Close Enough to HurtWell Then

Celine March arrived at Vale Meridian with a smile that made reception straighten. She was all gloss and precision: black suit, red mouth, pale hair cut sharp at her jaw. She had come from a European luxury group Adrian was trying to pull into a joint venture, and she treated business like flirtation and flirtation like business. Nothing she said crossed a line by itself. Everything she did touched it. Adrian noticed. He was not blind, and he was not innocent enough to pretend a beautiful woman leaning over his desk was merely checking figures. Celine laughed too softly at things that were not jokes, put her hand on his forearm when making a point, and stood close enough that he could smell her perfume. He should have stepped back. Instead, he let it happen, because it made the long hours feel less sterile. He had no intention of sleeping with Celine. He loved his wife. If anyone had asked, he would have said it immediately, offended by the question. Clara was not in competition with anyone. Clara was his wife, his home, the woman whose hair he still gathered in his fist when he wanted her face tipped up to his. But Celine admired him in a way Clara no longer did openly. Celine looked at him as though he was powerful, fascinating, inevitable. Clara looked at him lately as though she was counting the minutes until he disappointed her again. So when Celine perched on the edge of his desk on a Thursday evening and said, "You know, Adrian, men like you are wasted on conference rooms," he did not shut it down. He smiled. "Where should I be instead?" Her eyes moved over his face. "Somewhere with a view. And no minutes being taken." He knew exactly what she was doing, as if knowing made it harmless. "Dangerous proposal from a woman asking me to sign a distribution agreement," he said. "I would never mix business with pleasure." "No?" "Not without excellent terms." He laughed then, low and brief. That was what Clara saw. She had come to the office because she was tired of waiting for him to remember her. In her hand was a small paper bag from the bakery near their first flat, the one that made the pistachio cake he used to buy when they were newly married and pretending they could not afford it. It had been meant as an olive branch, though she had not admitted that even to herself. She stepped out of the private lift onto the executive floor and walked past the assistant's empty desk and the dimmed offices, with the city black beyond the glass, to Adrian's door, which stood half open. Clara heard his laugh before she saw him. Then she saw Celine sitting on the edge of his desk, knees turned toward him, one heel dangling. Adrian stood close enough that Celine's hand rested on his tie while she adjusted it with slow, intimate fingers. "There," Celine said. "Much better. You looked almost human for a moment." Adrian did not move away. Clara's grip tightened around the bakery bag. It was not a kiss, or his hand on Celine's waist, and perhaps it would not have satisfied a court. It was enough to answer every lonely dinner, the forgotten birthday, every time Clara had slept beside the cool shape of him after midnight and wondered what part of his life still wanted her in it. Celine saw her first, and her smile sharpened. "Mrs. Vale." Adrian turned. For one second, something like panic crossed his face. Clara wished she had not seen it. Panic looked too much like guilt. "Clara," he said. "What are you doing here?" She heard the question before he did. Not I'm glad to see you. Not Come in. Not This isn't what it looks like. What are you doing here? Celine slid off the desk with graceful leisure. "I was just leaving." "Stay," Clara said. Both of them looked at her. Her voice sounded calm, which felt absurd when something inside her was tearing in a slow, wet line. "I'm only dropping this off." She placed the paper bag on the small table by the door. "I thought you might not have eaten." Adrian moved toward her. "Clara, wait." She stepped back. The movement stopped him more effectively than a shout. "Enjoy your evening," she said. Then she turned and walked to the lift. He followed her. "Clara." She pressed the button. "Don't do this here," he said quietly. Her hand dropped from the button. She looked at him then: at the expensive shirt Celine had touched, at the tired, handsome face that cared so much about privacy and timing and not making a scene, at the man who had forgotten that scenes happened inside people too. "No," Clara said. "I wouldn't want to embarrass you." The lift opened, and she stepped in. He put a hand against the door before it could close. "I am not having an affair." She looked up at him. "Did I ask?" His hand stayed on the door. "You came in at the wrong moment." "Clearly." "Celine is a business partner." "Then perhaps she should stop dressing your tie." He had no answer quickly enough. The doors slid against his hand, and he held them open. "Come home. We'll talk there." "Will you be home?" He did not answer at once. "I have to finish this meeting," he said. Clara nodded once. "Of course you do." "Clara." "Move your hand, Adrian." For a moment she thought he would refuse. His fingers curled against the steel, and she thought the anger in his face was not for her but for a situation he could not manage. Then he stepped back. The lift closed between them. Clara did not cry until the lift reached the ground floor, and even then she made no sound. Tears slipped down her face while the security guard pretended not to see, while the driver opened the rear door, while London slid by in bright, indifferent streaks. At home, she changed out of the cream silk blouse she had chosen because Adrian once said it made her look soft and dangerous at the same time. She washed her face and sat on the end of the bed to wait. Nine o'clock. Ten. Eleven. A message arrived at 11:18. We need to talk. I’ll be home late. Don’t go to sleep angry. Don't go to sleep angry. She stared at the words until they blurred. There was no I love you in it, no I left the meeting, no You matter more than this. Clara stood and fetched her luggage from the dressing room, the cream leather set he had given her before a holiday he had taken calls through. She opened the larger suitcase on the bed and packed carefully at first: clothes folded, shoes in bags, toiletries sealed. Then her hands began to shake, and she threw things in without order: jeans, jumpers, underwear, the red dress he liked, then took it out again and left it on the chair. She removed her wedding ring last. She did not want to leave it, and it took her ten minutes to make her fingers open. She placed the ring on his bedside table, where he would have to see it if he came to bed. If he came to bed at all. By midnight, the taxi was waiting outside.