For Better For Worse

So this was why Louise had been so on edge with her recently; so sensitive… Eleanor felt as though her brain had gone into slow motion as she tried to deal simultaneously with both the emotional shock and the practical aspects of the bombshell Louise had just dropped on her.

‘But Louise, we’re a partnership,’ she protested quietly. ‘We’d made plans… You never said anything…’

‘We hadn’t made up our minds then.’ Louise flushed defensively. ‘Besides, Paul feels that my Russian will have more commercial value than… after all, most European countries already speak English.’

Eleanor winced. What was Louise trying to say to her; that her language skills were of more value to the partnership than Eleanor’s own?

She was tempted to point out what Pierre Colbert had said: that with the break-up of the Soviet Union no one as yet had any real idea of what language the re-emerging independent states would eventually choose to do business in, but what was the point in getting embroiled in a pointless battle of scoring off against one another?

If only she had recognised what was happening earlier; before Louise had made so many plans. If only Louise had had the consideration to tell her… give her some warning, she realised bleakly.

And she had thought they were such good friends… such good working partners. She had believed that they trusted one another… that she could rely on Louise to deal honestly with her.

‘You do understand, don’t you, Nell?’

Louise’s voice had taken on a pleading note now, and Eleanor tensed, resenting her familiar use of her shortened name, the name by which those closest to her—her friends—knew her.

‘It will be so much better for the children. London is no place for them to grow up. Paul and I have found the most marvellous château… it’s unbelievably cheap.’ Louise was starting to gabble nervously now, Eleanor recognised numbly. No doubt with relief that she had discharged the task Paul had undoubtedly set her.

‘You must all come out and see us once we’re settled out there. I’ve enjoyed working with you, but you can, I’m sure, understand how it is… and with our rent due to go up again…’ Louise gave a small shrug. ‘As Paul says, we would be fools to pass up on this kind of opportunity.’

‘Yes… Well, I hope it all works out for you, Louise.’

Try as she might, Eleanor knew her voice lacked warmth and pleasure. Her face felt stiff and cold, her body wooden.

As Louise came towards her she found herself automatically stepping back from her, physically rejecting her, not wanting her anywhere near her.

It wasn’t so much Louise’s desire to end their partnership that was responsible for her feelings, Eleanor acknowledged, it was the feeling that Louise had been dishonest with her, that she had in fact betrayed her… betrayed the relationship Eleanor had believed they shared.

She could remember so clearly now, when Louise and Paul had first married, Louise telling her vehemently, ‘Of course our marriage won’t make any difference to the business, Nell. Paul knows how important our partnership, our friendship is to me!’

Eleanor had sensed then that, whatever he might have said to Louise, Paul was the kind of man who liked to feel that he was in control of every aspect of his life and the people in it.

‘You know, I’m surprised that you and Marcus haven’t thought of moving to France,’ Louise burbled on. ‘The financial benefits alone are just too good to ignore and when I think of the freedom the boys will be able to have… It isn’t just that the French education system is far superior to ours… The boys have been having extra French coaching and Paul has become amazingly fluent. We all speak French every evening during supper now and—–’

‘I’m sorry, Louise, but I have to go out,’ Eleanor lied.

Her head was beginning to ache and her body still felt cold with shock. How long had Louise known that she was going to do this? Why couldn’t she have said something earlier?

You know why, a small cynical inner voice told her. She… Paul wanted to make sure, to secure their own future first.

A telephone call to their accountants later in the afternoon confirmed, as Eleanor had already suspected, that it was simply not financially viable for her to continue to work from their existing premises on her own, and that without a partner to share the load it was impossible for her to generate enough income on her own to service the costs involved.

Which meant… which meant what? she asked herself tiredly after she had replaced the receiver. She had a small amount of capital of her own, thriftily garnered over the years, a small bulwark to protect her and the boys, but nowhere near enough to cover all her existing expenses for any real length of time.

When she and Marcus had married she had been determinedly insistent that she wanted to be financially self-sufficient, at least as far as the boys were concerned. She knew from odd comments which Marcus had made that his first wife had been recklessly extravagant, using whatever income she earned as an actress for maintaining the kind of wardrobe and polished appearance she insisted was essential to her career.

And, while it was true that Marcus commanded high fees, he also had considerable expenses to meet. Vanessa attended an exclusive private school and Eleanor knew and applauded the fact that after the divorce he had assumed full financial responsibility for her.

