The Long Hot Summer (28 page)

I sit in silence as we drive back to the hotel. I am feeling angry again. Angry with myself for creating the problem in the first place and angry with David for his part in it. As he drops off the car out the front of the hotel for parking, I take off on foot. Running through the city like a madwoman. I find a corner pub and order a double gin and tonic. I find the darkest corner and sit in it. Fifteen minutes pass and I order another one. Suddenly I see David approaching. He has tracked me down. Unwisely we have a couple more drinks – I haven't been eating properly for weeks and the alcohol affects me much more intensely than usual. David steadies me as we walk back to the hotel. My mind drifts back to Adelaide a week ago when I was on tour. I had a get-together with two female friends who know us both quite well. I poured my heart out to them about our predicament. They listened and expressed great concern. Then one of them said something which at the time seemed a bit outrageous. But now, in my alcohol-dazed state of mind, it seems to make a lot of sense.

‘Perhaps what David wants is for you to drag him back from the clutches of this other woman. Like a cavewoman. Club him over the head to knock sense into him and drag him back.'

When we get back to the hotel room, I fly at David in an uncontrolled rage. I whack him around the head a few times then pull back. I pick up various objects and throw them at him.
He's ducking and weaving and trying his best to reason with me. I am, however, completely out of control.

What is happening here? I am re-enacting a thousand domestic brawls I witnessed as a child. My parents at war. Eternally. My mother flying at my father. Scratching at his face and throwing whisky glasses and bottles at him. The only difference is the response. David is totally passive and just defends himself from my wild attack. By this stage my father would have knocked my mother to the floor. She'd have had a black eye, or worse. She may even have been unconscious.

So it has come to this. The final degradation. For my entire adult life I have been non-violent. I have rarely smacked a child on the bottom for bad behaviour. I have always been slow to anger. Tolerant. Docile. Conciliatory. Non-confrontational.

Now here I am like a whirling dervish, attacking David from every angle. Trying to injure him. To knock him down. To bite him and scratch him and maybe even kill him.

Crimes of passion. How most people in our society are murdered. Not by strangers but by those who once loved them.

For the first time ever in my life I truly understand.

I was brought up by parents who were both communists and atheists. I was banned from Sunday school and never crossed the threshold of a church except for a family wedding or funeral. My parents were obsessed by social justice and issues such as human rights. These were the main topics of discussion around our dinner table and if religion, especially Christianity, was mentioned it was usually in a disparaging or negative fashion.

Yet despite her atheism my mother Muriel constantly quoted from the Bible in her everyday conversations, so that although I was never allowed to read ‘the good book' I am thoroughly aware of its basic teachings. My parents, in their behaviour towards each other, certainly didn't set a very good example for their children but intellectually the lessons were always there. ‘As ye sow, so shall ye reap' was one of my mother's favourites, along with ‘Do unto others what you would have them do unto you' and ‘Pride comes before a fall'.

These basic precepts have stayed with me all my life and certainly affected the way I brought up my own children. I didn't preach at my children, instead believing that leading by example is the most effective method of parenting. I believe that I demonstrated the importance of kindness and compassion, of love for humanity and of the joys of sharing. I have a firm conviction that the sense of values instilled in a child from birth will stay with them into their adult life. Not if they have been beaten over the head with theories of goodness, but if the theories have been practised as an integral part of their everyday life.

Now my mother's words come back to haunt me. Having believed I was always a kind and compassionate person, I now see myself in a totally different light. And the reason is simple. Instead of putting the welfare and happiness of others in front of my own, I have made a grab for putting my own needs first. I have acted out of self-interest and self-love, and the result of this is laid out before me like a tableau.

It's a complex question. Many would say that I have every right to nurture – or even indulge – myself at this stage of my life. My children have grown up and are successfully independent. They don't really need me the way they did as children. I have worked
hard, paid my way and been a ‘good' wife and partner to my husband. Loyal and loving and supportive. Well, at least until three years ago.

Others might say that I am getting exactly what I deserve. By wilfully following my own path regardless of the feelings of others, I have lost the right to expect the love and loyalty of my husband any more. Having felt betrayed and rejected, devalued and renounced, he has every right to follow his heart in a new direction.

On reflection, I should have made some difficult decisions in my life several years ago. Intending as I was to launch into an extra-marital affair, I should have made a decision one way or the other. Leave David and go to my lover, knowing full well that the affair would have to end and I would be alone. Or deny my desires and remain faithful to my husband. I should never have imagined that I could have it both ways. That it was possible for me to tip-toe off to France for illicit sex while David unhappily sat back at the farm waiting for me.

I'm sure there is a passage in the Bible that explains all this, but I don't believe it would have helped me to read it. I was hell-bent on doing the things I wanted to do for my own hedonistic reasons. But doing so hasn't made me happy. On the contrary, I have never been so unhappy in all my life. I am undone. Confused and thoroughly miserable. A lost soul, some would say.

The book tour has finally finished and David is driving us back to the farm. We haven't discussed my violent outburst of the night before, but we are shaken and subdued. The accumulation of stress, exhaustion from all the travelling and speaking events, the emotional turmoil and the physical effects of not eating properly and drinking to excess have caught up with me. I dare not look in the mirror – not just because I'm having trouble facing myself but because I know I will be alarmed at my deterioration. I just need time to collapse and sleep and eat some home-cooked food and dry out a little. I just need life to be normal for a little while so I can regain my strength for the unhappy times ahead.

