The Memory Trap Read online

  ‘I hope you left your laptop at home,’ Nina now said.

  He nodded. ‘Although the work’s quite portable,’ and tapped his head.

  The range and power of Daniel’s memory had impressed her ever more forcefully over the years. He retained the essence of books and papers after a single reading, even technical ones outside his specialty; whole poems and paragraphs of prose were cemented into memory; and names – people, places, plants, birds – Daniel heard a name and it settled into his cortex forever.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘It’s our anniversary weekend and I’ve no intention of working. I propose we make love till Monday.’

  Daniel was a plain-speaking man. This quality had been evident with his very first words to her, and more emphatically a couple of days later when they were about to make love.

  ‘You’re my ideal woman,’ he’d said when he saw her naked for the first time.

  She was in a strange man’s hotel room, she’d already cracked the foundations of her hard-made resolutions, she was breathlessly nervous, and, in her nakedness, precariously self-conscious. She believed herself to be so far from ideal she thought he was being polite. But she would soon learn that Daniel was hopeless at flattery, at any sort of dissembling. He truly liked hips to be full; her bottom, he said, was a wonder of nature; as for her heavy thighs, these were, if forced to choose, his favourite portion. ‘What about my eyes?’ she had protested, the large brown eyes that everyone remarked on. He had shrugged: large brown eyes were a dime a dozen among Jews, he said. And anticipating her next remark, he added that the same was true for smooth olive skin. He loved all of her, including the parts she liked least.

  His appreciation had made a difference. Before meeting him she had tried to hide her full figure, but for a long time now she had lived comfortably inside her smooth olive skin – which Daniel with his Semitic background might not appreciate, but coming from a fair-skinned, pale-eyed family she certainly did.

  ‘Yes. A weekend of sex and food, with an occasional walk to crank up our appetites.’ He reached out, and with his forefinger lightly traced a line from her ear to her clavicle.

  She picked up speed, but still the journey was frustratingly slow. The storm was powering in from the west and they were driving straight into it; she hoped the rain would hold off until they arrived. As she drove, Daniel passed her roasted almonds and they talked about her feminist project, then moved on to his book, and from there to a book by an old friend – a surprising disappointment that called into question their long-held belief in his talent. By the time they passed the Guildford turn-off they had shifted to politics, a conversational favourite.

  ‘There’s no leadership,’ Nina was saying. ‘And no vision.’

  ‘It’s the equality thing,’ Daniel said, ‘and we’re all equal now. It doesn’t sit well with any sort of leadership – political or moral,’ and after a pause he added, ‘or parental.’ Daniel had struggled with his younger son for years. He rummaged in his bag for the fruit pastilles he was never without. ‘Do you know that politicians now register lower than used-car salesmen on those “who-do-you-trust” scales?’

  Nina was incredulous. ‘Surely not.’

  ‘That might be a slight exaggeration, but the fact remains that people don’t think much of their politicians.’

  ‘Courage and pragmatism are at the crux of it,’ Nina said, bunkering into the topic. ‘The two stances are naturally opposed, and politicians, being primarily motivated to keep their jobs, settle for pragmatism.’ Her words streamed out, she was on a roll. ‘The problem is their pragmatism is so transparent that to respect them is impossible, and the very fact of the transparency suggests they can’t be all that bright, and why on earth would you trust your health, the education of your children, your nation’s security to people whose actions condemn them as not as bright as you are?’

  ‘I do like it when you’re fired up.’ Daniel was laughing. ‘Of course our politicians would simply dismiss you as elitist.’

  ‘Me and anyone else who values intellectual qualities. But they don’t dismiss soccer players for being elitist, or tennis players, or racing-car drivers, or sprinters. No sportsperson is ever derided as elitist. But to refer to someone as an elite thinker is a back-breaking insult.’

  ‘I count myself extremely fortunate in my sharp-tongued, elitist memory-keeper.’ Daniel was laughing even louder now, and soon she joined in too. She didn’t take herself quite so seriously these days.

  Spikes of lightning flashed into the countryside and the first drops of rain spattered the windscreen; Nina concentrated on the road. Daniel slipped a CD into the deck and stared out the window. Just before the Winchester exit, Daniel jerked forward and shouted, ‘Did you see that?’ And then gripped her shoulder. ‘No, don’t look, watch the road. It’s gone now anyway.’

  It was a falcon, he said, with something in its mouth. ‘I think it was a rabbit, or perhaps a squirrel.’

  He was silent for a minute, then he turned to her. ‘I never used to notice nature before you came into my life.’ There was another pause and when he again spoke she heard wonder in his voice. ‘In a very real sense you’ve given me nature.’

  It was an extraordinary acknowledgment. Without taking her gaze from the road, she reached for his hand. He squeezed it briefly and then placed it back on the steering wheel.

