What to Do When Someone Dies (8 page)

Chapter Nine

In the middle of the night I suddenly sat up in bed, straining my eyes in the darkness. I didn’t know what time it was. I had turned off the digital alarm clock because, over the past weeks, I had come to dread waking in the small hours and gazing at the time clicking past. I only knew that it was dark and that something had roused me. A thought, which must have wormed its way into my dreams. A memory.

Like most couples, I’m sure, Greg and I used to have conversations about which of our friends were unfaithful. After all, if one in three partners cheats on the other, or something like that, we figured we must be surrounded by people who were betraying each other. Now I remembered a conversation so vividly it was like being there again, and there we were in bed together, warm under the duvet and facing each other in the grainy half-light, his hand on my hip and my foot resting against his calf.

‘My parents?’ he was saying, and I giggled: ‘No way!’

‘
Your
parents?’

‘Please!’

‘Who, then?’

‘Fergus and Jemma?’ I suggested.

‘Impossible. They’ve only been together for a couple of years and he’s not that kind of guy.’

‘What kind of guy is that? And, anyway, it doesn’t need to be him, it could be her.’

‘She’s too moral. And too pregnant. What about Mary and Eric?’

‘She would have told me,’ I said firmly.

‘Sure? What about if it was him?’

‘She would
definitely
have told me that too. Even if she didn’t, I’d know.’

‘How?’

‘I just would. She’s a very bad liar. Her neck goes blotchy.’

‘What about me – would you be able to tell with me?’

‘Yes – so watch it.’

‘How would you know?’

‘I just would.’

‘Trusting fool.’

We smiled at each other, sure of our happiness.

I got out of bed, pushed my feet into slippers, went downstairs and into the kitchen, turning on the overhead light and blinking in the sudden dazzle. I saw from the wall clock that it was nearly three o’clock. It was windy outside and when I pressed my face to the window, trying to make out the shape of the roofs and chimneys, I imagined all those people out there, lying safely in bed with each other, warm and submerged in their dreams. I could still hear Greg’s voice and see his smile, and the contrast between the intense comfort of that memory and this cold, empty darkness was like a blow to the stomach, making my eyes water. No one tells you how physical unhappiness can be, how it hurts in your sinuses and throat, glands, muscles and bones.

I made myself a mug of hot chocolate and drank it slowly. Greg’s face faded. I knew he wasn’t here, wasn’t anywhere. His ashes were in a small square box with a rubber band around it. But I heard his teasing voice. Trusting fool, he called me.

‘Fergus.’

‘Ellie?’ His eyes widened with surprise. He was still in his dressing-gown, unshaven and puffy with sleep. ‘Are you OK?’

‘Did I wake you?’

‘What’s happened?’

‘Can I come in?’

He stood back, pulling his dressing-gown more tightly around him, and I walked past him into the kitchen, where the four of us had sat so many times, eating takeaways, playing cards, drinking almost until it got light. The supper things were still on the table: two stacked plates, an empty serving bowl, a half-drunk bottle of red wine. Fergus started to collect them up, dropping the forks on the tiled floor with a clatter.

‘I know it’s a bit early.’

‘It doesn’t matter. Coffee? Tea? Breakfast? Devilled kidneys? That last one was a joke. Jemma will be in bed for ages. She’s on maternity leave now.’ As he said this, I saw anxiety cross his face: Jemma was on maternity leave and I was childless, barren, shamed and alone.

‘Coffee, please. Maybe some toast.’

‘Marmalade, honey, jam?’

‘Whatever. Honey.’

‘If we’ve got any. No. No honey. Or jam, actually.’

‘Marmalade’s fine.’

‘The funeral seemed to go off all right,’ he said cautiously, as he filled the kettle and slid a slice of bread into the toaster.

‘The funeral was crap.’

He smiled ruefully at me.

‘No one knew what to say to me.’

‘It’s over, at least.’

‘Not really.’

He looked at me, eyebrows raised. ‘What d’you mean?’

‘I’ve decided to believe him.’

The kettle started to boil, sending puffs of steam into the air. Very methodically, he measured spoonfuls of coffee into the pot, then poured in the water. Only when he had handed me the hot mug did he look me in the eye. ‘Come again?’ he said.

‘Greg didn’t have an affair.’

‘Oh,’ said Fergus, putting his mug carefully on to the table with a click, then wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘Right.’

