“You were like an angel in that white uniform. I’ve never seen anything more sexy in my life.” His hand is moving farther up my leg with intent. “I wanted you, right there, right then.”
Magnus loves telling this story, and I love hearing it.
“And I wanted you.” I lean over and gently bite his ear-lobe. “The minute I saw you.”
“I know you did. I could tell.” He pulls my top aside and starts to nuzzle my bare shoulder. “Hey, Poppy, let’s get back into that room one day,” he whispers. “That’s the best sex I’ve ever had. You, in that white uniform, up on that couch, with that massage oil … Jesus …”46 He starts tugging at my skirt and we both tumble off the sofa onto the carpet. And as my phone bleeps with another text, I barely notice.
It’s not until much later on, when we’re getting ready for bed and I’m rubbing in body lotion,47 that Magnus lands his bombshell.
“Oh, Mum called earlier.” His speech is muffled with toothpaste. “About the skin guy.”
“What?”
He spits out and wipes his mouth. “Paul. Our neighbor. He’s coming to the wedding rehearsal to look at your hand.”
“What?” My hand clenches automatically and I squirt body lotion across the bathroom.
“Mum says you can’t be too careful with burns, and I think she’s right.”
“She didn’t have to do that!” I’m trying not to sound panicky.
“Sweets.” He kisses my head. “It’s all fixed up.”
He heads out of the bathroom and I stare at my reflection. My happy postsex glow has gone. I’m back to the black hole of dread. What do I do? I can’t keep dodging forever.
I don’t have a burned hand. I don’t have an engagement ring. I don’t have an encyclopedic knowledge of Scrabble words. I’m a total phony.
“Poppy?” Magnus appears meaningfully at the bathroom door. I know he wants to get to sleep because he’s got to go to Brighton early tomorrow. He’s writing a book with a professor there and they keep having disagreements which require emergency meetings.
“Coming.”
I follow him to bed and curl up in his arms and give a pretty good impersonation of someone falling peacefully off to sleep. But inside I’m churning. Every time I try to switch off, a million thoughts come crowding back in. If I call off Paul the dermatologist, will Wanda be suspicious? Could I mock up a burn on my hand? What if I just told Magnus everything right now?
I try to picture this last scenario. I know it’s the most sensible. It’s the one the agony aunts would recommend. Wake him up and tell him.
But I can’t. I can’t. And not only because Magnus is always totally ratty if he gets woken up in the night. He’d be so shocked. His parents would always think of me as the girl who lost the heirloom ring. It’d define me forevermore. It’d cast a pall over everything.
And the point is, they don’t have to know. This doesn’t have to come out. Mrs. Fairfax might call anytime. If I can just hold out till then …
I want to get the ring back and quietly slip it on my finger and no one is any the wiser. That’s what I want.
I glance at the clock—2:45 a.m.—then at Magnus, breathing peacefully, and feel a surge of irrational resentment. It’s OK for him.
Abruptly, I swing my legs out from under the covers and reach for a dressing gown. I’ll go and have a cup of herbal tea, like they recommend in magazine articles on insomnia, along with writing down all your problems on a piece of paper.48
My phone is charging in the kitchen, and as I’m waiting for the kettle to boil, I idly click through all the messages, methodically forwarding on Sam’s. There’s a text from a new patient of mine who’s just had surgery on his anterior cruciate ligament and is finding it hard going, and I send a quick, reassuring text back, saying I’ll try to fit him in for a session tomorrow.49 I’m pouring hot water on a chamomile and vanilla tea bag when a text bleeps, making me start.
What are you doing up so late?
It’s Sam. Who else? I settle down with my tea and take a sip, then text back:
Can’t sleep. What are YOU doing up so late?
Waiting to speak to a guy in L.A. Why can’t you sleep?
My life ends tomorrow.
OK, that might be overstating it a tad, but right now that’s how it feels.
I can see how that might keep you up. Why does it end?
If he really wants to know, I’ll tell him. Sipping my tea, I fill five texts with the story of how the ring was found but then lost again. And how Paul the dermatologist wants to look at my hand. And how the Tavishes are being snippy enough about the ring already, and they don’t even know it’s lost. And how it’s all closing in on me. And how I feel like a gambler who needs just one more spin on the roulette wheel and everything might come good, but I’m out of chips.
I’ve been typing so furiously, my shoulders are aching. I rotate them a few times, take a few gulps of tea, and am wondering about cracking open the biscuits, when a new text arrives.
I owe you one.
I read the words and shrug. OK. He owes me. So what? A moment later a second text arrives.
I could get you a chip.
I stare at the screen, baffled. He does know the chip thing is a metaphor, doesn’t he? He’s not talking about a real poker chip?
Or a french fry?
The usual daytime traffic hum is absent, making the room abnormally silent, save for an occasional judder from the fridge. I blink at the screen in the artificial light, then rub my tired eyes, wondering if I should turn off the phone and go to bed.
What do you mean?
His reply comes back almost immediately, as though he realized his last text sounded odd.
Have jeweler friend. Makes replicas for TV. Very realistic. Would buy you time.
A fake ring?
I think I must be really, really thick. Because that had never even occurred to me.
43 Haven’t both Antony and Wanda ever invigilated exams as part of their jobs? Just saying.
44 The first time Magnus told me his specialism was symbols, I thought he meant cymbals. The ones you clash. Not that I’ve ever admitted that to him.
45 Not that I’ve been prying or anything. But you can’t help glancing at things as you forward them and noticing references to the PM and Number 10.
46 OK. Busted. I didn’t tell the absolute full truth in my disciplinary hearing.
Here’s the thing: I know I was totally unprofessional. I know I should be struck off. The physiotherapy ethics booklet practically starts, Don’t have sex with your patient on the couch, whatever you do.
But what I say is: If you do something wrong yet it doesn’t actually hurt anybody and nobody knows, should you be punished and lose your whole career? Isn’t there a bigger picture?
Plus, we did it only once. And it was really quick. (Not in a bad way. Just in a quick way.)
And Ruby once used the offices for a party and propped all the fire doors back, which is totally against health and safety. So. Nobody’s perfect.
47 This is part of my prewedding regimen, which consists of daily exfoliation, daily lotion, weekly face mask, hair mask, eye mask, a hundred sit-ups every day, and meditation to keep calm. I’ve got as far as the body lotion. And tonight I’m rather hampered by my bandaged hand.