Tempting Fate (23 page)

She may be furious with Elliott now, but he is not the bad guy here. He does not deserve to be castigated for something he did not do.

‘I had a husband,’ she starts, her eyes flicking to the door, then she stops, abruptly. ‘Oh shit,’ she says. ‘And there he is.’

She looks at Julian like a rabbit trapped in the glare of headlights.

‘Do you need to hide?’ he leans forward and whispers.

‘I
don’t want to see him,’ she whispers back. ‘Or his ghastly girlfriend.’

‘I like it that you like the word “ghastly”.’ He is still whispering. ‘It’s my most favourite word. I’ve made a pact to myself to use it at least five times a day.’

‘This really is ghastly,’ she says. ‘Seriously. I don’t want to see them.’

‘Stop being a baby,’ he commands. ‘I can’t throw my Barbour over your head and pretend to be dining with the incredible shrouded woman.’

Despite herself, Gabby laughs, just as Elliott spots her, and stops in his tracks.

‘Don’t look now,’ Julian says out of the side of his mouth, ‘but the ex has seen you.’

‘If you had thrown your Barbour over my head I wouldn’t be able to look now,’ she mutters, wishing she could stop smiling. ‘I wish you had.’

‘Don’t be silly,’ he says gently. ‘If I had then we’d have to cut a hole in it so you could eat, and that wouldn’t be very practical, would it?’

Gabby bursts out laughing before sinking her head in her hands. ‘Oh God. This is awful. I don’t mind saying hello to Elliott, but the smug ghastly girlfriend? Ghastly!’

Julian peers over. ‘She does look rather smug. Very American perfect. Not my type at all.’

‘Oh no? What’s your type?’ Gabby couldn’t help the question, but Julian says nothing, merely smiles
and raises an eyebrow, lifting his water glass in a silent toast.

‘Watch out’, he says. ‘Here they come.’

‘Elliott!’ Gabby summons every ounce of graciousness she has ever possessed, flashing a charming smile at them both. ‘Trish! What a small world!’

‘Lovely to see you,’ Trish replies, without stopping, continuing through the restaurant to their table, shooting a look at Elliott as if he should follow her. Which he doesn’t. ‘Elliott?’ she says.

‘Be there in a minute,’ he says, turning to look at Julian. He extends a hand. ‘Hi, I’m Elliott.’

‘Julian. How do you do?’

‘Oh. You’re English. Are you a friend from home?’

‘No,’ Julian says pleasantly, not offering anything else.

An awkward silence descends.

‘How are the girls?’ Elliott asks Gabby eventually.

‘Fine. They’re with friends this evening. Hoping to see you sometime this weekend, I think. Oh, and some of the clothes from my house are still at yours,’ she adds. ‘Maybe you could bring them back?’

‘Do you know what they are?’

‘Some leggings. Long-sleeved Tshirts. And socks. We seem to have run out of socks.’

‘I’ll look,’ he replies, standing at their table a few moments longer but finding nothing else to say. ‘Well, I’d better get going.’ He looks at Julian again. ‘Nice to meet you.’

‘Enjoy your evening,’ Gabby says, and as she watches
him walk towards Trish she is reminded so much of an unhappy little boy. She turns back to Julian, an apology already on her lips.

‘Well,’ he says, settling back in his chair. ‘
That
wasn’t awkward.’

Usually Elliott is a sound sleeper. Gabby used to tease him because he could sleep anywhere, in any position, asleep almost before his head hit the pillow.

Lately, though, he has found himself waking up in the early hours of the morning, anxious, with no idea why. He has tried lying in bed counting sheep, deep breathing, meditating on ocean scenes, but nothing is able to send him back to sleep.

He turns his head and raises himself slightly, better able to see the digital clock on Trish’s nightstand. She is fast asleep, her cream silk nightgown bunched up, almost to her waist. He looks at her perfectly rounded naked bottom, with no desire to touch her. He is admiring, but dispassionate; it is as if he is marvelling at the cool white perfection of a marble statue by Michelangelo.

It is 4.33 a.m. He knows he won’t go back to sleep now. Occasionally, if he wakes up at two, or even, sometimes, three, he can get back to sleep, but after four he knows it’s all over; there’s little point even trying.

He climbs out of bed, not worrying about making a noise because Trish is dead to the world until morning. In his own house, he would lie back in his recliner and flick through the channels until he found something
that caught his interest; he might catch up on his reading, or find himself playing one of the kids’ mindless computer games.

