Taming the Beast (26 page)

‘Try!’ Sarah squeezed his hands. ‘You’re being so selfish, Jamie. You have a whole family. I’ve never had anyone. Now I do, and you’re all angry and mean.’

He
was
angry and mean. But not with Sarah so much as every one in the world who wasn’t Sarah. Shelley especially had been copping it. Despite her superhuman tolerance, they were fighting all the time. Just yesterday she had asked why he was so grumpy when she was the one with cracked nipples and swollen ankles and no sleep. Jamie reminded her that he also got up several times a night to soothe the baby and he had to go to work for eight hours every day. Then he said that her cracked nipples and swollen ankles were no treat for him either. Shelley cried for an hour after that one, and Jamie tried to work out what the fuck was wrong with him. He realised that no matter how hard he tried to be a good husband, the fact was that he looked at Shelley and didn’t see what he wanted to see, which was Sarah.

He couldn’t help thinking that if Shelley had not fallen pregnant then he wouldn’t have had to marry her and then he would’ve been able to marry Sarah. It wasn’t logical, because a) Sarah had only shown an interest in him after he moved in with Shelley, and therefore may have never started sleeping with him in the first place if Shelley hadn’t got pregnant; b) Sarah didn’t want to get married; and c) even if Sarah did want get married it would never be to Jamie, because she didn’t love him
in that way
. He used to take comfort in the fact that Sarah didn’t love anyone
in that way
, but that comfort was gone because now she did, and Jamie was frozen out and haunted by a train of thought that he knew was ridiculous but which wouldn’t stop. He hated Shelley, and he hated
himself, and he hated Daniel Carr, and sometimes he even hated Bianca. He never hated Sarah but he was aware that he certainly should.

‘I’m moving into his place,’ Sarah said in the kind of mock-cheerful voice that people used when they were telling you bad news but wanted you to think it was good.

‘When?’

She mumbled something that sounded like ‘today.’ ‘When?’ he asked again.

She spoke more clearly. ‘Today.’

‘Today.’ Jamie stared at her fingers. Her nails were bitten to the quick, like his. But Sarah had never been a nail biter; she always trimmed and filed them so there was a perfect white moon at each tip.

‘Well, tonight.’

‘Tonight?’

‘Yeah, so… I have to pack, I have to be ready.’

‘You have to be ready.’ Jamie continued to stare at those ragged fingernails. They were the nails of an anxious, frustrated, impotent person. The nails of a person just hanging on.

‘Stop repeating everything I say!’

Jamie looked up. ‘I didn’t realise I was.’

‘Yeah, well…’ Sarah half-smiled into his eyes. ‘You okay?’

‘Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?’

Sarah kissed him then. Soft, sweet, so gentle, so warm. For so many years of his life he’d dreamt of kisses like this. He’d watched her sitting in class and he’d thought about her touching his chin and leaning in with her lips parted. He’d watched her playing soccer and running the Cross Country and swimming in the carnival and had imagined what her natural, joyous athleticism would mean to a boy she loved. He’d seen men grope and pull and prod
her, and he imagined how differently he would treat her. He swore that if he had her, he would never treat her roughly. If he ever got that lucky, he would never, ever hurt her, not even in an act of passion.

Fast forward through his dreamy aching teens, and now he was a man, and he’d had Sarah many times. Many times in many ways and he had still never hurt her, although he understood what drove men to do that. Sarah controlled men with her too-soft hair and her clever lips and her insatiable cunt. She made her men feel simultaneously grateful and exploited. And she was so cavalier, so damn
haughty
, that you wanted to make her take you seriously. There was an instinctual need to show her that she had met her match, that you were a stronger, better man, the likes of which she had never come across; you were a man who could make
her
beg
you
. When you had her in your arms you wanted to know that behind the armour of her technique, underneath the roar of her shameless mouth, she was in awe of you. It was a strong, strong drive, and Jamie felt it now like he’d felt it every time she’d touched him.

But he was different to other men. He had been privileged enough to know her when she was brave and sweet and well-fed. He had known her before she’d been screwed, and that made all the difference. It was why he would never hurt her, why he would never let his lust, or his vanity, take control. He would always kiss her like this –
exactly like this now
– because whatever that animal had tricked her into thinking, real love was not selfish and cruel. Real love should draw no blood from the loved and buckets from the lover.

