The Three-Year Itch

‘I don’t remember carving it on a tablet of stone!’ Suddenly the discussion was getting too heated, too emotional, but she couldn’t stop. ‘I … I want to have a child now, Grey.’

‘Why?’

Because I love you and having your baby would be the most wonderful thing that could happen to me. His detached expression did not invite such a declaration.

In the absence of an immediate answer, he provided one for her. ‘Because all your friends are having babies,’ he said dismissively.

‘Rubbish!’

‘Cogently argued,’ he replied.

‘God, I hate it when you go all lawyerish on me,’ she declared fervently. ‘What would you do if I simply stopped taking the pill?’ The words were out. It was too late to call them back.

But his expression betrayed nothing. ‘Is that emotional blackmail, Abbie,’ he asked, very quietly, ‘or a statement of intent?’

Her face darkened in a flush of shame. She had always considered their marriage an equal partnership. Right now it didn’t feel that equal, but a child needed two loving parents and it was a decision they had to make together. Slowly, deliberately she shook her head. ‘I’ve been thinking about this for months, Grey,’ she told him.

The planes of his face hardened imperceptibly. ‘And now you’ve made up your mind, you’ve decided to inform me of your unilateral decision?’

‘It wasn’t like that, Grey. I … I just wanted to be sure.’

‘Well, I want to be sure, too,’ he declared. Then, as if trying to claw away from the edge of some yawning precipice, he went on, more gently, ‘What about your career? You’re beginning to make a real name for yourself—’

‘I don’t intend to stop working, Grey,’ she said, interrupting. Lord, if that was his only concern then there was no problem. ‘I thought if we had a nanny I could get on with—’

The tight constraint finally snapped. ‘Damn it, Abbie, a baby is not an accessory that every professional woman needs to prove that she’s some kind of superwoman. I won’t have a child of mine dumped at six weeks with a nanny while her mother gets on with her real life.’ He flung his napkin on the table, pushed back his chair and rose to his feet.

‘You don’t understand!’ she flung at him. ‘Why won’t you listen to me?’

‘I’ve listened. Now it’s my turn to think. Months you said you’d been thinking about this? How many months? I think I should at least be granted as long as you.’

‘Don’t walk away from this, Grey,’ she warned him. ‘I’m serious.’

‘So am I.’ For a moment they stared at one another across the table as if they were strangers. Then Grey gave an awkward little shrug. ‘We’ll talk about it again in six months. Now, since I’m really not very hungry, I’ll go and deal with the messages that have piled up on the machine.’

Abbie, stunned into silence, remained where she was. She didn’t understand what had happened. One moment they had been sitting quietly having their supper and the next they were tearing emotional lumps off one another.

‘Well, you really made a mess of that, Abigail Lockwood,’ she told herself aloud. More of a mess than she would have thought possible. If she hadn’t known better, she would have thought he didn’t want her to have his child … But that was ridiculous. Grey loved to be around children. She had been the one who’d wanted to wait a while to give her career a chance. She almost wished she hadn’t been so successful …

With a sigh, she gathered the plates, cleared away and collected her bag from the hall. If he had decided to work, then so would she; while he dealt with his calls she could download her laptop onto the PC. But before that she would insist that he listen to her. He might still oppose the idea of starting a family, but at least he would know she had no intention of dumping her longed for baby with a nanny and de-parting for all corners of the globe at a moment’s notice. Hardly any wonder he was angry if he thought that was her intention.

Grey, on the telephone, stopped speaking and looked up as she entered the study, placing his hand over the receiver. ‘Give me a minute will you, Abbie?’ he asked. ‘This is—’ She didn’t wait to find out what it was, but backed out, closing the door behind her with a sharp snap.

‘Abbie?’ He found her a few minutes later, loading the washing machine.

‘Where’s your bag, Grey? You must have some washing if you’ve been away.’

‘In the bedroom. Abbie, about the phone call …’

She didn’t want to listen to him explaining why suddenly he had secrets where there had never been secrets before. She knew some of his work was highly confidential, but they had always shared a study; he trusted her discretion … Or maybe it wasn’t work at all. The thought leapt unbidden into her head. She straightened, pushed past him and crossed the hall to the bedroom, where she unzipped his bag and began to remove his clothes.

Then she collected the clothes they had so carelessly jettisoned while under the shower. Two pairs of wet jeans? She glanced at the pair she was already holding which had come from his bag. What kind of lawyer took jeans to a case conference, for heaven’s sake? Not Grey. He had a wardrobe full of sober, well-cut suits that he kept for the office. And as she scooped up the pair he had been wearing she caught the faintest scent of woodsmoke that clung to the cloth, reminding her of the cottage.

He was still in the kitchen standing in front of the washing machine when she returned, so that she had to ask him to move before she could load the clothes.

‘Excuse me, Grey,’ she said stiffly.

For a moment she thought he wasn’t going to move. Then he shrugged, shifted sideways. ‘Abbie, will you stop fussing about and let me explain?’ he demanded as she pushed in the clothes, keeping her eyes determinedly upon her task.

