I know the expression on your face when you come. I know how you clip your toenails, floss your teeth, and blow your nose. I know how your dad upsets you and spiders frighten you and tofu disgusts you.
“Fine. But not the pub.” She didn’t want to be surrounded by happy people talking in normal voices. “We’ll meet in the park.”
She kicked at the wood shavings under her feet and wondered what Dan wanted.
They’d been separated for seven months now. The law said you couldn’t divorce until you’d been separated for a full year. No trial reconciliations were allowed during that time.
You had to prove to the government that it was more than just a little tiff, that your marriage vows were well and truly ripped to shreds.
And here he was.
She watched as he got out of the car and frowned up at the parking sign. He looked at his watch and then again at the sign, wrinkling his forehead. He always did have problems deciphering parking signs. You’re fine, Dan. It’s not after 3 P.M. or before 9 A.M.
Finally he came loping down the grassy embankment. He saw her, smiled, raised a hand in greeting, and it came to her in a matter-of-fact way that she still loved him.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
“Cold.”
“Very.”
He moved toward her as if he was going to kiss her on the cheek, and she ducked her head and held a hand out at the swing next to her. “Have a seat.”
He sat down, awkwardly stretching out his long legs.
He looked straight ahead. “How are you?”
“I’m fine.”
Presumably, through Charlie and Angela, he knew everything about what had happened at the restaurant. Her humiliation was so complete it didn’t really bother her. She had no more dignity left to lose.
He chose Angela. Gemma chose her baby.
“Cat.”
And for one wild, heart-pumping moment she thought he was going to say that he’d made a mistake, he wanted to come back home, fix things up, try again.
“I’m going to France. We’re going to France.”
I don’t feel anything.
“Did the Paris job come up again? I didn’t know.”
It was their dream. Angela was getting to live Cat’s dream.
“They told me about a week ago.”
He was doing his best to keep his voice flat, but she could hear the underlying ripple of excitement. The celebrations they must have shared!
“I didn’t want you to hear it from anybody else.”
“Gee, thanks.”
He gave her a quick, sharp look.
“I don’t know how to make you believe how sorry I am. About everything. I wish—I never meant—I’m just so sorry.”
It occurred to Cat that Angela could one day have Dan’s children. The little boy that Cat had always imagined, a miniature version of Dan, would now belong to Angela.
That woman was going to live her dreams and have her children.
And when Dan got home today, Angela would say, “How did she take it?” and Dan would say sadly, “Not good,” and Angela would look sympathetic and pretty and large-breasted.
In a sudden rush of movement Cat leaped from her swing and positioned herself behind Dan. That woman would not hear about the tears in her eyes.
“Here, let me give you a push.”
“Eh?” His shoulders stiffened.
She pushed him gently on his back and said, “Didn’t your mum used to push you on the swing?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
With her hands flat on his back, she rocked him forward. His legs dragged on the ground and he held on tight to the swing.
I don’t feel anything. I don’t feel anything. I don’t feel anything.
“So, Paris! At last!” said Cat, like a charming girl at a cocktail party. “Have they got somewhere for you to live?”
“They put us in a furnished apartment for a month, and then we’ll find somewhere for ourselves.”
“And Angela? What will she do? Will she work?”
“She’s not sure yet.”
“Mmmm, and busy times, I guess! Are you selling your car? Putting things in storage?”
“I’m giving the car to Mel.”
“Dan.”
Because suddenly she couldn’t do it anymore or bear it any longer.
She bent her head to his ear and spoke softly and urgently, in her own real voice, as if she only had a minute to pass on this dangerous message.
“Thank you for telling me. I’m fine. Really. But could you do something for me? Could you just go now, without talking, without looking at me? Don’t say anything, don’t look back. Please.”
He sat very still. It wasn’t his style to obey such a weird and melodramatic request. But then he put one hand up to hers and held it very tightly, and for a second she breathed in the smell of his hair. He squeezed her hand, stood up, and walked away, back to the car.
It was nearly an exquisitely tragic moment except that as he got to the embankment, he tripped, one foot sliding clumsily out behind him.
Well, exquisitely tragic moments weren’t really her thing. Farce. That was more her style.
Cat applauded. “Au revoir! You big klutz!”
Without turning around, he gave her an ironic thumbs-up signal and kept walking to the car.
CHAPTER 26
At around 9 P.M. the night before Cat met Dan in the park, while Nana Kettle was eating a little snack of grilled cheese on toast, with a nice cup of tea and watching her favorite recorded episode of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, a brick came smashing through a glass pane on her back door and landed with a thud on the floor.
Nana heard a strange noise and naturally assumed it was Pop’s bloody dog. She enjoyed being cross with the dog and immediately put the video on pause.
“What have you done this time, you silly, no-good animal?” she called out querulously, as if for Pop’s benefit. Yelling at the dog made her feel like Les was still alive, working away on some project in the back room. She could almost hear him calling back, “I’ll see to it, love! You stay where you are.”
It used to drive her mad the way Les spoiled that damned dog.
She was on her feet, at the TV room door, muttering crossly to herself, when she heard footsteps.
“Who’s that?” she called out, annoyed rather than frightened, as she walked down the hallway. Frank and her granddaughters all had keys. But, really, it was polite to knock.