Objects of Desire Read online

‘We can eat it tomorrow. Let’s go to the club,’ she insisted.

  Robert placed a lid on the saucepan and turned from his cooking to gaze across the kitchen at her. There was something in his eyes that she had never seen before. It was unnerving. And his silence – she felt something hostile in his refusal to answer her. That strange sense of fear that had seized her earlier in the day returned. She shivered. Robert turned his back on her. There seemed something terribly exacting in the way he turned the knobs of the cooker off. From the warming oven he removed a handsome porcelain soup tureen containing the lobster bisque. He walked with it past Anoushka to the dining room.

  She followed him, trying to tell herself nothing was wrong. It was just Robert changing his plans. The candles were already lit in the dining room and the table set for two. He at the head and Anoushka on his right. After placing the tureen on the table, he went to Anoushka and took her by the hand.

  ‘You’re a very beautiful lady, and the clothes are marvellous. You would have made a dazzling impression at the country club.’ But his voice was as cold as stone.

  He held the chair back from the table and, zombie-like, Anoushka sat down. Robert sat down in his. ‘There’s something very wrong this evening,’ she commented.

  ‘Ah, you’ve noticed.’ He poured a serious and grand old style claret, a La Mission-Haut-Brion into each of their glasses.

  ‘What’s going on, Robert? You’re frightening me,’ she told him.

  ‘There’s no point in being frightened or anxious about this. We are going to be civilised and deal with this rationally. As much as I would like to make this easy for us, there is no way to be kind and get the job done. It’s over, Anoushka. I want out of this marriage as quickly and with the least harm to the children as is possible.’

  ‘What are you talking about, Robert?’

  ‘Divorce.’

  She all but jumped out of her chair and in the process knocked over her glass of wine. It smashed and the wine soaked in a pool of red into the white linen cloth. She quickly stepped back from the table to stop the wine staining her skirt. Robert rose from his chair to cover the ugly red mark with his napkin and to take Anoushka by the arm and lead her away from the table, through the dining room into the drawing room. ‘I think something stronger perhaps,’ he suggested as, still gripping her arm, he walked her to the table where they kept a drinks tray.

  ‘Is there another woman?’

  Robert looked away from the drinks tray and met his wife’s eyes. How blind Anoushka could be when she chose to! So many years living with him and not to have known that. He felt no sympathy for her. Incredibly, her question angered him. ‘There has always been another woman,’ he told her.

  ‘What are you talking about, Robert?’

  He splashed two large measures from the bottle of vodka he had earlier removed from the freezer into small crystal glasses. He knocked his drink back in one swallow and Anoushka followed suit, closing her eyes and trying to catch her breath, shocked yet still not believing what she was hearing.

  Robert took her by the arm and once again walked her to one of a pair of French Directoire round chairs, sitting her down in it. He grabbed the other by its elegant arm, carved in the shape of a swan, and drew it from its usual place to sit opposite his wife. He could see it in her face. She was blocking out the reality of the situation, just as she always did when something threatened the peace and happiness of her life. She was trying to minimise the damage. But this time he would not make the slightest concession, as he had done all their married life to date. Not for her, the children, nor their marriage. Even he was shocked to find that his marriage to Anoushka was quite finished. How indifferent he was to the years or even the pleasure he had had with her and family life.

  ‘Anoushka, we can do this the easy way or the hard way, but it’s going to happen.’

  ‘I can’t seem to take this in, Robert. If there is a problem, let’s talk about it, work it out.’

  ‘Anoushka, the problem is this marriage, and I don’t want to work it out. It’s over.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Don’t do this to yourself.’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Ask me the whys and wherefores.’

  ‘Oh, I’m just to remain silent and make it easy for you to destroy my life!’

  ‘Talking about why I want a divorce will only hurt you more, and not make this any easier for me. It’s over, we have to go forward with our lives.’

  It was as if Anoushka had not heard his words. Once more she asked, ‘Why are you doing this?’

  ‘I want to live my life differently.’

  ‘Then we’ll both live our lives differently.’

