He goes to her, takes her face in his hands, and puts his lips to hers. She draws him close and shuts her eyes again. “I will give you everything . . . ,” sings the voice.
It happens much as he remembers it from before, that first span with someone new. If he could collect every such scene from across his past and put them together on a single loop, the total running time might be no more than half an hour, yet these would in many ways be the finest moments of his life.
It feels as if he had been granted access to a version of himself which he had long thought dead.
What dangers are posed by those touchingly insecure men who, unsure of their own powers of attraction, need to keep finding out whether they are acceptable to others.
She turns down the lights. There are so many differences within the same basic parameters: her tongue more curious and impatient, her back arching just as he moves to her stomach, her legs tauter, her thighs darker. What would stop him now? The idea that all of this is wrong has moved away into the far distance, like an alarm bell ringing through a deep sleep.
They lie still afterwards, their breathing slowly calming itself. The curtains are open, providing a view of the brightly illuminated power station in the fog.
“What’s your wife like?” she asks, smiling. It’s impossible to judge her tone of voice or to know how to answer. His and Kirsten’s challenges feel too distinctly their own to share, even if they have now attracted a new, more innocent satellite into their orbit.
“She’s . . . nice.” He falters. Lauren maintains her inscrutable expression but doesn’t press. He caresses her shoulder; somewhere, through a wall, a lift can be heard descending. He can’t claim to be bored at home. It’s not that he doesn’t respect his wife, nor even that he doesn’t desire her anymore; no, the truth of his situation is more peculiar and more humiliating. He is in love with a woman who too often appears not to need love at all; a fighter so capable and strong that there are few opportunities afforded to nurture her; someone with a problematic relationship to anyone inclined to help her, and who sometimes seems most comfortable when she feels disappointed by those to whom she has entrusted herself. It appears he has had sex with Lauren for no greater or lesser reason than that he and his wife have of late been finding it extremely hard to have a hug—and that he is, somewhere inside, without much justice, really rather hurt by, and furious about, the fact.
It’s rare to embark on an affair out of indifference to a spouse. One generally has to care quite a lot about a partner to bother to betray them.
“I think you’d like her,” he finally adds.
“I’m sure I would,” she answers evenly. Now her look is mischievous.
They order room service. She wants pasta with lemon and a little Parmesan cheese on the side; she seems used to explaining such requirements with precision to people who will care. Rabih, easily intimidated in service contexts, admires her sense of entitlement. The phone rings, and she takes a call from a colleague in Los Angeles, where it’s still late morning.
Perhaps even more than the sex itself, it is the intimacy possible in its wake which draws him in. It is a quirk of the age that the easiest way to start a friendship with someone is generally by asking them to get undressed.
They are warm towards and considerate of each other. Neither will have a chance to let the other down. They can both appear competent, generous, trustworthy, and believable, as strangers will. She laughs at his jokes. His accent is kind of irresistible, she says. It makes him feel a little lonely to realize how easy it is to be liked by someone who has no idea who he is.
They talk until midnight, then fall asleep chastely on opposite sides of the bed. In the morning they travel together to the airport and have a coffee at the check-in area.
“Stay in touch—as much as you can.” She smiles. “You’re one of the good guys.”
They hug tightly, expressing the pure affection available only to two people who have no further designs upon each other. Their lack of time is a privilege. Under its aegis they can each remain forever impressive in the other’s eyes. He feels tears welling up and attempts to compose himself by staring at a watch advertised by a fighter pilot. With the prospect of an ocean and a continent between them, he is free to let loose all his aspirations for closeness. Both can ache with a desire for intimacy and be protected from any of its consequences. They will never have to be resentful; they can continue to appreciate each other as only those without a future can.
Pro
He makes it home early on Saturday afternoon. To his surprise, the world appears to be carrying on much as it has always done. No one stares at him at the airport or on the bus. Edinburgh is intact. The front door key still works. Kirsten is in the study helping William with his homework. This accomplished, intelligent woman, who has a first-class degree from Aberdeen University, who is a member of the Scottish chapter of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and daily handles budgets in the millions, has been ordered to sit on the floor by a seven-and-a-half-year-old boy who holds an unparalleled command over her and is just now impatiently urging her to color in some archers in his version of the Battle of Flodden Field.
Rabih has presents for everyone (bought in a duty-free shop on the other side of passport control). He tells Kirsten he can take over with the children, prepare supper, and do bath time; he’s sure she must be exhausted. An impure conscience is a useful spur to being a bit nicer.
Rabih and Kirsten go to bed early. She has, for an age, been his first port of call for every piece of news, however trivial or grave. How odd it seems, therefore, for him to be in possession of information at once so significant and yet so deeply resistant to the customary principles of disclosure.
It would be almost natural to start by explaining how curious it was that he and Lauren happened to bump into each other by the lifts—since he was scheduled to be at a talk at the time—and how touching he found it when, after their lovemaking, she haltingly described the illness and death of a grandmother to whom she had been unusually close throughout her childhood. Adopting the same easy, digressive approach they take when picking apart the psychology of people they meet at parties or the plotlines of films they see together, they might review how moving and sad it was for Rabih to say good-bye to Lauren at Tegel Airport, and how thrilling and (a little) scary to receive a text from her on landing. There could be no one better qualified to consider such themes with than his insightful, inquisitive, funny, and observant co-explorer of existence.
It is a bit of a job, therefore, to keep reminding himself how close he is to unleashing a tragedy. Esther apparently has a playdate the following morning at an indoor ski slope. This is where their story could come to a decisive end, and madness and mayhem begin. They will have to leave the house at nine to be there by a quarter to ten. It would, he is aware, take only a sentence to bring everything settled and coherent in his current life to a close: his brain contains a piece of information a mere six or so words long which is capable of blowing the household sky-high. Their daughter will need her gloves, which are in that box in the attic marked Winter Clothes. He marvels at the mind’s capacity not to let slip a single outward indication of the dynamite it contains. All the same, he is tempted to check in the bathroom mirror to make sure that nothing is leaking out of him.