Swim
Then
When I eventually step out of the cottage, it is an act of rebellion,You cannot leave me in here, it’s not fair, I will not be stuck here, and while I am aware it is a rebellion entirely of my own invention (he has never forbidden me to leave, God that he would), it feels good to have something to push against.
My heart is pounding when I am in the clearing with everything I will say if I see him; I march through the woods, my sketchbook tucked under my arm like a rifle. But, I don’t see him. The disappointment fades. I slow down. The rush of blood in my head stops, I hear birds’ song, waves. I hold out my palms, touch the waist-high blooms. They are clusters of lacy white flowers growing in umbrella shapes. I pick off a flower, crush it, smell its scent – a sharp aniseed. I take out myGuide to British Plants, which he bought me. It’s cow parsley, native, common, it self-seeds, which is why the woodland is covered with it. I open my sketchbook.
Drawing has always been a state of dual consciousness for me: I am concentrating on capturing the simple five-petalled flowers,the ridged celery stem, but another part of me is set loose, drifts. It is this part that at first, is preoccupied with the thought of Daniel discovering me in the woods, I imagine entire conversations with him:What are you drawing? Cow parsley. See, how it’s almost identical to hemlock water dropwort but one you can eat, the other will kill you.Sometimes, I resolve to say nothing to him, I will turn the silent treatment he has used so effectively against me, on him. But eventually, I am fatigued by these thoughts, there are limits to how long I will torture myself. I think of the flowers themselves. I walked past them many times on the way to the field, each time, I made a mental note to look them up but I never did. Why not? Why now? Because I am alone. Because he is not walking in front of me. Because I am not focused on the line of his belt, the tan deepening above the neckline of his shirt.
The sea draws me eventually, the sea that has, before, formed only the backdrop to my afternoons with Daniel. I have brought a swimsuit to Cornwall, my black school one, but the first time I enter the water, I have not brought it, I left the cottage with no intention of going in. The beach at the end of the slipway is not as stunning as it was the first day, the tide is out, revealing a flotsam of plastic bottles, crisp packets, sticks. But the low tide uncovers something else: another beach to the right of the one we drove up to. I walk over.
I hated swimming at St Matthews. There were lessons at the local sports centre where there were only four changing rooms; unless you were aggressive, pushed to the front, you had to change with all the other girls, keeping your skirt on as you edged your knickers off, pulling your swimsuit up and then facing the wall to unbutton your shirt, praying no one would see you, make acomment about your new breasts, your thighs, your toes. Now, I understand that I do not hate the water at all, only my self-consciousness. There is no one to be self-conscious with here.
I leave my sketchbook on the rocks, peel off my jeans, stand in my T-shirt and knickers at the water’s edge, feeling the tow of shells and pebbles. I plunge in.
What I love about swimming:
The annihilation of it.
That it feels like being held.
That if I swim out far enough, away from the shallows, I come to a place where the water moves not in waves but in swells, where it is dark and misty with forest-green seaweed, where slick fronds wind around my wrists, circle my ankles. Tethered to the sea, I think there are mysteries here no one knows. Mysteries beyond myself. Mysteries beyond him.
29
Rain
Now
Iam shaking as I walk away from Daniel, my teeth are chattering. I look back to make sure he isn’t following me and then pull my parka tight round myself. Pointless. It’s not my body that’s undefended.
You don’t love him.
‘I do,’ I whisper furiously to empty pavements, empty streets. ‘He’s my soulmate, the love of my life,’ but labelling Kit like that, in words I’ve never used about him and he’s never used about me, only underlines their falsity. ‘You’re my best friend,’ I’ve said to him a thousand times, ‘the best husband, the best father.’ But now, these sound like greeting card slogans, unable to withstand the landslide ofCut me open and inside it’s you.
It’s raining steadily now, I’m on Threadneedle Street. Across the road is the Bank of England, the long wall of pillars, the flag waving in the wind.
Did you ever feel for him what you felt for me?
I stop. Stand on the pavement, staring at the dark, slippery road. A bike whizzes past, traffic lights change from green to orange to red. A double-decker bus brakes at the crossing before me. The driver catches my eye, gestures at the green man. But I don’t move. I’m at a different set of crossroads. Daring myself to answer Daniel’s question. Wondering if it’s an undetonated mine I need to explode. A brick wall I’ve come here to hit.
No.
I do not feel for Kit what I felt for you.
Voices roar in my head, so loud against the patter of rain. How could Kit compete with the voltage of first desire, the electric discovery of my own body? It is classic, playbook, that’s why grooming is so manipulative. That’s why it’s so wrong.
But there is another voice too, it waits until all the others die down before whispering:You set him up, right from the start.And then, I am moving again, rushing away from the dead calm of the street, as if I can rush away from myself because it’s absolutely true. The moment Kit lifted up his hand and gave me a shy wave, I knew instantly I wanted to be with him, more than any man I’d met at Wyatt or Oxford or Emma’s house parties. Because he had green eyes not that intense navy; he was lean and wiry not powerfully set; he was witty and self-deprecating instead of charismatic and serious. Sometimes, I’d catch him putting gel in his blond hair or cracking a joke or clearing his throat before he spoke on a call and doubt would crawl over me like insects: have I ever wanted him for himself? Or only as a negative of Daniel?
My stomach is spasming; I’ve walked too fast. I unsling my backpack, swallow some water before shielding my eyes fromthe rain to get my bearings. I’m on King William Street. There is the rooftop restaurant where Kit and I celebrated becoming fully fledged associates, Snow + Rock where I tried on hiking boots for our honeymoon to South America, the Nespresso shop where I bought him the coffee machine before we had Millie, if he was here, he’d put his arm round my shoulders, say, ‘Do you remember, babe?’ I do. But I also know that for every pure memory of his, mine is tainted. Because each second with Kit, I’m comparing him to Daniel. Exultant that he is nothing like him. And devastated.
Do you love him?
He doesn’t kiss like Daniel. He doesn’t say my name into my mouth. He tells me I’m pretty but never that I’m beautiful, rare, astonishing. He doesn’t linger over my body with that slow, penetrating gaze, like I’m a land he’s charting, a sea he’s navigating. Instead, he sends me emojis of mangoes when he’s horny, we giggle when we take off each other’s pyjamas, after we have sex, he brings me decaf coffees, I love him for all these things. But how can I trust how I feel when I’ve also felt their opposite?
The rain is growing stronger. People scatter for shelter, tourists because they wear plastic cagoules and enormous rucksacks, there are two groups under an Italian suit shop doorway, a cluster under the lip of a sandwich shop. I look at them and wonder if I am truly as alone as I feel or if any one of these marriages is like mine – built on flimsy foundations, deceptions, guilty trade-offs. Because I gave Kit everything. To make up for never being able to give him myself.
It isn’t hard. Kit is a feminist and an economist, we’ve always talked about the gender pay gap, the disproportionate burden ofemotional labour on women. When I decided to go back to work four days a week, he was the one who raised the impact it would have on my career, how it shouldn’t mean I was Millie’s main caretaker because he never wanted to be the kind of dad who wasn’t involved. But there would always come a point when we needed to make a decision – wedding venues, holidays, houses, nurseries – when I’d just hand him the reins. Now, it’s a struggle to express a different opinion. The muscle of surrender has grown very strong.