Elizabeth, maddened by his fussing over the child, flared up and attacked him.
‘Look at yourself. You never sleep. You never even look up. You scuttle about from work to the baby to work again, with great bags under your eyes, like some sort of maniac. It’s impossible to hold a conversation with you. You’re insane.’
She insisted that he leave the baby to her for a few nights, and he did so, taking sleeping pills to prevent himself lying listening for the cries that Elizabeth might not hear. Amanda survived. She was smiling now, and waving her arms above the blankets when she woke.
There began to be a balance between David and Elizabeth, as he recognized that she wouldn’t actually let the child starve, and she accepted that it was useful if he fed the child in the evenings and at night. It meant she could go out.
When Amanda was nearly one, Elizabeth made an announcement which was as startling as the news of her pregnancy had been. David had put Amanda to bed and was having his tea. Elizabeth, who was going out, had already had hers.
‘I want a divorce. I’ve met someone else and he wants to marry me.’
She treated David’s astonished questioning with contempt.
‘Well, if you didn’t know you must be blind. It won’t make a damn of difference to you – Amanda’s the only thing in the world you care about anyway.’
‘Yes, I’ve known him a while. I’ve known him two years, if you must know – on and off.’
When she’d gone out David sat staring at the dirty table. He was glad she went out. He wanted to hit her. He wanted to hit her face and punch her belly and hurt her. That was the only thing he could think of. Hitting both of them with all his strength. The want seemed to swell and he raised his fist and brought it down with all his force on the table. Two plates fell off and shattered, and the milk fell over, spilling everywhere. His fist hurt.
He was not a man to analyse feelings. When the desire to hit her stopped being a physical need, he methodically tidied and swept the kitchen. Then he went and looked at Amanda sleeping. It was Amanda he cared about. He wouldn’t care about Elizabeth, he wouldn’t even interest himself in what the bitch did. She was finished, as far as he was concerned. It was Amanda he loved.
When Elizabeth returned later that night he was perfectly controlled. Speaking politely and distantly he began to discuss the settlement of their joint finances. He proposed that she move out immediately. Amanda would continue to live with him but he would deliver her to Elizabeth in the mornings when he went to work, and collect her on his way home. He would stay in the house and buy her half of the joint mortgage from her. Elizabeth, who had visibly been crying, flew into an uncontrolled rage, calling him a bastard and throwing her shoes at him.
‘I wish I’d never married you. I wish I’d never seen you!’ she screamed. ‘You don’t know what love is. You’ve never loved me, you’ve never cared about me. Only the cupboards and the car and the fucking wallpaper. You won’t love Mandy either, when she starts to be a person – she’ll see through you. You’re incapable of love!’
He didn’t see what she had to be so upset about, since she was getting her own way and leaving. He went to bed and when she followed him with her weeping and accusations he shifted to the spare room.
Elizabeth moved out. The quality of David’s life improved almost immediately. He was an organized man, and with no one else interfering in the house, he could make it run like a machine. He shopped during his lunch-hour, and devoted the evenings to Amanda. She was walking now, and learning to talk. Her company was a constant source of delight. When he called for her she would go into a frenzy of excitement, clapping her hands and shouting, ‘Da da da da!’ She giggled uproariously at him when he pulled faces; they had a game where he would chase her round the sofa on all fours, roaring, and soon he had only to pretend to crouch down, to send her into a paroxysm of laughter.
At weekends he took her out, planning outings to zoos and parks to delight her. When old ladies commented on how pretty and clever she was he glowed with pleasure. People were always remarking on her beautiful hair, which grew longer and more fly-away, without ever changing its silver-blonde colour. He called her Silver Top, Duck’s Fluff, Dandelion Clock.
As if he had been turned on a giant wheel, he entered again into a terrible state of anxiety about Elizabeth’s care of Amanda. Elizabeth might let her run out on to the road. She might fall downstairs. He could see her hurt, maimed, unconscious on a hospital bed; she was only safe when she was with him. And when the child fell asleep, exhausted, at 8.30 or 9 p.m., he resented all the waking daytime hours of her Elizabeth had enjoyed.
He considered leaving his job. If he gave up work . . . It would only be for three years anyway. Amanda could start school at four and a half. It wasn’t long – and he could sell the car, and do odd pieces of carpentry at home, at nights. He had savings. Maybe he could persuade Elizabeth to wait for her money from the mortgage, till Amanda was five. The new man was well off, to judge by the size of his house.
He realized that Amanda greeted Elizabeth with enthusiasm when he took her back in the mornings. She did like her mother. Would it harm her to lose contact? From the opulence of his imagined full days and nights with her, he considered letting her go to Elizabeth for the odd weekend.
He gave six weeks’ notice at work before he’d even spoken to Elizabeth. He didn’t want the confrontation. But he was also quite sure that he would get what he wanted. If Elizabeth refused, he would go to court and get proper custody. He was the injured party in the whole affair – and had clearly established more rights to Mandy through his continued care of her. There was no way he could lose.
He finally told Elizabeth one morning as he dropped Amanda off, that he’d like to talk to her that evening. At 6 p.m. she ushered him into an untidy, expensively furnished lounge. As she turned to open the door in front of him he realized, with a jolt, that she was pregnant again.
So much the better. She’d have no need to fight for Amanda now – she’d have a new baby all to herself. It hadn’t taken them long, had it. It hadn’t taken them three bloody years.
She sat down and asked him, quite formally, to sit. He tried not to look at her. He was just starting to speak when the door opened and a man’s blond head peered round and said, ‘Sorry!’ before withdrawing.
David started again. ‘I’ve come to see you about Amanda.’
She nodded distantly. He imagined the shape of her belly under her smock, and his hands remembered the feel of her skin, stretched tight and silky-smooth. It was impossible that he should be speaking to her like this – in another man’s house. He had to close his eyes to steady himself and tell himself with all his concentration, ‘She is a bitch and I don’t care about her. She is nothing to me.’ His hands, clenched on the arms of the chair, were sweating horribly. He wondered where Amanda was. It would be easier if he could see her.
‘I’m stopping work. Given in my notice. I want to – you to – I want you to let me have Amanda. I’ll look after her in the days too. You can see her – but I want her. It’s only fair. You can see that.’ Blurted out, not like any of the speeches he had planned. He was burning up. What was it? He didn’t even know what it was that was sending waves of hot panic beating through his flesh.
Elizabeth seemed composed. She spoke in a low voice. ‘Look, I’ve got something to tell you, David, and I should have told you before. I’ve been putting it off because I didn’t want to upset you. But there’s nothing else I can do, I’m afraid. I didn’t –’ She faltered, and he suddenly realized that far from being composed she too was terrified, on the edge of tears. Her voice dropped even lower and he had to crouch forward to hear her. ‘When I moved in with Mark he guessed something which I’d never thought of. He hadn’t really seen her before, you see. But when he saw Amanda – properly – he guessed.’ She came to a complete stop. David was paralysed. The ‘WHAT?’ of rage inside