Our Tragic Universe (43 page)

‘It’s not an issue anyway, if you’re determined to stay with Lise.’

‘I just don’t see what else I can do. We’d have to leave Dartmouth. OK – I know – you’ve already left Dartmouth. But you’ve only gone a few miles down the coast. Everyone would disapprove of us. I’d lose contact with everyone I know in Devon, which I guess wouldn’t be a great loss, but I don’t know what else I have. I’d have to leave the Centre, I suppose.’

‘Rowan?’

‘What?’

‘We’re not going to run away together. There’s no point thinking about it. You’re going to stay with Lise and I’m going to … I don’t know what I’m going to do. But there’s no reason for you to think you owe me anything just because your wife accused you of having an affair with me.’

He took a deep breath, held it, and then slowly exhaled.

‘She’s not my wife.’

‘She may as well be.’

We’d finished our sandwiches. At least, I’d picked at the middle of mine, and he’d eaten half of his and pushed the plate away. Now Rowan looked at his watch.

‘I’m going to have to go in a bit,’ he said. ‘Lise has started calling the Centre every afternoon to check up on me.’

‘Shouldn’t you be the one doing that to her, since she’s the one who had an affair?’

‘You’d think so. Look. I’d like to finish this conversation properly. And also – didn’t you have something to show me? A ship in a bottle?’

‘You’re welcome to drop in for a cup of tea at Torcross if you’re passing.’

He breathed another deep, spring-tide breath, as if he was a river being filled and emptied more forcefully than usual.

‘Yes. I’d love to. But …’

‘We’re not having an affair. There’s nothing to feel guilty about. I’m not going to jump on you as soon as you walk in the door. I’ll keep all my clothes on the whole time; I promise.’

‘But if Lise found out …’

‘God.’ I sighed. ‘This really is ridiculous. Well, it’s up to you. I’ll email you my address and my phone number.’

‘Instead, can you … ?’

‘What?’

‘Can you put your number into my phone now? Don’t email. I think Lise has my password. I’ll text you if I’m in the area. Is that OK?’

He passed his phone to me. It was a bit bashed up around the edges and some of the markings on the keys had faded away completely. I opened his address book and saw about twenty numbers there, including Frank’s mobile, and Vi’s.

‘What shall I put myself in as?’ I said. ‘The dry-cleaner?’

‘No. I’ve never had anything dry-cleaned in my life. Just give yourself an alias of some sort.’

‘I can’t believe you’re being serious. OK; I’ll be Anna,’ I said.

‘Not a woman.’

‘I’ll be Anton, then.’

‘I’m so sorry about this. You can stop speaking to me if you like, and have nothing more to do with me. I’d understand.’

‘Do you want me to stop speaking to you?’

‘Of course not. I need a friend, like I said.’

‘A secret friend.’

‘Yes.’

I sighed again. ‘This is very weird.’

‘I’m sorry. It’s the best I can do.’ He looked at his watch again. ‘I’ve got to go. See you soon?’

‘Yeah, whatever.’ I felt like crying, suddenly.

He reached across the table and touched my hand. ‘Meg?’

‘It’s OK,’ I said. ‘Go.’

‘I’ll see you soon. I mean, I want to see you soon, if you want to see me.’

‘OK.’

‘Don’t get in touch with me. I’ll contact you.’

When Rowan left I just sat there with all the sandwich crusts. After a few minutes I took out my phone and replied to Josh.
Sorry for one day delay. Yes, I’ll come to Newman with you, and for pizza.
Tell me what time to meet you at Rumour
.

A week later I still hadn’t heard from Rowan. I hadn’t heard from Christopher either, although Josh had confirmed that he’d booked Rumour for the evening of 20th March. My feature had been published in the paper, and various people had written me congratulatory emails, but not Vi. I’d been back to the house in Dartmouth and removed the last of my stuff except the rest
of my books, which I’d arranged to have picked up by a Man with a Van that Andrew knew. I’d finished constructing my bed and had made it up with the plain white organic cotton bedding I’d bought from Greenfibres. I’d been working my way through Iris’s book in the evenings, and, using her instructions, had appliquéd an image of a wagtail onto the bottom right-hand corner of the duvet cover, using scraps from an old pillow-case. I cut up the rest of the pillow-case into fairly neat squares and added them to my newly constructed bag of patchwork materials. I was going to make a patchwork quilt for the winter, I’d decided, and write a column about it.

I’d got into a good rhythm of living by myself. Some evenings or lunchtimes I’d pop into the Foghorn for something to eat and a pint of Beast. Other times I cooked pasta or omelettes for myself. I learned how to pick the leaves from my basil plant in such a way that new ones grew in their place. And my hyacinth bloomed: it was blue, like the sea. I spoke to my mother a couple of times, and Libby. Claudia rang to let me know the arrangements for next week’s editorial board meeting. I wanted to ask her about Vi, but the words didn’t come out. In the evenings, when the phone stopped ringing, and after a couple of pints of Beast, I’d get out my guitar and play one of Iris’s folk songs, or a version of some blues song I already knew. I couldn’t help myself playing all the songs I’d ever talked about with Rowan. I’d decided to write my first weekly column about playing guitar, which I already knew how to do. Between songs I checked my phone for messages that I wouldn’t have heard over the music, but each time I saw that no one had texted me, not even Libby. At some point I went on the Internet and worked out how to text myself, to see if it was still working.
It was. My message, when it came through, said
You’re an
idiot
.

