A Suitable Lie (19 page)

‘You were working in your room, on this file, with this woman?’ She was preternaturally cool. The blast must be on its way.

‘No. I was working on the file, on my own in my room. This … colleague needed it once I was finished with it.’

‘Why are you sweating, Andy?’

‘I’m not sweating.’ I lifted my arm and wiped my forehead on my sleeve while wondering what she was holding behind her back. She moved closer.

‘You’re sweating because you’ve been fucking some bitch behind my back.’ The sentence started off quiet and clipped, but ended with a high-pitched squeal. ‘You bastard.’ Her hand shot out, connected with my solar plexus. Air bulleted from my mouth.

‘Uhn.’ I fell to my knees, bent forward, struggling for air. ‘Anna, please … I didn’t do … anything.’

‘Prove it to me!’ She held my head back by the hair.

‘What?’

‘Prove it to me!’ Her other hand moved from behind her back. Light reflected on whatever she was holding. Realisation of what it was made me try to struggle to my feet, but her grip on my hair was too tight, too painful.

‘Anna.’ I tried to keep the desperation from my voice. ‘What the fuck are you doing with a knife?’

T
he airport on Monday morning was mercifully quiet. Not many people around to see the mess I was in. Sheila, however, couldn’t hide her shock. Anna was normally careful not to make any visible marks. But this time she had really lost it.

‘Oh my God.’ Sheila’s hand hid her mouth. ‘What on earth happened to you? Have you been in an accident?’

‘Yes,’ I mumbled from the side of my swollen mouth. I motioned to Sheila that it was difficult to talk. ‘Car,’ I said. ‘Steering wheel.’

‘You poor thing.’ Sheila lifted her hand to the side of my head as if to caress the bruising. ‘Look at your eye.’ She didn’t touch me and pulled her hand back to her side. ‘Are you mad? You should be at home in bed. Or better still in the hospital.’ She paused. ‘You did go to the hospital?’

‘Of course I did,’ I lied. ‘Only bruising. Looks worse than it is. I’d rather be at work.’

‘Fine by me if that’s the way you want it. It’s your funeral.’

I tried to laugh at Sheila’s flippant remark. The thought that she was closer to the truth than she would ever know cut off my strangled laughter. Even now I could feel the iced steel pressing against my neck, Anna’s breath hot on my face as I knelt before her on the floor.

‘Prove it to me,’ she had demanded.

‘How the hell can I do that?’ A fist connected with my eyebrow.

‘You know how,’ she hissed in my ear.

‘I don’t. I haven’t a clue what you’re on about.’ A knee shot up to my chin. I bit my lip. Pain surrounded me, pain and a growing certainty what Anna wanted me to do. It was only now in the bright morning that I could understand that she was cleverly letting me state my own punishment. Because then my humiliation would be profound.

‘Remember the last time,’ she whispered. I recalled that time when, after we had made love, she checked herself for the volume of my emission.

‘No,’ I cried, ‘I won’t do it.’

The knife moved in the air in front of my eyes. It caught every available beam of light and reflected it at me with menace. She pointed the knife at my groin.

‘Prove to me that you haven’t been fucking about or I’ll get busy with this knife. Take your trousers down! And your pants.’

‘Anna, please, stop it,’ I begged. My mind screamed at me, why aren’t you running? But I went nowhere and with wooden limbs I unbuckled my belt, allowed my trousers to drop to the floor and then I pulled my underwear down to my knees, exposing my genitals.

‘You should have thought of this while you were screwing around.’ She flicked the knife at my pubic hair. ‘Or do you want to be like that guy Bobbit in the States?’

Utterly defeated, I started to tug at my shrunken flesh, willing it to expand, willing the blood to flow.

‘If you’re not hard in thirty seconds…’

I pumped my hand faster. Nothing.

‘You can’t get it up, you arsehole because you’ve been screwing someone else. I’ll fucking kill you if you don’t prove me wrong.’ The knife was back at my neck. Something wet trickled down into my chest.

‘Anna.’

‘Keep wanking. Prove to me that I’m the only one.’ Her eyes were an inch from mine. Madness swirled in them like black wings. She could do it, I thought. Right at this point she could quite easily push the blade through my flesh, seeking the vein.

I couldn’t have believed it possible, but fear for my life fired blood into my groin and semen spurted out of my penis.

‘Catch it in your hand you messy bastard,’ she ordered. ‘Don’t let any fall onto the carpet.’

Anna then grabbed my wrist and examined the contents of my
hand. Like a scientist peering over a petri dish she peered at the milky fluid strung over my palm. With a grunt she acknowledged that the volume was satisfactory.