‘On the one hand there’s how it appears, him dying with this other woman.’

‘Yes.’

‘And on the other is my trust.’

‘Yes.’

‘I’m keeping faith. I’m not abandoning him.’

I waited for Fergus to say that he was dead, but he didn’t. He said, ‘I see,’ and picked up his mug again, staring at me over the rim. ‘Well, that’s good, I suppose.’

‘Yes, it is.’

‘Good, I mean, if it lets you come to terms with what’s happened.’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘Because what has happened?’

Fergus frowned and ran his fingers through his hair, so it stood on end, giving him the look of a sad clown. He dipped his finger into his coffee and licked it. ‘Why don’t you tell me what you’re thinking, Ellie?’ he said eventually.

‘When you were doing work for him, in the office, did you see any sign that he was… you know – involved?’

‘No.’

‘Nothing?’

‘Nothing. That doesn’t mean –’

I interrupted what I knew he was going to say. ‘Look, Fergus, Greg died with another woman. But he wasn’t having an affair with her. He wasn’t. OK? So, what were they doing together? That’s the question, isn’t it? For a start there are other possibilities.’ Fergus looked at me and didn’t speak. ‘Just off the top of my head she might have been a hitchhiker.’

Fergus thought for a moment. ‘Not wanting to be a devil’s advocate, but this woman –’

‘Milena Livingstone.’

‘She was some sort of businesswoman, no?’

‘Sort of.’

‘Do they tend to hitchhike? In London?’

‘Or just some business contact.’

‘Absolutely.’

‘That he was giving a lift to.’

‘All right.’

‘So you believe him?’

‘Ellie, he’s not here to believe. Your husband – my best friend, the man we both loved and miss like hell – is dead. That’s what this is really about, isn’t it? It’s as if by somehow persuading yourself that he wasn’t fucking another woman, he won’t be dead after all. You’ll go mad if you keep on like this.’

‘You only think that because you believe I’m wrong, deluding myself, and that Greg was unfaithful to me.’

‘You’re never going to find out what happened,’ he said wearily.

I should have kept a tally of how many times that had been said to me. ‘I trust him,’ I said. ‘That’s enough for me. The toast is burning, by the way.’

At Sunday lunch with Joe, Alison and one of their three children, Becky, who had her father’s blue stare, her mother’s pallor and reticence, I repeated what I’d said to Fergus. It was harder in front of three people. I sounded forced and over-insistent. I saw Joe’s shoulders sag, and I saw him throw a helpless glance at Alison before he turned to me, a lettuce leaf dangling from his fork. ‘Sweetheart,’ he said.

‘I know what that means,’ I said. ‘
Sweetheart
. It means you’re going to tell me very patiently why you think I’m behaving in a wrong-headed and self-destructive way. You’re going to tell me I’ll never find out the truth and must learn to live with that uncertainty and move on. And probably you’ll tell me this is a form of grieving.’

‘That’s pretty much it, yes. And that we love you and want to help in any way we can.’

‘Do you want to put the kettle on, Becky?’ Alison said, in a mild tone. ‘I’ll get the cheese.’

‘You don’t need to be tactful, Alison.’ I smiled at her. ‘We’ve known each other too long and too well for that. It’s fine. I’m fine. Really. I just thought you should know that Greg wasn’t being unfaithful.’

‘Good.’

‘It would be better if someone believed me.’

The man stood on my doorstep, barely visible behind the battered wooden rocking-chair he was holding.

‘Terry Long,’ he said. ‘I’ve got the chair for you.’ He looked at me expectantly.

‘I don’t –’ I began.

‘For my wife. It’s her Christmas present. You said you’d repair it for us. It’s a bit of a mess, as you see. It was her grandfather’s, though, so it has sentimental value.’

‘There’s been a mistake.’

‘I called you at the beginning of September. You said it would be fine.’

‘Things have changed,’ I said. ‘I’m not taking on new work.’

‘But you
said
…’ His face had hardened. He put the chair on the ground, and it rocked gently between us, making a clicking sound. One of its runners was badly damaged. ‘You can’t just let people down like that.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘That’s it? You’re sorry?’

‘I’m very sorry. I just can’t. I really can’t. I’m sorry.’ I kept repeating the word: sorry, sorry, sorry. In the end he went, leaving the broken chair behind. Even his back looked angry.