Then there was also the Chelsea house which was expensive to run and maintain, and, while Eleanor knew that Marcus would willingly support both her and the boys, she did not want him to have to do so.

They had discussed her career before their marriage and she had told him that not only did she enjoy her work but she felt she needed the sense of self-worth and satisfaction she got from being financially self-sufficient; that she was proud of the fact that she was able to support both herself and her sons, that she did not want to go back to being financially dependent on someone else, no matter how generously that support might be given.

But how was she going to be able to maintain that financial independence now? As their accountant had pointed out, their expenses had risen uncomfortably high, and the number of commissions they were receiving was less than it had been; the recession meant that everyone was cutting back. Some of their smaller clients had even gone out of business altogether; everyone was having to fight hard just to survive.

The thought of working for someone else, even if she could have found a job, held no appeal for her; she was too used to being her own boss. And looking for another partner? The way the thought made her flinch was its own answer. Louise’s defection was too new and raw for her to even think of risking entering another partnership. The reason she and Louise had worked so well together was because they operated in different but complementary fields. To find another partner like that would be time-consuming and probably impossible. No, she would be better off working alone.

Louise had disappeared after making her announcement. No doubt to inform Paul that she had broken the bad news, Eleanor reflected bitterly.

Why hadn’t she realised what was happening… guessed what lay behind Louise’s recent odd behaviour? It had never occurred to her that Louise might want to end their partnership. Nor had she realised that Louise felt resentful because she thought her languages were of more benefit, contributed more to the partnership than did Eleanor’s own. Paul’s handiwork, no doubt. But she couldn’t put all the blame for Louise’s perfidy on Paul’s shoulders; Louise herself must bear some of the responsibility, and so perhaps must she.

She was uncomfortably aware of how blind she had been to what was happening. As blind as she had been to Tom’s fear that somehow her relationship with Marcus threatened his place in her life; as blind as she had been to the fact that, with her marriage to Marcus, Vanessa would turn against her.

What was happening to her?

Had she been guilty of being over-confident of successfully handling all her diverse roles? Twice in the space of a few short days she had been forced to confront the knowledge that she had been completely unaware of what those whom she had thought of as being closest to her were really thinking.

Her heart thumped uncomfortably. She was beginning to feel as though she was losing control of her life and what was happening to it. The problem was that she had so little time and so many demands to meet.

How long was it, for instance, since she and Louise had shared an evening or even a lunchtime together, excitedly discussing their plans and their business? And yet once those occasions had been so much a part of the fabric of her life.

And how long had it been since she had been able to spend any real amount of time alone with her sons, concentrating on them exclusively?

These days her weekends seemed to flash past in a blur of frantic organisation for the following week, her conversations with her sons seemed to be limited to terse discussions about the need for football kits and enquiries about the whereabouts of the partners of the four or five odd socks disgorged from the washing-machine with monotonous regularity. And that was on a good week.

Take this evening, for instance… She would be working until six and then she would have to drive across the city to the boys’ school to collect them and take them home for supper. She was lucky in that their school ran after-lessons sports and activities groups every evening, but it was not perhaps an ideal situation… Not like the one Louise had described so lyrically and which her children would enjoy.

Fresh air. The space to run free in proper open countryside, the security of a small close-knit community.

Only last week she had had to refuse Gavin’s request that he be allowed to have some school friends over on Saturday because Marcus’s daughter had been coming and there would have been nowhere for them all to play. Things were difficult enough with Vanessa as it was. Eleanor could imagine her reaction all too well had she arrived to find ‘her’ bedroom full of eleven-year-old boys.

Suddenly she ached almost physically for Marcus, and then guiltily she reminded herself that she had promised herself when they married that theirs would be an equal partnership and that she would never fall into the trap of using him as an emotional prop.

Tiredly she pushed her hair back off her face. Only another hour and she would have to leave to pick up the boys, and she still had this translation to finish.

‘Marcus, what is it? What’s wrong?’

Eleanor had just come downstairs from putting the boys to bed and had found Marcus standing in front of the window, staring into space.

He had been slightly withdrawn all evening, speaking curtly to Gavin when he and Tom had started arguing during supper.

‘You aren’t annoyed about last night, are you?’

‘Last night?’ He turned round to look at her, frowning.

‘The dinner party, and then Tom.’

He shook his head.