Repeat It Today With Tears by Anne Peile

Author:Anne Peile
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Profile Books
Published: 2010-11-23T16:00:00+00:00

On an evening in August I knew that I was going to be ill again. Jack had gone away early.

‘There’s a gallery thing, part of the festival. I have an exhibition so I have to talk to people and be nice. I can’t get out of it… you know I would if I could. I’ll leave as soon as I decently can… ’

The Chelsea Potter had tables out on the pavement in Radnor Walk. The ground was stained with the stickiness of spilt drinks. Julian was anticipating without enthusiasm the water sports holiday for which he would depart next morning. He now had a girlfriend in Putney; they had had sex on the night that they met. Although only a fortnight had passed, Julian was already blasé, or at least he pretended to be so. He had met Jill, the Putney girl, on a bus returning from Knightsbridge. Having finally summoned courage to approach the Estée Lauder counter in Harvey Nichols, he was told that the object of his desire no longer worked there. She had successfully applied for the coveted company post in Nassau.

‘It was a real downer, but then I just got on this bus and met Jill.’

I wanted to make him talk and laugh and be amusing to take my mind off the horrible feeling beginning in my throat. The same feverishness that hurried on the infection also hastened my anxieties, which tripped and stumbled one over another. If I became ill with tonsillitis I would have to stay at home, in bed. I would not be able to see my father. I would not be able to tell him why or to telephone from the flat. He would think I had gone and was not coming back or he might seek me out among the quiet lobbies of Prince of Wales Drive. If he did think that I had gone he would believe that I had left him for good, as he had once told me that I would. He would think that the time had come for me to take up that permission that he had tried so carefully and so fairly to offer me when we began. He would believe what Olive had told him about no longer being desirable; he would be convinced that she must be right because once he had relied upon her so much and I would not be there to show him otherwise and prove her wrong. He would start drinking again and he would not be able to work. I must not let it happen. I tried to sound very bright, with Julian. ‘So, what is it like then, is it how you thought it would be?’

‘Yeah, it was really quick, at first, but not as bad as it might have been. Jill has done it before, so she knows stuff.’

‘Do you want another drink?’ I determined to see if I could block the pain away with neat vodka and ice.

‘Okay, just a quick one. I haven’t packed yet and my dad will start getting twitchy.

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