  ‘Stop! I don’t want to live with you. This divorce is all about not wanting to live the remainder of my life with you. We’re both still young enough to make other, more rewarding relationships for ourselves. Ones that will make us really happy.’

  ‘I am really happy.’

  ‘Well, I’m not, Anoushka, and I don’t want to live one more day of a life filled with regrets. Not even one more hour.’

  ‘I can’t believe this is happening to me. I’m going to wake up and this will have been a bad dream, a nightmare.’

  ‘You are very much awake, Anoushka.’

  ‘We’re a family.’

  ‘Yes, we are at least that. You can see the boys any time you want to see them.’

  ‘I can’t seem to take this in. You love another woman and always have? And you are giving me permission to see my own sons when I would like to? Have I done something wrong? OK, if I have then I’ll make it right. If you’re unhappy with some aspect of our life, we’ll solve the problem, Robert. I love you and I know you love me.’

  She rose from her chair and paced the floor. Angry now, she confronted him with, ‘How dare you tell me you haven’t been happy, that we haven’t had a good life, a family and home that was everything you ever wanted?’

  ‘It was everything you ever wanted, I always wanted more but made do.’

  ‘That’s cruel.’

  ‘That’s the truth, and one we should have faced years ago. Now let’s be civil about this.’

  ‘It’s difficult to be civil, Robert, when I have been so deceived.’

  ‘I take full blame for the dissolution of our family.’

  ‘Oh, Robert, that’s rich! You destroy my life in one swift blow and don’t mind taking the responsibility for it. Who is she? Is she demanding that you divorce me and marry her?’

  ‘No. She knows nothing about this. And she has never, not once, made a demand that I leave my family for her. Quite the opposite in fact. It was she, many times, who tried to break away from me to save our family.’

  ‘Taking my husband anyway! How pathetic I must seem in your woman’s eyes. How rotten of her, how rotten of you. How long have you not loved me?’

  ‘You are determined to have this out, aren’t you?’

  ‘You bet I am.’

  ‘I won’t lie to you, so some things are better left unsaid. Believe me, it’s best for us merely to work out some arrangements.’

  ‘Better for you, but not for me. I want the truth.’

  The man standing in front of Anoushka was a Robert she had never seen before. All kindness, generosity, gone from his face; instead anger and bitterness and hatred. She shivered, felt sick and collapsed into the chair where she had been sitting.

  ‘I never wanted this marriage. I had to marry you. Now does that make this any easier?’

  ‘Because I was pregnant?’ It was more a gasp than a statement.

  ‘Yes. You trapped me into marriage. I did it for my unborn children.’

  ‘You loved me!’

  ‘Yes, for being the mother of my sons, and stayed with you because we had become a family.’

  ‘We had a good marriage, Robert. You can’t deny that.’

  ‘A very good marriage, but it’s over.’

  ‘Over?’ she repeated, and once having said it understood
for the first time that Robert did mean to leave her.

  ‘I made the best of a situation. For years, Anoushka, for so many years. Now I want more than just making the best of a situation.’

  ‘You’ve been planning this for a long time. Is that why you insisted the boys go away to school? You were setting me up to throw me out.’

  ‘No. I hadn’t planned this at all.’

  ‘You can’t just toss us away.’

  ‘I am not tossing my boys away. We’ll work out an amicable settlement.’

  ‘I want you, Robert. And my life as it is.’

  ‘Well, I don’t. And that’s final.’

  They remained silent for several minutes. He poured them more vodka. After some time, Anoushka asked, ‘You mean this, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I do.’

  ‘You’re angry with me?’ she asked, more out of puzzlement than anything else. How unfair Robert was being. What had he to be angry about?

  ‘I’m angry with both of us. Me for being so weak and not having done this long ago. And you for always closing your eyes to the reality of my unhappiness.’

  ‘Oh, so now this is all my fault?’

  ‘Yes. Actually, I believe it is.’

