The Trouble with Single Women Page 8

  ‘Are you happy, Fee?’ Bill would occasionally ask.

  ‘Of course I am,’ she’d reply. It was true. She was happy in these particular circumstances. ‘That’s all right then,’ Bill would reply, apparently reassured.

  Then, one night, he’d come back from his advanced photography evening class, begun five months earlier, and asked his by now customary question.

  ‘Are you happy, Fee?’

  She was about to give her usual response when Bill cut in, a muscle in his cheek twitching hard.

  ‘Only I’m not.’

  It was only then that she could afford to admit that what she’d been experiencing hadn’t, after all, been a muted kind of contentment. It had been sheer bloody boredom.

  Fee closed the photo album and shoved it under some cushions. Bill was now married to Erica, the woman who had taught him photography. Erica already had twins from a previous marriage and, within months, had become pregnant with Bill’s child. She gave up her part-time teaching job and, almost two years on, was now a full-time mother to all her children, including Bill.

  Everyone had said that Fee had been very good about Bill’s behaviour. She was civilized, understanding. They sold the house, split the contents.

  ‘I hope one day we can be friends,’ he’d said, dutifully.

  ‘Why not?’ Fee had replied cheerily. ‘It’s no more than we’ve ever been—’

  She glanced down and rescued a stray photograph that had slipped out of the album to the floor. It was a hazy head and shoulders of Colin Stevens taken in a booth. Fee couldn’t help but wince.

  About the same time as Bill’s last call, Colin had provided Fee with a new milestone. He marked her recognition that she was in the grip of an accelerating addiction to men who confused love with grievous emotional harm.

  They had met at a fund-raising supper and auction for Childlink, the Third World charity for which Colin worked as Director of Projects. Fee had attended as the guest of a girlfriend who was also employed by the charity.

  ‘I hate these things, don’t you?’ Colin had said, asking if the seat next to Fee’s was free. The following two hours in his company had sped by.

  Colin was thirty-four, unmarried. Almost immediately, he had made the mistake of telling Fee that he was far too involved in his work to have much of a private life.

  ‘But that’s the way I like it, I suppose—’

  ‘You love your work?’ Fee had said, just to make sure that she really had come across yet another member of the wandering tribe of Unattainables. Colin nodded.

  ‘The job involves a lot of travelling. So my time’s not my own. But yes, on the whole I do.’

  Fee moved into heaven. As always, it was only a temporary sublet.

  Over the next six weeks, Colin invited Fee out several times. They chatted, discussed, mildly disagreed at times, and laughed a great deal.

  Colin talked a lot about the importance of integrity and personal honesty. Fee blossomed on a diet of a couple of hours’ sleep each night. The two put the kind of tentative questions to each other that people often do when they hope they share a lot in common and are fearful of discovering that the opposite may be true.

  ‘Thrillers? Well, I’m not so . . . oh, you like them? Me? I love them. I really do—’

  In this exploratory way, they had begun to build up quite an impressive list: Wales, walking, white burgundy, the books of Ross Macdonald . . .

  Just when Fee really knew that something was happening between them, Colin announced that he had to go to the Middle East on a two-week trip. He’d call as soon as he returned.

  On Saturday afternoon, three days later, Colin Stevens was kissing a woman outside W. H. Smith in Victoria Station when Fee bumped into them both.

  ‘How have you been keeping?’ he asked curiously, as if Fee was some sort of semi-putrid fruit.

  Fee had smiled, with only the slightest quiver to her bottom lip. ‘Fine,’ she’d said.

  ‘The trip, it was cancelled. Last minute thing . . . That’s our train,’ Colin had added, increasingly uncomfortable. The two women, unintroduced, smiled faintly at each other, uncertain of their respective positions in the hierarchy of Colin Stevens’s life.

  ‘I’ll give you a ring, OK?’ Colin said, grabbing the woman’s hand.

  Of course, he never had.

  ‘You’d got to him,’ Claire had announced that evening in her flat, pouring Fee a drink.