When I think about it, my life has been on a razor's edge for most of the year. The lead-up to leaving Australia with a film crew hot on my heels, the difficult time in France, David's discovery of the second affair, his decision to end our marriage, my return to Australia and subsequent discovery of the new woman and then the frenetic book tour. It's no wonder I feel shattered.

We somehow settle into a familiar routine together. He does his calls and paperwork in the morning, then goes into Bathurst to the gym and I stay at home and write and cook and garden. He does the shopping, I do the cooking, and he does the clearing up. We sleep together and hold each other close even though we know it won't be like this for long. After a few days we start to talk again about the bigger issues. I am determined not to get angry or to escalate our conversations into arguments. We must talk it through calmly and rationally. The time for fighting has finished.

I put my case to David very plainly.

‘This is how I see it. We have been together for thirty-three years. We love each other and there are still many aspects of our relationship that are worthwhile. Worth hanging on to. We have created, in our time together, a fantastic family. If we split, the family unit will never be the same again. Our children and grandchildren will still love us and we will love them, but the unity will have been destroyed. Then we have our wider family and all our friends, with ties and connections going back three decades and more. Those relationships will never be quite the same again either. Financially, of course, we will both be worse off if our assets are divided. The quality of life that we have worked so hard to create will be severely diminished.

‘Then there is our future. I will have to live alone and I certainly don't relish that prospect. You will be in a new relationship, but how will it work? Will you move to South Africa and live there? Will she move here to Australia? She has family and career ties that will make it virtually impossible.

‘I believe our marriage is worth fighting for. Let's not give up on it. Please let's give it one more chance. We can work together to rebuild our relationship. I know we can.'

David questions my sincerity. He finds it hard to believe that I am serious, given all that has happened in France over the past few years.

‘I was certain you wanted to end our marriage, which is why you were behaving the way you did,' he says. ‘I was convinced that there was nothing left for us. I never, ever would have made a commitment to another woman if I believed that there was anything left to salvage. Your reaction has shocked me and now I don't know what to do. I do believe that you love me but I can't stand the thought of going through any more pain. I'm still not convinced that this is what you really want.'

‘I didn't realise this was what I wanted either,' I respond. ‘It wasn't until I lost you that I realised the terrible mistake I had made.'

During this whole rocky period David hasn't talked about his feelings or his pain with very many people. Not even with his family or closest friends. Only with one woman friend who is also a professional counsellor, and with our nearest neighbours Robert and Sue. But when his brother calls from Sydney I can hear them talking and David is explaining the issues that we have just been discussing. They talk for quite a long time, then David comes back into the family room and sits down quietly.

‘He agrees with you,' David says. ‘That we would be crazy not to give our relationship another chance. That it would be a mistake to throw it away without at least trying one more time.'

‘And what do you think?' I ask

‘I think he's probably right.'

I know with absolute certainty that David wouldn't say this if he didn't mean it. He's such a definite person. So black and
white. He's obviously made up his mind and he will stick to it. We will have another chance. He won't leave me.

But the look on his face speaks volumes. He's torn because now, somehow, he is going to have to break the news to the new woman. Go back on his promise. Break her heart.

It doesn't make me feel good.

Initially there is little joy in the decision. Instead of feeling elation and a sense of relief, I feel a certain flatness. An anti-climax. Maybe it's because I know David now has to deal with the difficulties of explaining his change of heart to the new woman. Maybe it's because I know I have forced him to make a decision which, although we agree it is the right decision, has been made for practical and pragmatic reasons rather than because he simply adores me and can't live without me. I realise that we will need to work through a tremendous number of problems before we make even the slightest progress in repairing the rift between us. It isn't just a matter of saying, ‘Okay, let's stay together' and suddenly being surrounded by a halo of happiness. If it's going to work, it won't be without a lot of struggling and effort from both of us. I wonder if we will make it.

I try to inject some happiness by suggesting that we call the children to share with them our decision. Their reaction is certainly important to me, and I also hope that talking to them
may make David feel more positive. One by one we get them on the phone and tell them there's been a resolution. We are staying together. We say there are no guarantees but we are both committed to giving it the best shot we can. One by one, they cry and say how thrilled they are. All they want, they say, is for us to be happy. It's an important decision for them too. Even though they are adults with their own partners and children, deep down they have never lost the child inside. The child that wants his or her parents to stay married. It's only natural.

The question of happiness is on our lips constantly. David believes it will be a long time before he can feel happy again. That so much damage has been done it will take years before he feels confident in me or relaxed in our relationship. I certainly feel happy that a decision has finally been made and that we can move on, but I sense a reserve in David that has never been there before. Almost an indifference.

He has decided not to speak to the new woman immediately but to try and let her down gently. It isn't necessary, however, because she has sensed it in his voice. She simply asks him a direct question about his relationship with me and he confirms it. There has been a reconciliation. After the call he is ashen-faced and will barely speak to me. In fact he becomes withdrawn and stays that way for days and days. I have to stand back and let him go through this, no matter how painful it is for all of us. I have been the spoiler. I have quashed his opportunity for a new and different life and I have put him in a position of having to hurt another person very deeply. Of all the things I have done, this is the one thing that he will probably never, ever forgive me for.