Chapter 47
47
‘Can I ask you something, and please don’t take it the wrong way,’ Connor said.
‘Like all people asked that, I am immediately going to identify what the wrong way would be and take it– and, moreover, assume that was how I was meant to take it. Go ahead.’
They were drinking cups of builder’s tea at her kitchen island, trying to sober up, amid moody illuminations. There was no way of turning on the lights in this place that didn’t look like you were planning a seduction or a party, so Bel didn’t try.
‘How did Ant ever impress you enough to pull you? I can’t imagine it. I know he’s only mid-forties but even the young fogey thing …? That said, I’ve never met a guy you like so I have no idea what your type is, and I’m running my mouth as I’m pissed. Also, I sound like I’m victim blaming and I promise I’m not. I suppose I’m saying: what’s he like when he’s not like that?’
Bel smiled and sighed. It occurred to her Connor was very easy to talk to really. Her senses were Martini-fugged, true, but she wasn’t sure why she’d ever thought he wasn’t.
‘I know. First, imagine me in my state of avoidance of knowing I had to end things with Tim. He had our mums saying they couldn’t wait to be co-grandmothers and I’m secretly crying in the bath I’m so unhappy. Then, secondly, Ant is known as the loveliest guy at work. Ask anyone at his paper. They’d say “would do anything for anyone” and “goes the extra mile for interviewees”, sending them cuttings, checking back in on them. He’s very well read and pops over to your desk to lend you something he thinks you’d like. I remember one bloke saying “he’s an old school gentleman– you don’t get many of those anymore”.’
‘Thank fuck you don’t,’ Connor said.
Bel stirred her teaspoon in her cup.
‘Haha. It’s an insurance policy so that when he goes off the rails in private you can’t match it up with Public Anthony and he has all these defenders who’d refuse to believe it of him. He is “what if gaslighting was a man?”’
‘You know what this means, though?’ Connor said. ‘He has things to lose by his behaviour coming to light. Not only his marriage– his living with his kid, his salary. He has his reputation too. He’s been bluffing you. He’s doing this because he feels confident it’ll stay between you, and if not, his word counts. He’s been depending on your greater embarrassment.’
‘What are we going to do if he does turn up?’ Bel said.
‘I hold him up against the wall by his throat while talking like Batman to the Riddler, if he thinks he’s a Batman villain, that kind of thing? I’ll be honest, I hadn’t thought it through beyond thinking I might be useful.’
As much as Bel guilty-pleasure liked the idea of Anthony facing off with Connor, she felt it wasn’t the way.
‘He’d probably file an ABH charge against you. Imagine the police interviews and the official statements? Loads of exciting interacting, and with him roleplaying the wounded party.’
‘Wouldn’t that mean the background would come out and be bad for him?’ Connor said.
‘I think he’d get a kick out of my having to decide if I was going to talk about what brought him to my door. He’d give evidence at a mag’s court here in Manchester and pull favours at the Yorkshire Post to not have it covered and his wife would never know. He’d make sure the office buzz was: hear that Bel Macauley mucked around with poor married bedazzled Ant and then when he had the temerity to ask why, got her new fella to lamp him? She’s not as butter wouldn’t melt as she seems.’
‘I refuse to believe he has this much power when he’s the one with more to lose,’ Connor said.
‘We’re journalists. What would we do with this story as journalists?’ Bel said.
All of a sudden, a plan came to her. It was simple and powerful and she couldn’t see a downside. She explained it to Connor, then they tested it out.
Connor said: ‘I have to admit this is better than hitting him. Its only flaw is it needs two people to execute it.’
‘For now, I have two people.’
As with many planned-for calamities, Anthony failed to show.
‘He’s our millennium bug,’ Connor said as Bel handed him a clean towel the following morning.
‘I’m still so grateful for you staying,’ Bel said.
She didn’t know how much Connor’s failed prophecy had been due to her winding things up and their being wankered, but it was incredibly considerate of him all the same. Also, she’d needed to stop playing the Surely He Wouldn’t game. She was happy to lose this round, if this was losing.
Connor had a shower in the downstairs en suite while Bel made scrambled eggs on toast.
‘Apologies for no bacon, I didn’t expect to have a guest,’ she said, passing his plate over.