I picked up the rocking-chair, shut the door, and went through the house and into the garden where I unlocked my shed; the door was reinforced and there had been three padlocks on it since the time a year ago when a gang of youths had broken into it and stolen some of my tools. Inside, there were several ladder-backed chairs, a corner cupboard in dark oak, a lovely little ash cabinet without a back, a carved chest with an ugly gash along its lid and scars where some of its raised designs had been, and a Georgian desk. They were waiting for my attention. I went in, without turning on the light, and ran my finger across the wooden surfaces. Even though I hadn’t been in there for days and days, there was still the wonderful smell of sawdust and wax. Curls of planed wood lay on the floor. I squatted, picked up a pale rind and fingered it for a while, wondering if I’d ever come back to work here again.

Greg and I had argued about stupid things. Whose turn it was to empty the rubbish bin. Why he didn’t rinse the basin after he’d shaved. Why I didn’t know how irritating it was when I cleaned up around him, huffing just loudly enough so that he’d hear me. When he interrupted me in the middle of a sentence. When I’d used up all the hot water. We argued about clothes that shrank in the wash, botched arrangements, overcooked pasta and burnt toast, careless words, trivial matters of mess and mismanagement. We never fell out over the big things, like God or war, deceit or jealousy. We hadn’t had long enough together for that.

‘So you don’t believe me?’

Mary and I were walking on the Heath. It was cool and grey, the wind carrying a hint of rain. Our feet shuffled through drifts of damp leaves. Robin, her one-year-old, was in a carrier on her back; he was asleep and his bald, smooth head bobbed and lolled on her neck as we walked. His pouchy body swung with each step Mary took.

‘I didn’t say that. Not exactly. I said…’

‘You said, “Men are such bastards.”’

‘Yes.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning that men are such bastards. Look, Ellie, Greg was lovely.’

‘
But
?’

‘But he wasn’t a saint. Most men stray if they get the chance.’

‘Stray?’ I said. I was beginning to feel angry and rattled. ‘Like a sheep that’s got out of its field?’

‘It’s all about opportunity and temptation. This Milena probably made the first move.’

‘This Milena didn’t have anything to do with him. Or him with her.’

Suddenly Mary stopped. Her cheeks were blotchy in the cold. Over her shoulder Robin’s eyes opened blearily, then closed again. A thread of saliva worked its way down his chin.

‘You don’t believe what you’re saying, do you?’ she said. ‘Not really.’

‘Yes, I do. Though you clearly don’t.’

‘Because I don’t agree with you, it doesn’t mean I’m not on your side. Are you trying to push us all away? It’s rotten, what’s happened. Really horrible. I have no idea how I’d be dealing with it in your situation. Listen, though.’ She put a hand on my arm. ‘I do have a bit of an understanding of what you’re going through. You know Eric? Well, obviously you know Eric. You know what happened just after Robin was born – and when I say “just after”, that’s what I mean. Three and a half weeks, to be precise.’

A feeling of dejection settled on me.

‘He slept with this woman at work. I was woozy and weepy and tired, my breasts were sore, I’d only just had my stitches out so I could hardly sit down, sex was out of the question – I was a moony, overweight cow. And yet I was happy. I was so happy I thought I’d melt. And it wasn’t just once, a drunken mistake or something, it went on for weeks. He’d come home late, take lots of showers, be over-attentive, over-irritable. It’s such a bloody cliché, isn’t it? Looking back, I can’t believe I didn’t realize what was going on. It’s not as if the signs weren’t there. But I was blind, in my own little bubble of contentment. I had to practically see them together before I knew.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’ I remembered again the conversation with Greg, in which I had insisted I would have known if Eric had been unfaithful to Mary.

‘Because I felt humiliated. And stupid.’ She glared at me. ‘So fat and ugly and useless and ashamed. You must understand that feeling now, after what’s happened to you. That’s why I’m telling you.’

‘Mary,’ I said, ‘I’m sorry. I wish we’d talked about it before. But it’s not the same.’

‘What makes you and Greg so different?’

‘He wouldn’t have behaved like that.’

‘That’s what I used to say about Eric.’

‘I have an instinct.’

‘You can’t face the truth. I’m your friend. Remember? We can tell the truth to each other, even if it hurts.’

‘It doesn’t hurt because it’s not true.’

‘Has it occurred to you that maybe he was sick of having sex to get pregnant?’