Remember Why You Fear Me (15 page)

They walked one end of the town to the other. A stretch of road had been pedestrianized, and now had cobble stones everywhere. “Very olde world,” he said, and he pronounced the ‘e’ on the end of ‘olde,’ and she supposed that was correct, but it still made him sound a bit of a tit. It began to drizzle, and they took shelter in a WHSmith’s. It was a very nice WHSmith’s, he said. She bought herself a copy of the Radio Times.

“Do you fancy some lunch?” he said to her at last.

“I’ve only just had breakfast,” she said.

“I know.” But it was still raining, so they went into a café anyway. They ordered toasted sandwiches.

“You can talk about your husband if you want.”

She thanked him politely, and asked him exactly why she would want to do that.

“I don’t mind,” he said kindly. “I’ll tell you about my girlfriend. If you’d like me to.” He breathed in, smiled bravely. “Okay, I’m ready,” he said. “Now, this is a bit complicated.” And he told her just about the least complicated thing she’d ever heard.

“It’s not fair,” he said eventually. “She seems so sure. How can she be so sure? Love, it’s a complicated thing, isn’t it? How do I know that what she feels is the same thing I feel?”

Quite, she said.

“I mean,” he went on, “I’d have thought you could only love one person. Or what’s it all about? What can it mean otherwise? But now. I can’t be so sure. She’d like us to get married. She’d like us to have kids. Can you see me as a father?” He laughed. “I mean, can you?”

She couldn’t see why not, lots of people were having kids, there were kids running about all over the place. They had to come from somewhere. “I suppose not,” she said.

He smiled at her. Tilted his head. “Why is that, do you think?”

“What?”

“I mean, you know me. What is it about me, what makes you think I couldn’t be a father?” He sat a bit closer to her. “Please tell me. I’d really appreciate your insight.”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe you’d make a great father. I bet you would.” His face fell a bit. “Yeah,” she went on, “I can see you doing it all, the school run, changing nappies, everything. Yeah.” By now he looked thoroughly wretched. “I bet you’re very fertile, why not?” He perked up at this, supposed he might be.

“But what sort of role model would I be?” he asked her seriously. “I mean, I don’t think I’m a bad man. I wouldn’t, you know, hurt anyone. But what sort of man would betray . . . I mean, here we are. And what we’ve done is bad, isn’t it? All that stuff in bed. I mean, it was very nice, but really, come on, let’s be honest, it’s filthy. It’s a filthy thing to do. Isn’t it?”

“Yes,” she said.

He let her pay for the sandwiches, they went out on to the cobbles again. The rain had stopped. They did a bit of window shopping.

“Look,” he said. “I’m sorry. This was supposed to be a magical weekend for you. I wanted this to be really magic. And it hasn’t been.”

She assured him it’d been fine. It certainly beat being at home on a Sunday afternoon.

“And last night should have been magical too. I think . . . I just wanted it too much. It felt like all or nothing. Which is silly, because we’re friends, aren’t we, you’re not going anywhere.” He took her hand. “We shouldn’t be here, looking in Marks and Spencer. We won’t get much chance to do it, we should be shagging, we should be shagging each other’s brains out. That would be good.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said.

“Please,” he said. “Please. Let me try again. Let me finish what I started.”

She checked her watch. It was only quarter past three.

They drove back to the hotel. Marcia was surprised to see them, wasn’t nearly as welcoming. “Did you leave something behind?” He asked her if they could have their room again. Not for a whole night, just for a few hours. She looked unhappy about this. “I haven’t made up the bed yet,” she said. He told her that was no problem. She said okay, but she’d need to be paid a full night. He said fine. And she’d need to be paid
now
, if they were just going to take off when they felt like it. Fine, he said, and gave her the money right there and then.

The room was just as they’d left it. The stains of red she’d made on the duvet looked rather lurid. He’d brought his suitcase in from the car, she couldn’t see why, and he started to unpack. “For God’s sake,” she said, and he explained it was just for the toiletries, he had to be clean, she’d want him clean, wouldn’t she? And he went to line them all up in the bathroom.