‘You mean you didn’t think you’d get lucky at the Northern Media Awards?’ Connor said.
‘That reminds me. I’ve had a text from Aaron wanting to know “where you and Adams got to?” We’re on the horns of a dilemma there.’
Connor paused, fork in eggs. ‘You mean …?’
‘I might tell him we’re working on a story. He’s going to be unbearable otherwise.’
As Bel got up to put the plates in the dishwasher, the doorbell rang. She went rigid and she and Connor stared at each other. Connor nodded at Bel and went to the sofa, where he was out of view of the doorway.
Bel steeled herself, counted to five before she walked over. After all that, it’d probably be a guy in a DHL tabard.
She yanked it open. It was Anthony. Standing there in a waterproof walking jacket with an expectant smile, like he was collecting for charity. She shouldn’t be surprised and yet she could scarcely believe it.
‘What the fuck are you doing here? Where did you get my address?’ she said.
‘Hah. Good morning to you too, Isabel,’ Anthony said, in a wry yet affectionate way, as if he was her father and she was a rebellious teenage daughter ruining the family brunch. To what do we owe the pleasure?
‘Do you think you can normalise this by using a patronising tone of voice?’ Bel said. She had to be careful: the plan required her to keep her temper.
‘I think you and I passed “normal” way back, didn’t we?’
Anthony wasn’t only unashamed, he was buzzing. He thought this pursuit of her was incredibly exciting, Bel realised. He bewailed the lovesick agonies that he’d convinced himself he was experiencing, but it was surface tension. And as he knew himself to be a Good Guy, it wasn’t abusive. There’d need to be an abuser for that.
‘There is no “you and I”,’ this is harassment and you’re a stalker.’
‘I’ve come to see you this morning precisely so you can’t say my intention is to intimidate you. I come in complete peace …’ Anthony said, holding his hands up.
A lie. Anthony had no impulse control. His being here meant he fully intended to turn up last night, exactly as Connor predicted, and hadn’t dared because of Connor. Anthony had taken this morning as second best, gambling she might be on her own. He’d not been able to bear going back to York empty-handed.
‘Stalking refers to a time of day ?’
‘I have tried in vain to have a sensible conversation with you, offered coffee to chat this out. I come up against a wall of silence or this flapping panic that I might access feelings you don’t want to acknowledge. So lover boy’s not stayed over …? Well, well,’ he said, craning to see past her.
‘Do you think it’s OK to turn up here uninvited? You honestly can’t see how far off the map of acceptability this behaviour is?’
Bel was biting down her urge to scream in rage. She wanted to say, ‘you don’t care how scary this is for me?’ but he’d love that: scoffing at it and saying how on earth could HE scare her, while getting a crotch-thrill from how it made him a dangerous rake.
He was obsessed with her– because he couldn’t have her– and it was conceptually impossible that she wasn’t obsessed back.
‘I think it’s unacceptable to sleep with someone and ghost them, Bel. I’d have dropped you in turn except for the fact I know you’re a much better person than this. I know for sure how much we feel for each other. You can fool me to a point with this hurtful routine but you can’t fool me about that. In fact, it’s exactly how I know I’m right.’
‘I didn’t ghost you. I told you I was no longer interested in having anything to do with you. What you imagine is keeping the faith is, in fact, refusing to accept someone else’s decision.’
‘When the realities of my other responsibilities became real for you, responsibilities we’d discussed at length I might add, you ran away.’
‘No one’s asking you to abandon your responsibilities, Anthony. No one.’
‘This is what I mean! The stonewalling! Dear God …’
‘Do you understand what …’ Bel couldn’t say ‘breaking up’, it made her so unclean, so coated in him , and they were never together to break up: ‘Something “being over” means?’
‘Do you deny you cut me dead when I wouldn’t instantly walk out on Julie and Jacob, even though I explained to you that Jake’s move to sixth form college is a delicate time? The irony is, I’d be the terrible person you paint me to be if I said oh, myself and this younger woman are besotted with each other, you’ll have to fend for yourselves.’
Bel steeled herself. Temporarily tolerating this sanctimonious, oleaginous, morally back-to-front shit was the price of getting to the other side of this nightmare.