The Other Woman's Shoes (18 page)

Martha concentrated very hard. Through the ringing in her ears she managed to decipher ‘the children… our priority’; ‘sell house, no rush, springtime good time for
house sales’; ‘solicitors… not likely to be necessary’; ‘surely still be friends’; ‘simply impossible to live with’;‘one life, no fun’.

‘Is there someone else?’

‘Christ, Martha, this again?’

‘Everyone thinks there is.’

‘You mix with some very small-minded people, Martha.’

She ignored his arrogance and focused on what she wanted, an answer. ‘Is there?’

‘I’m not dignifying that question with a reply.’

‘So there is.’

‘Grow up.’

‘Just tell me, tell me! Are you having an affair? Or maybe not an affair, not yet, but… but you think you’re in love with someone else, or just fancy them, or…’ Martha gasped for air through her tears and agony. ‘Just tell me. Help me understand why you’ve ruined everything.
Are
you having an affair?’ She wanted him to say he wasn’t. She would believe him, despite the mounting evidence suggesting he was. She hadn’t told anyone, not even Eliza, but she’d come across a statement from Michael’s gym. He’d taken a guest there. Who? And why had he worked so late, so often, recently? Was he really at work? And the weekend break he’d just taken – does anyone really go to Paris alone?

Martha wanted to believe that there could be innocent explanations. She still trusted him more than anyone. But if he was having an affair she wanted to hear that too. She just wanted some honesty. He owed her that at least. Surely he realized that she needed to have some respect for the father of her children. Even if it was galling,
reluctant respect, because he’d told a truth she didn’t want to hear. ‘Just talk to me,’ she sobbed.

‘I can’t talk to you, Martha. Don’t you understand? You’re silencing me. I know I’ve disappointed you. You’ve made that very clear, but I’m sorry, I just don’t love you any more. And as uncomfortable as that is for you to accept, you’re going to have to, because I’m not spending the rest of my life with someone I don’t love. Not to save you this hurt, not for the sake of the children, not because our friends and parents want it. It’s my life and I don’t want you.’

‘Just fuck off, Michael. Get the pissing hell out of here, you spineless, faithless bastard.’

Martha was beginning to feel rather affectionate towards expletives.

20

Eliza considered this date a success. She was deciding whether to have pudding and coffee or just coffee. Best just have coffee. She didn’t want to look down at a bulging stomach whilst lying flat on her back, and she did want to get flat on her back (and on top as well, for that matter). She was debating whether she would take him back to her place or go to his. Obviously, dating law dictated that it was safer at her own place, but as her own place was actually Martha’s place, Eliza thought it would probably be best going to Charlie’s. He was unlikely to prove to be an axe-wielding psycho because he was a friend of Martha’s; besides which, Martha was trying to seduce Michael tonight with tickets to Disneyland Paris. If she succeeded, it was likely they’d soon be in the throes of passion; and if the ruse failed, she’d be sobbing into her handkerchief.

Again.

Eliza didn’t really expect the plan to be successful. She thought that Martha was reading Michael wrongly. As Eliza read the situation, he’d buggered off because he was fed up of having the responsibility of being a father. He’d tried ditching as many responsibilities as possible (Eliza could hardly believe it when Martha confided that Michael had never once got up in the night, not for either of the children). However, ditching the responsibilities of being
a father had, unexpectedly to him, incurred the wrath of Martha, and Michael had obviously found being constantly reminded of his shortcomings about as comfortable as washing his bollocks in bleach. His only option was to take himself out of the picture altogether. Even thinking about it made Eliza want to puke.

She felt guilty knowing that Martha would in all likelihood be crying right now; on the other hand, she didn’t half fancy a shag. It had been weeks and this man was the nearest thing to a possibility Eliza had come across since Greg.

Charlie was a dot-com millionaire. He’d had the sense to sell his shares early on before people became too greedy. He’d walked away with enough to retire on at the age of twenty-eight. But he hadn’t retired; instead he’d set up his own company, something to do with DVD licensing. Eliza didn’t really listen while he explained it, although she was very impressed with the fact that he was still working when he didn’t have to. She knew for a fact that if Greg were ever to make enough money to retire, he would do just that. And he’d be penniless again in next to no time. Not that he ever would make enough money to retire.

It surprised Eliza how often she thought about Greg.

