Husbands (27 page)

I watch my wife with undeniable fascination. She is a chameleon. One minute she’s drinking with me in pubs, treating me to her wit and honesty, trailing me through memories that I’d long ago shut away, allowing me to be delighted by those said memories. The next, she is cold and dull. Or am I being too kind? Calling her a chameleon is too poetic. Is she just a whore?

Obviously, it’s unlikely to be a comfortable situation for either of us. But I would understand her better if she stuttered and stammered throughout our meetings. She doesn’t. She appears calm, cool and aloof. I’m angry at, and jealous of, her ability to disengage. Am I so disposable? Bella is the ultimate iceberg. When you meet her, you get to see about five per cent of what’s available. The rest is submerged in dark, murky waters. I am a fated
Titanic
.

On the other hand, Laura is an open book. She oozes
integrity and sincerity from every pore. She’s fun, good in the sack, interesting and no pushover. So why do I find myself continually looking at Belinda’s boobs throughout dinner (currently strapped up, high and inviting)?

We eat a bit and drink an enormous amount. Or, at least, everyone except Belinda drinks an enormous amount. Laura and Philip are knocking them back because they are on holiday and are carefree. I drink a lot because I’m in the middle of some sort of ghoulish nightmare and haven’t the moral fibre or immoral impudence to manage the situation without the aid of alcohol. I imagine Bella – because, hell, there’s no sign of Belinda tonight – isn’t drinking to demonstrate how much more self-control she has than me.

I’m insulted and furious that she treats me with such contempt in front of her ‘husband’. She practically ignores me. She hasn’t congratulated me on winning the King of Kings heats, even though she’s here as my guest. She doesn’t manage so much as a polite good-mannered chuckle when I make a joke. She can’t even be bothered to chat. I can see she might not feel comfortable enquiring about my most wild and romantic moments, my marital status or even which woman first broke my heart. Accepted. But she could chat about some of the non-consequential things that mates chat about – the weather, football results, how to make a decent whisky sour.

Whisky sour. Good idea. I’ll have a double as a chaser to this second bottle of champagne.

What power does Belinda McDonnel wield over me? It was the same way back when… She was playing out some childish romantic notion of eloping and I was just
the sap prepared to go the distance. Why did I instantly agree to tell grade A lies to my new girlfriend to help her out? How did I let her trick me into believing that we were back on a path that was developing into something like a genuine friendship? Because here’s the thing, this will make you laugh – I thought I
meant
something to her. The other night, when we were sat in All Bar One, the alcoholic equivalent to Starbucks, cookie-cut but reliable, I believed that there was a connection between us. I thought we’d started to weave gossamer-thin threads of deliberation, laughter and trust that amounted to the beginnings of an authentic relationship. But it was nothing. It meant nothing. I was deluded. Bella Edwards is a hard, manipulative, controlling bitch. And I am a weak, feckless and gullible idiot.

She’s got great legs.

Really fantastic for her age. Like, they’ve got better. I’ve always found the back of the knee particularly erotic and Bella’s is toned and strong-looking.

The whisky sour has been and gone. I’ve drunk too much.

‘How much have you had to drink?’ whispers Bella, as if she’s read my mind. I didn’t think we could still do that. She’s taken the opportunity of Philip chatting to the pianist and Laura visiting the loos, to interrogate me.

‘Not enough,’ I reply sullenly.

‘I think you should go easy.’

‘I don’t give a fuck what you think.’

Bella looks astonished, and that’s satisfying. Who is she to tell me how much I should drink? I order a beer just to annoy her.

Laura comes back to the table. ‘Stevie, baby, you’d better not drink much more. You have the photo shoot tomorrow. You don’t want to feel too rough,’ she says, with a smile.

‘You might be right, gorgeous,’ I lean across the table to kiss her. I kiss her in a way that yells randy. I gently bite her lower lip and push my tongue into her mouth. I let the bottom of my beer glass nudge up against her nipple. I’m not sure who I’m trying to get a reaction from, Laura or Bella. I’m too drunk to care.

Philip rejoins the table. ‘Ah, young love.’

‘Exactly that,’ I agree with a grin.

I still haven’t actually told Laura that I love her, not in so many words. I’m not trying to play games. The opposite. I don’t want to say anything too definite, with this mess hanging over my head. Laura doesn’t play games, she doesn’t even want to. It’s one of the many great things about her. She’s refreshingly uncomplicated.

