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‘If he is, then I’ll have to leave him a note. Dave’s collecting me at four, so I haven’t got hours to spend searching, but if I’m not back in twenty minutes, I’d be really grateful if you’d check them and take them out if they’re done.’
The light on the oven goes out to indicate that it’s up to temperature, so I hastily shove in the cake tins and make for the back door. I hate being indebted to Rosalind. She’s always very gracious when I need something from her, but I get the feeling that she’s storing it all up in some mental balance sheet to use against me later. I check my phone as I cross the yard. One of the downsides of living here is that the mobile phone signal is pretty much non-existent, so I’m surprised to see that I do have a tiny bit of reception. I dial James’ number, praying to the mobile phone gods that he’s also somewhere with a signal, but it’s not to be. The call goes straight to voicemail. There’s no point in leaving a message, as he might not get it for days, so I will have to continue my search on foot.
I notice Tony with his head inside the engine of one of the tractors, so I walk in his direction.
‘Hello Sophie, you’re looking nice today. Off anywhere special?’ he says, as he fixes his eyes on my chest, as normal. Annoyingly, I’m wearing a fitted white shirt, so he’s getting a better view than I’d like him to.
‘I’m off to spend the weekend with a friend later. Do you know where James is?’
‘Yeah, he went off to help Becky with something at the stables about twenty minutes ago. I expect he’s still there.’
‘Thanks.’ I can feel him watching me as I set off down the track. He really is a disgusting pervert.
It’s only recently that the stables have been brought back to life. James’ father was violently against the idea of keeping horses on the farm. He felt strongly that farms were no place for ‘toy’ animals that served no agricultural purpose and, in his time, the stables were mainly used for storage. One of the first things that James did when his dad died was get rid of all the crap in them, clean them out, and bring them back up to standard. We have stalls for sixteen horses, and we charge handsomely for their care. The fees not only cover the cost of employing a groom to look after them, but they’re one of the few parts of the farm that actually make a profit. A selection of horse boxes appears every weekend to take the animals off to various events, and they’re generally back in their stables by Sunday evening. As I stride down the track towards the stable yard, I can see that I’m in luck; James’ farm truck is parked outside. I pause next to it and make a brief fuss of the dogs, who are waiting patiently in the pick-up bed. The stalls are arranged in a U shape, and I pat the noses of some of the horses as I make my way around them, peering into each one to see if it contains my husband. As I approach the hay store and tack room at the far corner, I can hear faint noises coming from within. The door is closed but, from the gasps and grunts coming from the other side of it, it sounds like James and Becky, the groom, are struggling with something heavy. However, as I get closer and I can hear more clearly, I start to suspect something far worse. I know what that sound is, and it’s not the sound two people would make if they were struggling with something. Very much the opposite, in fact.
My heart is in my mouth as I gently pull on the door to open it.
2
I’m speechless, probably because I seem to have stopped breathing. The scene I’ve just walked into has literally knocked all the air out of my lungs and I’m temporarily paralysed. The small part of my mind that hasn’t shut down from the shock is frantically searching for the appropriate action to take after walking in on your husband having sex with someone else, but it’s coming up blank.
This isn’t even the ‘traditional’ method of catching your husband cheating, either. The way it’s supposed to work is that you come home unexpectedly, husband and lover hear the door, and you walk in while they’re frantically trying to get dressed. At least, that’s what the TV would have you believe. The scene in front of me is nothing like that. Instead of a bedroom, James and Becky are hard at it on a hay-bale, which looks rather uncomfortable and scratchy to me. They also have no idea I’m here, so they haven’t even had the decency to stop.
Another part of my mind unlocks and, even more strangely, I find myself critiquing my husband’s technique. There is nothing here that would fit the term ‘making love’; this is raw and animalistic. It’s fucking, pure and simple. They haven’t even undressed properly. Becky, the groom, still has her fleece on, although her boots, jodhpurs and knickers are carelessly chucked to one side and the fleece has ridden up to expose her pale, toned stomach. James is still wearing his boots, with his trousers and underpants pulled down to his ankles. I’m no expert but, from what I can see, there can’t have been much in the way of foreplay before they got down to the main event.
