There was a silence. “No,” James said at last. “Of course it isn’t.”
“Okay. Just checking. Bye now.”
The ice packs Lizzie used on her eyes hadn’t been very effective, so now she was keeping her eyes strictly down, making a detailed study of everybody’s footwear. She hadn’t realized how popular woven-heel wedge sandals were becoming.
At last the door of the village hall opened. Lizzie shuffled into the room at the back of the crowd.
“Mrs. Buckley?”
Lizzie saw a pair of brown suede slip-ons stop in front of her. She looked up cautiously. Mrs. Kirker, the nursery school director, was standing before her, eyebrows raised, mouth pursed.
“Mrs. Buckley, I’d like to have a word, if I may. About some, ah, issues that have cropped up.”
“Issues?”
“I’ve asked Mrs. Shay to settle Alex and Ellie at a table and keep them occupied just for a moment.”
“Oh. Right. Fine.”
“So if you wouldn’t mind?”
If she wouldn’t mind.
Lizzie followed Mrs. Kirker toward a tiny table and chairs, her back burning as she imagined the other mothers watching and speculating.
Mrs. Kirker lowered herself onto one of the child-sized chairs and indicated that Lizzie should do the same. Lizzie sat down gingerly. She was beyond caring about personal comfort, given that she was sleeping on a deflating blow-up mattress every night, but she didn’t like the mental image of herself with her knees so close to her chin.
As she arranged her legs, she was struck by a sudden unpleasant thought: since there wasn’t going to be a reconciliation with James after all, she was really going to have to buy some beds.
She wondered briefly what sort of bed James would buy when he moved into the house in Chipping Norton. She hoped he’d have the decency not to opt for a king- sized mattress. She hoped the house was a narrow one with a steep stairway that simply wouldn’t
let in
a king-sized mattress.
“Mrs. Buckley?”
“Hmmm?” Lizzie jumped guiltily to find the canny brown eyes of the nursery school director fixed on her in intense speculation.
“So do you have any suggestions?”
Belatedly, Lizzie realized that she’d missed something vital. Possibly she’d missed an entire conversation. She swallowed nervously. “Aaaah . . . could you run that by me again? Sorry. Bit preoccupied.”
Mrs. Kirker’s eyes narrowed. Lizzie had no doubt at all that she was taking the measure of her, from her unkempt head to her shabby moccasins. She was probably cataloging all the signs of imminent breakdown — red eyes, ragged fingernails, holey jeans, unstyled hair showing mousey roots, smudged mascara, shiny forehead, small fat roll just visible above waistband — and making a mental note to phone Social Services.
“I was talking about Alex’s behavior. Not to say that Ellie doesn’t have issues all of her own. But Alex is the one displaying the most overt aggression.”
“Aggression?” Startled, Lizzie glanced across the room to the low table where the twins were busily creating play dough shapes. Mrs. Shay, doubled up in her own tiny chair beside them, gave her a wave and a thumbs-up signal. Lizzie smiled back weakly.
“Dis is dog pooh,” Alex happened to say in a carrying tone just at that moment.
“Yes, it’s the biting mainly,” Mrs. Kirker explained in that stagily hushed voice she’d been using all along. “Unfortunately, while we can make sure there are no sticks or pretend guns in the classroom, we can’t take away a child’s teeth.”
Lizzie’s eyes widened as an image of a toothless Alex sprang to mind. “Of course you can’t,” she said with a small laugh. But Mrs. Kirker didn’t look particularly jokey.
Lizzie was aware that Alex occasionally sank his choppers into another child, but didn’t all children bite now and then?
“Many children display some sort of biting behavior between the ages of about nine months and two,” Mrs. Kirker declared, as if she had vast personal experience of this fascinating phenomenon. Which, very possibly, she did. “It’s nothing to get excited about. Generally, biters are just experimenting. They’re not purposely trying to hurt other children.”
Lizzie nodded vigorously. “That’s what I’ve read,” she said. “He’ll grow out of it any minute now.”
Mrs. Kirker frowned. “We-ell, in Alex’s case I think we’re running into quite different territory.”
Lizzie’s head froze midnod.
“Different territory?”
“That’s right. After all, he’s well over three now. I think he’s perfectly aware, at this stage, that when he bites another child he’s inflicting pain. Let’s face it, Mrs. Buckley, he’s using his teeth as a
weapon
.”
Lizzie burst into a guffaw and then covered her mouth hastily. “A weapon? Are you saying Alex is
armed and dangerous
?”
