Page 67 of Things We Never Said
‘Yes. Sorry about that. What’s up?’ she asks, sounding flustered.
‘Sorry ...’ Sean says. ‘But ...’
‘Yes?’
‘Mags, do you think Catherine had an affair?’
‘What?’
‘Do you think—’
‘Sorry, I did hear you. It’s just ... why are we asking this?’
‘I don’t know. I ...’
‘Did she say she did? Is this another one of her tape revelations?’
Sean frowns at his phone. Maggie is sounding brusque and unsympathetic, which is not like her at all. ‘Not really,’ he says, starting to wish already that he hadn’t phoned. ‘But she said that at one point, in Paris, neither of us was having affairs.’
‘Oh,’ Maggie says. ‘She says she wasn’t having one, then? And her saying that makes you think shewashaving one for some reason? Have I got that right?’
‘She said she wasn’t having onethen,’ Sean says, pedantically, ‘which surely implies that at another point she was, doesn’t it?’
Maggie sighs deeply. ‘I don’t see how that implies anything, Sean.’
Sean shakes his head in frustration. He realises that, without the context, without Maggie actually listening to the tape, he’s not making any sense. ‘You know what? Forget it,’ he tells her. ‘I’m sorry. I’m being daft. Have a good Sunday.’ And then he ends the call.
Maggie phones him back immediately but he doesn’t answer and she doesn’t leave a message.
He puts the recorder back in the box and puts the box back in the kitchen cabinet where he hopes he’ll be able to forget about it, even as he knows, with certainty, that he won’t.
A text message appears on the screen of his phone with a ping.
She didn’t have an affair, Sean,it reads.I’m certain of it. And if she says or implies that she did, it’ll be like the rest. Another morphine-induced anomaly. Relax. And give yourself a break from those damned tapes. As I keep saying, it’s really not healthy.
Sean sleeps badly for four nights in a row.
Twice, in the wee small hours of the morning, he gets up, descends to the ground floor and removes the tape recorder from the box. One time, at 3 a.m. on Wednesday, he goes as far as inserting the next tape and pressing play. But Catherine’s voice gets no further than explaining that it’s likely to be a shorter message than usual because she isn’t feeling well, before Sean, overcome by guilt, hits the stop button.
On Thursday, at work, Jenny asks him if he’s feeling OK. ‘You’re looking a bit peaky,’ she says.
When Sean tells her that he’s not been sleeping well, she suggests exercise. ‘It always fixes it for me,’ she explains. ‘Go for a really long walk after dinner. You’ll see.’ And, as it’s a beautiful evening, that’s exactly what Sean does.
He heads, quite automatically, down to the river, where he hesitates momentarily about which way to walk. Right will take him to Riverside, which feels a bit too much like work. Left will take him towards The Backs, and then on to Grantchester. He thinks of ‘his building’ and decides, for want of a better destination, to make his way there. It should be lovely in the evening light.
By the time he has zigzagged back and forth to the riverbank (there is no continuous footpath along the Cam), it takes him almost an hour of quite sporty walking to reach the building.
He scrambles though the scrubby undergrowth beyond the furthest side wall, then down the bank to the river’s edge, from where he can look proudly back up at the building he created. The evening sun is low in the sky and illuminates all sixteen windows quite magnificently. For once, the reality looks better than the artist’s impression he once drew.
Sean remembers quite clearly the late nights he put in, designing windows that would fold back entirely, effectively transforming the lounges into balconies. He studies and congratulates himself upon the perfect way the building is staggered to make the most of the evening light. He remembers, again, the funky kitchen units he designed, complete with integrated, rotating, vanishing dinner tables. He wishes he could step inside and feel the smooth sliding movement once again. They had been so beautifully crafted by a local carpenter. He wonders how well they have aged.
A man – fifties, shirtsleeves – appears at one of the third-floor windows. He pulls the handle of the vast sliding window, effectively sealing the interior against the cooling night air, and Sean remembers thinking, when he designed the building, that one day he would live there, that one day he would be that guy. He remembers, too, how, on seeing the prices, he had understood that he would never be able to afford it.
The man returns to the window with a tumbler of golden liquid in his hand, perhaps whisky, perhaps just apple juice. He stares down at Sean suspiciously and then turns and says something to someone behind him. A woman, young, pretty, well dressed, comes into view. She follows the man’s gaze and takes in Sean’s presence before simply shrugging and vanishing again.
Sean turns his back to the building and takes in the splendid view one last time. The sun is just starting to dip behind the trees on the opposite bank, and a couple are cycling along the footpath, their young daughter strapped into a child seat on the back. She looks like April.
He clambers back up to the road, where he takes a photo of the ‘For Sale’ sign before turning and heading for home.
