Gracious Living (17 page)

But to speak with Elizabeth was impossible, there had been no contact with her for years. Lydia had tried to keep up some semblance of friendship after the fracas at the races, particularly as Lydia’s version of events pronounced both her and Adrian innocent, but the attempt was soon modified by Lydia’s capitulation to guilt, and the friendship gradually came to an end. These days they had few friends in common and those they did deliberately kept them apart. Adrian never mentioned his ex-wife, and although Elizabeth would be at the opening of Eden Park, so too, would thousands of other people. Except across a crowded distance, the likelihood of Lydia’s seeing her was small.

Although Elizabeth must be reconciled to the breakdown of her marriage by now; after all, it had been a good ten years. Besides,
how happy could she have been as Adrian’s wife anyway? There’d been Ginnie’s problems too. But never had she complained, never in all the years of her marriage had Lydia heard Elizabeth utter one word against Adrian, one word against the child – and there had been ample opportunity. In those days Lydia had spent almost as much time at the Dadswell home as she did at her own. In addition to the numerous dinners and barbecues that brought the Dadswell and Branch families together, there were literally hundreds of times when, with a pot of fresh coffee on the stove, Lydia and Elizabeth would chat for hours about all manner of things, but never Adrian, never the Dadswell marriage.

Except once, and then it was not directly about Adrian or the marriage and neither were Elizabeth’s comments made specifically to Lydia. It had been about fifteen years ago, at a birthday party for Ginnie, Ginnie’s second birthday although her very first party. Elizabeth hadn’t thought it appropriate to have a party the previous year for, apart from the Branch children and Paulé and Oliver Warby’s James, there had been no one else to ask. But now, with her special mother and babies group, all that had changed.

She made out the list: Penelope Roscoe and Sam, Lauren Warneke and Sherrie, Kate and Walter, Vivienne Sweet whom Elizabeth had met through Kate, Lydia with Kerri and Timothy – this was well before the twins were born – Paulé Warby and little James. ‘Do you think everyone will mix?’ Elizabeth had asked Lydia, and Lydia had assured her they would; after all, they were there for the children.

The guests arrived at eleven dressed in their best. They made such an odd assortment that Lydia was pleased she had spoken with her two beforehand and made them promise to behave, particularly Kerri who was five and inclined to be outspoken. Elizabeth had gone to such a lot of trouble. There was pin the tail on the donkey, blind man’s buff and an easter egg hunt with an extra big easter egg for Walter because his birthday, his third, had not long passed; and there was pass the parcel with paper everywhere and much tearing and throwing of paper balls. The party food was a delight: hundreds of thousands on bread and butter, chocolate frogs in a pond of green jelly, marshmallows with
faces made from Smarties and licorice pieces, lamingtons, and an ice-cream cake in the shape of a house. At the end of it all the mothers pronounced themselves full and exhausted and the children fell asleep; except for Walter who rarely slept and Kerri who said she was too big and climbed into her mother’s lap and was soon asleep too.

There is a certain atmosphere, a certain closeness when surrounded by sleeping children. Voices are hushed, bodies lean towards one another in an effort to hear: there is an intimacy where there might otherwise be none. And so it was on that day, when, surrounded by sleeping children, Lydia found herself asking Kate how she managed without a husband to help her. In retrospect she was shocked at herself, such a personal question to a total stranger. But Kate had not been in the least perturbed.

‘But
are
they such a help, these husbands?’ She had asked.

‘Andrew certainly is,’ Penny Roscoe said. ‘And not just with the children and household duties. It’s what he gives me, his support and interest.’

‘I’d say the Roscoe marriage is very much an exception,’ Kate said. ‘What about the rest of you?’

The silence was not long, just long enough to be noticed, then mumblings of how no marriage is perfect, and all men have their little ways, and you have to take the good with the bad. Kate accused them of hiding behind platitudes, Vivienne advised her to tread gently, and Elizabeth, sweet unflappable Elizabeth, told Vivienne that Kate should be allowed to speak, after all, the conversation had come about because of a question directed to her. So Kate had her say, and an elegant piece it was, yet the outcome was all wrong – or so it had seemed to Lydia. Kate was suggesting that marriages were maintained,
their
marriages were maintained, by pretence, ignorance and a dreadful all-consuming desire for normality.