Of course it was never favourably. Well, except when she’d been out with Tarquin and thought how much she preferred Greg’s name. And when she’d been out with Sebastian and thought how much she preferred Greg’s heterosexuality. And when she’d been out with Henry and she’d preferred Greg’s humility. And when she’d been out with Will and preferred Greg’s sense of humour. And
when she had been out with Giles and he was nice enough but when they’d got to the tongue action, she preferred Greg’s kisses.

But Charlie had a reasonable name, he was heterosexual, he seemed amusing, charming, he remembered her name, he was good-looking. She would have to do something about his clothes; the woolly jumper would have to go. Greg would never be seen dead in something like that. But he did pay for dinner and besides which, she was gagging for it.

It wasn’t for want of trying. It wasn’t for lack of effort or will, but something went wrong. Charlie took Eliza back to his place. They’d both happily hopped in to the cab. They were both clear about what her accepting a coffee really meant, so there were no embarrassed silences. In fact, Charlie immediately got down to snogging her, although actually Eliza would have preferred it if he’d waited until they’d got to his flat. Yes, she was keen for a bit of action, but it always seemed so sordid to snog in a cab. It usually meant that the couple were adulterous, or minors.

His flat was fine. Clean, comfortable. Clearly, everything in it was expensive, but the general impression was not showy. There were no horrors in the bathroom, no stray pubes on the sheets. He had a cleaner because Eliza noted that the windowsills were dust-free and no man dusted windowsills. Or at least Eliza hoped they didn’t because she didn’t, and whilst her housekeeping standards weren’t great, she liked to think they were better than the average single man’s.

He poured her a glass of wine. He had an impressive wine selection but didn’t talk about it endlessly or highlight her ignorance by asking her to select. He made a suggestion, told her it was full-bodied, that she’d like it, then opened the bottle.

When she thought she was drunk enough to get on with it and yet not too drunk so as she wouldn’t remember it, she suggested they move into the bedroom.

Technically it was OK, she supposed. She’d had worse. But the problem was she’d had much, much better. It wasn’t his fault. He knew that a certain amount of foreplay was polite and he obliged. He was neither squeamish nor prudish, neither kinky nor lazy. But he wasn’t familiar with her body, he wasn’t right.

She wasn’t a tease, and as she was lying in his bed wearing nothing but a G-string (he was totally naked, men loved taking their clothes off) she felt she couldn’t back out. So she bumped and ground her pelvis into his fingers, hoping that things would improve when he got up. They didn’t. The deeper he got the more disappointed she felt. He couldn’t seem to find the spot that worked for her. Eliza tried to push his hand in the right direction; he took the hint but still nothing, even though his fingers were so far inside her she expected him to soon tickle her tonsils. How odd. When Greg finger-fucked her she went wild. The neighbours once knocked on the adjoining wall and asked them to keep the noise down. What was it? Were Charlie’s fingers too small? She’d never thought of herself as particularly roomy; she did lots of pelvic-floor exercises and she hadn’t even had a baby.

Perhaps if they just got down to it. He had a reasonable-size
penis. Normal size. In Eliza’s experience they all looked pretty similar and only incited comment if they were especially small or excitingly large. He popped it in and started to groan. He seemed to be having a good enough time at least. Wasn’t it bizarre, she’d been gagging for it for weeks? Now, here she was, flat on her back in between Egyptian cotton sheets, with a cute-enough dude – and all she wanted to do was roll over and go to sleep. Of course she couldn’t. It would be rude and he was doing his best. Eliza manoeuvred so that she could climb astride, it was usually a faster way to orgasm for her, and she had the feeling that Charlie wasn’t going to come until she did. That’s how you spotted the gentlemen of the twenty-first century. Normally she was appreciative of such consideration; tonight it was a nuisance.

He grabbed her boobs, and started to knead them. The pressure he applied was the right side of rough but it still wasn’t happening for her. Irrespective of this, Eliza started to rotate her head and moan. It had been a while since she’d had to fake orgasm, but in her day she could have earned an Oscar. The good thing about faking it with a new man was that he didn’t know the difference between ‘show time’ and ‘real time’. The bad thing was that he thought he’d done something well and would be inclined to repeat the same non-sexy stuff next time you slept with him. But Eliza already knew that wouldn’t matter: there wouldn’t be a next time with Charlie.

