Page 74 of The Lie
Finch blinked, looked away. ‘I’m packing up right now.’
He spoke as if he were in a daze and not really talking to her. She didn’t know how to respond.
‘How’s Michael?’
‘OK, I think. I haven’t seen him for a while.’
Finch nodded. His face was flushed and covered with sweat, his hands hung loose by his side. He looked lost. Then he seemed to pull himself together. ‘Good to see you, then,’ he said, almost mechanically, but didn’t move off.
She nodded, about to reply. But before she had time, he gave her a fleeting smile, turned and was gone. She listened in stunned silence to the slap, slap, slap of his trainers on the tarmac behind her. But she didn’t turn.
After a long moment, she continued with her run, her pounding heart having little to do with the exercise. She was devastated. All these months she’d been worrying about seeing him, dreading it and longing for it in equal measures, and now it had finally happened and it was like … nothing at all.
The hurt lingered all day. Finch had treated her cruelly. She’d seen no sign on his face, as he pulled to a stop beside her, that he felt any more for her than he did for, say, Jenny or Maureen – just another middle-aged village woman with designs on his time. It was unbearable for Romy, as she tried to marry the strength of feeling she still had for the man with his astonishing indifference. He might as well have struck her.
But she had no time to mope; there was so much to do. Downstairs, the house was in chaos. She was halfway through painting the kitchen a vibrant primrose. She needed to put the first coat on today because the new cupboard doors were due on Friday and the paint had to be dry by then. So she climbed into her painting overalls, trapped her wild hair in a knot on the top of her head andturned the radio up loud, determinedly pushing aside the stabbing ache of her encounter with Finch.
She was still at it by early evening, stretched up on tiptoe, arm screaming, back protesting and paint dripping from the roller down her arm. Over the music, she heard a cautious knock at the front door. She sighed. At this hour it could only be Vera, complaining again.Bins or top road?Romy shook her head as she put the roller down in the tray, wiped her hands on her overalls and stepped barefoot to answer it, composing her face into a welcoming smile as she went.
‘May I come in?’ Finch asked.
Romy stood aside. She didn’t care, this time, that she looked as if someone had stepped on her face, that she was spattered with yellow paint, that her hair looked like a rusty Brillo pad. She didn’t care that her heart was being crushed to nothing in her breast, that her breath seemed trapped somewhere south of her ribs. She just walked ahead of him, back straight, without speaking, into the kitchen, and took up the sticky roller again.
Finch followed her, but also did not speak. He stood in the doorway and watched as she began the rhythmic rolling above her head again – back and forth, second coat, filling in any gaps where the old cream paint still poked through. The radio was playing a violin piece Romy recognized but couldn’t name. She felt as if hours passed like this before he spoke.
‘Looks nice.’
She stared at him, suspending her roller above the paint tray to catch any drips.
He gazed back and she heard him sigh.
She dropped the roller. Finch stepped towards her and she was suddenly in his arms, his mouth hot on hers, the tears running down her face as he kissed her again and again, until neither could breathe.
When, finally, they were both naked, back on the sofa where it had all begun, they lay very still, their bodies touching lightly, his skin like a feather laid against her breast. He looked into her eyes and all she saw was a longing so powerful it made her jolt with recognition at her own starved and pent-up need. She reached to kiss him again, savouring the beautiful familiarity of his mouth as, slowly, they began to make love.
56
Finch woke to find Romy beside him. He had to shake himself to remember how this had come about. He’d been furious with himself the previous morning. Walking away from her on the harbour road seemed, at the time, the only thing he was capable of doing. But as soon as he was out of sight, he realized he must be completely insane.What the hell was I thinking?he asked himself. She’d looked so beautiful in the dawn light, almost fragile in her confusion. Yet someone courageous enough to face up to Grace and admit she’d been wrong, say she was sorry – it was not an easy thing to do. He’d been appallingly, bafflingly rude. He’d run off as if she were toxic.
For the remainder of the day, as Finch cleared out the cupboard in his bedroom and packed his clothes into boxes to take up to Hawk Cottage – the pretty house with russet ivy clinging to the grey stone he’d eventually chosen, on the edge of the Peak District National Park – he thought of nothing else, cursing his stupidity, his boorishness.
Romy implied she wasn’t caring for Michael any more, he thought. But what did it matter now? He had committed to tenants – a young couple and their small daughter – and Grace was expecting him. Nothing had changed for his poor stepdaughter.
But by the evening, his body was telling him otherwise, sweeping all obstacles aside and propelling him, unthinkingly, through the front door to walk – almost run – across the village to her house. If she threw him out, it was only what he deserved. He knew he would never forgive himself if he didn’t at least try to see her and thank her for what she had said to Grace. But, in the end, neither had needed words.
Now he looked over at her sleeping face and his heart contracted. What had he done, coming here like this and making love to her as if they could instantly resurrect what they’d once had?
He slid out from under the duvet and began stealthily gathering his clothes from where they had fallen last night. The memory of their lovemaking almost stopped him in his tracks, but he knew he should leave before it became impossible.
It was already too late: Romy had opened her lovely gold-brown eyes and he was lost. Half dressed, he sat on the bed and picked up her hand, bringing it to his lips, where he kissed it softly and held it for a moment against his cheek.
She smiled. But he sighed and turned away. ‘You know why I’m leaving the village?’ he said quietly.
‘To be with Grace, so I’m told.’
Now he twisted to face her. He didn’t bother to ask who had told her. It was never one person, but a gossip-vine running effortlessly through a society desperate for anything new.
‘She’s been in a bad way. I worry about her, but there’s precious little I can do when I’m so far away.’ Hesearched Romy’s sleepy face, but her expression was unreadable. ‘Coming back from Argentina, knowing I didn’t have you, I felt I needed to get away … I don’t know … start again.’ He realized he was gabbling and forced himself to stop.
