For the first time in my life, I had been devoid of self-consciousness. I was happy. Free. Giselle Ross, aged 32-and-a-half, was on a date. It may have come about by default, but it was nonetheless a proper, grown-up date.
If I had bumped into Ash on the street, on a sunny summer’s day, I would have offered him a timid ‘Hi!’ and walked on. On that rainy night, my natural inclination to help had emboldened me to offer him a lift. We were together now. How could I believe that this was anything other than meant to be?
Within an hour, the handsome man from behind the glass partition of the post office had emerged as a real person. He was no longer just the joker who teased me, no longer the aloof shopkeeper so disliked by many of my neighbours. I learned about his life, how he lived with and cared for his mother. He told me of his dreams and aspirations, and of how he was going to be ‘somebody’ some day. By the time I had dropped him off at his home later that evening, I felt exhilarated. Was this what it felt like to fall in love?
In the weeks following, I would learn the answer to that question. He overwhelmed me with flowers and tokens of his affection, the latest of which had just disappeared into my handbag. I placed the bag under the table and looked up at the waiter.
‘Would you like to order now? Madam?’
‘She’ll have a medium steak, with salad,’ Ash said, adding, ‘Bring me the same.’
He closed the burgundy-red leather menu and handed it to the waiter, without looking at the man.
‘To drink … Madam?’ the waiter asked, looking at me.
‘Diet Coke,’ said Ash. ‘And can you bring a jug of water? I’ll have a large vodka and lemonade.’
The waiter was still looking at me. He smiled, closed his order book and walked away. Ash’s eyes followed him.
‘Do you know him?’ he asked.
I looked in the direction of the retreating waiter and said, ‘No. I’ve never seen in my life before. Why?’
‘It was just that he was looking at you,’ Ash said.
June: I should have walked away the moment it happened.
The back of Rab’s left hand, enlarged to the size of a dinner plate, smashed into my face, his knuckles connecting with my nose.
My head snapped back and I heard rather than felt the sound of the blow. I was momentarily plunged into darkness. When the fog cleared, my hand was on my face, blood pouring through my fingers. I could taste metal and for a few seconds I could not fully comprehend what had just happened. His lips were close enough to my face to spray spittle on the back of the hand that was pressing on my nose.
‘Fuck do you think you’re doing?’ he growled.
‘Wha …’
I couldn’t even finish the word.
‘You fucking ever look at another man, you’ll wish you’d never been born.’
He was furious. Tears were running down my face, mingling with the blood. We were in Rab’s car. It was raining outside and the windscreen was smeared. I couldn’t tell if it was the effect of the rain or if I was still disoriented. Voices from outside wafted into the car and I saw five of my workmates walking through the gates of the factory where we worked.
And then I remembered. Rab had come to pick me up and I had just got into the car when my colleagues appeared. All of them were men. I rolled down the window and shouted to them, telling them to have a good weekend. I waved as they returned the greeting. I had just rolled up the window and was turning towards Rab when he hit me.
No one else had seen what he had done. I slumped down in the seat as Rab drove through the gates, passing my workmates, who waved in the direction of the car. I was frozen with shock. I could see the puzzlement on the men’s faces because I hadn’t responded. The rest of the journey passed in a silence pregnant with menace. I didn’t dare utter a sound.
Rab seethed. I had retrieved a handkerchief from my pocket and dabbed my nose. I pulled down the sun visor, and looked in the small vanity mirror. My reflection revealed a blood-stained face. The blood was caked around my nostrils and mouth. My blouse was splotched with dark stains. I didn’t think my nose was broken, but an angry weal stretched across the bridge. My teeth ached.
Rab glared at me, silently daring me to say a word.
I said nothing. I was terrified. This was the first time he had struck me. I had witnessed his rages, seen his fists flying, but they had never been directed at me. My mind raced. Shock, anger, and a sense of betrayal and fear competed with each other. Every instinct told me to remain silent. We came to a halt outside Rab’s flat, where we were now living together.
‘Get up the fucking stairs,’ he said.
I pushed open the car door, trying to keep my head still. I felt that if I moved too quickly it would fall off. I walked painfully, slowly, pausing at the door of the flat to allow Rab to unlock it. He loomed over me. I was intimidated.
The only other time I had felt like was when Rab tore to shreds a brand-new black cat-suit I had bought. In the few months we had been together I had learned that Rab had very specific ideas about how he liked me to be dressed. A slinky, figure-hugging one-piece suit was not acceptable. Whores dressed like that, he insisted. When I had first seen the cat-suit in the shop I had fallen in love with it. I couldn’t wait to wear it for him, to show it off. I had spent hours doing my hair and make-up.
When he saw me, he said, ‘Take it off!’
‘What’s wrong?’ I asked.
‘Take that thing off.’
‘Why?’ I pleaded.
‘Take off that fucking whore’s outfit or I’ll take it off,’ he shouted into my face.
He followed me into the bedroom, and I was still struggling to get out of the suit when he grabbed it and began tearing it apart. He was utterly furious, enraged, for no reason I could understand.
Now, as I sat on the bed, nursing my battered face, I wept silently for fear that my tears would provoke more anger. My best friend’s words came back into my mind. Wilma had warned me, ‘Stay away from him, he’s a pig!’
I remembered my defiant response.
‘No, he’s not. He’s lovely. I’ll show you all. I’ll change him.’
How could I go crawling back now and admit that they were right – and I was wrong? I could hear their words of comfort and see their told-you-so expressions. Granny had warned me often of lying on beds of my own making. I lay back now – on Rab’s bed – closed my eyes against the light and tried to shut down the turmoil in my head. I heard a sound at the bedroom door. Rab had come into the room. He looked down on me and I felt my stomach lurch.
‘We should get engaged,’ he said.
Giselle: His mother knew we were getting married – before I did.
‘We should get married,’ Ash said.
We were sitting in my car, looking out at Kelvingrove Park, the most beautiful of Glasgow’s many open spaces. The red sandstone of the magnificent Victorian museum and art gallery was darkening with the setting sun. I was overwhelmed.
I didn’t reply right away. We had known each other for only a matter of months and he had yet to meet my family. He knew Ma and my sister, Katie, and Katie’s daughter, Giselle. He knew of my father, but only through the post office. Ash hadn’t ‘officially’ met any of them, and now he was asking me to be his wife.
‘We’ll have a large house, a lovely garden, big cars in the drive, and I’ll be an important lawyer,’ he said.
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