Crash, page 12
Dan saw me and waved, his smile lifting the lines that drew down the corners of his mouth and made him look sad, which he rarely was. He waited for me to lock my car and we pushed through the door of the pub together. I found a table while Dan went to the bar, feeling the chill of a century’s hoard of wind and rain trapped in the stone walls, like storage heaters in reverse. While I had longed for the end of the heat wave, an English tavern on a wet Monday can be a miserable place. The pub’s small windows, so inviting seen from outside on a winter’s night, struggled to snatch at remnants of grey sky and the rooms had a damp, musty smell that mingled with a sour odour of spilled beer and wet dogs. Through the window by our table I could only see wet slate roofs from the brick cottages opposite, and I turned away to stare into an empty grate filled with artificial flowers, their colours muted with dust.
I shivered and watched Dan’s slow progress at the bar. He felt my gaze and turned and winked.
With a glass in each hand, Dan sat down with deliberate care but still managed to slop some of his beer onto the table.
‘Miserable out there, isn’t it?’ he said, nodding towards the door.
‘Was it difficult for you to get away?’ I asked.
Dan swiped at the spilt beer with the sleeve of his jacket. ‘Surprisingly easy. The students are only just back, so the department’s pretty empty. How about you?’
‘It was fine. Tom’s back at school but in detention. His governors’ meeting is tomorrow.’
‘I can’t imagine how you’re coping. What’s happening with Carl?’
‘Ella took Tom to school on her way back to London, so I managed to see him for a short while this morning. He’s better than yesterday. I left him watching CNN. Something seems to be happening over there in the financial markets. Have you heard of Lehman Brothers?’
Dan shook his head and reached for my hand below the table. ‘Alice, you were going to tell me about your life, not world finance. I won’t go back to work, so we’ve got a few hours. We could slip upstairs once we’ve eaten, if you’re okay with that.’
We’ve met at this pub for years. It’s plain but has a few bedrooms which are rarely taken because this area isn’t a honey trap for tourists and the staff indulge us by letting us pay with cash. Hiding my identity, my payments, is routine for me but not Dan. Today, I had promised to explain everything.
‘Of course that’s okay. I don’t have to collect Tom. He asked if he could go into Leicester after school with his friend Owen and with the governors’ decision tomorrow, which will likely go against him, I saw a chance for him to see a friend and us to have more time. It might be our last pub visit, for a while. What do you think, is it certain that he’ll be excluded?’
‘Come on.’ Dan nudged me. ‘That’s enough about Tom. Tell me about you.’
Dan listened, resting his cheek on his palm and tracing patterns with his fingers in the streaks of beer on the tabletop.
‘I met Carl in my first week at university,’ I began. ‘He loved me so much, I might even use the word “besotted”. Yes, he was besotted with me. But he slowly started to control me, keeping friends and everyone else away, even my mother, and picking apart the things I said or did. Then Euan moved in with us.’
I paused. Would Dan understand what came next?
‘I didn’t mean it to happen but I started sleeping with Euan, as well as Carl. They often stayed up all night, fuelled by coffee and stimulants but because I was asleep, it took me a while to realise that Euan was also sleeping with Carl.’
I tried to judge Dan’s reaction. He squeezed my hand and nodded, encouraging me to carry on. ‘Euan wasn’t obviously unkind, as Carl could be, but he didn’t stick up for me. He and Carl were inseparable, especially as their business grew. They convinced me it was important and I thought I was part of it. I believed I was included, until I wasn’t. I’ve only just learned the degree of my exclusion from the business and that was as much Euan as Carl. I was stupid, naïve. I trusted them when I should have been questioning everything.’
Bar staff brought our food and the fragrant smell of hot, oily pasta and herbs brought a rush of hunger. We ate quickly, our mouths so full of hot food we could only give a frantic nod when one of the staff returned to check that everything was fine. Dan apologised for ordering chips but I shook my head, my mouth crammed with potato and sharp mayonnaise, grateful I didn’t have to speak.
