Chapter 8

I awoke late on Saturday morning to find the bed empty. My first thought was that Faye was trying to avoid me, then with a half-laugh I realised it was getting on for eleven and we had two children whose needs begged primary attention, the chief among these being food; breakfast!

I showered and dressed and went downstairs, having recovered the optimism of the previous night, and looking forward to repairing all the damage to our relationship. At the foot of the stairs stood Faye, dressed to go out, with Michael.

I was about to greet them cheerfully when I noticed there was no smile on Faye’s face, in fact I thought it looked sullen, or perhaps just resigned. Certainly not happy.

‘We’ve all had breakfast and I need to get the shopping. Michael’s coming with me to help, and Sam’s in her room.’

With that she turned and left the house with Michael in tow, and the door was closed.

I stood for a second, looking at the closed door. I had not said a word. Saturday shopping was something I usually did, so to me her comment seemed like a reproach. There was no friendly comment like “Won’t be long,” or “Go and get some breakfast.”

So when I entered the kitchen I found there was no place setting left for me – everything had been tidied away. I began to feel uncomfortable, it felt as if I was being punished for sleeping in, when she could easily have woken me, or in happier times sent one the children to jump on me. I didn’t think beyond that, but set about making my own rudimentary breakfast.

I took two pieces of sliced wholemeal bread, put them in the toaster and looked round for the coffee percolator, finding it in the sink, unwashed but clearly having been used. Everything else had been washed and put away, except the percolator, which she knew I would want to use whether I had any breakfast or not.

It did not strike me that she might have been too busy either to wake me or to spend time cleaning the percolator, which takes a lot more time than a cup and saucer - not that we used saucers, we had mugs - they held more!

And why had she not woken me? Now there was a touch of resentment, and much of my early optimism and enthusiasm evaporated.

I put a plate, a knife, butter and marmalade on the table while the coffee was perking, then poured it and ate my toast. When finished I toyed with the idea of leaving the debris on the table, but dismissed the idea as petty, which indeed it was.

So everything was tidied away – including the percolator this time.

The day looked grey outside, and my mood was turning grey inside, but the clouds were high, so I decided to cut and trim the grass of the lawn of the back garden, which I did, finding the exercise calmed my discomfort. Faye liked the lawn tidy: perhaps the sight of that would cheer her up.

Encouraged by the success of that activity, and knowing that Faye would be out shopping until about one o’clock, I sorted out the family washing, put the first “dark” wash in the machine and started it, leaving the second load on the worktop, then took my current book into the living room and sat down to read.

As I relaxed, I saw my whisky glasses on the coffee table where I’d left them the night before. They had remained where they were. Resentment was beginning to rise when I reprimanded myself: it was quite likely that Faye hadn’t been in the living room that morning to see them. So I washed them and put them away.

I wouldn’t say my reading, when I returned to it, was a success. The book was a detective novel with a certain amount of humour, and should have been quite riveting, the sort of book I liked. I had the book open at the right page, but my mind was elsewhere. The elsewhere where it was residing was the imminent arrival of Faye and Michael, and I wondered whether her dour mood would have changed and how I should react if it hadn’t.

I decided to let things happen around me and react to whatever transpired. I didn’t know if that policy was the optimal one, somehow I doubted it.

I maintained the illusion of being immersed in the book when I heard the sound of the car and then a noisy arrival through the kitchen door.

‘Sam!’ Faye called. ‘Come and help with the shopping.’

Silence.

‘SAM! come and help-’

‘Yes Mum! No need to shout – heard you the first time!’

‘Well it’d help if you replied the first time, wouldn’t it?’ Faye still didn’t sound very happy.

A muttered unintelligible reply but with footsteps on the stairs. Was our daughter becoming an early teenager?

‘Hi Dad!’ She said cheerfully as she passed the open door to the hallway. ‘You’re up!’

‘Hi Sam. Yes I am indeed, as you say “up”,’ I replied, and carried on “reading” when she did not stop.

From the tone of her voice, Faye seemed stressed, but it now struck me that from waking that morning, and finding me dead to the world, she’d been on her own with the children, with the prospect of doing all the Saturday jobs alone that morning, jobs which we normally did together, while I lay abed.

