Saint Kate of the Cupcake: The Dangers of Lust and Baking (28 page)

“I’m not gay!” he shouted as he came into the room.

“You want to fuck other men. That means you are gay, you idiot!” We were only centimeters apart, screaming at each other. His face was red, rage twisting his features until they were no longer beautiful and transformed into something ugly.

“That’s all you wanted—sex, sex, sex. You’re a fucking nymphomaniac!”

“What I wanted was a man, not a repressed mummy’s boy who would rather lie to everyone than admit, even to himself, that he wants to fuck men,” I hissed back. “That’s it. I’m done!” I shook my head back and forth. “This marriage is over.”

With an inarticulate roar, he grabbed me and threw me face down onto the bed.

I reached out with my hands to brace myself, and then he was on top of me, pinning me so I was bent over the edge, my face pressed into the mattress. I turned my head so I could breathe, but otherwise his weight held me immobile. I couldn’t work out what he was doing, until I heard the sound of his belt buckle undoing. Even then I couldn’t really believe what was happening. I felt his hands fumble with my underwear, pulling them down so hard it scraped my skin.

“No, Jack, don’t!” I cried.

“This is what you want, isn’t it?” he spat against my neck.

“Stop, please…” I pleaded, but he kept going.

All I heard was “hate you, hate you, hate you” in time with the bright starbursts of pain.

Finally it was over, and he collapsed on top of me.

“I love you,” he cried, great heaving sobs escaping him as he clung to me. We slid backward onto our knees on the floor, Jack holding me against him as he wept. I felt numb, in shock. I didn’t fight him, just sat there trying not to feel the different hurts—the stinging pain between my legs or the deep cramping ache inside from the brutalized flesh.

Warm rivulets of blood or sperm or a mix of both started running down the inside of my thighs. I pushed away from him, and he let me go. I went into our ensuite, locked the door, and stripped off all my clothes and ran the shower. I stepped into the warm water and began to wash myself. I scrubbed and scrubbed, trying to erase the feeling of violation like it was a mark on my skin.

Twenty minutes later I was still scrubbing and realized I was crying. I’m not sure when it started, but I couldn’t make it stop. But it seemed distant to me, as if I was somewhere else looking in at my body. It was around an hour later I turned the shower off. Mercifully, the robot-like state continued, and I dressed and went downstairs. Jack was sitting on the couch, his head in his hands.

“You should leave,” I said tonelessly. I think I was still in shock because I couldn’t feel anything; there was no meaning somehow, even as I said the words. Seeing him look at me with hopeless resignation in his eyes, I felt nothing. It seemed impossible that he would even respond to them, when everything felt so insubstantial. I was hollow, just a paper shell, not enough mass to exert any influence on the outside world.

“I’m so sorry. I’ll stay at the London flat until we can sort everything out.”

“That would be best,” I said, then turned and walked out. I went to the kitchen and started making myself a cup of tea, for want of any other ideas on how to keep my hands busy. I heard sounds of packing from upstairs, then footsteps descending the stairs and the front door shutting quietly. The end of an era finished with a soft click. My legs faltered, and I fell heavily into one of the chairs.

Chapter Twenty-Four

I S
AT
I
N
A S
TUPOR
, unaware of my surroundings, staring at the small puddle of tea spreading and cooling on the table where I had bumped the cup. A rapping at the door startled me out of it, and through the frosted glass I could see Edwina’s outline.
This was so not going to happen
, I thought fiercely.
There is no way I’m going to let the bitch see me like this.

I rose, careless of whether or not she could see the movement, and went upstairs. I packed up what few things I absolutely needed into the car and, wheels spinning, tore past a startled Edwina walking back to her house. I returned to London and stayed in a hotel until I found a vacant rental house in Clapham that I could move into immediately. I bought some furniture that arrived the same day I did, took off the wrapping, hired a divorce lawyer, and then I fell apart.

