Relative Love (69 page)

Cassie went still. She had assumed Sally would show him her letter. Her daft, rash, hateful letter.

‘Who indeed?’ she echoed.

‘She knew your name, how long we had been seeing each other … everything. And when she confronted me I just broke down. It’s hard to lie to someone you’ve known for twenty years.’ He shook his head, and added, despairingly, ‘Especially if that someone is ill.’

‘Ill?’ Cassie pulled her hands free in surprise, forgetting the awkward secret of her letter.

‘I
should
have told you, I know I should, but the fact is Sally was – is – very ill. She has cancer.’

‘What sort of cancer?’

‘Cervical. She only told me in March – that night we were in the same restaurant as you, she told me then.’

‘Oh, my goodness,’ murmured Cassie, a reflex of genuine compassion clashing head-on with rather less edifying thoughts. Her lover’s wife was going to die! God had intervened, because they were
meant
to be together. They would have to wait for a decent interval, of course, but then, without the ugly stigmas or traumas of divorce, they would be together properly.

Dan was still talking, absorbed once again by the horror of his own predicament. ‘It just made it so impossible. I mean, I couldn’t just walk out on her.’

‘Of course you couldn’t.’ Cassie reached again for his hand, affection swelling as she realised she couldn’t possibly have loved someone who
would
have been prepared to leave his sick wife.

‘And now?’ she whispered. A waiter, pad and pencil poised, hovered at the table and disappeared again.

Dan looked at their hands, still clasped together next to the carnation in the middle of the table.

‘She’s had a hysterectomy and her lymph glands were removed as an added precaution. She’s started a course of chemotherapy. After that they’ll do radiotherapy. So …’ There was apology in his voice and eyes. ‘I’ve got to see her through, Cass, for a bit longer anyway. The main thing is they got it early and she’s going to be fine.’

‘That is the main thing, of course,’ murmured Cassie dutifully, pressing away the other treacherous thoughts.

‘But I have been so miserable without you, my darling. It’s been like living a half-life, you’ve no idea.’

‘Yes, yes, I have.’ She smiled sadly. ‘I have every idea.’

‘I love you,’ he said simply, recalling and dismissing the image of the tall, scruffy young man who had called at his surgery. ‘I got back in touch because that love won’t go away.’

‘And I love you, Dan.’ Cassie leant forward, expecting, hoping for a kiss. Instead Dan steered his mouth to her ear and suggested, in a breathy voice, that they forget lunch altogether and take a taxi back to her flat.

Cassie hesitated, but only for a moment. The thought of once more being touched by him, after so many months of deprivation, was irresistible. As soon as they were in the safe privacy of the taxi he let down his guard, covering her face and neck with kisses, stroking her arms and the
small of her back where her shirt rode up over the waistband of her skirt. Cassie relaxed, sighing at the familiar pleasure of his caresses. Somewhere inside she knew that they should have stayed in the restaurant and talked more. So much had happened that he didn’t know about, that she wanted – yearned – to share. He needed updating on her thoughts too, her increasing awareness that at thirty-eight time was starting to run out, if their precariously planned life together was to include a child. In that regard, fleeing to her flat for sex would solve absolutely nothing. But the smell of Dan’s warm skin flooded her senses, stirring a hunger that was too strong for common sense. There would be time for talking, she told herself, on the phone, or when they next met. In the meantime she was happy just to be in his arms, to feel the simple reassurance of his physical desire.

That afternoon Stephen took a break from his writing for a stroll in Victoria Park. A jogger had been killed there the previous week, jumped by an as yet unidentified assailant, who had raped her and then strangled her to death with his bare hands. Seeing the paths and grass bathed in autumn sunshine, filled by parents with pushchairs and people flying kites or kicking balls, it was hard to believe the place could have played host to such depravity. What madness of lust or hatred could prompt such behaviour? Stephen wondered, shivering as he walked past the orange tape and signs appealing for witnesses. The only extreme emotion he knew about, he reflected wryly, was love. The madness of love. For, looking back over the weeks of sleepless nights, the delusional conviction that the extremity of his ardour would be enough to ignite reciprocal feelings in Cassie, the clutching at straws as if they were weighty indicators – a game of Scrabble, a smile, a throwaway remark – Stephen recognised now that he had been suffering from a genuine form of insanity. Rudderless, pitching on storms of insecurity and ancient unresolved unhappiness, he had truly believed that Cassie Harrison offered the only direction his life could take. His north, his south, his east, his west, as Auden had so beautifully put it.

