Chapter 11

The clock read one in the afternoon when I awoke, feeling human once more. The sun was making a forlorn attempt to counter the earlier deluge. For some reason that helped.

I showered (again), shaved and dressed in my tracksuit, not bothering with underwear, and then emerged to look for Rachel and find out what the hell was going on.

For instance, if she was getting back with Gary, why was she here? That would do for starters. In fact the obvious answer to that was that she was not returning to her husband, but that idea still managed to elude me. I must have an obstinate subconscious.

Then her unexplained absence for over a week, I was looking forward to her explaining that one.

Then there was the lack of a Decree Absolute, though that would be explained by her going back to Gary. And why the fuck was she going back to him? Pity? Ah, his bedroom skills! How long would that last? More to the point what the hell was she doing here?

It will be noticed that I had forgotten all Cassie’s wisdom of the night before: the evils of drink!

It turned out she was not ‘here’ at all. She was not in the flat. I tried every room. Had I dreamt she was here? No, the plate and mug by the bed were testament to that. She had been here, now she was gone. Well, blow me down! It was enough to bring my headache back. I went to the kitchen and made myself some cheese on toast and this time some strong coffee.

As I ate my little lunch, I felt bewildered. Not angry, not resentful, just totally confused. All right, after a few mouthfuls, resentment began to creep in, and annoyance, and strangely a sense of loss and longing. Boy, was I messed up, and Rachel was the bitch doing the messing.

It had not percolated through that she might have had to go to work. So I started to suspect that she was punishing me for something in some counter-intuitive way, except I knew I’d not hurt or upset her. Then my mind went back to the earlier morning.

She was in my bed, and naked – I was pretty sure of that. Hell, what did she say? ‘Come to bed Roddy, ‘ wasn’t it? In the morning she brought me tea and pills, then more tea and toast, and cleaned and fumigated the bathroom. Did she say we’d talk? When I’d slept a little more? So, where was she?

Did she just want to keep wrong-footing me? Keep me guessing? But why?

I settled to read a novel but my mind kept coming back to Rachel, asking myself what her motives were. All the wisdom, propounded by my wise sister about the futility of surmising about Rachel’s actions had flown the nest.

So, while most of those thoughts were illogical and lacked any evidence, I had still got myself into a fine lather when I heard a key in the lock, and she wafted into the living room. She was back? Where’d she been? It was early evening.

There was the flash of a timid smile which disappeared into consternation as she saw my resentful expression.

“Rod–”

“What is going on Rachel? You’re deliriously happy when we meet both families at the weekend, you say you’re getting the Decree and can’t wait, then you disappear, and we find from a neighbour of yours at the flats that you’ve been staying with a ‘friend’.

“You switch your phone off, or block my calls, so for over a week I’m left in limbo. I get a text from Gary telling me you didn’t apply for the Decree Absolute because you’re talking about getting back together with him, and telling me to keep away from you, so I assumed you were back with Gary, as the ‘friend’.

“Then out of the blue you are in my bed inviting me to join you, you clean the bathroom, give me tea and toast and tell me we’ll talk when I’ve slept some more. When I wake up you’re gone. Now here you are again.

“Why are you doing this? To give me a nervous breakdown? What have I done to you that you should treat me like this? Eh? Eh?” I subsided into the sofa, despondent, and let’s face it, incoherent.

I looked up and saw a look of pain on her face, and tears in her eyes.

“Oh, Roddy, I’m so, so sorry!” she wailed. “I didn’t think ... It isn’t like that ... You’ve got it all wrong and it’s all my fault. How will you ever forgive me?”

Her expression, the tears and those words took the wind out of my sails, and my annoyance evaporated. Just like that. I’m a sucker for a crying woman, but my mystification remained.

“As a start,” I said stoically, “You could try to explain why ‘it isn’t like that’. And how ‘wrong’ I’ve got it, because from this angle everything now seems somewhat muddy.”

She took a deep breath.

“First, I wasn’t staying with Gary. How could you even think I was?”

“Well,” I replied, “Him texting to say you were getting back together went a good way towards that, and him telling me to back off, and that you weren’t going ahead with the divorce – how’s that for starters?” I was quite impressed with my calm delivery.

“On the Monday I left he rang me,” she began with a frown, “and begged me to see him and talk about the divorce. I told him it was too late for talking but he went on and on. I said I would think about it and would ring him in a week. He begged me to put off getting the divorce until we’d talked, and I agreed. I’m sure I never gave him an impression at any time that we’d get back together.”

