Last Tango in Toulouse (26 page)

We get a call from John in Australia to say that all is fine at the farm, although there have been a few minor hiccups. It's been cold, very cold indeed, with overnight temperatures of minus six and minus eight, and most of his time and energy have gone into keeping the two main fires going all day and night. Our massive woodpile, which we hoped would last for several winter seasons, is gradually disappearing – he hopes there will be some left by the time we come home. Disposing of the ashes has been a bit of a problem for him. I normally chuck them in the compost or around various parts of the garden but John has been wrapping them up and putting them in the huge hessian wool bale where we put our rubbish for collection by a local contractor once a month. One morning he comes out to find that the entire wool bale has vanished overnight, complete with rubbish, with only a few burnt-out catfood cans left as evidence of the overnight conflagration. It's fortunate that the entire shed hasn't burnt to the ground, because it contains three cars, several large drums of oil and fuel and all the remaining wood supply.

John has also been having an ongoing battle with Laurie, who tries to corner him every time he goes into the pen to gather eggs and replenish the grain supply. John won't venture near Laurie unless he's carrying a large stick to fend Laurie off. The most dramatic incident that has occurred, however, involved old Floyd, who is half-blind. It seems that one
afternoon a very attractive Husky bitch called Gemma, who was in season, sidled up the long drive and had her way with Floyd despite his age and arthritic joints. The problem was that they became enjoined, or ‘stuck', as breeders sometimes call it, and John simply didn't know what to do. In his panic he eventually hosed them down, despite the freezing conditions, and finally they managed to separate. It turned out the Husky was owned by some new neighbours, a young couple who have built a cottage across the road, and they weren't aware that she had escaped. We wonder if anything will come of the union. If it does, I guess they will be Huskadors.

In the meantime I am busy firming up all the last-minute preparations for the September walking tour. Jan and I visit all the hotels and confirm the bookings and have lengthy discussions with the bus company, finalising the logistics of the itinerary, hoping that our French bus driver will be a little more refined and professional than Roy. Soon it is early July, and David leaves for Australia.

I finally pluck up the courage to take the train to Toulouse. We have agreed by phone to meet on a street corner and, because our meeting time is mid-morning, we will go directly to a hotel room rather than out to a restaurant for lunch. In a way both of us need to confront this thing once and for all, without hours of seductive foreplay, sipping wine and talking. It has reached a stage where it needs to be dealt with in the stone-cold sober light of day.

Entering into a sexual relationship with a new person after so many years is a little daunting. I have often wondered how widows and divorcees handle going out ‘on a date' with someone for the first time after a long-term marriage has ended. For many it must be such a terrifying prospect that they simply don't bother, and who could blame them? It's like starting all over again, but without the benefit of youth, innocence and firm flesh.

For me, the major surprise is that making love to another man seems the most natural and easy thing in the world. I feel comfortable and at ease with myself, as if the whole encounter is
somehow right. I had never even kissed another man on the lips during all those decades, but when I kiss my lover for the first time I am not even vaguely unnerved. It feels perfect.

During the seven months preceding this relationship I have been unsettled by the thought of allowing another person to see me naked, especially as my body at fifty-two bears little resemblance to my body at twenty-one, when I first began my relationship with David. Yet, surprisingly, even that moment is easy. I am not even vaguely self-conscious or awkward. I am, instead, enraptured by the entire experience.

The only explanation I can give for the ease with which I cross this threshold is that I already feel very close to and familiar with the man from Toulouse by the time we finally embark on the physical part of our relationship. I am sure that if he had made a clumsy pass at me when we last saw each other, I would have rebuffed him on the spot. Yet because the closeness has developed gradually over the telephone and via email, the actual moment of our getting together has been so well anticipated that there is no risk of either of us being startled or taking flight. I have read a lot about Internet romances yet this is quite a bit different. I have already met this man and our mutual attraction has been established. It's just that our relationship has evolved, and here I am in a French city with my lover, having planned and plotted our affair from opposite sides of the planet.

Our love affair is brief and intense. Our meetings have to fit around his work and home life and my busy lifestyle. I am trying to avoid making David suspicious so I need to limit my trips to Toulouse and to be back in Frayssinet at times when he will be phoning from Australia to see how I am. It becomes an elaborate
web of deception, but for me the stolen moments make it all worthwhile.

After I get off the train we meet in a bar and have a quiet drink, then he takes me to a restaurant of his choosing. He knows Toulouse intimately and I sense that he is making an effort to create a heightened romantic atmosphere around our meetings. He doesn't try to impress me by choosing particularly expensive or upmarket restaurants. Instead, he takes me to places that I would never discover myself as a foreign tourist, out-of-the-way places known only to a few locals. He invariably takes charge, ordering both our meals from the menu, because he knows the speciality of each establishment.

He leans towards me and says, ‘I think you will like this dish. They have been doing it here for many years and they do it absolutely perfectly.'

He orders the wine with great care, discussing his choice with the wine waiter in almost conspiratorial fashion, as though they are plotting together to create the perfect dining experience.

