The Wrong Man by Amanda Brookfield

Author:Amanda Brookfield [Brookfield, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Boldwood Books
Published: 2023-08-11T16:00:00+00:00

It didn’t take Mattie long – just two roll-ups and a cup of tea – to get to the point. They were sitting toe to toe on the window seat in the spare bedroom where she was to spend the night, a box of tissues between them, like huddling teenagers. Bruised by self-blame and her usual insecurities, total honesty was not Mattie’s highest priority in telling her tale to her sister. Truth was there, but padded out with wishful thoughts and muddled regrets that had taken place only in the morning-after recriminative ferment of her mind. Without such fictional trimmings, her story would have sounded too much like a path of her own choosing to evoke the sympathy she craved.

‘Christopher? Christopher Lytton? Michael’s brother? Are you sure?’

Mattie, hunched over her mug of tea, her second cigarette wedged between two bitten nails, was too absorbed with curating her own version of events to register the scale of reluctant disbelief in her sister’s voice.

‘Yes, it was your dear brother-in-law – I am hardly likely to not know that, am I? I couldn’t believe it – seeing him there, at Greg’s. It was like – I don’t know – fate or something. He didn’t waste time, I can tell you.’ Mattie shook her dark curls, which looked dull and slightly greasy. ‘Talk about being taken advantage of…’ She gulped, assailed by a fresh wave of self-pity.

‘Poor Mattie.’ Jane touched her arm.

‘He used me… Christ, I know I didn’t actually tell him to stop, but it would have been nice to even qualify for a post-coital cuddle.’ She rolled a fresh cigarette, offering it to Jane, who vigorously shook her head. The desire to smoke had, curiously, departed with Michael. She had been watching her sister’s smoking, the ash being tapped into her empty tea mug, with revulsion more than anything, most of her energies directed at trying to process the awfulness of what she was being told. Mattie certainly did look quite terrible, the worst Jane had seen her since her teens when she had done her vanishing act and then tried to starve herself to death.

‘I mean, that’s the usual joke isn’t it,’ Mattie went on, exhaling plumes, having lit the new cigarette herself, ‘I bet even you’ve experienced that.’

‘What?’ The smoke was starting to make Jane feel sick. She swung her legs to the floor and took refuge on the bed.

‘Oh, come on, you know – the man falling instantly asleep after bouts of supposedly meaningful, torrid sex, leaving you to confess heartfelt emotions to a wall of snores.’

‘I don’t think I’m best qualified to talk about torrid sex,’ Jane said quietly, wanting suddenly to be left alone.

‘Well, Christopher,’ persisted Mattie, ‘didn’t even have the decency to fall asleep. He just lay there, blinking and not talking. When morning came, he said he had to make an early start and he was sure Greg wouldn’t mind if I wanted to stay and help myself to breakfast. Which I did, but honestly…’ She threw up her hands, scattering a fine spray of ash over Ernest’s faded blue window seat cover.

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