Desperately Seeking - By Evelyn Cosgrave Page 0,17
It was gorgeous, but not on me. It made me look too much like a girl and not in a good way. The DVF was divine but didn’t say ‘party’ (it might have been better suited to a party for two).
I was just taking it off and reaching for the Karen Millen when I became aware of people outside the cubicle, waiting for me to leave. Two women were talking in low tones but it was just possible to make out what they were saying. Only one was trying on, the other seemed to be offering moral support, which the one trying on appeared to need – she kept going on about her weight and nothing fitting her any more. Then the other said she didn’t know what she’d look like after her fifth baby…
Suddenly the thing that had been niggling me about these women became clear. I knew I recognized one of the voices. I pulled off the last of the DVF dress and slumped to the floor. There I was, semi-naked and sweating, and there she was, the jolly pregnant wife of my former lover.
∗
I had encountered her before, at another of those Law Society dinners. She hadn’t been at the one where Daniel couldn’t keep his eyes off me. This dinner was in aid of some charity and everybody was there. Daniel and I had been seeing each other for about six months, and I was deliriously happy. Everything about him was wonderful. It was sexy and exciting and provocative. I felt like I was the only adult in the world because only I could handle such a complicated relationship. Daniel loved me and I loved him, but he also loved his wife and kids and I had no problem with that. What he had with her was quotidian, pedestrian, and what he had with me was dynamic, passionate. I wasn’t so rooted in middle-class orthodoxy that I couldn’t handle sharing my man. I didn’t want what they had – the family life, the tedium, the reliability. What I wanted was a man so besotted with me he would risk the happiness of his family, the regard of his friends and colleagues, for mere moments in my company. I didn’t care who knew. We were in love; it was nobody else’s business.
Daniel, however, cared. It was agreed between us that the only way for this to work was to make sure nobody knew. That suited me fine: it added to the excitement and my growing sense of superiority over the rest of the inhibited boyfriend-or-husband-having world. I had a secret, which made me special.
So, at that dinner, at which I was unencumbered by an escort, I carried with me an air of smug delight. I knew she would be there. I couldn’t wait to meet her. What Daniel had told me about her made me confident she held nothing on me. I wasn’t disappointed. She was attractive, certainly, but in a conventional way. She was about my height and build, maybe slightly shorter, slightly heavier. Her hair was expensively cut into a bob, which framed her face well, and carefully dyed to enhance her skin tone. For her age (she had to be in her early forties) her skin was bright and free of lines. But there was nothing remarkable in any of her features. Eyes that were nicely made up but not particularly expressive, a mouth that was a little too small and lips that didn’t reveal anything. You would look at her and admire her, but you wouldn’t look again.
I was deep in conversation with one of the senior partners when she and Daniel came up to us. They joined in the conversation and later, as an afterthought, Daniel performed the introductions. Of course, she knew everybody else so she put out her hand to shake mine. ‘Very pleased to meet you,’ she said. ‘It’s great to see women staying in the profession. I’m afraid I never practised myself.’
She gave her husband one of those highly intimate mock-frowns that tell the world they’re of one mind about everything. Then, as the men continued the conversation, she marshalled me to one side to ask about conditions and present work practices, saying she could never get a straight answer from her husband. I played my part but I was eager to be away from her. I wasn’t suddenly struck down with guilt but I certainly didn’t want her as a confidante.