The Most Difficult Thing. Charlotte Philby
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I smiled reluctantly, leaning forward to kiss him, but he was less easily distracted than I was.
‘So, this house, it belongs to David’s parents but they don’t live there?’
I was touched that he cared enough to want to understand my life.
‘Exactly. His dad is mega-rich, he’s usually away on business and when he’s in town he has a flat he uses. So that just leaves David and the house …’
‘And now you.’ He thought for a moment before nodding. ‘OK.’
It did not hint at anything out of the ordinary at the time, the excitement shining in his eyes as he raised his glass to his lips, his eyes holding mine as he drank.
It was a while later that he pushed the parameters of our relationship beyond the generally permissible limits, broaching the matter one night as we lay side by side, our legs entwined, between the sheets.
‘I know I said I was jealous of the idea of you and David sharing a house, but I wouldn’t mind if you and he …’
My body tensed. Sensing my reaction, he placed his hand gently in the small of my back.
‘That’s not because I don’t want you – you know that, right? It’s just … You and me, there’s no question over what we have.’
Swallowing, I chose to ignore that questions blew between us like sheets billowing precariously on a line.
His lips pressed against mine and the thought was pushed away. He was a free spirit, that was all it was. There was no reason to feel alarmed.
‘It’s just, if it makes life easier, you know? I have no problem with it.’
I tried to forget Harry’s words over the following weeks, but no matter how hard I tried to run from them, they chased me. The thought of his indifference, the ease with which he could accept the possibility of another man’s body on mine, following me into sleep … But there was an excitement too. The seed of a possibility of something I could sense if not name.
And over time, I suppose, the idea lost its menace. Was it that simple? Perhaps it wasn’t, but in the end it felt like little more than an inevitability.
We had been sitting on the sofa, David and I, flicking through magazines, a half-smoked spliff resting in the ashtray on the coffee table. It was not planned, not consciously at least. David leaned forward to reach his glass of water and I felt my fingers stop him, my hand on his shoulder. Then, as if it was the most natural thing in the world, I was leaning in, my fingers lifting to his face, cupping his chin.
His mouth was dry from the weed, and I moistened it with my tongue, leaning him back against the sofa and lifting his shirt in slow, gentle tugging motions. His eyes were bloodshot and his face temporarily frozen. Throughout, I felt his want driving me, spurring me on, wondering how many times he had envisaged this moment.
Once he had finished I sat up and lifted the spliff from the ashtray, lighting it and inhaling deeply while he trembled on the sofa.
It was two months to the day after my first time with David that I stumbled upon the notes on Harry’s desk. We were lying on his bed watching a film on the laptop balanced on the duvet between us, the sound of a party flooding in from the flat above.
‘Do you want me to ask them to turn it down?’ I had asked as he fidgeted beside me, his hands refusing to settle.
‘What?’
‘The music …’
He looked confused and then batted his hand. ‘It doesn’t bother me.’
For a moment he was silent, and then he continued, shaking his head dismissively. His timing was perfect.
‘Sorry. It’s nothing, it’s just work.’
‘Anything I can help with?’
‘It’s just this story I’m working on.’ Leaning forward, he took a swig from his glass. ‘It’s nothing. Let’s just watch the film.’
The following morning I woke to find him already seated at his desk on the other side of the bedroom, his body folded over the table.
I loved watching him work, the way he argued with himself under his breath, chewing the tip of his pen, as he did now, absent-mindedly circling words on the page.
I pushed myself up to sitting. ‘What are you doing?’
‘You’re awake.’
He turned slightly from his chair, keeping his eyes fixed to the page. ‘I’m going to make coffee,’ he added without moving.
I smiled to myself, leaning back, breathing deeply, drinking in his smell, letting the coolness of the sheets settle against my skin.
‘It’s OK, I’ll make it.’ I went to stand but he got up first.
‘No, no, it’s fine. You stay there.’
I watched him walk through the bedroom door to the kitchen in boxer shorts and a T-shirt, the cotton rubbing against the curve of his shoulder blade.
Contentedly, I let my eyes drift around the room, soaking up the old press cuttings, a couple in frames against one wall, a thick stack of books on either side of the fireplace.
It was not like me to overstep boundaries with Harry. But it was in both our interests, I told myself as my toes pressed silently onto the floor next to the bed, the wooden boards soft against the soles of my feet.
Still, I was reassured by the sound of the kettle lightly humming in the kitchen as I wrapped the bedsheet around myself, turning slightly to the empty doorway before moving towards his desk.
I stopped again, giving myself a chance to back out; but it was not as if I was snooping, I reminded myself as I lowered myself slowly into his empty seat, which was still warm. It was hardly rummaging through his secret possessions; it was just a pile of papers and a pad, his writing, unconcealed, the thick, loopy scrawl of someone who thought too quickly.
I did not touch anything, I did not have to turn my head to read it. It was just there, in the middle of a series of words connected by arrows, streaking angrily back and forth across the page, the word ‘TradeSmart’ circled in pen.
My whole body tensed. That could not be right. I looked again, picking up the notepad this time, turning it so that the words were in sharp focus in front of my face.
As I raised the pad, a photo fell loose, landing face up on the floorboards by my feet. I looked down, and the image stared back at me. The single image of a boy, his extremities protruding from under a white sheet – a child of six or seven.
If it wasn’t for the skin, which was black, and the hair, which clung to his head in tight curls, it might have been Thomas. My own brother’s face, his skin unnaturally white that day, beneath a scattering of freckles across the bridge of his nose, had shared the same slackness of the jaw, the same unmistakable absence of life. His blond hair stuck to his forehead where he had pushed away the heat of the summer’s day with a tiny wrist.
‘Your coffee?’ Harry stopped when he saw my expression.
My eyes were unable to leave the photo. As if looking in from somewhere else, I heard myself gag, watched myself stand too quickly and then the chair falling away behind me.
‘Anna?’
Harry rushed towards me and I pulled myself away, making it to the bathroom just in time.
He had not been angry about me prying and, like a fool, I had taken his softness as a sign of his love. Rather, he had merely sighed, as if there was an inevitability about what was to come.
Leading me into the living room, he held a cigarette packet in his hand as we sat opposite each other on the sofa, spinning the box slowly between his fingers as he spoke.
After some deviation, we got to the point.