Authors: Grace Wynne-Jones
‘And what does that do?’ she asks.
‘It’s uplifting and balancing.’
Susan looks at the incense holder and the postcard of
Buddha. ‘Are you a Buddhist?’ she asks going into the kitchen to help him bring out the tray.
‘Sort of,’ says Charlie.
‘The same as me,’ Susan smiles.
Once everyone is seated I get a grilling. I’m feeling very
sheepish because I haven’t had an outburst like this in years.
Quiet desperation is more my sort of thing.
‘How do you know Bruce is having an affair?’ asks Susan.
‘Because he kept giving her funny looks at dinner – and
they were kissing in the kitchen.’
‘Did you see them?’ asks Charlie.
‘No, but Cait’s lipstick was smudged when she came back
with the cloth.’
‘The cloth – what cloth?’ asks Susan. And then I have to
go into detail.
‘So you’re not absolutely sure?’ says Charlie after two
fennel teas, four oatmeal cookies and a Bewley’s bun.
‘No – I suppose I’m not – it’s just a feeling.’ I’m looking out
the window into the rambling garden where Rosie is snuffling
around her large fenced pen. ‘I’m sorry to have made such a
fuss, but I do feel better,’ I add. ‘It’s been sort of building up
inside. It’s not just Bruce, it’s other things too.’
‘What other things?’ asks Susan. ‘Go on Jasmine, you know
you can tell us.’
‘Well, I’m not sure I can really,’ I say pulling at a tassel on
one of Charlie’s Indian cushions. ‘A lot of it’s hard to put into words.’
‘Go on,’ says Susan whose persistence earned her every Girl
Guide badge known to man. ‘Just give us some examples.’
And then, because truth along with ylang-ylang, geranium
and now pine incense pervade the room, I tell them about
Mell Nichols.
‘So you see it’s all rather pathetic really.’ I laugh feebly
when I’ve given them the details about my ten-year passion,
apart from the fantasies about wild sex in stalled lifts. ‘I
looked into his eyes for just a moment, and then he turned
back to the reception desk in a bored sort of way. That was
the extent of it.’
‘So you now realise you and Mell may never be an item.’
Charlie is smiling at me kindly.
‘I always knew that but I wish it hadn’t been rubbed in.’
I’m smiling a bit myself now.
‘Everyone has fantasies, Jasmine.’ Susan is leaning forward
earnestly. ‘I, for example, keep having these incredibly vivid
dreams about Daniel Day-Lewis.’
‘Really?’ This is cheering news.
‘Yes. I find myself with him in this huge country house and
I’m sure he’s going to seduce me, only it turns out he thinks
I’m there to French polish the mahogany dining table.’
‘The mahogany dining table…’ repeats Charlie, eyebrows
raised.
‘Yes. It’s not very satisfactory.’
‘I’m tired of dreaming.’ I’m stroking Charlie’s cat, Satchmo.
‘I’m tired of having to drift off into some place in my head
every time I want to feel happy – every time I want to feel
loved. It just doesn’t seem right somehow.’
Charlie pats my arm as he gets up and goes to the window.
He stands there, shoulders squared. ‘She’s my role model’ –
he’s pointing to the garden.
‘Who?’ Susan asks.
‘Rosie.’
‘Come off it, Charlie.’ I go over and stand beside him.
Rosie’s scratching her right buttock against the fence – a look of deep contentment on her face.
‘See what I mean?’ Charlie smiles. ‘No inner angst there.
Rosie just goes with the flow, and she’s never even been into
Waterstones.’ He’s teasing me about all my self-improving
books.
As he turns towards me he knocks over his saxophone
which has been propped up by the curtain. He picks it up
to put it somewhere else, only Susan says, ‘I didn’t know you
were a musician.’
‘He was in a jazz band for years – weren’t you Charlie?’ I say. ‘Go on – give us a tune.’
After fiddling about a bit, Charlie raises the saxophone
to his lips. And when the notes come out they fill the big
sunbeamed room with a bruised kind of happiness and a
sweet kind of sorrow.
‘That’s lovely, Charlie,’ I say as he looks over. ‘It really is.’
I glance at Susan, who’s looking at Charlie in a way I’ve
never seen her looking at anyone before.
Then I gaze out the window at Rosie, who pauses from her scratching to look at him with a similar intensity.
‘Huh – hullo – is that
– that you, Jasmine?’
