It wasn’t Jane’s job to tamper with what Peter chose to write, though, and she prided herself on the accuracy with which she translated Peter’s dictations into the written word. She’d heard one secretary in another firm had been sacked on the spot for deciding to insert a comma where none had been intended, completely altering the meaning of some highly important final-form legal document leading to red-faced explanations to the client and pleading negotiations with the other side’s legal team. Not good.
Plus Jane knew the partners had behaved pretty well to Kate over the last few months. Sitting outside Peter’s office, she had a fairly good grasp of all the office gossip. There’d been the grey-faced conversations between Peter and Kate, and Peter had very rightly said that if Kate needed to take time off to deal with things, she could do. It sounded like a good deal to Jane – sitting in a pretty bit of Northumberland on half-pay reading a book, someone even printing it out for you, making the occasional comments in red before sending it back in hard copy for Jane to run past Peter. He still liked paper, bless him. Less good for the trees, but better for his eyesight, and he seemed to think Kate would feel the same.
Mostly typos, really, Kate’s comments. If it weren’t for the risk that a stray comma or double negative might in the mystery of law change the meaning entirely, Jane was sure she could almost have done it herself, if it meant getting even half of Kate’s salary (she typed up the annual salary review letters as well, so she knew all about that). There’d been some grumblings in the kitchen from the lawyers that they wished they could just sit at home proofreading a book. Still, it couldn’t have been a fun life to nurse your dying father while taking any spare moment to wade through chapters on the apparent subtleties of commercial leases. Not fun at all.
She bet that things would change now that Kate’s father was actually dead – after all, Kate would no longer have to nurse him. Jane knew that was how some of the other partners saw it, that they’d been trying to convince Peter that they should call her to discuss a date for her to return to work. Peter had protested that Kate was doing good work at home, and that although she wasn’t making money for the firm by doing fee-earning work, she was only on half-pay and that might be translated into profits from the book. Plus the firm had been lucky to get her from London and they wanted to hang on to her, not force her out for personal considerations, Peter had argued. In the end, the compromise had been reached of sending her another chapter to review in a shorter time frame than usual to see how she responded, and if she came back with the chapter in time they would know that she was ready to come back to work. Bit underhand, really. Jane didn’t see why they couldn’t just pick up the phone to her and all talk about it like adults, upfront. They had this inbuilt desire to behave ‘strategically’ and to put everything in writing – even if there had been a phone call it probably would have resulted in a carefully-worded attendance note and a follow-up letter or email that she would have to type.
Anyway, it wasn’t her job to worry about it, she decided, sticking down the lip of the envelope. It was 5.30 on the dot and time for her to be going home to Bill. They were doing chicken lasagne tonight – she’d picked up the ingredients at lunchtime. Glass or two of wine to go with, perhaps early to bed. Very nice.
Poor Kate, Jane thought, as she lobbed the envelope in the post-tray, not being able to have those evenings at home with her husband. Couldn’t be much of a life when Neil was away at sea. She’d tried to ask Kate about it over the kettle, but she’d started chattering on about pizza places or something. They’d bump into Kate in town some weekends, in the cinema or along Gunwharf Quays, her and Bill giggling along, having a fun day out. In the moment before Kate saw them she was always looking glum, fretful. Of course, then Kate’s smile came on, everything was very jolly, and of course she was having a super weekend, she said. But Jane had begun to notice a kind of sadness behind her eyes that never quite went away, even when Neil was actually around to join the office party earlier that year. Masked by smiles of course but undoubtedly still there.
Chapter 11
-Anna-
Acting. That’s all that it was. She could do that. She had always been able to, splitting herself in two according to need. Whatever the role was, she was there. This time the role was Kate – good little wife sending emails to distant husband who she thought wanted news of home and would be interested in whether the guttering needed replacing or if she had felt like she might be getting a cold. True, there had been more thrilling roles, but it would be the performance of a lifetime. Once she got going.
Anna was composing her second email to Neil since the exchange, and she wanted to savour the writing of it. She had kept the first email fairly neutral, asking him how everything was going, what he was up to, and signed off with what seemed to be established norm for the number of kisses. She just mimicked Kate.
She had received a similarly bland email in response about what the ship was doing – no locations, she assumed that email wasn’t considered safe enough for that – and lots of strange acronyms which were apparently supposed to denote people or manoeuvres. Either way, quite frankly they did not interest her. These were not the sort of emails that she was in the game for. Neil ought to associate the emails she was sending with lust, desire and longing – surely that was appropriate for one so many miles away that you had not seen for so long. That was where Anna would come in. She could perform this role with her eyes closed. It was time for ‘Kate’ to embark on a new phase of her relationship with Neil, and Anna would take utmost pleasure in ushering it in. That was the aim of the experiment. And its end result. The best sorts of experiments are ones where the outcome is certain.
The rattle and slam of the post coming through the letterbox momentarily distracted her. It wasn’t such a big event though – it could just join the rest of the post on the mat. If someone considered it unimportant enough to send by snail mail, Anna wasn’t about to leap up and grab it the moment it came through the door. Besides, it was Kate’s post. Sure, she was now meant to be Kate, but it did remove that element of excitement. Bills and work are unexciting at the best of times, and someone else’s bills and work are even less enthralling. Anna would get to them in due course. Maybe. She turned her attention back to the computer.
‘My dearest Neil,’ she began.
No, too tame. Too old-married and Jane Austen-like. Kate may start her emails like that, but it was not Kate who was writing. Anna glanced at the picture of Neil beside the computer for inspiration.
‘Hey, sexy,’ she typed. That was better.
‘Longing to be there with you. I know those cabins are small but it would be nice and cosy with me beside you – or perhaps on top of you if that’s the only way to get me to fit in. Or perhaps we should be thinking about how best to fit you in… I’m sorry you’re so busy and have to work so hard – I would love to be there to give you the long, deep massage you deserve. Just think about that to keep you going.
‘Anyway, the bath is waiting for me. I’ve got it just the way I like it – steamy, scented, hot bubbles – can’t wait to feel that water lapping over me while I stretch out and just let the tension of the day flow out of me. It’s a good way to get really *in touch* with myself. I think I may have to stay in there some time, lying back and thinking of… you. XXX’
Anna sat back in the chair and read the words