Women are so unnecessarily complex. I mean besides Belinda – who is off the scale when it comes to creating needless difficulties in her life and the lives of those unfortunate enough to come into contact with her – other birds are not much better. They lie about their age, the number of men they’ve slept with and their weight, as a matter of course. They lie about fancying married men, their mates’ boyfriends and men with money, without batting an eyelid. They lie about the colour of their hair, their ability to eat chocolate and stay thin and how much exercise they do each week. It’s so pointless. We know you lie! Men know women lie!

But Laura is different. She thinks like a guy. That first
evening out together, she commented that getting to know someone is complicated enough without pretending to be something you’re not. I choked on my beer. She is
so
right. It’s so simple. So obvious. Her doctrine is the polar opposite to the doctrine Bella lives by.

And the one I’m living by. Holy fuck. Hardly a comforting thought.

‘Hey, buddy, I told them who you are,’ says Philip and he points towards the pianist.

‘Who I am?’ I ask. Who the hell
am
I? Laura’s boyfriend or Belinda’s husband? My head is spinning.

‘An Elvis King of Kings finalist. The pianist was really impressed.’ I shrug modestly. ‘He wants you to get up and sing something.’

‘Go on, baby. Go for it,’ Laura screeches excitedly.

‘No, I’m too pissed,’ I object.

‘I’ve never heard you perform,’ says Philip, ‘I’d really like to.’

‘Please, please, please,’ says Laura, giggling.

Other diners tune into the commotion and start to encourage me. They call out tracks they would like me to sing, and it’s a buzz, there’s no denying it. I’ve been in similar situations in the UK, at wedding parties if the guests are drunk enough, which they usually are. At the competition heats the crowds get fervent but there’s nothing like the enthusiasm of the Yanks. They have no embarrassment about encouraging or complimenting. It’s charmingly refreshing. Notably, Bella is not cajoling me on to the stage – she never has. It’s her reticence as much as everyone else’s encouragement that does it for me.

I walk towards the stage, wobbling slightly, it’s alcohol,
not nerves. I’d only noticed a pianist before I stood up, but in true Vegas style, a small band has materialized where it was needed. Beside the pianist, there is now a drummer and some guys on strings. They all flash me hundred-watt grins and ask what’s it to be.

Good question.

Drunk, there’s a serious chance that I’ll become pathetically slushy, indiscreet or angry. It seems impossible to choose a song without it appearing loaded and especially significant. Outright, I reject ‘Love Me Tender’, ‘Don’t Be Cruel’ and ‘Hard Headed Woman’ although just thinking about the last option makes me snigger to myself.
And
there’s the question who am I singing for? Laura or Belinda? Both will assume I’m singing for them. Whether I belt out a showpiece or croon a ballad, they will layer on tricky significance. As women, they won’t be able to help themselves, they will find a deeper meaning where none is intended. So, what I choose matters. I wish I knew the words to ‘Old Shep’. That alone would be safe.

I look back at the table. Laura is standing, looking shiny and Amazonian. She grins, waves and then puts her fingers in her mouth to wolf whistle. She looks thrilled for me and thrilled to be with me. I see nothing in her but uncomplicated pleasure. I smile back at her. I turn to Belinda. Bella is looking grave and nervous. She seems to be shrinking before my eyes. She’s struggling to meet my stare. I see nothing but regret and mess.

Both women fascinate me.

I start to sing ‘The Wonder of You’. I have no idea which one I’m singing to.

Philip

‘Wow, can that man hold a tune!’

‘He’s not bad,’ says Bella.

‘Frankly, I’m in awe.’

I unbutton my shirt and fold it carefully before placing it into the laundry bag at the bottom of the wardrobe. Our suite is so stunning that I don’t want to mess it up. Bella doesn’t have the same scruples; I wander into the bathroom where I’m assaulted by countless lotions and potions that appear to be positively scrambling to make an escape bid from their jars and packaging. It would never cross Bella’s mind to put a lid back on a bottle. I reunite various tubes and tubs with their tops, I then wipe away the messy gunk smeared around the jars and start humming ‘The Wonder of You’ that Stevie sang in the bar. I can’t get the tune out of my head. I can’t remember the words exactly, something about her love being everything to him, making him feel like a king. Good words. Simple, straightforward, effective.

