Got You Back (26 page)

‘How did you find out?’ he asked eventually.

Stephanie thought about telling him that she and Katie had met, that they spoke on the phone regularly, that his parents’ unscheduled visit had actually been part of their plan. There was some joy to be had, she thought, in watching his face while she revealed to him that the way his life had been crumbling around him recently had been partly her doing. But she found she didn't feel like kicking him when he was so obviously down. ‘I just did,’ she said. ‘You weren't as discreet as you thought you were, obviously.’

‘I'm so sorry,’ he said again. ‘I'm so, so sorry. I'm going to tell Katie it's over tomorrow. And then, please, please, can we talk? Please don't shut me out.’

Oh, shit, Stephanie thought. Katie.

After another ten minutes, in which James continued to cry and to tell her more and more details of his deceptions, as if by burdening her with it he would leave her with no option but to forgive him, Stephanie persuaded him that she had to go downstairs to check on the guests. ‘We can talk later,’ she said as she went. ‘Although, to be honest, I don't think there's much more to talk about.’

James had told her that Katie was planning another party for him the next day — a fact she, of course, knew already. He wasn't intending to go, he said. In fact, he wasn't intending to ever see Katie again.

‘Don't be ridiculous,’ Stephanie found herself saying. ‘You can't just run away from the situation. You've got a business to run up there.’

James had looked at her, confused: he had clearly
thought that promising to have no further contact with Katie would have pleased Stephanie. Christ, Stephanie thought, he still thinks it's all going to be OK.

‘Then you come up with me,’ he was saying. ‘That way you'll be able to see I'm telling you the truth when I say it's all over and done with. We can present her with a united front and then we can go to the surgery, clear my stuff out and come straight back down here.’

‘James, if you want to finish things with Katie, then finish things with Katie. But don't do it for me. I've told you it's over, OK?’

There was no way James was going to be able to go down and face their guests, so when Stephanie finally made a break for freedom, she did a quick circuit, telling them he was unwell and having a lie-down. Several people cast suspicious glances at the Japanese chefs and put their plates down nervously, rubbing their stomachs and feeling their foreheads for signs of a temperature. Once she had told enough people for the word to go round, Stephanie took the phone out into the garden, found a quiet spot and called Katie.

‘How's it going?’ Katie squealed.

Stephanie told her the whole story, leaving out some of the more unkind things James had said about her in an effort to please Stephanie.

‘Was he on to us, do you think?’ Katie asked, when she had finished.

‘No. Definitely not, I'd say. That's why it's so weird… it's genuine.’

‘Shit,’ Katie said. ‘I was so looking forward to tomorrow night.’

Stephanie told her of James's plan to travel up early the next day to end the relationship. ‘So, I guess it's all over,’ she said. ‘What will you do? Cancel the party?’

‘No way,’ Katie said, laughing. ‘I'll tell everyone it's to celebrate my freedom.’

‘That doesn't sound like you,’ Stephanie said, thinking of the sweet, rather naïve woman she had first met all those weeks ago.

‘It's the new me,’ Katie said. ‘The new improved no-one-messes-with-me version.’

Stephanie laughed although she wasn't entirely sure that the new Katie could be called an improvement. ‘Let me know how it goes, won't you?’

‘Of course.’

Back among her friends and family, Stephanie wondered whether she should stand up and make a statement: ‘Thank you all for coming. James and I would like to announce our separation. He turned out to be a lying, cheating, two-timing bastard but I'm sure we'd all like to wish him a happy birthday.’ She decided to leave things as they were. Everybody was having a great time and, probably, it was the last time they would all be together. Tomorrow she could start to let the truth slip. Besides, she had to tell Finn first.

35

In the end, Stephanie and James had had to share a bed on the night of the party because Pauline and John were sleeping in the spare room and one of their friends had fallen asleep on the sofa in the living room. James had taken Stephanie's reappearance in the bedroom as a signal that a thaw was approaching, and she had spent much of the night fighting off his tearful advances.

