Peter. She’d been temping for a few weeks at a school in Bermondsey, typing letters to parents about sports day, about uniform requirements, tallying up the registers, writing out the teachers’ pay slips. Those first few months after Joe had left, after what had happened in the hospital, with the bills to pay and the rent mounting up and the flat so dreadful and empty and the whole thing with Aoife: Monica hated to think about that time. She had, that morning, put on the emerald necklace Joe’s grandmother had given her when they’d got married. It wasn’t something she wore often but Joe had taken her rings, the pendant he’d bought her for her twenty-first. To sell, she supposed. They had always been short of money.
So she had put on the emerald necklace, not something she’d ever particularly liked. Too ornate, too old-looking for her taste. But she’d thought it would go with the green belt on her skirt. She’d been on the bus taking her south of the river, standing up on the running board because those early-morning routes were always jam-packed, when a man had offered her his seat.It always made her think of Aoife, whenever this happened. Because they’d been on the tube together once and a man, not old, middle-aged perhaps, had stood up for them and just at the moment where she’d been saying, Thank you so much, and moving forward, Aoife had caught her by the arm and said, No, thank you, to the man, it’s not necessary.
Anyway, so the man had offered her his seat and she had accepted with a nod—shutting her mind to Aoife and her principles—and lowered herself onto the seat and, as she did so, the man had exclaimed, “What a beautiful necklace.”
She had turned, surprised, ticket in hand. The man was leaning with one hand on the rail, examining her throat area, his eyes intent, his face absorbed. It seemed extraordinary to be looked at like that, with such attention, such concentration. So when the man had asked if she was fond of early-Edwardian filigree, she had breathed, “Oh, yes.” And he had taken the seat next to her, when it became vacant, and talked about metalworking and artisans and Venetian influence, and she had looked up at him, eyes wide, and when he asked if he could touch the “piece,” as he called it, she’d said, “Of course.”
She should dig out that necklace, Monica thought, as she soaped her shoulders. The phone rang again, more briefly this time, and Monica turned on the tap to top up the water, looking down at her body. Not bad, she decided, for someone approaching her mid-thirties. She still had a waist, which was more than could be said for most women her age. She was still trim; she was careful about what she ate, these days. She kept celery on hand in the kitchen for those moments of hunger. There was the sense that everything was being pulled downwards a touch, as if her flesh had suddenly become aware of gravity. The last time she’d seen Aoife—how long ago was it now, three years, almost four?—she’d been struck by her youth. The flawless, taut skin of her face, the way the flesh clung to the bone, the smoothness of herthroat, her chest, the supple flex of her arms. It had given Monica a shock; everyone said they looked alike but Monica had never seen it, not at all. As children, they couldn’t have been more different, Aoife so dark and she, Monica, so fair. But she suddenly saw that, the older they got, the more similar they became, as if they were converging on a single destiny, a unified identity. Monica felt herself to be so clearly separate from Aoife, so different in every conceivable way, but looking at her that day, that day in the kitchen, she could see herself ten years previously.
When Peter had told her, the second time they’d met—he’d taken her to a pub in Holborn, a dark-walled place with the severed heads of deer mounted on the walls—that he had children, Monica had felt a jolt that wasn’t entirely disagreeable. Of course,
So she had put on the emerald necklace, not something she’d ever particularly liked. Too ornate, too old-looking for her taste. But she’d thought it would go with the green belt on her skirt. She’d been on the bus taking her south of the river, standing up on the running board because those early-morning routes were always jam-packed, when a man had offered her his seat.It always made her think of Aoife, whenever this happened. Because they’d been on the tube together once and a man, not old, middle-aged perhaps, had stood up for them and just at the moment where she’d been saying, Thank you so much, and moving forward, Aoife had caught her by the arm and said, No, thank you, to the man, it’s not necessary.
Anyway, so the man had offered her his seat and she had accepted with a nod—shutting her mind to Aoife and her principles—and lowered herself onto the seat and, as she did so, the man had exclaimed, “What a beautiful necklace.”
She had turned, surprised, ticket in hand. The man was leaning with one hand on the rail, examining her throat area, his eyes intent, his face absorbed. It seemed extraordinary to be looked at like that, with such attention, such concentration. So when the man had asked if she was fond of early-Edwardian filigree, she had breathed, “Oh, yes.” And he had taken the seat next to her, when it became vacant, and talked about metalworking and artisans and Venetian influence, and she had looked up at him, eyes wide, and when he asked if he could touch the “piece,” as he called it, she’d said, “Of course.”
She should dig out that necklace, Monica thought, as she soaped her shoulders. The phone rang again, more briefly this time, and Monica turned on the tap to top up the water, looking down at her body. Not bad, she decided, for someone approaching her mid-thirties. She still had a waist, which was more than could be said for most women her age. She was still trim; she was careful about what she ate, these days. She kept celery on hand in the kitchen for those moments of hunger. There was the sense that everything was being pulled downwards a touch, as if her flesh had suddenly become aware of gravity. The last time she’d seen Aoife—how long ago was it now, three years, almost four?—she’d been struck by her youth. The flawless, taut skin of her face, the way the flesh clung to the bone, the smoothness of herthroat, her chest, the supple flex of her arms. It had given Monica a shock; everyone said they looked alike but Monica had never seen it, not at all. As children, they couldn’t have been more different, Aoife so dark and she, Monica, so fair. But she suddenly saw that, the older they got, the more similar they became, as if they were converging on a single destiny, a unified identity. Monica felt herself to be so clearly separate from Aoife, so different in every conceivable way, but looking at her that day, that day in the kitchen, she could see herself ten years previously.
When Peter had told her, the second time they’d met—he’d taken her to a pub in Holborn, a dark-walled place with the severed heads of deer mounted on the walls—that he had children, Monica had felt a jolt that wasn’t entirely disagreeable. Of course,
Similar Books
