His Other Life. Beth Thomas

nods too. ‘Yeah, good.’ He starts up the stairs and I follow behind. ‘Finally sorted out that three-bed semi in Whitlow.’

      ‘Oh good.’

      ‘Yep. The owner can’t believe it. He thinks I’m a god!’ He starts to change his clothes.

      I sit down on the bed and watch as, god-like, he folds his dirty shirt in half, then in half again, then places it carefully into the laundry basket behind the door. As he straightens the creases in his trousers before hanging them up, I remember the call from earlier.

      ‘Oh, there was a call for you.’

      ‘Yeah?’ He’s dressed again now and heads back downstairs. Dutifully, I follow behind. ‘Chinese or Indian?’

      ‘Neither, actually. He sounded English, I think. Possibly London or home counties …’

      I come into the kitchen where he’s standing with the East of India’s menu in one hand and the Moon Hung Lo’s in the other. ‘What?’

      ‘Oh, sorry, I thought you meant … Um, we haven’t had Chinese for a while, have we?’

      He bounces the menus up and down in his hands as he looks at me with a smile. ‘No, that’s true, but I’m really in the mood for a good curry tonight. What do you think?’

      What I think is that we haven’t had Chinese for a while, and actually I would run through our street singing ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ wearing nothing but a splash of perfume and three gold tassels for the chance to eat sweet and sour chicken balls, just once. But I nod and smile nauseatingly. I despise myself sometimes. ‘OK, yes, curry would be lovely. Thanks.’

      ‘Cool.’ He puts the menu down on the kitchen counter and brings his phone out of his pocket. As always, I feel a stab of … something when I see it. Or at least, my eyes do. They kind of jolt to attention as it comes into view, like a dog spotting a squirrel. Adam scans the menu, looking for the restaurant’s phone number. ‘Did you say there was a call for me?’

      ‘Oh, yes, there was. Someone called … Leon …’

      His head snaps up, the hand holding his phone frozen in mid-air. ‘Who?’

      I manage to drag my eyes away from the phone to focus on Adam. His usual air of ease and nonchalance is gone abruptly, replaced by an intense stark alarm. ‘What’s up?’

      ‘Who did you say called?’

      I frown, hesitating before speaking to let him know I’m not pleased with how he’s behaving. If I’m brutally honest, I also do it to torture him, just a teensy bit. ‘It was Leon.’

      He brings his face closer to mine. ‘What did he say?’ He’s speaking slowly, his hands still not moving.

      ‘Um, well he said something about being in the area—’

      ‘Shit.’

      ‘—and that he would see you soon.’

      ‘Oh shit. Anything else?’

      By now, the phone is back in his pocket and the take-away menu all but forgotten. My stomach notices this and gives a loud growl in protest.

      ‘You can hear for yourself – it’s on the answer phone.’

      Adam bursts into life, turning and marching rapidly into the living room. Seconds later I hear the answer phone message playing, that deep gravelly voice filling our cosy living space like a bad smell. When it reaches the click at the end, there’s the sound of a small movement, then the beep and the voice comes on again. ‘Hello Adam …’ At the end, Adam plays it a third time, and then a fourth, until my head is filled with that horrible raspy voice, pointedly saying my husband’s name, over and over.

      I walk quietly into the hallway and peer through the open door into the room; Adam is staring at the phone, unmoving, apparently frozen. Thinking hard? Undecided? Then in a sudden dart he looks up, catches my eye, and hurries past me, up the stairs. ‘Who’s Leon then?’ I ask pointlessly, running after him. He strides into our bedroom, but before I can catch him up, he’s out again, passing me on the stairs as he runs back down.

      ‘Oh, no one. Just someone I … used to work with. Years ago.’

      ‘Oh, right. So why are you so pissed off?’

      He stops in the hallway and turns to face me. I’m standing on the bottom stair still, so for once we’re about the same height. He puts his hand out and gently touches my cheek. ‘I’m not pissed off, Grace. Not really. I don’t like the bloke, we fell out at school and I wasn’t expecting ever to hear from him again. That’s all.’

      ‘I thought you said you used to work with him?’

      He puts his arm back down and puts his hand into his pocket. ‘Yeah, that’s right, I did, we worked together for a while after we left school, but we didn’t really have much to do with each other.’ The hand in his pocket reappears holding the car keys, and he jingles them a bit, distractedly. ‘He’s a bit of a prick, to be honest.’

      ‘Oh.’

      ‘Yeah. World-class knobhead.’ He looks at his watch then back at me, and smiles fondly. ‘OK, well, I’m off to get the food.’ He leans towards me, one hand round the back of my neck, and kisses me. As we break apart, he stays close, his thumb gently stroking my neck. ‘Don’t worry about him, Gracie. He’s nothing.’

      I nod. ‘OK.’

      He stares into my eyes for a few moments, kisses me again, then draws away and moves to the door. ‘Warm the plates up, sweetheart, I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

      He wasn’t.

      TWO

      Twenty minutes after Adam left finds me pacing the living room. I’ve put plates in the oven, got some wine ready and selected a few DVDs for him to choose from, but that only took a minute or two. Now I’m walking from the back window to the front, lifting up the curtain, peering out at the street then turning and walking to the back again. There must be a long queue in the Indian. And of course we never actually got round to ordering the food so he will have to wait while it’s prepared and cooked. It could take, ooh, at least, I don’t know, half an hour. But it’s already been … Never mind, never mind, if there’s a queue he could wait fifty minutes, easily. An hour, even. It’s possible. Maybe he’s had to try a few different places. Maybe he’s bumped into someone he knows and has lost all track of time. Maybe he’s bumped into Leon.

      After about two hours, I’ve stopped pacing and am now sitting on the edge of the sofa, rocking backwards and forwards and occasionally biting the hard skin around my fingernails. I’ve got my own mobile phone loose in my hand but it’s as good as useless when the one, the only person I want to contact has apparently switched his phone off. That sodding phone of his, full of mysteries and unknowns, always always with him, constantly lighting up and vibrating all over the place; but now, when I really need to use it, when it will be of more use than it ever has been before – to me, anyway – it’s in his pocket in complete darkness. Oh my God, why would he do that? Why would anyone? What’s the arsing point of having an arsing mobile if it’s arsing switched off, for arse’s sake?

      I did wonder whether it’s not switched off at all, maybe he simply hit a black spot or whatever it’s called, so I’ve texted, Facebooked and WhatsApped him too. That way, if he does happen to get a fraction of a second of signal, he’ll see my messages. At least then he could try to call me from a phone box, to put my mind at ease.

      But he’s called me before from the East of India. Or rather, I’ve called him there before. I know I have, I remember it. He forgot to ask me what I wanted, so I rang to tell him, to make sure he didn’t come back with a vindaloo for me like the first time, when he didn’t know I don’t like spicy food. Which means I know there’s no black spot there. Which means