Mrs. Kirker eyed her coldly. “You may choose to make a joke of it, Mrs. Buckley, but here at Chipstead we’ve noticed some rather disturbing tendencies, not only in Alex but also in Ellie.”
“What? Don’t tell me Ellie’s savaging people too?” Ellie had never bitten anyone in her life, Lizzie could safely say, but what if she was pulling ponytails or giving children Chinese bangles?
“No, Eleanor is not an aggressive child, as I’m sure you know. But she is capable of passive aggression. Pretending not to hear when a teacher talks to her; using most of a toilet roll when she goes to the loo and then not flushing; refusing to follow simple class rules like putting away the toys once she’s finished with them — that sort of thing.”
Wearing pajamas to school, Lizzie could have added. Squishing Rich Tea biscuits into the floor with her trainers at snack time. Mimicking whatever anyone said to her in a singsong voice.
Personally, Lizzie wouldn’t have classified this sort of silliness as “passive aggression.” Ellie was just going through a bit of a maddening stage, that was all. She was a lovely child at heart. So was Alex, for that matter.
Lizzie began to feel jittery and flushed. She was overcome with an urge to shove Mrs. Kirker off the tiny chair. Oh God! That was where the children got it from — their mother!
She took a deep breath.
She burned to give Mrs. Kirker a tongue-lashing about her inability to deal with minor discipline issues in the classroom. But Mrs. Kirker was a nursery school director. Clearly she outranked Lizzie.
“Sorry they’re causing trouble,” she mumbled. “Ellie’s just showing off, you know. I’ll talk to them both.”
Mrs. Kirker put out a hand and patted Lizzie kindly on the shoulder. “I didn’t tell you all this to upset you, Mrs. Buckley. But I was just wondering — is everything all right at home? You see, children often start playing up when they’re stressed about things beyond their control — a death in the family, a big move, any sort of upheaval.”
Lizzie was too tired to break down in tears. She just nodded and began to bite her cuticles.
“So — there is something?” Mrs. Kirker asked gently.
Lizzie took a finger out of her mouth to mutter, “Their daddy’s gone.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Their father. My husband. He’s not with us anymore.”
“Oh my! I had no idea. Oh, you poor thing. If you can bear to talk about it — when did he pass away?”
Lizzie broke into a high laugh, quickly suppressed when she saw the look on Mrs. Kirker’s face. “No, I don’t mean that,” she explained hurriedly. “I don’t mean he’s dead. He’s just not with us anymore. He’s with his parents in Gloucestershire. We’re here.”
Mrs. Kirker frowned. “Aah. I see. A separation. You had some serious issues in your marriage, I take it?”
“Yes, well. You know. This and that.”
Mrs. Kirker glanced quickly over at the children, who were now dumping puzzles out on the floor. She lowered her voice. “This is trespassing a little, so don’t feel you have to answer. But — was there any violence in the marriage? Was he — hitting you at all?”
“Good God! No!” Lizzie stood up, her sense of outrage finally overcoming her inborn deference for figures of authority.
Mrs. Kirker jumped up too. “Oh, my dear. I’m sorry. I can see I’ve offended you. I do get carried away sometimes. Please forgive the intrusion. But honestly, you’d be surprised — you’d be
astonished
— how often I come across domestic abuse in families that you’d think were
quite
above all that. I was just checking, that’s all.”
Lizzie’s chin wobbled. “My husband is a lovely man,” she said. “He doesn’t
hit
people. We’re not a family of . . . of
thugs
.”
“Of course not,” cried Mrs. Kirker.
But Lizzie was already limping off as fast as she could. Unfortunately, her left foot had gone to sleep during her session in the miniature chair. Mrs. Kirker scurried after her, tutting her distress.
“Come on, you lot, let’s tidy up Mrs. Kirker’s room,” Lizzie ordered her children.
Something steely in her voice must have penetrated their three-year-old brains because, to their eternal credit, Ellie and Alex both leaped to attention and began shoving puzzles back into boxes. Lizzie tried to maintain a dignified posture while scraping blobs of play dough off the floor.
“Oh, please don’t worry about clearing up,” Mrs. Shay begged.
“Really. Leave it to us,” Mrs. Kirker chimed in. “You have enough on your hands.”