  ‘You’ve got to him and he can’t afford to let himself be that vulnerable. Men like him need to be in control. What they fear most is opening themselves up—’

  ‘If that’s the case, all he had to do was say so,’ Fee replied. Claire looked at her as if to say, ‘You think it’s that simple . . .?’

  ‘I know he was interested—’ Fee insisted.

  ‘Of course he was. If he wasn’t, he’d still be here,’ Claire replied reassuringly. ‘But the crucial question is, what did you want from him?’

  ‘What do you mean “want”?’

  ‘Want . . . You know . . . WANT . . . Did you drop any hints? Come on too strong? Come on too cool? Did you mention the long term . . . shacking up, marriage, what?’

  ‘God, Claire,’ Fee interrupted. I’d barely got round to learning how many sugars he had in his coffee . . . we’d only known each other five minutes. It just might have been nice to see what would have happened . . .’

  ‘Fee, all you failed to do was examine the subtext,’ Claire snapped in exasperation.

  ‘What do you mean? Subtext?’

  ‘If you have an emotional investment in a man, assume, until proven otherwise, that what he says and how he behaves is no guide to how he feels.’

  ‘So how the hell do you know what’s going on?’ Fee asked.

  ‘You let your instincts pick up on the subtext,’ Claire instructed. ‘If you’re a clear, level-headed, self-confident, self-sufficient woman who knows what’s good for her, then that’s no problem—’

  ‘And if you’re not?’ Fee asked ruefully.

  ‘You’re in trouble,’ Claire announced. ‘Quite a lot of trouble.’

  After Colin, Adam’s adoration offered immediate comfort. Then Fee met Paul and the subtext had grown confused all over again.

  Fee sighed and neatly tore Colin Stevens’s photograph in two. He had been very pretty. Probably too pretty for her. Anyway, from now on, men would only be intervals of light entertainment.

  Never again would Fee see the fear of God pass across a man’s face when she mentioned the word ‘love’, however innocuous the context.

  Enough men had told her in the past that all they desired was ‘something light’, ‘no commitments’; ‘Let’s be friends with a bit of a zip.’

  Mostly her zips, Fee recalled.

  She too was now one of the Unattainable; one of the elusive; one of the ‘I’m-just-hopeless-at-involvement’ types.

  Why should a subtext be only a male perk?

  Fee poured herself a glass of wine and walked out onto her balcony to drink it in the evening sun. A small private treat. A woman who had just declared a state of permanent independence might be feeling excited, elated, hopeful. Instead, she was weary. A sense of emptiness had been with her all day, which at any moment might slide into self-pity. She knew who was to blame. It was all Claire’s fault.

  Fee acknowledged she shouldn’t mind so much about Claire’s impending wedding. But she did. It wasn’t that she was jealous of Claire, certainly not. She was irritated. That’s all it was – irritation.

  A woman caught Fee’s eye in the garden opposite. She was sitting in a deckchair, reading a newspaper. A man appeared and sat on her lap, tickling her as she did so. She laughed and they kissed.

  Fee felt a lump in her throat.

  ‘I am alone but not lonely,’ she told herself firmly. It was true. At least some of the time.

  At 11 p.m. that evening when Fee was watching the late-night news, the phone rang.

  It had to be Paul, Fee told herself.
Relief flooded through her. Everything was bound to be on a different footing now that he knew she couldn’t be pushed around.

  As she reached for the phone, Fee smiled wryly at her own display of instant weakness. ‘What’s it to be, kiddo, self-deception or honest spinsterhood?’ she asked herself.

  The voice was male but it did not belong to Paul.

  Fee smiled resignedly.

  ‘Hello, Will,’ she said.

  ‘Hi, Fee, it’s late I know. I’m really sorry . . . Can I ask a big favour?’ He didn’t stop to hear her reply.

  ‘I’ve run out of petrol. I’m only twenty minutes or so from you but I don’t want to leave the car here because I need it first thing. If you want to say no, I could try and find a garage. One that’s open, that is . . . but it’s late—’

  ‘OK, OK,’ Fee interrupted. ‘I’ll be there as quick as I can—’

  ‘Thanks, Fee.’ The pips began to drown Will’s voice. ‘You’re a real mate.’

