“I don’t want to think about it.”
“Something like this happens,” says Laura, “and suddenly you realize how vulnerable we all are. Anything could happen, any time.”
Henry’s undressing slowly, familiarly.
“But you can’t think like that, can you?” he says. “You have to carry on as if nothing bad will ever happen.”
“Isn’t that just sticking our heads in the sand?”
“Maybe,” he says. “But life has to go on somehow.”
“So you think it’s all right to go ahead with tomorrow evening?”
“I don’t see why not.”
He sounds tired. He’s had a hard day too.
“So what happened with Aidan?”
“Oh, Aidan tried to dress it up, but all they’ve got is a bog-standard director job. I’d be working to a series producer, an executive producer, and an editor.”
“That’s ridiculous. You can’t do that. You’ve always been the one in charge.”
“It’s a job.”
“Oh, darling. Did you say you’d do it?”
“I said I’d think about it.”
They move about the bedroom, both going through their accustomed rituals, exchanging information in short form, each aware of the mass of emotion that lies beneath.
“Roddy’s in an odd state,” Henry says. “He more or less told me he has some other woman.”
“Poor old Roddy. I almost wish he had. Can you imagine Diana?” In a Diana voice, “Don’t be so silly, Roddy! Put her down!”
When they’re both in bed and the lights are out, Henry says, “I’m glad the ring came back.”
“Me too.”
“What happened there?”
“Something to do with Toby, we think. Don’t worry. He’s going tomorrow.”
“He’s a lost soul, Toby.”
“Do you think so? I thought he was just the sort that would annoy you.”
“Maybe my standards are dropping as I get older. It seems to me that just about everyone has their own mountain to climb.”
“Even funny old Roddy.”
“Roddy most of all. He wants to let the ego die and float on the stream of life.”
They can both feel each other smiling, lying side by side in the darkness. Laura reaches out her hand and finds Henry’s hand.
SATURDAY
40
Maggie sits in the car in the station car park waiting for Andrew’s train. It’s running late. She’s much more nervous than she thought she would be, and she’s confused about why. Everything would be so much simpler if she knew what she wanted, but she doesn’t. She doesn’t even know what she feels.
I don’t want to have to choose any more. I want things to happen to me, and then to have to make the best of it.
Two of the station staff stand at the foot of the steps, heads down, shoulders hunched, snatching a cigarette. A woman is feeding coins into the parking-permit machine. Maggie has her car window open on this sunny morning, and can hear the coins dropping one by one. Then comes the sound of the approaching train. It makes gentle, squealing, rocking noises, like an enormous animal settling into its lair.
As always, she sees Andrew before he sees her. She feels a little rush of affection and relief, which catches her unawares. Did I really think he might not show up? He has a preoccupied air as he walks up the platform toward the exit. He carries a small rucksack slung over one shoulder, his usual weekend bag. He could be a husband, a father, coming home after a week away working to feed his family, anticipating the comfort and rest of a loving home. She could be a young wife with a bonny two-year-old on her lap, pointing him out as he strides toward them. “Look, here’s Daddy come home!”
Jesus, what’s wrong with me?
He opens the car door and folds himself into the passenger seat with a sigh of exhaustion.
“Only just caught the train,” he says. “Really late night.”
He doesn’t lean across to give her a token kiss, the way he usually does. She remembers he had a leaving party last night.
“How was it?”
“It was great. Quite emotional, actually. I wasn’t expecting it to be. But I’ve been there over two years. Duncan made a speech.”
“Did you make a speech?”
“I said a few words. Not my thing, really.”
She can feel his nervousness, which doesn’t help her own tension. She busies herself with the car, maneuvering it through the people crossing the car park.
“So you’re all set to start the new job on Monday?”
“More or less.”
He doesn’t say where he’s proposing to live, and she doesn’t ask, but it hangs unspoken between them. Andrew has never been one to take the lead when things need to be said. In the past this has annoyed her. Now it frightens her. His silence could mean much more than she knows. Perhaps he’s already sorted out a rented flat. Perhaps he’s going to live with Jo. This notion of a secret Andrew, an Andrew who could be living a life of which she knows nothing, gives her the oddest sensation. She knows this man better than any other man in the world, she can tell what he’s going to say before he even opens his mouth. How can he be a stranger?
“Did you manage to get any breakfast?”
“I thought I’d grab a coffee at Victoria, but there wasn’t time.”
“I’ve got some croissants at home.”
“Great.”
Croissants. Home. Next I’ll be producing the bonny two-year-old to bounce on his knee. “Look! Here’s Daddy!” Did I know when I was buying those croissants that they were for Andrew?
At some point they’ll have to stop playing this game that everything is just the same as it’s always been, but for now they are both in the grip of some instinctive etiquette that ordains a period of conventional courtesies. When two people meet there seems to be a certain minimum time required to pass before any real business can be transacted, as if their mobile phones have just been switched on and must search for an adequate signal before they can make or receive calls.
He looks out of the car window. There are paragliders above Mount Caburn, bright swatches of color against the blue sky.
