Alphabet Weekends - Elizabeth Noble [126]
Alec was a little late. He apologised – parking had been difficult, he said. Then she watched him stand in the short line and order his own unwanted coffee, carry it carefully over to her and sit down.
‘How are you?’ she asked.
‘I’m… I’m okay,’ he said.
It was only a matter of days since they had been lying naked side by side, as intimate as two people could be, but now Patrick and Marianne were between them, and it was entirely, utterly different.
He looked tired, and she told him so.
‘Not sleeping too well. You?’
Lucy answered with a small, tight shrug.
‘Are you still… at home?’
Alec nodded. ‘I think Marianne wanted me to go. At first I think she was inclined to chuck all my stuff out of the window.’
‘But?’
‘You know… neighbours, children, life… I wish she had. I’d rather have had her rage than this.’
‘Which is?’
‘I’ve broken her heart, she says.’ Alec stared into his coffee cup. ‘Patrick?’
‘He won’t tell me how he feels. He’s at his brother’s. He left the night… you know. He’ll hardly speak to me at all.’
Alec ran his hand across his face several times. ‘Christ. What a mess.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘It isn’t your fault.’
‘But I’m still sorry.’
At the next table a toddler smashed his plate. The flustered mother dropped to her knees and picked up the pieces.
‘Lucy?’ Alec reached for her hand, and held it on top of the table. She waited. ‘I want to stay with Marianne.’
She couldn’t take her hand away. ‘Is that what she wants?’
‘I don’t know. Not right now. She’s hurt and angry, and I don’t know if she’ll forgive me, ever, but that’s what I want to try to make her do.’
Lucy didn’t say anything. She had told Patrick she wouldn’t stay with him, whatever Alec decided. But she hadn’t allowed herself to think this.
‘I don’t know how honest you want me to be with you,’ he said. Jesus! How much more honest could they be than they already had been, lying in each other’s arms, eyes wide open, hearts wide open. ‘I love you both. I hope that doesn’t make me sound like an idiot. And I don’t know if it helps or makes it worse. I only know what I feel, and I’ve been pretty fucking confused for a while now. I love you both. I can imagine a life, a future, with both of you. But Marianne has my past as well. She’s the mother of my children, she’s the maker of my home, she knows me better than anyone else I’ve ever known, and I can’t leave her.’ He shook his head, dissatisfied. ‘No, no that’s not right. That’s not fair to you or to her. I don’t want to leave her.’
‘So what was this, Alec?’ It wasn’t an accusation.
‘This was me falling in love again. With you.’
‘That can’t happen.’
‘I didn’t think so either. But it has. Look at you. Don’t you love Patrick?’
‘Of course I do. He’s been all of the things to me that Marianne is to you. More, maybe. But not like this – I don’t love him like this. If I squeeze my eyes tight shut and try to imagine a life without him in it, I can, Alec. And it aches, but it doesn’t sting. I don’t know if I can say that about you.’
He didn’t answer.
‘You make me desperate, Alec. I want you. All the time. When I’m not with you, you’re all I can think about. When I am with you, I feel completely alive. You’re everything. I forget Patrick. I forget everything, basically.’
‘That sounds like infatuation.’ He said it in a flat, weird voice, as if maybe even he didn’t believe it.
‘Don’t you dare tell me I don’t love you because that would be more convenient for you! If I’ve just got a silly crush on you, you can go back to Marianne and get on with your life, and I can just be this embarrassing little blip – painful, but easy enough to get over. It’d be simpler for you, wouldn’t it?’ Her words were angry, but her voice wasn’t. She knew she sounded pathetic.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. None of this is easy for me, Lucy, believe me. It isn’t easy for any of us. Please don’t be angry with me.’
Lucy could feel hot tears in