Here, in Trish’s house, he is a little stuck. He hovers in the doorway of the living room, negatively anticipating the feel of the hard, modern sofa. It looks beautiful, but it is not a sofa on which to lie, cushioned by down pillows, feet up on a large wide armrest as you read a book, or watch TV.

Wait, there
is
no TV in here.

The sofas in the family room are not much of an improvement, for this is not a room where anyone ever lounges, or relaxes. But there is a television; for want of something better Elliott makes himself as comfortable as he is able to and starts to flick.

He isn’t looking for anything in particular. His thoughts are far away from anything on the screen, and there is little, at this point, that can bring them back.

Ever since he saw Gabby with that English man, he has felt out of sorts; wrong; ill at ease. She left him having already slept with, having been impregnated by, another man. They are getting divorced, even though he had to cancel the initial appointment with the lawyer because something came up at work – he doesn’t remember what – and he is supposed to have found happiness with Trish. What right does he have to feel uncomfortable seeing his wife with another man?

He gazes blindly at the television screen and pictures Gabby with that man. Elliott was facing their table,
looking directly at the pair of them, and he had to focus hard so as not to stare all evening. Even then, his eyes kept involuntarily landing on them. It wasn’t so much that she was with another man – they are separated, after all, and she has the right to be with anyone – it was that she looked so happy; happier than she has looked in months.

And Julian isn’t just any other man. He is English. He sounds just like her. He has that rugged English, Bear Grylls-ish quality. If you threw him in the middle of a jungle, by the end of the first day he would have built a two-storey hut out of banana leaves and twigs, caught a few fish out of the river with a stick he’d whittled into a spear, and would have a wild boar merrily roasting over a fire. He looks, Elliott realizes with shock, exactly like the sort of man Gabby should be with. They looked good together.

Better than good.
Right
.

‘Hey,’ he hears from behind him, turning in surprise to see a sleepy Trish padding into the room, running her fingers through her hair. She sits next to him on the sofa and kisses his cheek. ‘What’s up? Bad night’s sleep?’

Elliott shrugs. ‘You know how it is. My body’s exhausted but my mind’s racing.’

‘Which is stress,’ she says. ‘What are you stressed about?’

‘Who knows? Everything. Life.’ His voice is light, but his expression is not.

‘And Gabby,’ Trish says after a pause. ‘Being with another man.’

‘What?’ He feigns innocence, his eyes open wide. ‘That? Oh no. That’s no big deal.’

‘Elliott.’ Trish gives an ironic laugh, leaning back from him, as if her body is getting ready for the distancing that she knows is about to come. ‘I’m not stupid. I was there with you all night. You couldn’t take your eyes off the two of them, and you were frowning every time you looked at them. Just like you are now.’

Elliott quickly corrects his features. ‘It was just a shock,’ he says. ‘I didn’t know she was dating anyone.’

‘It was more than that,’ Trish says sadly. ‘It was that she was dating someone appropriate. You know what I saw tonight?’ Her voice is quiet. ‘I saw that you still love her.’

‘Of course I still love her!’ Elliott says. ‘I was married to her for twenty years! We have two children together. You don’t just stop loving someone overnight.’

‘I did,’ she says.

‘That’s different.’

‘Not much. Here’s the thing. You may still love her, but what I saw tonight was that you are
in
love with her. I saw love, and loss, and all the things you’re going to admit to if I push you, but I saw something else that you may not even realize. I saw
yearning
. You didn’t want Gabby sitting there with some other man, and you didn’t want to be sitting there with me. You wanted to be with her.’

Elliott says nothing, just looks at his hands.

‘I have no idea what the future holds,’ Trish says. ‘I don’t know if this thing she has is serious, or how she feels about you, but the one thing I’m absolutely sure about is that you’re still in love with her. Which means you’re not ready for a relationship with me, or anyone else.’

Still, there is nothing for Elliott to say.

‘I think you’re wonderful,’ she says, blinking back the tears that are threatening to spring. ‘I wish things were different. Who knows, maybe in a year’s time you and I will circle back to each other again, when you’re more ready, but I think we need to call it a day.’

She reaches out and takes his hand, squeezing it gently as Elliott just nods, ignoring the tears in his own eyes as they begin to slowly trickle down his cheeks.

‘Natasha!’ Elliott stumbles on the doorstep. ‘How lovely to see you.’ He has always got on very well with his soon-to-be-ex-mother-in-law, and has no idea how he should greet her.

