SOPHIE
3 October 2017
Thirty-two
The drinks reception at the conference hotel is packed. Heaving with delegates exhausted from a long day’s lobbying, their smooth faces sheened in sweat and adrenalin and the thrill of being in the same room as so many MPs.
The white wine is medium dry and warm. At the Spectator party, they serve Pol Roger champagne; at every other there is only this, concentrated orange juice, or fizzy water. Sophie swigs it anyway, tasting the thinness of the wine and the kick of the afterburn that strips her mouth and should, with any luck, soon numb the rest of her. She is drinking far more these days.
Where is her husband? She scans the room, conscious that he is still her focal point and wishing that she could relax and not continually note his absence, check his presence. But then, she is only here for James. It’s ridiculous: it’s not as if she doesn’t think of leaving him. Every morning she wakes and for a split second lies there in calm ignorance: in that semi-conscious state in which she is only aware of the warmth of her bed and the crispness of her sheets, for she is fastidious about weekly or twice-weekly sheet changing. In this state, the day still – just – holds the potential for contentment, for it is contentment, rather than anything more ambitious like happiness, that she craves.
And then, perhaps half a second later, the illusion is broken and she remembers. The memory comes as a physical pain. A corroding of her stomach and an aching of her heart so that she is briefly paralysed by the weight of her sorrow and the burden of a knowledge that could consume her if she did not swing her legs over the side of the bed and get up: up, up, up for there are children to get to school and the day to get on with and no time for introspection, which must be banished before she obsesses completely and it eats her away.
She tries applying the CBT techniques taught by Peggy – with whom she still cannot be truthful, of course, but who has proved helpful. But most of the time distraction, in the form of exercise and the perpetual, ruthless, unnecessary reorganisation of her house, is what works best.
In this way, she manages to box up the thoughts that kaleidoscope in those waking moments and, as she showers, before the welcome interruption of the children. Is James a habitual rapist? Was it just Olivia and Holly – for she has accepted what Ali says; a fact she finds almost unbearably sorrowful – or were there other young women beyond those two; these incidents not blips? Will there be others, still? A stream of lovers whose wishes he casually overrides because his need is more important? Just the thought stymies her, here in the bathroom; makes her want to stay, hidden, under the running water forever.
Does he ever think about what he has done? They never discuss it, of course, and he was so steadfast in his opinion – ‘I told the truth, near enough. Or the truth as I saw it. She wanted sex several times in similar situations’ – that she knows his view won’t have changed. But if he still has such a flexible approach to consent and to telling the truth, then what does that say about her? The fact she is still married to him.
When these thoughts press in, she cleans neurotically: drenching the corners of the cupboards with antibacterial spray; culling the children’s rooms of toys they have long outgrown but which they will mourn when they notice; folding underwear according to the strictures of a lifestyle guru, any odd socks or imperfect garments recycled, for her house will be rigorously ordered if nothing else is.
And, eventually, the churning turmoil of her mind begins to fade. Being away from London helps: away from James, with Ginny in Devon; and, incredibly, at the end of August, on a family holiday in France with him. He is charming with the children and loving to her. And though she feels nothing when he touches her, she knows that she needs to appear to thaw for the sake of Emily and Finn. They are – must be – her priority.
It becomes increasingly bearable to put on an act: to talk about new starts, and things getting better, because this is what a large part of her – the part that tries to forget what Ali told her and what James has admitted – so desperately wants to believe. And yet, on the rare occasions when they make love, she imagines organising her kitchen cupboards, the Kilner jars replaced for Jamie Oliver ones perhaps; with the Hardwick Green-type lids. Just as she knows – from knowing James – that it becomes second nature to detach oneself when having an affair, so she annexes her real self. She goes through the motions with her husband, while the real Sophie, the Sophie who was Sophie Greenaway perhaps, the girl who could scull down a river, confident, complete without a charismatic man to cling to, exists elsewhere.
And so she manages, she just about manages. Taking each day at a time; thinking purely of the children; looking on any possible bright side – she lives by these mottos, slipping a smile on her face when required. Look at her, here. In this thickly carpeted conference hotel: the one blasted apart by an IRA bomber in the mid-80s. Five people were killed then. She is so conscious of this fact, and it grounds her. However vast her problems, they are nothing compared to the finality of death.
She takes another glass from a waiter and drinks to that thought, aware her face is a mask of contemplation at odds with the frivolity of those around her. ‘Cheer up. It might never happen!’ A red-faced chap, pink shirt tugging at the waist revealing a sausage-like roll of fat, puts a hand in the small of her back as he sidles past and she recoils from his moist palm, her body tense. ‘No need to glower, dear!’ He holds up his hands in mock surrender; aggression palpable behind his thin veneer of affability. She smiles, her face taut, and turns away.