I still hadn’t realised that her memory of last night had not been a happy one. I had walked out on her and had not returned when, after waiting up for me, exhausted and thoroughly miserable, she would have gone to bed. By contrast I’d spent a happy if demanding hour with her sister who had straightened my attitude out and sent me on my way thoroughly optimistic and slightly drunk.

I did realise she was still doing all the jobs, the latest being preparing lunch. I wondered why she had not asked me to help or tried to find me. Perhaps she still resented what I’d done the night before, and I did not want a confrontation. I was blind to the idea that by actually volunteering I might have improved things.

There was a good deal of activity in the kitchen as the weekly shop was brought in and stashed away, but no one came to the living room. By now it was getting on for a quarter to one, and there was much muffled conversation in the kitchen, and sounds of activity, but still no one visited me, though really there was no reason why they should. They were busy.

At one o’clock, I switched on the radio for the news, which rewarded me with the usual dose of depression as war, insurrection, government ineptitude and crime predominated. Thankfully, being Saturday, the news only lasted ten minutes. As it finished, Sam came in.

‘Daddy, Mum says lunch is ready,’ and having given the message with a smile but without elaboration, she left the room. I suspected she’d picked up an atmosphere between Faye and me, though she’d not been present at our brief encounter before Faye went shopping.

I stood, sighed, though I could not name the emotions I was feeling, beyond discomfort and uncertainty, then made my way into the kitchen.

I was not greeted by anyone, nor did I greet. Everyone was already seated at the table, and Faye was doling out scrambled egg and sausage pieces. There was toast on the table. It was one of my favourite Saturday lunches. I took my seat, where my lunch already resided, and began to eat. The children were chatting about their plans for the afternoon. It seemed that each had been invited out by friends’ families.

‘I told you,’ said Faye to Sam. ‘Ask your Father.’ She did not look at me as she normally would, and I noted the use of “father” rather than “dad”.

‘D-a-ddee,’ was spoken in that wheedling tone daughters use to get round their fathers. ‘Cloe, Ann and Freda are going to the pictures, and want me to go too. Can I?’

I forebode making my usual comment “Yes, dear, I’m sure you can, the question is whether you may!” The atmosphere at the table wasn’t appropriate for that.

‘Which cinema and what’s showing?’ I asked instead, those being the obligatory parental questions in response to such requests.

‘It’s on at the Savoy,’ she said, naming the film which I’m sure was all the rage among the kids at the time, but the title of which I cannot now remember. ‘And Cloe’s big sister Jenny and her friend Angela are going with us too.’

I admired Jenny’s magnanimity; she often babysat for us, but to give up her Saturday afternoon, and unpaid at that, went beyond normal teenage sisterly devotion – unless Cloe’s parents were paying her to gain some peace and quiet for themselves.

‘Yeah, okay,’ I said, reaching for my wallet. Cinema tickets cost the earth nowadays, and then there are all the unhealthy refreshments at inflated prices to buy as well!

‘And Danny’s having a “Tree Housewarming do”. Can I go, Dad?’ Michael chimed in.

Now I’d helped Greg, Danny’s dad, to build said treehouse and I was surprised he’d finished it so soon.

‘Is it finished?’ I asked, showing my surprise.

‘Yeah Dad,’ he said doggedly. ‘Duh! That’s why he’s having a party. His Dad and Mum are going to be there.’

‘You taking something along – food?’ I asked, knowing the appetites of small boys.

‘Mum’s cooked more sausages, and we bought crisps this morning.’

‘Shame to waste them I suppose,’ I said, trying to appear grudging. ‘Yes, okay.’

A suspicion was growing that there was more than coincidence to the absence of both children that afternoon, and I wondered what Faye had in mind, and whether she’d engineered this, but since she had said not a word to me throughout lunch, I resigned myself to wait and see.

There was immediate frenzied activity as both children collected what they needed, being fussed over by Faye. Then came a knock at the door and a crowd of excited girls burst in, urging Sam to “hurry-up”. I handed over money and with a quick kiss on my cheek and a ‘love you daddy’ she was gone.

