Wife And Mother Forever

CHAPTER ELEVEN

THROUGH her shock Evie realised that this had always been coming. Underlying the joy at Naples, there had been something wrong. She’d sensed it without understanding, or perhaps not letting herself understand. Nor would she face it now. He was her life and she wouldn’t give up without a fight.

‘Who says we can’t love each other?’ she asked angrily. ‘You?’

‘What I am says it, and what I am can’t be changed.’ He gave a wry, mirthless smile. ‘Oddly enough, you were the one who showed me that.’

‘I did? How? When?’

‘When you came back after that day with Ruggiero and I tried to stop you doing it again. You told me not to give you orders or try to control you. Do you remember?’

‘Yes. And then you had such a strange look on your face-as though I’d said something terrible.’

‘You had. You’d said exactly what Margaret used to say to me when we were married. I was possessive and controlling-’

‘But that’s only because you were afraid of losing her, because you’d lost everyone else. Surely you realise that?’

‘Yes, of course. I did even then. But knowing why you’re behaving intolerably doesn’t mean you can stop yourself. I knew I was driving her further away from me every day. And I still couldn’t stop.

‘I saw her start to hate me and it made me worse. The more her love died the more I tried to force it back, and of course I failed because no woman can love a monster and tyrant for very long.’

‘Don’t say that about yourself,’ she cried passionately.

‘It’s the truth. I know what I am and I can’t be anything else.’

‘You can,’ she said stubbornly, ‘because now you’ll have me.’

He came forward in the faint light and stood beside her where she was sitting on the bed. She felt his warmth and breathed in the thrilling spicy scent of him as he put his hands on each side of her face, gazing down at her.

‘I’ve told myself that,’ he whispered, ‘a thousand times when I’ve been trying to believe that I had every right to bind you to me. But I’ve always known that I have no right at all.

‘Once I started thinking about Margaret I began remembering other things, how much I loved her at first, so much that it frightened me. But that didn’t stop me turning into-what I became, what I still am. I destroyed Margaret and sent her off to her death. I won’t risk doing that to you.’

She answered by reaching up, running her hands over his naked body and pulling him down beside her.

‘Stop talking so much,’ she said fiercely. ‘It’s all words. They don’t matter. I know there are problems but we can beat them-like this-and this-’

She was kissing him as she spoke, speaking to him on the deeper level where they could find each other. But even as she did so she knew that this wasn’t the way to convince him. She possessed his heart and his body, but his mind was fighting her. Without all three, he could never be truly hers.

As if reading her thoughts, he gave a convulsive jerk and pulled himself free.

‘Evie, don’t, please-’

‘You can’t destroy me,’ she said passionately. ‘I’m strong.’

‘Yes. Strong enough to fight me, and fight me with the most devilish weapons, because you know the ones I find hardest to resist. But is that the love either of us wants? She fought me. In the end we did nothing else but fight, and I think-’ his voice shook, as though the next words tore him apart ‘-I think, at last, I was actually trying to drive her away.’

‘But why?’

‘Because I learned to do that, long ago. Life’s less painful if I’m the one who’s doing the rejecting. I told you I was a coward at heart. Accept it.’

‘I won’t accept it because it isn’t true. A coward could never have made the journey that you did to find out about your mother.’

‘But it was your journey, that I took because you made me. Without you I’d have shut myself away in my steel trap. Let me tell you about that trap, because you need to know about it, and fear it. I was living there when we met. It’s a small place, because that way I can guard every inch. It has two barred windows, but they’re small too because it’s easier to keep out the world that way.’

‘Don’t,’ she cried in agony, putting her hands over her ears.

But he pulled them away and kept a firm grip on her wrists.

‘You’ve got to know,’ he said harshly. ‘You’ve got to understand what I have to do.’

‘I don’t want to hear any more about that cage. We broke it open and we’re taking it to pieces.’

‘Once I thought so. If you only knew how I hoped for that, because you could break it open if anyone could. But you can’t. Not even you.’

‘I don’t believe you’re giving up on us that easily,’ she cried.

