The Lost Letters of William Woolf Page 7

  ‘Ah-ha! There he is, with young Sally. Billy has been such a mentor to her over the last six months. I’d say he’ll miss her when she’s gone.’

  So this was the infamous Sally. William had been suffering an extreme case of mentionitis since she had started working there: ‘Sally came up with a terrific new catalogue system today – really quite remarkable in its efficiency’; ‘Sally brought in home-made brown bread today, you really could taste the difference’; ‘Sally told me the funniest joke today about Christopher Columbus’; ‘Sally went canoeing at the weekend. Maybe we should try to get out in the world a bit more, try some new things.’

  Canoeing! This from a man who wore his pullover to the beach on the hottest weekend in July last year. In fact, the only thing he hadn’t mentioned about Sally was how utterly gorgeous she was. Why had she never asked him what Sally looked like? She had pictured a sad creature who got her kicks from birdwatching and making her own soap. The hue of the past few months shifted as she watched Sally shimmying around her husband, bending her back towards him. William was certainly not moping in the corner watching the door, as history had taught her to expect. Clare stood on the periphery of the dance floor, waiting for William to notice her. And on she waited. When he eventually stopped for breath, he was just in time to see Clare’s back manoeuvring towards the exit. He shuffled awkwardly across the room, weaving around two vampires kissing, a giant apple and a very sad-looking clown. He caught Clare by her coat-tail as she slipped into the cool hallway, where the party became a strange-sounding, muffled other-world. A dark blush was creeping up from the lace collar of William’s costume and his breathing was heavy.

  ‘Clare, hey, wait a minute! Where are you going? Why aren’t you wearing your costume? I was worried about you.’

  ‘Not half as worried as you seem to be now. Having fun, were you?’

  William’s flushed face and burgeoning stammer did little to placate her.

  ‘I was just dancing. Where are you going? How come you’re so late?’

  Clare readjusted the strap of the charcoal suede satchel that was slipping off her shoulder; the weight of its briefs set her slightly off balance and she cursed herself for not leaving it in the car. She was always so anxious in case it got stolen, details of her cases made public. The fallout from her old habit compounded her irritation.

  ‘Well, I rushed straight here so as not to let you down, but I clearly needn’t have bothered. Do you know how long I’ve been standing, waiting for you to finish your dance of the seven veils? Is that part of the work-experience programme? How to make a fool of your manager? Or his wife, at least?’

  Clare noticed Marjorie eyeballing them from the dance floor and nudged William out of her sightline. He tried to take her satchel from her, but she yanked it back and hoisted it once again on to her shoulder. Their words rushed at each other like foot soldiers, focused only on their own purpose: not to listen, just to be heard.

  ‘Clare, what are you talking about? I’m glad you’ve made it.’

  ‘Don’t try to pacify me, I –’

  ‘I’ve spent most of the evening just sitting on my own, waiting for you. Sally –’

  ‘So, it’s my fault? Because I have responsibilities?’

  ‘Sally dragged me –’

  ‘Stop saying her name. I don’t want to hear –’

  ‘She just felt sorry for me.’

  ‘What? The neglected husband? It’s me she should have sympathy for.’

  ‘I’m sorry I didn’t see you, but it’s packed in there. You should’ve come over.’

  Clare let her satchel slam on to the floor. The thud on the marble tiles echoed around the lofty walls, and more faces turned to look. She took a breath, smoothing down the lapels of her suit jacket, and her voice became an angry whisper.

  ‘What? And spoil the fun? Besides, I wanted to watch you. Witness how you behave when I’m not there. Who you are. You reminded me of someone I used to know.’

  The words lashed out of her before she had time to think about what she was saying. Had she gone too far? William fell silent. Afraid of the look in Clare’s eyes. Fearful of the bag of snakes squirming in his belly, afraid that one might circle his heart, rise up his throat and speak.

  ‘Woolfie, Woolfie! There you are! Where’s my champagne?’

