Lifesaver (27 page)

‘So, see you later,’ said Adam with finality. ‘I really must go, or Max will think I’ve forgotten about him.’

‘Right. See you later,’ I said, and hung up, too flummoxed to even think about running outside to try and offer Dora some assistance. Instead I just watched as a middle aged bald man in a Barbour jacket obligingly ran along the bank after the duck-chasing dog, until it got close enough for him to grab the lead. A small crowd of assorted dog walkers, ramblers, and mothers with toddlers had gathered on the little ornamental bridge straddling the pond, and were watching with fingers pointed and mouths agape—not just the children, either. That was country life for you, I supposed, where the biggest excitement of your day was a dog splashing after some panic-struck ducks.

I wondered what on earth they’d all think about me, if they’d known. It would probably have kept them in gossip for days. And why did I feel so despondent about a man I didn’t want, and couldn’t have anyway?

I was surprised at how hurt I felt at Adam’s apparent unwillingness to let me babysit. It tainted the euphoria of my day, affecting all my subsequent decisions. As I balanced on the bed in order to check my appearance in the flat’s one small mirror on the bedroom wall, I realized that had chosen a totally different outfit to the one I’d vaguely been planning. I’d replaced the intended smart black wide-leg trousers and silk button-up Agnes B shirt with my short denim mini skirt and my lowest plunge-necked contour-hugging top: Ann Widdicombe to Divine Brown in three easy stages. How had that happened? And how had a simple lack of enthusiasm for my offer to babysit led to me doubting my own attractiveness? I suddenly felt as if I was right back to being seventeen again: anguished and insecure about whether the object of my affections liked me, or whether it was merely wishful thinking.

For the first time I confronted the thought which had, prior to that point, merely been skirting around the periphery of my mind. I had a devastatingly handsome, hugely successful and - reasonably - devoted husband; a good man whom I respected and loved and wanted to grow old with. Yet, for some unfathomable reason—and I was pretty sure it wasn’t
just
to do with Max—I acknowledged that I had developed a stonking great crush on a paunchy balding ceramics teacher.

It was true, I realised, as I stood on the bed still twisting my torso around to try and look at my bottom. I hadn’t allowed myself to indulge the notion before, but ever since I’d cooked them dinner, I had found myself thinking about them both, constantly—and thinking about Adam in a very different way to the way I thought about Max. Thinking about the way Adam’s blue eyes were so honest, and the openness of his smile. Thinking about his broad shoulders—despite the slight paunch, he was a powerful, well-built man—and strong legs. Seeing him over and over in my mind, bending down to pick up Max’s toys. The way that almost everything he said had either made me laugh, or feel good, or feel admiration for him. The rough skin on his large hands, which had given me a rasping thrill when they’d held mine in welcome and farewell. That hug…

I tried to analyse it, to extrapolate an explanation. Maybe it was solely because he was so different to Ken. Since we’d been married, I hadn’t really spent any amount of time with any other males, not like that. It was only a temporary infatuation, I told myself; a reaction to the strange situation I’d found myself in. I’d get over it.

Of course it had nothing to do with sex. But why, then, was I having mini-fantasies about getting down and dirty with a pottery teacher? Imagining that I got a place on Adam’s life drawing class, and that his hand would guide the charcoal stick in my own, as we gazed on the flawless body of a model (even in my fantasy I couldn’t work out which sex to make the model. If male, it would be sexier for me; if female, perhaps Adam would substitute in his mind my head on her body). Our eyes would meet over my easel, and he’d praise my work with an expression which would tell me that it wasn’t just my drawing he was impressed by.

And why could I not seem to stop trying to picture what his body looked like beneath his loose jeans? I remembered with shame the way that, on the final day of the mosaic project, he’d brushed my hand as he showed me the finer points of grouting, and I had blushed like a schoolgirl. So it had started back then, and I’d been in denial; despite the fact that I had even taken to fits of inane giggling whenever he said something funny—which was often. The like of which laugh I had never heard coming from my own throat before.
Hee hee hee
, I’d tittered, like a five year old meeting Santa for the first time. It was pathetic.

