Guy, unusually perhaps for such a strongly heterosexual male, had an eye for colour and line, a sensitivity for style that caused him to flinch in almost physical pain when he was forced to witness other people’s apparent blindness to the necessity of creating visual harmony.
It amazed him that Jenny, who could pick just the right piece of furniture, just the right fabric and accessories to decorate their window, could fail appallingly to apply that talent to her own wardrobe and person. He had hoped their triumphant excursion to Armani might have changed things, but so far he hadn’t once seen her wearing the trouser suit they had bought.
‘How is David?’ he asked politely as he watched her pushing her hair off her face with fingers on which her wedding ring had become loose.
He had never taken to Jenny’s brother-in-law, whom he privately considered to be both a weak and a rather vain man.
‘He had a bit of a set-back, although he’s stable again now,’ Jenny replied. She frowned a little, remembering that the nurse had told her that David had become upset during Jon and Tiggy’s visit.
‘His wife had been talking to him and he became very agitated, so we had to ask her to leave,’ she’d repeated.
What exactly had Tiggy been saying to him? Jenny wondered, her heart giving a funny little nervous beat.
‘What’s wrong?’ Guy asked her softly.
She gave him a wary look, then shook her head, denying, ‘Nothing.’
To put into words her fears and confusion about the change in Jon’s behaviour would give them a weight and power she couldn’t bear them to have. There had been many times during their marriage when she had felt isolated, and alone and very vulnerable, but never one when she had felt quite like this, when she had known instinctively that her marriage was being threatened by another woman.
Not deliberately, of course. Tiggy could never be so cold-blooded. But … Was it really any wonder that Jon should be so attracted to her? She was all the things she herself was not and she had always known that he had not married her out of love, or at least not out of love for her, she amended mentally; there had never been that wild, passionate flaring of sexual excitement between them. In its place, though, they had shared a harmony she kept hoping would compensate for all that they did not have.
‘I must get back,’ she told Guy. ‘Jon will be home soon and—’
‘I saw him earlier. He was in the Italian restaurant with David’s wife.’
‘Yes,’ Jenny agreed distantly. ‘He would have been.’
Guy looked searchingly at her, wondering if she was aware just how much she had revealed in those sad, almost bitter, words. He had seen for himself the intimacy Jon and Tiggy were sharing, Tiggy putting down her fork to reach across the table and touch him, not perhaps as a lover but in a way that betrayed almost as clearly how she felt about him, and if Jon had not been equally intimate in return, he certainly hadn’t made any attempt to withdraw from her.
Gravely he watched Jenny leaving the shop. It was too soon yet for him to do or say anything. He had waited all these years, he could wait a little longer.
Wearily Jenny made her way home, her heart turning over uncomfortably as she saw Jon’s car parked outside the house. It was unusual for him to be home so early these days and again all her instincts warned her that his presence now was not a good omen.
He was waiting for her as she walked into the kitchen.
‘There’s something I have to tell you,’ he said sombrely.
‘Is it very important or can it wait until after dinner?’ Jenny asked with forced brightness.
‘I … I won’t be in for dinner. I’ve got a meeting in Chester.’
It wasn’t true, but Jon knew that there was no way he could sit down and go through the same stifling routine without breaking the promise he had made himself and either saying or doing something that would hurt her.
‘The children,’ she began, but Jon shook his head.
‘The girls are upstairs doing their homework and Joss has gone round to see Ruth.’
‘Oh, well, I’ll just put the kettle on and—’
‘Jenny …’
The stifled impatience in his voice stopped her.
‘I … I can’t stay here any longer … I need to be on my own…. This house, our life …’
You, he might just as well have said, Jenny acknowledged as she listened to him in anguished silence.
‘They … I …’ He stopped and shook his head.
‘What is it you’re trying to tell me, Jon?’ Jenny asked as calmly as she could. ‘That our marriage is over, that you want a divorce?’ Despite all her good intentions, her voice cracked painfully over the last few words and Jon winced as he heard her pain.
‘No … not that. Not a divorce—a separation.’
‘What about the children?’ Jenny protested.
‘They’ll manage. They won’t need us much longer,’ Jon told her, guilt driving him into anger. ‘And anyway, they’ve always related more to you than they have to me.’
Jenny bit her lip. ‘What are you trying to say … that I’ve been too possessive with them, that …?’
‘No,’ Jon denied wearily. ‘Jenny, I don’t want us to argue. If we’re being honest with one another, we both know …’ He paused. ‘I know we married for the best motives but—’
‘But?’ Jenny pressed him determinedly.
Let him say it. Let him say what she had always privately known … feared, but he obviously couldn’t. His glance slid away from hers. He edged closer to the door … to his exit … his escape.
‘Where will you go?’ she asked him and then regretted her question. Now it was her turn to be afraid of what her eyes might reveal, to look directly at him. She knew, of course. He would go to Tiggy, but when he answered, it seemed she was wrong.
‘I … I don’t know. I’m going to look for somewhere to rent. It’s for the best, Jenny,’ he said almost plaintively. She could hear the pleading note in his voice and her heart ached not just for herself but, ridiculously, for him, as well. She wanted to hold him, much as she might have done one of the children, to comfort him and reassure him that she understood, that he was forgiven, but how could she when that wasn’t what she felt at all?
‘When—’ she moistened her dry lips ‘—when will you go?’ she asked him quietly.
‘I don’t know. Just as soon as I can arrange something. There’s no point in drawing things out…. I’ll move my things into the spare room in the meantime.’ He saw the look she gave him and winced a second time.
‘The children,’ she whispered. ‘What are we going to tell them?’
Jon shook his head. ‘I don’t know….’
‘I could tell them that … that it’s just a temporary thing,’ she suggested huskily. ‘They might find that easier to accept.’
‘Tell them whatever you think best,’ Jon replied. He was looking at her almost pityingly, Jenny recognised as she felt the first stirring of something other than pain and shock, the first awareness of the mortality of the blow struck not just at her heart but also at her pride.
You’re the one who’s doing the leaving, she was tempted to say. You explain it to them. But instinct and habit urged her to stay