A Bad Bride's Tale (26 page)

Casey came back from the kitchen with some pretzels in a small gold china bowl. She offered the bowl and Stevie noticed how each of her shell-pink nails was subtly manicured, not chipped at all. Despite the magazines and growth of salon- culture at home, British girls, like her, were still no good at nails. Not on a Sunday at any rate, a day when her fingers were normally stained with newspaper ink and there were croissant crumbs be- neath her nails. Their grooming default setting was far lower on the scale.

Casey’s dark eyes scanned Stevie’s face intently. “So you going to have kids soon?”

Stevie swallowed a too-big chunk of pretzel. “That’s the plan.” She wondered, once again, where her period was. She must test as soon as she got home.

“You don’t sound too enthusiastic about it.” Casey rummaged around in a bag, pulled out a small ball of dark gray wool streaked with silver. She yanked the yarn and started pulling at the corners of a half-knitted square.

“I don’t?” Stevie asked. “Shit, I totally
am
. I’m so broody, it’s

embarrassing. But, oh, it’s just . . . oh . . . I don’t know.” She stum- bled, unable to articulate something she hadn’t yet fully worked out. “I’m feeling quite a lot of pressure to start . . .”

“Oh, husband’s going totally tribal, is he? Wants you to popu- late his cave?”

“Yeah, a little bit.”

“I love the sound of him already.” Casey laughed, bent one leg up, her long, painted toes curled over the side of the chair. “Broody men are kind of endearing. There’s something so old-fashioned and feudal about them.”

Was that it? Could the explanation be so simple? Had she mis- judged Jez completely? For a moment, she considered blurting it all out to Casey, just to see her situation refracted through the sharp prism of a New Yorker, someone, perhaps, with a harder, more pragmatic view of hitching and hatching. But then her nerve failed. What was there to say, really? It was all in her head. There was no
evidence
that she was not in love with her husband. There was no evidence it was the wrong relationship. There wasn’t even any evidence that Jez had seriously set out to get his hands on a trust fund by getting her pregnant. He didn’t have to marry her. He could have married a million other pretty girls. And he chose
her
. So, yes, she was married, imperfectly, but weren’t all relation- ships imperfect? How to explain to Casey that she had all this and still yearned for something more—something more passionate, more meaningful, and more consuming? Was this a yearning for a child or was it a yearning for something else? And could the yearn- ings be reconciled? And was it possible to sometimes feel like she was imploding inside, while the exterior of her shopped and smiled and exchanged information about the best muesli brands with her mother-in-law.

“Are you okay, honey?” Casey asked, one eyebrow raised, the ex- panding knitted square gobbling the thread of silver wool as her needles clicked.

Stevie shook her head free of thoughts like a dog shaking water from its coat. “Fine, fine. Jetlagged, miles away. Sorry.”

“Right! I’m off.” Lara bounced into the room, wearing a Pucci print dress that succeeded in making her look sophisticated, but also five years younger. She tugged at a small cargo-friendly wheelie suitcase. “Sam just phoned. He’s coming to pick you up first thing tomorrow morning.” She winked. “At your service.”

THIRTY-TWO
Æ

snip, snip
. the scissors’ stainless-steel blades
sliced through finely woven pale blue wool, and Seb’s Pringle sweater fell to the floor in a shredded heap. She hated that sweater—horrible banker-boy preppie gear.
Snip, snip
. Down went two Thomas Pink shirts.
Snip, snip
. The navy Burberry V-neck she’d bought him in the January sales. Guillotined: a knitted Prada tie. Seb hadn’t returned her calls for over a week. He had slunk out of the relationship, without even turning out the lights.

Katy bundled the strips of cloth and wool into an old Tesco bag and carefully placed it at the base of the wardrobe, near the door, so he would find it when he came back, as inevitably he must. She was not crying now, but fueled by an unexpected new energy, a precari- ous joyful exhilaration that came from certainty in her own mind that things were finally over, that he had no intention of ever mar- rying her or settling with her or fathering her children. She didn’t know what to do with the hurt, so she let it conduct itself through the stainless-steel scissor blades.
Snip, snip
. Katy Scissorhands.

She stopped. Enough already. Damn it. Damn it. Katy’s rage

suddenly exploded, once again, into a furious sobbing sadness. She would never wear her late mother’s wedding veil. Her DNA would never spiral with Seb’s; she was never going to see whether her nose would pass on to the next generation. Her life, as she’d planned it, was over. Katy’s phone rang. She delved into her large Chloé hand- bag, rummaged for the phone. Tara. She let it go to voicemail. It rang again. Emma. She let it go to voicemail. She noticed that her rings swiveled on her fingers. She’d lost weight. For once, this gave her no pleasure at all.

