Something Might Happen (17 page)

No. I don’t think so, no.

He smiles at me.

And Natasha? I say.

What about Natasha?

Does she like that, too?

His face when he looks at me is unchanged.

She does, I suppose, yes.

I look down at my drink.

I don’t live with Natasha, he says.

Oh, I say. You don’t?

No.

The windowpane has turned black and outside in the street there are noises now—evening noises that I suppose I must be used
to because I hear them all the time. Except not normally from up here.

I hear the heavy, clanking sound of the security grille of the Amber Shop. A lorry backing up. A child’s shrill complaint,
wanting something. A lone bicycle bell. Ding ding.

I don’t think of my own children. I’ve never been so far from them. For now, they’re little specks, they’re nothing, they
don’t exist. If I ever wanted to shock myself, this would be the moment and this would be the way.

Tell me something, he says as he leans over to pour me the rest of the vodka. Why did you run away from me?

I make an effort to sit up on the chair, cross my legs the other way.

What? I say.

The other day. In the street. You ran away.

Did I?

Yes. You know you did.

I put down my glass and knit my fingers together and sigh.

I did, I agree, yes, I’m sorry.

No need to be sorry.

Well, I am.

Why?

Because it was rude—

No. Why did you do it?

I think about this.

Oh, well, I was scared, I tell him at last.

He looks at me closely, as if it can’t be true.

Really?

Yes. I think so.

What, scared of me?

No, I say, struggling to get it right, not of you, just—well—I didn’t know what was going to happen.

In what way happen?

I glance up and my heart bumps. I can’t say it.

I can’t say it, I whisper.

He is sitting on the edge of the bed and he reaches out and touches my hand, the one that is on the table, the one without
the glass. Just touches it. The touch—warm, terrifying—makes me breathless. I don’t look at him. My heart flips over.

And do you know now? he says.

Know what?

Do you know—what’s going to happen?

No, I say. Leaving my hand there, looking at it. No? You don’t know?

I take a breath and look at the window again. Shut my eyes. I daren’t even think about it, I say.

The moments pass. Nothing happens. I take my hand back and put it in my lap. Safe.

Why did you do that? I ask him.

Oh Tess, he says, don’t ask me that—

He leans forward from where he sits on the bed, but he doesn’t touch me.

Tess, he says.

Yes?

You came to see me, he says.

I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry. I didn’t think, I just did it without even thinking—

But I love that! he says. The way you just do things—so frank. I mean it. That’s what I liked about you from the start.

I’m not frank, I tell him, looking at him now. I’m not being frank with Mick. I’m only frank when it suits me to be.

You’re lovely, Lacey says quietly.

I close my eyes.

I shouldn’t be sitting here, I tell him.

It’s easy to say that.

Is it?

You’re lovely, he says again.

Well, I tell him, it’s easy to say that too—

Not for me.

It’s wonderful that you think it—I mean, it’s exactly what I want you to think—but I also think I’m misleading you.

Oh? he says.

I mean, I don’t really want anything to—happen.

You don’t?

He is looking at my face all the time.

I’m sorry, I tell him, I really shouldn’t have come. You see, it’s—I’m waiting.

Waiting?

To get used to you. For this to wear off.

For what to wear off?

This thing—this—

He smiles, waits.

This pull, I say.

He sits back and gives me a long look.

Do you feel it, too? I ask him.

Yes, he says, I feel it.

I just want to be your friend, I tell him and he smiles again even more.

Me too, he says.

This feeling. It will pass. I know it will. In the end you’ll just seem ordinary to me.

Oh, he says, sounding disappointed. Will I?

Yes, eventually.

He seems to consider this.

But, hey, look, what if I don’t?

No, I tell him firmly, that’s why I’m here, if you want to know. To make it happen—

It?

Make me used to you—

But, he says, not laughing now, how do you know, Tess, that it works like that?

I just know.

You know a lot of things.

Yes, I agree, I do. I told you I did. But please don’t touch me.