  Sally was aglow with excitement as she skipped down the hall, her shining ebony hair spiralling in electric curls about her shoulders. She turned towards Clare.

  ‘Hello. They seem to have run out of champagne. Could you ask them to send some more through?’

  William jumped in before Clare turned a whiter shade of rage.

  ‘Sally, this is Clare. She doesn’t work here, actually. She’s my wife.’

  ‘Oh! Oh, I see, it’s just … the suit … Well, it’s so nice to meet you.’

  Sally offered her hand to Clare, a limp invitation, held closer to her own body than Clare’s. William slowly exhaled when Clare extended her own strong hand to complete the exchange. She didn’t say anything to Sally, though, but turned to face William once more.

  ‘I’m leaving. Come, if you like. Or stay and play. I’ve certainly had enough.’

  ‘Of course! Yes, let’s go. I’ll just grab my coat. Wait here?’

  Clare sat stiffly down in a brocade velvet armchair and gripped the arm rest. William hurried down the hall, Sally scampering along beside him. Clare watched as Sally took his elbow and stood on tiptoe to whisper in his ear. It horrified her that William jumped away, like a man receiving a blow. He glanced back over his shoulder to see if she was watching. Clare shook her head at him before rising and stalking towards the front door alone.

  The drive home was impossibly long. A new, unfamiliar silence to those they were accustomed to settled between them. They became like three uncomfortable strangers forced to share a bed: a husband, a wife and the row that loomed. Clare clenched the steering wheel, turning the windscreen wipers on against the drizzles of rain, forgetting to turn them off again when the rain stopped, despite their dry screeching over the glass. In the past, theirs had been a gentle love, not prone to arguments, accusations, recriminations. Now, this new world, where a battle seemed always to be in the post, had somehow robbed them of their easy talking and familiar affection. Clare nursed her wounds through red lights, roundabouts and stop signs until the sanctuary of their home gave her licence to let go.

  There, she bent over the kitchen sink, scrubbing dried-on cornflakes from the breakfast bowls they had abandoned that morning, running late as usual, escaping from the house. He hovered around the kitchen door.

  ‘I don’t really understand what’s going on here, Clare. I was only dancing with one of the women from work. I really think you’re overreacting.’

  Clare froze mid-scrub, and her shoulders closed together another inch.

  ‘William, you don’t think I’m overreacting or you wouldn’t look like a child who has dropped an egg. If there is nothing going on between you and that teenager, why are you acting so guiltily?’ She turned to face him and watched the question flicker across his face while he searched for an answer.

  ‘Because I do feel guilty.’ His answer was a slap in the face, and she felt a momentary panic grip her. What was he going to confess to? William registered her shock and rushed over to her, placing his hands on her shoulders. ‘Not because I’ve done anything wrong,’ he continued, ‘just because I’ve upset you. I wanted tonight to be a chance for us to have some fun. I can’t believe it’s turned out like this.’

  Clare turned away from him and watched his reflection in the kitchen window.

  ‘So you’re telling me that this girl who you’ve been going on about for months means nothing to you? And the fact that you never mentioned she looks like she’s walked off the cover of Teen Vogue was an accidental oversight?’

  He started wrestling the rubbish bag from the bin, frustrated when the jagged contents caught on the rim. ‘Why would I comment on what she looked like? And a
nyway, I hadn’t really noticed that she was anything special to look at, not really.’

  Clare clattered two spoons on to the draining board.

  ‘Oh, please don’t patronize me. At least if you acknowledged that you fancied her –’

  ‘Fancied her? Are we back in Year Ten now?’

  ‘At least then I might be able to believe you. Pretending you’ve never noticed just convinces me even more that you’ve got something to cover up. Admit it. You find her attractive!’

  William’s eyes ran around the room, looking for inspiration in the washing on the clothes horse, the glasses winking at him on the dresser, the grout between their no longer quite so white floor tiles.

  ‘Fine. So she’s an attractive girl. So what? It doesn’t mean anything. I’m sure you meet good-looking men at work all the time.’