Stevie is talented, far better than I had anticipated. Not that I’m in any way a connoisseur of Elvis tribute acts but I have seen two or three in my time: one at university, another at a corporate do, and most memorably a cluster of Chinese Elvises – guys who double as waiters at a very
trendy (in a kitsch sort of way) restaurant in Clapham. But Stevie is something else, far better than anything I’ve ever seen, even on TV.

The funny thing is Stevie doesn’t even look much like Elvis but when he got hold of the mic tonight, there were moments when I really thought I was in the presence of the King. How crazy is that? He captured the exact melodious tone that Elvis was famous for. A tone that conveyed a blend of sweet, deferential pleading and soulful sincerity. I don’t think it was just champers, I felt a huge lump in my throat and for a short time I found that I couldn’t swallow, not even alcohol.

‘La, la. Laah. La,’ I hum.

‘Give it a rest, Phil,’ says Bella, joining me in the bathroom. It’s clear she means the humming rather than my cleaning-up efforts so I stop, except in my head. It’s an enormous bathroom with two basins and two mirrors. We stand side by side, her cleaning her teeth, me clearing up her mess. I love the way Bella cleans her teeth. It’s so precise, so deliberate and thorough. She always brushes for three whole minutes and she flosses twice a day, unbelievable. I like her purposeful, painstaking approach to cleaning her teeth because it shows she has the ability to be dedicated to something. She may not be dedicated to a career or even to keeping her wardrobe and make-up tidy but she has a high level of personal hygiene and would never go out without lipstick. She’s conscientious that way.

‘I’m going to have a quick shower,’ she says. ‘I’m surprised that there’s so much smoking allowed. I thought it was outlawed in the US.’

Bella can’t stand the smell of smoke and won’t be able to sleep unless she’s washed the stale lingering smell off her body and hair. I wait for her in bed.

Fifteen minutes later she joins me. She’s wearing a matching vest and pants set in a lilac colour. It’s cute rather than sexy. She rarely comes to bed naked nowadays. I tell myself that it would be unreasonable to expect it here as the air con is ferocious: she wouldn’t want to catch a chill. I put down the guide to Las Vegas and ask, ‘Did you have a nice night?’

‘Good, thanks. Yes.’ She’s rubbing cream into her hands.

‘Even though you missed out on the champagne?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why didn’t you have a glass?’

‘Didn’t feel like it.’

‘Still got a headache?’

‘Something like that.’

I consider leaving my line of questioning. It’s possible, likely even, that Bella does have a headache. She’s complained about the constant jangle of slot machines and the tinny music from the casinos. But why do I get the feeling that something more than a headache is bothering her?

Of late she’s veered – almost hysterically – from shrill and nagging, to silent and uncooperative, from delightful to tearful, then back again. Bella is normally so level, so together, but at the moment I feel I’m married to two women: reliable, kind, calm, even-tempered Bella and the hysterical, cutting, complaining banshee, who jumps when the phone rings and sometimes refuses to answer
the door. She’s not sleeping well and has got into the habit of skipping meals – and sex too, sadly. Giving up alcohol follows a number of evenings on which she has staggered home seriously drunk.

I’ve given the matter a great deal of thought and the only possible explanation is that she does not like being idle. Bella may not have ever enjoyed career progression as such, but she has a strong work ethic and had never had a day of unemployment in her life, until we married. I persuaded her to take some time to consider what it is that she wants to do with her life. I’m beginning to think that was a mistake. It pains and worries me to say it, but recently Bella has been showing some of the classic signs of depression, sometimes manic, sometimes lethargic, sometimes ecstatic and other times tearful.

A friend of mine, Bob, is one of those life coach gurus. He worked with me in the City and then when he became a father, he did the standard reevaluation of his life thingy. He came to the conclusion that his life was lacking in some of the essentials; time with family, a sense of pride or fulfilment in his career and a day-to-day sense of meaning. Serious stuff. So he chucked it all in and retrained as a life coach in the hope that he could help other people reach similar conclusions about their lives. I wasn’t particularly supportive of his career choice and commented that I hoped everyone he advised had already paid off their mortgage on the six-bedroom pile in Notting Hill before throwing in their lucrative professions, just as he had. Frankly, I’ve always thought that life coaching was a bit of nonsense. For God’s sake, what’s the world come to if you need a life coach to help
you make every decision – from whom to marry to how you take your tea?