I sat abruptly back down on the bed. My hands were shaking, and I felt damp and hot between my legs. Then I lay back and closed my eyes, giving myself leave to imagine him pressing me up against the wall of the dingy hamster-cage Ladies toilet in Moose Hall, pinning my arms above my head. Even just thinking about it evoked that scent of sawdust and Dettol again, and there Adam would be, whispering, ‘shhh, Anna, we must be quiet’ (because, even in my erotic daydream, Ralph would be hovering outside the door of the Ladies, waiting for me to emerge so that he could continue to bore me about his bunion operation or his fencing skills).

‘Shhh, Anna’, Adam would say, and with that irresistibly appealing cheeky grin he would lean forward until his broad chest touched my breasts and I would be able to feel his breath on my lips, and he’d inch closer and closer until his bulk would be squashing me, in a nice way of course, and then as the lower part of his trunk came closer, there it would be, the lump in the front of his jeans which would collide with me just as he began to part my lips with his tongue, and he’d exude that divine smell of his, a faint but musky trace of aftershave mixed with bluebells in the forest, blocking out the hamster-cage smell, and then we’d kiss, slowly at first and then—but it wasn’t about sex.

Not at
all.
He was just a lovely person, that was all. Surely it was natural to want to get close to such a lovely person. There was nothing unusual or worrying about being attracted to another man. It was what you did about it that would get you into trouble. And I had absolutely no intention of ever acting out my daydreams.

Lucky too, I supposed, that Adam clearly didn’t feel the same way about me. He was so obviously one of those easy-going men who most women liked, I thought, and far too much of a gentleman to ever try anything on.

I’d never even considered having an affair and I certainly didn’t want one—but there had just been something about the way Adam had looked at me, especially when I’d been at his house that time. With something approaching almost depression, I realized that if he did, as I suspected, find me attractive, and if he made a play for me, I’d have found it quite difficult to resist.

Oh, see sense Anna, I told myself. The last thing I needed was to have an affair. It would probably finish Ken off altogether. He’d been devastated about Holly too, and it would be a big enough mindfuck if he ever found out that I’d lied about the acting job. I couldn’t have an affair. I couldn’t do that to him, on top of everything else.

I’d read in a woman’s magazine at the dentist surgery that it was healthy for an adult woman to have crushes, just as long as they didn’t make her miserable. A good crush could improve the circulation and boost the immune system, it said, not to mention the excitement of letting one’s imagination run riot. So I granted myself a small, temporary licence to enjoy such new and strange feelings. It was OK to find Adam attractive, because he was an attractive person, inside and out. An attractive person who listened to me, who laughed at my inane jokes and looked genuinely interested in my throwaway comments.

And anyway, he probably didn’t
really
fancy me. He was probably just lonely.

By the time I eventually pushed open the door of the restaurant, I was confused and anxious; wrung out with doubts and trepidation. It made me feel exhausted, actually, to think that this was only the beginning. No going back, not for now; not when I had a real chance to be in Max’s life, and I’d paid a three month deposit on the flat in Wealton.

‘Anna! Hi! Come and sit down,’ Mitch patted the seat of an empty chair next to him, so I pretended I hadn’t heard, and headed in the opposite direction towards Adam.

It had not escaped my notice, the way my head swam at the sight of Adam in a clean white shirt, smiling at me, but I tried to ignore it. Unfortunately, since my minicab had been ten minutes late, the seats on either side of him were already occupied by his fan club, Pamela and Serena. They were practically hanging off his arms like groupies, vying for his attention in what I thought was a most unsubtle manner. I had to slide into a space in between Pamela and Ralph, although it wasn’t an ideal position. Ralph and Dutch Margie were holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes, and Pamela of course only had eyes for Adam, and so both were leaning away from me, making me feel like I had some kind of dire personal hygiene problem. Everybody said hello to me, of course, and Adam did slide me a sly little resigned look, as if to say, ‘sorry I’m a bit trapped here, but I’ll be with you when I can,’ but I still felt awkward. I occupied myself by studying the menu and, when they weren’t looking, my fellow diners.

There were eight of us present: myself, Adam, Mitch, Serena, Pamela, Margie, Ralph, and Orlando’s mum—I couldn’t remember her name. All the women were far more dressy than I was, sporting chokers and beaded garments, fake flower clips in their hair (Margie and Serena), and I could smell the hairspray which crystallised Pamela’s large coiffure, as well as the perfume from behind her equally large ears. I was glad I’d had my own hair done that day but, as Mitch gazed shamelessly into my cleavage, I fervently wished I’d stuck to the black trousers and sober shirt combo.