  ‘This is why we’re not at the country club tonight. It wasn’t love or sexual passion that made you change our plans. Although one would hardly have guessed that by the performance you put on upstairs in the bedroom. Fuck me and leave me! How despicable. Not worthy of you, Robert, to end it with one last fuck.’

  ‘Do you expect me to defend myself? If you do you will be sorely disappointed. Or would you prefer me to be crude and hurtful and tell you that this evening, like most of the sex during our married life, was predominantly your hunger, your lust? It turned me on, you were too good a fuck to resist, and why not? Sex made you happy, made us both happy. Maybe I even did it as much out of a sense of guilt because I never loved you, so I fucked you well, gave you as much pleasure as I could because I couldn’t really give you what you wanted. Me and love. Because I was giving that elsewhere.’

  ‘I can’t bear it. All these years you’ve been playing a role in some cheap melodrama.’

  ‘A role you cast me in. There’s no point to this conversation. I have done everything for the boys. I always will. I hope you feel the same.’

  ‘What exactly do you mean by that?’

  ‘The boys are old enough to understand that we want to go our separate ways.’

  ‘You want to go your separate way. Let’s just get that straight.’

  ‘All right, I want to go my separate way. I can sell this place and give you half of the proceeds. It will buy you a small place in a less affluent neighbourhood here in Lakeside. You can take what you want from the house.’

  ‘Bust up our home?’ It seemed unthinkable to Anoushka.

  ‘I’d rather not do that. There are alternatives. I would like to keep the house intact for me and the boys. They love Chimneys. This is their home.’

  ‘The home you’re breaking up.’

  Robert chose to ignore her remark and continued, ‘Their home has always been a stable environment for them. I know we would both like to keep that for them.’

  ‘But without me?’

  ‘Yes, without you.’

  ‘God, you’re a bastard.’

  ‘I will, of course, settle some money on you. Half of what I have. But we live so high, there isn’t much to divide. I’ll give you a portion of my income, keep you until you can find a new life for yourself.’

  ‘And how do you suggest I do that?’

  ‘Go look for it. Get out into the world and find out who you are and what you can do for yourself. You can’t do it here, not in Lakeside.’

  ‘Are you running me out of town now? Proposing I should leave Lakeside?’

  ‘I’m proposing one of us should leave Lakeside. It would be practical, it would be constructive for all of us if you were to choose to leave. You cannot easily, if at all, make a life on your own here in this community, not after a divorce. Half the lifestyle you know and are used to is all you might manage at best. Too tough. It would be easier for you to begin again elsewhere.’

  ‘No husband, no house, and now no town to live in. I suppose what comes next is to take my children away from me?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have put it exactly that way, but yes, I do want custody of the boys.’

  ‘Never!’

  ‘Don’t say never, Anoushka. The burden I’m taking off your hands gives you the freedom to go out and start again. You won’t exactly be homeless. If you agree to leave Lakeside and let me help to support you financially, I’ll make our house in the Caribbean over to you. You’ve always liked that house and living there. You can take the boys there on their holidays, live in some degree of elegance or travel. Begin again.’

  ‘Oh, you’re not going to take our island home away from me. At last a sacrifice on your part! What if I don’t like these plans of yours?’

  ‘They’re hardly plans. I may have wanted out of this marriage for a long time but until now it was a vague thought which I never acted upon. I have never planned how we should part. I’m talking this out for the first time.’

  ‘Well, I don’t like your plans for me. What are the alternatives?’

  ‘I can leave Lakeside and the clinic. You can remain here in this town and take custody of the boys, give them a diminished life, and have a thin time yourself. Anoushka, divorced women like you – well, let me put it this way. You can never regain in this community the same life we had as a family. I’m offering you a better deal than hanging on in Lakeside. If you’re smart, you’ll take it.’

  ‘Oh, so now this has come down to the best deal? I can’t believe this is happening to me! The boys – do you think they will choose to live with you rather than me?’