He lies back on the bed with his drink. He does exactly as I ask, I’ll give him that. He doesn’t touch me or come
near. But he might as well not bother to do this distance-keeping. Because the truth is he has found a place in me that no
one else has ever discovered—not Alex, not Mick—and he’s there right now and it makes me go absolutely still and calm, hypnotised.

I don’t tell him this.

Talk to me, he says. He is a little drunk. So am I. The room has become both larger and smaller, our place in it more tilted
and strange. Amazing how drink stops you minding about things.

I ask him if he likes his work. He hesitates.

I keep on telling myself I’ll stop, he says, that this will be the last one. Then something else comes up—and I worry about
why I’m doing it.

What do you mean worry?

Well, each new case, the details of it, the people, it takes a piece of you. You get sucked into people’s lives—

Is that bad?

Not bad exactly, but taxing. Difficult.

He looks at me and smiles, such a warm smile.

I told you before—you get too involved. It can be sort of—hard to resist.

Because you’re good at it?

No, he says, because it’s too interesting, too exciting. Whether you want it to or not it gives you a buzz.

He looks at me.

Yes, even something like this, he says. Does that shock you?

No, I reply, wondering whether I mean it.

It should, you know—it’s not a good thing. You get habituated. That’s not healthy.

I shrug and the room tips a little.

Lots of things aren’t healthy, I tell him.

Your job is, he says. The job you do is healthy.

I try to think about my job, but in my head it dwindles and slips away from me.

It’s all I can do. I’ve never thought about it like that.

Yes, but do you like it? Does it give you a buzz?

I laugh.

I can cure babies of colic and make them sleep all night. I can make old people walk more comfortably. I can take pain away.

He stares at me.

That’s wonderful. It’s just what I would expect you to be able to do.

Would you? I ask him.

Yes, he says. You’re an angel. I thought that from the start. There’s something boundlessly good and true about you.

I laugh.

Boundlessly good and true? I like that!

No, he says and his face is suddenly serious, there is. I mean it. I wouldn’t say it otherwise.

In the end I begin to cry.

What? he says. What is it?

Nothing, I tell him. Just—I may be drunk.

He gets up and moves over to me. It only seems to take a second, too little time to stop him.

It’s your fault, I tell him.

What is?

All of it.

His hands are on me, on my shoulders, but I pull back.

Tell me, he says. What’s made you cry?

I ought to go, I tell him and I put down my glass and reach for my coat. He looks at me.

You know something? he says.

What?

No. Forget it. I was going to say a bad thing.

Don’t, I tell him, suddenly wanting more than anything for him to say it.

OK, I won’t. But look, tell me something. Is it working?

Is what working?

This thing of ours—is it wearing off?

I glance at his face.

I don’t know, I say as I pull on my coat. It may take a little while.

He says nothing. He just lies back on the bed and smiles.

Will I see you again? he says, and when I don’t answer he doesn’t look at all surprised, just goes on smiling.

I can’t lie to Mick. I tell him half of the truth. A version anyway. That I ran into Lacey and had a drink with him. That’s
where I’ve been. Yes, really. All of this time.

A drink?

Well, two.

He stares at me blankly from the sofa where Livvy is lying, cranky and fidgety, across his lap.

But what about the exhibition?

Oh, I say as casually as I can, they had enough people. More than enough. They were fine.

He stays looking at me and saying nothing.

What? I say.

More than two drinks, he says.

No, I chuck my coat at the chair but I miss and it slithers off onto the floor. I pick it up again. It’s just—I’m not used
to it.

It’s true. I haven’t drunk properly since Liv was born.

He says nothing. He looks at the TV, then back at me.

This baby’s very hungry, he says at last.

I know, I tell him because my breasts are bursting.

You think you should feed her when you’ve been drinking?

I shut my eyes.

I have to—now. But OK maybe we should start trying her on formula.

He makes a face of surprise.

I thought you wanted to carry on as long as possible?

I do.

Well, then.

He stands up, hands her to me. Livvy’s eyes gleam at the sight of my face.

