‘Charlotte, you’re so blinkered! You still think it’s me having the affair? Talk to Jack, ask him what’s really been going on. I’ve had enough. I’m going to bed.’
She whistles for Maisie who creeps out from under the sofa and trots, head down, not making eye contact, towards Cassie. Maisie trembles by Cassie’s feet. She looks like she’s been scolded. Cassie bends to rest her hand on Maisie’s head; it’s like she’s a completely different dog, shell-shocked and terrified of life. Cassie looks at the turquoise ring on her finger, heavy on Maisie’s head and she realises that if she leaves like this, no matter what she did, Charlotte would always blame her. She’d be blamed if their marriage broke up, if their child grew up in two homes. She thinks of the baby, twelve weeks old; even if Cassie’s life here is over, she’s going to be inextricably linked to Charlotte and Jack forever. Charlotte needs to know the truth. She can’t be complicit anymore, protecting Charlotte from the truth about Jack and protecting Jack from the truth about Mike. She turns back to Charlotte who is sitting back at the table, her hands wrapped around her mug, her gaze still fixed firmly on Cassie.
‘Charlotte, it was Jack who had an affair, not me. It was Jack and my friend Nicky. I saw them.’
Charlotte’s eyes flash at Cassie; something phantasmic passes behind them, like the truth has roused something dormant within Charlotte, and it doesn’t like what it hears.
‘You’re lying. You’re lying to protect yourself.’ Charlotte stands suddenly. She leans forward over the table, opposite Cassie. Maisie, smelling tension, creeps around the door and curls herself gingerly in a little ‘u’ shape at the bottom of the stairs. Charlotte looks different to Cassie suddenly; where she once saw strength she now sees something tremulous and unpredictable resting behind her eyes. It feels familiar somehow; she’s seen it before in someone else.
‘Charlotte, I think you should tell Jack about Mike, about his affairs. I think it’s only fair he knows. He’s a grown man now, not a little boy.’ More gently she adds, ‘He’d be angry at first, but then he’d calm down and be honest with himself. I think he already has suspicions.’
Charlotte’s eyes snap up to Cassie.
‘You told him?’
‘No, no, I swear I didn’t tell him anything.’ Cassie raises her hands to her mother-in-law, baring her palms, trying to calm her.
Charlotte comes up close to Cassie; her words make Cassie’s hair sway.
‘If you told him any of it, Cassie, what I told you in confidence, I … I …’
Charlotte’s words are swallowed by her anger; she can’t finish her sentence, just like Jack.
After a pause she shouts, ‘I just want to protect my son!’
‘Well, I think it’s time to stop.’ Cassie breaks the gaze first. Anger crackles between them, making it harder to breathe; she feels her heart bounce in her chest.
Charlotte is still staring, her gaze fixed on Cassie across the table.
‘What do you think all this is going to achieve, Cassie, really?’
‘I …’ Cassie pauses, and in the pause she thinks she might tell Charlotte about the baby, tell her that she wants her child to grow up in the truth, like she did, even when the truth isn’t pretty, but instead she says, ‘I’m going to go and stay with Jonny tonight.’
Charlotte’s face twists again, but Cassie raises her hands once more to her mother-in-law and says, ‘You can think what you like, Charlotte, I don’t give a shit any more.’ The truth of her words chimes delicious and real through her whole body. She doesn’t care! Suddenly she can’t wait to be a memory here. She turns towards the stairs. Maisie jumps up, startled by all the unexpected movement, and follows Cassie up the stairs. As Cassie runs away she hears a sharp crack as Charlotte’s mug crashes against the kitchen wall.
The room spins around Cassie as she grabs, unseeing, at the things she was going to take in the morning. Toothbrush, face moisturiser … she tips them into her bag. She remembers the letter she wrote to Jack, and shoves it in the inside pocket of the leather bag. She can’t leave it here any more; she doesn’t want Charlotte reading it. She takes off her pyjamas and grabs the jeans she wears for painting and pulls on a jumper, simultaneously wiggling her feet into her old Converse. She tries to text Jonny that she’s coming to his now, but her reception has dropped off again. She’ll text him on the walk over. She knows she needs to move fast, before her heart slows and her resolve trickles away. Everything looks different again, the colours and banal everyday shapes of the room she used to share with Jack made new and bright by her decision to leave now, right now. Suddenly it feels like someone else’s bedroom, a stranger’s space. Her body feels indestructible, oiled with strength. She’s shoving Maisie’s lead and treats into the bag when she hears the back door slam. It makes her freeze immediately, her ears strain for any other noise. She thinks she can just about hear the clock in the kitchen, but there’s nothing else. The cottage is completely silent. She’s gone, Charlotte’s left; she must have decided to walk home!
The zip seems to laugh in relief as she pulls the bag closed in one long tug and hauls it over her shoulder. Maisie hovers by her ankles as Cassie walks out onto the landing where they stop to listen again at the top of the stairs. There’s nothing. The quiet has the complete quality of no other living, breathing thing filling the space.
Her feet seem to echo as she walks down the stairs. Charlotte went out the back door; she always takes the footpath across the fields and over the little bridge to meet up with the village path that leads to her house. She’ll be home in ten minutes. Jonny’s place, thank god, is in the other direction, along the lane. Charlotte’s left the lights on in the kitchen; a large wet mark drips down the white wall opposite the kitchen table. Cassie steps over the broken porcelain and tries not to think about Jack coming home drunk and cutting himself on the shards. She opens the drawer where they keep all the miscellaneous home stuff; she searches through a stew of old chargers, lost pieces of string and instruction manuals. The torch is missing. Fuck it. She’s got Maisie and the torch on her phone. They know the route well; they’ll be fine. She needs to leave now before her excitement turns into fear and fogs her clarity. Her eyes dart around the kitchen one last time before she sees a flash of blue and walks over to the simple silver frame.