The Judas Scar (22 page)

He called out to her from the kitchen as she came in but she disappeared straight to the bathroom for a shower. His heart sank a little. When she appeared ten minutes later he looked at her face; she looked different, less angry, but perhaps that was merely wishful thinking.

She glanced at him but looked away, as her eyes filled with tears.

‘Hey,’ he said. ‘It’s not supposed to make you cry.’

‘It looks great.’ She walked across the small area of mowed grass to the other bed. ‘You’ve done so much. The plants are lovely,’ she said. ‘Do you know what they all are?’

‘I’ve kept the labels. I thought I’d try and learn their names.’ He smiled and walked over to her, then took her hand and gently pulled her up to the top end of the garden where he’d put the rose in the large blue pot. He touched its leaves. ‘This one’s called
Danse du Feu
. Isn’t that lovely?’ He turned to her. ‘It reminds me of the time you and I went to Anglesey, and we lit the fire on the beach.’ He stared at her, waiting for her to nod, but instead she avoided his eyes, transfixed by the brilliant red petals of the rose. ‘We danced in the sand beside the fire. Do you remember? When I saw the name I thought of that evening. I had to have it in our garden then every time I look at it I’ll remember that night. We were so completely happy then, weren’t we?’

She looked at him and nodded. ‘That seems a long time ago.’ Her arms were crossed, hands clasping her elbows tightly. He could see the whites of her knuckles. He tried to fight his disappointment. He had no idea what he’d been expecting from her but this passive sadness was heartbreaking.

‘Harmony,’ he said with a deep breath. ‘I don’t expect you to forgive me. I just listened to what you said, that’s all. The garden needed doing and I wanted to do it for you. For us.’

She didn’t say anything, just looked at the ground, hugged herself more tightly.

‘You look around. I’m just nipping into the kitchen. Back in a sec.’

He went to the fridge and took out the wine, which he sank into the clay wine cooler she’d given him the day North End Wines opened for trade. He put it under his arm and then picked up the tray he’d already filled with the food, two glasses, a corkscrew and some paper napkins.

Harmony was sitting on the seat at the far end of the garden, her hands loosely clasped and resting on her knees. He put the tray on the rug on the grass, then knelt down, smarting a little at the pain in his lower back. He thought of his mother again, of all the times he’d seen her out in their garden, pausing to stretch her back as she weeded on her knees for hours at a time.

Harmony came to join him and he handed her a glass of wine then leant over to put the bottle back in the cooler. He thought she looked pale suddenly. ‘Are you feeling unwell?’

‘No.’ She sat on the rug, knees pulled tightly in to her chest. ‘I’m tired, that’s all.’ She glanced at him again. ‘I love the garden, though.’

She gave a thin, watery smile that didn’t hold.

‘Well, you were right,’ he said. ‘When you said that the garden was neglected. There was no reason for it and it’s my fault.’

She shook her head. ‘It’s both our faults. You’ve transformed it.’

‘This isn’t about the garden,’ he said. ‘I don’t give a shit about the garden. It’s you I care about.’

Still she wouldn’t meet his eyes.

‘Did you hear me?’

She picked up a small leaf and turned it over in her fingers.

‘Harmony?’ He paused, wishing she didn’t look so pained. ‘Do you want this to work or not?’ He regretted the question as soon as he’d asked it, worried in case she said no.

Finally, she looked at him. She was chewing on her lip and he noticed a small red graze on it. ‘I’m confused.’ She looked like a child, her eyes large and wet with tears, vulnerable, exposed.

‘I wish we could turn back the clock and do things differently.’

‘Yes, I wish that too.’

‘Do you want to eat? Are you hungry?’

‘Yes,’ she said softly. ‘I am a bit.’

He was filled with a sense of relief, as if her accepting supper in the garden was a step in the right direction, but though they talked as they ate, they avoided anything of importance and their conversation was stilted, as if they were on an unsuccessful blind date, unsure of comfortable ground, preferring instead to keep to neutral subjects. She asked him about the garden, about how much he had needed to burn and how hard the earth had been to dig. He told her about the stag beetle larvae he’d found, two fat white grubs that looked like a pair of albino slugs. He had reburied them because he remembered reading somewhere they were endangered. She nodded and told him they were. Like bats.