‘I’ll take Michael and the food,’ Faye told me, and the two of them were off, leaving me with a table to clear and dishes to wash, w nhich I did. Next came emptying the washing machine and hanging the contents on the line outside. Then reloading with the “whites’ wash”.

All this done, I returned to the living room and picked up my book. I felt excluded from my own family.

Faye returned after about an hour, passed the open living room door without a word to me and went to the kitchen. There was an exclamation, and then she came back and stood in the doorway.

‘You washed up,’ she said, it was just a statement, a fact, perhaps with an element of surprise.

‘Yes.’ I said, an answer in the same style, it expressed a lack of emotion. Neither of us smiled.

Pause. As if she were waiting for me to say more.

Then, ‘I’ll get on with the clothes washing then.’ Another dull statement.

‘Dark wash is on the line outside; White wash is in the machine,’ I said, monotone.

‘Oh.’ She said. She did not sound surprised this time, or grateful for that matter. Then she left the doorway and went who knows where, to do who knows what.

As before, I sat with an open book and unable to concentrate on the tale it told, wondering what was going on in her mind. I could usually guess, but not this time. Was she feeling guilty after my diatribe yesterday evening, was she angry that I had gone to Cressy or simply that I had walked out at all? Or was it that I was late getting back last night? All that had obviously distressed her at the time: I saw the evidence on her sleeping cheek’s when I returned.

I corrected myself. She certainly didn’t sound angry or even annoyed. If anything she sounded depressed. Every word she uttered was dull, emotionless, unhappy.

On the other hand, I did not sound happy or welcoming either, all my positive feelings having evaporated long since. In fact I sounded exactly like she did, dull and lifeless. I suppose I was echoing or mirroring her tone. Why was I doing that? It was a pointless reaction on my part; I had intended to be positive and encouraging as I returned last night. Indeed, I was looking forward to a real reconciliation. Now we seemed to be playing some weird psychological game. Or was that just me? Game or not, I now decided the only thing to do was to wait her out, to take my cue from her.

Time passed, then she came back and stood briefly in the doorway, as if to enter, then went away again. More time passed, then she came back again and stood as before, then left again!

Each time I looked up at her, and searched for some sign of emotion, and saw indecision and perhaps puzzlement. I waited in case she was going to speak, but she went away, so I “returned” to my book. No words had passed between us, and no words were entering my consciousness from the book either! The whole atmosphere was of dulness.

Then she came back, and this time she entered the room decisively, walked purposefully around me and sat on an armchair facing me. I swear I could feel the tension in her, as she sat forward on the chair. We gazed at each other for a long moment.

Then she took a deep breath and said: ‘I can’t go on like this, Aaron,’ her voice breaking and her face showing distress. I looked at her and her eyes filled with tears.

I closed my book deliberately and put it aside. I turned towards her.

‘I can’t take this silence between us,’ she went on, her eyes cast down. ‘I know I’ve been very stupid. I know I’ve hurt you badly and I’ve hurt the children too. But you came and rescued me.’

She glanced at me. I nodded.

‘I would have made such a drastic mistake,’ she went on, ‘and would have destroyed all that we had, and we had so much. Compared with this’ - she gestured vaguely at the room - ‘we used to live in paradise, and I was set on tearing it all apart, and you saved me Aaron.’

Again she glanced at me and her eyes were wet. She looked down again.

‘So ... I thought you’d forgiven me, but you haven’t, have you?’

She took a breath, still with eyes cast down.

‘What you said last night before you left,’ she said mournfully,’and how you said it – you’ve never treated me like that before, and then you left me – and now you’re not talking to me at all, and when you do you seem so cold.’

She paused, and shivered, looking pitiful, and I wondered if she was looking for a response from me, but before I could work out how to reply, she continued.

‘You’re going to leave me aren’t you?’ She took a sobbing breath. ‘I suppose you’ve every right to, but if you’re staying, and I really, really want you to stay, I can’t take this atmosphere any longer, and the silent treatment. Please talk to me, Aaron, I need you so much.’

The tears were now tracking down her face, and she looked woebegone, she was wringing her hands in her lap. This put a completely new perspective on her behaviour today. I was giving her the silent treatment? What did she mean?