‘Why do you have to go?’ Jamie asked, still kissing her.

‘It’s just the way it is.’

Jamie started to cry again and it was like she didn’t notice, except, he knew she did. She just wasn’t the type of girl to draw
attention to pain. She just kept right on kissing him, rubbing his lower back, then the skin above his waistband. Rubbing and kissing, ignoring the hot wet tears that were sticking her eyelashes to his cheeks.

‘Where is he taking you?’

‘Not far.’

Jamie kept crying, taking off her shirt and pants, helping her with his, kissing her softly in between the unbuttoning and the sleeve pulling and the underwear peeling.

‘I’ll still be able to see you, won’t I?’

Sarah answered with a gasp. She had wriggled her way under him and without really meaning to, Jamie had pushed inside her. He briefly worried that this was the last time he would ever make love to her, but the thought slipped away rapidly. The world was Sarah’s flesh clenching his. Everything that wasn’t her was incomprehensible, but he intuited that the answers lay somewhere at the end. Surely this unspeakable urge had a purpose beyond physical satiation. Surely there had to be the meaning of life or the secret to inner peace or the key to her heart waiting for him at the end.

There was no revelation. There was just the too brief feeling of peace, and then there was Sarah, as unfathomable as always, smiling up at him, stroking his shoulder blades and his back. He asked if she wanted him to get off and she said
never
.

‘Sar, what I asked before, about still being able to see you…’

‘Nothing in the world could stop me seeing my Jamie-boy,’ she said, but her body had tensed beneath him, and her tone was all wrong. It was that mock-cheerfulness again.

‘So nothing will change?’

Silence. Sad eyed, stiff-armed silence.

‘Sar?’

‘No, things will change. What’s the point otherwise?’

Jamie felt himself shrinking out of her. He tried to press back in but it was too late. He would never again be inside Sarah Clark’s body. He realised it didn’t matter all that much, not compared to the prospect of never seeing her at all. He would gladly give up sex forever if it meant he could talk to her at least every second day.

‘So no more of this stuff?’

‘No more of this stuff.’ Sarah tickled his back. ‘One of the few things about my life I’ll miss.’

‘Sure.’

‘It’s true. In fact, all of the things I’ll miss are all of the things I do with you.’ Her eyes widened, moistened, blinked. ‘Do you have any idea how important you are to me? When I think about not having you, I can hardly breathe. You look at me with that hangdog face, all rejected and sorry for yourself, and I don’t think you understand that giving you up is the hardest, worst, most painful thing I’ve ever had to do and am ever likely to do.’

Jamie climbed off her, pushing away the warmth of her flattery and processing the cold message beneath.
Giving you up Not having you All the things I’ll miss…

‘I’m never going to see you again, am I?’ he said, picking up his clothing, putting his physical self back together.

‘Never say never,’ Sarah said, and laughed horribly.

‘This was a goodbye fuck?’

‘I thought you knew that.’

Jamie forced himself to look at her. She was still naked, sprawled out shamelessly. She was lighting a cigarette, as she always did. As he would never see her do again.

‘I thought it was a goodbye to fucking fuck. I didn’t know it was a goodbye everything, have a nice life fuck. I had no idea you were that insane. I had no idea you were going to give up ten years of friendship over a crazy old man who belts the crap out of you.’

She flinched, then shook her head as if to clear it away. ‘We’ll see each other, Jamie. It’ll just be less often. It’ll be twice as sweet for being twice as rare.’

He thought for a minute that he would scream. He turned away and reached for his shoes, glad for the concentration required to untangle the hastily untied laces. ‘Okay, Sarah. Just write down the phone number and address and I’ll call you in a couple of days. Maybe me and Shell can come over for dinner once you’ve settled in.’

‘Jamie, I don’t think–’

‘Yeah, I don’t think Shelley would want to hang out with a middle aged teacher either. I’ll just come around and we’ll have a drink or something.’

Sarah touched his shoulder but he kept his eyes on his feet. ‘I think it’s better if I call you. I don’t think Daniel will–’

‘Yeah, alright, cool. You’ll call me whenever.’ His shoes were on. He had no more reasons to be sitting here. ‘I’ll catch you later then. Thanks for the root.’ He stood up.

