The Book of You. Claire Kendal

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СКАЧАТЬ you.’ Your hand is still in the air, an awkward reminder of your wrong move. ‘You shouldn’t be alone.’ You punctuate this by letting your hand drop heavily to your side.

      ‘I don’t want to give it to you.’ Despite my words, I don’t think I sound concerned.

      ‘Let me take care of you, Clarissa. It’s below zero – you shouldn’t be out in this and your hair’s wet – that can’t be good for you.’ You’re taking out your phone. ‘I’m calling us a taxi.’

      Again, you’ve cornered me. The black iron railings are behind me so I can’t back away from you any farther; I don’t want to slip and fall through the gap – there’s a three-foot drop to the road below. I step sideways, repositioning myself, but this doesn’t stop you towering over me. You look so huge in your puffy grey jacket.

      The hem of your jeans is sopping, from dragging in the snow – you aren’t caring for yourself, either. Your ears and nose are red and raw from the bitter cold. Mine must be too. Your brown hair is lank, though it’s probably freshly washed. Your closed, frowning mouth never relaxes.

      Pity for you steals upon me, however much I guard against it and recoil from you. You must be losing sleep, too. To speak meanly, even to you, goes against the kindness my parents taught me. Rudeness won’t make you vanish now, anyway. I know all too well you’ll only follow me, pretending not to hear, and that’s the last thing I want.

      You’re punching numbers into your mobile.

      ‘Don’t. Don’t call.’ Your fingers pause at the sharpness in my voice. I push the point further. ‘The doctor’s not far from here.’ I make myself more explicit. ‘I won’t get in a taxi with you.’

      You press the red button and pocket your phone. ‘Write down your landline for me, Clarissa. I seem to have lost it.’

      We both know I’ve never given it to you. ‘I had it disconnected. I just use my mobile now.’ More lies. I give a silent prayer of thanks that you didn’t somehow find the number and note it down when you were in my flat. I’m amazed you overlooked such a chance. You’re probably kicking yourself for that. But you were busy, then.

      I point up the hill. ‘You should try along the top edge for your walk.’ I play on your desire to please me, a callous move, but I’m desperate. ‘It’s one of my favourites, Rafe.’ There’s too long a pause before I manage to get out your name, but I do use it and that’s all you notice; it doesn’t occur to you that I’ve only thrown you this treat in the hope that it will lure you into going away.

      ‘I’d like that, if it’s special to you, Clarissa. All I want is to make you happy, you know. If you’d just let me.’ You attempt a smile.

      ‘Goodbye, Rafe.’ I force myself to use your name again, and when your smile becomes deeper and more real I’m amazed and a little guilty that such a crude trick can work.

      Hardly daring to believe I’ve got away, I step carefully down the hill, checking periodically that the distance between us is increasing. Each time, you are looking back and raising your hand, so I have to make myself wave half-heartedly in response.

      From now on, I’ll take taxis to the station in the mornings and check through the windows to make sure you aren’t following. Next time I’m faced with you, I’ll consider the long term and obey the leaflets. I’ll refuse to speak or I’ll tell you for the zillionth time – in no uncertain terms – to leave me alone. Even my mother would think such circumstances warranted bad manners. Not that I would dream of worrying my parents by telling them about you.

      My teeth chatter as I stand on the platform, anxious that you will materialise while I listen to the apologetic announcements about cancellations and delays due to the extreme weather.

      I lean against the wall and scribble as quickly as I can in my new notebook. It’s my first entry. The notebook is tiny, so that I can always carry it with me, as the leaflets advise. The pages are lined and wire-bound. The cover is matt black. The people on the helplines say I need a complete record. They say I mustn’t miss out anything and I should try to write as soon as I can after each incident, no matter how small. But your incidents are never small.

      I am shivering so violently I regret not drying my hair. I rushed out the door to avoid being late after over-sleeping because of bad dreams – about you, always about you. There would have been time to dry it, though I couldn’t have predicted that as perfectly as I can predict you. My hair feels like a wand of ice, channelling the cold through my skin and into my veins, a spell freezing flesh into stone.

      There had to be a world where he wasn’t, and she thought perhaps she’d entered it at last. Portraits of stern-looking judges hung on the wall opposite the marble staircase. Climbing to the first floor, Clarissa felt as if they were watching her; but she couldn’t give up the hope that this could be a place where she wasn’t spied on, a place she could keep him from.

      She let the jury officer inspect her passport and pink summons, then sat down on one of the padded blue chairs. The room was wonderfully warm. Her toes thawed. Her hair dried. It seemed a magic place, away from his eyes. Only jurors were allowed in, and they needed to tap a code into a keypad before they could even get through the door.

      She jumped at the crackle of the jury officer’s microphone. ‘Will the following people please come and stand by the desk, for a two-week trial that is about to begin in Court 6?’

      Two whole weeks in the safe haven of a courtroom. Two whole weeks away from work and away from him. Her heart was beating fast in the hope that she’d hear her name. She sank back in her chair in disappointment when it never came.

      At lunchtime, she made herself leave the sanctuary of the court building; she knew she needed fresh air. She hesitated just outside the revolving doors, scanning up and down the street. She worried he might be hiding between two custodial services vans, parked a few metres up the road. She plunged past them quickly, holding her breath. When she saw that he wasn’t crouched by one of the bumpers she exhaled in relief.

      She wandered through the outside market, watching local workers buying quick wholefood or ethnic lunches from stalls, glimpsing barristers sitting around a large table in an expensive Italian restaurant.

      Checking over her shoulder, she disappeared into the familiar comfort of a sewing shop. As always, she was drawn to the children’s fabrics. Mermaids floated absently as little girls swam after them, under enchantment; she imagined a toddler’s peasant dress, its tiers alternating between plum and fuchsia seas.

      Henry would have hated it. Twee, he would have said. Sentimental, he would have said. Too pretty, he would have said. Unoriginal, he would have said. Plain colours are best, he would have said. Perhaps it was just as well that the failure to make a baby had driven them apart.

      She aimed herself firmly at the thread display, then searched her bag for the scrap of mossy green quilter’s cotton traced with crimson blossoms. She found it, chose the best match for the background colour, and headed for the till with two spools.

      ‘What will you be sewing?’ the girl asked.

      Clarissa saw eyelids vibrating beneath pale brown lashes, a gaze she couldn’t escape, lips dripping cuckoo spit: flashes of Rafe’s one night in her bed.

      She would exorcise him. ‘New bedding,’ she said.

      It would feel lovely against her skin. And she was СКАЧАТЬ