The Third Wife by Lisa Jewell

Author:Lisa Jewell [Jewell, Lisa]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub, mobi
Tags: General, Fiction
ISBN: 9781446429228
Google: 7a8AAwAAQBAJ
Amazon: B00IA6MC3E
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2014-07-02T23:00:00+00:00

Twenty-seven

July 2012

Adrian let the curtain drop at the sound of Caroline’s footsteps up the front steps. He’d just watched Paul Wilson kissing his ex-wife in the front seat of his white minivan (it turned out that Paul Wilson was a purveyor of organic mushrooms and truffles, making him possibly the most Islington person in the borough of Islington. His van said ‘Shrooooom!’ in diminishing typeface on the back doors) for approximately ten minutes. As if the entire preceding weekend hadn’t given them both ample time for such things.

He heard the children upstairs stampeding to the door to greet their mother, and the dogs skidding about on the tiled floor in their desperation to see her face. As though she’d been gone for weeks, not since yesterday morning. Caroline appeared at the door of the sitting room a moment later holding a writhing dog and a wodge of mail, looking entirely like a woman who’d been having sex for thirty-six hours. Her lips were engorged and tender, her hair voluminous, her blue eyes burning bright as hot summer sky. Are you ovulating by any chance? he wanted to ask.

As Much Sperm as Possible.

That had always been her mantra when they were trying to conceive. None of this timing it to the precise moment of the egg floating away from its moorings. Just quick and often.

‘Hello,’ she said, dropping the dog and examining the letters in her hand. ‘Good weekend?’

‘Yes,’ he said brightly. ‘Really, really good weekend.’

She sat on the sofa and removed her sandals. Beau came in holding a certificate he’d been given that morning at a science show at the Business Design Centre. ‘I made a firework,’ he said, climbing on to Caroline’s lap and letting her look at his certificate. She peered at it over Beau’s shoulder, pointing and making the appropriate parental noises. Adrian watched from the armchair. He imagined her sitting there, bursting at the seams with Paul Wilson’s 38-year-old sperm.

Christ, he thought, is this what it was like when he and Maya had been trying to get pregnant? Is this what it felt like for the rest of them? He’d always assumed everyone would be delighted. A new brother! Or sister! A brilliant new addition to the large and wonderful family he’d brought into being. And everyone had seemed delighted. Cat in particular. At the time. But thinking of the venom in those emails from the mysterious poison penman or-woman, had the whole venture actually been shrouded in ill will and unhappiness? Had it upset Caroline? Susie? The little ones? He tried to remember what the others had said about it. But he couldn’t. Is it possible, he wondered now, that he hadn’t asked them? Hadn’t discussed it?

‘Miserable bloody weather,’ said Caroline, eyeing one of the letters cursorily and then sliding it back into its envelope. ‘Honestly, I can’t remember a more depressing July. Makes me want to emigrate.’

‘What’s emigrate?’ said Beau.

‘It means going to live in another country,’ said Adrian.

‘I don’t want to emigrate.’

Caroline smiled and squeezed him.

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