Page 33 of The Affair
Dragging herself into a sitting position against the wooden headboard, Connie gave a puzzled frown as he set the tray alongside her on the bed.
Standing with arms crossed and a big grin on his face, Devan said, ‘Happy anniversary!’
Oh, shit, Connie thought. She had never, in all the years of their marriage, neglected to mark their anniversary. She tried to bring a smile to her face, when all she felt was dismay. Devan’s expression had fallen. He obviously hadn’t even considered she might have forgotten. But that must have been what his strange look had implied, the previous night, when he suggested they go out for supper and she’d responded so casually.
She smiled up at him, contrite. ‘This is gorgeous! Thank you, Devan.’ He perched on the bed as sheopened her card. The outside was a bunch of beautifully hand-painted poppies. Inside the message said simply, ‘I love you so much, Connie, xxx’.
She felt tears spring to her eyes and a wash of fatigue at the unstoppable guilt that plagued her. ‘I love you too,’ she said. And this time it was heartfelt.
Devan leaned forward and kissed her lightly on the lips. ‘You forgot, right?’
Connie gave him a sheepish grin. ‘I’m so sorry … I never, ever have before. You should have said something.’
He poured some coffee into one of the mugs, handed it to her. ‘Don’t apologize. With the way things have been …’
‘That’s for you,’ Devan said, pointing at a square package lying on the counter, when Connie arrived in the kitchen. It had been a lovely breakfast, both of them propped up in bed, sipping coffee and strewing croissant flakes over the sheets, laughing about it. She’d had the first moment of peace since that night in Lake Como and Jared’s kiss.
Connie raised her eyebrows. ‘A present as well?’
He shook his head as he washed out the coffee grains from the cafetière. ‘Not from me, I’m afraid.’
She picked it up. It was light. Pulling open the cardboard box, she was confronted with bubble wrap, which finally revealed a small snow-globe. Peering at it, she recognized the Royal Palace and the Sigismund Column in Warsaw.
Connie’s heart missed a beat.Please, no, she thought, trying not to run from the kitchen, the globe singeing the skin of her palm.
‘What did you get?’ Devan was at her shoulder, peering at Jared’s gift.
Silently she showed him because she couldn’t speak. If it wouldn’t make her appear completely mad, she would have hurled it straight into the bin. Instead she watched her husband tip the globe upside down and then the right way up, gazing at the gently falling snow.
‘Dear Audrey,’ Connie said. ‘One of my passengers. Her grandson is obsessed with them so she buys one wherever she goes. I told her about Bash and she said I should start a collection for him too.’ She didn’t look at her husband as she lied with unnerving assurance. ‘How kind. She must have got the shop to send it.’ The shop outside which Jared had been sitting, Polish newspaper in hand, the sun burnishing his hair gold.
‘Good idea,’ Devan said, handing the globe back to her. ‘Give him a sense of the outside world. Although he’s a bit young to appreciate that yet.’
Connie stuffed the globe back into the bubble wrap, then the box. She didn’t want to see itever again. Neither did she have any intention of giving it to her grandson, this emblem of her infidelity. The thought made her shudder.
‘We can surprise him with it, next time we go up,’ Devan, back at the sink, was saying.
That night, Connie took a long time getting ready. She wanted to look good for Devan, but her efforts felt hollow, a sham. Like disguising a second-hand gift in pretty paper and a bow. When she finally entered the sitting room, where her husband was sitting, smart in a pressed white shirt and navy chinos, she felt ragged with fatigue.
‘You look lovely,’ Devan said, smiling at her. Putting his phone away, he sprang up from the sofa and came towards her, pulling her into his arms and looking down at her, his gaze tender. ‘I’m a lucky man,’ he said, kissing her firmly on the lips.
I’m not at all lovely, she wanted to shout. She hugged him fiercely, pressing away her deception. It seemed oddly difficult, getting used to this new, romantically charged incarnation of her husband. But she told herself it would get easier. She had, after all, loved Devan for a lifetime.
It was a soft July evening, the sun low on the horizon, partially covered with light cloud. She shivered, although it wasn’t cold, as they walked the short distance to the pub. Devan had his hand clamped securely round hers as they drew level with the Skittle House. But he pulled her past the door.
‘What are you doing?’ she asked.
He grinned at her but said nothing.
‘Devan!’ She snatched away her hand and stopped on the corner, turning to face him, arms defiantly crossed.
‘Play along, Connie,’ he said, putting his arm around her shoulders and encouraging her gently across the road.
She reluctantly allowed him to guide her, realizing there was only one place they could be going to: the Kitsons’. She’d been hoping for a quick steak and a glass of red at the pub – Stacy’s wife, Nicole, did a mean sirloin and chips – and an early night so she could close her eyes and stop having to hide her real feelings from Devan. As her husband opened the latch on the low gate to their friends’ front garden, Connie sucked in a breath and steeled herself.
Bill greeted Connie with open arms, his broad, affable features already tinged pink, his breath redolent of whisky. She saw him wink conspiratorially at Devan as he ushered them into the kitchen.
A rose-draped banner had been strung across the row of copper pans on the far wall: HAPPY ANNIVERSARY CONNIE AND DEVAN, it said, the pink balloons tied to one end bumping each other gently in the breeze from the open French windows.
