Chapter Text
He’s sweet the next morning.
He wakes you with a cup of tea and a fresh packet of Silk Cut, which you tear open with a sleepy ‘thanks’, and proceed to smoke two before he bustles back in with breakfast. You just about manage to not look aghast at what he presents to you. He has produced a plate of rubbery, anaemic scrambled eggs and burnt toast, with no butter. Ever so pleased with himself, he puts the tray gently on the bed and pads off to the bathroom, whistling out of tune.
Between bites of your ghastly meal, you listen to the patter of the shower, Sebastian’s hacking and spitting audible over the water. He leaves for New York tonight, and you’ll have to pretend as though his departure upsets you. Any other time, it might have been easy. But you’re tired, a little bit hungover. His jauntiness has set your teeth on edge in the way only he can, and you chain back-to-back cigarettes in an effort to calm yourself.
Naturally, you pack his suitcase for him. Five of his best suits in vacuum bags, a sleeve of two hundred Pall Mall, and barely any room left for his underclothes, which you stuff into tiny crevices in the corners. That’s before you contend with his chosen shoes, four pairs in all. You dump them inelegantly on top of the clothes and have to sit on the case to close it fully. By the time you’re done, you’re sweaty and all the more irritable for it. Were it not for you, he’d be leaving with unmatched socks and no pocket squares to go with his ties. Heaven forbid.
“You’re too good to me,” Sebastian murmurs at your back, startling you. He kisses the top of your head noisily. “What would I do without you?”
“Probably find some other silly girl to fold your undies for you,” you mutter, and it’s fortunate that he sees the funny side of the remark. He laughs, a horrible gravelly sound, and saunters off to go and telephone his parents to say goodbye. Afforded a moment to breathe, you abscond downstairs to the sitting-room and turn on the television. It’s been left on BBC News. A pretty, dark-suited female reporter speaks in a sombre tone, standing in front of what appears to be a hospital.
“...another two deaths have been confirmed as of this morning at Middlesex Hospital, on the specialised AIDS ward opened last year by the Princess of Wales…”
Sebastian pokes his head around the door, still with the phone pressed between his ear and shoulder. You can just about hear Felicity’s typical droning, made tinny by the receiver.
“Disgusting,” Sebastian says, scrunching his nose. “I don’t know why they bother with them. Waste of bloody hospital resources.”
You turn in your chair with a frown. “That’s a terrible thing to say, Seb. They’re people, just like me and-”
He waves you off and disappears into the hallway again, booming down the phone in that no-nonsense voice he reserves primarily for his mother. You turn the television off and stalk back upstairs to shut out your husband’s voice. It seems every other day there’s another death on the news, and you’d shed slightly drunken tears when Princess Di appeared on the screen to open the ward dedicated to treating these poor people. Sebastian’s always been particularly vocal on the matter.
“Dirty poofters,” is one of his favoured insults, levelled at his morning newspaper while he wolfs down croissants and black coffee. “They’ve only got themselves to blame, I say.”
You have to bite your tongue when he goes on one of his tirades. His friends, though less crude in their delivery, voice similar sentiments over lunch as though merely dissecting the day’s weather forecast. You come away each time feeling vaguely ill, after having to nod and smile sweetly through these uncomfortable exchanges.
Sebastian finds you brooding in the bedroom, having finally gotten his parents off the phone. For a minute he stands in the doorway, smirking and leaning up against it in a manner he must think is seductive. His tongue flickers out to moisten his dry lips.
“Come here, gorgeous,” he simpers, and you groan inwardly as your eyes land on the bulge at his crotch. He’s not drunk, so he shouldn’t be acting like this, but you suppose he is about to be away from you for three months. You think briefly and wishfully of making some excuse to keep his hands off you, but come up short. Barely holding back a sigh, you tie your hair up and give him what he’s after.
One rushed blowjob later, and he’s satisfied. You scurry off to spit out his come and brush your teeth until your gums bleed. Better that than actually getting on your back and putting up with a few minutes of insipid thrusting, which is the only kind of sex he prefers.