I have no clear recollection of the next few weeks, as if someone had turned off the lights and I sat in darkness. Gradually the numb feeling left and the pain and loneliness set in. Despite everything, I missed Jack. He had been part of me for so long, and that part was gone, painfully and messily hacked off. I grieved for him, myself, and us.

The child inside me remained, unaffected by the assault or my emotional state. I had wondered what it would be like to be alone. Maybe one day it would reach that comfortable stage, but right now it felt like a life sentence in solitary confinement. I lay in bed, watching the drapes that enclosed it move in a slight breeze, the light changing as the days passed, unable to summon the will to move. I ignored the phone and the knocks on the door. They seemed irrelevant. There was nothing anyone could say that would make a difference, and I couldn’t handle anyone seeing me like this. Pity or sympathy right now would make me physically sick. I sent text messages when communication with the outside world became unable to be refused. I pretended I was starting a new book and was deeply absorbed in preparation work. Nothing could be further from the truth. I spent all day in my pajamas doing nothing at all, day after day. I wept. I slept. That was all.

The only one persistent enough to break through my bubble was Bats, because she literally broke into my house. I had shambled from my bed to the couch, where I flopped listlessly, watching God knows what. I didn’t care enough to notice what was on or whether it was those infomercials that usually annoy the bejesus out of me. I was wearing a pink fluffy dressing gown that badly needed a wash, and my hair had become solid. I vaguely registered the tinkling sound of breaking glass, but I didn’t think to connect it with my house. Footsteps down the hall sent a chill of adrenaline like a splash of icy water, and I sat bolt upright, frozen with indecision: try to hide or get out of the house.

“Katie?” I heard Bats’ voice shouting from half way up the stairs and almost wept with relief that it wasn’t Jack or a burglar.

“In here,” I said weakly, my voice cracking with misuse. I cleared my throat and repeated myself a bit more loudly.

“Dear God! What has happened to you?” she said upon seeing me through the open door.

“I…well…Jack…” I tried to start explaining but just burst into tears.

Putting her arms around me, she shushed me gently.

“I love you, but you need a bath desperately. I don’t know if I can handle a long story if I have to be this close,” she said kindly as she firmly helped me up off the couch and steered me to the bathroom. She turned on the shower and pushed me in, clothes and all.

“Strip off, and I’ll put them in the wash.” Dutifully, I followed her instructions, handing her the sopping garments. She disappeared briefly and returned with a towel and some clean clothes.

“I’ll make some tea while you finish up here. Wash your hair and clean your teeth too!” she ordered, and then she disappeared back around the door.

Dried off and in clean clothes, I felt much better. Somehow the logic that I needed to wallow in my misery by not taking care of myself had gone a bit far. Hopefully, liking being clean was the herald of a new, less painful stage. I took a deep steadying breath and went downstairs.

Bats had made me something to eat and a cup of tea. I was so ridiculously grateful, I could feel tears coming again. She carried it over to the table, and we sat down. I took a sip of tea, which was hot and perfect on my tongue.

“So, what happened?” she asked. I told her almost everything, what I’d done, what I’d found out about Jack. But not about
that
.

“You never suspected anything?” Her brow furrowed slightly.

“No. Should I have?” I looked at her closely, to see if she had known. It would be so much worse if everyone else was in on it and I was just the poor deluded wife who had subconsciously refused to see what was obvious to everyone else.

She held up her hands, palms outward, to show no offense was meant.

“I had no idea, but then I wasn’t married to him. Frankly, you never know what’s going on in a relationship from the outside.”

“No one else knows, then?”

“I hadn’t heard even a rumor. He must have been pretty careful, because you know how everyone gossips. There hasn’t even been anything in the media, unlike your little fling.”

“Yes, I know. Completely stupid, but I don’t really regret it, even now. Well, maybe a little bit.” I grimaced slightly. “Part of me knows that having an affair didn’t cause the problems with Jack, that there were other issues that were seriously wrong, but it was the catalyst for bringing it out into the open. Maybe I could have kept my head in the sand a bit longer, or become braver and confronted it on my own. I’m sure it would have been better if I could have taken the moral high ground.”

