Читать книгу William Walker’s First Year of Marriage: A Horror Story - Matt Rudd - Страница 61

The relationship was in terminal decline anyway. It was that last three-year one, the one where you know it’s your final practice run before you meet the woman you’re going to marry. It’s as much about timing as anything. You’re slightly too young to propose like you have to when you’re in your late twenties, slightly too old to walk away easily like you could when you were younger, so you just carry on going out aimlessly, waiting for something dreadful to happen.

Saskia was the dreadful thing that happened. I was at a party; she was also at the party; Elizabeth wasn’t because she was at another party with other friends doing other things. And it’s not every day that the sexiest girl at a party asks me if I’d like to go somewhere—pause for double meaning to become lip-quiveringly obvious—quieter. I knew the right and honourable answer was no, but Elizabeth and I were in the doldrums. We were sick of each other. And Saskia was beautiful. So I said something cool but contradictory like, ‘Sure, this place is dead anyway,’ and before I could catch my breath we were having sex in Hyde Park.

It was a seedy, torrid affair, and one conducted largely outdoors because we had nowhere indoors to go. My flat was usually out of the question because of Elizabeth. Saskia’s flat was always out of the question because it was owned by a forty-year-old stockbroker she had been having an affair with but who, in an effort to avoid hefty alimony, was now trying to rebuild his marriage. I thought this was all incredibly exciting but entirely unsustainable. Apart from all the obvious reasons why being a philandering, cheating, good-for-nothing two-timer is inadvisable, there’s the sheer stress of it all. Lying and cheating is exhausting. Besides, Saskia and I had nothing in common and we both knew it. A month after we met, I told her we had to stop meeting in public parks like this; she said fine, kissed me goodbye and went to live in New York. But not before she phoned Elizabeth and told her I was a cheating bastard.

I suppose I should have been grateful. I was too pathetic to be honest and tell Elizabeth it was over. Saskia saved me the trouble. Without Saskia, I might never have met Isabel. In many ways, Isabel should be grateful.