In the mirror above the sink, you prod mournfully at your skin. There’s a pallor about your cheeks that wasn’t there before you met him, a slight puffiness under your eyes. Nothing that a good coating of makeup can't conceal, but still you grieve for the fresh face that used to stare back out of the mirror. You’ve started to look older than twenty-two, and every new flaw brings a keen ache to your chest. At least he still wants me, you think grimly, whilst wishing that he didn’t.
Sebastian spends the rest of the day milling around uselessly, badgering you with such idiotic questions as Where’s my passport? and Did you pack my cigarettes? Hard as it is not to snap at him, by some miracle you manage to just smile back and say, yes, darling. He’s oddly clingy, too, shadowing you around the house as you try to clean. He doesn’t seem to know what to do with himself at all. You find this awkward boyishness quite unsettling, if anything. A good wife would be endeared, helpful, where you can only muster up annoyance for his behaviour.
You are close to snapping by the time dinner rolls around, which you eat in stony silence while Sebastian frets out loud about the drive to the airport, his connecting flight, the weather in New York. And when you clear away his plate, still piled with barely-touched shepherd’s pie, you could so easily break it over his head. But they’re the good plates, so you don’t.
Relief comes at seven o’clock, three hours before his flight from Heathrow. He packs his car, darts into the house several times to check he hasn’t left anything, and finally settles when you assure him he hasn’t. The sun is just about setting over the house when he takes you into his arms for one last embrace.
“You’re so beautiful,” he murmurs, pulling away to look down at you. “God only knows how I’ll manage without seeing that face every morning.”
Rather than roll your eyes, you plaster on a fatuous smile and lean up on your tiptoes to kiss him. His growing stubble scratches at your upper lip, and when his hand snakes around to grope lecherously at your arse, you’re reminded of what you really are. A live-in prostitute who does it all for free, at his beck and call. It’d be one thing if he was remotely good in bed, but he doesn’t even have that in him.
“I’ll miss you so much, handsome,” you tell him, earnestly as you can. “Give me a call when you’re settled at the hotel, okay?”
He promises to do just that, then climbs into his Silver Spirit and starts up the engine, gives it a few obnoxious revs. A wave, a blown kiss, then he’s reversing out of the drive, through the gates. The car disappears around a bend in the road.
You fill your lungs with air, then release the breath in a shudder. He’s really, truly gone, not to return for twelve whole weeks. And still, you find that you don’t feel much of anything about it. Not relief, not sadness - absolutely nothing. Perhaps you ought to have necked a bottle of wine secretly before seeing him off, so as to feel something. Perhaps you ought to do that right now.
The house is awfully empty, and your footfalls seem to echo louder than they normally would. There’s a funny feeling in your stomach, as though you’d eaten something that doesn’t agree with you. Maybe you’re getting ill. Stress can do that, you suppose. You’ll call Sebastian’s doctor in the morning and ask for some tablets. That’s what all the housewives do when they feel the slightest bit off. With any luck, he’ll prescribe you something suitably strong and numbing to stave off this burgeoning malaise.
But the thought is soon forgotten as you sink into a scalding hot bath, unmolested, with the latest copy of Vogue in one hand and a bottle of Chardonnay in the other. You don’t bother with a glass, and soon drift off in the tub. Dimly you think you hear a phone ringing some hours later, somewhere in the fog of your dreams, but it doesn't quite rouse you. The candles sputter and flicker, burning down to their wicks.
––––– ⛓ –––––
A wine-sodden week goes by before you remember what you promised to do in your husband’s absence, and panic sets in like a falling sheet of ice.
Dressed in an old set of overalls, you walk slowly through the house and take it all in. The wallpaper is beginning to yellow from all the smoking - you really ought to do that outside - and peeling in places. The previous owners had decent enough taste, but they were in their seventies and not quite up to speed with the trends. Yet you are charmed by some of their quirks which linger in the design; the jazzy, bright rug in the parlour, the tiny moulded lion’s heads at either end of the mantlepiece. It reminds you a little of your grandmother’s house, eclectic and characterful, on those rare visits to Manchester with your parents as a small girl. But Sebastian likely expects an unrecognisable home when he returns, so such quirks will have to be dispensed with.
