The Bookshop of Second Chances by Jackie Fraser (e books for reading txt) 📗

is. He pretended he didn’t care, but I could see he did. I enjoyed the feeling. I’m not proud of that,’ he adds, ‘or of any of it. After that it was almost an obsession. I’d sleep with girls he was seeing, if I could. And I usually could. We moved in similar circles, even though we weren’t really speaking to one another. It would have been better for both of us if he’d gone to university somewhere else, but there you are. He got suspicious, eventually. By the time I slept with Julia – well, like I say, they were separated by then. But that’s why he didn’t introduce me to Carolyn until the wedding.’

‘To stop you sleeping with her?’

He nods.

‘But it didn’t stop you.’

‘Ha. No. She couldn’t believe we’d never met before. Three years they’d been together. “Did he tell you why he didn’t want us to meet?” I asked her, and she was surprised. “Is there a reason?” So I told her: “I like to sleep with my brother’s girlfriends.” She was shocked. “I’m afraid you won’t be able to get the full set,” she said, and I said, “We’ll have to wait and see,” which she thought was funny, I suppose. And after that she was always… He didn’t invite me round or anything, but I did see them sometimes. She used to come into the shop. I think she was intrigued or whatever. For some reason. I did my best “barely interested” and in the end…’

‘Oh my God.’ I laugh, but I really am rather shocked by this.

‘I didn’t like her that much, as I said. But we did it quite a lot. I suppose we had an affair. He caught us eventually. That was probably the plan, after all.’

‘Bloody hell, Edward, this is–’

‘I’ve never been more… It was incredibly satisfying. That was the moment when I realized though. That I’d screwed my own life up, as much as his. Theirs. I mean, yeah, he was unhappy, and angry, and all those things, but I’d never – or hardly ever – even tried to meet anyone. Anyone for me, anyone who wasn’t part of the game I was playing. So that’s why I avoid it, mostly.’

‘Mostly?’

‘I do have some friends,’ he says, ‘female friends. Close friends.’

‘People you sleep with?’

‘Sometimes. Yes.’

‘But you wouldn’t count them as your girlfriends?’

‘God, no. No.’

‘Gosh. How sophisticated it all is,’ I say. ‘I feel desperately provincial.’ I put my empty glass down on the grass. I think I might be a bit pissed.

‘You disapprove.’

‘I don’t think you should base your sex life round your brother, but apart from that you can do what you like.’ I blink at him. ‘You’re a grown-up, after all. I have no problem with any unofficial arrangements you might have with your friends. That seems extremely healthy in comparison.’

‘I suppose it does. And what about you?’

‘Me? What about me?’

‘What are you going to do about your sex life?’

‘Oh, good grief. Ha. Nothing.’

‘Ever?’

‘It’s way too early for me to think about having a sex life. It’s twenty years since I slept with someone who wasn’t Chris. I can’t imagine ever meeting anyone, or wanting to.’ I shake my head. ‘Good grief.’

‘Are you heartbroken?’ He’s sort of joking, but I’m not, of course.

‘I should say so.’

‘Really?’

‘I’m… entirely bereft.’ I feel that familiar ache in my throat.

‘Shit,’ he says, ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to–’

‘It’s okay. I’m sure it will be all right eventually. Or I’ll get used to it. Or something. It doesn’t kill you, after all. I knew that. It’s just… it’s very sad, and tiring.’

I get up, slightly unsteadily, and go back inside for a glass of water. I run the tap and wonder what Chris is doing. He’ll be at work. I wonder how he’s finding this almost step-parenthood he’s indulging in. I wonder if he likes it, children in his house. Her middle son is quite a handful. I wonder if he’s always wanted that, secretly. Not a child who is a handful. Just a child, any child.

They could have one together, I suppose; she’s younger than I am, only thirty-eight or something. I grip the edge of the sink. They seem a thousand miles away, another life. It’s as though I might wake up and find it all a dream, all this, these months up here. I might drive home and find him waiting for me; we might pick up the threads of our life and carry on as usual.

Or maybe he comes home to her and thinks the years I lived there were the dream, the illusion, waiting for the moment when I could be pushed aside. I wonder whose idea it was, how it happened. I didn’t ask and I’ll probably never know, how their first kiss emerged from their friendship, how they were drawn together, how they – I don’t like to even think the phrase – fell in love.

I open the cupboard and find a glass, bend to fill it, and when I straighten, I catch the side of my head on the open cupboard door, hard enough to see stars.

‘Ow, fuck, shit,’ I say, elegantly. ‘Bastard.’ I turn off the tap, put the glass down and investigate the damage cautiously. There’s blood on my fingers.

‘Are you okay? What’s happened?’ Edward calls from outside.

‘Cut my head open,’ I tell him.

‘Oh no, how’ve you managed that?’ He’s inside now, coming to see.

‘Banged my head. I didn’t shut the cupboard. What an idiot. Ow.’

‘Come here,’ he says, ‘let me see if you need stitching. Not that I can drive you to A&E for like, another four hours,’ he adds. ‘I think I’ve had too much to drink.’

‘I don’t think it’s that bad. Hope not, anyway.’ I stand by the door in the bright late-afternoon sunshine so he can examine my wounded scalp. ‘It’s here,’ I say. ‘Ow.’

He gently pushes my hair out of the way. ‘Oh yes,’ he says. ‘It’s not too bad. But it is bleeding. Hold on.’

I stand, leaning