Sophie's Run (28 page)

Alas, my mobile had run out of battery when I retrieved it outside the Tube station. It was one hundred percent completely dead. I weighed my options. It was
probably
a bad idea to visit Dan unannounced. Yet my need for human contact, for conversation, for a friendly face, was so overpowering that I couldn’t get myself to abandon the idea. My feet started walking as though with a will of their own and took me down the familiar streets.

There it was, Dan’s house. Looking very much the same as it always had. All the windows were closed, and the house had a shut-up kind of feel to it, but that didn’t mean anything. After all, Dan could be in his studio. I stepped up to the front door and rang the bell.

After waiting uncertainly for five minutes, I rang the doorbell another time, even longer. The sound was clearly audible through the front door.

I chewed my bottom lip; I should probably go. If he wasn’t in, he wasn’t in. Yet a flat, sinking feeling spread through my stomach at the thought of remaining on my own for the afternoon. Perhaps I would stick a note to his door and he might call me later? I latched onto the idea like a drowning woman.

Rummaging through my handbag for a pen and a piece of paper, my fingers closed around a set of keys. Familiar keys, but not mine.

Oh my gosh, I still had Dan’s keys.

My gut reaction was to let myself in. After all, Dan had never minded before. Yet technically, I ought to have returned the keys a long time ago. Would he mind if I used them? What if he was out and returned to find me lounging on his sofa? Would that still be okay, like it had always been?

Get a grip
, I admonished myself.
This is Dan we’re talking about. He’ll be fine. The last thing he would want for you to do is lurk around outside his front door
.

That settled it. I inserted the first key into its lock and was rewarded with an encouraging
thunk
when the key couldn’t turn the mortise mechanism. Somebody was home. I used the Yale key to disengage the snap lock and stepped in. By force of habit, I put the keys in the bowl on the side table right there in the hall where they always lived, and I took a moment to listen for any signs of life.

The house was quiet. It smelled of furniture polish, fresh laundry, and Dan’s aftershave. Feeling like an unlawful intruder, I ambled through the downstairs first but Dan was not there. Next, I tried the studio, but the door was wide open and there was no sign of recent activity.

Very odd.

Suddenly, I was gripped by an irrational fear. What if he had slipped in the bath and was lying right at this moment unconscious on the bathroom floor? He might have cracked his head. I could almost envisage the blood seeping from a gaping wound.

Anxiety constricted my throat, and I couldn’t call out, much as I wanted to. It was like one of those nightmares when you’re desperate to shout, scream, warn somebody, get help—and yet you can’t.

So instead of calling out, I went upstairs to investigate.

Halfway up the stairs, I realized that the house wasn’t empty. I heard a voice, a weird moaning. Dan
had
fallen and was in pain.

I took the remaining steps two at a time. At the top of the stairs, I halted, trying to get my bearings, listening to where his moaning was coming from.

The bedroom, it seemed. He had obviously managed to drag himself in there. Of course, he was trying to get to the phone. My heart was beating furiously with fear at what I would find.

I took a few more steps forward, then stopped again. The bedroom door was only half shut, and Dan’s voice was clearly audible now. He was moaning, but he wasn’t in pain. He seemed to be talking. There was another voice, as well.

A very familiar voice.

A female voice.

In slow motion, I found myself dragging my feet across the polished wooden floorboards, keen now not to make a sound myself. Without the shadow of a doubt, I knew what I would find but I couldn’t help myself. Hesitating at the door, I eventually nudged it open far enough to see.

I had an immediate view of Dan’s super-king-size bed.

Dan was in it. Or should I have said, on it.

In a
very
compromising position. He hadn’t seen me, but I could see enough to notice that he was wearing his special necklace. Whose companion-piece I was still wearing myself, never mind I had Steve now. It was part of me, and I had never taken it off, really. Weird, how my mind fixed on that tiny detail with utter clarity.

Dan was lying on his back, his legs moving rhythmically, his arms thrust high behind his head. Between the white half-moons of his buttocks, a pale, hairy expanse of scrotum showed, winking at me.
Hello Sophie, fancy seeing you here. Care to join us?

The absurdity of it all didn’t escape me. Human beings mating—they looked kind of primal, in a grotesque kind of way.

And.

On top of Dan—

I could only see her back, but I recognized the voice, and the tangle of tussled, sex-goddess hair.

Rachel.

Oh my God, Rachel.

She was riding him hard. Her pert little buttocks molded perfectly into the curve of Dan’s groin.

Time slowed down to a crawl in a way I had never experienced before. I could hear my breathing in my own ears, absurdly echoing the panting coming from the copulating couple. Their bodies were moving as one as they were approaching a climax. Just how I knew that I wasn’t sure. I had never even watched a porn movie in my life—it wasn’t my thing.

What I was witnessing now; it was sick. It was more than sick. It made me want to vomit.

My best friends—both of them. Dan and Rachel. Together. Really together. As up close and personal as it was possible to be.

It was revolting. My heart beat in my throat and my head was spinning. Hot tears pricked at the back of my eyes but wouldn’t come.

Rooted to the spot for what seemed to be an eternity, I suddenly came to and fled.
Down the stairs, through the front door, pull it shut softly, don’t let them know you were here, you saw; don’t give them the satisfaction.

Up the road now, quick, quick, don’t cry, don’t cry, you can cry at home. Get to the Tube, don’t be seen, just get home. Just get home.

The tears I had been holding back could be restrained no more. By the time I sat down on a train, my T-shirt was soaked with teardrops, but I didn’t care.

How could they
?
How
could
they?
My best friends. Dan and Rachel. Rachel, in particular.
Was Dan her mystery man?
I wondered. Was he the one she had been so coy about?

