‘I’m leaving,’ he said.
She kept her head down as though working on the pages in front of her. She’d heard the ‘you’ even though he hadn’t said it. I’m leaving you.
He continued to stand in the doorway, making her wonder if he really meant what he’d said, but she knew that he did.
He’d told her about the affair two weeks ago. She hadn’t suspected it, although she probably should have. She’d lost her temper, had even hit him, had told him she didn’t care if he was sorry, and that he had to get out.
He hadn’t gone then, but he was going now.
She didn’t want to look at him; it would hurt too much. She didn’t know what to do to repair this.
‘Do you have nothing to say?’ he asked.
‘Is there anything that would make a difference?’ she countered, her head still down.
He sighed and she pictured his expression, exasperation, worry, guilt. It was the guilt she couldn’t stand to see, because it would confirm that he cared. If he didn’t care his eyes would be cold, and she’d never seen his eyes cold. She knew he didn’t want to hurt her, had never set out to, but with the way things were between them …
The affair had been going on for five weeks.
That was all the time it had taken for him to decide he wanted out of their marriage so he could go to live with her best friend.
No longer a best friend.
‘Holly wants to come with me,’ he said quietly.
A brutal knife in the back, this one almost worse than the other. He was going to take their teenage daughter with him.
Could she allow that? Did she have a choice?
Holly made her own decisions these days and some were to spite her mother, or challenge her, or simply to annoy her.
Did either of them know that her heart had already been broken before they’d taken the pieces and broken them all over again?
Holly would pretend not to care, but she wasn’t as unfeeling towards her mother as she tried to make out.
He would care, but she’d never told him how it was with her, what she’d done to blot out the pain, so that was that.
‘Please say something,’ he urged, ‘even if it’s only goodbye.’ He apparently thought about that because then he added, ‘You probably don’t want to be that polite about it.’
Even now, in the midst of this nightmare, he could make her smile. She didn’t let him see, but he’d know it anyway. That was how well they knew each other, they could sense things, know things without having to see or hear them.
Finally she turned around and because she loved him so much the hurt cleaved through her. He was tall and rugged with a slow, winning smile and sleepy dark eyes that were as kind as his soul. When they were younger she used to call him Harry because he reminded her of Harry Connick Jr. ‘Just a shame I can’t sing like him,’ he’d say. She couldn’t remember a time when she hadn’t loved him, when she hadn’t felt complete because of him, when most of her thoughts hadn’t found their way back to him. They’d been young when they’d met, but they’d considered themselves mature, as all teenagers did and do, especially those at uni. They’d become parents in their twenties and it had brought them closer together. They’d supported each other’s careers, understanding one’s ambitions were no more important than the other’s, they’d hit more highs and lows than she could recall and had always been there for one another.
Now it was all going to change.
‘Have you packed?’ she asked, and immediately regretted it when she saw him flinch. She didn’t want to hurt him really. Why would you want to hurt someone you loved?
‘Everything’s in the car,’ he replied.
‘Holly too?’ Why would he take her daughter? Why did Holly want to go? What did it say about her? As a mother, as a person?
‘She’s almost ready,’ he said.
She had to swallow a choking build-up of emotion before she could say, ‘It’s hard for me to imagine being happy without you, but obviously it’s not hard for you.’
His eyes darkened and they entered a rare moment when she didn’t know what he was thinking, although they were becoming more frequent now.
He was leaving her today and she wasn’t trying to stop him. She could sense his confusion over that, along with the guilt – of course guilt, he’d been sleeping with another woman. And yes, he was hurting, because all their years together had meant something to him too and he’d probably expected her to fight harder to keep him.
He could have accused her of driving him to this, but he never had because that wasn’t his style. He didn’t blame others for his actions whatever the provocation. He was a decent man, not a coward who hid behind excuses. In some ways that was a failing, for often he claimed responsibility when there was no need to.
Superhero-dad, protective-husband, respected boss.
‘You’re not angry any more,’ he stated, and she heard his surprise and pique.
She was angry all right, so angry she could turn violent simply to think of him with another woman – especially that one – like she had when she’d first found out. A lot had been smashed that day and she didn’t doubt that more would go the same way during the darkest moments ahead.
She was going to hate sleeping in their bed alone, not hearing his key in the door at the end of the day, pouring only one glass of wine, not having him to talk to or watch TV with. For as long as she could remember they’d been the closest couple amongst their friends, no one had expected this to happen, theirs was the marriage that would go on to the end.
It would have if it weren’t for the affair …
It would have if he’d been there for her when her world had spun out of control, when she’d lost the sense of who she was, and asked herself what point there was to anything any more.
Maybe he would have been if she’d told him, but she hadn’t, because she couldn’t, and wouldn’t.
Some things were just too hard.
And so he was leaving.
CHAPTER ONE
1968
The really cool thing about teasing Sir – (Mr Michaels the music teacher) – is the way it makes him blush. It starts under his collar and creeps out like mischief, slowly, cautiously, as though checking to see who’s looking before suddenly revealing itself with rosy abandon over his neck and cheeks. It makes him seem younger, closer to our age in a way, but not so close to give him the air of a teenager, or someone lacking in worldly sophistication. He definitely isn’t, for he seems to know everything and isn’t easily shocked, only easily thrown or discomfited by a roomful of fifteen-year-old girls intent on claiming his attention.
He’s not tall exactly, but few of us girls can look him directly in the eye – I don’t think he’d allow it even if we could. We’re too challenging, too full of ourselves and determined to score points over one another at his expense. I can tell he understands that and he never assists. I’m not one of the girls who dares to throw myself at him – no one does really, at least not in an actual physical sense. However, some are brazen enough to try and treat him to glimpses of their stocking tops or to ask if he thinks they should wear lipstick when kissing a boy.