Shutting the door of the flat, she headed out into the rain along Westbourne Grove. She pressed the last dialed number on her phone. There was only one person right now she could face seeing. “I’m here. I’m walking toward the market,” she said, breathlessly.

jez ducked into
the sitting room. “
Mum
,” he shouted above

Antiques Roadshow.
“I’m off.”

Rita turned the volume down. “Oxford?” she asked wearily, her wan tone carefully selected to arouse sympathy.

“Er, no. Just popping down to Portobello.” Jez had not been to see Poppy yet. He felt bad about this, but not bad enough to spring into action. Moreover, Katy needed him, in a way that someone like Poppy, surrounded by that big family and all her friends, never would. And it was nice being needed after his own spell of grieving neediness. It reassured him he wasn’t a victim; it shored up his masculinity in an indefinable way. Not that it was a great sacrifice to help Katy, of course. He felt privileged just to look at her, aware as he was that it was a fleeting pleasure, like when you visit an art gallery and manage a few minutes in front of a famous portrait be- fore the crowds of Japanese tourists jostle in and ruin your view.

“I thought we were going to Oxford together? I thought it was going to be a nice day-trip.” Rita turned the volume down.

“My friend, she’s in a state, Mum.” He was answering the call of gallantry. “I have no choice.”

“Maybe I’ll go on my own.” Rita looked thoughtful. “I could visit Margaret—remember Margaret Dawson, who slipped her disc in Whitstable last year?—she lives in Banbury, in a very smart bungalow, apparently. I’ve been meaning to visit her for years. It’s only a short bus ride from Oxford, she assures me.”

“Really? But your foot . . .”

“Oh, I fancy a change of scenery. I’m going a bit stir-crazy here. You know Patricia and I don’t see eye to eye exactly, but she’s got a lot on her plate with this early new grandchild, hasn’t she? She could do with some company, too. Yes, I’m sure she could. And Chris is nice. I like Chris. A decent chap. And I think my ankle will hold out, if I’m terribly careful.”

“Well, that would be great. It would spare me . . .” Jez checked his reflection in the hall mirror. “The bus goes from Notting Hill Gate, ten-minute walk. Remember, I showed you the other day. Or take the train from Paddington.” Jez ran his fingers over his jawline. Bit of stubble, good; kind of Daniel Craigish. He patted his stomach. If he could just motivate himself to do a few early-morning Hyde Park jogs, the Pad Thai tummy would be kept in check. Marriage wasn’t a great motivator. But Katy, he was discovering, was. Jez cupped his breath, sniffed it, then set off, trying to break in his stiff denim jacket—annoyingly, his mother had ironed and starched it—by flex- ing his arms at the elbow, like a power-walker. He located Katy gaz- ing into the highly polished windows of an interiors shop on Westbourne Grove, focused on a modern ketchup-red sofa. His mouth dried as he got closer to her. “Babe, are you okay?”

Katy pushed a tangled clump of blond hair away from her eyes. Strands stuck to her tear-streaked face. Her cheeks were unusually convex, puffy, and shiny, like canned button-mushrooms. Her eyes were about half their normal size and red-rimmed, making them more electric blue than ever. Even her tiny nose had swollen to veg- etal proportions. Jez thought he’d never seen her look quite so lovely.

“I cut up his clothes,” she said matter-of-factly.

“O-
kay
.” Jez rubbed his chin and smiled. “That’s pretty radical.” He hoped she’d gotten to Seb’s suits. Smarmy bugger. “Did it feel good?”

“Yeah. It was a rush, kind of like chocolate. But now I’ve slumped.” Katy allowed herself to wilt fragrantly into Jez’s arms, pointing at the shop window. “He loved this sofa.” The tears started again. “People are staring.” She sniffed. “I can’t deal with Notting Hill fuckers staring right now.”

“Shall we go to the park, my sweet?” Jez had never called a woman “my sweet” before. He wondered where the poncy words had come from. They weren’t generally in his vocabulary. But, oddly, a woman like Katy seemed to require a whole new language. With an arm around her shoulder, he supported her frail weight, surprised he was so moved by her sadness and vulnerability. “This way, Katy.”

