Chapter Seven
Seven
Honey
I don’t want to jump to conclusions, but my body already has. Icy dread is steadily building in the pit of my stomach, and I can feel my cheeks flaming with humiliation.
Max is here with another woman.
He doesn’t have his arm around her, but that’s only because their hands are interlinked. Max is holding another woman’s hand.
I can’t move. Tears are pricking behind my eyes, but I don’t want to cry. I won’t.
They haven’t noticed me. They’re still just sitting there watching their blaring action film. Still holding hands. Somehow this low-level closeness is worse than if I’d walked in on them having sex.
That would just be physical, but this is more than that. This is everyday closeness.
They continue not to notice my arrival, which is really quite awkward, because I don’t know how to alert them to it. Eventually, I scuff my foot on the original oak floorboards, but there’s no reaction, probably because I’m wearing the silk slippers.
I clear my throat and it comes out louder than I expected. Max freezes, but the girl still hasn’t noticed me, and she carries on leaning into his shoulder.
‘Excuse me,’ I say.
She flinches at the sound of my voice, so harshly that her braids jump too.
‘Jesus,’ she says. ‘You scared me.’
‘Sorry,’ I say, and then hate myself for it.
‘Oh, honey,’ she says, turning to Max.
‘This is Lindy,’ Max says, because I appear to have lost the ability to talk. He looks shamefaced, but I notice he still hasn’t stopped holding her hand. ‘Lindy and I have been dating for a while.’
We’ve been ‘dating’? Really? Because we almost never go on dates.
‘We’ve been in a relationship,’ I say, but I don’t sound convincing. I’m not sure I’ve even convinced myself.
‘She’s the one?’ Greta says, raising her eyebrows at me, as if surprised that Max would stoop so low. I wish I wasn’t wearing the slippers. How can anyone have gravity when wearing pink, silk slippers?
Max nods. ‘This is not the way I wanted to tell you, Lindy,’ he says and then falls silent. No explanation, no attempt to make me feel better, or stop holding her hand.
‘I’m sorry,’ Greta says, getting up and looking me in the eye. She looks genuinely sad for me. ‘I didn’t mean it to get this far. I knew he had a significant other. I thought we could just be friends without any feelings. We haven’t even kissed yet.’
Then she walks right past me, grabs her biker jacket from the arm of the sofa and leaves.
She doesn’t slam the door; she closes it so gently that it barely registers.
Max is standing now, but he hasn’t moved any closer to me. Perhaps he thinks I’m going to lash out at him. Make a scene. Throw a slipper.
‘I have one question,’ I say in a high voice that doesn’t even seem to belong to me.
He nods for me to continue, looking down at his own slippers. Blue plaid. Burberry.
‘How long has this been going on?’
‘Nothing’s really going on. We watch films,’ he says. ‘It’s just a movie club.’
‘For two people. Who hold hands in the dark,’ I say.
He gets quiet and I can tell he’s trying to work out how to spin this; if he really even wants to spin it.
‘Okay,’ he says, and purses his lips.
‘“Okay”? What does okay mean? How is that a complete sentence?’
‘Okay, maybe there’s more between us.’
‘How much more, exactly?’
I hate that I’ve asked this question. That I’ve needed to.
‘We sometimes cuddle, but that’s it. It’s not sexual.’
‘It’s worse,’ I say, feeling all my fight drain out of my feet. ‘I can see it in your face. You have feelings for her.’
He bites his lip.
‘It’s true, isn’t it? You’ve fallen in love with each other, and all this movie-watching self-control is just heightening the experience. It’s like you’re courting and saving yourselves for marriage. Oh my god, you’re living in your own chaste romance.’
‘I don’t know what to say,’ he murmurs, staring desperately at the wall.
When I first began staying over at his place, a few months into our relationship, he brought me a cup of tea to help me wake up. Then a coffee from his expensive machine. He tickled me to sleep when I felt anxious, feather-light fingers on my back. He talked about our future. Our house in the country, our roaring log fire, our dogs. Now that’s all over.
‘Why couldn’t you just have bolted the door? You know I have a key.’
As if this oversight is the problem. As if not bolting the door is the thing that has ended us.
‘I’m sorry, Lindy. It seemed like such a remote possibility that you’d come over without telling me first. You always give me a heads up for anything you do. It’s your thing.’
‘That’s not my thing,’ I say, feeling my temper begin to flare. ‘And if you think it is, you don’t know me at all. I was just trying to be sensitive to your needs. I know you hate surprises. I can’t say I’m a big fan of them either, after tonight.’
I see his expression harden. He has always disliked me showing anger. He finds it irksome. Unattractive.
‘I didn’t realise finding me watching a film with another person would be so traumatising. You hate watching TV. You don’t even watch my latest uploads.’
I can feel my eyes widen in disbelief. As if this is all my fault for not supporting his YouTube channel and not going trekking with him through the shitty Thames mud for ancient boxwood nit combs?
‘It wasn’t just watching a film with “another person”; it’s a woman you’ve been seeing in secret. A woman you have feelings for. This is not me being paranoid; this is you being a cheating bastard.’
‘There’s no need for that kind of language,’ he says, in his school-principal tone.
I’ve heard enough.
‘I’m going. And I’m taking my wine and crisps with me,’ I say, swiping them from the hall table. ‘You can keep the massage oil. Maybe have a swig of it, Max. It might help with your chronic constipation.’
And with that, I leave, heart thumping, face burning and eyes streaming with the burning tears of betrayal.
Max has fallen in love with someone else and I hadn’t even noticed.