I was sobbing now, nearly howling, making quite the spectacle of myself. Thank goodness I was nearly home.

Get a grip
, I told myself sternly.
And anyway, so bloody what? You’re not seeing Dan, and Rachel’s not seeing anyone, and you are definitely in love with Steve, aren’t you?

Damn the rational side of my brain, always playing devil’s advocate, always speaking up at inopportune moments.

I don’t care,
I mentally shot back at myself.
I don’t care. I love Steve, and I don’t care if Dan shags anything that moves. That’s not why I’m upset. But Dan and Rachel? Rachel? Of all people, Rachel? It’s sick.

SICK.

Sick sick sick sick sick.

I took a deep breath. On autopilot, I had alighted from the train and exited the Tube. I was racing up my road and I had inadvertently started talking to myself, talking out loud, hissing that last utterance with all the venom I could muster. A terrified a passerby took one look at me and changed to the other side of the road. I needed to calm down.

And anyway, why should it be sick? Why shouldn’t they make out?

Because—

Well, because—

I didn’t know why. I couldn’t explain it, not rationally. Other than that it was like finding your mum bedding your teacher, or something. Two people you implicitly trusted, but who should never conjoin in lust or any other manner, suddenly doing just that and pulling the rug out from under you with one swift sleight of hand.

Nicely done, really.

Congratulations, you two.

I howled with pain and frustration and outrage. Moreover, I felt deeply embarrassed on their behalf. Angry, humiliated, disgusted.

Betrayed.

My mind finally clung firmly onto that notion. I felt let down and betrayed. Betrayed, by two people whom I would have trusted with my life. By two people who had been the pillars of my adult universe. Dan and Rachel weren’t meant to be an item. They weren’t meant to have sex. Admittedly, I didn’t want Dan anymore, not in that way. But I certainly didn’t want Rachel to have him instead. I hadn’t minded the parade of women going through Dan’s house even while I was living there. They didn’t mean anything to him, or to me.
But Rachel,
I mused, as I was stomping furiously down the road toward my house,
Rachel
meant
something. To him, and to me.

I reached my flat and raced up the stairs, slamming the front door behind me. Anger was now muscling in on my emotions determinedly, doing a good job of eclipsing betrayal for the moment.

How
dare
Dan sleep with Rachel? How
dare
he abuse her vulnerable position, allow himself to be carried away with someone who had only just got back on her feet? And Rachel, the stupid woman! How could she let herself go, knowing, as she did, that she was on the rebound? Knowing that she would end up hurt again. Because no, she wasn’t going to reform Dan. He wasn’t going to change for her, either. She would be broken-hearted once again in the space of days, weeks. How could she go there? Where were her self-respect, her common sense, her instinct for self-preservation?

Stupid, stupid, stupid
, I raged for the third time that day, thumping sofa cushions for emphasis and release.

I had never been so beside myself with boiling emotion before. I was literally seeing red. I had always thought people were exaggerating when they talked about the red mist descending, but I was in that space now.

And I hurt. Oh my gosh, how I hurt.

In my despair, I tried the only recourse I had. I attempted ringing Steve again. I would apologize for my silly behavior, I would grovel, beg forgiveness and ask him to come over. I needed him to hold me and to love me and to tell me everything would be all right. Thus I rang, and I rang, and I rang, but he wouldn’t answer or wasn’t there.

When the phone eventually shrilled in my hands while I was poised to dial Steve’s number yet again, I nearly jumped out of my skin with frayed nerves. Instinctively, my thumb lifted to press the answer button, but caller display showed that it was Rachel calling and I froze. Nah. No chance!

I let the phone click through to answerphone and listened while Rachel prattled on cheerfully.

Hey, sweetie!
Her voice was merry and light. How I wished I couldn’t hear the undercurrent of sexual gratification oozing out from her every word.
Where are you? It’s six o’clock, I thought we were having dinner? Hurry up, I’m starving!

“Argh!
”

Faced with such blatant duplicity and deceit, I lost my rag completely. I hurled the handset, innocent though it was, against the wall with all my might. It cracked apart with a satisfying crunching noise indicating terminal damage. However, when I picked it up, the screen was still intact, so I stomped on it for good measure.

I was shaking with fury when I collected up the various bits of broken phone from my lounge. The force of impact had also made a dent in my beautifully replastered lounge wall, and that would no doubt serve as a reminder of this day for years to come. I would have to cover it up with a picture.

Of course, now I was phone-less.
Talk about cutting off your nose
. I howled again, this time with frustration at my own inability to control my anger, and resignedly stuffed the broken pieces into the bin. I would have to replace the phone, of course. And soon, too. I couldn’t really be without. It would cost. But.

I seized on this notion gratefully. I would get a new number as well as a new phone. That way, I wouldn’t get any more calls from the two cheats. It would be a clean break. End of story. Taking a deep breath, I went to the bathroom to inspect myself. Would I look any different? Emotionally scarred, perhaps? Traumatized?

Not really. I did look, however, as though I had stuck two fingers in a socket and got myself electrified. My hair was standing on end in an untidy mess, and my face was red and blotchy from crying. I recoiled in horror.

The horror was amplified when I realized I was still wearing Dan’s necklace. My immediate reaction was to rip it off, tearing the delicate chain with one easy act of vengeance. But I caught myself. I recognized that I had inflicted enough damage on innocent inanimate objects already. Besides, the necklace stood for a long and happy period of my life whose memory I couldn’t, wouldn’t deny. Even in the darkest depths of my current despair, I knew I was going to regret it bitterly if I broke this precious keepsake. A phone, I could replace. This was priceless.