Once I was able to talk, I said, ‘At least you didn’t order garlic bread.’
Dan lifted one eyebrow and wiped his mouth with his napkin. ‘There’s still time,’ he replied.
I shook my head and Dan sat back in his chair, his eyes waiting and expectant.
‘I fell pregnant just before our final exams,’ I continued. ‘I should have left them, in fact Carl’s mother tried to make me leave, but I didn’t know who I was anymore. I didn’t know if I could survive without them, or what else I could do. I wanted to stay with them both, to have their child.’
‘Did Carl know the child might not be his?’ Dan asked.
‘We never spoke about it. Carl and I decided to marry but we both thought it would be the three of us, forever, with our baby.’
‘And it wasn’t?’
‘Euan died a year after the wedding.’
Dan slowly exhaled, as if he had been holding his breath. ‘You both loved him,’ he said.
I nodded. ‘Carl’s drug use escalated. It was his way of coping.’
‘What was your way of coping?’ Dan asked.
‘I pretended it made no difference. I believed I had to stay, even without Euan, for Carl and Ella.’
Dan frowned. ‘There was no one left, was there, Alice? No friends, no family. That’s how controlling narcissists work.’
‘I’m not blind to my own situation,’ I argued, aware that I might have spoken sharply. ‘We all know much more than we used to about how such relationships work. As Carl’s addiction took hold, the control increased because of his growing paranoia, except his methods were not so obvious. I have no evidence, of course I don’t… he’s too clever for that… but he started to use his surveillance methods on me. In the last few years, as Carl has become increasingly diminished by the meth, I dared to believe I could have a normal life. He wasn’t capable of thinking about anything else other than managing his use. But as I have faded from importance in Carl’s mind his business partner, Oliver, has become more controlling. I don’t know if Carl has asked him to monitor me, or even if it’s all in my imagination but I’ve had to become an expert with deceit.’
My voice faltered and I paused before expressing a thought that had become horribly clear only in that moment. ‘Dan, I’m afraid I’ve taken a great risk seeing you. More than you know.’
‘We’ve met every week for five years,’ he said, shaping each word. ‘We worked together before that. Why didn’t I realise how bad things were for you? I’m ashamed I couldn’t see it.’
‘I hid it from everyone, even the children. Tom didn’t know until recently that Carl is an addict. It’s all about shame and fear and trying to hold on to something that isn’t there. Secrecy becomes a habit and having money makes it possible to hide things. Carl has always been an outsider, the one who doesn’t belong, but he turned his invisibility into a business asset. He’s never known anything else.’
Dan left in search of the toilets and said he would order coffee. My eyes tracked him, the pub carpet swirling with green and brown fronds and the walls, shiny with cream gloss paint, reflecting shafts of sunlight cutting through the rain clouds.
‘I feel as if I’ve been blind,’ Dan said, pushing a cup towards me. ‘I’ve got so many questions. I don’t understand, how have you put me at risk?’
‘Carl can find out almost everything about anyone and I think he’s passed his methods on to Oliver. I’m not certain Oliver knows about us but he’s hinting at something. It might be a bluff.’
Dan frowned and stared at the table before raising his head to look straight at me. ‘I know I shouldn’t ask this, but why didn’t you leave Carl? Why go on and have another child?’
My attention was caught by a group of elderly women lunching together, their silver heads nodding as they chatted. It was difficult to say the words; the truth hurt. All I wanted was to run away. As if he guessed, Dan rested a steadying hand on my arm.
‘I felt worthless… I am worthless. If I tried to leave, he would have hidden his addiction, hired the best lawyers and fought me for custody of the girls. The only thing I’ve achieved is to be a mother but like most women, I’m not perfect. There was every chance he would win and I would have lost contact with the children.’
I swallowed hard, afraid of losing control. This was a conversation I needed to have and I resented that tears might rob me of this chance.
