Christopher Nicole - Her Name Will Be Faith

Michael waited until they had all left the room, taking Nana with them. Then he said, “Perhaps you’d like to explain.” His voice was deceptively quiet.

“Well… there’s not a lot to explain, Michael.” She sat down. “This druggie broke in here and tried to assault me…”

“In the altogether?”

“He pulled off my housecoat,” Jo said, refusing to lose her temper.

“Is that a fact. Druggie? Broke in here? How the hell did he do that? This is supposed to be a burglarproof building. What the hell do we pay round-the-clock porters for?”

“Well, I suppose the fault was mine. Washington called to say there was this man to see me, who said he was an old friend, and without thinking I said to send him up. I was working, and just never thought, I guess.”

Michael went to the bar and poured himself a drink. “You expect me to believe that? Jesus Christ, entertaining hashed up dropouts in my apartment in the middle of the afternoon…”

“I ought to kill you for saying that,” Jo said.

He half turned, and flushed. “You going to pretend you didn’t know the guy? How did he know to come to this apartment and, no other?”

“Sure I knew him,” Jo snapped. “He was one of the people I interviewed for my hurricane article. Nothing more than that.”

“How’d he know your name?”

“I told him my name,” she shouted.

“A street side lay about?”

“An interviewee. I always tell them my name, and who I work for.”

“Who you work for.” His momentary embarrassment had disappeared now he had discovered another handle to twist. “That goddamned stupid job. Do you realize it could’ve got you raped? The kids hurt. And Jesus…” He looked at the empty pedestal. “Do you have any idea how much that shitting vase cost? I demand you give it up. Now.”

She stared at him. But she had been frightened; she could almost be tempted. If he would co-operate. “And if I do, will you come to Eleuthera next month?”

“You have got to be joking.” He pointed. “You have nothing with which to hit me, sweetheart. You’re the one out of line on this one. And I’m the poor bastard whose wife’s name is going to be splashed all over the newspapers. I suppose you have to give evidence at the trial?”

“Of course I do. Don’t worry, they tell me it won’t be until after the yacht racing season.”

“Bitch,” he commented. “But you are giving up that job. Now.”

“Go to hell,” Jo told him, and went into the bedroom. She had had just about all she could stand.

The concept of what had happened had set Michael going, in an almost obscene way, Jo thought. That the idea his wife had been wrestling naked with a strange man should start the vibes was horrible… but that night he wanted to return to her — she had slept in the spare room since their quarrel — and when she refused to let him they had another flaming row.

Yet what had happened had set her going too. It had been the unacceptable face of sex, but so were her relations with her husband. She wanted to lie naked in a man’s arms, feel them about her and him against her — but the arms had to be loving rather than angry or hating or claiming a right.

And in any event, having read the morning paper, she knew she had to contact Richard. But in fact he contacted her, at the office, just after she had finished enduring the comments and sympathies of Ed and the staff, and the apologies of Jeannie Ryan for having divulged her address to a total stranger.

“Jo?” Richard’s voice was fraught. “I’ve just seen the paper. My God…”

“Nothing happened,” she assured him. “The guy was just hashed up.”

“But… the papers say he broke in and assaulted you. That he’s being charged with…”

“Attempted rape. He didn’t get very far.”

“It says you knocked him out.”

“With a little help from my friends.”

“Oh, Jo…”

“I’ll tell you all about it when we meet.”

“When?”

“I could make Thursday.”

There was a moment’s pause, and she could hear him riffling the pages of his diary. “You got it. Ah… I could arrange some time off.”

“Yes,” she said. “I would like that.”

So here she was, Jo thought; Josephine Donnelly, would-be adulteress. It was the oddest feeling of her life, to be sitting across this now so familiar table, gazing into those now so familiar eyes, knowing that they were both doing nothing more than going through the formalities. But she had been doing this all week, existing on a cloud much higher than seven, hardly aware of what she was doing as she had been waiting for this moment. Fortunately, Ed had put her preoccupation down to her ‘ordeal’, as he called it. So did most other people. Neal and Meg had called to say goodbye, as they were off to Eleuthera. They had looked forward to seeing her there in a couple of weeks. “A good lie in the sun will put that horrible experience behind you,” Meg had trilled, every word redolent with outrage. Eleuthera? Eleuthera was a million miles away right this minute.

There were no banalities, about ‘how’re you doing?’ or ‘I wondered if you were going to call’. They were two people who were thinking with a single mind.

He paid the check and they walked along the sidewalk together. Their hands brushed, and once or twice they exchanged a quick squeeze of the fingers. Nobody appeared to notice, although they both had the feeling that anyone could look at them and tell they were on their way to bed.

In the elevator, he said, “I’m afraid I’ve started stripping the wallpaper.”

“Good for you. What color have you chosen?”

“It’s an off-white, really.”

“Sensible.”

She waited while he unlocked the door, trying to control the pounding of her heart. She had not felt like this since the first night of her honeymoon. But then, she hadn’t felt like this then, either.

“Voila! It really is a mess.”

She gazed at the half bare walls, the piles of loose paper, the layer of dust…

He closed the door, slipped the chain into place. “I’ll get it straight, eventually. And the bedroom’s clean as a whistle.”

She turned, and was in his arms, pressing herself against him as they kissed: “My darling girl,” he said. “I’m going to say something stupid.”

“Then don’t say it. Don’t say anything at all.” She released him, opened the bedroom door, and went in, terribly conscious that she was leading here where she should perhaps have waited to be led. But it was her nature, and she couldn’t risk any weakening of her resolve.

The door closed again, and he was in the room with her. Facing away from him, and carefully avoiding looking in the mirror, she reached behind her and unzipped her dress. She wore no slip in the summer, but for that reason always a bra. She shrugged her shoulders and the dress slid down to her thighs. She stepped out of it, reached behind her again, and touched his hands. “May I?” he asked.

“Yes,” she told him, and waited, as the clip was released, and he carried the brassiere forward with his hands as they moved round, under her armpits, to hold and caress her breasts. She gave a little shiver, but it was pure ecstasy at the gentle loving of his touch — the last two pairs of hands to touch her there had been vicious.

She let him hold her for several seconds; then reached down to slide her pants past her hips. He let her go, and she stepped out of them, drew a long breath, and turned to face him. If the family habitually skinny-dipped when in Eleuthera, it was a very long time since any man other than her husband had looked at her naked — in a bedroom. Suddenly she was afraid he would be disappointed in this slightly overweight wife and mother. But his eyes told her she had nothing to worry about.