‘Jamie!’ Sarah jumped in front of him, naked and wild-eyed. ‘How can you be so calm?’

‘I don’t know. How can you be so cruel?’

Sarah reached for him but he stepped out of her way. If she touched him, he would shatter.

‘I can’t let you leave like this.’

‘Why not? It’s not forever is it? I mean, we’ll see each other all the time. You’re going to call me.’ Jamie started walking. Step after step after step.

‘Yes, yes, I am, Jamie. You know I love you, right? You know I’m going to call you as soon as I can?’ Her voice already sounded far away. She was already a memory. Less than that, she was a memory of a dream he had once. A nice dream, while it lasted.

Sarah showered with the water as hot as she could stand it. Her hangover was worse than it had been this morning, the places Daniel had hit and kicked her were beginning to throb, and on top of all that, she could not stop shaking. The hot water was supposed to calm her, but it just made her sicker and shakier. She got out of the shower, threw up nothing, splashed her face with cold water and got dressed.

She was drinking coffee and trembling, trying to get it together enough to start packing, when Mike returned. ‘Bloody hell, I’ve missed you,’ he said, putting his arms around her. ‘What’s wrong, babe? You cold or something?’

Sarah ducked out of his embrace. ‘I’m fine. I don’t have much time though, so –’

‘I see.’ Mike sat down on the sofa so he was looking up at her. ‘What’s going on?’

‘With what?’

‘With us.’

‘Oh, well, nothing. We used to fuck and now we don’t.’

His face crumpled up for a second, then quickly smoothed out. ‘Jamie said you’ve hooked up with someone.’

She sighed and sat down beside him. ‘Yeah.’

‘Is it true he’s your old teacher?’

She nodded and Mike clicked his tongue. A habit that made Sarah want to cut it off. Mike lit a smoke and offered it to Sarah; she waved it away and got one for herself.

‘Jamie said he slaps you around.’

‘J–’ Sarah’s throat closed over. She cleared it with a painful cough and tried again. ‘He finds it hard to be objective. He takes everything the wrong way.’

‘Who does? Jamie?’

‘Yeah.’

Mike squinted at her through the smoke. ‘You’re being evasive, Sarah. Does this bloke belt you up, or what?’

‘No.’

Mike’s eyes screwed up so tightly that they almost disappeared and his bottom lip trembled like a naughty child. ‘I suppose you got that bruise on your forehead from walking into a door?’

Sarah resisted the urge to cover the bruise with her hand. ‘I have no idea how I got it. I’ve had a hell of a week.’

‘Yeah, sure, whatever.’ Mike leant across her to stub his cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray. ‘So you’re full on with this fella and that means we’re done?’

‘Yes.’

Mike scratched his neck hard enough for pink streaks to appear. ‘You suddenly believe in monogamy?’

‘Not at all. I’ll continue to fuck whomever I like, whenever I like. It’s just that my first choice for who has always been him, and once I’m living with him the when will be all the bloody time, and therefore, I don’t see where I’d find the time, or have the need, to fuck you or anyone else.’

‘You’ve gone mental.’

‘Call it that if you want. I love him. He’s everything I’ve ever wanted.’

‘Great, I’m really fucking happy for you.’

Sarah reached for his hand, pulling it away from his throat. She was afraid he’d gouge a hole otherwise. His hand was hot and sticky,
his face mottled red and white. Sarah was aware for the first time that the man sitting across from her had feelings.

‘I’m sorry, Mike, but I really have a lot to do. I have to pack and call the real estate and–’

To Sarah’s astonishment, Mike’s eyes filled with tears. He squeezed his eyes shut, but the tears trickled out from under his lids, some getting caught on his lashes before breaking free again and soaking into the stubble on his jaw. Sarah was sure that if she saw one more man crying today she would murder him.

‘Mike…’ She had no words to comfort him with. She didn’t even
like
him. The only thing they’d ever had in common was a penchant for rough sex. Fully clothed, vulnerable,
weeping
, Sarah just wanted him gone.

‘What if I left Jess?’ he said, pressing his eyes with the backs of his hands.

‘That’s a ridiculous thing to say. Pull yourself together.’

He looked at her in a way that made her skin crawl. ‘I think I love you, Sarah. I didn’t mean to, but I do. I can’t believe you’re going to–’