Peter will naturally mention my trousers and Chiswick to others, to the denizens around him, which will make for an inflammatory combination.
Once the sticky type of word got round, it stayed round and rumours of a sexual nature were the tastiest for onlookers and the most adhesive.
No, not that.
His current predicament had nothing to do with women, or a woman, in the erotic sense.
No, not that.
But everyone would assume. They thought he had women, that he had some ludicrous stable of complacent partners and rushed from one bed to another dispensing sex.
No, not that.
If you trace things to their sources …
During his marriage he’d been taken as neuter, treated like an invalid — patronised by some and softly avoided by others who didn’t want his assumed deficiencies to infect them. And those men who knew his wife in the sporting sense … some were brash with him, some guilty, some gentle. Being married to an adulteress taught you a lot about human nature.
After the divorce very little had changed, although he’d seemed to be accepted as less contagious. And he’d been able, for a few translucent weeks, to identify even the most covert of the colleagues she had encountered, come across, had … Each of the men had displayed an underlying tension he could only assume was caused by fears that Valerie might now intend to marry and then betray them.
Although I must not exaggerate. It wasn’t so many men. Not that many. It was only enough. I suppose one could frame it in those terms. It was enough to satisfy her needs, which I was not.
Beyond that stage, there were pats on the shoulder, rueful and complicit looks, invitations involving pubs, or coming round for dinner to get a change of air, meet the wife and kids.
Jon had sidestepped each offer of hospitality and been punctual, reliable in his working life — which was to say the whole of his life, pretty much — and had given no indications of internal crisis.
What I feel …
Well, if I don’t know at present it doesn’t matter … Except it does feel … I do feel … as if I have misplaced something of importance and forgotten what … And Christ knows, I haven’t and can’t and mustn’t forget anything today …
It’s as if I am ill … as if my skin were someone else’s … There’s a strain … the obvious strain … which I hope is not obvious …
And then, it had been on a Thursday morning — he’d never taken to Thursdays, they weren’t as generous as Fridays should be — today is an exception but could rally — they weren’t as workman-like and peaceable as Wednesdays, Thursdays were bitter … On a Thursday, he’d discovered he’d been turned into this whole new figure of fun.
The word had been put round. A number of words, to be accurate: Lucy, Sophia … words such as those words. And I was declared a divorcé now off his leash. One and all have since assumed that I am, in some manner, taking up where Valerie left off.
Not that she has left off. Not that I am presently left on.
Jon was far from the river by now, had passed — surely and inevitably had passed — the usual priggishly well-trimmed Chiswick hedges and lopped trees at a pressing but sustainable speed. Which was to say, he did have to assume he must have done that. He was no longer on his wife’s pavement, was able to realise that he’d travelled quite a way …
I started by passing the brewery — that recollection is clear — Valerie still gets a ration of free beer to make up for the ambient scent of brewing. Not that she’s a beer drinker, of course. Unless terribly pressed. I think she sometimes cooked with it.
Then after the brewery there must have been streets … There were, are streets … houses … mature magnolias … anal-retentive privet and masonry apparently covered with royal icing …
His head shook, perhaps only internally, as if he’d been dunked in water and was trying to rid himself of some flowing, cloying burden, the way it filled his ears.
Chiswick High Street is a bit of a walk from Val’s, it takes … usually not as long as it seems to have taken … But I am, at present, in the high street.
But something, lots of somethings, come before that …
But I can’t recall them …
Which is too many buts again.
But I’m here … The laws of physics dictate that Chiswick must therefore have existed as I passed through it, but was somehow unaware.
He couldn’t quite explain how this had happened, but his head — and the rest of him, all the way down to his feet, his totality — was already in the high street and this change of location had taken place apparently in one blank instant and yet — he examined his watch again, as if it would be helpful and informative, when in fact it was only scary — his journey had also definitely taken far too long. He had significantly misplaced himself.
I … I should be feeling concerned perhaps … I’m not that, though. I’m not that, either …
He flagged a cab, resigned to the fact that the traffic would murder him and only compound his problem, which was lateness, rather than the problem with his interior, which he couldn’t identify, and the problems with his exterior which were … They were just …
Their name is legion. Their name is Rebecca and Lucy, Sophia and … Christ.
His heart pattered. ‘Tothill Street, please.’ And he set his fingers to the cab’s door handle almost as if he doubted it would be there.
The driver nodded a consent and Jon climbed in, his limbs more unruly than necessary, right hand clutched around his briefcase as if it were a safe support.
Like gripping the armrests on your seat when your plane hits a storm front — you’re holding on to what may drop and kill you. Something to do with our history as apes — we used to be fine if we hung on tight, so we keep on clinging to ease our tensions.
Of course, if the entire tree was ruined and dropping with you, then you’d be better off letting go …
‘Actually, sorry … I have to get some trousers.’ No one but Jon needed to know that and the back of the driver’s head seemed to reflect this truth eloquently. ‘That is … I’ll … if you can stop when we see somewhere … Damn … no, there won’t be anywhere open … Unless … you don’t know somewhere …? An early-morning trouser …? Provider …? I mean, that’s … thanks. Tothill Street.’
Jon forced his spine, his intentions, to stop craning forward. He could get there for half-past eight — behind schedule, but before nine — and this would pass and would be OK, if imperfect. He preferred to be in before the busyness, but it would be fine. He was a professional of some rank — he could have done better after all these years, but had a not unnoticeable rank and could deserve the confidence of those with whom he dealt. That was understood. He would overcome the trouser issue. It was not unethical to ask a staff member, maybe, to go and purchase … No, it had overtones. Could one tell a female subordinate the length of one’s inside leg? Or outside leg for that matter?
In my proper context, I can make decisions. But I’m not in context, I’m in a cab.