‘Look at you, you’re pathetic.’ The scorn in her voice was sharper than the blade at my throat and infinitely more painful. ‘Go and clean up, you wanker.’ Finding her choice of words amusing, she laughed. ‘Get out of my sight.’ She kicked at my shoulder and I fell to the floor, my humiliation complete. But she wasn’t finished yet.

‘What would your precious mother make of you now, your bare arse stuck up in the air, your hand full of spunk?’

‘Leave my mother out of this.’ I spoke into the carpet, hoping she couldn’t hear me.

‘What about that arse of a brother of yours? Eh? He probably wanks himself comatose every night. I’d bet Paula is sick of him.’

‘Leave Jim out of this,’ I said louder, pulling myself to my feet, while simultaneously trying to dress myself. I’d been naked in front of Anna countless times but for some reason in this situation I felt deeply uncomfortable. Like a choirboy naked before a row of nuns.

‘And what about the boys? How much respect do you think they would have for you right now?’ She was building herself up nicely.

‘Don’t you dare bring the boys into this.’ I fought for control. She knew my weakness and, not content with the humiliation she had already delivered, she was going for more.

‘Those poor wee boys, having an excuse like you for a father. What would they think if they saw you grovelling there?

‘Shut up.’

‘They love you as well. I’ll just have to put them right. Tell them that their father is a worthless piece of scum.’ She moved closer.

I couldn’t take any more and stepped towards her. Delight softened her expression. She wanted this, but even knowing it, I couldn’t stop myself. I grabbed at the hand holding the knife and squeezed her wrist until she dropped it. With the other hand I swung at her head. The connecting slap, flesh on flesh, rang out. The world slowed
and Anna seemed to glide through the air until she crumpled against the far wall.

Rage ran unfettered through my mind, a rage that was fuelled by years of frustration. Moments of pain and humiliation were dark beads strung on a line of barbed wire that ran from this point in time, through my past to the day we got married.

And in that moment I was caught up in the release. Enough. No more.

Anna was at my feet begging.

‘Andy, don’t.’

The words reached my ears, but their meaning didn’t register. She needed to know what I had been feeling like. She needed a flavour of what she had put me through.

I stepped towards her. Mind dark. Fists solid.

She would understand how it felt and I didn’t care what the consequences were.

‘Daddy?’ A sweet soprano broke through the fog. Again. ‘Daddy?’ It was Ryan. He sounded terrified.

I turned to him and saw the pale of his face as he emerged from the shadows in the hall.

Closing my eyes, I took a breath. Somehow forced the anger down.

‘Bed,’ I said and wondered where I had found a tone that was almost normal. ‘Back to bed, son. Everything is fine here.’

I turned away from him and looked down at my guilty hand as if it belonged to someone else.

Sense broke through. I could hardly believe my own strength or that I had broken one of my own commandments. I sobered up. I had done exactly what she wanted.

Anna climbed to her feet, holding the side of her head. Bruised but triumphant and looking almost disappointed that I had managed to make myself stop.

‘You’ve gone and done it now, sunshine,’ she crowed. ‘You’re mine.’

‘Anna, I’m so sorry.’ I crumpled. Fell to my knees, my fists pressed against either side of my head. What would she do now? Call the police?

‘Look what you’ve done to me.’ She limped over to the mirror and examined her face, ‘I’m all red.’ Wincing, she then pulled at her shirt, baring her shoulder. ‘I’ll be a mass of bruises in no time.’

‘Anna, I’m so sorry. I’ll never hit you again.’

I didn’t think it was possible to feel any worse than I did five minutes previously, but I did. I had broken the one rule that had kept me sane thus far. I had clung to my belief that the stronger should never strike the weaker. In a fit of temper I had thrown away my lifesaver and was about to go under.

‘Anna, please forgive me, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.’ My own hurts were completely forgotten. How could I have lost control like that? She walked slowly into the hall. Despite myself, I followed and watched her adding drama to her limp as she moved up the stairs.

She stopped halfway up. Her voice drifted down, a penetrating hiss. ‘Stay out of my sight. I’ll have to think about what I should do with you.’

Summarily dismissed, I slunk back into the living room and sat on the floor before the TV.

Events of the evening ran through my mind. An image of my erect penis in my hand was superimposed on the TV screen by my imagination. Cold steel burned my neck. Fear that Anna would carry out her threat had stripped every voluntary thought from my head. I was thankful that filling your lungs was an involuntary action or I would have probably stopped breathing as well. Adrenaline stripped fur from my arteries and filled every vein to bursting point. All of this and yet I had managed to ejaculate. Was this self-preservation at its keenest? Had the mechanics of my pumping hand been enough?