Jez directed her to the café opposite the Diana Memorial Play- ground in Kensington Gardens. They sat at a slatted wooden table and nursed over-frothed cappuccinos. Katy sniffed and moaned about Seb. Jez listened carefully and crunched a KitKat, admiring the rise and fall of Katy’s décolletage as she sniffed.

“You are such a good man, Jez,” Katy said, wiping her nose with a Kleenex, wondering if Jez found her too ugly to look at. He could

hardly meet her eye. She felt snotty, unkempt, “Listening to me whinge on like this.”

“I try.” Fucking good to hear these words after the criticism, the constant criticism, from Stevie, he thought. Nothing was ever good enough for her. Fuck it, not even unexpected windfalls of money. Some people were never happy. “Seb is certifiably insane.”

Katy looked up appreciatively. “You think so?” “Damn right.”

A rabble of noisy toddlers jostling past sounded like monkeys. Mothers and nannies carrying discarded coats and tricycles and half-drunk cartons of juice tailed them into the fenced-off play- ground area. The playground gate clicked open and the toddlers screamed at the sight of the sand and swings. Katy stared at them, her eyes swimming with tears. “I have a dream . . .”

“A dream, Katy?” Weirdly, he couldn’t help thinking that com- ing from Katy’s mouth, the words seemed to regain some of their original dignity and import.

“Yeah.” She pulled her hair back into a ponytail, twisting it to stay in place, her face exposed now, in all its Scandinavian-cheek- boned glory. “The funny thing is, I always thought I was allergic to the country, but recently I’ve been dreaming . . .” She wiped her eyes and sniffed. “. . . that I’d get married, have children, lots of children with ringletty blond hair, and we’d move to the country— Devon or Sussex—in a big house with old fireplaces and nurseries and utility rooms, somewhere I could give up work, pad around barefoot, grow organic vegetables . . .” A teary laugh. “Oh, I know it sounds completely ludicrous.”

Jez was silent for a moment. “It doesn’t.” He cleared his throat and paused. “You know something? I’d love all that stuff, too.”

“Really?”
Katy smiled. A flicker of recognition lit up her face. “You and me are quite alike, aren’t we?”

Jez tried to hide the blush by scratching the stubble on his chin. Blushes weren’t normally in his repertoire, either. Alien emotions were breaking out in him. It was like being in a chick flick movie. This woman was getting to him. Stop it. They were friends. Just good friends.

Katy didn’t notice the blush, too absorbed by the challenges of her central role in the drama. “I’m tired of working, Jez. I’m tired of the fashion business. I’m ready to downshift. I’m sure I could think of a small cottage industry, set up an agency promoting local crafts, something like that. But now . . .” she started sobbing again. “Now there’s no point. I’ll be turfed out of the fashion in- dustry sooner or later, you know, the moment middle age hits. I’ll have cats rather than children. I’ll live alone in a Marylebone man- sion block.”

Jez leaned across the wooden table, placed his hand on hers.
“Never.”
As he patted her hand, he suddenly became horrifyingly aware that what he really wanted to do was push aside the cappuc- cinos and the last half-eaten finger of KitKat and spread-eagle Katy across the wooden table. Shit, what had come over him? Get a grip, man. He paused, collected himself.

“You okay, Jez? You’ve gone all silent on me.” Katy studied him quizzically. “Am I boring you?”

“Boring me? Never, never.” He held her hand, his surging desire to be noble only complicated by an equally surging desire for her ass. “I would do anything, Katy.
Anything,
to make you feel better.”

Katy smiled sadly. What would she do to hear Seb say those words, just once. “Only Seb can sort this mess out, I’m afraid.”

“Of course.” Jez felt stupid. It started to drizzle. Time to leave. He took Katy’s arm and they walked along the gravel-strewn wide path toward the ornate iron gateway where the park met Bayswater Road. Katy refused his offer to escort her all the way home and, feeling reassured by the male attention, she took a bus to Holland Park to see a single girlfriend. She smiled as she waved from the top deck, face dry now, features shrunk back to normal.

Jez gripped one of the cool iron railings to steady himself as he watched the bus speed down the road. He felt dizzy. His heart drummed. Something had happened inside where he couldn’t con- trol it. A switch had flipped. Although he walked slowly, not want- ing to get to any destination too quickly, inside he was careering out of control, like a Porsche 911 with a broken brake belt. He felt unable to return back to the flat, the marital home, so he turned back to the park, crunching up the gravel once again toward Ken- sington, past skaters, wheelchairs, joggers, dogs, and flocks of tourists.