The rest of me is totally shut down. It’s like I’m observing something that has nothing to do with me. I’m almost expecting David Attenborough to start narrating it:‘The dominant male senses her receptiveness and wastes no time in mating with her. It’s a brief and functional encounter, which will be repeated several times while she is in heat.’
Well, you’ve got that one wrong, David. It may be functional, but it seems to be going on for a bloody long time. To be fair, I’ve probably only been here for around thirty seconds, but time has a weird way of stretching and compressing when you least want it to, and it seems determined to stretch this so that it feels like I’ve been standing here, motionless, for hours.
After what feels like half of my life, but is probably only a minute or so, James gives a couple of big thrusts, bellows like a bull in pain, and slumps on top of her. This seems to be the trigger to unfreeze my body and, without thinking, I turn and start running back up the track towards the yard. My breath is coming in great ragged gasps, partly from the exertion of running, but also from the shock of what I’ve just witnessed. I keep glancing behind to see if James is following me, but the truck is still parked outside the stables. As I near the yard, I slow down to a walk. My mind is in complete turmoil, and I have absolutely no idea what I’m going to do next. I’ve only just noticed that my cheeks are wet with tears.
‘Did you find him?’ Tony’s voice is enough to snap me back to reality. Whatever is going on, the last thing I need is Tony sticking his nose in it. I hastily wipe my cheeks with my sleeve and say, ‘Yes, thanks, Tony,’ in as normal a voice as I can muster. To reinforce the sense of normality, I continue walking purposefully towards the main house. Rosalind glances up from the newspaper as I enter the kitchen.
‘Did you find James?’ she asks casually, and then her face drops. ‘What on earth is the matter? You look like you’ve seen a ghost!’
‘I found him,’ I tell her, and suddenly the tears start to flow again. I swipe at them angrily with my sleeve; I really don’t want to talk about this with Rosalind.
‘Oh, darling!’ she coos, as she comes over and puts her bony arms around me. This simple act of kindness is more than I can bear, and the tears turn into full-on sobs. Rosalind lowers me gently into one of the kitchen chairs and sits facing me, with her hands on my thighs.
‘What’s happened?’ she asks gently.
It takes me a while to get any words out through the sobs, but eventually I manage to utter ‘He was at the stables. He was with Becky. They were…’
I can’t get any more out than that, but I see the look of comprehension dawn in Rosalind’s eyes. She moves her chair round so she’s sitting next to me, wraps her arm around me and pulls my head on to her shoulder. It’s extremely uncomfortable, partly because I’m not used to displays of affection from her, but also because the bones in her shoulder are digging into my cheek and the arm of the kitchen chair is pressed hard into my side. At least the discomfort is giving me something else to think about. My mind is replaying the scene with James and Becky over and over, like one of those annoying GIFs that people post on social media, except this has high-definition audio and video.
The sobbing fit appears to be subsiding a little, so I gently detach myself from Rosalind and head for the downstairs loo to sort out the worst of the mess. I’ve been proper, ugly crying this time, so first I blow my nose and wipe away the river of snot that has run down over my top lip. Thankfully, I don’t tend to bother much with make-up these days, so I don’t have to worry about my mascara running or anything like that. I splash cold water on my face and dry it carefully with the towel before returning to the kitchen, where Rosalind hands me a cup of tea. She’s also taken the cakes out of the oven and put them on racks to cool.
‘I’ve put sugar in it, to help with the shock,’ she tells me as she passes over the mug. ‘It stings, the first time, doesn’t it?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘His father was just the same, you know. Sexually incontinent. I had hoped that Edward wouldn’t have passed on that particular trait to James, but it seems he has. The first time it happened, I was just like you are now. We had an almighty row and he promised he would never do it again. I wanted to believe him, but deep down I knew he was lying. In the end I just accepted it as part of his nature. I don’t think men can help themselves. They’re like children, always distracted by something new.’
‘Why didn’t you leave him?’ My voice is barely more than a whisper.
‘Where would I have gone? Things were different in those days. I had no means of supporting myself; I’d never had a job and wouldn’t have had the first idea how to go about getting one. Although he was continually unfaithful, he did love me, and I would have thrown away a comfortable life here for something much worse. I also had James to consider.’
‘But he broke his marriage vows! How can you stay with someone who does that?’