‘Elliott!’ With her trademark warmth, she flings her arms round him, enveloping him in gauzy scarves and a squeezing hug. Stepping back she holds him at arm’s length and examines him. ‘You look incredibly dapper and handsome. I hate to say it, but separation suits you.’

Elliott laughs. ‘Only you could say that and not have me think you were crazy.’

‘Some might say I am crazy,’ she replies, and laughs too. ‘Which is why I can get away with it. It is true, though. I haven’t seen you look so good in years. And yet …’ She peers at him. ‘You don’t look terribly happy. You look tired.’

‘I didn’t sleep last night. No idea what happened. Recently I’ve started waking up in the early hours of the morning, and once I’m up, that’s it. No more sleep.’

‘Sounds like you’re going through the menopause,’ Natasha says. ‘Maybe you should go and see a doctor.’

‘Ha!’

‘Are you coming in?’ she says after a while. ‘Gabby’s out but the girls are here. Are they expecting you?’

‘No … I brought some clothes that Gabby said were missing.’

‘Good. Come in.’ She leads the way into the kitchen. ‘Do you still take your coffee with half and half and one sugar?’

Elliott smiles in relief as he shrugs off his coat. ‘Good memory.’

‘It
has
been twenty years,’ she says.

‘True.’

He looks around at the familiar kitchen, but hesitates before sitting down at the table.

Footsteps come running down the hallway then Alanna runs into the room. ‘
Daddy
!’ She flings herself onto his lap, giving him a reception far better than the usual grunts of hello he gets when they are dropped off at his house.

‘Unexpected visits can bring unexpected pleasures.’ Natasha smiles, putting a steaming coffee in front of him just as Olivia walks in, Henry leaning against her shoulder, gently burping as she pats his back.

Her face lights up as she blows her father a kiss, then she sits down, careful to sit far away from coffee or anything that could spill and hurt Henry.

‘You look scarily proficient with that baby,’ Elliott says, looking for Gabby in the baby’s face, but not finding much. The eyebrows? Perhaps. Ears? Maybe. The baby is blond and long, as different to the girls as he
could possibly be. They were dark, chubby and so obviously girl-like, with tiny delicate features.

Alanna takes Henry from Olivia and jiggles him up and down. ‘Look, Dad!’ she says. ‘You have to see this!’ She puts him in his bouncing chair in the corner of the room, then crouches in front of him.

‘Atishoo!’ she says, pretending to sneeze, and a huge smile comes across Henry’s face.

‘Atishoo! Atishoo!’ Henry starts chuckling, and then, as both girls continue sneezing, his chuckling becomes full-on hysteria. Everyone is laughing. Even Elliott, for this baby, with his delighted giggling, is adorable enough to spellbind everyone who lays eyes upon him.

‘Isn’t he
amazing
?’ Alanna looks at her dad, laughing. ‘Don’t you
love
him?’

‘He’s definitely amazing,’ Elliott says, astonished that he doesn’t feel more of the animosity he had anticipated. He has been dreading meeting this child properly. He has seen him bundled up in Gabby’s arms, but, to her credit, she has never offered up the child for him to approve, and he has always tried not to look.

The situation is painful enough, he has always felt, without having the physical reminder being forced upon him.

But here is the physical reminder, and it isn’t painful. It is adorable.

‘Can I hold him?’ Elliott has no idea where the words come from as he nervously looks at Natasha, knowing he has no right to this child, has nothing, in fact, to do
with this child, but she just smiles approvingly as Alanna lifts him up and hands him to Elliott.

‘What a good boy!’ Elliott bounces him on his knee as Henry giggles, then he brings him forward and holds him, burying his nose in the baby’s neck and inhaling that sweet, powdery, baby smell, which immediately sweeps him back to when the girls were little.

‘Isn’t he so chubby and delicious?’ Olivia says. ‘Don’t you just want to eat him?’

‘He is delicious,’ Elliott croons. ‘You’re delicious! Yes, you are! You’re delicious.’

‘Wow, Dad.’ Alanna watches him. ‘You’re really good with babies.’

Elliott fixes her with a fake hard glare. ‘You would think so, given that I’ve had two of them myself. Hard as it is to believe the two of you were ever babies.’

‘That’s not what she means.’ Olivia is watching. ‘She means you’re really good with
this
baby.’

Unseen by the girls, Natasha silently raises her eyebrows before taking a sip of tea.

‘I like all babies,’ Elliott says. ‘When they’re not screaming.’

‘Henry never screams,’ Alanna says. ‘He’s the best-behaved baby ever. He doesn’t wake up at night, either. He’s been sleeping right through until five o’clock. You’d love him if you lived here again.’