Bruce is on the phone. From the rasping, broken noises he’s making I can tell he’s given up on words and is trying sound effects. He wants me to know that he’s in agony and I must return. He also wants to know how to make shepherd’s pie. He asks me this, I presume, to let me know that if I don’t return soon he will learn how to live without me. That he’s taking methodical steps in this direction and may soon even know how to put on the duvet cover alone.
‘How much mince do you need for two?’ he demands after I’ve wearily given him the instructions.
‘I dunno – two pounds I guess – and make sure it’s premium. The other can be fatty.’
‘I’m having Eamon round, that’s all.’
‘How nice.’
Bruce pauses for a moment to prepare his party piece.
‘Everyone’s talking.’
‘About what?’
‘About you moving in with Charlie.’
‘It’s not like that. He offered me a place to stay, that’s all.’
‘But you don’t need a place to stay, Jasmine – you have your own home – here – with me.’
‘And Cait Carmody.’
‘Oh, come on, Jasmine – that’s all over now.’
‘Have you any idea what it felt like – finding her fake diamond hair grip in our bed?’
‘I know. I’m sorry.’
‘There I was, off at my adult literacy conference hoping
you were managing alone, and…’
‘Jasmine – we need to talk.’
‘No we don’t.’
‘Of course we do. Katie’s very upset.’
‘No she isn’t. Not very. I spoke with her yesterday.’
‘Oh.’
‘Look Bruce, I’m taking a break, okay? Other people take
holidays from work – well, I’m taking a holiday from my
marriage. I may come back or I may not. Now fuck off and
leave me alone for a while.’
Then I slam down the phone.
A rather nice recent development is that I’ve become quite
rude. Up until now other people’s rudeness always seemed like something I had to deflect, not counter. I used to
think this was because I am a mild, sensitive person who desperately seeks approval. Now I see that anger spits and
crackles inside me like a venomous volcano and could engulf
entire continents.
Deep down I must have always known it was there. After
all I regularly practised the art of telephone invective during
my years as a purchaser of household goods – fulminating
about flexes and fibres – berating anonymous individuals
about the indecipherability of manuals and delayed deliv
eries. And now Bruce is getting a long overdue blast.
At least it’s good that he’s acting contrite because, in my experience, guilt turns some people nasty. My first great love, Jamie, for example, was a total sod after he dumped me. The whole thing almost made me jump under a train at the time and now I can hardly remember what he looked like.
Though I feel angry and hurt with Bruce I don’t think I
could summon enough outrage to cut the sleeves off all his
suits or pour paint over his new Volvo. Of course newspaper
exclusives and chat shows might be quite lucrative but a
career as a distraught wife, though in some ways satisfying,
isn’t quite what I’m after.
The thing is I don’t feel that surprised. Bruce and I have
been leading fairly separate lives for quite a while, especially
sin
c
e Katie left for college. And then of course I myself have
been having wild sex with Mell Nichols for many years. It’s
more a dull ache than a sharp pain really – and Charlie’s been
just great. He listens to me until my jaw aches and makes big
log fires I can stare into. I wish he’d go out with Susan. He and Susan would really hit it off.
I still can’t believe I actually did it – actually got up and left Bruce and my home.
It’s my home I miss. I long with a passion for my walnut
cabinet where I put my most precious things. Katie’s first
mittens and her tooth fairy teeth are in there. So is the painted stone, and the birthday card she made when she
was five. It has a drawing of a cake with candles on the front
and says: ‘Hapy burtday Mumy from yor dawter Kate.’ She
was a rather precise child. The card was made with great
care. She’d ruled lines in pencil to make the words straight
and then tried to rub the lines out, only some of the words got rubbed out too. You can tell which words she had to go
over because they’re darker and bits of the rubbed out ones
still show through.
I also miss my Dad’s chair, the teapot I decorated with
rosebuds at ceramics class, my special mug, my hot-water
bottle and…well…I suppose everything really. I’ve
always had a rather over-developed sense of nostalgia. It’s even provoked comment on occasion – most recently from
one of Bruce’s guests.
‘You’re obviously a woman of eclectic tastes, Jasmine,’
he said.
‘Really?’ I replied as I tried to remember the difference
between eclectic and esoteric and hoped he wasn’t going to
say something rude about my
boeuf bourguignon.
I’d just
cooked him dinner.
We were in the sitting-room and Bruce was in the loo.
Since he’d furtively grabbed a copy of the
Radio Times
on
his exit, I knew his return was not imminent.