  ‘I think they’ll choose to stay with their father here in their family home where they are happy and secure and have their friends all round them, and know that their mother is at the end of a telephone when they need her, that they can see her whenever they wish, as you can see them whenever you want to. They will understand we gave our marriage the best shot and it somehow missed the target. Alexis and Mishka are mature boys who have seen more than half their friends come from marriages that didn’t work. Our boys understand the realities of life far more than you think. They’re kids with lots of savvy, like most children of the 90s, stable, well balanced and very bright. They will know that within this unfortunate break-up between you and me …’

  Anoushka interrupted Robert, ‘Oh, you do at least agree it’s unfortunate?’

  The look of utter disdain he shot at her made her shiver. He chose to ignore her remark and continued, ‘They love us both, and trust us, and will see that we are doing the best we can for all of us.’

  Anoushka covered her face with her hands. She felt the tears staining her cheeks and swallowed hard, drying her eyes with the back of her hands. ‘You’re stripping me of my life, my whole world.’

  ‘No, just your lifestyle. I won’t be able to keep you lavishly but I promise you will never be destitute.’

  ‘Oh, and I’m supposed to thank you for that? Next you’ll be telling me that I’ll thank you for this one day.’

  ‘No, I would never have uttered that cliché, but it’s probably true.’

  ‘What happens next?’

  ‘We go and see the boys and then our lawyers, who will make a meal out of this. Unless we are careful they will come out financially better than either of us.’

  This time it was Anoushka who rose from her chair and went to the vodka bottle. She poured herself a large measure of the powerful clear liquid. After emptying her glass she went to stand next to the fireplace. For several minutes she remained silent with her back to Robert. Quite suddenly she whirled round to face him. Anger shimmered from her. ‘What if I say no, no divorce? If you leave me, you leave with nothing.’

  ‘Then I will leave you without a divorce, and with nothing if nee
d be, and you will have destroyed our sons’ lives and most probably your own chances of ever finding a man to love you better than I have done. You do that and I promise the boys will hate you for your selfish vindictiveness. And so will I.’

  ‘Even more than you do now?’

  ‘Hate is the wrong word. I’m indifferent to you now, Anoushka, and that’s the result of years of love and hate. Love for being the mother of my children, for your lust and for keeping a family together for us. Hate for having trapped me into marriage, for your own pride and self-satisfaction in being my wife.’

  ‘You bastard! You’re blackmailing me into this divorce, using Mishka and Alexis. I never dreamed you could be so despicable.’

  ‘Desperate.’ The bitterness in Robert’s voice penetrated to Anoushka’s heart.

  ‘I don’t deserve this, Robert.’

  ‘Who said life is fair?’

  ‘Who is she?’

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘Of course it matters.’

  He clenched his hand into a fist and slammed it hard on the table, dislodging a lamp, an ashtray, a silver-framed photograph of himself, Anoushka and the twins. Robert’s anger, held in check until now, turned to rage. He pulled his wife out of her chair and held her by the arms in a painfully tight grip. He raised a hand to slap her hard across the face and she pulled back in fear. Robert trembled. He managed to retain a semblance of control over himself, enough not to strike his wife. Instead, he pushed her hard and she fell back into the chair.

  He told her, ‘You don’t listen. No, that’s not true, you do listen but you don’t hear. You always hear what you want to hear, see what you want to see. You will pursue this questioning. I’m trying to spare you, but why do I bother? You enrage me. So much so, I want to beat you into the ground. That comes of years of concessions in our marriage, of being separated from the woman I really love and want to build a life with. That comes from my weakness, for not going out and grabbing the love and the life I wanted with the woman I love.

  ‘One mistake, that’s all it takes, one small mistake. That’s all we have been all these years, and now that mistake is over and still you don’t let me go. Still you question my life, my need to be free of this marriage. You have not the least understanding or feeling that this breakup is happening to us, not just you, that all questions are irrelevant, as are all the rehashings of our life together. Your unwillingness to face up to the misery of our situation drags me down to brutality. Spare you? In my own fashion I’ve been trying to do that. A mistake. Now I will spare you nothing. Rosamond Rogers is the other woman, and we have been lovers very nearly from the day you and I returned from our wedding trip. And she is the woman I will marry as soon as I am free.’