‘Don’t be stupid,’ Olivia says. ‘Dad’s not going to live here again. Are you?’ She doesn’t mean for the note of
hope to creep into her voice with the last two words, but, nevertheless, it is heard by everyone in the room.

Elliott doesn’t know what to say. For the rest of the night he was thinking about what Trish said, and as much as it pains him to admit it, she is right. It is all true. He does still love Gabby. But things are different now; they can never go back to how it was before, and he can’t see a way forward.

Gabby is dating, and she has a new baby with another man. He has to move on. It is definitely too soon for him to have another relationship, and perhaps time will heal the wound; perhaps acknowledging that he is still in love with Gabby, instead of pretending that he pities her, will allow him to move on properly, rather than attempting to project feelings he doesn’t have onto the first woman who steps in his path.

But he didn’t expect this: to like this baby. Any baby. He, after all, is the one who continued with the vasectomy despite knowing how much Gabby wanted a baby; he is the one who told her, in no uncertain terms, he was done. He didn’t want to get up for night feeds; he didn’t want to show up to pre-school events when he was old enough to be a grandfather; he didn’t want to give up his life for another eighteen years when the light at the end of the tunnel was just starting to become visible.

Yet here he is, holding this chubby, chuckling boy, and all he wants to do is continue burying his nose in
his neck; blowing raspberries on his tummy; bouncing him up and down to make him laugh.

And Henry isn’t even his.

The front door opens and all of them start. A jingle of keys down the hallway, footsteps, and then Gabby is there in the doorway. She stops, stunned to see her baby in the arms of her husband. Soon-to-be-ex-husband.

‘Elliott. What are you doing here?’

‘I brought the clothes you were looking for. I couldn’t find all of them but I’ll check the laundry when the wash is done.’

‘Oh. Great. Thanks.’ She’s speaking slowly, carefully, unable to believe he has Henry in his arms and is clearly comfortable. More than comfortable; he is loving it.

‘Girls? Go and tidy the mud room, please,’ she commands. ‘Your shoes are everywhere.’

Reluctantly, for the girls can tell something interesting is going to happen and they don’t want to leave, the girls sidle out of the room.

‘I just made Elliott a coffee,’ says her mother. ‘Would you like tea? If not, I’ll go upstairs and do some laundry of my own.’

‘I’m fine,’ Gabby says as her mother walks past her, giving her arm a discreet, supportive squeeze. She sits down at the table opposite Elliott, who is still holding Henry, and fixes a cool gaze upon him.

‘I thought you didn’t like babies,’ she says.

‘What? Of course I like babies. We had babies. I love
babies. I just didn’t want one of my own at this stage in our life.’ He pauses, knowing he has to tread carefully. ‘I have to say, though, I’d forgotten how completely delicious they are. This little guy especially. He’s so different from the girls. Remember how dark they were?’

Gabby laughs. ‘Oh God. Remember Alanna? She came out with a full head of thick black hair. It was terrifying. I thought I’d given birth to a three-year-old.’

‘And remember how Olivia screamed all night long? For months. That bloody colic. Alanna was the same. Oh God. I just remember that whenever the pacifier fell out there was hell to pay.’

‘I remember you walking both of them up and down the stairs all night long to get them back to sleep.’

‘Yes.’ Elliott smiles. ‘And the minute they fell back to sleep and I’d try to oh-so-gently lay them back down in their cribs, they’d start screaming again. It was hell.’

‘It was,’ agrees Gabby.

‘I knew I couldn’t go through that again.’

‘Luckily,’ Gabby says, holding her arms out for Henry, Elliott reluctantly giving him back, ‘we don’t have to with this one, do we, mister? Aren’t you the best baby in the whole world? Yes, you are! You are! Because you know Mummy might run away if you weren’t.’

‘No up all night?’

‘None. Sleeps all night.’

‘No screaming for no reason?’

‘None.’

‘No sleepwalking through your life with exhaustion,
wondering how you’re going to make it through the day, let alone the rest of your life?’

‘None. He truly is the best baby I’ve ever known.’

There is a silence as they both watch Henry. He is grasping a rattle and waving it around, his mouth opening over it whenever he manages to bring it close enough. He looks up at each of them and breaks into a large grin.

‘I’d better go.’ Elliott drains his coffee cup before standing up. ‘Did you have fun last night? He seems like a nice guy.’

‘He is,’ Gabby says simply as she shows him out of the door.