As well as all this, I finished knitting my slippers and found it was quite easy to rinse the pieces and lay them out on the kitchen table to dry and take shape. But Libby had been right about sewing them up. It was both boring and stressful in a way very few things are: as if someone has given you a priceless antique and told you to stand there holding it for five hours. The last time I’d been in Totnes I’d bought organic unbleached wool and a set of four double-pointed bamboo needles, along with a sweet little zip-up bag in which to carry my sock-knitting. The needles were odd-looking things, like giants’ cocktail sticks. I was going to have a go at Iris Glass’s pattern and write about it in my second column, and had decided that I should start trying now, as Libby had said it was so hard.

To knit a sock you have to cast on some stitches to one of your double-pointed needles and then distribute the stitches around two of the other needles, so you have something wigwam-ish and triangular, with none of your stitches ‘twisted’. I didn’t know what that meant exactly, but Iris’s other instructions had all made sense in the end, although usually only as the activity was being performed. So one evening, after the sun had gone down and while the fire was crackling in the grate, I got a couple of bottles of Beast from Andrew and sat down to work it all out. I’d already done a swatch, which I’d cast off and was now using as a beer mat. My wool gave me six stitches per inch, so I used Iris’s table to work out that for an ‘adult medium’ sock in this yarn I should cast on fifty-two stitches and then divide them on the needles so the first and last needle held seventeen stitches, and the middle one eighteen. This took a
few attempts. I had no idea which the ‘first’ and ‘last’ needles would be until I tried it out, got it wrong, read that the tail of the wool dangles between them like a rat’s tail and tried again.

To knit a tube, which is basically what a sock is until you get to the heel and ‘turn’ it to get to the foot, you simply knit the stitches off whichever needle carries the live yarn onto a ‘free’ needle. It’s similar to juggling, which I’d also learned from a book, years before. With juggling, you only have to remember to throw the ball from the hand that is about to receive a ball. Knitting socks turned out to be oddly similar. By midnight I’d got a rhythm going, and I’d knitted seven rows in a K2 P2 rib. After that, I moved on to a simple knit-stitch to carry on making a stocking-stitch tube. My sock looked like the beginning of a sock! I couldn’t believe it. That night I went to bed without putting my phone on the pillow beside me. In fact, in the morning I couldn’t remember where I’d left it. Rowan could have been texting me all night and I’d never have known.

When I found it, it was textless. I rang Libby.

‘You’ll never, ever guess what I’m doing,’ I said to her.

‘Shagging Bob’s uncle?’

‘Libby!’

‘Sorry.’

‘You can’t keep saying that.’

‘Yeah, yeah.’

‘Anyway, guess again.’

‘You’re making rhubarb jam for the shop? I bet you’re not. But everyone’s asking, now that the forced rhubarb’s in.’ She sighed. ‘That bloody shop. All people care about is food. There must be more to life than eating nice food and getting fat in front of the telly.’

‘Are you OK?’ I asked her.

‘I’m totally, totally in the shit again. I was going to ring you today anyway. Are you busy at lunchtime?’

‘No, why?’

‘I’ll come to you. Meet you in the Foghorn? You can show me your new place.’

‘Sure.’

Libby hadn’t been more specific than ‘lunchtime’, so I went into the Foghorn at quarter past twelve with my knitting and settled by the fire to wait for her. Andrew brought me over a half of Beast and a pink straw.

He laughed as he waved the straw in front of me. ‘We all know you’re multi-talented. But even you can’t drink and knit at the same time. Thus the straw. Aunt Iris used to drink through a straw when she was knitting. Used to get totally pissed, drop stitches all over the place and sing sea-shanties, sometimes until the sun came up. Even had a couple of knitting songs too, I think, although I’m sure she invented those.’

‘I’ve been reading her book,’ I said. ‘It’s how I learned how to do this.’

I held up the sock, which, to an objective observer, probably wasn’t much of a sock yet. Still, I’d done thirty-six rows, and I thought it was really beginning to look like something. I’d expected Andrew to glance at it vaguely and pretend to be impressed, but he leaned down, took off his glasses and touched the fabric gently with his big fingers.

‘That’s pretty good,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about the knobbly
bits and the dust. That’ll all come out the first time you wash them. Nice wool. You taking orders?’

‘Orders?’ I laughed. ‘I haven’t even got to the heel yet. My first-ever sock might be my last-ever sock if that doesn’t go right. It could still turn into a legwarmer.’

‘Nothing like hand-knitted socks,’ he said. ‘She used to make them for me.’

‘Iris?’

‘Yeah. Made them for half the village. You can’t buy socks after you’ve had home-made ones. It’s not the same.’

‘I’ll tell you what,’ I said. ‘If I can get one pair done – which I warn you might be in about a million years – I’ll make you a pair next. Say thanks for the cottage and stuff. I’m really enjoying living there, I can’t tell you how much.’

‘Oh, there’s no need,’ he said, putting his glasses back on. ‘I’m only kidding with you.’

I shrugged. ‘Oh, well. I’m going to write about Iris’s book in the newspaper, though. You might want to tell the publisher.’

Andrew smiled. ‘Thanks, mate. And actually, what am I saying? I must be mad. Give me a pair of hand-knitted socks and you can have all the logs you want for free. And a few pints – lots of pints – of Beast on the house.’

‘You’re on.’

Andrew drifted away to wash up glasses. I carried on knitting until Libby came in about half an hour later, carrying a box of rhubarb.

‘Ha, ha!’ she said.

‘Ha, ha,’ I said back. ‘Yes, I’ll make the jam.’

She put the rhubarb down on the end of the table, sat next to me and took off her sunglasses.

‘Holy shit, you’re knitting a sock.’

‘I am.’

‘Where in God’s name did you learn to do that? Have you got a new best friend?’

‘Well, sort of, but she’s dead.’ I told Libby all about Iris Glass. ‘The coolest thing is that I’ve been given a column at the paper and each week I have to “try out” a different hobby. I’m going to do sock-knitting for the next one.’