He had been reading a lot of poetry since his visit to Cassie’s doctor friend. And writing it again – rather more objectively now and on all sorts of subjects. It helped, Stephen found, not only to vent his emotions but to create a sense of order in what he now accepted as an intriguing but disordered world. To the same end he had also started work on a thriller featuring an Irish detective called Jack Connolly, who drank too much but had a nose for a criminal. Begun purely as an intellectual exercise, Stephen had been pleased enough with the results to share three chapters with his agent. So enthusiastic had been the response that, these days, Stephen was setting his alarm clock and writing eight hundred words before he allowed himself lunch. Structured thus, time had begun to motor instead of crawl, revealing the life-saving truth that survival as well as art could be managed effectively with the application of a little routine, with the gripping of the small realities of existence rather than grasping after its impossibilities. Greatly steadied by the process, Stephen had even ventured back up north to visit his parents, this time without the burden of expectation – or apprehension. He had stayed for lunch, an overcooked roast with soggy vegetables, and talked about football results and the weather. His parents, he saw now, were old people with shrivelled horizons and selective memories. They didn’t know that their idea of parenting had fucked him up and they didn’t want to know. So what? He’d returned to London feeling separate from them. Safe and separate. That night he’d eaten out in the Indian round the corner and asked one of the waitresses if she’d like to meet up on her night off. They had gone to the cinema and held hands in the dark, and Stephen had thought, I can do this, I can be normal and happy and sane. When Cassie entered his mind he
made himself remember the doctor’s chiselled face and wished her well in her own separate pursuit of love. Truly caring for someone meant wanting their happiness more than one’s own. He knew that now and it had brought a sort of calm.

He spotted a little pink teddy bear lying on the grassy verge of the path, dropped or hurled by a toddler, and stooped to pick it up. He brushed off flecks of dirt and dried leaves, then propped it up, tenderly, on the back of a bench, in conspicuous view of the path. A few yards on he turned to check that it was still there, hoping with a rush of sentimentality that its young owner would reclaim it. The thought of the little bear never finding its way home, could have – if he had let it – made him weep. His feelings did rush at him, these days, from unexpected angles and with inappropriate vehemence. He stood still for a few moments, waiting for this new surge of emotion to pass, much as one might wait for a shower of rain to fall before venturing outside. He could use the bear in a poem, he decided, starting to walk on. Something poignant. A tacky pink bear, loved beyond reason. He turned on his heel and strode back in the direction he had come, not looking at the toy any more – not needing it. The lines were already forming in his mind, begging for release on to the crisp whiteness of a fresh page in his notebook.

St Peter’s School

Dear Mum and Dad
,

I hope you are well. I am fine apart from having rather a lot of work. Sometimes I wish I hadn’t been put forward to do French and maths GCSE early, though I suppose it gets them out of the way. Also I am not enjoying rugby very much. I have bought some shoulder pads and put them on the school bill – hope that’s OK
.

It is the house drama competition this term and we are doing a one-act play called The Gunners, set in the Second World War. I think it will be quite good although the sixth-former directing it – George Rogers – is USELESS. I am helping behind the scenes which is OK so long as they don’t ask me to do too much painting etc. As you know, I’m not much good with a paintbrush. I was wondering if there was anything of Uncle Eric’s we could use for props. Do you think Granny and Granddad would mind?

That’s about all my news for now. I am looking forward to half-term already. Tell Granddad to do double the amount of fireworks this year!

Love from Theo

PS Tell Chloë – because she might be interested – that a boy in the year above me got bitten by a dog in the summer while he was on holiday in Kenya and they thought he might have RABIES. He had to have some huge injections but is OK now
.

PPS Also tell Chloë NOT to go in my room while I am away. PLEASE
.

