went back to their desks.
Anna took out her mobile and began texting a message for Martin: Job now permanent . She could have it all, just as Bethan had said: the home, the job, Martin – he’d assume she’d taken his advice and was seeing it his way, behaving like an adult at last.
What was she doing? These things were assembling themselves around her; she wasn’t choosing them, only surrendering control. She cancelled the message without sending it.
Last night she had dreamed her Rose dream again, the one where Rose came back. She came back only for Anna to push her away. The dream played itself like a film Anna had seen many times, familiarity only intensifying its horror. They’re in a plane together, sitting side by side. There are magazines, drinks, smiling attendants; she looks out at blue sky dotted with flat-based clouds of improbable regularity. Rose, in the window seat, is laughing, relaxed against the seat-back, turned towards Anna; she isn’t afraid of flying. Anna is always afraid. Her stomach clenches; Rose’s warm, laughing face makes something harden in her. Her intention is reflected in Rose’s widening brown eyes. Rose shifts against the restraint of her seat belt and presses herself against the arm-rest nearest the window; her gaze holds Anna’s. Anna has to close her eyes to do it. She stretches out both arms and pushes. She knows what will happen: the sides of the plane, the window, soften and sag like Dali wristwatches, rubbery, melting, holding Rose briefly as in a hammock, then thinning and splitting into chewing-gum strands with a mesh too loose to stop her from falling, spinning away into the immensity of sky and space.
A cry catches in Anna’s throat. Her arm lunges into a futile, too-late, meaningless grab. No one has noticed what happened, but she feels blackness close in as the sides of the aircraft reshape themselves around her. She sits tight and alone. No one knows what she has done, but she feels the terrible irrevocability of the outstretched arms, the push. The intention. She must hide her secret, but guilt chokes her and crushes her into her seat.
Gasping for breath, hooked out of her dream like a fish, she surfaced into her body, into her bed. Usually Martin’s sleeping warmth was close by; she could snuggle close and be calmed, even though he was quite unaware. Last night she reached out for him but found only the cool sheet, her hand sliding over the edge of the bed; she registered the shape of the wardrobe, the unfamiliar position of the window, and realized that she was in her old room at home. Her heart was thumping, the dream still vivid.
Rose had done this. Rose would never let go.
Letting herself into the flat, Anna thought of telling Martin her news. Now he’d approve of her; she’d go off to work every morning, and her salary would appear in the bank account every month. But she felt herself resisting. Had she bought herself a safety net, or was it, instead, a tightening mesh, strangling her when she tried to struggle free?
It was no good. Something was pushing her away from her own life. Happiness was on the other side of an invisible barrier. Even when it seemed within her grasp, it was only there to mock. Happiness was something other people could do.
He’d be late back, she remembered; she’d better do something about food. Meanwhile, another decision made itself, and Ruth was the person she chose to tell, on the phone.
‘I’m moving out of the flat. Martin and I are splitting up.’
She heard Ruth’s intake of breath; then, ‘What? You can’t mean that!’
‘I do.’
‘But why?’
Anna searched for a reason. ‘Things weren’t working out.’
‘But you seem – he seems – so, so—’
‘Don’t say happy. We’re not. I mean weren’t.’
‘When did this happen?’
‘It hasn’t, exactly. Not yet. I haven’t told him.’
A beat of silence, then Ruth said: ‘So it’s your idea, not his? Anna, whatever’s gone wrong, it
Anna took out her mobile and began texting a message for Martin: Job now permanent . She could have it all, just as Bethan had said: the home, the job, Martin – he’d assume she’d taken his advice and was seeing it his way, behaving like an adult at last.
What was she doing? These things were assembling themselves around her; she wasn’t choosing them, only surrendering control. She cancelled the message without sending it.
Last night she had dreamed her Rose dream again, the one where Rose came back. She came back only for Anna to push her away. The dream played itself like a film Anna had seen many times, familiarity only intensifying its horror. They’re in a plane together, sitting side by side. There are magazines, drinks, smiling attendants; she looks out at blue sky dotted with flat-based clouds of improbable regularity. Rose, in the window seat, is laughing, relaxed against the seat-back, turned towards Anna; she isn’t afraid of flying. Anna is always afraid. Her stomach clenches; Rose’s warm, laughing face makes something harden in her. Her intention is reflected in Rose’s widening brown eyes. Rose shifts against the restraint of her seat belt and presses herself against the arm-rest nearest the window; her gaze holds Anna’s. Anna has to close her eyes to do it. She stretches out both arms and pushes. She knows what will happen: the sides of the plane, the window, soften and sag like Dali wristwatches, rubbery, melting, holding Rose briefly as in a hammock, then thinning and splitting into chewing-gum strands with a mesh too loose to stop her from falling, spinning away into the immensity of sky and space.
A cry catches in Anna’s throat. Her arm lunges into a futile, too-late, meaningless grab. No one has noticed what happened, but she feels blackness close in as the sides of the aircraft reshape themselves around her. She sits tight and alone. No one knows what she has done, but she feels the terrible irrevocability of the outstretched arms, the push. The intention. She must hide her secret, but guilt chokes her and crushes her into her seat.
Gasping for breath, hooked out of her dream like a fish, she surfaced into her body, into her bed. Usually Martin’s sleeping warmth was close by; she could snuggle close and be calmed, even though he was quite unaware. Last night she reached out for him but found only the cool sheet, her hand sliding over the edge of the bed; she registered the shape of the wardrobe, the unfamiliar position of the window, and realized that she was in her old room at home. Her heart was thumping, the dream still vivid.
Rose had done this. Rose would never let go.
Letting herself into the flat, Anna thought of telling Martin her news. Now he’d approve of her; she’d go off to work every morning, and her salary would appear in the bank account every month. But she felt herself resisting. Had she bought herself a safety net, or was it, instead, a tightening mesh, strangling her when she tried to struggle free?
It was no good. Something was pushing her away from her own life. Happiness was on the other side of an invisible barrier. Even when it seemed within her grasp, it was only there to mock. Happiness was something other people could do.
He’d be late back, she remembered; she’d better do something about food. Meanwhile, another decision made itself, and Ruth was the person she chose to tell, on the phone.
‘I’m moving out of the flat. Martin and I are splitting up.’
She heard Ruth’s intake of breath; then, ‘What? You can’t mean that!’
‘I do.’
‘But why?’
Anna searched for a reason. ‘Things weren’t working out.’
‘But you seem – he seems – so, so—’
‘Don’t say happy. We’re not. I mean weren’t.’
‘When did this happen?’
‘It hasn’t, exactly. Not yet. I haven’t told him.’
A beat of silence, then Ruth said: ‘So it’s your idea, not his? Anna, whatever’s gone wrong, it
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