catch the wedding portrait of her and Mike hanging against the dark red wallpaper in the hall, still not replaced from when they moved in nine years ago. That couple was happy, she thinks, look how they laughed.
Stepping forward, she studies the photograph. She hasn’t looked at it, really looked at it, for a long time and yet she walks past it maybe twelve times a day. Perhaps that’s what’s happened to their marriage, she thinks, perhaps they’ve grown so used to each other that they just walk past without seeing.
She gazes at Mike’s striking face in the photograph. She can see no resemblance between him and the man who said those hurtful words about the miscarriage to her last night, even though they look much the same. The person in the photograph was fun, he was open and loving, a man who wore his heart on his sleeve. Not a man given to irrational deep thought.
Olivia shakes her head as the anger resurfaces. The bastard implied she was somehow responsible for the miscarriage, for the death of their son. She still can’t believe it; it was an unforgivable thing to say, but an even worse thing to actually believe.
Antonia looks at her watch and continues her pacing from the lofty hallway, around the staircase to the lounge. She feels guilty. Hot and guilty. She’s aware that it’s a terrible betrayal, but she can’t help herself. She’s spent half an hour reapplying her make-up and has changed her clothes twice. It’s ridiculous, she knows, but she’s nervous, more nervous than she ever expected. She catches her face in the hall mirror and somebody else stares back with long, straight, dark hair looking polished, calm and relaxed.
It’s not as though I don’t know him, she thinks. It’s me who instigated it and now I must see it through with no regrets.
She glances at her watch one more time, the white-gold strap bright against her honey-coloured skin. He’ll be here any minute and it wouldn’t do to be waiting at the door. She walks into the silent lounge and puts on an Adele CD for company. Standing for a moment, she listens, but even Adele’s intoxicating voice doesn’t seem right, so she turns it off and plumps up the sofa cushions yet again.
The doorbell is shrill in the silence. Antonia stands up, touches her hair and then takes a deep breath. Then she walks to the front door, straightens her shoulders and opens it.
‘Hello, Sami,’ she says.
Olivia is running late as she leaves her untidy house to collect Hannah from school. The afternoon has flown by as it always does and she feels hot as she searches for her keys, but the cold air swipes her cheeks at the door, so she turns back to fetch her coat. It’s only then that she stops to study the wedding photograph again. She doesn’t look at the man this time, but at the girl. She has pale hair and pastel eyes but a bright, confident smile. She holds a single bunch of yellow roses and her dress is traditional but plain. There are no feathers or frills in her hair. This isn’t a girl who needs chocolates or flowers to tell her she is loved. This isn’t a girl who craves flattery or attention to give her self-worth. This is a girl who’s said ‘for better or for worse’ and who means it.
‘Here’s the post for signing, Mike,’ Judith says as she neatens a letter escaping from the tidy rectangle of her long day’s endeavours.
Mike looks up at her and nods, then drops his head again, continuing to punch numbers into a calculator, which spews out digits on a tiny receipt. She turns away towards the filing cabinet, feeling contemplative. The filing is up to date, but she hovers for a moment, busying herself by opening cabinet drawers, tidying the hanging baskets and closing them again. Mike hasn’t said much to her at all today. He looks tired and unhappy, and she wonders how the flowers fared last night. Pretty badly, by the looks of it, she concludes.
She casts a final glance at Mike and notes that his frown line seems more pronounced than usual. It is, she reflects, the one slight imperfection in an otherwise perfect face.
She has her hand on the handle when he abruptly speaks. ‘Who’s the father of your baby, Jude?’ he asks.
Judith turns, blurting out a laugh of surprise. It’s the first time in all the years she’s known him that he’s asked such a personal question. ‘Bloody hell, Mike. Am I dreaming or did you really ask me that?’
He drops his intense gaze and picks up a pen. ‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘None of my business.’
Judith studies his slightly flushed face. There’s something vulnerable about him, she thinks, like a little lost boy who needs a big cuddle from the wicked witch or the snow queen, to be led by the hand into the land of temptation … he just doesn’t know it.
She toys with the idea of teasing him, perhaps asking if he realises his question is tantamount to sexual harassment, or something similar, but he looked so sincere when he posed the question that a straight answer seems only fair.
‘No, that’s fine,’ she says, pulling out the client chair and sitting heavily, grateful to be off her feet for a minute or two. ‘Actually, no one in particular, as it happens. Just someone who was tall and pleasant for an evening or two. With hair and good shoes. And, of course, with straight white teeth.’ She smiles. ‘Some things you can’t compromise on.’
She watches him absorb her reply and then laughs at the look of mild shock on his face when he realises her answer is serious. ‘For a leftie, you’re very conservative at times. I don’t know why you’re surprised, Mike. You of all people know I’ve tried them all, big, small, black, white. I even married a couple and they all ended in disaster. So I figured there’s me and my mum and that’s all the baby needs.’
She stops for a moment, her head cocked. She can almost see the slow chug of Mike’s mind trying to keep up, to understand. ‘Ask yourself this, Mike: what’s better, to have a dad who buggers off after two minutes, to have one who gives the odd slap, or not to have one at all? Well, I know which one I’d prefer, the one with the least heartache.’
It’s dusk outside, the office empty save, perhaps, for one or two other surveyors who are still at their work stations clocking up chargeable hours before the end of the month. Mike sits at his desk for a long time without moving. It’s the first time in twelve years of marriage that he doesn’t want to rush home at the end of the day. He has no idea what awaits him. Olivia busied herself with the girls and their school bags when he left this morning, avoiding all eye contact with him.
It has been a day of maybes, his mind fit to burst with the awful uncertainty of it all. Maybe Olivia will forgive him for the things that he said. Maybe life will go on as before. He wants it to, of course, but there’s an iota of a maybe that still hangs around, suggesting there’s no smoke without fire. Maybe he was right.
Last night everything was fine. After the frisson of the shower he took Olivia to bed, dried her body with kisses and eventually she smiled and said, ‘Yes, just there. That’s so nice. Oh, Mike, where have you been?’ It was love at its best, hearing her come, the sweetest of sounds and one he can never get enough of, before releasing himself.
‘You didn’t explain why,’ she said later as they lay entwined in the dark. ‘Why you went away in here,’ she said, kissing his temple.
Mike sighed. His fears now felt foolish and childish. He’d hoped she wouldn’t ask. ‘It doesn’t matter now,’ he said, drawing her close.
‘It matters to me,’ Olivia said, pulling away from him. She turned on the bedside lamp and looked intently at his face. ‘What was it, Mike? Was it the miscarriage? I thought we grieved together and put it behind us.’
He sat up, staring ahead at nothing in particular. He suddenly felt angry, really angry. He could feel the heat rise in his body, the colour flood his face. ‘You put it behind us, Olivia. You wiped the slate clean and said “never mind”.’
He could feel her flinch, heard her intake of breath, but he knew he wouldn’t stop. ‘But you didn’t pause for