With the vague idea of taking at least some of the task on yourself, you drive out to Wickes in your Mini and buy several tubs of paint, a few wallpaper samples. You’ve got twelve weeks in which to get the job done. Easy enough, you imagine, considering you’ve nothing better to do. In the shed you find a rusty old ladder, drag it into the house to start painting. Green for the parlour; it’ll go nicely with the baize of the pool table, you think.
Hours later, having splashed paint all over the charming jazzy rug, you’ve had quite enough. The most you’ve succeeded in doing is painting a small patch of wall, and the room is simply too large. The ladder doesn’t even stretch anywhere near the ceiling, and you neglected to buy dust sheets for the furniture. Of course you've faltered at the very first hurdle. You've never held a paintbrush in your life, let alone tackled an entire house. Defeated and sweaty, you slump off to dig out another bottle of wine from the cellar. Red, this time. It'll soon douse your downcast mood and hurry off this sense of uselessness.
The quiet should be peaceful, you muse, as you clear your third glass. Why on Earth don't you feel a shred of peace, then? Your cigarette dribbles ash onto the arm of the sofa. Listless, you begin to cry. How pathetic you are, feeling sorry for yourself in this beautiful house, free of your husband and basking in his absence. You don't miss him, so that can't be the source of your grimness. You've no issue with your own company. What, then, is this bizarre feeling? How could someone who has everything be so miserable about it?
It's only when you've drained the entire bottle that it comes to you, just as sleep starts to drag you down.
You're upset because he's coming back. Because this peace won't last, and the next three months will hurtle by and be over before you can blink. He’s coming back, so there’s no point in trying to enjoy yourself only to have it shattered by his return. Still tearful, sick from your overindulgence, you fall asleep fully dressed on the couch. The phone goes off again, barely heard through your drunken stupor. You're too tired to get up and answer it.
Morning brings with it some clarity, along with a thumping hangover. No, you can't handle these renovations alone. That won't be a problem, not with thousands of pounds sitting pretty in your bank account and waiting to be spent, courtesy of your husband. You can pay someone else to take care of things for you. That's what everybody else does, or rather, those with the means to do so. All you need is a name, someone who can take your muddled visions for this house and breathe life into them.
With new purpose and a couple of paracetamol gulped down, you pick up the phone and dial one of Sebastian’s closest friends, Grant. His wife answers, as you'd hoped she would. She's one of the more grating wives in your circle, but the most fashionable by a long way.
“Angela,” you chirp into the receiver. “How would you like to get some lunch?”
“Oh, I'd love to,” she groans, and you can tell she's just as hungover as you are. “Sweetings at twelve? I'll book us a table. My treat…or Grant's, should I say, ha ha ha…”
It takes forty-five minutes to get her off the phone, by which point you're left with scarcely an hour to get ready. You smear concealer under your bloodshot eyes, coat your lashes in mascara; you can't look dreadful if you're to meet Angela. Everyone would hear about it. Nice as she pretends to be, she's an awful gossip. For your part, you know that she cheats on Grant regularly with the young man who looks after their enormous gardens. These little secrets form a currency of sorts between the gaggle of dull housewives which constitutes your ‘friends’. Perhaps even insurance, if it were to become necessary. They tell you far too much when they're drunk, which is most of the time.
Angela is waiting outside Sweetings in a pair of dark glasses when the black cab drops you off, and she kisses you on both cheeks like an old friend.
“How's darling Seb? Did he get off all right?” she twitters as you get seated inside. It's no secret that she fancies your husband, but she fancies any man better-looking than poor Grant, who is already balding in his mid-thirties.
