Commencing Our Descent. Suzannah Dunn
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cope with Bloomsbury. The scene on the other side of the window was quite unlike anywhere else in central London in this undertow of a heatwave. Across the narrow street, people were loitering in the shade of the awnings of a bookshop, a gallery and a deli. I made a start on my designer water. Sharing our neighbouring and similarly stool-sized table were two men who clearly had nothing to do with each other. One was chopping his spoon into a slice of cream-dolloped Dutch apple pie, his back overlapping the slats of his chair, his shirt’s lower buttonholes taut. Next to his plate was the Telegraph, firmly folded into the shape that is ideal for fly-swatting or worse. Opposite him, a bespectacled and bearded man in black jeans and T-shirt was hunched over a paperback entitled From Plato to NATO, readings in political philosophy, and nibbling a lettuce-sodden bap.
Edwin asked, ‘So, anyway, what have you been doing to that house of yours, since I last saw you?’
Because, of course, that was what I was doing: the house; that was all I was doing.
Between sips of water, I told him about the man who had come to advise on the floorboards, the man who was a twin from a family of two sets of twins and who had twins of his own, one of whom had twins of her own. And I received appropriately appreciative responses as I worked through this particular box of tricks.
Then he asked, ‘Do you want children?’
‘A coffee will do for now.’
His smile was quick, small, uncertain.
‘Do you have children?’ I asked him. I had been wanting to ask, on that train journey; there had been no mention of any.
‘No.’
I said, ‘I don’t know whether I want to stay married.’
There: said. Said concisely and calmly. Said as if I had been saying the words casually every day for years, for all the years that they had been unsaid. Close friends are too close to be told; this burden of mine would simply become theirs too. So the truth was said to a man who I barely know. But if he is to know me, then this is what he has to know; this is who I am.
And, anyway, he asked.
Sort of.
He was silent for a moment, presumably giving me a chance to say more, before he responded with a careful, ‘Ah.’
This ah somehow served to lessen the impact for me: Ah, that little brain-teaser. Suddenly I was so grateful, hopeful: that little brain-teaser, the one that other people have; the one to which there is a solution. I reached for my glass, craving a salutary, celebratory mouthful. Up close, the fizzing water sounded like fat frying. I looked down into that volatile mixture of liquid and ice; down on to the pip-shedding, popeyed, swirling slice of lemon.
He asked, ‘Does your husband know?’
‘Philip,’ I said: I felt that we should say his name, that this was his due, and I felt that if we were to have this conversation, then it was important to be clear about absolutely everything.
‘Yes,’ I answered: somehow, I realised, he knows.
‘And what does he say?’
‘What is there to say? I think that he thinks that I’ll settle down.’
‘And what do you think?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘do I.’
Neither of us spoke again for a moment, but I wanted to say, Go on, ask me another. I was ready for more. Never having spoken a word of this, here I was, replying to his questions with no hesitation. And of course I was, because I had had the answers for a long time. There is nothing that I do not know about my situation, about living with someone and keeping up appearances but longing to be somewhere else, anywhere else. Oh, yes, I am an old hand.
His next question was, ‘And for how long have you been thinking of leaving?’
But this was wrong, I knew instantly that this rang untrue, and I knew why: I have not been thinking of leaving, during these bad years. Thinking of leaving is not what I have been doing. I have simply been thinking of not being where I am. I have nowhere to go. I have no reason to go, and every reason to stay. Mine is a perfect life, courtesy of a perfect husband. Leaving is unthinkable.
I said, ‘Three years.’
‘Three years,’ he did not seem to flinch, he seemed to be mulling this over. ‘How long have you been married?’
‘Three years.’ I was the one who flinched. ‘We’ve been together for seven.’ Seven minus three leaves four. I looked around for the waitress, then smiled for her to come and take an order. I wanted so desperately to avoid mention of those four years; four years when Philip and I were happy, the four years of my life when I was happy; four years that are lost to me, that I have lost. I have lived three years on ice. What would Jacqueline have given to have had three extra years of life?
Edwin said fairly cheerfully, or at least with some vigour, ‘We’ve been married for six years. We’ve been together for seven. We married because Vivien was pregnant.’
Vivien. Momentarily I was baffled, because he had said that they had no children; but I realised what had happened in the instant that he explained, ‘She miscarried.’
I said, ‘Oh. Oh, I am sorry,’ and I was.
‘I expect that a pregnancy seems a bad reason to marry, but I’m not sure what a good reason would have been, for me. I didn’t want us to marry, I didn’t see that marriage would make a difference, but that was what she wanted, and why should I refuse? In the end, she miscarried before we married, but …’
‘Yes,’ I said quickly, to save him from having to say.
Much slower, he admitted, ‘That would have been really rather heartless.’ Then he resumed, ‘And if that was important to her, why should I refuse to sign a piece of paper and have a party? I mean, we were together, and we seemed to be going to stay together.’
He had not mentioned love, but perhaps that was a given.
‘I was thirty-three, and I suspect that there’s something about reaching thirty-three, that round number.’
I said, ‘It’s not a round number, Edwin.’
He frowned. ‘But you know what I mean. It looks round.’
Thirty-three plus six: he was thirty-nine, he was only thirty-nine, only eight years older than I am. I had thought that he was much older because of his less than full head of hair, and because he looked so resigned. Yes, that was his look: one of resignation. Also, I should have allowed for my habitual over-estimation, my tendency to assume that grown-ups are so much older than I am simply because they always were.
He finished with a sudden, cheerful, ‘In seven years, we’ve never had a crisis.’
I did not know what to say, whether to congratulate him or to ask, Why? what have you been doing? The waitress whirled to our table, and I blurted, ‘Coffee?’
His mouth opened and closed, he was undecided, and looked as if he would remain forever undecided.
I heard the impatient shuffle of the waitress’s shoes, and requested, ‘Two espressos, please.’ She turned on her heel, literally, causing a squeak.
He looked up, puzzled. ‘I don’t drink espresso.’
‘A double for me, then.’
‘Why did you marry Philip?’
‘I don’t know. No reason.’ I meant, of course, no specific reason like pregnancy: and this Edwin seemed to understand. I meant no reason other than the usual ones such as that Philip asked me and I was in love with him. Are they reasons? do they explain? I have been thinking, yesterday and today, and now, if I do not remember why, I do remember how: I know how it happened.
This is how: Philip had said, ‘Marry me,’ as a little