21

Eliza pushed open the front door; the house was unusually, eerily silent. Maybe Martha had taken the children to the park. She picked up the post. Two bills, a mailshot for expensive, French children’s clothes and another postcard from Greg. It was the third Eliza had received. It was odd, but only a week after Eliza had left Greg, his group had been asked to back quite a big, up and coming boy band, on a tour around the UK and Germany. He’d dismissed their music as crap and it wasn’t exactly a big break, more of a slight crack – most of the gigs were in clubs, not mega venues – but it was regular work for six weeks. The first six weeks that Greg would ever have received a regular income in all his adult life. Eliza was pleased for him.

His postcards were oddly unsettling.

Not because they declared undying love and begged her to take him back.

But because they didn’t.

Eliza had done her fair share of ditching in her days. In fact, more than her fair share. She knew the form. She’d tell them that it wasn’t them but her (which was partly true, she knew it). They’d beg her to explain what they’d done wrong (she never could), sometimes they cried, sometimes they sent flowers, sometimes poems and once something in a box from Tiffany’s. They always wanted
her back. Greg hadn’t done any of the above. Besides his drunken call a couple of nights after they’d split up, Greg hadn’t put any pressure on her to return. His postcards were light chatty notes detailing the funny antics of the band. They were the type of postcard that he could have sent to any one of his many friends. They never alluded to the fact that they had been lovers. He’d obviously forgotten about her already. Four years meant absolutely nothing to him.

He was so shallow.

‘Aunty Iza, Aunty Iza,’ yelled Mathew from the kitchen or, possibly, the back garden.

Eliza tucked her postcard into a deep pocket in her bag and her mind, and followed her nephew’s voice. ‘Mum, Dad, nice surprise,’ she said, kissing both her parents. ‘I hadn’t realized you were looking after the children today.’

‘Mummy’s drunk,’ said Mathew, ‘drunk-as-a-skunk, drunk-as-a-skunk. Drunk.’ He yelled with delight, ‘Drunk-as-a-skunk, skunk, skunk!’

‘Shush, Mathew, why don’t you go with Grandad and try and find some worms,’ encouraged Mrs Evergreen. Mathew weighed up his options and decided that torturing worms just about had the edge over exposing his mother’s frailties to the neighbourhood, so he happily took his grandfather’s hand.

‘What’s going on?’ asked Eliza. ‘Why are you all outside?’

‘Recovery is what’s going on. And we’ve brought the children outside because we’re trying to keep the noise down.’

‘Recovery from a hangover?’

‘That and recovery from a broken marriage,’ sighed
Mrs Evergreen. ‘Don’t you recognize it, Eliza? This is your famous Stage One. Next, she’ll be eating Mars Bars and calling him the things he deserves to be called.’

Eliza looked up at the window of Martha’s bedroom; the curtains were still drawn. ‘So she’s finally accepted this is serious.’

‘He asked for a divorce last night,’ said Mrs Evergreen.

‘A divorce? Already? Isn’t it a bit sudden? Martha thought they were blissfully happy up until seven weeks ago. Shouldn’t they try counselling or something first?’

‘Martha might have thought that they were blissfully happy but Michael blatantly didn’t. Who knows how long he’s been working out that he wants out. Martha’s got quite a lot of catching up to do. What was that noise?’

‘It sounded like the door,’ replied Eliza. ‘I’ll go and see.’

Martha hurriedly walked out of the front gate and down the street. She heard Eliza shout to her but she ignored it. She didn’t want to talk to Eliza, or anyone for that matter. Not her parents, not her children, not even Michael. She needed to think. And she needed fried eggs. She didn’t have a hangover, but she couldn’t kid herself that this was because she hadn’t got very drunk yesterday. She had got very, very drunk. In fact she was still drunk – and that was the only reason that she didn’t have a hangover yet.

She felt surreally disconnected from the world around her. She couldn’t decide whether to attribute this to the fact that she’d drunk two and a half bottles of wine last night, or to the fact that her husband had asked for a divorce. A divorce – what was that about? She felt as though she were operating in slow motion and everything
around her – people, that dog weeing up a lamp-post, the traffic whizzing by – was working at double speed. Michael was certainly working faster than she could comprehend. She had been extremely slow, retarded in fact, in her detection of the extent of his rejection.