“He’s taken it that way though, probably because you put off getting the divorce. OK, I accept you’re not with him, and ‘it’s not like that’ as far as he’s concerned.

“So explain why you left me for a week, why you disappeared without saying anything, why you left me high and dry worrying myself sick about you. I was almost certain you were dumping me, otherwise surely you would have said where you were going and why. That hurt, Rachel. It hurt a lot.”

She went to one of the armchairs and sat down, the tears were welling again.

She looked crestfallen. “That was so wrong of me and yes it was a serious mistake. I’m so sorry Roddy. It was a stupid and thoughtless thing to do.”

“OK,” I agreed, “I’ll certainly go along with that. I’m asking why you did it.”

Her expression clouded as she remembered.

“I was on my way to work on that Monday, and everything suddenly became too much for me. I felt frightened and I panicked. I phoned work and told them I was ill, and then phoned Nuala. She was my best friend at school. You remember her?”

I nodded. Who could forget Nuala? Nuala was gorgeous, better endowed in the chest department than the other girls, and sported a perfectly rounded behind to balance the frontage. Great legs, and red hair – bright red. Yes, Nuala was a cracking bit of totty at eighteen. My expression must have given me away, for Rachel frowned at me, but I gestured for her to go on.

“It was a whole heap of things, I felt overwhelmed. To begin with I was going to apply for the divorce that day. Then Gary phoned and I abandoned that idea, but the feelings crashed in. He was so desolate, so upset.

“I was dumping Gary after six years, and from his phone call I knew how devastated he was. I felt so guilty at hurting him. The two days before, you and I had been to our families and I had been so happy: everything was going perfectly for me, while Gary was so unhappy. I had no right to be happy. I felt callous, heartless, guilty.”

I made to interrupt, but she waved at me to wait.

“Try to let me finish Roddy, darling.”

Darling?

“That brought another fear, another panic. I had lived with Gary for two years – and they were happy years, then marriage. Four years married as I gradually began to feel more and more lonely and bored and began to think that it was a mistake.”

“But he–”

“Yes, yes, he wouldn’t change, I know. But don’t you see? I now felt as happy with you as I had with Gary at the beginning. If I failed once, I could fail again, and cause you all the suffering I’m now causing Gary.”

“But you’re not a failure, and–”

“Please Roddy! You wanted to know my state of mind that day. I’m trying to tell you. I was desperately sure that I couldn’t risk hurting you like that, and the Decree Absolute was looming, even though I’d put it off. It just cemented my feeling of failure.

“So I went away for a week, took the week off work. By the time I was settled at Nuala’s, I knew Gary, you, our families, and my feelings were all bound up together, and I was beginning to think I ought to call our relationship off. I knew if I heard your voice over the phone, I’d weaken and run back to you, and I needed to sort everything out. Nuala is like you, she sees clearly and listens really well, so I knew I’d clarify everything with her.

“We talked. The discussion really spanned all the way from school to the present.

“She told me something I had forgotten. I told you I fancied you and hadn’t the courage to approach you. Well, she reminded me that she saw how I stared at you, and how I listened to your conversations, and she kept on at me to go to you and ask you out. We nearly fell out completely when she threatened to go to you on my behalf.

“But she’s made me see that it’s always been you Roddy, and that what I have with you is completely different from what I had with Gary. It took a lot of talking, but by the time she’d finished with me, I knew that you and I would be all right together and I would never fail you like I failed Gary.”

“Rachel you haven’t failed–”

“I still feel a failure, Roddy. Anyway, she did say I would have to talk to Gary.

“This last Monday she asked me what you thought of me leaving you for over a week. I told her you didn’t know, that I’d gone away without telling you.

“She gave me the rounds of the kitchen over that. She went ballistic. I was my own worst enemy, the biggest fool on the planet. She really didn’t have to go on, I knew perfectly well then that I might have blown it with you. She was asking how I could do that to you, didn’t I realise how hurt and worried you’d be?”

“She was right!” I said with considerable feeling, and again she looked contrite.

“Well, I switched my phone on again, but I think you had given up on me by then. I’d decided that I’d talk with Gary, finish with him finally, and then come over in person.

“That’s what I did. Afterwards I came straight to your flat and let myself in, psyching myself up to beg your forgiveness for cutting you off like that, but you weren’t there. I waited and waited, and still you had not arrived. I decided if I was in your bed, you would have to wake me up when you got in. I reckoned you’d gone to see Cassie.”