  ‘What more could a girl want?’ Fee said as she hunted for her car keys.

  Half an hour later, Fee drove into a cul-de-sac in which several cars were parked. Two figures sitting on a low wall were locked in each other’s arms.

  Fee stopped the car and sat and watched for a matter of seconds. How peculiar. She’d never seen Will kiss anyone before. Not even his ex-wife. Not like that.

  ‘Will,’ Fee hissed, leaning out of her car window.

  She had to call three times, before the name registered. He finally looked up and waved casually, as if she just happened to be passing by.

  He kissed the woman again. She was faintly familiar to Fee. The woman walked away without giving her a glance.

  Five minutes later, as Will poured petrol into his tank from the can Fee had brought, she asked casually, ‘Why isn’t your friend coming back?’

  ‘She lives around the corner. That’s why we’re here,’ Will answered.

  ‘Why couldn’t you stay the night with her then, instead of dragging me out?’ Fee asked.

  ‘I hadn’t seen you for a couple of days. I missed you.’ Will smiled.

  He handed the can back to Fee and wiped his hands on the back of his jeans.

  Then he said, ‘Look, I can’t stay with her. She lives around the corner with her boyfriend. I don’t think he’d be keen to offer me a bed for the night—’

  ‘God, Will, don’t you care about what you do? Don’t you ever have a conscience?’

  ‘No,’ Will replied cheerfully, leaning against his car, his arms folded. He observed Fee’s growing indignation with amusement.

  ‘My view is, if he was making her happy, she wouldn’t feel the need to come to me.’

  ‘That’s not the issue,’ Fee answered, wondering why she felt so angry when it was none of her business.

  ‘What should matter is that you are being deceitful, dishonest, stealing a person who belongs to someone else. I bet you that’s half the thrill for you . . . Well, in my view, that’s just plain nasty . . . Nobody—’

  ‘Whoa, whoa—’ Will said, taking a step back.

  He walked around his car and opened the passenger door, indicating to Fee that she should take a seat.

  ‘Hop in and let Uncle Will hear all about it—’

  Fee contemplated telling him to shove off but, instead, half an hour later, Will had the whole story: her decision, Adam’s proposal, Paul, Claire, the christening, her mother’s reaction . . .

  Will had always been a good listener.

  ‘So, what do you think?’ she asked, turning to him uncertainly.

  ‘Have you told Adam yet that it’s a no?’ Will asked.

  ‘Yes. He’s now saying he never really proposed in the first place.’

  ‘Terrific,’ Will replied.

  ‘Have you told Paul that you’ve signed the pledge?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Ahaa!’ Will examined Fee’s face in the street light and wagged his finger disapprovingly.

  ‘Of course I haven’t. It’s not the sort of thing you say is it? I intend to stay single? I’m a matrimony-free zone?’

  ‘No,’ Will answered, thoughtful now. ‘But you need to make some kind of public statement. For your own good. No turning back, that sort of thing.’

  ‘What? A sort of disengagement party?’ Fee sounded more flip than she felt.

  He smiled. ‘Of course, a greater cynic than me would suggest that you’re having a little game with yourself. Don’t look and, hey presto, the man of your dreams appears.’

  Fee shook her head vigorously. ‘That’s what my mother thinks. But if I’ve learnt anything over the years, it’s that the men of my dreams only give me nightmares. I want to get myself on an even keel. I want to stop wasting so much energy looking for the next great love which turns out to be as flawed as the last one—’

  She hesitated. Even with a friend as close as Will, she was wary of revealing too much.

  ‘Go on,’ Will turned on the engine and the heater.

  ‘One day, when I’ve stopped equating loving with hurting, perhaps I can give it all another go. And if by then there’s no one around who’ll have me, well, at least I’ll know that I can manage alone. And that I can have a reasonably happy life. Does this all sound totally dotty?’ Fee asked anxiously.

  Will shook his head. ‘It’s just a bit of an unexpected blow. I realized that I’d have to wait for you, but I didn’t consider that we were talking years—’

  She swiped him on the back of his head. ‘I knew I shouldn’t have opened my mouth,’ she said.