The sky eventually grew dusky and with it came a chill in the air. Harmony rubbed her arms.

‘Are you cold?’ Will asked. ‘Can I get you a sweater?’

‘I’m going to go in,’ she said. ‘I might take some work to bed; I’ve some notes to read through.’

He stood too and they faced each other.

‘We’ll be okay,’ he said.

His sentence hovered in the still air as if unfinished. She folded her arms across her stomach and looked at the ground. He reached for her with a sudden feeling she was floating away from him, that if a heavy gust of wind blew she’d be carried away with it.

‘You still love me, don’t you?’

She lifted her trembling hand and placed it flat against his cheek.

‘Because if you do, that’s enough.’

‘Is it?’ she asked, dropping her hand from his face. ‘I’m not sure it is.’

‘Yes, of course it is. Nothing is more important than that. If we love each other that’s all that matters. We can work through this, Harmony.’

She bent to pick up the tray and plates and took them back into the kitchen.

Will blew out the sickly-sweet citronella candles and folded the rug. He closed the parasol and threw the last olive into the bushes, then picked up the glasses and gathered the rug and took them inside. He suspected his marriage was over. It was there in her eyes. She was distant from him; she had been since the miscarriage, but there was something else between them now, something he couldn’t pin down. She hadn’t been able to look at him, the only touch she’d given him was when she’d placed her hand on his cheek, and that gesture held more regret and sadness than he’d thought possible. It was as if she were saying goodbye. Helplessness gave way to anger, which billowed like a mistral wind, bringing with it images of Alastair Farrow, leering at him with malignant eyes.

Will sat up until late, staring mindlessly at the television, desperate to keep Alastair Farrow at bay. He watched the news, then a poorly written sitcom with jerky camera work, then the shopping channel, a man in a shiny suit desperate to flog steam cleaners to his zombified post-midnight audience. But as much as he tried to keep Farrow from his head, all he could think about was the message he’d sent him. Glib, fatuous, facetious, sitting on the wall of his Facebook account, laughing at him.

I was a bit of a cock at school! No hard feelings.

He walked through to the study and turned the computer on, logged onto Facebook. He reread the message, Farrow’s pudgy, balding head beside it, and felt a swell of bile hit his throat.

‘You shit,’ he said aloud. ‘You absolute piece of shit. This is all your fault.’

Hi Alastair, Good to hear from you. A drink sounds great. It’s been a long time. I happen to be coming over your way for work next week. Are you able to meet up for a quick one, maybe Tuesday or Wednesday? Thursday would work at a push. Let me know. Will.

He jammed his finger on the return key and his message etched itself into the computer screen.

C H A P T E R    E I G H T E E N

Emma Barratt-Jones walked into the kitchen and dumped her shopping bags on the black granite worktop that shone like a mirror. She sighed. It was quiet. Too quiet. She didn’t like it when the house was this empty, just her rattling around between school drop-off and pick-up. Nearly all her friends moaned about the school holidays, about having their children under their feet, about the mess and the I’m-bored-mummy cries. Emma loved the holidays. Loved having Josh and Abi around. The house lit up when they were in it. To hear them playing, running around, to cook for them, chat to them, laugh with them, it all gave meaning to her life. While they were at school the house was dormant, like a museum, and all she could hear over the silence was her own breathing and the ticking of the clock in the hall.

As she turned to unload the shopping bags, she caught sight of the worktop around the sink and oven. The sunlight streamed in through the windows, highlighting a fine layer of otherwise invisible dust. She left the shopping and took the J-cloth from where it hung, folded and damp, over the rise of the expensive designer tap. She wiped the surfaces, making sure every speck of dust was lifted. Then she rinsed the cloth and refolded it over the tap. She unpacked the shopping and thought about Ian. She’d tried to call him that morning but he’d been too busy to talk to her. His secretary had been vague, as if she was hiding something, as if she was lying when she said Ian was in a meeting. Nothing was right with him at the moment. It worried her. Usually, she was able to work out what was wrong with him, soothe him. She was a good wife. She knew that. She kept an immaculate house. She listened to him. She didn’t even shop as much as Ian would have their friends believe. In fact, she prided herself on being frugal by nature, something that came from her upbringing. Watching her mother racked with stress as she tried to feed her family of six on next to nothing had stayed with her. Emma never wasted food and always shopped in the sales and took advantage of offers. She’d managed to kick her coupon habit; coupons made her feel poor rather than thrifty. But for the last month he’d drawn further and further away from her, and nothing she did seemed to bring him any closer, or provide him any relief or comfort.

