Chapter 24
Another thing SJ had noticed since she’d given up drinking was that she’d started to remember things she hadn’t thought about since they had happened – or at least not for a very long time – which wouldn’t have been so bad if any of them were nice.
But they weren’t. Sometimes the memories were incomplete – she’d get fragments of the past flicking into her mind; random scenes that weren’t connected would play out in her head like some surreal film.
This usually happened at night when she was trying to get to sleep, which was virtually impossible when the only nightcap she allowed herself was camomile tea.
When she mentioned it to Kit, he told her that alcohol was a very good memory suppressant, which was often why people drank, and that eventually the memories would work themselves out of her head.
‘It might help if you talked about them,’ he added idly.
‘To you?’ she asked, half wanting to talk to him about them, and half afraid.
‘It doesn’t have to be me. You could see another counsellor, maybe a psychotherapist if you prefer?’
SJ shook her head. She trusted Kit, but she didn’t want anyone else poking about inside her mind.
There was a small silence.
‘Did you mean now?’ SJ asked, noticing with a stab of alarm that they had forty minutes of the session left.
‘If you like?’ He gave her a half smile and said nothing else until eventually she said, ‘Okay…’
Kit nodded, his dark eyes interested but not impatient, and SJ went on slowly.
‘A lot of things I remember are about my parents…’ He nodded again.
‘…This is probably very childish and stupid but I don’t think they’ve really ever loved me.
’ She bit her lip. ‘No – that’s wrong. They do love me, but they love Alison more. ’
‘And what makes you think that?’
‘They always take her side,’ she said, swallowing hard.
‘They always did it when we were kids, and they’re still doing it now.
’ She paused. ‘Even when she slept with Jacob they sided with her. Well, they were shocked for a while, but then as time went on they thought we should move on, put it all behind us. They didn’t understand why I couldn’t bear to be in the same room as her. They still don’t.’
Kit shifted in his chair but he didn’t speak, and after a while she went on quietly.
‘They’ve never once said that Alison should miss a family gathering so I can go for a change.
They don’t blame her for breaking up my marriage.
They just blame me for being an unforgiving cow.
’ She could feel tears sliding down her face, but she couldn’t stop them and she couldn’t look at Kit.
‘It’s their party a week on Saturday and I’ve got to take Tom to meet Alison. ’
‘Are you scared it might happen again, SJ? Is that what you’re thinking?’
She reached for the box of economy tissues and narrowly avoided knocking over the leaflet stand.
‘I don’t think I can do it without a drink,’ she said.
‘Yes, you can. You’re stronger than you think, SJ.’
‘I’m not,’ she said sadly. ‘I’m really not.’
It was only when she had tidied up her face in the loo downstairs with the aid of some cold water and a paper towel and was outside again in the sunshine of the Soho street that she realised she had never answered Kit’s question.
Was she afraid Alison would make a move on Tom?
Tom wasn’t like Jacob. Tom was a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of person, whereas Jacob had been far more complex.
As far as she knew Tom had never lied to her – unlike Jacob, who’d kept on lying, even when he must have known it was futile. Even when he must have known all his lifelines were used up.
‘I’ve just been to see Alison,’ she’d announced on that dreadful day six and a half years ago, as she’d walked back into their kitchen.
‘Oh, yeah – how’s she doing?’ There was nothing in his face. Not a flicker of apprehension, not an echo of remorse. She’d felt anger building.
‘You know how she’s bloody well doing – you slept with her on Saturday night.’ SJ didn’t recognise her own voice; it was so choked with bitterness, every word twisted with pain.
Yet still for a moment he hadn’t reacted. He’d just stared back at her, his eyes blank. For an awful moment SJ had thought he was going to carry on denying it. Tell her she was imagining things, being paranoid.
Instead, he scratched his nose, coughed, and cupped his hand over his mouth, almost thoughtfully.
Not thoughtfulness, but guilt, SJ registered, remembering something she’d learned in psychology.
People always touched their faces when they felt awkward or were about to lie – it was almost as if they could take some of the power out of their words if their hand was across their mouth. Make the lie not quite as potent.
‘So?’ she prompted quietly. ‘Tell me your side of the story. Is it true? Did you sleep with my sister as soon as I was safely in Dublin? Or has she made the whole thing up?’
‘Um…’ He took a couple of paces backwards, half turning so he was facing their kitchen window.
SJ followed his gaze. On their patio the rotary clothesline was strung with a line of his socks and pants, the Armanis amongst them, stirring slightly in the evening breeze. She could see the line of tension in his jaw.
She trembled. ‘For God’s sake, Jacob, just tell me what happened.’
‘I was off my face. I don’t really remember.’
‘Well, Alison does.’ She moved across his line of vision so he was forced to look at her. ‘Alison remembers all the gory little details. She even remembers what boxers you were wearing. And what sheets…’ She broke off, haunted by fresh images.
Jacob shook his head and stared at the floor. A muscle was twitching in his cheekbone. His brown hair was ruffled like the feathers of a bird after a dust bath. He had never looked so beautiful. She had never hated him so much.
He cleared his throat again, spreading his hands in front of him; his wedding ring glowed dully in the golden light.
‘I’m sorry, okay. I’m really sorry. Like I said, I don’t even remember it – I was really pissed.’
‘But you still managed to do it. Was it good? Or did you just think, well, I’ve tried one sister, I’d better try the pretty one. Is that what you thought?’
‘No. No, of course I didn’t.’
For the first time he looked shocked. When she raised her hands to slap him, hardly aware of what she was doing, wanting only to hurt, he didn’t even try to defend himself. He just stood there mutely, letting her vent her rage and pain and grief.
She’d bloodied his nose and he hadn’t tried to stop her.
Afterwards, she’d sat at the kitchen table while he cleaned off the blood with a wet dishcloth at the sink.
Then he’d turned back to her, his shoulders straighter now as if he somehow thought that it was done with.
An eye for an eye, a bloodied nose for the worst pain he could have inflicted.
SJ had felt wrung out, all the fight and anger gone.
But she’d known he could never make up for what he’d done.
All through their marriage she had ignored it when he flirted with her friends because she had trusted him utterly. She had felt secure in the knowledge that he’d chosen her. That she came first in his life and always would.
But now that trust was shattered. She knew it could never be rebuilt.
While Alison had gone back to her adoring husband and been forgiven – sometimes SJ thought Clive would put up with anything for a quiet life – SJ had thrown Jacob out and filed for divorce.
He hadn’t even fought for her. He’d moved away, and she’d heard later on the grapevine that he’d met someone else.
The unbearable pain had slid slowly into black depression, but she couldn’t take him back.
She couldn’t risk letting him do it to her again.
She couldn’t risk letting any man do that to her again.