“Oh, he's very well, yes,” you lie, with a mounting horror in your gut. Sebastian has telephoned several times late at night, owing to the time difference, and you haven't once picked up his calls. You've been too drunk to do so, and when morning rolls around, you get sidetracked and forget all about it. I'll call him when I get home, I'll apologise, it'll be all right…
“New York, I mean, wow,” Angela remarks over her glass of wine, nosing into it like a sommelier. “What an opportunity. With any luck, he'll come home even richer!”
“Here's hoping,” you grimace, hiding your chagrin behind your cup of black coffee. Angela reels off her many annoyances about Grant, interspersed with extolling the virtues of other women's husbands. It's talk you can tune out, for the most part, whilst waiting for an opening.
“Do you happen to know any interior designers?” you ask quickly, capitalising on a rare break in the conversation. “It's just, I promised Seb I'd do the house up while he's away. But I'm absolutely useless with that sort of thing, and I was thinking to get some help…”
Angela picks at a scallop thoughtfully. She's marginally less intense after a second glass of wine. “Is that so? Well, I could always put you in touch with the designer who did ours up.”
“Could you? Oh, that'd be amazing, Angela. Who is he?”
“She,” Angela corrects you. “And I know what you're thinking. But she's the best in the business by miles. She'll turn your house into a palace, she did for me and Grant. Sure, she's a bit odd, but…”
You frown as she trails off. “Odd? How do you mean?”
“Oh, nothing wrong with her!” she hastens to add. “But, I mean…single, at her age, really? And she's always wearing suits. I thought she fancied herself a bit like Lady Thatcher, at first, but she's absolutely darling. A consummate professional. Give her a call. I promise you’ll thank me when you see what she can do for you.”
Angela's house is very pretty; all tasteful dark furnishings and rugs over bare boards. It reeks of wealth that doesn't wish to announce itself too brazenly. Grand, yes, but with just the right touch of modernness about it. And, you suppose, you'd much rather a woman be the one to take on the job. The idea of a man telling you what to do with your home doesn't exactly appeal. Sebastian wouldn't like to think of another gent spending hours alone with his wife, in any case.
“Alright, I will,” you decide. “Yes, I'll give her a call. Do you have her card?”
Angela beams and produces from her purse a little black business card, gold lettering swirling across its front. The card identifies this woman simply as Alcina Dimitrescu, Interior Designer, with her phone number etched below. You trace over the lettering with your fingertips, wondering what manner of woman could have made such an impression on Angela.
“You won't regret it,” Angela says sagely, clicking her fingers at a passing waiter for another drink. “Best in the business, I promise.”
––––– ⛓ –––––
“I've been trying to call you for a week. A bloody week!” Sebastian snaps, slightly distorted by the bad line. “I've had to ring around everyone just to check you're not dead. What have you been doing all this time?”
You pinch the bridge of your nose. “Darling, I've said I'm sorry. What else do you want me to do?”
Somehow the distance makes you feel braver, strong enough to withstand his anger, but it still manages to chill you from thousands of miles away.
“I suppose you've probably been drinking,” he says coldly. “Explains why you haven’t picked up. Rather be at the bottom of a glass of Pinot, wouldn't you?”
You don't even like Pinot.
“Seb, you're five hours difference from here. It's late when you call. I've taken to going to bed early.”
He swallows the excuse, but only just. He sounds too tired to argue any more. “Right, fine. I'll ring earlier next time. How's the house coming along?”
Biting the inside of your cheek, you hesitate for a moment. Best not to tell him how little progress you've made, considering his sour mood.
“I have someone coming to help me nail down the design,” you say brightly. “I've started painting, changed a couple of the rugs, you know…”
He grunts, losing interest fast, and you let yourself relax a fraction. “Good. Good that you're keeping busy, I suppose. Things are mad over here. These Americans just don't stop for breath…”
His chatter washes over you, amidst small noises of assent at the right times. You're well practiced in making it seem as though you're listening, when your mind is very much elsewhere. The next call you make will be to the designer, and you silently will Sebastian to shut up and let you get on with things. Mercifully, he soon exhausts all of his pent-up topics and winds down. You toy idly with an unlit cigarette and wait for him to say goodbye.