Theo put the cap on to his fountain pen, then took it off again, wondering whether to add another PS expressing specific concern for his mother’s health. Both he and Chloë had been told not to advertise the business of the baby yet – because of things still being able to go wrong. His sister had squeaked in dismay, while Theo, secretly, had felt a certain relief. It was, of course, exciting that they were to acquire another sibling. All the encouragement he had given his mother after his fall from the tree at the end of the summer had come from the heart. But the prospect of sharing the news with his schoolmates was quite another matter, since it meant – inadvertently – addressing the notion of his parents having sex. Of course, every member of year ten knew he had not arrived in the world by a process of immaculate conception and yet … and yet … Theo
sucked his pen-top, trying and failing to equate the stirrings triggered, these days, by the mere thought (let alone any glimpse) of a nude woman with any comparable impulses shared by his parents. It was impossible. Gross, in fact. In the end he did add another postscript, but only to say, ‘Write soon!’ Clem hadn’t written for a while and any letter – even one from his parents – was better than none at all.

Helen, reading her son’s letter over a leisurely breakfast the following Saturday, laughed out loud then handed it across to Peter. They were eating in the conservatory although it was a little late in the year to be doing so. Her legs, protected only by the folds of her dressing-gown, were goosebumped with cold. It would take a long bath to warm her up properly, steaming with scented oils and foam. At the thought Helen let out a little sigh of pleasure. She wasn’t ready to retreat upstairs just yet, though: it was too nice just sitting there, watching Peter’s face as he read the letter and the dust motes dancing in the sunbeams next to him. Through the door into the kitchen she could see the now familiar plump figure of Griselda, their nanny, in pursuit of a new diet, carefully peeling fruit and chopping it into a bowl of yoghurt, her tongue curling round her lower lip in concentration. She still ironed badly and smoked the occasional cigarette in her bedroom, but there was a pleasing quietness about her – an instinct for withdrawing at appropriate times – that made her presence in the house very easy. She was also fabulous at the piano, which had done wonders for Chloë’s recalcitrance towards her own music practice.

‘A good letter, isn’t it?’

‘Very good.’ Peter tucked the single page back into its somewhat crumpled envelope and smiled at his wife. ‘You look cold.’

‘I am. I shall have a bath in a minute.’

‘I’ve got to do some work today, I’m afraid.’

‘Poor you. I’m taking Chloë into Richmond. She needs some new ballet shoes. Kay’s coming too,’ Helen added, quickly enough to betray the habitual reflex of wariness about her friend. ‘If you’re working we might grab lunch there, a pizza or something.’

‘Sounds good.’ Peter folded the newspaper, which he had opened next to his plate, and prepared to retreat to his study.

‘Peter?’

‘Yes?’ He paused in the doorway, the paper under his arm.

‘About – about what you said to Charlie.’ Helen shifted position, tucking her dressing-gown more tightly round her freezing thighs. She was slowly getting bigger now: she could feel it everywhere, as if her whole body was swelling protectively round her child. ‘The Ashley House thing … You can always change your mind.’

‘No.’ He looked at her gratefully, but also a little sadly. ‘No, I can’t. And I don’t want to. It was
waiting
to be done and I’ve done it.’

‘Not just for me, though?’ she whispered, glimpsing the strain of his decision and knowing that she would prefer the burden of her own unhappiness to being responsible for his.

Peter sighed. He had no regrets, not deep down, but a part of him was still in the process of letting go and it wasn’t easy. ‘Not just for you, no. For me, too. For all of us. I’m going to talk to Dad about it at half-term. It will all be fine, you’ll see.’ He walked back to the table and tapped her fondly on the head with his newspaper. ‘Now get into that bath. You’re blue.’

As Helen got to her feet Chloë skipped into the room dressed only in a tutu. ‘Look, Mum, a handstand.’ She performed a little leapfrog on to her arms, waggled her legs in the air for perhaps half a second, then collapsed amid dramatic panting on to the floor.

‘Hm. Very good, but I shouldn’t practise in here, the floor’s too hard. You’ll hurt yourself.’

‘No, it’s not,’ shouted Chloë, lurching back on to her hands for a second attempt.