‘Explain? You wanted to make a private telephone call. What’s there to explain about that?’ Everything, she thought as she banged the door shut, set the programme, and when she turned away he was standing in front of her, blocking the way.

‘I know you’re angry with me for not wanting you to have a baby right now—’

‘Give the man a coconut,’ she interrupted flippantly as she tried to sidestep him. But it wasn’t true. She was angry with him for not wanting to talk about it, for not listening. It was so unlike him.

He caught her arm as she brushed past, held her at his side. ‘I’m sorry if I seemed as if I didn’t care. I do. And I will think about it … it’s just that it’s been a difficult couple of weeks.’

‘Difficult?’ She was immediately contrite. ‘What’s happened? Is it Robert?’ she asked, remembering the earlier telephone call.

‘Robert?’ At her mention of his brother his eyes narrowed.

‘You rang him earlier. I just wondered …’ She hesitated in the face of his guarded expression. ‘I thought perhaps Susan had been causing more trouble.’

‘No. It’s not Susan …’ He gave another of those awkward little shrugs that were so out of character. ‘I can’t explain right now.’

‘No?’ She stiffened abruptly. ‘Then I can’t understand. If you’ll excuse me, Grey?’ she said with polite formality. ‘It’s been a very long day, and if I don’t lie down right now, I think I might just fall down.’

He stared at her as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Well, that was fine with her. That made two of them who were having that kind of trouble today. He stepped back abruptly to let her pass, his jaw tight, a small angry muscle ticking away at the corner of his mouth. ‘Then I certainly won’t disturb you when I come to bed. Goodnight, Abbie.’

She made it to the bedroom before the tears stung her eyes. What on earth was happening to them? They had been married for three years. Three blissfully happy years. Of course they’d had rows. Loud, throwing-the-china rows on more than one occasion, rows that had lasted for seconds, blowing away the tensions, before the most glorious and lengthy reconciliations. But never a row like this, that you couldn’t put your finger on. A tight-lipped, hidden secrets, polite kind of row.

Something was wrong. She had sensed it from the moment of her arrival at the airport when he hadn’t been there to meet her. He would normally have checked the answering machine from his hotel while he was away. He’d had plenty of time to get her message last night. But he hadn’t. Something had happened while she was away. But what? She curbed the instinct to turn back and confront him. Demand to know. Things were bad enough.

True to his word, Grey didn’t disturb her when he came to bed. Despite the long hours of travelling, sleep eluded her, but hours later, when Grey finally came to bed, she closed her eyes, and whether he believed it or not he didn’t challenge her pretence. He didn’t put on the light, but quietly slipped out of his clothes and lowered himself gently into the bed beside her, and after a moment he turned his back.

She opened her eyes in the darkness and lay for hours, listening to his soft breathing and thinking about the plans she had made so eagerly on her journey home. Was it possible, she wondered miserably, that she had left the decision not to accept any more overseas jobs just one assignment too late?

She woke to a room still darkened by the heavy velvet curtains drawn across the window, but the sunlight was spilling in from the hallway and she knew instantly that it was late. She lay for a moment in the silent flat, knowing that she was alone and hating it. She had hoped that the morning would bring some kind of reconciliation. Neither of them had behaved exactly brilliantly, but they had both been tired last night and she was prepared to acknowledge that, while Grey might have been a little more receptive, she might have picked a better moment to suggest a total upheaval to their lives.

Instead he had left while she was asleep. Gone to his office without even saying goodbye. She had intended to stay at home that day, attend to wifely things. Shop, prepare a good meal. Reclaim her surroundings from two weeks of Grey’s bachelor housekeeping. Instead she found she had a need to reinforce herself as a person in her own right. And there was no better way of doing that than work.

She flung back the cover and slipped out of bed. But as she reached for her wrap she frowned. On the wall opposite the bed had hung a small Degas. Not a great painting—nothing that would set the galleries of the world at each other’s throats—but very pretty and very genuine. It was gone. Had they been burgled while she was away and he hadn’t wanted to frighten her? Was that why it had been a difficult week? Abbie flew to her jewellery box, locked in a small drawer in her dressing table, but it was there with all the pieces he had bought her during three happy years. She picked up the phone to call him at his office, then hesitated.

There was probably some perfectly logical explanation. Grey sometimes lent it to galleries for exhibition—maybe he had simply forgotten to mention it to her. They hadn’t exactly spent the evening in close conversation. She replaced the receiver. That was probably it, she decided. It would wait until he came home.

Trembling just a little, she went into the kitchen to make some tea. On the centre island, where she couldn’t possibly miss it, stood the silver bud-holder that Grey had bought her for their first wedding anniversary. In it was a red rose, a half-opened bud. And there was a note propped against the bud-holder—a plain sheet of paper, folded once. She opened it. ‘I thought you needed to sleep. I’ll see you this evening. Grey.’

That was all. No apology. But then he had taken the trouble to go out and find a rose for her before he drove into his City office. It wasn’t quite like buying a pint of milk from the corner shop. It couldn’t have been the easiest thing to find at seven-thirty in the morning. Yet why did she have the disturbing feeling that he might have found it a whole lot easier than waking her up and saying that he was sorry?