Trisha Ashley - Good Husband Material

‘You’ve never seen him since?’

‘No!’

Only in my dreams. And let us hope James doesn’t get a sudden urge to read one of my books (unlikely though it seems) wherein all the romantic heroes are remodelled and transmogrified versions of Fergal.

Tish the literary vampire.

Frankenstein Tish, creating a new Fergal each time from the best bits of the old (and there were some choice bits), joined to new parts culled from my imagination. (I’ve got a good one. Lurid, even.)

Wonder if Fergal gets pale and listless every time I write a new novel? I wouldn’t like to think I was draining his batteries …

Who am I kidding? Yes I would! It would serve him right for breaking my heart.

James pulled up outside the flat with an over-dramatic swerve and stalked silently off without opening my door, one of the little old-world courtesies that first endeared him to me.

I only hope he’s not going to brood over this. I don’t know why he’s so upset about it, since he knew I hadn’t lived in an ivory tower before he came along. (A concrete university accommodation tower, actually – the urge to escape Mother overcame me.)

Perhaps it’s just that the type of man I went out with doesn’t match the image of me he’s been cherishing.

Sometimes lately I’ve thought the image he has of me doesn’t match me very much either.

You know, even now I’m not quite sure how I came to be married to James!

I wasn’t actually looking for Mr Right. Not even for

Mr Will-Do-at-a-Push-if-Desperate.

I remember telling him quite plainly that my life was blighted and I intended living quietly in the country devoting myself to my writing, and him saying he’d always wanted to live in the country too (his self-sufficiency phase). Then he just sort of sneaked up on me with flowers and chocolates and stuff. While spontaneity was not his middle name, dependability was: he was always there.

And being older he seemed rather suave and sophisticated. And attractive, even if not exciting, which was a plus point after Fergal: I’d had excitement. In fact James had practically had ‘Good Husband Material, Ready to Settle Down’ stamped on his forehead.

I don’t know what was stamped on my forehead, but it must have been misleading.

He was, in many ways, terribly conventional, and I think, looking back, that he thought I was too. I was so quiet and stay-at-home (or stay-at-digs) after Fergal.

On this reflection the car door was suddenly wrenched open, and I would have fallen out if I hadn’t still been wearing my seat belt.

‘Are you going to sit in the car all night daydreaming about your ex-boyfriend, or are you coming into the house?’ demanded James with icy sarcasm.

Oh dear.

Over his shoulder I observed something like a giant animated white hearth rug leap the area railing and bound off into outer darkness.

‘Bess is out, James,’ I said helpfully.

Fergal: November, 1998

‘ROCCO ROCKS ART WORLD.’

Sun

‘Is this the face of New Renaissance Man?’

Sunday Times

The painting is four foot square.

Step back, she swims out at you from the green depths.

Step forward, she vanishes.

The lady vanishes.

The gallery is crowded, thanks to the papers who have finally made the link between Fergal Rocco (infamous) singer/songwriter, and Rocco the painter.

At least most of the art critics have been kind. The gallery’s been quietly selling my work since I left the Royal College of Art, so there’s none of this ‘pop singer thinks he can paint’ stuff. That would have really pissed me off.

There are two things I’m serious about: my painting and my music.

There used to be three …

‘Oh, Fergal, you’re so clever,’ Nerissa sighs, lifting a face like a cream-skinned, innocent flower. ‘All these hidden talents.’

She’s small, pretty and curvaceous, and, judging from her short, select list of former conquests, finds fame in a man a powerful aphrodisiac. Nineteen going on immoral, and about as determined to get what she wants as Scarlett O’Hara. Sounds like her too, when she’s trying to get round me, all that fake ‘lil’ ol’ me’ stuff.

Daddy’s bought her everything she’s ever wanted – so far. He’d jib a bit at me, though, even if I were for sale, which I’m not – just available for a short loan.

She’s about the same age Tish was last time I saw her …

Tish.

Swimming out of the green paint like a mermaid; walking hesitantly into the gallery as if summoned by my subconscious.

For a minute I really do think she’s a figment of my imagination as she pauses in the doorway, gazing around. Her eyes seem dazzled by the lights, then they slide over the painting near me and meet mine, and it’s as if we are falling into each other all over again.

Someone coming in behind her touches her elbow to get past, breaking the contact, then she turns on her heel and is gone.

I only realise I’ve taken a stride forward when Nerissa’s weight on my arm brings me up like a sheet anchor.

‘What is it? Where are you going?’

I realise I’ve been holding my breath as though I’ve been swimming underwater for a long distance. ‘Nowhere,’ I sigh. ‘I’m going nowhere.’

Nerissa’s eyes flick from the painted girl behind me back to the empty doorway. She’s never going to be acclaimed as Intellectual of the Year, but she has her own sharp instinct to guide her.

‘That was the one – the girl in the picture, wasn’t it?’

‘The girl in the picture doesn’t exist.’

The lady vanishes.

Again.

She was the one.

Oh God! What on earth made me call in to see Fergal’s exhibition? And how could I have known he would be there, days after the show opened?

It was pure (or impure) curiosity – but I certainly wouldn’t have given in to it if it hadn’t been for James’s constant snide, jealous little remarks since he found out about Fergal. He even shoved the review of the exhibition under my nose, so it is all his fault.

My heart is still going like the clappers even now I’m safely home, and there’s a feeling like a hot nest of snakes in the pit of my stomach.

He saw me too. (Oh, damn and blast!) All those people, and the minute I walk through the door they part between us like the Red Sea before Moses. Like some invisible ley line …

(Wow – that’s just given me a great idea for a novel title – Ley Lines to Love! )

One glimpse of Fergal, and the pain and hurt feel as fresh as yesterday. But also something else, something I’m ashamed of: lust, I think. All those hot snakes. Very biblical.

It’s certainly something never stirred in me by James …

When our eyes met it was just like the first time, when I fell on him from a great height – except then he felt it too, I know he did.

This time he simply froze, expressionless, with that old painting he did of me right behind him so that I seemed to be swooping out towards myself over his shoulder.

Like coming face to face with your doppelganger (except that he’s given me red hair, for some reason, though at least it means that no one will recognise me).

James goes to art galleries only if I force him to, and I certainly won’t be doing that with this exhibition.

Poor old James, steady as a rock. I can’t let this ridiculous stirring-up of past emotions affect my feelings for him.

I may be racked with anger, lust, whatever – shaken but not stirred – but it can all be safely bottled up and infused into my next book. Imprisoned by Love between hard covers.