Alligator Playground by Alan Sillitoe Page A

anathema in red ink on the back of their marriage certificate. And yet, where could she go? Probably to that batty old aunt who lived in clotted cream and pasty land, and made shit-coloured pots. Maybe Diana expected him to go after her so as to give proof of his love. Fat chance of that, as well.
    He stretched his long legs from an armchair, troubled to realise, at long last, that in personal relationships his mind wasn’t subtle or wary enough to detect in advance the schemes being laid for his downfall, while those he wove himself were useless because they were only for his amusement and never led to action.
    The central heating was at full crack, but he shuddered in the chill gloom. He put on another sweater, hoping he wasn’t marked for the flu. The temperature seemed ten degrees lower with a single body in the house, but the thermometer read normal. He couldn’t understand why Diana’s absence made the house feel so different. How would he be able to work the washing machine, and figure out the time clock for the central heating system, not to mention the various burglar alarms?
    Sleep was getting the better of him, as it never had during the day. To stay awake he dialled Denise. Her ansaphone came on, and he had no real message to leave. Saturday afternoon wasn’t their time, and whose it was he couldn’t know. Where was she, anyway?Was the world suddenly without women? He should have been more forceful with Tina and got her to stay, or at least to come back in the evening.
    When he reached Denise on her mobile she sounded as if just back from a bout of tennis – or love.
    ‘Diana’s gone,’ he said.
    She laughed. ‘Gone where?’
    ‘Not to the bathroom, that’s for sure.’
    ‘To see a boyfriend, I should hope.’
    ‘It’s not funny.’
    ‘Oh well, if she comes to my place I’ll let you know. But thanks for telling me. She might try the same as one of your ex’s did to her.’
    ‘She’s not that sort, so relax.’
    ‘Even so, you’d better not show up at my flat.’
    ‘I know. I’ll hang on here, in case she comes back.’
    He didn’t like her way of avoiding trouble: ‘Yes, that’s best.’
    ‘Where are you?’
    ‘Not up your way, if that’s what you mean.’
    He hadn’t expected her to be any help, but why was it that the women he took up with, so compliant at first, soon became too hard to handle? He put the phone down and lay on his bed, the question putting him to sleep.
    Waking, something had shifted and he didn’t know what. His chin was smooth but he felt in need of a shave. There was too much on his tectonic plate, though nothing around him seemed solid or real. Having a wife run out on you was one thing, but to be left high and dry in the middle of a supermarket with two trolleys of provisions was so original an idea as to be unforgivable. Of all the ways he had mulled on to leave her, his well-dug imagination had never thought of that, and the sense of gall was destabilising. Devilishly planned and done, it showed she wouldn’t come back,which made it futile to chew on the miseries he would put her through when she did.
    All lights on, no curtains drawn, he set Sibelius’s ‘Finlandia’ to play full blast on the Bang & Olufsen, performed by a block-and-tackle band from a bleak industrial ruin in the Black Country. Halfway through his second bottle of Bordeaux red, blue lights began revolving outside the window. Drink had never done that before. Closing his eyes and opening them didn’t get rid of the notion that someone had come for him from Mars, or even Jupiter. They had travelled all that way especially for him, an experience he could well do without.
    The hall also was lit by flashing space stations. Or were they navigation aids? The doorbell was so loud it almost killed the music. Back for reassurance in the kitchen, he pulled up the lid of the Aga to check that it was hot, but the signalling continued, as if someone had wedged a matchstick in the bell and run