Page 14 of A Midlife Gamble

‘Do you?’

‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘When I first met you. At Kay’s, remember?’

Caro stared at him. Of course she remembered. But she hadn’t for a moment considered that he had. Confused, she looked down at her cup.

‘You needed it.’

'Did I?' She stared at him. Decades of working with some of the world’s wealthiest and most powerful men, and she’d never failed to be amused at the way their decision-making abilities evaporated whenever wives or girlfriends appeared. Guilt made idiots of them. Guilt at the long hours they worked, or over other women they’d slept with, or money siphoned off… She’d become shrewd at spotting it. The guiltier they were, the more inept they became. As if deferring to a wife over the choice of that evening’s restaurant was atonement for sleeping with a secretary. Shook, it occurred to her now, hadn’t a single thing to hide.

She watched him sip his own tea. Did he take sugar? And if he didn’t, would she know the moment that he needed to take it? And then have the self-assurance to offer it to him? He was, she thought now, perhaps the most genuinely self-assured man she’d met. ‘I hardly know anything about you,’ she said, and looked down at the hand that now covered hers, the rough calloused joints and the clean short nails of this man.

‘What do you want to know?’ He smiled, his eyes that same unlikely shade of clear blue. Like little swimming pools; incapable of hiding even the smallest lie.

A feeling of anticipation rose in Caro. All these weeks, they really had been saying nothing to each other. She hadn’t spoken of her miscarriage, or the pregnancy, or how she had come to be pregnant in the first place. And he hadn’t spoken about his life. They had simply ambled along together, falling in step as easily as dance partners. Life left clues enough. And it simply hadn’t felt necessary to insist upon the kind of unpacking that she might have gone through when she was younger.What do you want?What do you do?Where do you see yourself?What was the point of hurrying to unpack something that was so clearly damaged goods? Still… She took a deep breath. If they were going to see exactly how damaged, one of them was going to have to be brave and take a closer look. His real name was Tomasz, but she never used it. She loved the silliness of his nickname; the sound of it, but maybe she should start there. ‘I remember,’ she said now, ‘Kay said, that before Shook, they called you Shaky. When did it change?’

But his response was not what she had expected. He withdrew his hand and lowered his chin, stretching his arms forward, so the heels of his hands came together around his cup. He didn’t speak.

Anticipation turned to unease. ‘I hope,’ she whispered, ‘you don’t mind me asking?’

And still he didn’t speak, and within the long moment of his silence a doubt that had never existed before began budding in Caro’s mind, unfurling into technicoloured flowers. Had she touched on something raw? Overstepped a mark she hadn’t been aware of? Or maybe – and this was the quintessential source of her doubt – he wasn’t yet sure about the relationship? All this time she’d presumed it was her holding him at arm’s length, because although there had been times when she had felt closer to him than any other man, ever, the reality was that walking and talking was the extent of their physical relationship. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said, laughing to mask her discomfiture. This was why… this was why she’d kept her reserve. After the devastating blows last summer had brought, she was a fool to have risked exposing herself to the idea of love, of company, again. ‘No, it really doesn’t—’

‘Coffee break,’ Shook said, turning his head sideways and looking directly at her. ‘Third week of February.’

‘Oh.’ A corner of Caro’s mouth turned up. The tiniest outward sign of the river of relief that flowed. ‘That’s… exact?’

Shook nodded. ‘There’s a kid at work. I was drinking my coffee, and he said my hands weren’t shaking. From then on, it was Shook. I didn’t mind.’

‘And were…’ Now she was looking at his hands. His wonderful, strong, honest hands, feeling the warmth of sun in her world again. ‘Were you really that shaky?’

‘Yes.’ He nodded. ‘Yes, I was.’

‘Oh.’

‘Do you remember,’ he said, ‘when the Pope first came to Poland? 1979.’

Caro frowned. ‘Vaguely. I was very young. 1979… that sounds such a long time—’

‘That was the day I started drinking.’

She stared at him. ‘How old were you?’

‘Fourteen.’

‘Oh. Well…’ she started. ‘Teenagers here—’

‘But I didn’t stop, Caro,’ Shook interrupted, and amongst the crumple and ruddiness of his cheeks, his eyes remained that bright clear blue. ‘It’s ironic. Two million Poles got themselves sober to go and see the Pope. But me? That’s when I started getting drunk.’

‘Did you go and see him?’ Caro’s voice was soft, the question tentative. They were talking about something that had passed through her consciousness over forty years ago, as fleetingly as a comet. How strange, she was thinking, that this long-ago event might hold the key to getting to know him.

Shook nodded. ‘I went with my family. With every relative I’ve ever known and more. And when we got back everyone fell asleep early, because they were sober, and I found thebimber.’

‘Bimber?’

‘You don’t want to know.’ He shrugged. ‘Everyone drank. Every day. You wouldn’t get through your shift at the factory otherwise. The cold and the noise. You had to drink.’

Caro stopped smiling. She was thinking about those two last words: the cold and the noise. She’d never worked in a factory in her life. How different they were. And if this thought had occurred to him, she would never know, because suddenly he said, ‘So that’s when my name changed. And I’m still here. And I can still handle a saw and those tiny screws, you know?’

Caro laughed. ‘No I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever used a screwdriver.’

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