  The following morning, Will Evans was woken by the phone ringing. It was Hilly Byrne again.

  ‘We’re desperate,’ she began. ‘We—’

  He interrupted her. ‘I think I’ve got the woman you’re looking for. She’s thirty-eight and whole-heartedly single. For now. Her best friend’s getting married and they’re both fairly competitive, so you’d better get a move on—

  ‘About that drink—’ he added.

  ‘Give me her details . . .’ Hilly demanded. ‘Let’s do the personal stuff later . . . if we really have to—’

  Chapter Six

  AT EIGHT thirty in the evening on the same day, Veronica Haslem sat in a chair in the ladies’ lavatory on the fifth floor of Tendon Hospital. The room was chrome and glass. It had three toilets, a changing room for babies and, on one wall, the health trust’s logo and motto were emblazoned in fashionable fuchsia.

  ‘Dedicated to Health,’ read the words. Underneath on the cream wall in orange lipstick, someone had written, ‘But not at weekends and after 5 p.m.’

  Veronica stared at her own reflection. In many ways, she was still waiting to grow up. Ridiculous really. Over fifty, and still waiting to grow up. Veronica felt no age. A no-age woman. Inside, she was no age; but, outside, the evidence told her that she was decaying.

  She didn’t look attractive. That’s very hard when all your life your appearance has been so much a part of how others judge you.

  People still told Veronica that she was ‘a handsome woman for her age’. But she didn’t welcome such consolation prizes. She knew she had become invisible. Men no longer looked at her; not in that way.

  She settled herself more easily and readjusted her feet, propped up on an overturned plastic waste-paper basket. She took the lid off the takeaway cup of coffee. As she sipped, the cappuccino froth dissolved to reveal a disappointing grey liquid.

  Veronica looked again at herself in the mirror and frowned. If looks can kill – how come it never worked on her? Suicide by glancing?

  She opened her duffel bag. Black leather, one of her daughter’s rejects. Once a high-fashion item, Samantha had now classed it as ‘sad’. She pulled out a paperback. Her father had always bought them second-hand; coffee-stained and dog-eared, but he carefully wrapped the covers in cellophane and labelled each with the place of purchase, cost and date.

  Two Guns at High Chapparel, First Edition, Bloomsbury Book Fair, £1, October 4th 1971,’ she read
out loud.

  Even in her late teens, Veronica would join in when her father and Fee played cowboys in the back garden. Fee was always the sheriff, dad the baddy, Veronica the good guy who walks into town and straight into trouble.

  She smiled at the irony. As it turned out, she’d never been in trouble in her life, not even a parking ticket. Until now.

  ‘Get me a tea on your way back, Bob,’ said a female voice outside in the corridor. ‘One sugar and milk. And a Kitkat, there’s a sweetheart.’

  Veronica looked at her watch again. She had left home at eleven that morning, without quite knowing where she was going. Several hours later, nobody had realized she was missing. That was part of the problem.

  Les was visiting a fast-food festival at Alexander Palace and wouldn’t be back until late.

  ‘That’s nice,’ Helen had said on the phone the previous night. ‘You’ve got the whole day to yourself. Why don’t you come and have a bite to eat with me? Or I’ll come to you if you don’t feel up to it.’

  Veronica refused, explaining that there was still a lot of clearing up to do after the christening. Instead, she had left the house and walked. In the late afternoon, she found herself at the hospital.

  Recently, she had made several trips to Tendon. She wasn’t visiting a patient, but a memory. Her father had been treated here before he died from lung cancer.

  She poured the remaining coffee down one of the basins. She had been in the place for two hours and not a single person had come in. This floor of the hospital was used in the daytime for antenatal research. Now it was peaceful, apart from the occasional slam of a door, and the ping of the lifts.

  In a strange way, she told herself, she was quite enjoying this business of being odd; at least it gave her something on which to concentrate. It gave a kind of structure to each day: planning ways to avoid the next kill.

  It didn’t use to be like this. Veronica had always been busy when the children were young, too busy to think. She was involved with their activities, she was a volunteer helper in the classroom, and she served teas in an old people’s home every Friday afternoon.