‘Because you don’t know what I’m really like, the shadows inside me that I can’t get rid of, not even now. That’s why I have to make the decision for both of us, but don’t ever call it easy.’ He looked at her out of haggard eyes. ‘Forgive me, Evie. Try to forgive me.’

‘I won’t forgive you,’ she flashed. ‘We’ve been given such a precious gift, and you’re throwing it away.’

‘Because the man I’ve grown into can’t do anything else. Don’t you see? That’s the cage, and that’s why it’ll never be destroyed. I have to live in it, because for me there’s no longer any choice. But I’m damned if I’ll imprison you in there with me.’

‘And what about Mark?’

‘Mark’s found what he needs with his new family. You did that for him, and I’ll always be grateful.’

‘And I’m supposed to just shrug my shoulders and go away, leaving you to shrivel?’

‘You deserve better than to live in a cage.’

‘Don’t you?’

‘It’s a safe place. There’s no feeling there.’

‘Don’t try to tell me you’re unfeeling,’ she raged helplessly. ‘I know better.’

‘You think you do.’

‘Do you think a woman doesn’t know if a man loves her when she’s with him, when they lie together? I’ve seen your eyes and heard you whisper my name. You can’t shut out those times or pretend they didn’t happen. They were wonderful.’

‘They were very enjoyable,’ he said harshly. ‘We’re good in bed together. Nobody could deny that, but let’s not get sentimental about it.’

His voice fell cruelly on her ears, leaving her too shocked to speak.

‘You really fight dirty,’ she whispered.

‘Have you only just discovered that? Well, it’s time you found out, and you’re better off knowing the worst of me.’

‘Stop trying to frighten me.’

‘If you’re not frightened, you ought to be. Go away from me, Evie. I just hurt everyone I touch. I can’t help it. I wish we’d met years ago, but now it’s too late for me. Can’t you understand that?’

‘No, and I won’t believe it,’ she flashed.

‘What can’t you believe? That I can plan to leave you at the same time as doing this?’

He pulled her hard against him, cradling her head for the most crushing kiss he’d ever given her. She returned it in full, driven as desperately as he. Like him she had something to prove, and she tried to prove it by more than meeting him halfway. Where he had been tender before, now he made love fiercely, but she contended with him in ferocity.

Only a few minutes ago she’d told herself that to unite with him physically but not mentally would be useless. Now she abandoned all thoughts of his mind. This might be her last chance, and she would win the game in any way she could.

And victory felt in her grasp with every fevered caress. He had said he couldn’t do ‘three little words’, but he could love her with power and abandon, revealing the depths of his need with every movement. Her answering love was a promise from her soul. He must sense it and answer it. He must.

But in the last moments she felt her victory slipping away. It was over. He had loved her tonight as never before and, in that mood, he would sever himself from her for ever. She sensed that through her skin, her heartbeat.

When at last they lay in each other’s arms she felt his face against her skin and knew that he was weeping.

Then she wept with him.

Evie told herself that she had been here before. A relationship that had looked promising came to an end and she was once more a free agent. There was sadness but there was also relief at her escape.

That was then. This was now.

In the past she had always been the one to call a halt, fearing for her liberty. This time it was like being tossed into a black pit.

She had loved Justin with an intensity of feeling that she’d never known before, giving herself to him, body, heart and soul, with a completeness that had surprised even herself. To love and be with him always had become more important than anything in life, even liberty.

Sometimes she could work herself up into hating him, reminding herself of his cruel words about getting sentimental, telling herself that he’d meant every one. If she worked hard, she could almost believe it.

At other times she was haunted by the conviction that he’d been forcing himself to say what would drive her away, not for his own sake, but for hers. That belief was the worst pain of all, because it meant that he’d chosen to withdraw into the bleak cage where no sun shone and where her love couldn’t reach him. And he’d done it for her.

Before leaving his house she had returned to Justin the diamonds that Hope had given her.

‘She meant these for her daughter-in-law,’ she said. ‘So I can’t keep them.’

She was gone before Mark returned. The boy sent her emails, demanding to know when she was coming back, refusing to believe that everything was over. She could hardly believe it herself.

She wrote back, carefully explaining that she and Justin had decided that they had no future together, but that she would always like to hear from him.