“I'll call you in the next couple of days, alright?” he says. “Make sure you pick up, or I'll send someone over to check.”
“I will pick up,” you promise, a little bit cross with the threat. Who does he think he is? “I'll let you go, darling. I miss you.”
“Mm,” he grunts. “You too. Bye.”
Finally he hangs up, and you slam the receiver down with such force that it clangs. More than anything, you're upset with yourself. He's a swine for speaking to you like that, but you did leave his calls unanswered for a week. Anyone would be livid. Still, it doesn't warrant such nastiness. You slug back more wine in defiance, even as he can't possibly know what you're doing. If he thinks his wife a drunkard, you'll become one just to spite him. You'd be just like his mother, in fact. And he won't want you then.
Once you're pleasantly tipsy and bolder for it, you fish the designer's card from your purse and punch in the number. It's a local one, a familiar area code. The ringing goes on for a good while, and you almost hang up with a huff, but the line connects just before you do.
“Hello?” A woman's voice, deeper than any woman's you've ever heard, with a timbre that saps all your irritation away.
“Yes, hi,” you say quickly, stupidly, after a moment's uneasy pause. “Is this Alcina Dimitrescu?”
“Speaking.”
“An, erm, a friend of mine recommended your services to me,” you babble, unnerved by the woman's silence. “I'm looking to have my house remodelled.”
The strike of a lighter over the line, another pregnant pause. “Very good. Would you like to book a consultation?”
“Erm, yes, please. I'm…I'm free anytime. Whenever's best for you.”
“Is tomorrow suitable?” she drawls, sounding almost bored. Her accent doesn't quite seem local, though you can't place it exactly. “I can be with you for, let’s see…ten o’ clock.”
“Ten is perfect,” you mumble, between steadying drags of your cigarette. “Thank you.”
“Your address, please, if you would.”
You give it to her, and she exhibits the first shred of emotion you've heard from her. The lilt of her voice makes you jittery, for some reason, or perhaps it's all the coffee you downed to quell your hangover.
“You're Sebastian Barreau's wife, then?” Alcina remarks. “Of Barreau and Thompson?”
“I am, yes,” you say with a slight frown, taken aback. “Do you know me from somewhere?”
“Not personally, no. I had my eye on your house, as it happens, before Mr Barreau bought it. I look forward to seeing it again.”
“Ah, I see…” You don't quite know how to respond. Thankfully, Alcina seems every bit the consummate professional Angela described, as she's back to business in a flash.
“Ten o' clock tomorrow,” she confirms, and you sense that her attention has already flitted to other matters. “I'll see you then. Have a pleasant day, Mrs Barreau.”
You barely have time to return the sentiment before she hangs up.
Angela was right. This woman is odd, and she has succeeded in throwing you completely off-balance with her bluntness. Somewhere between irritated and dazed, you wander the house with a fresh cigarette. It's a mess. You haven't been keeping up with cleaning very much since Sebastian left, and it shows. It's anyone's guess as to when you last did the laundry or ran the duster around. Will Alcina expect an immaculate showhome when she arrives? At the very least, she’ll expect not to walk into a pigsty. The thought spurs you into slightly frantic action, and you dart back to the phone to call Winnie, your housekeeper.
When she agrees to come by early tomorrow for the promise of double pay, you almost relax. Almost, but not quite. Such a strange day it's been. You're struggling to recall much of the last week, namely on account of the amount you’ve been drinking. The bottles piled up on the kitchen counter jar you a little. Have you really had that many? A party of people couldn't get through so much, and you've managed it all on your own. You sweep them into the bin with a kick of shame in your stomach, promise yourself you'll ease off it. Tonight is as good a time as any to start.
Without the drink, sleep doesn't come easy. You swallow a handful of pills instead, and wrestle with unsettling dreams into the small hours.
