Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
I set my bag down in our hallway, and greet Tiddles, who makes figure of eights around my ankles. I take a moment to process what it feels like to be back. No Harriet just yet. And, because he’s away at the conference, no Rupert for tonight, either. No stale cooking smells hanging in the air. Only the lavender detergent our cleaner uses, and an overripe banana stinking in the fruit bowl. I go upstairs. Normally I unpack immediately. But right now, I just lower myself onto our bed, and lie there with my arms stretched out like a starfish and think about my last few hours in Athens.
His flight leaving at 6.10 a.m., mine at 9.00. Us tiredly making our way back to the hotel at dawn, so he could collect his bag. Him telling me I should try to take a nap. Me agreeing but knowing that I was unlikely to become Rip Van Winkle any time soon.
‘I’ll see you, then…’ His parting words. The kiss that would have been on the lips if I had not awkwardly moved my head, because I wanted to remember our last kiss when it wasn’t our last kiss. I didn’t want last anythings; not the last time he touched me, or the last time his eyes met mine.
After he walked away, and I’d watched him, he suddenly stopped, turned. ‘Do what your heart is telling you,’ he said, apropos of nothing. ‘It’s not selfish. It’s your life. You’re entitled.’
He didn’t say Please come with me . He didn’t even say, Let’s stay in touch.
I spend the better part of the afternoon wandering around Marks the exclamation mark is everything. If he’d put three dots after it, I might have thought he was trying to say, Beautiful afternoon, if only you were here…
Safe travels home to Malibu, I write. When he ‘likes’ it, and there are no more moving dots, I find myself sliding back into a blue funk.
The Ping wakes me up.
Good evening.
Frank again!
I push a sleeping Tiddles off my stomach and sit up. He has sent a picture of the ocean by moonlight.
Good morning! I respond. I glance at the clock. Almost 9.30 a.m.; 1.30 a.m. in LA.
Just taking a beach walk. How was your sleep?
I picture him walking under a canopy of stars at the water’s edge. Alone. The ocean feeding his soul. Because that’s really all he needs.
Not great. Couldn’t get my head to settle down…
Will he know why?
No more dots. I stare at my damned phone, panicking.
Just when I’m on the brink of despair, up comes another Ping!
Just walked back indoors. How’s Harriet?
I imagine him striding onto his patio, past the firepit where his chairs are arranged, entering his kitchen. The place where I first set eyes on him when he commented on the picture of the boat and the woman’s sexy long legs shooting out of the water. Splash! I believe it was called.
I tell him she’s okay, that Aiden is taking good care of her.
That’s great, he responds, after a minute or two.
The conversation is drying up. I don’t know what else to say to hold him there.
But then up pops a photo. Me, in profile, staring out at a setting Santorini sun. I don’t have any memory of him taking it, but I look serene and content.
Not bad. Considering you didn’t get the subject’s approval.
He responds.
I have another one that wasn’t exactly approved of…
I find myself hanging there in a silly state of suspense. I don’t know if he’s deliberately keeping me waiting but…
‘Oh no!’ I actually say it out loud.
Our portrait! Me with my ghoulish ‘tear-stained’ face. Or, rather, a photo of it lying on his Carrara marble breakfast bar.
What??? How????
Made the cab driver reroute on way to airport. Reeks like garbage but I’m going to frame it.
I chuckle, despite the fact that this is terrible, just terrible.
You can put it in your bathroom beside Marilyn Monroe.
That’s the plan! Wait. How do you know what’s in my bathroom?
I’m about to confess that I snooped the length and breadth of his house, but then I hear something. The purr of Rupert’s engine.
He said he’d be back before 4 p.m. Not 9.30 a.m.
I quickly type to Frank: Wild guess
I can hear Rupert having a word with Kevin, our neighbour, who will be on his way to work, them laughing.
Another Ping!
I haven’t been able to stop staring at it.
A key in the door. Rupert’s voice. ‘Moy?’
I can’t think of what to type fast enough. The lull feels too long. I see the dots again.
I have no right to text you any more. Tell me to stop.
Rupert’s voice again, a little more assertive. ‘Moira?’
My heart thrashes. Rupert is on his way up the stairs now. I can hear his heavy footfall, the familiar squeak of a loose board on the sixth rise. Then he walks in the room. ‘You’re there.’ He says it like he might have expected me not to be. His eyes go to the phone in my hand.
‘So are you,’ I say. ‘I thought you were coming later?’
‘I decided to sneak out before breakfast.’ He greets the cat who has now jumped off the bed to say hello to him. He stands there, awkwardly, then he says, ‘Bursting for a pee.’ He throws his jacket onto a chair then walks into our en-suite. He pushes the door closed, but it stops part way so I hear him relieve himself.
I stare at Frank’s message. Tell me to stop . We are back in that café. With all the time in the world, and no time at all.
I quickly type: Don’t stop. The small Swoosh! of it sending gets drowned out by the flushing of the toilet.
‘Are you alright?’ Rupert comes and stands by the bed. ‘Not like you to sleep in.’ There is genuine concern in his voice.
‘I’m fine,’ I say.
I swipe out of messages, click my screen off.