He emailed her regularly. Sometimes he would add news about his father, who was apparently snowed under in work. There was never anything personal, except that he sometimes added, Dad says hallo.

She wrote to Hope, thanking her for her welcome, and the way she had underlined it with the diamonds.

I cannot keep them. But it will always make me happy to remember them.

Hope replied in a furious temper.

You’ve both taken leave of your senses. I don’t want diamonds. I want the daughter-in-law that I love. I want a wedding and more grandchildren (not necessarily in that order. I’m not a prude.) I shall keep the jewels locked away until you both see reason.

Evie had to smile at that, recognising the loyalty and affection that lay beneath Hope’s words, as well as the annoyance that the world was daring to disobey her.

The weather turned colder. Mark wrote to say that they were going to Naples for Christmas.

She could have spent her own Christmas with Debra and her family, but she made an excuse. The sight of Debra’s husband and children was more than she could have borne just now.

She spent the festive season locked in her apartment working until she was exhausted, and remembering the words Debra had once uttered.

‘One day I hope you’ll fall hook, line and sinker for a man you can’t have. It’ll be a new experience for you.’

Her friend had been joking, but it wasn’t funny any more.

When the doorbell rang on a freezing February day Evie didn’t know who to expect.

‘Mark!’

‘Can I come in?’

‘Of course.’ She stood back and ushered him inside, glancing into the corridor outside. But Justin wasn’t there and she forced back the brief surge of hope.

How quickly children grew! Mark had changed, even in six months. The young man he would soon be was starting to show in his face. He was also taller, as she realised when he hugged her.

She was longing to ask him a million questions-about himself, about his father and their life together. But she held off until he was sitting in her tiny kitchen, tucking into a hastily prepared snack.

‘I’m glad to see your appetite is as healthy as ever,’ she said. ‘Another piece of apple crumble?’

He nodded, his mouth still full, and she loaded his plate again.

‘How did you know my address?’ she asked.

‘You wrote it on the outside of the packet when you sent my memory stick back that time.’

‘But that was ages ago. You made a note of it then?’

‘We agreed to keep in touch.’

‘Yes, we did. You really are your father’s son, aren’t you? He’s ultra-methodical too.’

Merely talking about Justin was a pleasure. She forced herself to relinquish it. It was too dangerously sweet.

‘So tell me,’ she said, ‘what’s been happening. How was Christmas?’

‘Great. Nonna’s ever so nice, but I wish you’d been there. I wished it all the time. I kept thinking you might turn up as a surprise, but you didn’t.’

‘Mark, dear, it isn’t possible. Your father and I aren’t together any more.’

‘But you could be,’ he pleaded.

‘No. It was never going to work out. I’m out of his life now, for good.’

‘But I don’t want you to be out of mine,’ he said stubbornly. ‘That’s why I’m here. I want you to come to the funeral.’

‘Whose funeral?’

‘Mum’s. He brought her home. He started talking to me one day, about Mum, and how I felt about her still being in Switzerland. I said I’d like to have her here, so he arranged for her to be flown back and reburied in that churchyard you saw.’

‘That’s wonderful,’ she said. ‘It’s what you wanted, isn’t it?’

He nodded, his eyes bright. ‘I always wanted to have her home, but he didn’t think it mattered, and I couldn’t explain. But he’s different now, Evie. He understands things he didn’t understand before.’

She was silent, feeling a glow inside her that she had thought never to know again. It was almost like happiness. For she knew, as surely as if Justin were standing there beside her, that she was responsible for this.

She had thought their love had turned into a barren thing, but if he’d learned the way to reach out to his son then some good had come from it.

He understands things he didn’t understand before.

She could keep that and treasure it.

‘The funeral’s the day after tomorrow,’ Mark said. ‘Will you come?’

She gasped. ‘Mark, I can’t. I really can’t.’

‘But you must, because it’s down to you, isn’t it?’

‘I may have said something to him once, but-no, it was his decision.’

‘But you made him do it.’

She shook her head. ‘Nobody makes him do anything.’

‘You do. He did listen to you, although he pretended not to.’

She tried to deny it, but it was hard when he was saying what she longed to hear.

‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I expect your mother’s family will be there. They might not like my being there.’

