The Teacher's Secret (27 page)

Rebecca, by contrast, is agitated as she waits for the plane to depart. Reassurance comes in the smallest of increments: the sound of the doors closing, the illumination of the seatbelt sign, the beginning of the safety demonstration and then, finally, the overhead request for cabin crew to take their seats as slowly the plane begins to move. Only when the plane tilts forward to lift off the ground and into the sky does Rebecca start to breathe normally.

Looking out into the night, she watches as the lights of the terminal recede. Gone and gone and gone. The relief nearly cripples her. But though her body is limp with fatigue, her mind won't rest. At first, this is because she is still fearful, but gradually, as the hours pass, her fear fades to resentment then flares into anger.
Where were you?
she wants to scream at him.
Where were you?
But she cannot, because he isn't here. He still isn't here.

If she had the energy, she would cry. But she can't. Instead, leaning her head back, she closes her eyes. Finally, then, she sleeps.

When she wakes, breakfast is being served. Later, hours later, when Sebastian wakes, there is lunch. After that, there is dinner, and then, to her surprise, a descent.

There is no one to greet them at the airport.

In the terminal, they find a cash machine that spits out foreign notes so colourful they might be play money.

Outside, the light is artificial. Night again, so quickly. They follow signs and a line of lights to a taxicab rank. As they wheel their bags to the cab they have been allocated, there is a click as the boot springs open. Rebecca waits for the driver to take their bags but he doesn't get out of the car. Eventually, she heaves the bags into the boot herself.

When she and Sebastian get into the back of the cab, a light comes on but the driver doesn't turn around to address them. Instead, he looks at them in the rear-view mirror. ‘Where to?' he asks.

‘Brindle,' she says. ‘We are going to Arthur Street, Brindle.'

In the mirror, the driver looks put out. ‘Two hours,' he says. ‘Two hours I've been waiting here and what do I get? Brindle. You might as well ask me to take you to the other side of the airport.' He leans forward to switch on the radio and turns it up loudly.

She bristles at his rudeness.

Sebastian is oblivious to it. He simply slides along to the far side of the back seat and, pressing his face up against the window, looks out. From her own side, she copies him. Within minutes they are on a freeway, banners lit up on the side advertising cars and cameras. As they drive on, the freeway becomes more desolate and they pass waterside industrial works and shipping containers stacked up in piles. A left-hand turn and the freeway is done, another left and another one and suddenly there is no traffic at all, only suburban streets and streetlights.

When she gives him the street number, the driver stops in front of a block of flats. ‘Thirty-two dollars,' he says, although the meter reads twenty-five.

‘Thirty-two?' Rebecca queries.

The driver looks at her in the mirror. ‘Airport tax.'

She doesn't add a tip and he doesn't help her with the bags.

Once he has driven off, she takes a look at the building in front of them. Emmanuel had told her it was an apartment, but still she had imagined a house. And in the street-lit darkness, she sees that it is a street of houses and that this building, this apartment block, is out of place here.

And so, rather than relief and solace, she feels disappointment. This is wrong of her, but she is too tired to chastise herself for it. Too tired, even, to make her way to apartment number four, knock on the door and whisper, ‘It's us.'

Sebastian draws close to her. ‘Ma?' To her surprise, he is shivering.

‘Ma,' he says, ‘shouldn't we go in?'

She nods. Of course, they should go in.

There is a glass door at the front of the building and, as they approach it, they are flooded in a light so bright it makes her freeze like an animal.

The line of buzzers beside the glass door is labelled, in descending order, from one to six. Beside most of the numbers there is a name, but beside buzzer number 4, which should read Chuma, there is nothing. Rather than pressing the buzzer, she gives the door a little push, just in case. Surprisingly, it opens, and so, pulling their suitcases behind them, she and Sebastian walk through into a foyer area. It has a strange smell, like that of a hospital, a smell so strong Rebecca has to put a hand up to her nose.

There is no lift in the foyer, only a stairwell. The stairs are not carpeted. Instead, the concrete has simply been painted grey to match the railing she clutches as she drags her bag up the stairs.

At the top of the first flight of stairs there are two doors. A gold number 1 is screwed onto the first door, a silver number 2 to the second door. They rest here between the two numbers, while she catches her breath. Door number 4, with its own metal plate, is at the top of the next flight of stairs. Apart from the number itself, there is nothing to distinguish it from doors 1, 2 or 3.

She knocks softly.

Although the footsteps come quickly, still the door doesn't open. Instead, she hears his voice from behind the door. ‘Hello?'

She makes to answer him but finds she has no words.

‘Hello?' he repeats as the latch clicks and the door is pulled open.

There he is, then, in the doorway, wearing a grey woollen pullover and grey pleated trousers. No shoes. Just socks.

And in that moment, that first moment, he is completely unfamiliar to her. Perhaps she, too, is as unfamiliar to him for he just stares at her.

‘Rebecca,' he says finally, his voice both gentle and confused. ‘Rebecca.'

She stays where she is, planted to the spot, while Sebastian pushes in front of her and reaches for his father. ‘Dad,' he says, his voice high and panicked. ‘Dad.' And in the doorway, his face bewildered, Emmanuel Chuma draws his son to him and holds him tight. As the boy begins to shudder and sob, Rebecca watches on, like an observer moved by curiosity to stop and stare. In her head, she makes simple sentences that a young child might be made to read.
Here are my husband and my son. My husband holds my son and my son cries.