‘I can’t tell you how often I sit with my married girlfriends and hear them complain about their husbands,’ Kate said. ‘They all say how Fred or Tom or Harry seems uninterested in them, how he doesn’t notice their new hairstyle, the clean house, the trouble taken over the evening meal; how he never discusses anything
of importance with them – one of my friends describes the conversations she has with her husband as marginally less interesting than a shopping list – how he’s always too tired to talk or go to a film, how even the children seem too much for him. Each of them describes a litany of neglect, each shows in the most heart-rending way how her husband takes her for granted; each talks about how happy and energetic her husband is when he’s with his mates and how bored and lethargic when there’s only the family around. And each concludes with a platitude: “Things could be worse”, “At least he doesn’t beat me”, “Oh well, boys will be boys”, and each says she knows he loves her. “How do you know?” I ask. “He ignores you, he doesn’t notice what you do for him and the children, he seems bored with you, how do you know he loves you?” And my friends answer that they just do.’

‘And it’s true,’ Lauren Warneke said, ‘you do just know.’

‘Of course you do,’ said Lydia.

And then Elizabeth was speaking – private, uncomplaining Elizabeth. ‘You don’t. If he doesn’t show it, if he can’t explain it, if he treats you no differently to the washing machine or the vacuum cleaner, you can’t say he loves you. You might want him to love you, might pretend that his silence, his neglect, his treating you like a machine is love, but it’s not. It’s silence, it’s neglect and it’s treating you like a machine. You can’t assume love when there’s no sign of it, nor enjoyment or pleasure when all there is is habit and convenience. And while you can pretend all you like, it won’t make him love you, won’t even make him notice you, all it does is preserve the marriage and avoid scenes. Although for most of us that seems to be enough. For most women the alternatives to marriage are far worse than an unhappy marriage.’ She shrugged an apology to Kate and Vivienne. ‘Marriage gives women like me something where otherwise there would be nothing.’

‘You were an artist once,’ Vivienne said.

‘Pipe dreams, my art was a fantasy. No one would have taken me seriously.’

‘Do they take you seriously now?’

‘As a mother, yes. As wife to Adrian, probably, but only because I behave well, don’t make scenes. Men don’t like scenes, men don’t like to be caught out.’ Lydia was feeling distinctly uncomfortable, but Elizabeth was taking no notice of her, rather she seemed to be talking to Kate and Vivienne. ‘Men like pretence because they want everything to be just right. Normal.’ And she went on to speak about Janine, a teacher from art school, a woman of thirty-five who had been married for ten years. ‘Married to John, a minister of the church and a child psychologist who Janine guessed was having an affair with one of his patients, or to be more accurate, the mother of one of his patients. Time and again she confronted him and on each occasion he denied it. She begged him to admit to the affair so at least they could work out their problems, work together to save the marriage. But still he denied everything. This went on for months. After a while John counteracted the accusations with one of his own: Janine was being paranoid, he said, she needed professional help. Eventually, believing her husband could not possibly lie to her, and certainly not for months on end, she thought she must be a little crazy and agreed to see a psychiatrist.

‘The week she was to see the doctor John was away at a conference. Janine was nervous about the appointment, wanted reassurance, so rang the hotel where he was staying. She gave her husband’s name and said he was part of the conference group. The clerk assured her there was no conference at the hotel that week, but John’s name was listed and he would put her through to his room. A woman answered, Janine heard her call out to John. When John took the phone he explained that a few of the delegates had come to his room for discussion of some of the issues raised in the day’s proceedings. He asked about Janine’s week and wished her well for the appointment, advising her to be totally frank with the doctor.

‘After she hung up Janine went to the car. An hour later she was at the hotel. She inquired at the desk and went directly to John’s room. She knocked, moments later her husband opened the door dressed only in a dressing gown. There was a woman inside similarly attired. John told Janine that the woman, one of
the delegates, was consulting him over a serious problem with her son; she was very upset, he said, and Janine’s intrusion, her insane jealousy, would undo any good achieved thus far. But there is no conference, Janine said, there are no delegates; who is this woman? It is as I told you, John said, she is consulting with me, she is a patient of mine. You’re paranoid, he said, insane, he said, she’s my patient, he said, pointing to the woman in the dressing gown, in his hotel room at eleven o’clock at night.

