Honor put on her running shoes and black lycra shorts. Running along the undercliff would release those endorphins to brighten her mood, expand her lungs and send oxygen-rich blood to her brain — hopefully allowing her to work out whether she ought to call on Martyn. ‘Hi!’ And, maybe, ‘As I realise that you’re avoiding my calls and not answering my texts I thought I’d coming banging on your door . . .’ Yes, why not make a guy feel cornered and defensive? Way to go.
It wasn’t that she was hoping to encounter him out running, on neutral territory or anything . . . But running the route he ran every morning, at exactly the time he usually ran it, wouldn’t hurt. She could run it two or three times before she fell over from exhaustion, probably.
The weather was very British. Patchy August sun but a chill breeze, tourists sticking obstinately to their summer clothes as if that would warm up the day. Honor paused at a bench down on the Undercliff Walk to do her stretches, taking her time and stretching right out. Then she set off slowly, to warm up, but soon she was running comfortably, weaving gently between strolling tourists and young families with bikes and buggies, teenagers with skateboards.
And other runners.
Her wish came true when a runner who threw a long shadow drew level and slowed his pace to match hers. She risked a glance up at him, his hair streaming back from his face and managed, ‘Hi,’ without disturbing her breathing.
He responded, ‘Yeah, hi,’ neutrally. He wasn’t even breathing fast, yet.
They completed the distance to Rottingdean together and ran up the steps and down the slope, up the steps and down the slope. When Honor felt as if the bones would slide out of her legs if she had to do one more circuit, Martyn jumped down on to the stones and set off back in the direction they’d come.No way!Lungs beginning to burn, she forced herself to keep up on the concrete. When he jumped back up and ran into the underpass, she followed, their footsteps magnified and echoey, then out of the underpass, around the corner, across the parking area and into the park.
Martyn took only one run up the grass slope, then walked along the brow, beside some houses, cooling down. Shakily, Honor flopped down on to the grass, chest heaving.
Presently, after he’d performed a load of sensible stretches, he crossed his legs and folded down beside her.
From their vantage point, they could look down on the children’s play park, the skateboard park and some courts wheremen were gathering, stringing up a volleyball net. One shaded his eyes and looked up to Martyn, shouting a question.
Martyn waved and shouted back, ‘Five minutes, Jamie.’
Only five minutes. Words began to burst from Honor’s mouth. ‘So, aren’t we even friends, now?’
For the first time, he looked right at her. ‘I don’t know what we are. I’ve been thinking about nothing else but that you didn’t even trust me enough to tell me Robina’s your mother.’
She’d had over a day to mentally run this conversation and had her bullet points all ready. ‘You said I was tainted even when I went to work with her. You call her your stalker.’
He ripped up a handful of grass. ‘Fuck it, Honor! Having an imperfect mother isn’t a foreign concept to me. I would have understood.’
She kept her eyes on his face, on the well-defined profile, set and grim. ‘You’re pissed with me. And I don’t think it’s because I hid my unsatisfactory parentage. It’s because Stef turned up — even though I had been open with you about my status.’
Silently, he turned and watched the men below tossing around a volleyball, boosting it up into the air with forearms, punching it down again with fists. He chewed a stalk of grass. Finally, ‘Maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s unfair but, actually, you’re right and it’s all about your “stattus”, and yes, I am pretty pissed. Maybe more at me than you. Because I knew you were married and what the potential for trouble was. Now the trouble has arrived, it’s eating me.’ Climbing to his feet, he set off down the slope.
‘I told him I want a divorce,’ she called after him, without moving.
He halted. She watched him trade off his curiosity against his dudgeon. Then he reversed his route and let himself back down beside her on the cool grass, closer, this time. ‘What did he say?’ His brown eyes were cautious.
Scrunching up her knees, she laid her cheek on them, holding his gaze. ‘He said no way. It was awful,’ she admitted. ‘He stayed and stayed, arguing, and he’s hanging around, still hoping to change my mind. He says he loves me. I told him I can’t live his life any more but it’s hard to hurt him. I guess it goes against my character.’ A tear tipped, unwanted, on to her cheek.
He let his fingertips touch her arm. Pause. Hover. Stroke. Warm. Delicious. His voice was soft. But regretful. ‘That sounds like too much Honor, not enough Freedom.’
‘And you sound so good-mannered about not taking something that’s not yours. So fuckingEnglish.’
His thumb was drawing tiny circles on her arm, creating goosebumps. ‘I am English. Which brings me to the small matter of us living three thousand miles apart.’
‘People make it work.’ She slid her hand on to his.
‘Like your parents?’
‘Your parents lived in the same country and that didn’t work a whole lot better, did it?’
‘Fair point,’ he admitted. ‘But you need to sort yourself out. I don’t want some half-arsed triangular relationship with me as the villain, the adulterer. I hate that kind of guy, the weasel who sneaks around. I should have kept a lid on things because, where you’re concerned, I don’t share. I want all of you.’ He leaned in and kissed her nose.
She sniffed as he jerked suddenly to his feet and the tears began to trickle down her cheeks. ‘Martyn?’
He turned.
She tried to swallow away the misery that made her throat stiff. ‘I’d already told him that I wanted out, before . . . you and me. You believe that, don’t you?’
