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‘Oh Stella, I’m so sorry.’ Bridget’s eyes pooled with tears.
Stella took a sip of her wine. ‘Simon wiped out Emily’s bank account before he left.’
There was a silence as they digested what Stella had just said.
‘Bloody hell. He really does have form,’ said Lucy.
‘Sadly, he does. But as awful as this sounds, and I can only say this to you, it helps me to know that. Because now I know I’m dealing with someone who lies, someone who doesn’t care about other people’s feelings and who will do whatever they need to do to make themselves feel better. Although I’m not sure better is the right word. I’ll have to ask him that.’ Stella picked up a cheese straw and took a bite.
‘Wait, what do you mean? When are you seeing him?’ asked Sarah.
‘I’m not sure yet, but soon, hopefully. I saw my lawyer today. She’s sending him divorce papers via the investor’s office. Annabel Collins.’ Stella paused for a few seconds, took a sip of her wine. ‘I’ve asked for a meeting, just me and Simon, so I can talk to him. I’ve written down the conditions of our divorce, and when I see him, I’ll then give him a chance to either agree or not. And if he doesn’t…’ Stella trailed off.
‘What will you do?’ Bridget asked, quietly.
Stella looked at the flame of the candle flickering in the middle of the table. ‘I’m sure I’ll think of something.’ She looked up at them, her eyes steady.
‘Oh Stella, I can’t believe he’s done this to you. Will you be all right seeing him on your own? Don’t you want someone with you?’ asked Lucy.
‘To be honest, the thought of seeing him makes me stomach turn, but yes, I’m sure. I need to do this bit on my own.’
‘We’re all here, you know that,’ said Sarah, quietly.
‘Of course, I know that, thank you.’ Stella raised her glass to them.
‘So, what happens now?’ Bridget chinked Stella’s glass.
‘I wait for his message.’
‘What if he doesn’t respond?’ asked Lucy, reaching for a cheese straw.
‘I’m pretty sure he will.’ Stella smiled. Once he realised Stella knew about Emily, she suspected that would be enough to bring him to the surface, if only to find out what she knew. ‘Who wants a top-up?’
* * *
The sound of a far-off siren reached Stella’s ears and for a moment she stayed where she was, lost in a dream. But then she opened her eyes to find Max standing by the bed, gently shaking her.
‘What time is it?’ She looked at Max in his school uniform, then at the clock on the table beside her. Seeing the time started with an eight, she sprang out of bed. Throwing on some clothes, she told Max to go and wake the girls.
‘They’re having breakfast.’
‘Really? Are they dressed?’
‘Yes, I woke them up. We decided to leave you asleep.’
She’d gone upstairs just after eleven, not long after Lucy, Bridget and Sarah had left, but hadn’t fallen asleep until well after four o’clock; she remembered looking at the time as she desperately tried to stop her mind from running through all the possible scenarios of the meeting that lay ahead. ‘I must have fallen back to sleep… OK, you go down and ask them to get their bags ready, I’ll be down in a minute. Thank you, darling.’
Max nodded and went back downstairs, deciding not to tell her she’d been crying out in her sleep.
Ten minutes later, they were all out of the door and on their way to school. Stella couldn’t help but suspect that the children had all made a pact to behave that morning. There were no lost bags and not a single argument on the way to school. She dropped them off at the gates and headed back home to walk Percy before going to the office. Even he’d seemed to have got the memo about being good as gold, trotting behind her on the walk and showing no sign of having eaten anything he shouldn’t have done the day before.
As Stella made her way around her usual loop of the park, past the playground and round the bandstand, she found herself thinking about the early days of their marriage. It had been so long since she’d dared to think about them, as if Simon had taken any happy memories with him when he left. But Stella thought right back to the beginning, to their honeymoon; how happy and fearless she’d felt. She remembered the small hospital room where Max had been born, how Simon had held her hand throughout. And when the twins arrived, how her world had been so totally turned upside down and yet, at the same time, how she’d felt this was always meant to happen. Simon was so proud of the children. As Stella ran through the milestones in their time together, she realised the happy memories all belonged to her too. They weren’t Simon’s to keep.
Her phone buzzed in her back pocket. She reached for it, calling Percy, who’d gone to sniff around a bench before looking at the screen and seeing a message from an unfamiliar number. She stopped dead in her tracks, staring at it. Taking a seat on the empty bench, she moved her other hand to the screen and tapped it to open the message. It took her a few seconds to focus on the words.
Where do you want to meet?
Stella couldn’t believe her eyes. After all this time, with no idea why or where he’d gone, here he was. It was as if he was making an arrangement for after-work drinks, not a meeting with his wife who he’d not spoken to since the day he’d walked out. The message actually made her laugh out loud. How could he be so casual? Then she remembered. This was the real Simon, not the person she thought she’d married.