She felt lost and helpless. After putting the last of the shopping away, she folded the canvas bags neatly and put them in the drawer then turned the kettle on. She waited while it boiled noisily. When it clicked off, and the rumbling boil ceased, the kitchen was plunged into dreary quiet again. She didn’t want tea. She wanted to talk to someone; the god-awful quiet was eating away at her. She leant back against the worktop and reached for the phone.

‘Hello?’ said Harmony.

‘Hi, it’s me.’ she said. ‘Am I disturbing you?’

‘A little,’ Harmony said. ‘But don’t worry. I’m sorry I didn’t call you back yesterday.’

Emma could hear the tightness in her voice and knew Harmony was working. ‘It’s okay, I know how busy you are. Are you sure you’re not in a meeting or something?’ she asked.

‘No. I’m working from home today, but I’m trying to concentrate on something.’ Harmony sighed heavily. ‘My boss sent me a pretty blunt email last night asking for this piece of work. I’m finding it hard to focus, though.’

‘Anything wrong?’ Emma leant on the worktop on her elbows, chin resting on her hand. Harmony seemed to hesitate. Emma ran her finger back and forth over the granite and waited for her to speak. She thought she heard Harmony sigh again.

‘No, not really.’

‘Have you got time for a chat?’

‘Yes,’ Harmony replied. ‘I could do with a break.’

They chatted about this and that but Emma could tell there was something wrong. Harmony wasn’t herself, she was uptight and withdrawn, and she wondered if she’d done something to upset her, though for the life of her she couldn’t imagine what.

‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ she asked.

‘Not really. Will and I are having a bit of a tricky time.’

‘You and Will?’ Emma exclaimed. ‘I don’t believe it. What’s happened?’

‘Do you think I’m too hard on him, Em?’

Emma furrowed her brow. ‘Hard on him? No. I don’t think you are at all. Why do you say that?’

‘I don’t know. I just wonder whether I’m understanding enough. Whether I’ve been sympathetic enough. I mean, like when he gave up his photography. He was so disappointed, had the wind knocked out of him and … oh … I don’t know … I just can’t remember if I was kind to him.’

‘You certainly weren’t unkind. Not as far as I was aware anyway. I’ve never known you be unkind to anyone or anything in your life. Least of all Will. To be honest, I’m not sure I ever heard you talking about it at all.’

‘Maybe that’s what I mean. Maybe I was so focused on him having a
sensible
career that I didn’t give him enough credit for following his dream. I suppose I always thought he should do something with wine. After all, he’s been working in it for long enough. I didn’t support him enough with the photography, I didn’t appreciate how difficult it was for him when it didn’t take off. I just told him to stop being silly and get on with finding another job.’

‘You’re being very hard on yourself,’ Emma said. ‘You were having to think about bringing the money in and all that. He seemed to realise, certainly when Ian and I spoke to him, that businesses go under all the time. And he’s done brilliantly with the wine shop and it’s not as if he hates it.’

‘I know,’ she sighed. ‘I just wonder if we all take other people’s dreams for granted.’

‘Listen, I’ve known you a very long time and I don’t think you’ve ever assumed anything to be unimportant. You take everything very seriously. It was a few years ago anyway and he always appears very content and relaxed. I … ’ She was stopped in her tracks by a sudden wave of emotion. ‘Sorry,’ she managed. ‘Give me a sec.’

‘Are you crying?’

Emma took the phone away from her face and pressed her sleeve into her eyes to stop herself from crying. ‘No,’ she said, bringing the phone back. ‘Not really.’

‘Gosh, what a pair we are,’ Harmony said gently. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Probably nothing.’ She paused. ‘I’ve just had one of those weeks, ignore me.’

‘Go on, tell me, I can hear you’re upset.’

‘I am a bit.’ She paused again. ‘Are you sure you have time? You should be working, shouldn’t you?’

‘Don’t be silly, of course I’ve got time.’

Emma dried more tears with her sleeve. Then she rubbed at an invisible mark on the worktop. ‘There’s something going on with Ian.’