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.Maybe she should just tell James, Lorna thought, lying there willing the cramping to pass, except she couldn’t stand to see the pity in his eyes.He’d known how much she wanted children and he had wanted them too.Five of them, he had joked on their wedding night, stroking her tummy and telling her that this was just the start.‘I know it was rushed…’ She could barely get her head around it, she was married to James, his ring was on her finger, the man she had loved from afar for ages was now the man she would spend the rest of her life with.She’d never been so happy, she just needed to know he felt the same.‘I know my dad was awful, that he forced you—’‘Lorna.’ James interrupted her with a deep kiss.‘It’s our wedding night—can we please not talk about your father?’Coming home that evening, he found her, glasses on and frowning in concentration as she bent over in the living room and painted her toenails.It was such a familiar sight, stirred up so many familiar feelings that James was seriously worried.‘Pauline lent it to me!’ She beamed at her ten glossy toes all separated with balls of cotton wool and on display on the coffee-table.‘I feel human again!’ Lorna added as James took one look and headed for the kitchen.‘Good.’Her father had never let her wear make-up, and from the age of eleven Lorna had painted her toenails—a little act of rebellion that stayed safely in her slippers or shoes.‘I rang up about trains for Glasgow and I’ve booked for Sunday morning.’‘Good.’ James said again, because he couldn’t live like this much longer, couldn’t stand remembering.He pulled out a casserole that Pauline must have made, but on second thoughts it may have been Lorna.Only Lorna stood and peeled the vegetables over newspaper then wrapped the peels in a tight little ball and threw it in the bin.‘Did you make the casserole?’‘Pauline did!’ Lorna called from the living room, her voice getting closer as she walked into join him.‘I just helped with the vegetables—it was my occupational therapy for the day,’ she joked.James wasn’t smiling.He served up two dinners and tried not to remember what they’d once had.It was like being back there, back in their tiny little flat with their tiny little kitchen, which she’d kept so neat it had driven him crazy.He’d wanted to haul her into bed, to lie in the little island they’d created and watch TV and read and make love and talk and read and make love, not take down curtains and arrange cupboards.‘Are you not hungry?’ She frowned as, instead of herself, it was James who was pushing his dinner around the plate.‘I had a sandwich at work.’‘That didn’t used to stop you.’ Lorna’s voice trailed off, realizing that he was uncomfortable.They struggled through the rest of the meal in a rather strained silence, save a couple of comments about how different the hard London water tasted compared to Scotland’s, and that he had to remember to put the rubbish out tonight because Pauline had forgotten.Not exactly riveting stuff, but it got them through dinner.‘I’ve got a surprise!’ She saved it till after dinner.Lorna had half decided that, given the sudden tension, maybe she should just go to bed, but she was bored with bed and tired of having only Pauline to talk to, and anyway she had missed him all day! When James had loaded the dishwasher he came back to the lounge to find her setting up her favourite board game.‘Look what Pauline brought over for me!’He laughed and groaned at the same time.‘Look, maybe another time—I really have had a shocking day.’‘Then you need to relax!’ Lorna smiled up at him.The board was neatly set up.He’d have looked a right old misery if he refused to play—she’d been so ill after all.She beat him, of course, guarding the dictionary and challenging him on every word, and it was fun and it was nice, but it was just too much of a glimpse of all that they’d lost.By the time it was ten, James was only too glad to pounce on her first yawn and tell her it was time for bed.‘I’ll put the game away,’ he added, because they’d always argued over that.Lorna used to want to leave everything just so, while James had always wanted to head for bed.Another sign of their incompatibility—only it wasn’t there tonight.‘Leave it.’ Lorna shrugged.‘It will still be there in the morning.’‘You’ve changed your tune,’ James said, and suddenly it felt as if they were back at the dinner table, trying not to compare the past with the present, trying not to remember how it had been once—only, unlike James, Lorna wasn’t uncomfortable with it.‘Have you only just noticed?’ Lorna smiled and for the first time when she said goodnight she kissed him on the cheek, but as she slipped into bed the smile she’d worn all evening faded.What the hell was she doing?She knew what it was called, knew that she had been flirting.Not deliberately, of course.James was off limits, they were off limits.She knew that, and so did James—she’d heard the relief in his voice when she’d told him that on Sunday she’d be gone.Yes, Lorna told herself, two more nights and apart from a thank-you card, they’d never have to be in contact again—and they’d both surely be better off for it.James left early for work the next morning, even by his standards [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]