Not for a moment do I feel as though I am surrendering my independence by just allowing all this to happen, just to unfold. And I find it hard to describe how much I enjoy the sensation of being led by the hand into unfamiliar territory. It is like being allowed for a few brief moments into another world, like dipping my toe into a culture and lifestyle that I have only ever read about. Yet here I am, sitting very close to my lover in the corner of a restaurant. He touches me often, touches my hand or my cheek or my knee, and we talk and laugh and share a level of intimacy that I find exciting but also a little disturbing. While we are both anticipating our inevitable move from the restaurant to the hotel he has booked, it's the enjoyment of our conversation
that really surprises me. I somehow thought it would be just about sex, but it isn't like that all. It's the whole experience – the meeting, the atmosphere of the places we go to together, the easy banter between us. Part of me knows that it isn't real – this isn't what everyday relationships are based upon – yet part of me relishes every detail of the unreality. It's all a dream, a fantasy, except that it is actually happening and it's happening to me.

The man from Toulouse is amazed that I have never had an affair before. When I ask him about his own sexual history with women other than his wife, he smiles enigmatically. Of course he has had affairs, not that many, but a few over the years. I wonder if I am just naive, playing into the hands of a serial womaniser. Or if I am fortunate to have fallen into a relationship with a man who has the experience to make this brief dalliance even more exciting.

One aspect of our relationship fascinates me. The man from Toulouse treats me as I have never been treated before. He is thoughtful and courteous in a way that I can only describe as old-fashioned. As a liberated woman of the Sixties, I am astounded at the way in which our affair is conducted. He always designates a meeting place and is waiting for me when I arrive. I never have to wait even a moment for him. He is there, smiling and welcoming. He takes care of all the logistics with the minimum of fuss. Accounts are paid and taxis are ordered and I am barely aware of it. When the time comes for me to leave, to catch the train from Toulouse back home, he takes me to the station in a taxi and makes sure I am safely where I need to be. His attitude is both solicitous and protective and I find it most appealing.

Tingling from head to toe, I sit on the train in the late afternoon, on the way back to Cahors, wondering if it is all a
dream. Can this really be
me
having an affair? It's not the sort of thing I do. I have never even contemplated it. Yet here I am swept up in the intensity of a new relationship and loving every moment of it.

As the time grows near for me to leave France and return to Australia I have several earnest conversations with the man from Toulouse about our painful situation. We both know that the time is fast approaching for us to reach some resolution about our relationship but we put it off until the last possible moment – until our last day together, our last lunch.

Guilt has never entered into my feelings about what has happened. I don't feel guilty about his wife or my husband, although I do feel extremely nervous at the prospect of either of them discovering the affair. What worries me is the inevitable distress that such a revelation would cause, not just to our respective spouses but to our wider families – to our children in particular.

From the outset we both felt strongly that we were not entering into this relationship as a way of escaping from our marriages. He is very much a family man with a strong sense of his own identity and his place in the world. Likewise, my commitment to
my family is unshakable, and I also feel very much an Australian woman in every sense. While I love France and want to spend part of each year living there, I certainly can't imagine abandoning my husband and my home, my family and my country to take up a new relationship on the other side of the world.

For us both there has been a clear understanding from the start of what this was to be – an affair, nothing more. An interlude of heart and mind, a brief encounter. Not permanent, not damaging or negative.

Of course nothing is ever that simple. You can't take a relationship and define it in such limiting terms. You can't use terminology to categorise what passes between a man and a woman, because it has to do with feelings and chemistry, reactions and emotions. The truth is that the ‘affair' is more heartfelt than either of us anticipated when we first recklessly embarked on it. We care more for each other than we ever intended and so keeping a lid on the situation is extremely difficult. I want to be cool about it, matter-of-fact and casual. So does he. I don't want to phone him when we are apart and he doesn't want to phone me. But we do. It is an irresistible attraction, a sort of madness that feels as if it will never go away. Intellectually, we are in total agreement about what the future holds for us – absolutely nothing. Yet we both feel shattered.

Nevertheless we end it. We say ‘no more' and terminate the relationship. I pack my bags, hand my house keys to Jan and with a heavy heart catch the train from Gourdon to Paris to connect with my homeward flight to David in Australia. At the airport I bolster myself with several strong gins – not a good choice, as it is famous for causing melancholy. Sitting in the bar, feeling lost and strangely disembodied, I very nearly miss
the plane because I am so engrossed in my own sad feelings. After take-off I have another drink and swallow a sleeping pill. I tend not to sleep well on planes but, remarkably, I fall into a deep coma that lasts more than eight hours. Nervous and emotional exhaustion (not to mention alcohol and pills) totally wipes me out yet, when I wake up, having missed both dinner and breakfast, I feel curiously light and happy. I can't understand why I feel so good, but my sadness has lifted and I am left with a sense of relief that the tension is finally over. Even though the relationship lasted only for a few short weeks, I must have been coiled up like a spring for the entire time. Now that it has ended I come back to earth and feel grounded and focused.