“Are you up for a walk later?” she says. “I haven’t got out on the Downs all week.”
“Yes, sure,” he says. “I’d like that.”
They both know then that they’ve agreed to do the real talking when they’re out walking. This takes the pressure off the immediate present.
Maggie pulls the car into the little cobbled parking space in front of her cottage. She sees the way he looks round as he gets out and pushes open the iron gate into the front path. She can tell what he’s thinking as clearly as if he was speaking aloud. He’s thinking, Is this my last time here? Such a pretty garden, Maggie knows how to make a place welcoming, I shall miss it.
All her own imagining, of course, but the odd thing is she’s as grateful to him as if he has actually said the words. It’s good to have your home appreciated.
In the kitchen, she fills a kettle to make coffee in the cafetière, and puts three croissants in the oven.
“Butter?” she says. “Marmalade?”
His usual accompaniments.
“Please.”
She sips coffee, nibbles a croissant, along with him. The late breakfast makes them both feel better. He’s starting to relax. He looks at her across the kitchen table, and for the first time she meets his eyes without looking away. He gives her a little smile, a little shrug that says, So here we are.
“How’s your week been?” he says.
“Busy,” she says. “Confused.”
“Me too.”
“So I gather.”
He looks away, pouring himself more coffee.
“Have you talked to Jo?”
“Yes,” she says. “She told me what happened.”
“That was just stupid,” he says.
“How was it stupid?”
Suddenly they’re in the middle of it and she f
eels the tension rising in her. What’s stupid about having sex with someone? You do it because you want to do it. Call it disloyal, or callous, but it’s not stupid. It’s not like you do it by accident.
“Okay,” he says. “Not stupid. Just a really bad idea.”
“And you were drunk, right?”
“Not very. Jo was a lot drunker than I was.”
At least he’s not hiding. Not ducking and diving.
“It’s okay,” says Maggie. “I didn’t mean to start talking about that.”
She’s hurt, much more hurt than she ever expected. All right, so she’s not blameless, but she’s not been fucking someone else.
“You want to know the truth?” says Andrew. “When you think the person you want to want you doesn’t want you, it’s nice to be wanted by someone else. It’s like comforting the bereaved.”
“Comforting the bereaved!”
“It’s been a bad week for me.”
Maggie jumps up and starts putting the breakfast things away. She had meant to be all calm and reasonable but now she wants to cry, or maybe hit him. Then she remembers something Jo told her.
“Jo says you were crying.”
“There was a bit of that.”
She stops clearing up, presses her fists down onto the table, and gives into her distress.
“You didn’t have to fuck her.”
“No.”
“Did you think of me? Even for one minute?”
“Before,” he says. “After. Not during.”
“Jesus! Don’t spare my feelings. Please.”
She moves to the sink. Clatters dishes. He says nothing. When at last she turns round, there he still is, sitting at the table, his head in his hands.
“So what are we going to do?” she says.
“You tell me.”
Maggie says nothing. Words don’t come.
“If this is where you tell me it’s over,” he says, “just do it fast, and I’ll go out and take a walk by myself, then I’ll come back and be grown-up about it.”
“Oh, Andrew.”
Now she wants to cry because suddenly she’s so touched. She hadn’t realized this is what he’s been bracing himself to hear. His morning journey, breakfastless from London, now appears so gallant. She wants to say, “Of course it’s not over.” But is that true?
“Do you want it to be over?” she says
“No,” he says. “No.” Then he thinks some more and says again, “No.”
“But it’s not all simple, is it?” she says. “I mean, it’s not like there’s no problem.”
“Yes. I can see there’s a problem.”
“Do you know what it is?”
This is unfair. Getting him to be the prosecution as well as the defense. But it’s important too. She wants to know he knows what she’s feeling, as then he’s facing it with her, not just being the victim. But she doesn’t want to say it herself because it’s so hurtful.
“I think so,” he says slowly. “Jo said something.”
“What did Jo say?”
“She said you’re not sure I’m the one for you.”
“Why wouldn’t you be?”
“Because I’m too nice.”
He gets up and walks over to the window, stands there with his back to her. So he’s hurt anyway.
“I’m nice Andrew. I should be more assertive. That’s what women want. So, great, I can do that. I can be as selfish as you like. Treat ’em mean, keep ’em keen. Then you’ll say I’m the one for you. Is that how it works?”
He’s speaking quietly but he’s angry.
“No,” says Maggie.
“Tell me how any of this makes sense, because I can’t see it. I thought when people loved each other they wanted to make each other happy. I want to make you happy, but that’s not allowed, that’s being too nice. Even though it’s what I want for myself. I want someone who wants to make me happy. Do you want to make me happy? Maybe you don’t. Maybe you’re not too nice, like me. Maybe that’s why I love you. Is that how it works? People only love the ones who treat them like shit? Because if that’s how it is, then it’s a truly fucked-up system and I don’t want to be part of it.”
He falls silent. Maggie feels mortified.
“I know,” she says. “You’d be far better off without me.”
“Maybe I would.”
