White Bodies(8)

“Come and see.”

He picks up the car keys and throws them for Tilda to catch, and they leave, his arm around her shoulders, me following, comparing the blondness of their hair, the thinness of their hips, their totally modern beauty. Tilda says sweetly, “So you forgot the water on purpose? So sneaky!”

A few streets later, and we’re admiring Felix’s new silver-colored Porsche sports car. He opens the door, sits in the driver’s seat and presses a button that makes the roof slide backwards. “James Bond,” I say. I want to be massively impressed, but I’m still thinking about Tilda’s arms. I clamber into the back, and Tilda slips into the passenger seat, picking up a white envelope that has her name on the front, written in a spiky, tight script. She opens it and reads the card that’s inside.

“My God! That’s perfect.” She starts kissing Felix with an uninhibited enthusiasm that makes me look away.

“Come on,” I say. “Take us for a spin.”

“Look, Callie.” Tilda turns around to face me, her face radiant, and hands me the card.

I read: Darling T, come with me to France.

On the other side is a picture of a whitewashed villa on a hillside, a turquoise swimming pool at a tasteful distance from a vine-covered terrace.

“To this actual house?”

“Yes, that actual house.” Felix steers the car through the streets with one hand, the other arm stretched out, his fingers under Tilda’s hair, brushing the back of her neck.

“We’ll drive down to Provence,” he says proudly. “And, while we’re gone, my builders will come into your flat and do some work.”

“What sort of work?”

“A surprise.”

“Nothing too drastic?”

“No—what can I say—fine-tuning. . . . You’ll like it. It will be my gift.”

“Lucky me!”

That wouldn’t have been my reaction—and I’m surprised that Tilda’s going along with Felix’s scheme. Wanting to change her home without consulting her about how strikes me as rather extreme. “You’re being swept off your feet,” I say.

“I am.” She’s ignoring my disapproving tone, acting like the emotional dash into the bathroom hasn’t happened, like her arms aren’t bruised, and she laughs as Felix puts his foot on the accelerator. We zoom three hundred yards up Regent Street; then hit a traffic jam.

? ? ?

In the dossier I write: I was shocked to see bruises on Tilda’s arms. Was Felix responsible?—I don’t know. I can’t work out whether he’s a truly amazing person—organizing surprise holidays and improving her flat—or a deeply dangerous one. Either way, Tilda’s infatuated with him and I’m in pain. I don’t know whether I still feel the elation that came from adoring him, or whether I’m now terrified that I’ve been manipulated.

I go online and start googling. I look up the dangerous elements in passionate romances, and what happens psychologically as relationships become increasingly abusive. Before long I come upon a website called controllingmen.com, and I find myself reading for hours the hundreds of posts in forums called “The First Signs” and “Romance as Control” and—most interesting of all—“What You Can Do to Help a Friend Who Has Been Targeted By a Controlling Man.” In fact, I’m so sucked in that I join the site, giving myself a username, and entering the forums that are visible only to members. It’s addictive, and I’m up all night, reading, reading, reading.





5


The following evening I go to Curzon Street without calling ahead. My mind’s full of controllingmen.com and I’m hoping to see what Felix is like towards Tilda when he’s not hosting a planned event, because I now suspect that’s what our meetings have been—the movie night, the river trip, the arrival of the Porsche—all setups for Felix to act the loving, romantic hero. A comment on the website is ringing in my head: In public my husband acts like he’s Prince Charming, so loving and caring. In private he’s cold and he hits me, but never on the face. Only where the bruises won’t show.

Because I’m now playing the role of investigator and maybe rescuer, I’m nervous as I stand on the pavement outside the front door, pressing the buzzer. Twenty silent seconds elapse, and as I turn to walk away I’m actually relieved that I don’t have to go through with this, that I can go back home and have my sweet-and-sour chicken supper. Then, through the crackling intercom, I hear Tilda’s distorted voice—an uninviting “Hello?”

“It’s me. Callie. . . . Can I come up?”

“What? What are you doing here?”

I’m about to make up an answer when she says, “Oh, okay . . .” And she buzzes me in.

As I turn the corner at the top of the stairs I see that it’s Felix standing at the open door to the flat, casually dressed in a gray T-shirt and dark jeans but still somehow smart and together—like those clean-cut Americans who give TED talks. He welcomes me with a flash of flawless teeth and a quick hug that I would normally describe as warm and friendly.

“Come on in. . . . What’s up, Callie? Why this unexpected pleasure?”

“Oh, I’ve brought a book for Tilda to read.” I fish in my bag for the novel I’ve put there as my cover. “It’s American Psycho,” I say.