The water is all gone.
Having two husbands, two lives, is very time-consuming. Something had to give. I chose to sacrifice friendship. I took Daan’s phone calls before friends. If he suggested we meet on a date where I was already tied up, I pulled out of the prior arrangements. The lovely women I met at work – who I had joked with in the staff canteen, swore with when bosses were unreasonable – all fell by the wayside. As did my mummy friends, the mothers of the boys’ friends. I turned down invitations to join book clubs or spend the evening with someone enthusiastically selling beauty products or kitchen utensils. The only friend I could not give up was Fiona. She has always been like a sister to me. The thought of her comforts me but in some ways hurts me too. I lost her anyhow because I couldn’t tell her. Of course not. So the honesty and intimacy between us faded and then disappeared altogether.
There is nothing honest about a second bank account, about a second phone. It’s complicated. Strangely, it wasn’t the things I kept apart that stung – the separate things were a shield – it was the crossovers that were painful. The near misses fling themselves into the front of my awareness now. They itch uncomfortably around my wrist where I’m chained, they sit in my parched throat. I can’t swallow them back.
I recall walking down the street. Kai walks with an arresting fluidity. She rolls, languidly, like a cat. Leigh bounces, much more of a puppy. This me, is bounding. So I am Leigh, heading towards Mark, Oli and Seb, keen to rest my eyes on them, to feel the boys roughly bury into me as they hug me hello. There is a supermarket trolley lying across the pavement. I bend to stand it up and park it to the side so that it doesn’t obstruct those with strollers or in wheelchairs. That is when I notice it, the bracelet glinting against my skin. Relieved I’ve spotted it, I slip it off. Not that Mark would guess they were real diamonds, he’d imagine I’d splashed out at Swarovski at best, more likely Accessorise. I slide £4,000 worth of jewellery into my handbag. Noting that I should take more care. I slip in and out of consciousness; in my dreams, my nightmares, I’m chained by a row of diamonds.
My head throbs as I recall an especially busy week when I took clothes from both my wardrobes to the same dry cleaners and then had them delivered to the penthouse for ease. I didn’t think an extra dress and suit would be noticed; I planned to take them back to my home with Mark on Thursday. But Daan did spot the dress Leigh had worn to Mark’s parents’ wedding anniversary lunch. ‘That’s very fashionable,’ he commented. I knew it was a criticism. He is not fashionable and doesn’t aspire to be. He is classic. He liked me to be classic too. Classy. I didn’t take offence. I was simply relieved he hadn’t seen Mark’s suit from Next.
I suppose there is only so long you can choke back a secret like this. Bliss like this. Pain and stupidity on this monumental scale will out.
I sacrificed myself. I wasn’t twice as interesting or busy or complete. I was half the person. In my dreams I hear the typewriter hammer out another note. The paper is slipped under the door.
Too late for regrets.
Then there is another, it flies around the room.
Too late for explanations.
And then a third. A flock of paper birds swoop and swarm, surrounding me. Pecking at my hair, my head, my eyes. I manage to read one or two of the messages.
Too late for excuses.
Too late.
And I close my eyes because he is right. It is too late for me. I do not know how to be or who to be. I’m no longer the woman I was or even the woman either of them thought I was. I’m no longer anyone. It will be easier if I allow myself to slip into unconsciousness. It will be easier if I let go.
41
Mark
The moment Fiona leaves the house Mark bounces up the stairs and charges into Oli’s room.
‘You knew?’ he demands.
‘Don’t you ever knock?’ Oli is trying to sound bolshie, confident but Mark can see in his eyes he is scared. Scared of Mark? The thought is like a punch. Another one. His son gets up off the bed, draws himself up to his full height. Chest out, man to man, eye to eye. He glowers a challenge. He’s taller than Mark now. Maybe two or three inches. When did that happen?
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ Mark demands.
‘Because you’d have gone off it.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You know what I mean. You’d have gone all hulk-man and started tearing our lives apart. It was better I just dealt with it my own way.’
‘And how was that exactly?’ Mark’s spittle hits Oli in the face.
He doesn’t acknowledge it. He doesn’t wipe it away. Slowly, he replies, ‘I decided to do nothing. You know the teachers are always calling me lazy. I decided to do nothing.’
Mark wants to believe him.
But he doesn’t.
42
Kylie
Someone is shaking me roughly. ‘Kylie, Kylie. Kylie, wake up.’ It’s just another dream and I don’t want to wake up. But the voice is desperate, frightened and insistent. They won’t