––––– ⛓ –––––
Winnie leaves the house spotless by nine o' clock the next morning, and you thank her with a fistful of banknotes, far more than you'd usually pay her. A tip of fifty pounds by way of apology for the short notice, and her eyes all but pop from her skull. She makes herself scarce, wisely; you’re on edge, taciturn and moody. Last night’s abstinence left you feeling uneasy, and the sleeping tablets have rendered your thoughts foggy and reluctant. It’s a hangover of a different sort, unfamiliar ground. Two hastily gulped black coffees don’t do much to alleviate this sluggishness.
There’s only an hour between you and this Dimitrescu woman's arrival. You grow restless as you wait, biting your painted nails down to the quick and smoking until your throat itches. Then you realise how awful the house smells for it, undoing some of Winnie's hard work, and scurry around with a can of air freshener to mask the ashtray stink. You wind up red in the face and coughing from the artificial lavender. And before you can even think of taking a breather, the doorbell sounds its sonorous tone. A glance at your watch confirms the hour.
Still breathless, you scuttle up to the peephole and press your eye to it. The face on the other side is distorted, visible only in profile as the woman stares out across the lawn. A strong jaw with black curls framing it, a proud straight nose. Around her eyes there is a suggestion of crow's feet, barely there. She turns her head, and you almost gasp. Scrambling, you gather yourself and wrench open the door.
“Hello,” you breathe. “Thank you for coming, Ms Dimitrescu.”
“Mrs Barreau,” the woman smiles, not altogether warmly. “Your home is just as beautiful as I remember.”
“Thank you…”
She is tall, even in her low-heeled boots, quite easily taller than Sebastian. Angela's words from yesterday drift across your thoughts as you take her in. Alcina's trouser suit is beautifully tailored, a stark navy blue against her pale, almost translucent skin. In her large hands she clutches a briefcase, tapping her red-tipped fingers on it rhythmically. She casts her eyes over you, unreadable; they're a strange hue, almost amber. A mixture of yellow and blue flecks run through their irises, thick black lashes accentuating their lightness. The weak sunlight throws into relief a smattering of silver-grey strands which pepper her curls.
A good minute must pass before you regain yourself, and move to one side clumsily to allow her entry. She steps over your threshold with a gait that calls to mind a wildcat, fluid and unhurried. Like one who has all the time in the world, and goes only where she pleases.
“Would you like a cup of coffee?” you quaver, wringing your hands like a schoolgirl. You're cross with yourself, frankly, for being so nervous, but there's just something so disarming about this woman. She has scarcely breathed a word, and you're acting as though scolded by a teacher.
“Coffee would be lovely. No milk or sugar, please.”
“Of course, yes. You can wait in the lounge, if you'd like. I'll be just a moment.”
You rush off to the kitchen, faintly thankful for this moment of reprieve as you fill the kettle with water. There's a tremor to your hands that just won't shift. Likely it's the pills more than the nerves, you tell yourself. You'll have to wrangle a new prescription from the doctor, something milder. It won't do to be trembling like a newborn lamb wherever you go. In your haste to brew the coffee, you spill granules all over the worktop. The kettle whistles, and you decant the water into two mugs, piling milk and sugar into your own.
When you peek around the lounge door, Alcina has her back to you. She's squinting at the picture frames on the mantle, your wedding photo prominent amongst them. Behind the glass, your smile has an almost haunted quality, where Sebastian’s is broad and effortless. He has barely changed since that photograph; still handsome, still young and strong. You feel as though you've aged a decade in barely two short years.
Alcina turns on her heel, catches you dawdling in the doorway. “Ah, thank you. You'll forgive me if I have a little look around before we sit?”
You nod mutely, and set the cups down on the coffee table. Alcina takes a long, sweeping look around the room, then drifts past you, into the hallway. You aren't sure whether you're supposed to follow her, so you lag a few feet behind as she enters the parlour. The patch of green paint is the first thing her eyes find, and the corners of her lips twitch.