Or was I as sick as she was?

Sleep eventually claimed me, my anxiety reduced by the thought of my hands round my wife’s throat. Squeezing.

Squeezing for all I was worth.

‘A
ndy, are you sure you’re okay?’ Sheila asked once again.

I nodded. ‘Let’s get to the plane.’

W
e agreed that I would do most of the donkey work that week, out of sight and hearing of the customers. With a pen in one hand, a mug of coffee in the other and piles of folders around me, I spent the remainder of my time in Campbeltown in the staff room. Working as many hours as I could, I tried to forget about striking out at Anna. What damage could I have done if I hadn’t stopped? A movie played in my head while I crossed off lists of erroneously paid cheques: Anna bloodied and lifeless at my feet, me being handcuffed to a policeman and the boys being taken into care.

That series of events just couldn’t be allowed to happen. There had to be a way out of this mess. What terrified me most was that I would eventually snap and murder would be the result.

Sheila couldn’t do enough for me that week. She brought me morning snacks, lunch and dinner, made sure the kettle was never empty and continuously asked how I was. My resolve to keep a safe distance between us dissolved under this barrage of solicitude and I found myself anticipating her next kindness, waiting for it like a pup waits for its ear to be scratched.

Each evening we would work until eight or nine then return to the hotel. Sheila would invite me to the bar for a nightcap, and, torn, I would refuse. The idea of sitting at the bar nursing a whisky and chatting with her was just too delicious to contemplate; besides, I knew if I wasn’t back in my room to take Anna’s phone call, the consequence would be severe.

The first phone call, on the Monday night, was surreal. No mention was made of my violence the night before; instead Anna talked about the boys, how much fun they’d had that day, how Ryan was starting to ask for the potty at last. While one half of my mind enjoyed the thought of the boys having fun, the other was bracing itself for the aural onslaught. It didn’t happen.

Tuesday night, an almost identical talk took place. My nerves
were in shreds as I waited for an outburst. Nothing. Wednesday’s conversation was the same, until just before she hung up.

‘Oh, by the way, I registered a complaint with the police today. They’ll be waiting for you at the airport on Friday. I’m going to bed now. Don’t call me back.’

Stunned, I sat on the edge of my hotel bed for what seemed hours with the phone up at my ear. Eventually the insistent tone made me put it back on its cradle. Oh my god, the police. What would they do? They would never believe that Anna had struck first. I was already healing. She’d probably enhanced her bruises with a little purple make-up. They’d take the boys away from me. I’d lose my job, my house.

Why the hell did you hit her, Boyd? You’ve lost everything.

Sleep was a stranger that night as dire scenarios filled my mind. I made it in to the office the next day, dim with fatigue and grey with worry. Sheila, sensing that I was not really present, kept her distance. The hours passed in a blur of figures and files. I probably made enough errors that day to ruin our work of the previous two and a half weeks. At six o‘clock, I threw my pen across the desk.

‘I’ve had enough,’ I stated. I needed to get out of this building. I needed to drown the voices in my head with as much alcohol as possible.

‘Do you want to go for something to eat?’ asked Sheila.

‘I’m going to the pub.’

Walking down the hill from the bank, I entered the first licensed premises I saw.

‘A large whisky,’ I demanded of the barman and took a stool at the bar. Alcohol would numb my brain, stop the march of destructive thought. Three doubles later I was still in a fog of worry.

‘Fuck.’ I slammed the glass on the bar and held my head in my hands.

‘Could I ask you to mind your language, sir?’ the barman said firmly but politely.

I grunted an apology. Looking around me for the first time since
I entered, I noticed the place was all but empty. A couple sat in the far corner as if they had nothing left to say to one another and their only shared pleasure was booze. A small, thin man sat in the middle of the room toying with a cigarette. There was no sign of a lighter, he simply turned the cigarette end over end with his fingers. To my right sat another man, his head sunk into his shoulders. His face was lined and all sharp angles, his eyes dark caves. He looked like a man at the end of his road. He wore a tie the same as mine. It looked as if it could easily swing around to form a noose. He looked like me. I sipped at my drink, so did he.

I was looking into a mirror.

The stranger beside me had my sympathy before I knew who he was. Could I sympathise with myself? What mistake had I made other than to love the wrong woman? Was it really my fault, the violence? Had I really jumped willingly into the whole mess or had it sneaked up on me while I was simply trying to be happy? Overriding all of this was the image of me on my knees with a knife at my neck and my dick in my hand. Humiliation pushed its way to the front of the throng of confusion in my mind.