jealousy.
She picked up the newspaper that Paul had left spread across the kitchen table and took it outside to the patio. She sat down and began to leaf through the pages while working out which jobs to do the next day. She knew that if she didn’t take the secateurs to the garden soon, the whole place would be a jungle. The white wisteria, while beautiful in flower, grew so vigorously that it was threatening to overwhelm the pergola and the apple tree beside it. The summer storms during the week meant that the weeds were pushing their way through her carefully planted borders and the shrubs seemed to have taken on a life of their own as they sprouted towards the sun, spreading sideways, fighting for space.
As she considered what to tackle first, she was interrupted by a sudden shout from inside where Paul, in khaki shorts, T-shirt and sandals – he’d got the message about not wearing socks with them at long last – was jumping up and down, sucking the index finger of his right hand.
‘What’s happened?’ She got up. ‘Are you OK?’
‘I cut my finger on a bloody tin,’ he muttered. ‘Where are the plasters?’
As he moved across to the sink, Kate could see the large chrome Brabantia bin on its side, rubbish spilling across a sheet of newspaper on the floor with a green plastic bucket nearby. ‘What on earth are you doing?’ she asked, as she opened a cupboard to get out the first-aid box, then passed him a small box of plasters.
‘I’m going through the rubbish – obviously.’ Paul was running his finger under the tap, the water streaming scarlet. ‘Perhaps you should have a look at this. Stitches or septicaemia – I don’t know which would be worse.’
Years of experience of being married to one of the world’s great hypochondriacs had taught Kate to ignore all remarks relating to his well-being. They were invariably exaggerated. It had always struck her as odd that a man with such an impressive City profile should be such a wuss behind his front door.
‘Have you lost something?’
‘No! Don’t put that there.’ Paul’s attention turned from his injury as he grabbed the handful of orange peel she was about to return to the bin and tossed it into the bucket instead. ‘The fruit and veg go in the bucket, the paper in the plastic box and everything that can’t be recycled goes in the bin. How many times do I have to remind everyone?’
She stared, astonished, as he continued to rummage through the mess picking out potato peelings, teabags and leftovers from supper the night before.
‘I’m the only one in this house who takes recycling seriously,’ he added.
‘I hope you’re not saying I don’t? Sometimes I forget, that’s all. It’s going to get mixed up once it’s in the rubbish van anyway.’
‘Kate, you haven’t a clue what happens in the van – or at the recycling centre, come to that. I’m just trying to do my bit – well, our bit.’ He separated out some pieces of egg shell.
‘Isn’t this a bit extreme? The odd bit of potato or orange peel in the wrong place isn’t going to bring the world grinding to a halt.’
‘If everybody talked like that . . .’
‘Pinch me, please.’
‘What?’
‘Pinch me. I want to be absolutely certain that we’re really having this conversation.’
She knelt down and began to help him sort out the rubbish, unable to stop a snort that turned into a stifled giggle. ‘Look at us!’ Within seconds, they were sitting side by side on the floor, laughing together like old times.
‘Are you going into the surgery today?’ Paul recovered himself enough to ask, satisfied that everything was in the right place.
‘I haven’t decided. It’s such a lovely day but I suppose I ought to get on top of my referrals. Why?’
‘In that case, I’ll go down to the fishmonger’s and get the stuff for that bouillabaisse I’ve wanted to try for ages. I’ve started making some panna cotta too.’
Kate smiled. ‘Sounds good.’ She considered her husband as he went over to pull out a recipe book. He was still so much the man she had fallen in love with so many years earlier. ‘Will Jack be in?’
‘God knows. You know what he’s like. Saturday night? I doubt it.’
As if on cue, the sound of the bathroom door prefaced the sound of footsteps heading downstairs.
‘Morning, Marge.’ Jack hugged his mother. ‘Anything for breakfast?’
Kate squeezed him back, feeling a great rush of affection towards the tousled twenty-two-year-old who towered above her. She leaned against his Chelsea strip, inhaling his sandal-wood aftershave, yet again struck by the speed with which all her children had grown up and saddened by the thought that it wouldn’t be long before they’d all gone. Jack was the last to fly the nest. ‘Try the fridge. Are you going to be in tonight?’
‘In? What, here? No way. I’m off to the Chelsea match and then I’m meeting some mates. There’s a party in Chiswick somewhere.’
‘So it’s just us, then.’ Paul pulled out a used envelope and began writing his shopping list.
‘Again.’
‘Don’t say it like that. We haven’t had a night in together for ages.’
‘Yeah, Mum. Chill out. The old man’ll cook something great and you can open one of those posh bottles of wine you insist on keeping under lock and key.’
‘Only because I know they’re not safe when you and your mates are around and we’re not.’
‘Just because we finished off that crate of Château-something-or-other when you were away. How was I meant to know it was so special?’
‘My point exactly.’ She put her arm around Paul’s shoulders and kissed his cheek. ‘It’s a lovely idea. Let’s do it.’
Fifteen minutes later, she was on her own with a valuable half-hour in which to do nothing. Paul had gone off armed with carrier-bags and Jack had left for Stamford Bridge, having rejected the contents of the fridge in favour of a sausage sarnie on the way. As she resettled herself on the garden bench with a coffee and the paper, her thoughts returned to Ellen. She had been glowing from the inside out this morning, giddy with happiness. Whoever this man was, he must be a good thing if he could bring about a change like that so suddenly. Kate could still remember what it felt like, the intensity of that first flush of love – the sense of there being no one but Paul in the world, that nothing else mattered – as if it was yesterday not thirty-odd years ago.
Paul had been such a maverick then, always the life and soul, unpredictable, fun. Their children would never believe how different he was from the man they knew today. She remembered the party where they’d met, the usual student thing: crowded, loud and with plenty of drink in the kitchen. She had been sitting in a corner where it was quieter, less smoky, huddled in conversation with a couple of other medics from St Mary’s when Paul had come towards them. As soon as she saw him, her heart skipped a beat. Quite literally. She knew she wasn’t alone in fancying him, but the difference had been that, incredibly, he felt the same about her. They went home together that night and that was that. For thirty-one years their rock-solid relationship had been the envy of their friends. But the sensations she knew Ellen must be experiencing had faded long ago.
Kate sighed and stretched out her legs on the bench, leaning back with her face angled to the sun and thinking about her marriage. If anything, it was like a favourite old coat: over the years, patches of fabric had grown thin, one or two rips had been stitched up so you almost couldn’t see them – but you always knew they were there. Yet, despite its increasing shapelessness and the signs of general wear-and-tear, it still felt more comfortable than any new coat ever would. It was ‘her’. She shut her eyes, pleased with the analogy, and felt the sun warm her cheeks. Perhaps she and Paul had come to take