“I see you've been doing my job for me,” she remarks drily, nudging the forgotten ladder with the toe of her boot. “The green is lovely, actually. You have a good eye.”
“Oh…thank you,” you murmur, feeling heat rise up your face, and her smile broadens. One of her incisors is a fraction shorter than the other, though it doesn't detract from her prettiness at all. She looks annoyingly good for a woman presumably well into her forties.
“Do you mind if I do a little walk-through by myself?” Alcina asks, serious once more. “I won't go into the bedrooms. Just the main rooms, if that's all right.”
“Please, do,” you say, quite gratefully. “Take all the time you need, and go wherever you need to. I'll, erm…I'll wait here.”
With a murmur of thanks, she sets off once again. You hear her footfalls echo up the stairs, and battle a vague sickness in your gut. Angela really didn't prepare you for…this. Certainly, she warned you briefly and cheerfully about the strangeness of this woman, but managed somehow to skirt around everything else. You had expected, dimly, that you would be sitting down by now and regaling Alcina with all of your visions. That she would be pulling out samples and fabrics for your perusal, agreeing, naturally, with whatever you wished. Not this stalking around your house unsupervised, perhaps even judging what she sees. She hasn't asked you a single question, you realise. What sort of designer is she, really?
The question floats, unanswered, as Alcina is already veering back into the room briskly.
“Thank you,” she says, still utterly, irritatingly inscrutable. “Shall we have that coffee?”
She follows you back into the lounge, but you're unsettled here, with the huge bay windows facing out onto the front lawn. Private, yes, with a huge Scots pine blocking the view from the road, but anyone coming up the drive could see right in. You’re not sure why the idea bothers you, exactly.
“Let's, erm…let's take this in the reception room.”
You scurry ahead with the mugs, and as you cross the hall and into the reception room, Alcina hums in the back of her throat.
“Oh, this is lovely,” she murmurs, approaching the baby grand with a flicker of admiration. She runs a finger over the keys slowly, reverentially. You're quite relieved, and a little fascinated, to see a spark of humanness in this stone-faced woman.
“Isnt it?” you agree. “It came with the house. Sebastian wanted rid of it, but I wouldn't let him.”
“I remember it from my viewing,” she muses, perhaps a bit wistfully. “Do you play at all?”
Her eyes find you as she asks the question, and you fight not to shrink from her gaze.
“Oh, not so much anymore,” you mumble. “My parents had an old upright at their flat, barely in tune, but I loved it to death. I still have some of my old sheet music somewhere.”
“Well, if I may speak out of turn, I think you should keep it,” Alcina says, quite decisively, as though the choice were hers. “No house is complete without music, don't you think?”
You're dazed when you respond, and you hope she doesn't notice the glassiness of your eyes. “Oh, absolutely. I quite agree.”
She gestures to the sofa, infuriatingly, inviting you to sit in your own home. She's likely just being polite, likely has noted how very faraway you are. You're much too jumpy and edgy, fretful of saying the wrong thing. You feel as though you're being interviewed for something as you sit across from her. She blows on her coffee and eyes you piercingly.
“What would you like your home to feel like, Mrs Barreau?” she asks, evidently not one for small talk. “A safe place, an imposing one? Are you looking to impress people, or to put them at ease?”
You blink at her foolishly. “Erm, I'm…I'm not quite sure. I'd like people to feel safe, yes. Cosy, if that's at all possible in a place like this…”
You trail off, and Alcina produces a small notepad from her briefcase, starts scribbling rapidly on a fresh page. Her eerily light eyes flick up again momentarily.
“Somewhere to raise children?” she suggests, and you almost spit out your coffee. By some miracle, you manage to swallow the mouthful, which burns your throat on the way down.
“N-no, not particularly,” you stammer, awfully thrown by the bald question. “I mean, we've tried and, well…I can't say the idea appeals, exactly. It'll be just my husband and I.”
Why say such a bizarre thing? You scold yourself silently, but Alcina isn't the slightest bit ruffled. If anything, she has once again adopted a kind of detached half-interest, scrawling away in that notepad. You wish you could see what was on the page.