But Lizzie wasn’t content until every last puzzle piece was in its box and every last toy and book was on a shelf. Then she hissed at the twins to say thank you and good-bye. She might look like a battered wife but she’d show the old cows that she expected impeccable manners from her children. She was sure the two women couldn’t wait for her to be gone so they could put the kettle on, wheel out the real chairs, and start thrashing out her wretched case.
She drove home in a silence so earsplitting that even Alex noticed. As they bounced up the lane, she sped straight past the cottage and on to the barn.
Ingrid Hatter came to the door with a surprised look. “Lizzie? How lovely to see you.”
“Ingrid, I’m terribly sorry, but can you take the children for about half an hour?”
“Of course I can. Is it an emergency?” Ingrid’s eyes lit up with curiosity.
“Yes. I need to go running.”
Lizzie loped down the muddy lane in her shiny white new shoes until she reckoned she was out of earshot of the barn. Then she began to sprint. As she picked up speed, she did what she’d been longing to do since the phone call with James that morning. She let rip with a bloodcurdling, spine-chilling, ear-piercing scream.
It was a short-lived scream because she didn’t have enough breath to make it last. But she kept on running as fast as her quivering legs would carry her over the rough terrain of the lane.
Strangely exhilarating to hear the wind in her ears, to see the mud flying away beneath her feet, to feel her heart working so hard. She was so powerful, so fleet of foot, so — crikey, she was airborne.
Lizzie picked herself up out of a puddle and checked for injuries. Nothing major, but her shoes might never be white again.
She started to run again, darting off right at the cornfield along the footpath used by hikers and dog walkers. Naturally, she couldn’t sustain the sprint for very long. Soon she was hobbling along at a pace barely faster than a walk, with a flame of pain flickering up each shin — but still she was running. Every time she came to a downhill slope she broke into a faster lollop, determined to flee all the frustrations and mortifications of the day.
After about fifteen minutes of noble endeavor, Lizzie’s hard-driven body began to assert itself. Stop, it said loudly. Stop this minute. Stop or I’m going to seize up right here, right now, in the middle of the footpath.
She stopped and sat down on a large rough rock. Her mud-splattered legs were shaking and her heart was thumping so hard someone might as well have been playing bongo drums inside her chest. There was sweat on her face, sweat trickling down between her breasts, sweat making her hands too slippery to clasp together.
Gosh. It felt pretty good.
Her exhilaration didn’t last long, though. As she cooled down, the sweat began to make her shiver, and after a while she noticed that tears were dripping from her chin.
She must have sat on that rock for at least twenty minutes, breathing in, breathing out, letting the tears slide down her face, gazing vacantly across the green and friendly landscape.
I want this divorce at least as much as you do
. The words had shaped themselves into a slightly sinister chant by now and eventually they drove her to her feet.
She tried to run again, but she was soon reduced to a hobble. Every now and then she attempted a slow jog, but her body was having none of it. Her body had suffered more than enough insult and injury for one day, and it was as much as she could do to force her jellified legs to take all the necessary steps to get her to Ingrid’s barn.
When Ingrid opened the door and took in her red, tear-streaked face and swollen eyes, for once she asked not a single question.
That evening, while the children ate their spaghetti and cheese in front of a
Kipper
video, Lizzie plugged in the phone and made a call.
When Tessa answered with a cheery “hello,” Lizzie’s throat suddenly constricted and she couldn’t speak. After a moment or two of strangled noises, Tessa said, “Listen, mate, if this is a crank call, you can just . . .”
“Tessa,” Lizzie managed at last. “It’s me. Don’t hang up.”
“Lizzie? Oh God, what’s the matter?”
“It’s — it’s James.” She broke into hoarse sobs.
“James? What — an accident?”
“Oh. No. Nothing — nothing like that. It’s just — he phoned me today. Tessa, he’s not bluffing. He’s not teaching me a lesson. He’s dead serious. He thinks we’re finished and done for. He’s asked me to get a lawyer. He wants to get shot of me as qui-quickly as possible.”
For a moment Tessa herself was speechless, but then she rallied. “Lizzie? Look, just calm down for a second. Take a few deep breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth. That’s right. Now, this sounds bad, but you don’t want to overreact. Remember, a man’s pride is his vulnerable underbelly — and you pretty much
walloped
him there with that e-mail of yours. It’s going to take him a while to recover. He wants to strike back at you, of course he does. But don’t give up on him just yet. It’s not over till it’s over. What have I been saying to you all along? You’ve got to pull yourself together and make a concerted effort to, you know, win him back.”