  She turned the hot tap on full and the water blasted the sink.

  ‘Yes, William, I do. But I don’t spend every second I can with them, regale you with tales of how fabulous they are or spend the evening in their arms at work dos.’

  ‘I don’t spend evenings with her! You’re exaggerating!’

  ‘And I certainly would never lie to your face about them. In fact, as far as I know, that’s the first time you’ve lied to me about anything. As far as I know.’

  ‘I wasn’t lying to you! I was just trying to protect you from worrying about something that doesn’t matter. And anyway, what about Max?’

  She bent over and held her hair in fistfuls in her hands.

  ‘Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me! What has Maxi got to do with anything? Don’t try and turn this around on me!’

  William walked towards Clare and reached behind her to turn off the tap.

  ‘Ah, yes, of course, it’s Maxee. As if it wasn’t tedious enough, the way he follows you around like a puppy, he has to have a name like a child’s pet, too. I’m surprised he hasn’t caused an accident in the workplace, with all the drool he leaves behind him.’

  ‘Don’t be so childish. We’re just friends, as you very well know.’

  ‘Do I? Really, Clare? Is that what he thinks?’

  ‘Is that why you’ve been carrying on with Sally? To get back at me for having friends of my own at work?’

  ‘Carrying on? Nothing has happened with Sally, okay? Can we just drop this? I just enjoy the company of a beautiful young woman at work. So what?’

  The rage Clare had been trying to control erupted, and she smashed the last of their honeymoon bowls on the floor. It was a second before she realized that the shocked howl which accompanied the sound of breaking china had come from her. The noise reverberated inside her head. She gripped the kitchen sink, her arms trembling. Slowly, she floated back down inside herself, empty now.

  William took a step closer but hesitated before he reached for her.

  ‘Clare, that sounded bad, I know, but I didn’t mean anything by it. Honestly. Why don’t you go into the living room and I’ll clean up in here? I’ll get us a drink. Clare?’

  The fragments of china crunched underfoot as she brushed past him and walked stiffly to their bedroom. Upstairs, Clare turned the lock and rested her head against the powder-blue door frame she had so carefully painted without smudging the walls. William had installed the lock for her so she could barricade herself in if burglars ever came during the night. She had never thought she would use it against him. He wasn’t the sort of man who would kick the door down to get to her, although a part of her wished he was. Instead, he shuffled quietly up and knocked softly. A barely audible whisper coaxed through the wood. He told her he would wait outside all night until she was ready to talk, but it wasn’t long before his shadow disappeared and she could hear him riffling through the airing cupboard for something to sleep under on the couch. Clare’s anger slowly turned inward. She despised herself for losing her temper and lashing out like her mother would have done. She had worked too hard to rid herself of those fingerprints and was furious that William had provoked that in her. There was a reason she had settled with a man like him and not one of the Jamies of this world: he was supposed to be stable, solid, trustworthy; not someone who would cause her to smash crockery.

  That night, Clare put on one of her father’s old shirts which she had salvaged from the charity-shop pile her mother made when he passed away. Her wet cheeks dirtied the sleeves with her smudged make-up as she roughly scrubbed it from her face. As the clenching in her bowel eased, the emptiness of their bed enveloped her. Was she losing her mind? Maybe she had overreacted. Had he really given her any reason to doubt him? Was she just looking for an easy answer to what was already happening between them? Attack as the best form of defence?

  She got up and sat on the floor with her back resting against the bed. William’s question about Maxi settled on her now. Her husband was no fool, not really. So far, she had held Maxi at arm’s length, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to rationalize why she did so, when William offered her fewer and fewer reasons to stay. Maxi seemed to offer everything William couldn’t: an equal partnership, ambition, success. He was the most accomplished partner in their firm but still found time to publish papers in the Law Review, train for triathlons and take skiing holidays every quarter. Just the sort of man who would have been out of her league once upon a time. It was enticing, but would he make up stories for her about a superhero named Clare and hide them in her briefcase? Or wake up early to get the papers for her every Sunday, and present them to her on a tray (having taken out the supplements she wasn’t interested in) with a pot of tea and toast soldiers with the crusts cut off? Would she ever feel confident enough to sing along to the radio in front of him, even though she couldn’t carry a tune? Probably not, but maybe there would be other things, though. New intimacies she hadn’t discovered yet.

