Part 13 (1/2)

It was a pity he had to rush away again so soon. My pizza was delicious and the half-bottle of Valpolicella we'd ordered (I'd drunk most of it) had put me in the mood for another. But he had to go. He promised he'd make it as short as possible and I promised I'd wait up.

Once I was back in the flat, alone again Jean was out with her new man I decided to reward myself with a little gla.s.s of a powerful s.h.i.+raz she had left lying around. After all, it had been a very good day and I was, on the whole, behaving very well. Then I treated myself to a second little gla.s.s and so, by the time the buzzer rang some time later but n.o.body was there, I wasn't bothered. And when my doorbell rang again a little later, I didn't think it strange at all. However, when I opened the door to Daniel O'Hanlon, you could have knocked me down with a feather.

11.

I hadn't been expecting it. If pressed, I'd have said that I never expected to see him again. He'd been wiped from the universe, and while I might b.u.mp into his wife in the odd department-store changing room, he had ceased to exist. Yet there he was, standing in the doorway to my flat, one hand resting on the upper jamb, the rest of him sort of hanging in the door frame. If I'd had time to register who he was I would have closed the door. I wasn't interested in starting all that again, but he had stepped inside before I was fully aware that he, Daniel O'Hanlon, was standing in front of me.

Then I tried to get out of the door myself, but that wasn't going to happen. He shut it and wedged himself in front of it to prevent me going anywhere. He looked wretched. His suit was crumpled, as if he had been wearing it for several days without a pressing. His s.h.i.+rt was wide open at the collar and seemed grimy. His skin was greasy, his hair matted and thin. It took me only seconds to get a picture of a man under duress. I was trying to push past him but he grabbed my arms and pinned me against the wall. Immediately he let go, holding up his hands in surrender.

'Sorry, sorry,' he gasped. 'I just want to talk for a minute. Just a minute. Then I'll go, I promise.'

'I don't want to talk to you,' I said firmly.

'Just for a minute.'

'I have nothing to say to you.'

'I needed to see you,' he said. 'I've missed you.'

'Please go, Daniel.'

'Just hear me out.'

'I'm not interested in anything you have to say. I'm engaged now. I'm getting married.'

'I've missed you so much. You're beautiful, Kate.'

He made a pathetic picture: a middle-aged man in need of a wash and a shave, spouting garbage to a woman who had no use for him.

'Daniel, there's nothing to say. We're finished. We were finished that day when you dumped me. So turn round and get out of here, or I'm calling the police.'

'I love you, Kate.'

'I'm calling the police. And your wife. I'm calling your wife to come and take you away.'

'My marriage is over, Kate. It was over from the day I met you.'

'That's b.o.l.l.o.c.ks and you know it. Go on home to your wife,' I shouted. 'Go on home to your wife and your new baby.'

'It's over, Kate. It's you I love. It's always been you.'

'b.o.l.l.o.c.ks.'

'Don't say that. It's true. I love you. I'm leaving her.'

'Look, Daniel, you can leave your wife all you like, just not on my account.'

'We can have a life together, Kate. I should never have pushed you away.'

'You didn't push me away,' I almost spat at him. 'You dumped me in no uncertain terms. You dropped me, just like you picked me up in the first place, on a whim. I don't know what's going on with you at the moment, maybe you're not getting enough sleep, but I'm wide awake, and I'm more than capable of telling you to f.u.c.k off out of here or I really will call the police and your wife.' I felt weak by the end of my tirade.

'Come on, Kate.'

'No!'

'Come on.'

'Look, Daniel,' I said, finding a calm note, 'I've moved on. I'm getting married soon. I '

'OK, OK,' he said. 'I'll go. But you have to give me one thing. You have to admit that what we had was good.'

'I'll admit nothing.'

'Oh, come on. I bet what you have now with this guy isn't a patch on what we had. You don't often find pa.s.sion like that, Kate.'

'It wasn't pa.s.sion, it was l.u.s.t.'

'It was love, Kate. When it was good, it was love. You know it was.'

'Daniel, please, go away.'

'Kate, don't settle for second best.'

'It is not second best!' I exploded. I was nearly choking I was so angry. 'What I have with Keith is a million times better than than our sordid affair.'

'I don't believe you.'

'Believe me.'

'OK. Whatever you say. But believe me when I say I still love you. That I still want you.'

'I don't care. I don't feel anything for you and I'm amazed I ever did. Now will you please get out of my house?'

'All right, I'm going.' He began to walk away, then added, 'You know where I am.'

He went slowly down the stairs, looking back one more time before he disappeared round the corner.

I watched him go, then closed the door and turned the lock. I was shattered. Ireached for one more gla.s.s of wine, but even the smell of it made my stomach heave. I dashed into the bathroom and vomited. It was pure revulsion. I crawled out of the bathroom and straight into bed.

But, of course, I couldn't sleep. How could I after what had happened? My head was pounding, my hands were trembling, my very core was aching. I still couldn't quite believe that he had really been here, that Daniel O'Hanlon had come back into my life and apparently wanted me back in his. Yet the most surprising thing was how much I had hated the sight of him. Not for one second did I see the man standing in my doorway as anything other than a very old, very sorry mistake. I had loved him once, or thought I had. Now, there was nothing of that and I was still too angry to work out what had been left behind.

How dare he come here and think I'd want him back? How dare he tell me that what we had was special when it was only more of the same story that suave older men and foolish younger women had been playing over and over since time began? And how dare he presume to comment on what Keith and I had, let alone criticize it?

Whenever I've felt strong enough, I've wondered how I got to be in that position with Daniel how I went from being happily in control and at ease with our scenario to a blubbering mess that couldn't have all the things she thought she didn't want. Somewhere along the line my expectations changed. In the beginning I had everything I desired. He was good-looking (the word 'das.h.i.+ng', however ridiculous, always seems apt); he was successful (at the very thing I was failing at); he was charming; he was pa.s.sionate, although s.e.x with him was probably never as good as I thought it was but fuelled by the most powerful thing about him that he was forbidden. It must be the simplest and most potent aphrodisiac, but I never thought I was simple enough to be fooled by it. I used to congratulate myself on having escaped the boring norms of everyone around me. They might do the conventional thing, they might perpetuate their bourgeois existence, but not me. I would be different. I wasn't afraid to live on the edge.

But that wasn't the reality at all. The reality was that I spent nearly a year of my life in hiding. Hiding from my family, hiding from my friends, hiding from myself. When I look back on it I seem pathetic. I don't know if the worst part was my arrogance in thinking I was so different from everyone else, or my weakness in failing to grasp that what I was doing was wrong in so many ways. It doesn't matter. What matters is that it is over.