‘She didn’t have anyone. It’ll just be Dad and me-and you.’

She was shocked by how badly she wanted to say yes. Just to see Justin again, speak to him, watch his face. All these things would be wonderful and terrible.

Then Mark stunned her again by remarking, ‘He’s still got your picture.’

‘What picture?’

‘One of the two I took of you that night you came to the house. Dad cropped it down to your head and printed it out small.’

‘You saw him?’

His smile called her naïve. ‘’Course not. But he forgot to wipe it off my computer afterwards. So I checked his wallet, and it was there last week.’

‘Mark, you shouldn’t have looked in his wallet.’

‘But I had to,’ he said with an air of injured innocence. ‘How can I find things out if I don’t check the facts?’

‘Don’t you try to blind me with science, my lad,’ she said, half laughing, half crying.

It was madness to feel suddenly full of joy. He’d kept her picture. Better still, he’d listened to her. In a way they were still part of each other’s lives, even if they never met again.

‘Mark, did you tell him you were coming here?’

The boy shook his head. Before she could speak, his mobile phone rang.

‘Hallo, Dad. It’s all right, I haven’t disappeared. I came to see Evie. Dad? Are you there? I’m at Evie’s apartment. I told her about Mum and asked her to come to the funeral, but she says she can’t.’

‘Let me talk to him,’ she said, holding out her hand for the phone. ‘Justin?’

‘Yes,’ came his voice after a moment, and even that one word, tinny and distorted as it was, had the power to move her.

‘I just want you to know that Mark is quite safe. He’ll be on his way home in a few minutes. Please don’t worry.’

‘I don’t worry if he’s with you, but I’m sorry he troubled you.’

‘He’s no trouble. And Justin-I’m glad-about his mother-’

‘It was what he badly wanted. I should have seen that at the start. He says he’s told you his idea.’

‘For me to come to the funeral, yes, but it doesn’t seem right.’

She stopped, hardly daring to let herself think further ahead.

Then he said, ‘He wants it badly, but of course I’ll understand if-I couldn’t really expect you-’

‘I’ll come, of course I will. I didn’t think you’d want to see me there.’

Silence. She wished she knew what she could read into it.

‘Mark misses you,’ he said at last. ‘I think it would mean a lot to him.’

Say that you miss me, she thought wistfully.

Silence.

‘Then I’ll come.’

‘I’ll send my driver to collect him. Thank you for looking after him today. Goodnight.’

‘Goodnight,’ she said, trying to match his formal tone although it hurt her that they should have to be polite, like strangers.

‘You’re coming?’ said Mark, who’d been listening. ‘That’s great.’

‘Yes, I’ll be there.’

‘Did Dad sound angry?’

‘No, he wasn’t angry, he was just-he wasn’t anything.’ That was the only way, she realised, to describe the sense of blankness that had reached her down the phone.

But telephones made everything different. It would be all right when she saw him.

‘While we wait,’ she said cheerfully, ‘why don’t you tell me some more about Christmas? Did you find it a bit quiet, because Italians don’t really celebrate Christmas. They wait until Epiphany on January 6th.’

‘Yes, but Nonna said ’cos I was English I must have presents at Christmas, like always. And then, when it was Epiphany, she said I must have more presents because that’s what everyone did. I tried to say I didn’t expect two lots of presents, but Nonna told me I’d just have to put up with it.’

‘I can just hear Hope saying that,’ Evie mused, relishing the picture.

‘And I learned lots of Neapolitan words. I remembered them for you.’

They chatted in this way until the bell rang, announcing Justin’s driver. He said he would call for her again to take her to the funeral in two days’ time, and bring her home afterwards.

When Mark had gone she plunged into her work and tried to think of nothing else. But pages passed before her eyes, making no impact. In the end she took the motorbike and rode at speed for hours until she no longer knew where she was. Which pretty much described her whole life, she thought.

For once the speed didn’t bring the usual sense of release. She knew now that she was fleeing something that would always lie in wait, just ahead.

When the day came she chose an austere dark blue suit, and checked her appearance again and again. She was trying to stay calm, knowing that soon she would meet Justin again for the first time in months. And he would look different to her, because now she knew that he kept her picture with him all the time.