Dan cupped the back of my head with his hand. ‘Alice, you were never worthless, only brave. I can’t imagine being forced to leave a child in charge of a delusional addict. There was no choice… of course you had to stay, to protect them.
‘I have another question I’m afraid,’ he continued. ‘Couldn’t you leave once Carl’s addiction became obvious, once he could no longer hide it? No court would have given custody of children to a barely functioning addict.’
Around me, laughter roared and chinking glasses sounded as if someone was smashing plates. The smell of frying food now made me want to retch. I had to confess the worst thing.
‘I was waiting for him to die. I wanted him dead. I’m so ashamed but I colluded… yes, that’s the right word… I colluded with his addiction. Death was the easy way out.’
Dan dropped his arm and rested his hand on my knee. ‘That’s not so unusual. Sarah and I had a few sessions of counselling, when we were going through a sticky patch. The counsellor told us many people in long-term relationships have fantasies about their partner’s death, because it makes separation blame-free. They don’t mean it of course. If their partner actually died, they would be devastated.’
‘But in my case, it wasn’t a fantasy. I only had to wait and everything would be resolved. No lawyers, no blame, just a grieving widow. I’m finding this tough, Dan. Is there anything else you need to know?’
Dan grimaced and stroked his chin, waiting to speak. I pulled my chair forward to allow someone to squeeze past our table. ‘This one’s about me,’ he said. ‘Why didn’t you tell me before? Couldn’t you trust me?’
‘I’ve often thought of telling you, but I wanted you to love me just as I was, the Alice who works in the Sociology Department, the harassed mother of three teenagers, someone who exists on her own merit. Someone who exists.’
My throat tightened, and I forced my eyes wide to stop the prickle of tears. Dan rested his hand on the back of mine, squeezing my fingers in his palm. ‘Let’s see if they’ve got a room.’
We made love. I wasn’t sure we should, because of what was inside me but I needed to be held very tight, to feel his skin against mine, to disappear into my body and only be aware of physical sensation. Dan was a competent lover, not imaginative but polite and generous, as he was in every other respect. He touched me as if any worries about my health, my marriage, our safety, were needless. Afterwards, we lay on top of the bed, my back tucked into his soft belly and a draft from the open window cooled our damp skin. The rain had stopped and I smelt the moist earth, Dan’s fresh sweat and heard his breathing drift back and forth in the pattern of sleep.
I had known almost immediately that Dan and I would be lovers. The touch that might have been imagined, the way he looked at me as if I were truly there, the way his eyes travelled down my breasts and hips when he thought I wasn’t looking. It felt different from the way every other man behaved towards me. He was just on the wrong side of handsome, he wasn’t tall, and his shirts were rarely ironed but he carried his desirability with utter conviction. Out of all the women he met, he had chosen me, and our transition from work colleagues to lovers felt easy and natural, never clumsy, awkward, or embarrassing. Looking back, I can’t believe how little I cared about the risk we were taking. Having Dan seemed inevitable and necessary.
I stirred and Dan traced the slope of my arm with his fingers, dipping into the curve of my waist and up onto my hip bone. He dropped his hand down between my thighs, then up across my stomach and cupped one of my breasts. Rolling forward, he kissed me just below the earlobe.
‘I love you, Alice,’ he whispered.
‘I love you, Dan,’ I said, catching the words, ‘please leave Sarah for me’ before they spilled out to cause untold harm. If I spoke them aloud, he might come to me because he felt obliged. The fine balance of our old lives had gone forever and I needed him to make the offer to leave Sarah without prompting. I turned over and ran a finger down his nose.
‘It’s time to go home,’ I said.
Dan dried himself after his shower, different parts of his body moving in opposition to his vigorous towelling.
‘How would things have been if Euan hadn’t died?’ he asked.
‘We both lost the one passion of our lives,’ I said, watching him pull on his underpants and socks. ‘In the end, I’ve been lucky… I found love with you. Carl found crystal meth.’