On Sunday morning he made a big show of getting up early and announcing to her that he would be back from Lincolnshire by dinner-time. Stephanie had to sit him down and tell him all over again that there was no hope.

‘If you're coming back down to London tonight, then you'll need to find somewhere to stay,’ she said. ‘I'll start packing up your things.’

At breakfast, Finn was full of the party, and Stephanie had felt a genuine wave of pity for James while he tried manfully to join in the conversation and not give anything away to his son. They had decided that Stephanie would break the news to him once James had gone, because she would be able to do it rationally and calmly. James, on the other hand, was likely to break down.

‘Let me know where you're going to be,’ Stephanie said to him, as he got in the car, wanting to reinforce the idea in his head that he wasn't coming home.

‘Sweetie, I've got something to say to you,’ she said to
Finn, as soon as James had left. Might as well get it over with. ‘Me and dad are… Well, we've decided to live in different houses for a bit. It's not because we don't love each other or anything like that, it's just, well, sometimes grown-ups decide to do things like that. It doesn't mean we're not a family any more…’

It sounded like one big cliché to her but Finn seemed to be taking it in. He was looking at her calmly.

‘And it doesn't mean either of us loves you any less either. Oh, and you can see Dad whenever you want. OK?’

‘OK.’

She waited for him to say something else but he had already turned back to his PlayStation. So many of his friends lived with only one parent, she thought sadly, that it probably seemed quite normal to him. Either that, or he was pretending to take it in his stride for her sake. She needed to get some advice on the best way to make sure he didn't bottle up his feelings and end up in a couple of years as a homicidal crack-taking maniac.

Katie had spent most of the night and the best part of the morning trying to decide how to react when James told her it was over. She had thought about packing up all his stuff and leaving it on the doorstep, calling out an emergency locksmith to change the locks and then watching him secretly from an upstairs window. She'd considered cooking him his favourite meal (roast lamb with broccoli, minted peas and roast potatoes), putting on her prettiest dress, making up her face and watching him squirm as he tried to get up the courage to tell her.

She'd even thought of letting out all her pent-up anger and screaming insults at him in a way she'd often fantasized about over the past couple of months. In the end, though, she decided that absolute indifference would unsettle him the most.

So, when he pulled up at about one o'clock — Stephanie had called her at ten this morning to let her know he was on his way already — she was sitting on the sofa reading the Sunday papers, legs curled under her. She had arranged herself in this casual position when she had heard his car turn into the road and she was now doing her best to look as though this was any normal Sunday morning. In fact, she was curious to see whether James had it in him to tell her the whole truth. It was hard to imagine that he would and, to be honest, she would hardly blame him if he couldn't. After all, where would you start? ‘I'm sorry I forgot to mention that I was still living with my wife. Did I tell you I was separated? Really? I don't know what came over me.’

Her heart had clearly not been listening when her brain had been telling it to act as if it didn't care because it was racing now, as James got out of the car. She noticed that, of course, he didn't have any bags with him — he wasn't intending to stay. She forced herself to stare at the page of the supplement she was holding and, with her other hand, she stroked Stanley's ear, willing herself to calm down. James, when he came through the front door, looked as if he had been up crying all night, which, of course, he had, according to Stephanie, who had told Katie she had had to tell him several times to keep it down so as not to wake Finn. His hair was standing up
on end and his eyes were wide and haunted. If she hadn't already known exactly what he was about to tell her she would have thought someone had died. He stood in the doorway, clearly waiting for a reaction.

‘You're early,’ she said. Stanley, who didn't know any better, was up on his feet and wagging his tail, happy to see his master.

‘I have to talk to you,’ he said dramatically. ‘I have to tell you something.’

Katie knew that he wanted her to help him out, to look fearful and ask him what it was, to rise to the melodrama of the occasion. But she wouldn't.

‘OK,’ she said calmly.

He flung himself into the armchair, opposite. He looked as if he was going to cry some more, she thought, and that made her irritated. Just get on with it, she wanted to say.

‘The truth is…’ he started, and then paused — for effect, she thought.

