Part 17 (1/2)

Finding him at the bar later, I tried a little old-fas.h.i.+oned flirtation; after all, there had been a time when he'd found me irresistible. I sidled up to him and casually suggested we take a walk outside. I knew he was very drunk, drunker than I'd ever seen him. He looked at me straight on, almost as if he wasn't quite sure who I was, and said he was sorry the wedding had turned out this way. He said he hadn't meant it to be like this.

'It's fine,' I said to him. 'The wedding is fine. It doesn't matter. But I wish you'd tell me what the h.e.l.l is the matter with you.'

'There's nothing the matter with me,' he said. 'Nothing at all. Everything's fine.'

He seemed to sway gently between me and the bar. Then he added, 'I think I'll go to bed now. You stay and enjoy the rest of the wedding.'

It was so unlike Keith that I didn't know what to do. I had never had to take care of him before; it had always been the other way round. I was almost tempted to ask his mother for advice but that would have been wrong for several reasons. So, I took his hand and guided him up the stairs to our room. He fell in through the door and slumped across the bed. I took off his shoes and tie and loosened his belt. I squeezed myself in beside him and turned on the television. The late-late movie, Brief Encounter Brief Encounter, was about to begin.

The following morning, despite his hangover, Keith was up and packing the car before I was awake. I wasn't sure whether or not I had a hangover, but I had a knot in my stomach. I decided to skip breakfast and join him. He was waiting for me.

'Are you ready to head, so,' he said, without catching my eye.

'Yeah, I'm ready. Do you want to say goodbye first?'

'I don't want to see anybody.'

'What about your parents?'

'Look, Kate, I'd really just like to get going.'

'OK.'

I got in beside him, and before I had my belt on he had backed out of his s.p.a.ce without checking his mirror and was heading out of the car park at twice the speed limit... This was not like Keith. In fact, nothing would ever be like Keith again.

It wasn't until we were back in my flat that he told me. He emerged from the bedroom having carefully placed my bags by the bed; his own he had left in the car. He was ashen. I don't know why I was quite so unprepared for what came next. Surely I knew that things weren't right between us. Or maybe, as Keith suggested later, my mind had been occupied elsewhere. He walked to the couch and sat down. He put his head into his hands and, for a moment, he was crying. I sat beside him and put my arms round him. He didn't resist. He steadied himself. Then he sighed deeply and took my hands in his. 'It's not going to work,' he said.

'What do you mean?' I asked.

'We can't get married.'

'What do you mean?' I said again, thinking that perhaps he had lost his job or something, and thought we couldn't afford to get married. I was all prepared to a.s.sure him that we could work it out; we could get married without a wedding it was all unnecessary expense anyway, as his mother had said. It even occurred to me that that was why he had been in such bad form at his cousin's wedding he was afraid he wouldn't be able to do the same for me. I had it all worked out in my head.

But that wasn't it.

He looked straight into my eyes, just as he had when he'd asked me to marry him a few months earlier, and he said that I was the most gorgeous creature he had ever known. He said that he loved me more than anything in the world and that he probably always would, but he couldn't marry me.

I was afraid. What had he heard? Who had been saying things? What exactly did he mean?

'Why?' was all I managed.

'Because you don't love me.'

My only impulse was to deny.

'I do love you! I do love you!' I said, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him. 'I do love you,' I repeated. 'Why do you think I don't?'

He got up and walked over to the window. With the light behind him, his features were slightly blurred, which added to the sensation that this wasn't the Keith I knew, that somehow my Keith had been switched with a Keith who was breaking all the rules.

'You've never really loved me,' he said. 'I've always known that. I'm not a fool.'

'That's not true, Keith. I do love you. Stop saying that.'

'Oh, you probably think you do, and maybe you do in a way, but you don't love me enough for for ever.'

'Don't be ridiculous,' I said, speaking far too quickly. 'What's for ever anyway? n.o.body knows if anything will last for ever. You just have to go with it and hope for the best. You said you love me, you have to believe I love you too.'

I stopped. There were so many things wrong with this conversation. 'Where did all this come from, anyway?' I asked.

'It's been coming for a while. You must have known it. I thought for ages that it didn't matter, that you'd eventually love me in the same way, or that it didn't matter as long as we were married. But it does matter. It matters a lot.'

I felt powerless. I couldn't deny that much of what he was saying was true, but I'd had no idea that he'd thought so too. And why now, when I was doing everything to try to make it work, was he so positive that it wouldn't?

I joined him at the window. He was leaning against the sill, his pose almost casual as if there was nothing more bothering him than what he would have for his tea. 'What's changed, Keith? Something has to make you think this way.'

For a while he didn't say anything. He seemed to be reflecting on what he was going to say next, or on exactly how he would put it.

'Look, Kate, I nearly got married before, but I didn't because I didn't believe I was in love. And I was right. But with you... with you, I was so caught up that I didn't even notice you weren't in love with me. And it breaks my heart to do this... believe me.' He kept his eyes fixed ahead of him as he spoke.

I didn't believe he was serious. He could still be persuaded There was no need to ruin everything just because he was having a few doubts. 'Then why do it? We have as good a chance of being happy as anybody else. We're friends, we care about each other, we've been very happy together. I know I'm a bit flighty at times, but I'm settling down. You've helped me to settle down.'

'No. You're not settling down,' he said, swinging round to face me so that his mouth was only inches from mine. 'You're about to go back to college. You're going to have new experiences, meet new people. You're going to want to do crazy things...'

'Is that it?' I asked him. 'Is that what you're worried about? That I'll meet some twenty-year-old and want to run away with him?'

'No. Maybe. No.'

'What exactly are you saying?'

He walked away. He was practically striding. He walked across the room several times before he settled on the couch. His face was red and his temples were throbbing visibly. 'Kate, I don't know if you fully realize this, but not only are you not in love with me you are in love with somebody else.'

It was as if he had reached out and struck me across the face. How could he say that? How could he know it? But the worst of it was that he was wrong. Could it really be that that man was still ruining my life? I knelt beside him and, with my two hands, made him look at me.

'You're wrong,' I said. 'That's over. It's absolutely over. I care nothing for him. When he was creeping round here over the summer I sent him packing. I felt nothing for him. I know I should have told you everything from the beginning but I couldn't bear it. I was ashamed... Who told you, anyway?'

He was silent for what seemed like eternity. When he spoke it was as if he had just worked out a difficult problem in trigonometry. 'Oh, you mean Daniel O'Hanlon,' he said, smiling crookedly. 'I've known about Daniel O'Hanlon since the first night I met you. One of your work colleagues let me in on the secret. I'm not talking about him him.'

I was mystified. He'd known about Daniel all along? Why had he never said anything? What must he think of me? But, more importantly, if he wasn't talking about Daniel, who was he talking about?

'Keith,' I said, 'you're confusing me. What are you talking about? I'm not in love with anybody else.'

He sighed, as if he really didn't want to have to spell it out for me. He was looking at me with a mixture of incredulity and annoyance. 'Your precious brother-in-law,' he spat out. 'Or I should say your ex-brother-in-law.'

'Mike?' I said. 'You think I love Mike?'

'Yes,' he said, rather sarcastically. 'I think you love Mike. And I think he f.u.c.king loves you back, so if you don't mind, I'd really rather not be in the middle of all that.'