“Let’s make magic,” he said. He asked if he could undress her, and she said she couldn’t really see the point, there was no magic in getting undressed. But he pleaded, he promised it would be fun, so she let him, and it wasn’t. “You’re beautiful,” he said, at last, looking at her naked body. She told him she already knew. “You don’t want me to undress you, do you?” she asked, rather sternly, and he said that on balance that wouldn’t be necessary.

“Lie on the bed,” he told her, and she did. “I’m going to lick you on every inch of your body. I’m going to do it properly this time. You’ll see.”

“No,” she told him. “Enough of that. If you want to fuck me, you fuck me. All right?”

He looked as if she’d broken his favourite toy.

“Listen,” she went on. “You want this. Do you hear me? You’re the one who wants this. I don’t want this. I don’t need this. It’s you who wants a fuck. In which case, for God’s sake, for God’s
sake
, just get on and do it.”

“You don’t want this?” he asked.

“No,” she said. “
You
want it. I want to make that very clear.” She looked at his penis, and it didn’t even have the decency to wilt a little.

“Okay,” he said softly. And struggled with a condom wrapper.

“You’re not listening,” she said. “No fucking condoms. No nothing. Fuck me now, fuck me right this
second
. Or fuck off. Don’t you see?” He stared at her. “I don’t care. I just don’t
care
.”

So he fucked her. It was tight, and it hurt, but at least it
felt
like something. And he began to grunt, and she joined in too, one grunt from him, one from her—utterly out of time now, but it was honest, the grunts just came out the way they wanted to.

And from next door, too, the grunts began in earnest.

“I don’t believe it,” he said, and froze.

But there they were. Louder than theirs. Bolder. And much much happier.

He pulled away—she tried to hold him back, keep him inside, but he had rolled off her now, his face a picture of fury, his penis already dropping and giving up the ghost. “Shut up!” he cried, and banged on the wall.

“Come back to bed,” she said.

But he was having none of it. His fists pounded against the homely wallpaper. The goose picture jumped at the impact each time, as if in surprise. “What are you doing?” he screamed. “What’s in it for you? Have you even
looked
at each other? She’s a tub of lard, he’s . . . he’s a fucking
dwarf
. . . ! Why are you doing this to us?”

“It’s funny,” she told him. “Can’t you see it’s funny?”

And he began to howl a little, as he kept those fists banging uselessly against the wall. Because they didn’t care next door, they must have heard him, of
course
they had, but the grunting didn’t even pause a beat, on and on it drove, and he was crying now, actually crying, angry tears, every which way. She watched with utter fascination as he at last lost the energy to rail anymore, and sat down on the edge of the bed, sobbing and bawling like a baby.

What it must be like to cry like that, she wondered coolly. She hadn’t cried for such a long time. She hadn’t even tried for a while. She should, sometime, she decided then and there, she’d give it a bash, see if anything came out.

“She doesn’t deserve this,” he was saying, “I mean, yeah, she pisses me off, she’s such a
child
, I’m so sick of being the adult all the time . . .” And this was so funny, she had to laugh out loud.

He stared at her, surprised, his face wet and red. “Don’t you feel any guilt at all?”

“No,” she said.

“Jesus,” he said. “What’s the matter with you?”

“I’m dead inside,” she told him. She said it very simply, but the words still sounded gloriously melodramatic, she just had to say it again. “I’m dead inside, that’s how they put it,” she said. She laughed at that, and his face was such a picture of horror and confusion that she laughed at that too.

They didn’t speak for a while. He sobbed a little more, then was still. The grunting next door just went on.

“I’m very tired,” he said at last. “I didn’t sleep much last night.”

“You should get some rest,” she said.

He nodded, lay out on the bed. She got up. “Just shut my eyes for a while,” he said. “Might as well, the room’s paid for.” He cuddled up
to a pillow. She drew the curtains. “Thank you,” he said.

She got dressed. It was still light enough that she could read the Radio Times. She sat on the chair under the TV, read the listings, found out what programmes she’d been missing. There was an old film she quite liked playing on BBC2; she switched on the set, but turned the sound off, followed the last half hour on subtitles.

And a little while after that she climbed into bed next to him. He didn’t wake, but moved to her anyway; she opened her arms, and in he came, and she held him. And she even gave him a kiss—just the once, mind, and gently, and on the forehead. And at some point the grunting must have stopped—she didn’t notice it anymore, anyway.