‘OK, I'm just going to say it. The truth is that I'm still married to Stephanie. We still live together when I'm in London and she had no idea about any of this. About you and me. I've been lying to you all this time — to both of you, actually — and I'm sorry. I'm really sorry.’

Katie was momentarily taken aback by the fact that he seemed to be being completely honest. She had to remind herself to keep her expression neutral.

James was looking at her for a reaction. When he didn't get one he took a deep breath and carried on: ‘And I've realized I've made a terrible mistake. I don't know how to say this to you without it sounding cruel but I know
now that it's my family I want — even though they don't want me at the moment — but I'm going to fight to get them back. I'm sorry, Katie, I really am, but I've got to do anything I can to save my marriage. This has to be the last time we see each other…’

Even though she had known what was coming, this last part made her angry. He was happy just to cast her aside. Forget that she didn't want him any more, it still hurt that he seemed able to dump her so easily, so finally, and without even considering the time they'd had together as anything other than, in his own words, ‘a terrible mistake’. Bastard.

She took a deep breath to try and slow her speeding pulse and spoke slowly to ensure that her voice was steady and calm. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘I'm going to take Stanley out now. Please make sure you've packed up your stuff and gone by the time I get back. I'll give you, what, an hour? Oh, and leave your key.’

James, exhausted by his long speech, was incredulous. ‘Is that all you've got to say?’

Katie forced a smile. That'd confused him. ‘Good luck,’ she said cheerily. She waved as she went out of the front door, not looking back. ‘’Bye!’

Once she was round the corner, out of sight of the cottage, Katie allowed her expression to drop. She hated him. OK, so it was to his credit that he'd actually managed to tell the truth for once in his life, but the fact he hadn't even seemed to care about sparing her feelings incensed her. He was so blinkered now that he couldn't see anyone other than himself and Stephanie. He hadn't cared that Katie might be hurt, that for all he knew he was ruining
her life. She let out a shout of frustration and it echoed back across the empty field. He wasn't going to get away with it.

By the time she returned home, exhausted after walking miles through the damp grass, all trace of him had gone. She wondered, briefly, whether he had driven straight back to London or whether he would try to tie up the loose ends of his life here properly first. She shook her head, as if dismissing the thought. It was nothing to do with her any more and she had a party to get ready for.

There wasn't a great deal he wanted to take with him. As much of the equipment as he could cram into the car — that might come in useful for selling later — his personal bits and pieces and copies of the company accounts, which he imagined he might need in the future. He had already loaded the patient files into boxes and had made two trips round to Simon's house where he'd dumped them outside the front door. He couldn't face speaking to anyone. He had placed a note on top of the pile which simply said, ‘I have decided to give up the business. Here are all the records. J.’

Katie's reaction had both confused and, he realized, disappointed him. He hadn't wanted to hurt her any more than necessary and he knew he should be grateful that it seemed she was going to be absolutely fine, but he didn't want to believe that she hadn't really had feelings for him. If that was the case, what had the last year been about? It wasn't so much that his ego was punctured, it was that he felt stupid. Had he risked — ruined, maybe — everything for someone who could just casually wish him good luck
and take the dog for a walk when he told her it was over? He had always believed that Katie was absolutely devoted to him. Had he been completely mistaken?

He took one last look round. He would have to call a house-clearance company to take away all the things he was having to leave behind. He had already sent away the paperwork for the retrospective planning application so that was in the lap of the gods. He wondered whether, if it wasn't granted, he would have to come back and rip down the extension with his bare hands before he could sell the place. He couldn't worry about that now. The important thing was to get back to London and start trying to piece his life back together.

36

If the party guests didn't know that something was up before they reached the village hall that night, it didn't take them long to pick up on it once they arrived. Slung between two hooks above the front door was a printed banner that had once clearly read ‘Happy 40TH Birthday James’ but which now, with the aid of a thick black marker pen, proclaimed ‘Happy Fuck You James’, something which made those of the villagers who had brought their children to the party with them feel very uneasy.