‘Men don’t like to be questioned,’ Elizabeth said, ‘and they don’t like to be found out. They’re happy with the pretence.’

Vivienne and Kate waited for one of the married women to speak. Lydia was very quiet, she wanted none of this conversation. It was Lauren who spoke.

‘An extreme example, Elizabeth, you can’t base all men and all marriages on that.’

‘Extreme examples help portray ordinary occurrences more clearly,’ Vivienne said.

Elizabeth nodded her agreement.

‘So what happened to Janine and John?’ Kate asked. ‘You can’t stop in the middle of the story.’

‘Well, the marriage dragged on another three months, during which time John continued to accuse Janine of pathological behaviour. But she was less inclined to believe him now, and – ’

‘She should have just left,’ Kate interrupted, ‘and the fact that she didn’t simply proves my case about women and marriage.’

‘Yes, in a way, Kate, but there was something else with Janine, something else with all women who have committed themselves to a marriage. She had believed John to be a kind, sensitive, humane man. After all, he was a minister of the church and a well-respected psychologist. As the marriage ground down she was faced with two possibilities, neither of which was palatable: either she had misunderstood John all these years and he had always been a liar and a cheat, and if that were the case it said little for her own judgement, or he was ill, enduring some sort of crisis alone.’

‘Or the other woman offered a little more fun and excitement,’ Kate suggested.

‘Yes, that had already occurred to her, so she had lost ten pounds, bought new clothes, had her hair restyled, read some recent psychology books, and still it made no difference. Only then did she look around for another reason, any reason would do as long as her husband of ten years was not revealed as a bastard. “I’m sure he still loves me,” she would say to her friends. “This woman must have bewitched him.” And her friends, wanting her to see reason, told her the current woman was not the first. “You can’t prove that,” Janine would say and then quickly change the topic.

‘Finally John left, on a Tuesday while Janine was at work. He stripped the house of most of their possessions, left a letter from his solicitor on the table: the house was jointly owned, he wanted to liquidate his share. Janine was angry, but not overly so, still she insisted that something had gone wrong, something had caused him to behave in this uncharacteristic way.

‘Six months later I saw a brochure advertising a seminar on relationship breakdown.’ Lydia started fiddling with Kerri’s dress, relationship breakdown? What was Elizabeth doing with a brochure on relationship breakdown? She wanted the story to finish, wondered how long she could sit quietly while guilt ricocheted through her. But the story was not finished, not quite. Elizabeth continued, ‘The brochure listed John among its speakers. His topic? “The Pain of Separation” and he was described as an expert in the area. As for Janine, she had been ruined, emotionally and financially, by this new expert in the pain of separation, by this man who had lied and cheated and brought a ten-year marriage to an end, who had felt no qualms whatsoever in trying to convince his wife she was crazy. This expert on separation had been perfectly happy to do all this without a single word of explanation.’

‘That’s awful,’ Lauren said. ‘And were there any children?’

‘None, John didn’t want them.’ There was a silence and then Elizabeth turned to Kate. ‘Are you lonely?’ Kate shook her head. ‘And what about support? Are you lacking support?’ Again Kate shook her head, she had a circle of devoted friends. ‘And money? I know you don’t have much, but you manage?’ Yes she did. ‘And
I’ll guarantee your self-esteem is healthier than mine. You study, you have a job, you don’t waste precious energy gilding a life that collapses under close scrutiny.’

There seemed to be no answer to that. Shortly afterwards, the children woke and everyone collected their belongings and returned to their homes. It would have been preferable, Lydia decided later, if Elizabeth had shown some emotion during the story, had broken down, asked for comfort. But she had been sure and fluent, almost pragmatic; she knew what she was talking about. A few days after the party Lydia asked Adrian whether he was sure Elizabeth was unaware of their relationship. ‘Absolutely,’ he said. And then he started to laugh. ‘You’re not becoming paranoid are you?’