Thing is, I’ve started to notice that the nest egg is shrinking. First by a little, then a little more, and a little more. I’ve rarely checked the balance – as far as we’ve been concerned, it’s off-limits until the day my waters break and, besides, we have other money. It’s a saving, right? So, where’s it going?
Outwardly nothing has changed – mostly Will is still himself; a little dour, clumsy, shaky from too much coffee – and we’ve been talking about booking a holiday when my redundancy pay comes through, maybe to India or Thailand. But still, there’s that germ, the one that infects my whole nervous system. Something’s wrong.
The first day I went searching I hadn’t known what I was looking for, only that the sour, uneasy feeling in my stomach had got worse those last few days. His computer was switched off, the box files full of random paperwork labelled with his neat, blocky handwriting: Bills, Mortgage, Warranties. On his desk, beneath the piece of coral he uses as a paperweight, was a small stack of documents. I slid the top one aside with my finger, then the next and the next. Halfway down the pile I found something that caught my attention: a handwritten bill of sale for seven hundred and fifty pounds. The descriptor read only SSB (MM). The headed paper read Porters of Mayfair, the date written in heavy ink in the top left corner. Nineteenth of March. My eyes stung, and a pain blossomed in my stomach. I sat down in his chair, staring at the piece of paper as though I could somehow decode it. Something to do with the car, maybe? A repair? No, no. He would have told me. William told me everything. It used to drive me mad to hear the long, detailed litany of his day, particularly when I’d first left work and was bored stiff, but I wouldn’t have missed this, would I? No. I was scrupulous about our assets, particularly when we were more reliant on our savings than ever. I thought about the online poker again as I slid the bill of sale back into the stack of papers. SSB (MM).
Later that night, I curled into William on the sofa, my feet tucked beneath me, my head on his chest so that his heartbeat drummed against my cheek. He had a half-drunk bottle of beer in his hand. He smelled good, comfortable. I tilted my head up to catch his eye. He smiled down at me.
‘All right, babe?’ he said.
‘Sure,’ I told him.
And for a while, it was.
I didn’t want to know. Sealed myself in ignorance, cocooned by my defences. Easier that way. Safer.
But two weeks later my eyes rolled open as the alarm went off and I knew what was going to happen. Even as I scraped my knife against the toast and took a mouthful of too-hot tea, my head foggy and dense with tiredness, I knew. I showered and dressed and dried my hair, taking my time. I kissed William goodbye and then I sat at my laptop and listlessly browsed the job sites, one eye on the clock. When it reached nine, I took a deep breath and opened the door of the study again. The rain pattered softly against the narrow window. It felt as if it had been raining for days, a shimmering veil of grey silk. The sky was the colour of worn stone.
At the top of the receipt I’d found during my first search was a phone number and I dialled it quickly, feeling my heart pick up as a voice at the other end said, ‘Porters of Mayfair, good morning.’
I explained, in a voice that was running just a fraction too fast, that I was trying to do my tax return and had discovered a receipt among a pile of others, although I couldn’t for the life of me remember what the item I’d purchased was and would she be able to help me, please?
There was a pause and then the voice answered, ‘I’ll try.’
‘It just says “SSB” with “MM” in brackets. The price was seven hundred and fifty pounds.’
‘It’s a bag,’ she said almost immediately. ‘Sequin Shoulder Bag by Miu Miu. Your husband paid cash.’ There was a silence and then her voice came again. ‘Are you still there?’
‘I’m still here. Thank you, you’ve been very helpful.’
That evening Will called me. It was nearly seven o’clock, and I’d offered to pick him up from the station because the rain had grown heavy, sluicing against the windows in gusts. His commute, uncomfortable and expensive and nearly two hours long, had been part of his reluctance to move house when I’d first started pressing him about it. He’d told me he didn’t want to live in suburbia and I’d told him Swindon wasn’t suburbia, and he’d said did I know that an anagram of ‘Swindon’ was ‘disown’ and that maybe he’d disown me if I kept on about it, and that had made me laugh and then everything had been good again.
‘Babe, I’m going to be late home.’
A coldness, spreading in my chest. In the background I could hear the faint rumble of conversation and music, a pub perhaps.
‘Why?’
‘Huh? Sorry, it’s so noisy in here. I’m in the pub, the one by Paddington, you know? I came for a drink with Matt and Olly and I’ve only just seen the time. I’m only staying for one more, though.’
Silence. I let it float, like dark clouds.
‘Babe? Frances? You mad at me? It’s only a couple of pints.’
‘No, it’s not. It’s not that. Who did you say you were with?’
The noise faded a little. Perhaps he’d moved outside. I could picture him with his overcoat unbuttoned and the phone pressed against his ear, stubble shading his jaw. Maybe he was playing with his hair, tugging at it the way he does when he’s lying. My hand gripped the phone tighter.
‘Matt and Olly.’
‘Which Matt?’
‘The one from – sorry, mate – I’m in someone’s way. The one who used to live by us.’
‘The courier?’
‘No, the other one. The Arsenal supporter. Are you okay? You sound weird.’
‘Put him on.’
Silence. My heart quickened.
‘What?’
‘Matt. Put him on the phone to me. I want to say hi.’
Will laughed uneasily. ‘You barely know him, Frances.’
‘Just do it, would you?’
He sighed; the line bristled with static. I waited, holding my phone so tightly that my knuckles were turning white. I had forgotten how to breathe. There was some rustling, and then a surprised voice, male, cheerful-sounding.
‘Frances? Long time no speak! How are you?’
‘Matt?’
‘Yeah! From Turnham Road. I bumped into Will as I was heading to Paddington. You all right, yeah? You staying dry? It’s miserable up here. Hang on, hang on, he wants the phone back – we promise we won’t keep him out too late!’
William’s voice sounded heavier when he took back his phone and asked me again if everything really was all right.
‘You need to be working,’ he told me. ‘All this time at home alone, it’s not good for you.’
By the time I hung up, tears were building behind my eyes and I blinked them away before they could spill, annoyed at myself. If William was having an affair, you would know, I told myself sternly, opening a bottle of wine. Besides, when would he find the time? He’s on a train for four hours a day and in an all-male office the rest of the time.
One of a team of only three, Will’s computer consultancy business had nearly been called The Three Amigos before I pointed out that there were copyright laws against that sort of thing. They’d settled on Three Squares because, as they told me, they were the most boring nerds they knew. Straight down the line. Dependable. Prosaic to the point of banality. It was one of the things I’d loved about William the most, in the beginning. My polar star, guiding me away from the wreckage of my twenties, sane and modest and easy to read, so unlike the other men and women I’d had relationships with.