She does not cry. She doesn't think that she can; indeed, it is possible she has no tears left. Fright, she thinks, might well have dried them all up.

By contrast, Sebastian has many tears and while he cries, Emmanuel keeps a tight hold on him. Only when the boy has stilled does he release him and turn his attention to her. He doesn't enfold her in his arms. Instead, he handles her as one might a nervous animal—slowly and tentatively. Taking her by the hand, he leads her into a room that is simply furnished: a sofa that faces a television on top of a sideboard, a low coffee table in between.

He ushers her to the sofa and leaves her there. He returns with a cup of tea, which he gives to her. Heat radiates from it and this comforts her. ‘Drink it, my love,' he tells her.

She hears water running. ‘Sebastian?' she asks.

Emmanuel sits down beside her. ‘I told him to take a shower. He will feel better with a shower.'

She nods.

‘And you too,' he says. ‘You will benefit from a shower.'

She is comforted by his words, by how he speaks. Thoughtful, helpful words. Gentle words of suggestion. Not
you must have a shower
. Rather,
you will benefit from a shower
. She has always loved his words.

‘Yes,' she says. ‘Yes.'

There will be questions, she thinks. Soon, he will ask her all the questions she would expect him to have. She hopes it won't be tonight. She hopes it will be some time before they are asked.

She follows him into an alcove that turns out to be the kitchen. It is a ridiculously small space, little more than an afterthought, it seems. A kitchen should have a table, but there is no room for a table here. And yet there is no table in the other room, either.

And so the first question she asks him is this: ‘Where is the table, the dining-room table?'

He looks away when he answers her. ‘The apartment was not furnished with a table. With the exchange rate, accommodation is very expensive here. In the smaller bedroom, there is a desk. That is where I have been working.'

‘And for eating?'

He gestures out towards the television area. ‘Mostly I sit on the sofa to eat,' he says.

He is making toast now, and he spreads it with butter and honey before he cuts it in half, diagonally. ‘Have this,' he says.

She sits on the sofa to eat it and the honey runs from the toast onto her fingers, leaving them sticky. She has nothing with which to wipe herself and can only lift her fingers up to him to show him what has happened. He nods gravely, although at another time he might have laughed at her: his elegant, articulate wife, helpless with sticky fingers.

He returns to the kitchen for paper towels, then, sitting beside her, carefully wipes each of her fingers clean.

‘So,' he says, when he is done, ‘you are here.'

She nods.

‘I was not expecting you so soon.'

Again she nods. ‘I know.'

She doesn't want to talk anymore and he doesn't ask anything more of her. Instead, he stands in front of her and, putting a hand under each of her arms, lifts her up. ‘A shower now, then some sleep.' Taking her hand, he leads her to the bathroom door. ‘Here is the shower, my love. I will see to Sebastian.'

It is an old bathroom. A pink ceramic toilet bowl and a matching pink ceramic bath take up the length of one wall. Opposite the bath is a cheap white vanity, edges of laminate pushed open by water-swollen chipboard. There is a shower hidden behind the vanity and when she steps into it, the small, hexagonal tiles are cool under her feet. When she turns the tap on, the water is hot and plentiful. But as she lifts her face up to the water, exhaustion sets in and it takes all her energy to turn off the taps, step out of the shower and reach for the towel Emmanuel has left for her.

There is a bedroom to her left. It is sparsely furnished, with only a double bed, a bedside table on either side of it, and a built-in
wardrobe. Inside the wardrobe are Emmanuel's clothes. She takes his dressing-gown off its hanger, puts it on and walks back into the living room.

Emmanuel smiles. ‘I like you in my clothes.'

She passes a hand over the front of the gown but says nothing. Sebastian is sitting on the sofa eating a toasted sandwich. He has a remote control by his side but when he points it at the television, Rebecca shakes her head. ‘It is late,' she says, ‘and you have already missed a night's sleep.'

He cocks his head to the side, questioning this. True, she thinks, he slept in the plane and true, it is not yet night at home. But still.

‘Finish your sandwich, then you should try to sleep. To get used to the time difference.' He is reluctant, but he is an obedient child and, when he has eaten, he takes himself off to the smaller of the two bedrooms: the one with the desk, the one where Emmanuel has been working. She should go in to settle him, to see that he is all right.

She, herself, is not all right and without Sebastian there, the space between them is wide. ‘Would you like more to eat?' Emmanuel asks her.

She shakes her head. ‘No,' she says.

She knows she should offer him something more: a couple of words, the beginning of a conversation. But she doesn't.

Later, in the bedroom, Emmanuel unties the cord of the dressing-gown and slips the gown off her shoulders. It unsettles her to be naked in front of him—even though he is her husband and even though he knows her body well—and when he reaches for her, she feels herself flinch.

In the morning, she wakes early: before Emmanuel and before Sebastian. In the living room, her suitcase still stands beside the front door and she rummages through it until she finds a pair of trousers and a pullover.

Once she is dressed, she slips outside.

The morning is cold and she has to tuck her hands up in her sleeves to keep herself warm. But she needs to walk. This is what she needs to do. It doesn't matter where. So she walks along Arthur Street and when, at the end of it, she finds a road that slopes downwards, she takes it. To her great surprise, she finds that what Emmanuel has told her is not a joke: the ocean is at the end of the street, right there.