Heya, sorry this is a short one, it was kinda Robert's turn to speak but I sort of trapped it a bit. Just getting back into everything after an unintentionally long break! Anyway… ramble over; enjoy!
Jessie xx
VII
She called my name. Damn. I had been so sure of keeping control over that conversation. But she always did have to get the last word.
"Sandra?" the sound of her name as it fell unbidden from my lips cut the air. Suddenly, the strictly professional attitude I had taken was the precise opposite of what I wanted to have done. The modicum of control that I had maintained was gone. An uncommon fear was behind my eyes now, how I hoped she couldn't see it. Her eyes were fierce; her tone was sharp.
"Is that it?" she asked. The sharpness was gone. Before me stood the woman I had fallen head over heels for. In the bland, emotionless corridor in the heart of the MET, the girl who had been my life held my heart in an unspoken whisper. What had happened to us? "Sixteen years. Now, here's the rules, here's a case, get on with it without spending too much on paperclips?"
How could I answer her? I thought it was the best way to proceed? The echoes of that last conversation wounded my ears. I swallowed.
"Sa… Superintendent…" I was trapped in the headlights of what had turned into the biggest disaster since I had left that night. Sixteen years ago she had asked me to leave: I should never have left.
"No," she stated.
"What?" I was confused.
The voice of sixteen years silence passed between us.
"I'm sorry," she said at length. "We'll get right on to it," she tapped the folder in her hand. I had forgotten about the folder.
I had to say something. But it felt like my heart was breaking all over again as I realised the truth of our situation; we'd known each other, now we were strangers. I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. Ever again, maybe I should just cut my tongue out before my brain can come up with any other ridiculous ideas of how to deal with things. Not that this was just anything, of course. This was the woman I had loved, married, lived a lifetime with in six years before she had pushed me away and I had stupidly gone.
"Sandra…" maybe it wasn't too late, maybe I could save what I'd lost.
She shook her head. It was too late. "We knew each other, once."
It was a simple statement, one which was undeniable in its validity. I nodded and watched her return to the room. Doors shouldn't have windows. Because through the window in this door I had to watch her move effortlessly through the crowd and into the subtle embrace of somebody else's arms as if there were no-one else in the room except the man she was seeking. Doors shouldn't have windows.
The rest of the function and the working day passed me by in a blur where I made small talk, vague assertions to looking forward to my new role and avoided bumping into any member of the UCOS team; this latter task was facilitated by their own aversion to meeting me again and disappearing surreptitiously from the proceedings. Returning home, I occupied myself helping Hermione and Rufus with their homework; listening to my wife talk about so-and-so from the country club that she'd met in the hairdressers and wouldn't it be nice to go skiing in half-term? I don't know, I might have successfully jumped off the side of my boat by then. How could I have possibly imagined that meeting her again wouldn't turn my head upside-down? Watching Helen float around the house in her designer clothes talking about designer people, I remembered the shabby little terraced house that Sandra and me had lived in. We'd been skint, the only thing designer in our lives had been Tony who'd lived two doors up with his extravagant partner. I think he was an estate agent. Tony was an interior designer who sold wallpaper to Debenhams. He would always say good morning. Life had seemed so simple then. Life had been so simple then.
"Robert? Are you even there?"
I blinked. Smiled. Nodded. "I'm here."
It was all I could say, for now.