I watched a thought track across Dan’s face and his expression darkened.
‘Are you jealous of Euan?’ I asked.
‘Of course I am.’
‘How can you be jealous of someone who’s dead?’
He turned from me and buttoned his shirt, whistling tunelessly and checking his reflection in the mirror. ‘You’re still in love with him, I can hear it in your voice.’
It was my turn to shower. I angled the spray so that my hair wouldn’t get wet and squeezed a handful of shower gel from the dispenser. Downstairs in the pub, those grey-headed women, they must all have lost someone they still love. Surely, love never stops?
Euan’s parents would now be the same age as those aged diners. He’d mimicked them with unkind sarcasm and I’d imagined a powerful couple, fiercely intelligent, but instead they were confused, tiny and very Scottish. At the funeral, his mother held out her handbag before her with both hands, in supplication. In her eyes I’d seen the love she still held for Euan, even though they had not spoken for years. I remember showing them the baby but was too riven with grief to speak to them properly, or anyone else. I have no memory of where Carl was, out of his head in the crematorium toilets no doubt.
Warm water splashed between my breasts. Hiding these grandparents from Ella had been wrong. It was never enough to send them a Christmas card every year, one that included a photograph of the children, hoping they might guess. This was a betrayal of Ella and Euan and I had to put things right, however difficult it might be.
The pub garden already had early evening customers and through the window I could hear chatter and glass touching glass. Dan waited on the bed, watching me apply make-up, and as I pretended to peer at my skin in the dim light, I checked his reflection. Without awareness of my scrutiny, Dan’s shoulders slumped and the grooves on either side of his mouth deepened.
‘Would you mind if I said something?’ he asked. ‘Something you might disagree with.’
I didn’t turn around. ‘Go ahead.’
‘The reasons you gave for having more children, for trying to build a life with Carl, despite everything he did to you, are logical and make sense but they don’t go deep enough. You and Carl clung to each other to hold on to Euan, the only person you both loved. In that way, you kept him alive, but you have both suffered. I think you’ve punished each other, for not being him.’
Dan’s words felt like a blow under my ribs and I struggled to breathe. I wanted to argue, but there was no time for further discussion. All I could do was nod and hold him through a long, tight embrace, measuring what felt like understanding and forgiveness. He would go home and when his family allowed, he would think about my story, but ordinary life would reassert itself and soothe him. This special man, who until a few hours before had known little about my life, was trying to understand me, and that was all that mattered.
SEVENTEEN
TUESDAY 23RD SEPTEMBER
On a perfect, autumn morning like this, it was hard to believe that so much had gone wrong. I had been up since six, roaming through the garden in my bare feet with Honey following at a distance, checking every scent left by those night-time visitors who slid around the edges of her territory. The air smelt fresh after yesterday’s rain, with the return of another bright, hot day still wrapped in the chill of dawn. Each blade of glass shimmered with diamonds of light. A green woodpecker tapped at the stones around the foot of the sundial and as I crept towards her she hopped away, chattering in complaint, then rose towards the woodland beyond the gate. I followed the path our footsteps had left in the dew and made coffee in the kitchen, warming each foot in turn on the radiators, now heating the house for the coldest hour. I sipped from my mug, wondering what Dan was doing at this moment.
I know his routine in the mornings. He gets up first and makes tea and toast, then climbs back into bed until Sarah wakes. He says she’s often irritable because teaching wears her out, so he pours her a mug of tea, by now very strong and she sips with her eyes closed while he reads bits out from the newspaper. We should have tried harder to spend a night away. A tiny and improbable idea grew and became solid. Why shouldn’t we wake up together, just once, and drink coffee. Why not? We had a few days before my surgery… Carl wasn’t here. I would work out the details and ask him. He could only refuse and might well do so, but I’d rather endure the hurt, than lose this one chance.
