Steven Watson - Before I Go to Sleep

I knew then. Without her saying anything, I knew. The missing piece of the puzzle, the reason Ben had left, the reason my best friend had disappeared from my life and my husband had lied about why this had happened. I had been right. All along. I had been right.

“It’s true,” I said. “Oh God. It’s true. You’re seeing Ben. You’re fucking my husband.”

She looked up, horrified. “No!” she said. “No!”

A certainty overtook me. I wanted to shout Liar! But did not. I was about to ask her again what she wanted to tell me when she wiped something from her eye. A tear? I don’t know.

“Not now,” she whispered, then looked back to the hands in her lap. “But we were once.”

Of all the emotions I might have expected to feel, relief wasn’t one. But it was true: I felt relieved. Because she was being honest? Because now I had an explanation for everything, one that I could believe? I’m not sure. But the anger that I may have felt was not there, neither was the pain. Perhaps I was happy to feel a tiny spark of jealousy, concrete proof that I loved my husband. Perhaps I was just relieved that Ben had an infidelity to go with my own, that we were equal now. Quits.

“Tell me,” I whispered.

She did not look up. “We were always close,” she said softly. “The three of us, I mean. You. Me. Ben. But there had never been anything between me and him. You must believe that. Never.” I told her to go on. “After your accident I tried to help out in whatever way I could. You can imagine how terribly difficult it was for Ben. Just on a practical level if nothing else. Having to look after Adam… I did what I could. We spent a lot of time together. But we didn’t sleep together. Not then. I swear, Chrissy.”

“So when?” I said. “When did it happen?”

“Just before you were moved to Waring House,” she said. “You were at your worst. Adam was being difficult. Things were tough.” She looked away. “Ben was drinking. Not too much, but enough. He wasn’t coping. One night we got back from visiting you. I put Adam to bed. Ben was in the living room, crying. ‘I can’t do it,’ he kept saying. ‘I can’t keep doing this. I love her, but it’s killing me.’”

The wind gusted up the hill. Cold. Biting. I pulled my coat around me.

“I sat next to him. And…”

I could see it all. The hand on the shoulder, then the hug. The mouths that find each other through the tears, the moment when guilt and the certainty that things must go no further gives way to lust and the certainty that they cannot stop.

And then what? The fucking. On the sofa? The floor? I did not want to know.

“And?”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I never wanted it to happen. But it did, and… I felt so bad. So bad. We both did.”

“How long?”

“What?”

“How long did it go on for?”

She hesitated, then said, “I don’t know. Not long. A few weeks. We only… we only had sex a few times. It didn’t feel right. We both felt so bad, afterward.”

“What happened?” I said. “Who ended it?”

She shrugged, then whispered, “Both of us. We talked. It couldn’t go on. I decided I owed it to you—and Ben—to stay away from then on. It was guilt, I suppose.”

An awful thought occurred to me.

“Is that when he decided to leave me?”

“Chrissy, no,” she said quickly. “Don’t think that. He felt awful, too. But he didn’t leave you because of me.”

No, I thought. Perhaps not directly. But you might have reminded him of just how much he was missing.

I looked at her. I still did not feel angry. I could not. Perhaps if she had told me that they were still sleeping together, I might have felt differently. What she had told me felt as though it belonged to another time. Prehistory. I found it hard to believe it had anything to do with me at all.

Claire looked up. “At first, I was in touch with Adam, but then Ben must have told him what had happened. Adam said he didn’t want to see me again. He told me to stay away from him, and from you, too. But I couldn’t, Chrissy. I just couldn’t. Ben had given me the letter, asked me to keep an eye on you. So I carried on visiting. At Waring House. Every few weeks at first, then every couple of months. But it upset you. It upset you terribly. I know I was being selfish, but I couldn’t just leave you there. On your own. I carried on coming. Just to check you were all right.”

“And you told Ben how I was?”

“No. We weren’t in touch.”

“Is that why you haven’t been visiting me lately? At home? Because you don’t want to see Ben?”

“No. A few months ago, I visited Waring House and they told me you’d left. You’d gone back to live with Ben. I knew Ben had moved. I asked them to give me your address but they wouldn’t. They said it would be a breach of confidentiality. They said they would give you my number and that if I wanted to write to you they would pass the letters on.”

“So you wrote?”

“I addressed the letter to Ben. I told him I was sorry, that I regretted what had happened. I begged him to let me see you.”

“But he told you you couldn’t?”

“No. You wrote back, Chrissy. You said that you were feeling much better. You said you were happy, with Ben.” She looked away, across the park. “You said you didn’t want to see me. That your memory would sometimes come back and when it did you knew I had betrayed you.” She wiped a tear from her eye. “You told me not to come anywhere near you, ever again. That it was better that you forgot me forever, and that I forgot you.”

I felt myself go cold. I tried to imagine the anger I must have felt to write a letter like that, but at the same time realized maybe I hadn’t felt angry at all. To me, Claire would hardly have existed, any friendship between us forgotten.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I could not imagine being able to remember her betrayal. Ben must have helped me write the letter.

She smiled. “No. Don’t apologize. You were right. But I didn’t stop hoping you’d change your mind. I wanted to see you. I wanted to tell you the truth, to your face.” I said nothing. “I’m so sorry,” she said then. “Can you ever forgive me?”

I took her hand. How could I be angry with her? Or with Ben? My condition has placed an impossible burden on us all.

“Yes,” I said. “Yes. I forgive you.”

We left soon after. At the bottom of the slope, she turned to face me.

“Will I see you again?” she said.

I smiled. “I hope so!”

She looked relieved. “I’ve missed you, Chrissy. You’ve no idea.”

It was true. I did have no idea. But with her, and this journal, there was a chance I could rebuild a life worth living. I thought of the letter in my bag. A message from the past. The final piece of the puzzle. The answers I need.

“I’ll see you soon,” she said. “Early next week. Okay?”

“Okay,” I said. She hugged me, and my voice was lost in the curls of her hair. She felt like my only friend, the only person I could rely on, along with Ben. My sister. I squeezed her hard. “Thank you for telling me the truth,” I said. “Thank you. For everything. I love you.” When we parted and looked at each other, both of us were crying.

At home, I sat down to read Ben’s letter. I felt nervous—would it tell me what I needed to know? Would I finally understand why Ben left me?—but at the same time excited. I felt sure it would. Felt certain that with it, with Ben and Claire, I will have everything I need.

Darling Christine,

This is the hardest thing I have ever had to do. Already I’ve kicked off with a cliché, but you know I’m not a writer—that was always you!—so I’m sorry, but I’ll do my best.