Jane Green - Bookends

‘I’m sorry, but we will still be here in the morning if you want to come and finish the book.’

And all this said with a polite smile. Eventually everybody leaves, and Bill, Rachel and I walk around the shop and put the books back where they belong, the shelves managing to get extraordinarily muddled up by the end of each day.

Bill and Rachel leave, and half an hour later I move over to the bar to see how Lucy is. She finishes wiping one of the tables, winks at me, then a few minutes later comes over to the table with two large milky coffees and a giant slab of juicy carrot cake with two forks.

Untying her apron she collapses into a chair and gives me a weary smile. ‘How are you doing, my darling Cath? And more importantly, what are you up to tonight?’ she asks. ‘Seeing James again or is it too soon?’

‘Much too soon. I haven’t even thanked him for last week. Damn. I meant to phone today.’

‘Why not phone now?’

‘No, it’s okay. I’ll wait until I get home.’

Lucy’s smile disappears for a while and she stares into space, her mind obviously on other things. Poor Lucy. Oh God. Do you think she knows?

‘Lucy? Are you okay?’

She looks at me with a smile and nods, but the expression in her eyes is one of sadness.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Well, no.’ She says finally, and I mentally brace myself because if she actually asks me if I know anything, I just don’t know what I’m going to say. Lie. You must lie. But I’m a hopeless liar. My face is, as Si always says, exactly like an open book.

I blush, I stammer, and I find it completely impossible to look the other person in the eye. Your classic textbook crap liar, so please God, don’t let Lucy ask me, don’t let her elicit my opinion on this.

‘What’s the matter?’ As if I don’t already know.

‘It’s us, I suppose. Josh and I,’ and the smile has well and truly disappeared, which is when I realize that I never see Lucy’s face in repose. She is always so bright, so animated, that seeing her like this makes it look as if all the stuffing has been knocked out of her. Which I suppose it has, if she’s found anything out.

‘Things just aren’t right,’ she continues after a long pause, looking up at me to see if I’m still listening.

‘I know that things have changed, what with me working here, and Josh suddenly having this really big deal, and that we’re not spending as much time together, but Josh seems to have taken it personally, and the less time he spends at home, the less time he seems to want to spend at home.’

‘Have you tried talking to him?’ I say, which is what I always say when I can’t think of anything else. Plus, I learned it from Lucy.

‘Ridiculous, isn’t it? Here I am, having recently done that damn counselling course, and I’m married to a man who completely clams up at the first hint of a problem. The worst thing is that normally I can draw things out of him, but I feel so guilty at not being there, not being at home any more, I seem to have lost the ability to communicate as well.’

‘Oh, Lucy,’ I say sadly, rubbing her arm to comfort her.

‘And I know this sounds ridiculous, but if I didn’t know better I’d think he was up to something.’

I can’t stop my sharp intake of breath, but luckily Lucy’s looking at the table and she neither hears nor sees.

‘Late nights practically every night, incommunicado because he’s locked in meetings. God,’ and she gives a rueful smile. ‘They’re supposed to be the classic signs of an affair, aren’t they?’

‘ Do you think he’s having an affair?’ I ask, in what I hope is a nonchalant manner.

‘Josh? Absolutely not,’ and she starts laughing. ‘But don’t think I haven’t thought about it. It’s just absolutely not up his street, although God knows I wouldn’t blame him, given the state of our sex life. I don’t even remember the last time we had sex, and Cath, this is so awful, but I’m just too blasted tired.

‘You know,’ she says, looking up at me, ‘often during the day I feel really rather sexy. I’ll read something or think about something, and I’ll think, how lucky I am to be going home to a man that I still really fancy, and maybe tonight we’ll make love and I spend the rest of the day looking forward to it.’

‘And?’

‘And then by the time I’ve got home and spent some time with Max, and had something to eat and jumped into a hot bath, I’m so exhausted I can hardly lift my feet, and it’s all I can do to actually stand up and walk from the bathroom to the bedroom, fling back the duvet and climb into bed. That uses up any surplus energy I might have had, and then that’s it. I’m fast asleep as soon as my head touches the pillow.’

‘Lucy, if it’s any consolation, it’s exactly the same for me. It is exhausting, running our own business, and I could seriously do with a holiday, but don’t the benefits outweigh the negatives?’

‘In your case, my darling, yes, because, and Cath, don’t take this the wrong way, but because you haven’t got a family, but in my case, I just don’t know any more.’ She sighs deeply. ‘I didn’t mean that. Of course the benefits outweigh the negatives, I suppose it’s just a question of finding the right balance.’

There’s a silence for a while and I try to lighten the tone. ‘Well, they always say that you stop having sex when you get married. You’re just proving the rule.’

‘But Josh and I always had the most marvellous sex life. Oh, Cath, I’m not embarrassing you, am I? Do you mind me talking to you like this? It’s just that I have to talk to someone or I’m simply going to explode. Or implode,’ she says sadly, ‘which is infinitely worse,’ and she smiles.

‘It’s fine. I don’t mind at all. I just wish I knew what to say.’

‘Josh and I always used to say how lucky we were that our sex life was still fantastic, but now…’

‘Did you mean what you said about not blaming him if he were to have an affair, then?’

‘No,’ she sighs. ‘Of course I didn’t mean that. I’d be devastated if he were having an affair. It would be horrific. But trust me, Cath, I know I feel like I’m going crazy, but I honestly don’t believe he would do that. I think, I hope, it’s just a phase we’re going through.’

‘All marriages have their ups and downs,’ I state sagely, praying that this is just a phase, that soon this will be over and Portia will have moved on.

‘I know,’ she says sadly. ‘It’s just that we’ve never hit a down like this before, and, although I know we’ll come out of it, it’s pretty bloody miserable when you’re stuck in it.’

‘What about pulling a big seduction number?’ I say suddenly, as Lucy looks puzzled. ‘You know, sexy underwear, stockings, the whole works. I always read those articles about women putting the sex back into their sex lives, so why shouldn’t you try it?’

‘You’re not serious?’ Lucy starts to laugh. ‘I’d look like a trussed-up chicken in one of those outfits.’

‘You wouldn’t.’ I start liking this idea more and more. ‘You’d look gorgeous. How about if Si and I took you on a shopping expedition? If nothing else we’d have a laugh, and God knows we all need a laugh right now.’

‘I’d feel ridiculous,’ Lucy laughs, pretending to be embarrassed, but I can tell her resistance is wearing thin. ‘Anyway, what on earth do you suppose I’d buy?’

‘I don’t know,’ I chuckle, ‘possibly a little French maid’s outfit? Or how about a nurse’s uniform, that always seems to do it.’

‘God no!’ Lucy starts to giggle. ‘How impossibly naff.’

‘But sexy,’ I wink, and the pair of us snort our coffee out through our noses.