I, on the other hand, am feeling excellent. Tonight has imbued me with a new vigor, a reminder of the reasons I am doing this. I’ve been feeling so out of sorts, I’d lost sight of my connection with Jack. The way he made me feel when we first met. How he seemed to pick me out of the crowd, focus his attentions on me and me alone. I felt a fraction of that this evening—those quiet, shocked murmurs of sympathy topping up a tank I didn’t know had emptied. Now I just need Jack to fill it to the brim.
Before I enter the sitting room, where I can hear the TV blaring, I take a moment to compose myself in the mirror. There’s a flush to my cheeks—likely a product of my excitable mood. It is not quite the impression I want to give off, so I hunch to make myself look smaller and hope he doesn’t notice.
But Jack doesn’t even look at me when I enter the room. I know heknows I’m there, because he leans forward and mutes the TV. Another episode of that awful reality program plays on the screen. He really should be watching something educational. True crime is a personal favorite of mine.
“Where thefuckhave you been?” His voice is so deathly quiet, I barely catch it.
I shift so I’m standing in front of the television. It’s a bold move for a weak woman, but I want his full attention. Once I’m in position, I allow myself to cringe slightly away from him, like his tone is barbed enough to cause me physical pain. “Jack. I’m sorry. I just—things have been so odd between us. I just needed to get out for a few hours.”
“I’m so sorry that it’s all become such aninconvenienceto you. That my asking you to do a few things for me while you live here rent-free is such a problem. Do you know where I’ve been tonight? I went to an AA meeting, because I promisedyouI’d get sober, and this is how you repay me. Fucking disappearing. No note. No message. Have you even checked your phone? I must’ve called you twenty times.”
Truthfully, I did check my phone. I saw those missed calls, and I liked them. There is power in silence. I liked that he had cause to chase me for once.
Outwardly, I hold my hands up. “I haven’t checked my phone, I’m sorry. I’m grateful, I really am. It’s just…all been a lot. With Mum, with—” I break off. I was about to say Freddie, but I sense now might not be the time.
“I asked you where you’ve been.” That quietness again. It would cause a feebler woman to quake, so that is exactly what I do. I don’t want to tell him that I was at the group. It bolstered me so much that I fully intend to keep going, and I sense that revealing where I was tonight might cause him to do something rash, like forbid me from attending again. He’s been so reactive recently, so on edge.
“I’ve been walking,” I say. “Just trying to clear my head. Thingsbetween us have been so strained. I don’t understand what I’ve done wrong. Everything was going so well, and now it’s like you don’t want to be around me anymore.”
An echo from my conversation with Freddie. Jack stares at me like he’s trying to read the veracity of this claim in my face, so I keep still. Utterly earnest: brows pulled together, eyes wide, not leaving his. Whatever he sees there must convince him, because he sags and the fight seems to leave him.
“You’re right. I’m sorry, Iris. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I always get like this at the beginning of a relationship. It’s something I know I need to work on. I think, subconsciously, I’m trying to test how strong the connection is by pulling away. Seeing how much I can push you. Testing what it would take for you to leave.”
This confession feels like he is opening a door, allowing me in again. Granting me access to the inner workings of his mind. I rush toward him. “I’m not going to leave you, Jack. I would never do that,” I say, and I mean every word. I love that he felt safe enough to admit to this darker portion of his personality. Darkness exists in everyone, after all. I know that, probably better than most.
He takes my hand, presses it hard to his lips. “I do understand needing to walk. I’m sorry. I was just worried about you. But it makes sense why you’d need to get out. After Alice died, I walked for miles.”
The comment snags on something distant at the back of my mind. Something that recalls Matt, then Catherine, then Alice.
“Jack,” I say slowly, tentatively. I’d rather he didn’t explode again, ruin our truce. “Your mum. She mentioned something about Alice going into remission?”
His mouth opens, then closes again. His eyes snap quickly to the left and then back to me. There is a long pause. “She did,” he says quietly. “And then”—he swallows—“then the cancer came back.”
And though there is nothing about his tone to suggest he isnottelling the truth, I log the way his eyes flickered. And I know that he is lying. I don’t press the issue, because he comes toward me then, envelops me in a hug, and the smell of him is enough to chase such frivolous thoughts away. As his arms fold round me, I’m sure I catch the faint smell of whisky on his breath.
—
The next morningfinds me standing in front of Alice’s wardrobe again. It’s the first time since Martha caught me snooping; until now, I haven’t dared go back. I have tried to avoid Martha since our first encounter. As someone who is doing her very best to uphold an image of a submissive housewife, it makes sense that I shrink away from her whenever she enters a room. But working in my favor today is the fact that Martha is not coming in. Jack mentioned it this morning in bed as he stroked my cheek (in a blatant but welcome attempt to make up for last night). I saw my opportunity and snatched at it.
I was able to read between the lines last night. I have simply not been doing enough to prove to Jack that I am in this for the long run. He doesn’t yet trust my feelings for him. That I’m not going to leave him like Alice did.
I run my hand across the clothes again. They’re all so beautiful. I’ll start with something simple, I think. I inhale the perfume that wafts from the cupboard and begin rummaging.
I settle on a pair of high-quality jeans and a high-necked cashmere jumper. Thankfully, we’re roughly the same size. When I pull the jumper over my head, the scent envelops me. I tuck the necklace—embossed with the “A”—beneath the collar, then, standing in front of the full-length mirror, pull on the jeans. They suit me. Amazing how something so simple can change an appearance so completely. They are the perfectaccompaniment to my new persona. I twist in front of the mirror, liking the way the clothes hug my figure—thinner since Freddie died.
The buzz of my phone from the bed breaks me from my self-admiration. An unknown number. I don’t answer. It might be a scam caller or—worse yet—Mum with a new number. The phone rings out, and a text pops up a few seconds later.
Please ring me back. I really need to talk to you.
Mum, then. While she might have forgotten the way she spoke to me, I certainly have not, and it will take more than a few feeble attempts at contact to get back into my good graces. I silence the phone.
I spend a few hours practicing in front of the mirror. Perhaps I’ve been a littletoomeek. Rolled over too easily. Alice’s clothes, in their brightness, are not suggestive of someone who shrank completely into the background. Kind, but with some steel in her backbone. I’m pleased with this deduction. The dull monotony of domestic chores has begun to grate on me.
Thirty-five
I practice for themoment Jack gets home until I’m completely satisfied. I position myself on the stairs, trying out several different poses. I settle for one hand draped over the banister, neck long and erect—as though he has just caught me descending for the evening, dressed in Alice’s exquisite clothes and looking forward to nothing more than spending an evening with him. When I inquire about his day, I will do so as though his response is the most important part of mine.
I’m so excited to help steer Jack back to the man he was at the beginning that I even allow myself the indulgence of reflection. This feels like a seminal moment of transition for us—a moment when Jack and I can take stock of everything that has brought us together and move forward in the knowledge that we are entirely committed to each other. It only seems right, now, to look back on everything that has led me to this moment. The learning curves, the setbacks, the deaths.