She wouldn’t let herself think of what might happen then. That way lay madness. But, despite her good resolutions, the thought of seeing him after the long lonely months, studying his face, the way he smiled at her, all these made her heart beat faster.

Finally the cemetery came into view and at once her mind began to replay her last visit, in early summer when the leaves were green and the sun was high. Now it was the depth of winter-cold, wet, and miserable.

Mark came to meet her at the church door, taking her by the hand.

‘Thank you,’ he whispered. ‘We’re all ready.’

She was startled by the bleakness she found inside. As Mark had said, there was only himself and his father, with no family on his mother’s side. Justin was standing in the front row with his back to her. He turned as she approached, and at first she didn’t recognise him.

He was older and thinner, but that wasn’t the worst of it. His face now had the hard, withered look that she’d feared to see.

‘Hallo,’ she greeted him softly.

He seemed to take a moment to respond, as though not quite sure where he was. Then he inclined his head a little towards her.

‘Thank you for coming,’ he said politely. ‘It was important to Mark.’

‘I’m glad he wanted me.’

The priest appeared, wanting to know if they were ready to begin. Justin nodded and glanced at Mark, who went to stand beside him, taking Evie’s hand in his so that she was on his other side.

It was a short service. There was very little to be done. Justin kept his eyes fixed on the flower-covered coffin. Watching him, Evie remembered what he had told her about Margaret, how much he had loved her, and how it had all turned to hate.

What was he thinking now? Was Margaret there in his heart again at this moment? Was there any room left for herself?

They moved outside to where the grave had been dug. Now she could see more clearly the flowers on the coffin-two bouquets of roses. One bore a card in Mark’s childish hand.

To Mummy, with love always.

The card on the other was from Justin. It said simply, Thank you.

When the graveside rites were concluded Mark squeezed her hand, as if to say that everything was all right now. Evie looked at him, touched by the way he was reaching out to her, even at this moment.

Justin’s face was like a rock, revealing nothing.

Everything was unreal. How could she be here with him, her heart alive to him as though the lonely separation had never been? As the service concluded, she saw him look at her. She went to stand in front of him, daring him not to face her.

‘Are you really glad I came?’ she asked. ‘Not just for Mark’s sake?’

He took a long time to answer and a chill crept through her.

‘Yes, I’m really glad to see you,’ he said at last. ‘I’ve wondered how things were with you.’

‘And I’ve wondered about you, whether you were well, how life was treating you.’

‘It’s treating me fine, as you can see.’

No, I can’t see that. I can only see that your face is tense and weary, as it was when we first met.

‘Do you see much of your family?’

‘We have a standing invitation to Naples. Mark can go more often than I can, but Hope and I get on well.’

I thought I’d banished that defensive look from your eyes, but it’s there again, and perhaps it always will be.

‘I’m glad of that,’ she said firmly.

‘You did that for me, and I’ll never forget it.’

No, in the end there was nothing I could do for you, my love.

‘What about you? Have you been back to Italy?’ he asked desperately.

‘There hasn’t been time. I’ve been swamped in work.’

‘Well-I’m glad your career’s going well.’

‘Yes, very well, thank you.’

I’m grabbing all the work I can find. It fills the hours.

She’d been deluding herself with false hopes about this meeting. He hadn’t wanted to see her, and now he was struggling for something to say.

‘The driver will take you back as soon as you’re ready,’ he said. ‘I hope we haven’t taken up too much of your valuable time.’

There was an ache in her throat. Through the worst moments she’d clung to the hope that one day they would meet again.

But this was the meeting, and now she knew they were really at the end of the road.

When at last she could speak, she forced out words that were as formal and ugly as his own.

‘Well, it’s time I was going,’ she said briskly. ‘It’s so nice to have seen you again. The best of luck.’

He drew a sharp breath and for a moment his face was constricted with pain.

‘Evie,’ he said harshly, ‘are you all right?’

‘No. You?’

He shook his head. But he would not yield.

‘Goodbye,’ he whispered.

She touched his cheek gently.

‘Goodbye, my love,’ she said. ‘Goodbye.’