The Last Letter from Your Lover

she’s trying to cut down, but now he’s here and her stomach has those knots that only alcohol can loosen.
    He chats on about his trip, the books sold, the changes in the Dublin waterfront. She watches him as he talks. She’d read somewhere that you only truly saw what someone looked like in the first few minutes of meeting them, that after then it was only an impression, coloured by what you thought of them. It gave her comfort on the mornings when she woke up puffy-faced after drinking too much, or with eyes pixellated from lack of sleep. You will always be beautiful to me, she told him in her mind.
    ‘Not working today, then?’
    She hauls herself back into the conversation. ‘It’s my day off. I worked last Sunday, remember? But I’m going to pop into the office anyway.’
    ‘What are you working on?’
    ‘Oh, nothing very exciting. I found an interesting letter and wanted to have a root around in the archive in case there were more like it.’
    ‘A letter?’
    ‘Yes.’
    He raises an eyebrow.
    ‘Nothing to tell, really.’ She shrugs. ‘It’s old. From 1960.’ She doesn’t know why she’s being reticent, but she would feel strange showing him the raw emotion on the page. She’s afraid he might think she had some hidden reason for showing it to him.
    ‘Ah. Strictures were so much firmer then. I love writing about that period. It’s so much more effective for creating tension.’
    ‘Tension?’
    ‘Between what we want and what we’re allowed.’
    She looks at her hands. ‘Yup. I know all about that.’
    ‘The pushing against boundaries . . . all those rigid codes of conduct.’
    ‘Say that again.’ Her eyes meet his.
    ‘Don’t,’ he murmurs, grinning. ‘Not in a restaurant. Bad girl.’
    The power of words. She gets him every time.
    She feels the pressure of his leg against hers. After this they will return to her flat, and she will have him to herself for at least an hour. It isn’t enough, it never is, but the thought of it, his body against hers, is already making her giddy.
    ‘Do you . . . still want to eat?’ she asks slowly.
    ‘That depends . . .’
    Their eyes linger on each other. For her there is nothing in the bar but him.
    He shifts in his chair. ‘Oh, before I forget, I’m going to be away from the seventeenth.’
    ‘Another tour?’ His legs are enclosing hers under the table. She struggles to focus on what she’s saying. ‘Those publishers are keeping you busy.’
    ‘No,’ he says, his voice neutral. ‘Holiday.’
    The briefest pause. And there it was. An actual pain, something like a punch, just under her ribs. Always the softest part of her.
    ‘Nice for you.’ She pulls her legs back. ‘Where are you going?’
    ‘Barbados.’
    ‘ Barbados .’ She can’t help the surprise in her voice. Barbados. Not camping in Brittany. Not some distant cousin’s cottage in rain-soaked Devon. Barbados doesn’t suggest the drudgery of a family holiday. It suggests luxury, white sand, a wife in a bikini. Barbados suggests a treat, a destination that implies their marriage is still of value. It suggests they might have sex.
    ‘I don’t suppose there will be Internet access, and the phone will be difficult. Just so you know.’
    ‘Radio silence.’
    ‘Something like that.’
    She doesn’t know what to say. She feels quietly furious with him, while conscious that she has no right to be. What has he ever promised her, after all?
    ‘Still. There’s no such thing as a holiday with small children,’ he says, taking a swig of his drink. ‘Just a change of venue.’
    ‘Really?’
    ‘You wouldn’t believe the amount of stuff you have to cart around. Bloody prams, high-chairs, nappies . . .’
    ‘I wouldn’t know.’
    They sit in silence until the wine arrives. He pours her a glass, hands it to her. The silence expands, becomes overwhelming, catastrophic.
    ‘I can’t help the fact that I’m married, Ellie,’ he says eventually. ‘I’m sorry if it hurts you, but I can’t not go on holiday because –’
    ‘– it makes me jealous,’ she finished. She hates the way it makes her sound. Hates herself for sitting there like some sulking teenager. But she’s still absorbing the significance of Barbados, the knowledge that for two weeks she will be trying not to imagine him making love to his wife.
    This is where I should walk away, she tells herself, picking up her glass. This is where any sensible person pulls together the remnants of their