporate tickets for the private box and it was a chance to see a live match and you just don’t pass up those opportunities. We went up on the train because we both fancied a drink with the posh lunch we were going to be served. A few people from his work were going too, so we’d had to dress up for the occasion. I’d said I’d look after the girls so Tami could go, but she’d said, ‘I’d rather stick knitting needles in my eyes’ so I’d gone. Which I was secretly pl
eased about since I LOVE football. On the way there and during the match he’d seemed happy and unburdened. We drank, laughed, joked – even managed to watch some of the game – and then we had to get a car back on the company account because we missed the train home. The closer we drew to Brighton the quieter he became until he confessed – after much prompting from me – he was dreading going home, dreading seeing Mirabelle at work on Monday or on the street any time.
‘Why, Scotty?’ I asked, concerned by how down he seemed.
‘She’s … she’s been giving me the come on,’ he said. ‘I’m finding it hard to say no.’
‘What, you’re into her?’ I asked, horrified. ‘You want to start something up with her?’
‘Of course not,’ he reassured, ‘I’m just finding it hard to get her to leave me alone. Tami has no idea what she’s really like.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘Get tough with her,’ he said, like it was some great effort. A person like him didn’t run an international company by being squeamish. ‘I’m scared, though, she’s going to go crying sexual harassment or something.’
‘Urgh! Women like that make me sick. They make it hard for all of us women in business.’
Scotty’s gaze rested quite affectionately on me but he didn’t say anything.
‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ I asked.
‘Tami wouldn’t see it that way. She’d be asking without asking if there was any merit to Mirabelle’s claims. She thinks women have it tough in the corporate world.’
‘Only if you choose to be a victim,’ I said to him.
‘Exactly,’ he said. ‘That’s exactly it. It’s nice to talk to someone who understands for a change.’
I can’t abide women like Mirabelle. I can’t abide Mirabelle herself, either. Tami tried several times to get us to be all matey but I couldn’t stick her. Maybe it’s because even back then I got a sense Mirabelle was after Scotty.
OK, seeing as you can’t seem to find your dialling or texting finger, I’ll just go out with the new guy at work instead of babysitting the girls like I planned so you can go out to talk. It’s fine if I’m the only one wanting to save things here. I’ll leave you alone now. Bea x