We were a mismatched party. Mitch had brushed his long straggly hair, but still wore the grubby tie-dye t-shirt I’d first seen him in, and he looked distinctly at odds next to Orlando’s mum—oh, Mary, that was her name—in her pearls and floral blouse. She was clearly not happy to be seated next to him, and was leaning across the table talking to Serena. I wondered what the other people in the restaurant made of us. Probably thought we were the local branch of Alcoholics Anonymous—at least, until the waiter brought over a bottle of red and one of white, plonking them already opened in the centre of the table without offering anybody the chance to taste them first.

To try and cover up my discomfort, I took charge. ‘Red or white?’ I asked Pamela, gripping both bottles by their necks and waving them towards her.

‘Red please,’ said Pamela, looking at me with the sort of curiosity usually seen in small boys discovering molluscs in the compost heap. ‘Sorry, I recognize your face, but I don’t recall your name. I’m Pamela.’

‘Anna,’ I said. ‘We met at the college a few weeks ago. I was trying to get on an art course but they were all booked. You put me in touch with Adam and he got me down to the mosaic project. Which is why I’m here.’

I liked saying Adam’s name out loud. I didn’t get much chance to use it, and it felt familiar and comforting - “mentionitis” was what Bridget Jones would have diagnosed it as.

Pamela nodded, but once I’d filled up her glass she turned back to Adam without further ado. I got up and went around the table dispensing red and white, leaning away from Mitch when I came to him so that he couldn’t look down my top. It didn’t stop him grabbing my wrist, however, to pull me in so he could give me a large wet kiss on the cheek. I was pretty sure he’d been aiming for my lips, but I turned my head at the last minute. His breath smelled of stale hash, and his skin was clammy. I sloshed white wine into his glass as hastily as I could, and moved on.

Margie and Ralph were still in a huddle together, but when I got to them they were both frowning, and as I poured their wine I noticed Margie deliberately untwining her fingers from his, one at a time, and placing her hands firmly in her lap. Ralph rolled his eyes and looked away. Oh terrific, I thought; a domestic. I just couldn’t understand what Margie saw in him. He was admittedly pretty good looking in that strong, relaxed Jamaican way, but he was a bit of a bore, and quite possibly a lech. I liked Margie, and felt like telling her she could do better.

When the waiter had been summoned by Adam to take our order—he seemed on a mission to give us as little service as was humanly possible, and Adam waited ten minutes for him to reappear in the restaurant, plus another five to attract his attention - Serena delved into her shoulder bag and took out a packet of photographs.

‘Listen everyone,’ she commanded, tossing her hair back over her shoulders. She was smiling, but still managing to retain her strange bitter caught-in-a-wind-tunnel expression. ‘I’ve got something to show you. Paula’s had her baby: a little girl! Isn’t that wonderful!’

There was a half-hearted smattering of applause from around the table, and ‘aahs’ from the women. Adam picked up his glass. ‘Let’s have a toast to her and the baby, shall we? To Paula and -’

‘Jasmine. Jazzy, she’s going to call her,’ Serena supplied.

‘To Paula and Jazzy,’ chorussed everybody, chinking their glasses. My heart sank as my glass raised. Not baby photos, please, I prayed. Don’t show me the baby photographs.

But it was inescapable. Round they came, a series of almost identical shots, the only difference being the degrees of close-up of the baby’s face, and whether her eyes were open or closed. There were a couple with Paula too, looking shattered and green in a towelling dressing gown, her hair straggly and her eyes bloodshot. She was unrecognizable from the perky pregnant woman I’d seen at Moose Hall.

I thought of Vicky then, and felt a wave of compassion for her. I wished she could have been there with me, laughing at Mitch’s hideousness and Ralph’s minute shorts, buoying me up with her good humour and sense of adventure. I wondered if I’d ever have it back again, or whether it was lost to me for ever.

‘Look at this one,’ crowed Pamela, talking directly to me for the first time. ‘Isn’t she just adorable!’ She jabbed me in the ribs with her elbow, and forced me to accept the next photograph in the seemingly unending display. I glanced reluctantly at it, and bit my lip. The baby was gazing at the camera with such clear blue eyes and the sweetest expression of surprise: kind of
, wow, what is this place? Give me a little while to get used to it, and I think I might like it!