Distractions (19 page)

It was only nine in the morning and Emma was still in her nightie. She had been reading in bed when she heard the knocker.

‘I am so glad you’re here,’ was all Emma had said on finding Paul at the door.

Paul was delighted by his welcome. He was never sure how he might be received. And this morning Emma looked ravishing, especially with messy hair, sleepy eyes and bare feet.

No matter how hard he tried to keep her fresh in his mind while he travelled about, she was
always more beautiful, more attractive, more special to him when he finally saw her again.

But she repulsed his advances this morning. There would be no hasty fuck in the hallway. She led him into the kitchen and started making them both coffee.

Paul still harboured a rebel’s dream. A pirate’s dream. Whenever he came to Emma, he looked at her eyes and tried to spot a look, one that would trigger definite action on his part, one that invited drastic measures. He would then swing in on his vine, take Emma in his arms and return to the jungle.

Today, for the first time, he saw such a look. Something was troubling those normally carefree eyes. The more time he spent with her, the surer he became that today was the day for action. He was booked on a flight to Peru in a fortnight. He might move that forward. They could be aboard a plane that evening, bound for anywhere.

‘I’m going to Peru.’

‘What? Now?’

‘I could do.’

‘What are you saying?’ she asked.

‘This isn’t for you. Come with me. We’ll just travel. I have to be in Peru in two weeks. You
haven’t been there. Come with me now and we’ll just go on and on. We shouldn’t settle, we’re not made for this.’

Listening to her lover’s words Emma felt revitalised. There were real and exciting options in her life. Paul was one. She had not thought outside her small enclosure for some time.

‘I’m not saying it doesn’t suit you,’ added Paul. ‘You have never been lovelier than you are this morning, but you’ll get bed sores. We are not made for this.’

‘I am.’

‘What a load of rubbish, Em. Really. Come with me. We’ll live in Rome, Buenos Aires, Cape Town. I don’t mind, take your pick. We need never sleep in the same bed twice, if you’d prefer.’

‘It isn’t real life, though, is it, darling?’

‘Is this real life?’ he asked, placing his palm on the cold granite bench top. ‘I remember a time when you would have been ashamed to be associated with such wealth. I mean, Em, this house
is
a little bit obscene.’

Paul glanced around and Emma followed his gaze.

‘I suppose you don’t see it any more. It’s just home to you. I see it. I see it every time I cross the
bridge to visit. I see it as I park my car. The houses which line the street … your neighbours … Millionaires, one and all. And David is one of them. And he’ll be expecting you to fit in.’

‘I do fit in. I am one of them.’

Paul moved to her. He placed his hand on her hip. Emma backed away.

‘You’re not one of them, Em. That’s why you’re unhappy.’

‘Who says I’m unhappy?’ she asked and smiled.

‘I do,’ he said. ‘Your eyes do.’

‘I’ve just climbed out of bed. I haven’t any make-up on. I’m tired, not unhappy.’

‘What is wrong? What has happened?’

‘Nothing is wrong. I can’t handle the lies, that’s all. I’ve been thinking about starting fresh with David. I think I have to. I want to tell him everything. I want to be married to a man who knows everything about me. Everything is a lie because of us. I want to tell him about you.’

‘The lie is with him, not us. The fact is our relationship has little impact on anyone else’s life. Does David accuse you of not paying him enough attention? Does he feel unloved? No, he doesn’t. He has no right to disturb us.’

‘Loyalty?’

‘Always an afterthought.’

Emma sighed.

‘Never tell him. Know him. When you know him you’ll see that I was right. He will never know himself. Therefore, he can’t be trusted.’

‘I trust him.’

‘But can you rely on him to behave in the most reasonable manner? Do you feel you can predict his behaviour? If you don’t want to lose respect for him, don’t force him to show his cruder, underdeveloped thinking. He is certain he knows the truth about the world and that is that. And you, you eloquent womb, are drawn to it like a moth to the flame.’

‘
Eloquent womb?
’

‘Your womb appreciates a man who knows things for certain. It’s biology! Being right has nothing to do with it. Every brutish, opinionated bore finds a wife.’

‘That’s ugly,’ she said.

‘You married him. I just ask – Why?’

Emma was silent. Fuming. Then she said, ‘He is your friend.’

‘I’d never marry him. I’ve never agreed with a thing he’s said, or thought. Would you marry silly Sally?’

‘I think you should go now,’ said Emma.

‘Are you serious?’

Emma just nodded. Her eyes were darker than he had ever seen them.

‘I’m not leaving. Fuck you, I don’t deserve this! Did I find a soft spot? Jesus! And after we had just described this bullshit behaviour, too. It was irrational to marry him. It was. You know it. And all I did was force you to hear the truth. You just bloody well ignore it. Eloquent womb, I got it in one.’

Emma just stared at him, speechless.

‘I’m the kind of man you want. I’m him. You described your man years ago and I am him. I can handle all you’ve got to dish out and more. I just don’t make the money. Your precious butt loves to sit on finer stuff than the camp stool.’

She still said nothing.

‘Well, you know what? I
am
going to go. You can climb back into his big black pot and stew for a bit. The cannibal will be back for his dinner soon.’

With this parting shot he swung around, knocking the table on which his coffee cup had stood. The cup rocked from side to side but his hand was quick and stilled it. He gave her one last look and walked off.

A few moments later she heard his ancient Alpha Romeo start up noisily, and with an authentic guttural roar, he was off.

TWENTY-SIX

Emma spent the rest of the day in shock. When David arrived home she took him in her arms. They held each other for far longer than they had for some weeks. Emma wanted desperately for her relationship with David to work. She was at her wits’ end trying to discover what it was she was doing wrong.

