No car, so she’s definitely out. I clean the glass with the back of my hand and stare inside. Tidy shelves line the sides, everything organized. The empty space in the middle reserved for the car I loved, the one that now has puke on the passenger door.
I decide to use the keys and try the lower Chubb. No luck. The Banham refuses to move too. Then it dawns – she’s changed the locks. Suddenly, I have a feeling that she’s in there. She’s been there all the time. I prise open the letterbox.
‘Beth! Open the door!’ I am greeted by silence. Now I’m on my knees peering through the letterbox, my head tilted sideways.
‘Hello, Adam.’
I leap to my feet. Sylvia, our next-door neighbour, the one we’re attached to, is standing at a gap in the laurel hedge.
‘Sylvia,’ I say, wiping the dust from my trousers. ‘I er—’
‘The locks have been changed,’ she confirms, staring at the driveway.
‘I see.’ I aim for eye contact; after all, we have been dinner-party mates for more than ten years. ‘I don’t suppose …’ Sylvia is also key-holder for the alarm company.
‘Don’t ask me that, Adam, please.’
‘No.’ I nod. ‘Sorry. Do you know where she is?’
Sylvia shrugs. I see it then. Sadness, pity, in her expression. I’m not sure what to call it, but I am sure I’m not ready to be judged on my own doorstep.
‘Okay, not to worry. I’ll call her later.’ With that, I nod to my erstwhile dinner-party mate and head to the safety of my pukey Lexus. Jesus … I lean back into the soft leather of the driver’s seat and wonder where my wife is. She could be out with her mate, Karen. I start the engine, do a three-point turn out of the driveway. In the rear-view mirror, I see the house sign, ‘The Lodge’, shrink as I move away. I’m feeling a slow reality check develop in the pit of my stomach. Beth can do as she likes. I no longer have the right to wonder where she is on a Friday night – or any night, for that matter. An image of her with another man flashes briefly in my brain. And I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit. By the time I reach the motorway, I can only conclude that I like myself even less.
‘I’d like you to write about yourself,’ she says, just as the hour is up. ‘I want you to only write about you – not Adam, not Meg, nor your mum, your alcoholic father, your dead baby brother or anyone else – just you. Don’t think about it too much. Just let it flow.’
I write every day, but the idea of me, and only me, being my subject matter makes me want to grab my knees and rock back and forth in my chair.
‘Use the Russian doll idea,’ she suggests, picking up a small barrel-shaped doll from the coffee table. Last time I was here, I noticed a whole shelf of them nearby. Opening it up, she reveals five layers, with the final one being the size and shape of a monkey nut.
‘That’s where you need to get to,’ she says, pointing a filed French nail to the monkey nut centre. ‘Peel back the outer layers, get to yourself. Your core.’ She is smiling, as though she’s rather pleased with herself.
‘I’m not sure …’ The anxiety in my voice is audible. ‘I can’t get that small, I don’t think I’d know my inner bits if they walked up and introduced themselves.’
‘Maybe you could start with, “Who am I?”,’ she says, leaning back.
I imagine this in my head using word association, and panic as I only have enough words to cover the two outer dolls at most. She tells me to breathe, breathe, slowly in and out.
I close my eyes.
‘Then go on to “How do I feel?”,’ she continues.
Oh God, I feel a little sick. Please don’t let that be vomit at the back of my throat.
‘And then maybe what do I like and dislike?’
‘Okay, stop!’ I get it. I look at her and her coffee-table toy. ‘You’re going to need a bigger doll.’
Caroline, as she has insisted on me calling her, has suggested that I borrow some books and CDs on relaxation techniques. She showed me a reflexology pressure point on the fleshy part of my hand, between my thumb and index finger, advising me to press it gently whenever I feel panicky. I think Abba songs work well too, so I’m singing ‘Fernando’ aloud when I reach Weybridge High Street. It’s the afternoon school run and the traffic has formed a long, snaking queue.
‘Fernando’ over, I tackle ‘The Winner Takes It All’, only to decide, midway, that it’s a bad song choice. I push one of Caroline’s CDs into the player. The sound of the sea crashing against rocks and some dolphin-like ‘clicks’ fill the car. I breathe in deeply through my nose and exhale through my mouth, just like she showed me. Three minutes later, I haven’t moved an inch and I leap at the Bluetooth trill of the mobile.
‘Hey, darling,’ I say.
‘Hi, Mum. You okay?’
‘Great.’ I never lie to Meg, but now is not the moment to confirm that neither Abba nor dolphins are resolving my anxiety. I glance at the clock. ‘Didn’t you say you had lectures all afternoon?’
‘I did. I do. I didn’t go in.’
‘I see …’
‘He called me.’
‘Okay …’ The traffic still at a standstill, I prod the fleshy part on my left hand with my right thumb.
‘I mean, I’m not sure what he wants me to say? He leaves you – I mean us – for another woman, phones me up and just wants to have a chat! I asked him. I mean, I asked him if he was still with her. He didn’t even have the balls to just admit it.’
Meg takes a moment to breathe and I remove my foot from the brake, inch the car forward, jab the flesh again. I’m sure I’ll have a bruise tomorrow.
I’m determined to say the right thing. ‘Meg, love, don’t cut him off. This is about me and him. It’s our marriage that’s the problem, not you and him. He’s still your father and he loves you with all his heart.’ Even as I’m saying this, I can imagine her twisted grimace. She and I have wondered lately if he even has a heart.
‘He’s a liar,’ is her angry reply.
‘Yes, yes he is, but it’s me he’s lied to, not you.’
‘His lies still affect me! Can’t you see that, Mum?’
‘I’m sorry.’ My head is nodding. Of course I can see it. I’ve always been able to see it, but something tells me that, while she hates him now, it’s a temporary thing. Soon, she’ll love him again, and I don’t want her to feel she needs my permission. They are, and will always be, thick as thieves. ‘Just talk to him if he calls. Don’t cut him off for my sake. You need each other.’
She makes a ‘hmph’-like sound and I change the subject, urge her back to classes, insist she keep carrying on as normal. She hangs up with a promise to visit next week.
The entire exchange with my daughter lasts a few minutes and I’m still stuck in the High Street. There is nothing else for it. I press play on the CD player and surround myself with more ‘Flipper’ noises.
By the time I get home, I feel quite serene, if a little seasick. I park the car a few metres back from the double garage. It’s separate from the house, set back on the unattached side, and it’s another of Adam’s anally tidy spaces.
I enter through the up-and-over door. Inside, there is floor-to-ceiling shelving on one side, with various selections of paint, paint brushes, rollers, cleaning fluids – all filed beautifully in shades and can sizes. I find