He said he’d drop her off at the top of the road. It’d be safer that way, and the rain had stopped, she wouldn’t get wet walking home. She said she didn’t care. Then he thought, and said, no, he’d drop her outside the house. Why not, he wasn’t ashamed. And it was so late at night, surely that’d be okay, unless—and he laughed—her husband was given to staring out of the window at four thirty in the morning. If he was, he’d be very odd! If he was odd like that, no wonder she was having an affair! And she said she’d meant it the first time, drop her where he liked, she really didn’t care.

He parked the car, looked at her. “Well,” he said. And smiled.

“Well,” she said.

“I know that wasn’t quite the weekend we’d been looking forward to. But I want you to know, most sincerely. I had a really good time.”

She nodded. Fumbled for the door handle.

“We’re okay, aren’t we?” he said. “We’re still friends. We’re still going to have those gossips by the third floor lift at lunchtime?”

“Why not?” she said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“I love you,” he said.

And there was nothing to say to that. He broke into a shy grin.

“Well, it’s out there now,” he said. “That’s put my foot in it!”

She pulled at the door handle. And forgot she was still wearing her seat belt. She sighed.

“I didn’t know you could love two people at once,” he said. “It’s a funny thing, this love thing. And I do still love Alice,” and it took her a moment to puzzle out who Alice was, “but, you know, if I have to choose between the two of you, I’ll go with you. I will. It’ll break Alice’s heart,” and she now just pictured poor Alice, lying on a bed somewhere, glistening with his spit as he licked every inch of her body, wet and sticky and bored out of her tiny fucking mind, “but if that’s the way it has to be, then. . . . You don’t have to leave your husband,” he added helpfully. “You know. I’m not asking for any sacrifice on your part.”

“Thanks.”

“I’ll just fit right in.”

“I get it. Thanks.”

“You want to go, don’t you? Sorry.” And he undid her seat belt for her. She pulled it away gratefully. “I just think. What you said. You’re a very unhappy person, I think. And that just breaks my heart. Because I know I can make you happy. I can
fill
you with happiness, if you just let me.” He opened his arms out for a hug.

She looked at him. She supposed a hug wasn’t worth much, not after what she’d given him already. But she was damned if she was going to feel his body around hers again.

He frowned, waiting. “I’ll take care of you,” he said.

And then, from the trunk, she heard a grunt. She checked his face. No doubt about it, he’d heard it too.

It broke the moment. He lowered his arms. They both looked behind them, even though obviously there’d be nothing to see.

“No,” she breathed.

His silly boyish face broke into a beaming smile. “He’s all right!” he said. “What a relief! Isn’t that a relief?”

“Yes,” she said, softly.

“Do you know, I thought he’d died on me. I thought he was back there, you know, already rotting away. I thought I was going to have to slap him straight in the freezer!”

And all she could think of were the babies. The mother hadn’t finished giving birth to her babies—there’d been others inside her broken body, needing to be rescued. She had failed them.

“I’ve changed my mind,” she said. “I’d like to look after it.”

“What,” he said, “the rabbat?”

She had failed them. She should have picked up the mother, she should have checked. She should have picked her up, put her fingers between those flaps of skin, her whole hand if need be. She should have rummaged around, found whatever else was incubating inside, should have pulled them free.

“You said I could,” she said. “You said it could be
my
discovery. And I want it to be. I’ve got the perfect room to keep it in. It’s like a little nursery, it’d be lovely. It’d be happy with me. She’ll be happy.”

“Yes,” he said doubtfully. “I’m sure. But I’ve got a nice room too. I’m sure we’ve both got nice rooms.”

“You love me,” she said. “Give me the rabbit.”

There was another grunt.

He licked his lips. She didn’t take his eyes off him.

“It is ours,” he agreed. “I said it was ours. We’ve so much to share. But I’m going to be the one who cares for it.”

And she could have insisted, maybe. She could have fought him, she could even have offered to hug him, to accept his love, to go on as many weekend shag sessions as he liked. But it was half four in the morning, and she was tired, and the seat belt was off now, wasn’t it, and the door was open too—and she got out of the car.