‘What has happened to us?’ she managed to ask softly, her cheek pressed against his shoulder, the corner of her mouth brushing the soft fabric of his suit coat. The moment required no subtleties, she needed only to know. Paul’s
attack had rattled her. She needed her husband’s view.

‘Everything’s fine, Em,’ he said. He had had no inkling she was unhappy with their relationship. They had been better than ever lately, hadn’t they? All they’d been doing, all day every day, was having sex.

Emma sighed with relief. His tone was sincere. He’d seemed surprised. She knew everything wasn’t fine, but she stifled all of her objections and hugged him back tighter.

David broke from their embrace and said he was going up to change. She followed him up. Once in their room, having watched him take off his suit coat and tie, and kick off his shoes, Emma led him to the bed. She wanted some greater assurances that their relationship was not unravelling before her eyes. She pushed him on his back and sat straddling his hips.

‘You’d tell me if you were unhappy with me,’ she said, looking down into his eyes.

‘I love you, Em,’ he said, somewhat bemused by her apparent anxieties. And happy, too. This was proof that she did love him as he loved her.

‘That’s not what I asked,’ she said, squeezing him between her thighs.

‘I am happy with you,’ he said. ‘You have no reason to worry.’

‘Why have you been so distant?’ she asked.

‘I haven’t.’

‘You have.’

‘I haven’t, really,’ he said, colouring slightly because he suddenly realised that he probably had been. Surely she couldn’t know who he had been thinking about. There had been a phone call that very afternoon.

‘You have. I’ve felt it. You have,’ she reiterated.

‘I’ve been busy at work. Umm … We’ve been fucking so much we’ve barely had time to talk.’

‘We did it to fill the silence,’ she said.

‘I didn’t. I can’t get enough of you.’ Which was kind of true. He was so excited by his plans that he was constantly aroused.

David had finally spoken to Sally only an hour before leaving the office. The conversation was very strange, but utterly erotic. She had kept him at a distance, had spoken to him as though Emma and the Pope were in the room. Their conversation was short and reached no conclusion. Nothing was arranged, nothing was said. David was absolutely sure though, by the time he hung up the phone, that he had a lover.

‘I thought …’

‘You thought wrong, Em. I know you’re a genius, but you can be mistaken. I can just want you, can’t I? Pure and simple, stupid and physical, lust. Can’t we be superficial too? Can’t we fuck just for the fucking glorious pleasure of fucking?’ he said, feeling his normal buoyant self after days and days of mental preoccupation.

Emma laughed and let the man pull her down to kiss her. His kiss was full and deeply felt.

Later that night, Emma and David sat side by side near the back of the cinema in Mosman. They were there to see a film of David’s choosing, a thriller of lukewarm standing in the papers. Emma was more than happy to settle into the seat, snuggle up against her husband and turn off her mind for two hours.

David, meanwhile, was feeling powerful. His life had taken a turn. He had reassured his wife of his love for her the same day as he had taken a lover. The future was now more complicated than it had been. His perfect wife had been tarnished slightly by recent events though the thought that she was inherently unsound was difficult to admit.
Had the first golden shine of marriage dimmed? Was that all? Had this moment been inevitable? He was more a realist concerning marriage. Nothing lasts.

This thought made him catch his breath. His fortune was surely based on one certainty: the continuation of his marriage, which meant, when stripped of ceremony, having Emma in his life. The thought that there may be a future when he might wake and have no access to Emma stopped him short. His mind had been leaping merrily ahead of itself. He had beautiful Emma and beautiful Sally. He was congratulating himself on being a realist when he knew, he just knew, by taking Sally as his lover he was hastening the end of his marriage. The coward within sighed in relief. The coward might set up house with Sally. Good, dependable, unimaginative Sally. He shuddered at the thought and yet this, the coward believed, was his future.

And if Emma would not give him a child, Sally most certainly would.

He loved Emma. He could feel it more now, now that he was preparing to be unfaithful. The thought thrilled him. To cheat on a wife you’re growing tired of is one thing, to cheat on a woman who excites and challenges you more
than any other, is another thing altogether. He had no need of Sally. He was being a glutton. This was exciting. Very exciting. He was gambling his wife – high stakes indeed.

They sat in the cinema watching the trailers when David took Emma’s hand and brought it to his crotch. Emma found his cock was hard.

‘What is this, another present?’ asked Emma.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘But you’ve given me so much already,’ she said.

‘I’m feeling generous,’ he said, actually visualising them in the public toilets downstairs.

‘Shall we go back home?’

‘Wait until the movie gets going …’ he said.

‘You want to do it here?’ she asked.

‘Why not?’

‘What’s got into you?’

‘It’s a full moon.’

‘It is not,’ she said. She looked around the cinema.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Looking for another woman for you. I’m no match for you.’

‘Good idea.’

‘Bastard!’ she said, and squeezed his cock through his pants. Emma was very pleased with
David. The man’s vitality was ceaseless lately. He’d been seemingly driven to fuck. Now that she was assured that she was the cause of his appetite, that her anxieties were hers alone, she was far more accepting of his desires. He excited her. David had indulged her penchant for lewd acts in public only rarely. Paul had always been more obliging. David’s current mood seemed to suggest he was willing to be caught out, so she undid his fly and gripped his cock in the flesh. He looked around automatically.

She began to pull him with a tight grip. His nervousness encouraged her, though she was glad of their position. No one was behind them and their row was empty. The theatre had barely thirty people in its seats. Emma looked around again. She wondered what she might be able to do to him. Could they get away with fucking? Why had she worn jeans? His cock felt so fine in her hand. She was in a theatre she had been patronising all her life. There had been so many sensual episodes lived out in this very cinema. David’s was not the first cock she had held here. But she was an adult now. Adults share in the great conspiracy. Adults become participants in the social order. Adults uphold normality. But that also exposes one to an adult humiliation.