  She shook her thoughts away from Maxi. Maybe she should go to William and try to salvage a night’s sleep for both of them, but every time she circled closer to the idea of reconciliation, the image of that girl on her tiptoes whispering to him slammed back into the forefront of her mind and paralysed her. William had looked at that girl in a way she thought he reserved only for her. Something about the way his arm reached out to her, the lean of his head, the familiarity, their closeness on the dance floor. She couldn’t convince herself that it was all in her mind. In her bones, she knew something wasn’t right. She just didn’t know if something had already happened or whether it was brewing. Maybe it wasn’t too late, but if, all this time, she had been standing by him while he had been having an affair, she thought she would never recover.

  When dawn broke, the sunlight was a searchlight exposing the madness of her night. She looked in the mirror in despair at her blotchy face, tangled hair and damp shirt. The crumpled sheets were balled at the foot of the bed. She lay still as a stone at the bottom of a black lake, straining for sounds of William, until she heard the front door close softly behind him. She was momentarily surprised that he hadn’t come to see her before he left but was relieved not to have to speak to him just yet. The great purge of feeling the night before had cleared her thoughts. Things could not continue as they were; otherwise, in twelve months from now, five years from now, a decade from now, they would still be stuck. She needed to escape. This flat was oppressing them, and they would never face their fears, their feelings and failures, while they were living here together. She needed to do something drastic to force them into action.

  That was when she staggered to the shower, where she attempted to wash the terrible row down the drain and ignore the telephone ringing. The first time. And the second. On the third attempt, with her hair rinsed clean, she surrendered. Wrapped in William’s dressing gown, she ran to the telephone, determined to rid herself of the persistent pest. Wet tendrils sent shivers down her spine as she impatiently snatched at the receiver. She was drying her legs with the ends of the gown as she prepared for a quick disconnection, but the voice at the other end surprised her. It was Maxi, and he was calling from t
he telephone box at the end of her street.

  VI

  On the morning after the fancy-dress fundraiser, productivity at the depot was particularly low. Mr Flanagan cancelled the morning meeting because of poor attendance, and even Marjorie’s constant sound effects were reduced to a low, plaintive whine as she nursed her headache on the mustard leather love-seat in the kitchen. The remnants of last night’s mascara remained smudged around her bleary eyes. Sally had not shown up for work at all and William was relieved not to see her, as Clare’s accusations continued to crash about inside his head. Nothing had happened between them. To say, however, that the charms of Sally in all her flirtatious glory had been completely lost on him was untrue. The ability to pull the thread lay at his fingertips and, sometimes, they twitched to do it. Perhaps he should have told Clare the truth, but he couldn’t imagine any version of that story where he could emerge from the conversation unscathed. He knew there were no bonus points for fidelity – surely that was the baseline for reasonable behaviour – and he was prepared to accept last night as a warning. When that bowl smashed, he felt the very foundations of their marriage shake. Where had Clare’s rage come from? It frightened him to think how easily she had snapped; how long had that temper been building inside her? In their early days together, he worried about how completely self-controlled she was, so cold when they argued, but now, it was as if the feelings she had suppressed were exploding from within. How much had she been hiding from him? He couldn’t risk any further cracks permeating their marriage; it was time to douse out this frisson with Sally before something happened that he couldn’t undo.

  The day Sally appeared in the dust-filled hallway of the depot, with her shiny youth and infectious optimism, it had felt akin to an alien invasion. It would have been easy to get carried away by the attention she lavished upon him, surprised though he was to receive it, but in reality, he knew he was just enjoying the distraction. He was more relieved now than ever that he had stayed on the right side of that war; he would put more distance between them.