After You Left(36)

‘A week?’ His disappointment was palpable. It should have mattered, yet all she could think about was the need to buy herself more time. Her heart pounded as she waited for his answer.

‘Well, do as you will,’ he said.

She tried not to let out her relief until she had hung up. For a brief second, she felt she’d signed a lease on freedom.

Then she did something that she knew crossed a line.

His street was a long row of pre-war terraces. She peered at numbers until she found his. It had fresh paintwork and a mint-green door. Out front by the gate were a child’s pink bike and a pair of tiny pink plimsolls. Evelyn was driving her mother’s old car. She parked it two houses away on the opposite side. After sitting there for about ten minutes, she got out and crossed the street, focussing on the clip of her heels to try to ignore the wild pounding of her heart.

She gave three tentative raps. She hadn’t fully decided what she’d say if his wife came to the door. She tried to remember that, as far as Laura knew, she was just Mrs Coates’ daughter. No one was going to read her face and know any different.

She could hear music from a radio indoors. Suddenly, she got cold feet. She was just on the point of turning around and sneaking away when the door opened and Eddy appeared.

‘Evelyn?’ Shock and mild annoyance registered all over his face. She heard a voice say, ‘Who is it, Edward?’

‘It’s nothing,’ he shot back, stepping outside and letting the door close part way. ‘What are you doing here?’ he asked, in a rushed whisper.

She flooded with shame. ‘I came to see when you are coming back to finish painting. We still have a job to do.’ She didn’t really know what she was saying. It mortified her to act like she had a right to him. ‘You didn’t finish,’ she said, almost curtly.

She could see the alarm in his eyes. ‘I can’t. I can’t be there. Can’t see you, be so close to you, and not be able to, to . . .’

The woman in the house said, ‘Edward?’

‘I can’t handle this, Evelyn. I might look like I can, but it’s too much for me.’

She nodded, and backed away while his eyes held on to hers. Then she turned around and almost broke into a run.

The last thing she remembered was hearing the door close a little too firmly. Like someone shutting out a potential intruder and trying not to give the impression they had felt threatened.



The following day, she went back to the paint shop. The woman behind the counter observed her with too much interest. Evelyn bought some supplies and hurried out.

Back at the car, she was trying to balance her purchases on one arm and open the boot with her free hand when she heard him say, ‘Hello Evelyn.’ It was as though her ribs collapsed with the weight of her relief.

‘Can I help with those?’ He was behind her. His manner was perfunctory. He didn’t meet her eyes. Without waiting for her reply, he took the cans of paint from her, and her keys. ‘Here.’ He opened the boot and put the cans in. ‘You shouldn’t be doing this.’ She thought he sounded mildly impatient.

She didn’t know why he would have stopped to speak to her if he was going to be like this. ‘I really don’t need your help.’ She tried to wrestle the third can off him, which was mildly absurd. He finally stopped struggling and let her take it, then held up both of his hands in surrender. ‘You need some more white for the ceiling. We had run out.’ Before she could speak, he had walked off, and she thought he was leaving, but he went into the shop. When he came out, carrying another can, he seemed more relaxed; it was as though she might have imagined his earlier hostility. It fanned her flame for him in a way she hadn’t been prepared for. It no longer mattered that he hadn’t come earlier. It mattered that he was here now.

‘You were just passing?’

‘I followed you.’

‘Followed me? I thought you’d never want to see me again!’

‘Well, maybe not on my doorstep. But I did want to see you again. Desperately. You’re all I can think about. I was telling my friend Stanley I have this so bad it’s ruling me like I never thought I could be ruled.’ He moved in to perhaps kiss her neck and stopped himself. ‘I tell myself I can’t see you, I mustn’t see you, but I can’t stay away from you.’

‘I thought you hated me now.’

He searched her face, like a man torn between loathing and enjoying this trial-and-error, hit-and-miss process of getting to know a woman. ‘Hated? If anything, I thought you would hate me after how I behaved . . . Evelyn, maybe if I hadn’t been married all these years I’d have had a bit more practice – a better grasp of boundaries and when to cross them. But then you showed up at my door. That was the biggest adrenaline rush I’ve had in this lifetime.’

She loved his confession.

‘I need to kiss you, to have you in my arms. You can’t run away from me again. We only have one life. We can’t mess this up again.’

‘But it’s wrong.’ She jumped into the car without really thinking, and slammed the door. What was she doing? Her hands clutched the wheel. She was light-headed. She put the car into reverse while he just stood there, clearly confused. She pulled out of the parking spot a little too abruptly. The car bucked. She stalled the engine, started it and tried to do it all over again, this time without the ‘getaway driver’ sound effects.