My head aches. As she gasps and closes her mouth over my nipple, fixing me with her hot black eyes, Mick goes to the kitchen
and returns with a glass of water. Passes it to me. In silence.

Thanks.

I put my finger into Livvy’s small, proffered fist. She releases the nipple a second to register pleasure, takes a quick breath,
latches on again. How could I be late for this child?

Mick sits down in the armchair, watches the TV, then watches me. Eventually he flicks the TV off.

So. What did you talk about? he says. I feel a rush of sympathy for him.

What? With Lacey?

Of course with Lacey.

Not a lot.

Come on, Tess—

Oh, you know, all sorts of things, I tell him vaguely.

It’s nearly the truth. When I think back, there are no words I can grasp.

Stuff about his work, I tell Mick.

Fair enough, he says, and what are you doing now?

I’ll feed Liv and maybe watch the telly a bit, I say. And then go to bed.

Fine, he says and gets up.

Where are you going?

Bed. I’m skipping the TV part. I’ve done that. Turn off the kitchen light before you come upstairs, he says.

I change Liv and put a clean sleepsuit on her and lay her gently in her cot. I wind up her mobile, the one that takes a full
seven minutes to run down.

Normally this would send her off, but tonight she barely
needs it, she’s ready to sleep. Maybe it’s because she had a chance to get properly hungry, because I wasn’t on tap for once.

Anyway her eyes flutter open briefly and then shut again. Her thumb is jammed in her mouth, the cuff of her sleepsuit pulled
up over it, her fat cheek moving furiously as she sucks. If we’re lucky, she might not wake now for a whole six hours.

In the bedroom, Mick looks asleep, the duvet pulled up right over his head and only the top of his black hair poking out.

I take off all my clothes then go to the drawer on the landing and pull out the boned and buttoned and strappy thing in violet
lace that Mick bought for me before I got pregnant with Liv, in the days when I still had a body and knew what to do with
it. A piece of underwear, I don’t remember what you call them—half alive it seems now as I turn it over and around in the
thick, drunk half-light and try to remember how it goes on.

Hooks and eyes, maybe twenty pairs of them. You do them up in front of you and then when they’re done, you twist the whole
thing round. I hold my breath, feel the lace rub on my skin. Then push my two breasts, tired and empty of milk now, into the
funny, strapless cups.

I try not to look in the mirror. Instead I go back in the bedroom and sit on Mick. He makes a small sleeping noise and then
he half wakes up.

What? he says. Tess, for fuck’s sake, what’re you doing?

I turn off the light, kiss him as if I mean it.

Sex.

What?

I thought we could do it.

I think at first that he’s going to resist but then I feel it—him moving under me—and I think how I’d forgotten how easy it
all is. So easy if you just don’t think about it first. He touches the tops of my breasts, the place where the flesh is crammed
in and jiggly. Then he slows and hesitates.

No, he says.

What?

You’re drunk.

I’m not.

I know you are.

Not any more.

OK. Then come here, come and kiss me first.

I tell him I don’t want that, I just want to do it.

He lets his hands fall back on the bed.

I want you to be aroused, he says.

I am—I am aroused.

He sighs and puts a hand between my legs.

Wet me, I tell him. Go on—do it. Spit on your fingers.

But he doesn’t. Instead he kisses me—a small, snappy kiss on the inside of my arm. It’s not enough.

I bend my mouth to his ear, smell the warm sleep and skin smell of it.

Hit me, I suggest in a whisper. Hit me if you want.

He touches my mouth.

No, he says, in a voice thick with the beginnings of desire, I don’t want.

I want you to do things, I tell him.

Come here, he says. Let me get you wet properly.

No.

I want you to enjoy it too, he says again, moving his fingers over my thighs, trying to put his tongue on any part of me he
can reach.

Fed up of trying, I sit and put my hands on his bare chest and I wriggle on him and try to stuff him into me. But it won’t
go, it just bends, only half stiff. He pulls me off at last and sits up.