Swimming Lessons(81)

“Fuck Gil,” he said, raising his glass.

“To Ireland,” I said. “I’ll pack up the house, pack up the girls, and move out.” It was the drink talking, making plans without my brain being asked.

Jonathan waved his glass towards the bar again and poured me more wine.

“Thank you for the offer, Jonathan,” I said, concentrating on my words, which wanted to run together. “I really appreciate it. Will you do something else for me, too?”

Jonathan shifted across the table and held my hands in his. “Anything.”

“If something should happen—you know, to me—promise you’ll keep an eye on Nan and Flora.”

“What do you mean? What’s going to happen?”

I stared at him until he said, “OK, I promise.”

When we got up to leave I staggered, catching myself against the table. The barmaid was sitting on a stool, waiting for us to leave. Two plaits of yellow hair lay coiled on the bar beside her.

“Are you drunk?” Jonathan said.

“Of course I’m bloody drunk,” I said. “You made me drink a whole bottle of wine, plus what we had at dinner.”

“I think you need some coffee,” he said. “Come on, upstairs.”

Jonathan took me to my room and sat me on a wooden chair in the corner against another heart-shaped hole and kneeled to take off my shoes. I bent forwards, meaning to kiss his forehead, but he jumped up. “Coffee,” he said, and picked up the kettle from the tray on the unit opposite the bed. He shook it and went into the bathroom. I got up, steadied myself, and followed him. The tiny space had been tiled with pictures of edelweiss and hearts which swirled together. Jonathan jumped when I stood behind him and put my arms about his chest, and when I looked around his shoulder his eyes met mine in the bathroom mirror. “I can’t do this, Ingrid,” he said. It hadn’t occurred to me that we were doing anything until he said it.

“Why? Don’t you want to?”

He left the kettle in the sink, turned around, and put his hands on the tops of my arms.

“It would be wrong.” He sounded sober.

“But downstairs you said we should live together in Ireland.”

“Not like that, though. You’re still married.”

“So you don’t want me, either.” I went back to the bedroom.

From the bathroom’s doorway Jonathan said, “Come on, Ingrid. Don’t get all maudlin on me. It’s wine you’ve been drinking, not gin.” He laughed. “Let me make you some coffee.”

He sat on the edge of the bed drinking a minibar whiskey. I sat in the chair holding a cup and saucer on my lap.

“Drink it up,” he said. “I might even make you have another.”

“Oh, please don’t. I’ll be peeing all night. Look.” I turned the cup over the saucer and shook it; a couple of drops came out. “See, all gone.” I got off the chair and onto my knees, put the cup and saucer down, and inched the two feet across the carpet.

I know, Gil, you don’t want to read this. But you have to, every word. No skipping or skimming; this, my love, is your punishment. All I ask is that afterwards you break that stupid rule of yours and you remove these letters from their books and get rid of them. (More things our children mustn’t read.)

This is what happened—the facts, the reality. I’ve always found that reality is so much more conventional than imagination. And over the years I’ve imagined far too many things: your women, your places, your actions.

Jonathan’s knees were together; I opened them and kneeled in the space between. I took his glass of whiskey and put it on the floor behind me, and then I kissed him. He tasted of alcohol and sweetness; of the first spoonful of Christmas pudding after the flame has gone out. I hadn’t kissed another man for more than sixteen years.

He pulled away but I took his bottom lip in between my teeth and bit, gently. I lifted my dress over my head, undid my bra, stood up and took off my knickers. I waited in front of him naked, and he held my buttocks and pulled me to him, pressing his face between my legs and breathing me in, long, deep breaths. It was me who had to break away then, had to reach out to pull his shirt from his trousers and unzip him. Everything we did, the kissing, the undressing, the touching, everything was done slowly, as if at any time we were allowed to change our minds. Neither of us did. And when he came inside me as I sat astride him, his hands on my breasts, I watched his old familiar face from the perfect angle, and not once did I think of you.


In the morning I was woken by the click of the hotel door closing. The empty space beside me was still warm. Jonathan had left a note on the pillow:


I told you I couldn’t do this. I’m going to see Gil to get him to meet you at the Swimming Pavilion. Go home to your husband.

Jonathan x

PS—Sorry about Ireland.


I am grateful that he felt you and I, our marriage, our family, were more important than his flight to Addis Ababa, more important than anything he and I could’ve had together, but I don’t deserve it, any of it. I never meant for this to be my life.

Time, tomorrow, for one more letter.


Ingrid


[Placed in The Swiss Family Robinson, by Johann David Wyss, 1812.]





Chapter 43