But someone else catches her eye. A lean man in late middle age who is listening to Malcolm Thwaites, head cocked to one side, dark eyes flickering over his face intently. His navy suit shines – it looks a little threadbare – and dandruff brushes his shoulders; lean fingers toy with a glass of red. She recognises him from court: Jim Stephens, one of the reporters who filled the press benches, and who shouted at her that terrible morning when James arrived to give evidence. ‘Does the PM still have full confidence in your husband, Sophie?’ A question that still sparks a sting of fear. She remembers how determined he was to provoke a response and how this jarred with his shambolic manner: that shabby raincoat; his breath, as he came too close to them, sharp with coffee and cigarettes.
Her scalp pricks. He doesn’t work in the lobby, so why is he here? He must be sniffing for dirt on James. At last year’s party conference, her husband was sleeping with his researcher. Who’s to say that James isn’t such a risk-taker, he’s back to his old ways? Or is he probing for a different story? The newspapers are still obsessed with that photo of the Libs: the one with Tom and James preening on the steps; an indelible, resonant image of their privilege. She thinks of the terrible event at the end of her first year; James’s anguish when he told her, the next day: eyes red-rimmed and uncomprehending. The only time she has ever seen him cry. Her heart judders. Please, don’t let him have a sniff of that story.
The journalist meests her gaze, then raises his glass. Heat creeps up her neck and she turns and pushes through the banks of tight-suited activists, determined to put some distance between her and him. She grabs another glass of wine. Anything to distract her. There, that’s better: once you’re on to your third, the sweetness becomes less cloying. She drinks steadily and quickly; accepts a top-up, her stomach fizzing with acid and fear.
She must find James for this is meant to be part of his rehabilitation, this mingling with the party faithful: showing that he is willing to put in the hard graft – the hand-pressing and attentive listening – and that he has learned from his fall from grace. We all love a repentant bad boy and they have lapped him up: listening to his mea culpa at a fringe meeting on the importance of family unity; watching in apparent awe as his voice cracked and he bit on his knuckles to stem his tears. They couldn’t get enough of him: these couples in their sixties and seventies, who she might have assumed would be judgemental, and the forthright women in their fifties in their bright peacock-blue or magenta jackets. ‘You have to admire someone who can hold their hands up and say they were wrong but they have learned from it,’ one opines; and she wants to grab that stupid woman and scream in her face.
But of course she can’t. The new, more cynical Sophie – and how she hates that he has made her like this – must stand dutifully while he courts them all, playing the penitent with precision; feigning an interest she knows he cannot feel. She could almost admire his performance were it not that she cannot trust a word he says. ‘We all adjust the truth from time to time,’ he had told her, in such a blasé tone that it almost sounded reasonable. And yet it wasn’t. And it isn’t. Most people don’t do that. It is only now that she is beginning to realise how frequently he plays with the truth, through elisions, omissions, half-truths, and manages to shift it in this way.
Well, there is no point staying here. She scours the room one last time and spies someone she wishes she could ignore: Chris Clarke. He catches her eye and she looks away too late, for he is moving towards her, the crush of the crowd parting as he pushes his way seamlessly through.
He places his hand below her elbow and steers her to a quieter spot of the room, beside some doors that can be slid open and a table crammed with empty glasses and bowls greased with the shards of peanuts and crisps. Jim Stephens is on the far side of the room with his back to them and the lobby journalists are still filing copy. The delegates are too far away to hear.
‘So, these are better circumstances in which to meet.’ His tone is consciously upbeat but his smile doesn’t meet his eyes.
‘You mean rather than in court?’
He blinks, mole-like.
‘I’m sorry,’ she adds. Anything to make him go away.
‘Cheer up. He’s doing well.’ His eyes scan the room. The home secretary is making his way through the throng, a gaggle of prospective MPs doughnutting around him. ‘He could be back in the Home Office before you know it.’
‘Come off it.’ Her tone is dry.
‘Under secretary of state; in charge of drugs policy. Possibly a poisoned chalice but he’s coped with far worse, hasn’t he? And of course he still has the confidence of the prime minister. An audacious move but the PM thinks he could manage it.’
‘For fuck’s sake.’
He glances at her, startled. She never swears and the words have slipped from her, involuntarily. A bubble of rage swells inside her. Not that post! How could Tom be so fucking stupid; so unthinking? She imagines the PM smiling his charming, blameless smile, barely considering the arrogance of that decision; the riskiness of his behaviour, and of James’s too. They have got away with everything before now, his logic would run, so what’s to stop him making this decision? After all, he’s the prime minister. But oh, the arrogance, the hypocrisy of it all.
She looks at Chris and she is aware that her eyes are burning, the tears inevitable, and that she needs to get away from him quickly before she says something she will regret.
‘Is there something I should know?’ He looks at her properly now, pale eyes alert, as she scoops up her jacket and handbag, every fibre of her vibrating as she resists the need to flee.
‘Is the PM being too kind?’
She almost wonders if he is being disingenuous.
‘Do you really have no idea?’
He doesn’t nod; won’t make any concession to his ignorance. She stares down at the carpet: noting the thickness of the tread.
‘You might want to ask them about a party post-finals. Several of the Libertines. Tom and James. June 1993.’
And with that she leaves the low-ceilinged room, with its oppressive heat and braying noise and awful people, who scheme and plot and gossip, and heads for the relative cool of Brighton seafront on a chill early October night.