Free Crazy Paving by Louise Doughty Page A

yellow exit sign, he realised that his legs were shaking. She was there, a matter of yards behind him. Perhaps she was
settling down into the seat he had left, still warm from his body. He could have spoken to her, touched her even. Now she would never know. She would carry on, her evening undisturbed when his had
been torn apart. He sank into a nearby seat. The other passengers rushed by. By the time they had cleared, the train had started to move. He watched it, trying to work out when Ellen’s
carriage would pass, willing Ellen to see him. The train picked up speed. The windows flashed past. The people inside became momentary images, then coloured blurs. The train disappeared into the
tunnel with a rush of wind and a huge rattling sound that echoed down the empty platform.
    He sat on the plastic seat, alone. He gripped the edge of it with his hands. He thought, I am in pain. I am in so much pain I can’t stand it. All the achievements of the last few months
seemed nothing. His promotion, his new car, the evening class he had started to get himself out of the flat: nothing; worthless.
    He knew then that this small incident had set him back months.
    He rose from his seat, breathing deeply. Then he turned slowly, as if he was an old man, and began the seemingly endless walk down the platform.
    It was three years before he got seriously involved with anybody else and when he did he married her. Alison was tiny, efficient, funny. She wore neat little trouser suits with
high heels which would have looked old-fashioned on another woman her age but she somehow carried it off. Her hair was very short. She made jokes about looking like a pixie. Everyone (i.e. his
parents) agreed; she was just right.
    He was careful not to rush things. They went out for six months and were engaged for a year. They bought a small two-bedroomed terrace in Bromley and moved in four months before the wedding. He
was so swept up with the business of purchasing property that he almost forgot they were getting married as well. Luckily, Alison had it all organised. She showed him the wedding list one night and
asked if there was anything he thought she had left off. He cast his eye down it: crockery, cutlery, china, a yoghurt maker (he liked yoghurt), a pine hat stand . . . He shook his head in wonder
and thought, we get all this just for having sex?
    In the fortnight before the event, Alison disappeared altogether into a miasma of bridesmaids, car hire, disco equipment and unexpected aunties. He felt deserted and duly had an attack of last
minute nerves. This, it turned out, had also been planned for. Alison took him out to dinner and told him she would be worried if he
wasn’t
having last minute doubts. The next time
he saw her alone was at Gatwick airport, when they had bid the best man goodbye and gone to join the check-in queue. They were on their way to Portugal. They were man and wife.
    I have a wife, he said to himself as they handed over their passports. At the boarding gate, he waited for her outside the Ladies. There is my wife, he thought, as she emerged. On the plane, he
said to the stewardess, ‘My wife would like some orange juice.’
    The novelty of having a wife lasted well through the first year of marriage. By then, he also had a son.
    Paul was a boisterous boy who rarely cried and played with whatever he was handed: a wooden spoon, a holepunch, a piece of lettuce. By the time he was three, it was clear that he would be
handsome and good at sports. William felt overwhelmed with gratitude. Paul was exactly the sort of boy he had spent his childhood wanting to be: unanalytical, good natured, not overly clever. He
felt grateful to the child. He also felt grateful to Alison. How well organised of her to produce this neat little thing for him to care for. How considerate of her to give him all this certainty.
Occasionally, he went drinking with other men who complained about their wives and children; the demands, the expense.