“That should be enough to get us started, I think,” she says brusquely. “I'll bring out some samples next time. Did you have a timescale in mind?”
“Ah…my husband will be back in a couple of months. I was hoping to have everything more or less finished by the time he gets home, if possible.”
Alcina is already gathering her things, draining the last of her coffee. Once again, you sense that her attention has moved on, to somewhere you can't fathom.
“More than possible. My people are very efficient,” she assures you. “I can come back, say, this weekend? If you've no plans, that is.”
She rises and talks over her shoulder as she leaves the room, with you straggling not far behind.
“None at all,” you mutter, abashed, because you likely should have plans, like any other girl your age. Not to merely sit at home and wait for your husband to come back, as though he were a soldier fighting in a far-off land.
You see Alcina out to the driveway, where a black Range Rover is parked, and she climbs inside without another word. But before she shuts the door, she addresses you coolly from her elevated height. “Just so you know, my services don't come cheaply. I trust that won't be an issue?”
“No, I shouldn't think so,” you say, at pains to match her tone, but it doesn't quite come off. “My husband left me rather a lot of money for this, so, whatever your price…”
This, for some reason, elicits just a glimpse of warmth in Alcina. Her eyes crinkle and she smiles down at you, markedly friendlier than before. She cocks her head to one side, as though intrigued by what she sees. It's just you, standing in your dress with shaking hands and darting eyes. Perhaps she's trying not to laugh.
“That's good to know,” she replies. “Do call me in the meantime if you have any questions. Have a pleasant day, Mrs Barreau.”
She’s closing the door, backing out of the drive before you can bid her goodbye. Not until her car veers out of sight do you allow yourself to breathe again. Perplexed, and a little embarrassed with yourself, you dart back into the house and slam the locks home. There’s a clammy sweat on your brow, and your mouth is horribly dry. Thinking only to slake your thirst, you start towards the cellar for a bottle of wine, only to remember last night’s promise to yourself. Too long you’ve been reaching for a drink to quash any emotions when they rear up, before they can take root.
Except, you aren’t sure what it is that you’re feeling, exactly. That bizarre woman is to blame, most likely, but she’s been nothing but exceedingly pleasant and agreeable. A touch stiff and over-professional, yes, but not unkind. She's just so…different from those other women in your orbit. Different in looks, certainly, but also in the way she carries herself. You've come away with the distinct impression that she doesn't wish to impress anybody, doesn't cater to anyone's whims but her own. A sudden twinge of inadequacy flares within you, coupled with a slew of doubts that batter the inside of your skull like trapped wasps.
For a moment, you ruminate on the idea of seeking out another interior designer. One who will simply allow you to thrust money at them and, in turn, do exactly as you say. You'll wind up with a freshly boring, pretty house; that would please Sebastian the most, you imagine. It's tempting, to be sure, though pleasing Sebastian isn't really amongst your desires. You just want a quiet, simple life, and this woman, having hardly spoken more than five sentences, seems set to threaten that wish.
You recall, with some reluctance, Angela's assurances about Alcina. She'll turn your house into a palace. Will she, really, on the back of a few brusque questions and a glance at some swatchbooks? Then again, she knows better than you could possibly claim. If anyone is to understand your vision for this house, perhaps it's her, even as her peculiarity gives you cause to reconsider.
You're being daft. There's absolutely nothing wrong with her.
In the end, you don't touch the phone. You'll keep the weekend's appointment, though it unsettles you to do so. If you don't take to her the second time around, you'll simply dispense with her services and find someone else. Strictly business; emotionless and straightforward, just like her. You doubt if she'd take it at all personally.
With your mind made up, you drift back to the reception room in something of a trance. There's the piano, the one thing which seemed to draw something from Alcina, piquing your curiosity in turn. You run your fingers over the keys unseeingly, play an idle chord dredged up from somewhere in your muscle memory. The sound, clear and high, echoes through your empty home and lingers long after you depress the keys.