“Though I did get you croissants.”
He turns to her, and he looks so sad.
“Oh, Maggie. What are we going to do?”
“Let’s go for this walk,” she says.
They’ve done it so many times on their weekends together, followed the track that starts at the back of Edenfield Place, climbed the chalky tractor road up to the trig point at the top. Just setting out together feels like old times, and so comforts them.
They walk for a while in silence, between the high fringes of nettles and cow parsley. The steep slope makes them pant, but they press on to the top without stopping. The sweep of the coast now spreads out before them, from Newhaven to Eastbourne, a band of green and yellow land, a band of gray and blue sea.
They head east along the ridge path, with the wind in their faces. After the confusion of emotions in the kitchen, Maggie feels her thoughts clearing. Why has she assumed that it has to be all or nothing? She shrinks from the extreme decisions in both directions. Can’t they find a way to muddle along until—until what? Until the decision makes itself.
I don’t want the responsibility of screwing up my entire life.
It turns out Andrew’s thoughts have been clearing as well.
“You have no idea how I’ve been punishing myself over this,” he says. “No one can blame me more than I blame myself. But it’s not just me, is it?”
“No,” she says. “It’s not just you.”
“This too-nice thing,” he says. “I keep thinking about it. I have these arguments with you in my head, to prove to you you’re wrong. Which is so stupid. Feelings aren’t right or wrong, they’re just what you feel.”
But Maggie wants to hear the arguments. She wants to be told she’s wrong.
“What sort of arguments?”
“It’s only me trying to get off the hook.”
“By making me be the one who’s in the wrong?”
“Pretty much.”
“Maybe I am.”
“Actually, it’s worse than that. It’s me wanting to believe you’re so screwed-up you’ll never be happy with anyone. That way I don’t feel so bad about losing you.”
“Maybe I am that screwed-up.”
“No. It’s only sour grapes.”
“I’d like to hear the argument, even so.”
What Andrew says is almost exactly what she believes: she’s so screwed-up she’ll never be happy with anyone. It almost excites her to hear it coming from his mouth.
They’ve reached the point on the ridge path where they either turn back and retrace their steps, or head down the hillside past America Cottage. Andrew, following long habit, all unaware of his surroundings, takes the descending track.
“It’s a pattern-recognition thing,” he says. “You create a pattern of responses, if A then B, if B then C. You project the pattern forward to predict outcomes. It’s meant to be descriptive, not judgmental.”
“Will I understand it?” says Maggie.
“Oh, yes. It’s all pretty obvious. But you’ll hate it.”
They pick their way down the steep diagonal path, and Andrew picks his careful way through his nonjudgmental argument.
“Suppose your pattern is that what really gives you a buzz is pulling a man. You can only get that buzz from a new man. Someone who already wants you can’t deliver it. And it’s the buzz you want, as much as the man. That means that after the initial phase you get a choice. Either A, you move on to another man, or B, you stick with the first. But choosing B means you run out of buzz. It means you have to switch to another kind of relationship. Oh, I should have started with that. Suppose there’s two kinds of relatio
nships. There’s A, conquest, and there’s B, companionship. So pattern A gets you conquest, X. But it leads on to B, which gives you companionship, Y. So you have to keep repeating A to get X. And the more you do it, the harder it gets to move on to B, sticking with one man, even though you keep telling yourself that you want Y, companionship, and that if you do enough A you’ll get there. You won’t. The only way to Y is through B. And the only way you can ever get going on B is by giving up on A. Which you’re never going to do.”
“You have totally lost me,” says Maggie.
This is not entirely true. For all his Xs and Ys, she gets the idea, which is by no means new to her. But is it true? What if somewhere out there waits a man who is so right for her that she’ll know beyond doubt that she wants to live with him forever?
“I expect it’s bullshit,” says Andrew. “Just my way of telling myself it’s not all about me.”
“And making it turn out to be all about me.”
“I told you you’d hate it.”
He sounds almost philosophical. How strange to be having this conversation, which in one form or another has run in her head for years, with an actual boyfriend who is personally implicated in the outcome. Except there never is an outcome.
“It’s the Mr. Right question,” she says. “Does Mr. Right exist? Or does Mr. Right, however right he is, turn into Mr. Ordinary once you’ve spent enough time with him?”
“He has to, doesn’t he?” says Andrew. “You have to settle down to another way of loving.”
She thinks about that as they scramble down the last of the steep track. On one side New Forest ponies graze behind electric fences. Ahead, the low drone of the distant main road as tiny cars pass up and down.
“Here’s what I don’t get, Andrew. If you think I’m stuck in this stupid pattern, why on earth do you want to stick around me?”
“For the same reason,” he says. “No one’s perfect. Why should I do any better with anyone else? You’re a bit screwed-up, but you’re good enough for me. The problem is I’m not good enough for you.”
“No. That’s not true.”
She stops, making him stop. This is important.
“It’s not true you’re not good enough for me. It’s just . . .” She pauses, summoning her courage, looking away over all England as she speaks. “How do I know there isn’t someone out there who’s even better?”