Page 56 of The First Time I Saw You
His head turns back towards the inside of the house as a clatter and a cry from a child forces its way through the gap in the doorway and into the street.
‘Look, about what I said, I’m not—’ I begin to try and explain when the scream from inside gets louder and more urgent.
‘Thanks for this.’ He nods towards the bag. ‘But I’ve got to . . .’ His words come out in short breaths.
‘Sure, I understand,’ I say. He nods, takes a step backwards into the house as though he’s afraid to turn his back on me. ‘Well, thanks again.’
I take out my phone, the screen of which is starting to get closer to the edges of the darkness, and call for a taxi, then make my way back to the bench. Two women are walking towards me as I follow Michael along the path. One of them is holding a lead, a pug trotting lazily beside her. They are looking over at me and I smile at them. I turn my head where I can see the bonnet of my taxi and its indicator flashing as it turns into the street. I stand, extend Michael to his full height and let him tap the edge of the pavement, checking for the edge of the kerb.
‘Cute dog,’ I say to the woman.
‘Sicko!’ she gasps.
‘Yeah,’ the other adds, ‘some people really are blind. It’s not a joke!’ and off they totter on their air of self-righteousness, leaving me and Michael watching their retreating backs with a blank look of disbelief.
Week Twenty-Three
Sophie
It has taken days for the infection to abate. Now I feel fine again physically, but the longing I had felt for Samuel after my night of fevered dreams hasn’t been cured. I keep thinking of the yearning I experienced during that moment when I thought he was here, and I question again if I should be fighting for him. I’m a woman who has spent her adult life fighting for what she wants: is an assumption of his betrayal, or the fear of being hurt again, enough to justify letting him go?
‘Of course you should find him!’ Helen had said, exasperation mocking my question.
‘But what if—’ I had begun.
‘What if what? What if he listens to you and realises why you left? What if he finds out he’s about to be a father with a woman who loves him, what if he realises he should never have betrayed her?’
‘I told you, I deserved that.’
‘Whatever. Just ring him, Sophie.’
I pick up the phone and dial his number, but again I hang up before it connects. Am I strong enough to hear him tell me I’m nothing to him – can I cope with that yet? I stroke the curve of my stomach and feel the shift beneath my skin. I imagine him laughing at me as I try to explain my actions. How will he react when I tell him I’m pregnant with his child and never told him? And if he can forgive me, what if I can’t? What if our betrayal sits between us . . . would our relationship ever really work?
The sound of Charlie’s door opening and closing pulls my thoughts away from Samuel. I’m worried about him. You know how they say that the eyes are the window to the soul? Well, if that’s true then Charlie’s soul is disappearing. Our roles seem to have changed; I seem to be cooking for him, visiting him, and he puts up with it.
I balance the tray tottering with sandwiches and chips on my bump and knock on the door. He opens it without greeting.
‘Hi, um, ham salad OK? I was making some for myself and . . .’ My sentence trails off like a reluctant bride’s train: there for decoration, hanging on but not necessary.
I overlook the mess in the kitchen, step over the discarded tea towel on the floor and ignore the smell from the stagnant water sitting in the sink. He eats the food I put in front of him and he answers my questions, but rather than his answers being delivered in his usual curt manner, he answers them slowly, as though he can’t process his thoughts quickly enough.
‘Can you believe it’s mid-July already?’ I ask, the sandwich halfway to my mouth. He blinks slowly and slides his focus away from his food and up at me. His eyes are bloodshot and his eyelids heavy.
‘July,’ he repeats in reply. I swallow my food and worry that there is some significance to this month and Charlie’s actions.
I try to make small talk about the weather, about what has been happening on the news, the latest gossip about new restaurants that have opened in Mid Wales, about new dishes that the critics are raving about, and he listens, and he comments, but it’s like he’s not really here. Charlie pushes his food around the plate as though he’s not going to eat it, but somehow he does. He is functioning in the same way that we all do – his chest is moving up and down as he breathes, his feet take one step after another the same way that mine do. He can see the seasons changing; he is seeing the new flowers that are showering my garden with summer; he can see the beauty that the world has to offer – but then he’s not seeing it at the same time. He gives every appearance of living and breathing, but it’s as if, inside himself, he is dead.
Week Twenty-Three
Samuel
When I woke up this morning, in the house where I grew up, with the familiar sounds and smells of home, I felt happy. This is a strange feeling to acknowledge when even in the last week I have noticed how much darker my world has become. I feel like I can start to live again now that I have left behind the person I once was.
I have spoken to Bob Golding, my boss from Greenlight, and I imagined his pallid chins rolling over the top of his collar as he talked; his voice even sounded fat – how is that possible? The investigation found that I hadn’t broached any infringements, as I knew they would. This means that they can accept my voluntary resignation and I will now receive the severance pay that I had been denied the last time I had made this offer, that morning while Sophie lay asleep in my bed, the morning I had called Bob and told him I wanted to take voluntary redundancy.
I wonder how different my life might now be, if I hadn’t been distracted by Sophie in my shirt, if I hadn’t fallen asleep after, if she hadn’t somehow misunderstood how the company had found out that we were together and left without speaking to me about it. Would there still have been an explosion? Would I still have put the kettle on the stove without lighting it, or would we have been doing something else? Would she have been the one to notice that it wasn’t lit? Would we both have been there? The image of her being hit by the white light turns my stomach. I’ve got to stop this. I have to start my new life, and that life doesn’t have her in it.
My faithful friend Michael leans against my bed and I reach out for him; he guides me into the bathroom. Hot steam fills the room as I turn on the shower and carefully step into it, my muscles relaxing as I close my eyes while the strong jets pound my back, the water washing over my face as I try to wash away the thoughts of Sophie.