“Maybe, or maybe you both being in the wrong meant you could talk on an even footing without someone playing the victim.”

“That’s not how it went,” I whispered, unable to meet her eyes. I burst into tears, ashamed of what happened. Could I tell Bats? Or should I keep it quiet?

“So, it’s really over?” she said gently. “There’s no chance of you getting back together?”

“No.” That’s all I had to say. There might be a time when I could speak about it, but not yet. “This is going to be hard for you; you and Jack grew up together. I’ll understand if we can’t be friends anymore.”

“Are you asking me to choose between you?”

“No, but Jack might.”

“We’ll deal with that if it comes to it. Don’t borrow trouble from another day.”

Bats gave me a long hug, and I wiped away the tears, determined to pull it together and do better.

The human body is amazing, and I had no lasting physical effects from the assault, but in my head at odd moments, I kept flashing back to Jack on top of me, remembering the words of hate. It was being powerless to stop it that was almost worse than the thing itself. I knew I would have to see him again because of the boys, but I couldn’t just yet. I knew he was sorry; it said so on the card with the flowers I threw straight in the rubbish bin. He tried to call a few times, but I screened the calls, allowing them to go through to voice mail but deleting them unheard.

I shouldn’t have been surprised when the television deal fell through. Stupidly, I somehow thought that the world could stand still while I went into hibernation, somehow able to sense the devastation in me and back off for a while, even though, of course, they knew nothing about it. Unfortunately, the world doesn’t work like that, and after numerous desperate phone calls from Lindsay, the phone went quiet. When I finally called her back, her voice was cold.

“Where the hell have you been?” she demanded.

“Dealing with my marriage ending,” I shot back, quick to anger these days.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said stiffly. “Don’t you think you could have let me know? Do you know how many times I pushed back the deadline on the TV deal, trying to keep it alive? You made me look like an idiot. I don’t like looking like an idiot.”

“I’m sorry, Lindsay. To be perfectly honest, I wasn’t thinking much outside my own stuff.”

“If you want to have any hope of continuing you career, you’re going to need to put in some serious rehabilitation to your image. I’m not going to even bother if you’re not committed.”

“Trust me, I’m committed. I’m raising the baby on my own, so I need an income more than ever.”

“We’re going to need to get your story sorted. Is Jack going to have a problem with saying the baby is his?”

“I’m sure we can come to an arrangement.” I shuddered at the thought of having to see him again.

“Are you going to be able to get back to work soon? We’ll do a photo shoot with you pregnant and then plan to have something new to release after you’ve had the baby. How soon after the birth are you going to be able to do publicity?”

Dread filled me at the thought of having to leave the baby with a nanny for the length of time required to publicize a book, as well as being vulnerable to the media to ask me whatever questions they wanted. There was nothing for it; I couldn’t go back to work as a lawyer after all this time. I had to make this work or I would be without an income.

“I’ll get started on a new book. Any chance of getting the TV deal?”

“No, not now. You’ve screwed that up.”

“Sorry.”

Lindsay sniffed. “I’ll try to get you some appearances and paying gigs. It’s going to be harder now you’re not with Jack. How long can we hold off announcing it?”

“No hurry. I don’t think Jack wants it out there.”

“This is good. Try to keep it quiet for as long as you can.”

I knew I needed to pull myself together for the baby and get my life back on track: eat, shower, brush my hair, etcetera. It took me a month to start the day with a shower, rather than random times throughout the day or night. I was shocked to look at the calendar and realize that the boys would be home for the holidays in three weeks. I wanted to see them, but not in the state I was in. I pulled myself out of bed and forced myself into preparations. I cleaned the house, did the laundry, set up the bedrooms even though it felt like there was a weight on my back, slowing me down and making every job that much harder.