  A few minutes later lightning was all about them and the sound of thunder blasted into the car. Nina would be pleased when they were safe inside the cottage. And not far to go now, for they had entered Austen country. Our country, Daniel said, as he always did at this stage. He had proposed to her at Chawton Cottage, in the parlour right by the tiny circular table where Austen wrote her novels. Daniel had proposed and without a moment’s hesitation she had accepted.

  ‘We should pop across to Chawton some time this weekend,’ Daniel now said. ‘A romantic pilgrimage.’

  ‘I will love you forever,’ Nina said that evening as they toasted their twelfth anniversary and their thirteen years together.

  Daniel took over: the future was, after all, his domain. ‘I will love you forever,’ he said. ‘Because I’ve done the research and I’m in charge of predictions.’

  Forever lasted exactly five months. There was no explosive stroke, no spectacular heart attack. Daniel, at sixty-one years of age and in the best of health, arrived home from a meeting in Cape Town and told Nina he was leaving her. There was no need for discussion, he said, his mind was made up. Indeed, if left to him he would have packed his bags and left without another word. Nina was in shock, her brain had jammed, yet she managed to remind him his decision concerned her as well. He conceded her point and sat down.

  In brief, and he was very brief, four months earlier he had met someone –

  ‘Who?’

  Daniel’s face was clad in discomfort; this was clearly a question he would prefer not to answer.

  ‘Who is she?’

  He stood up, crossed to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a Scotch. The fluid hitting the glass was loud in the silent room. She watched him raise the drink, she heard him swallow, she heard him take a breath. She heard him say Sally.

  ‘Sally?’ She didn’t believe this was happening. ‘You don’t mean your research assistant Sally? Sally who’s about to move in with her boyfriend?’

  Daniel turned to face her. ‘Obviously she’s not any more.’

  ‘But she is still thirty.’ The words just slipped out.

  ‘You can be such a bitch, Nina.’

  Never in all their years together had he sworn at her. In fact, he had always appreciated her sharp tongue, had often said with admiration that she knew exactly where to land a verbal punch. She looked at him standing stiffly in front of the liquor cabinet, so familiar but obstinately out of reach. He might have been a photograph, this man, her husband, this person who for the past four months had been having an affair with his research assistant.

  ‘Former research assistant. And it�
��s not an affair. I’m going to marry her.’

  Daniel, so reluctant to speak just moments ago, seemed to be warming to his topic. But Nina did not want to hear about his future. She didn’t want to know about the marriage that was to follow hers, nor the babies they planned to have, nor their home or summer cottage. She didn’t want to hear about his future without her. Her heart was shredding; she wanted to vomit.

  ‘Are you absolutely sure?’ Her voice was – miraculously – steady. ‘You’ve thought it through and you’re absolutely sure about this? Leaving me, leaving our marriage, our life, to start afresh.’ She wanted to add ‘at your age’, she wanted to say ‘with someone young enough to be your daughter’, but while there remained a skerrick of hope she would not attack him.

  ‘Absolutely certain. Not a doubt.’ Daniel was staring into his drink, gently rocking the fluid in the glass – an intricately cut crystal from Waterford and an early gift from her. He stared into his whisky and he looked happy. He’d done the hard part, he’d confessed, and now he was eager to get on with his future. He put his drink down and took a step towards her. ‘I’m sorry, Nina, I really am. I didn’t plan this.’

  ‘But neither did you stop it.’

  He didn’t finish his drink. He tossed a few things in a suitcase, returned to the living room and went to kiss her goodbye as if he had forgotten that everything had changed. She turned away. From the hall he said he’d be in touch. She heard the door open and close, she heard him leave.

  Alone now in the silent house she might have turned to stone for all she could feel. Outside the wind stripped the last leaves from the trees, rain turned to sleet, the day closed down. At some point she turned on the lights, some hours later she extinguished them. She remained seated on the couch in the dark, paralysed and numb. She remained locked in limbo, outside time, outside geography. She remained there until dawn, the dawn of a future she did not want.

  3.

  The winter came and went. As one month moved into the next, Nina did not notice the profusion of crocuses and daffodils, nor the bright young leaves on the trees. A succession of bloodless days and jangling nights carried her forward. She moved her winter clothes into the hall closet and her summer clothes into the bedroom cupboard; she woke, she ate, she slept, she worked. She marked her birthday alone, she spent the Easter holiday alone. She avoided favourite walks and favourite restaurants, she could not bear to go to the cinema or the theatre; all she once shared with Daniel was ruined. Even the pigeons. ‘Any creature that can survive Arctic wilderness as well as Trafalgar Square deserves our admiration,’ Daniel used to say as he tossed crumbs to the marauding throng. Now she would look at the scrabbling pigeons and hate them. And all of these occurrences, the doing without him or the not doing at all, in the period following Daniel’s departure felt like falling through thin ice.

  Friends took charge of her, mutual friends horrified at Daniel’s behaviour invited her for home-cooked meals and weekends in the country. And Zoe, her sister, flew in from Melbourne, a short visit taken in school holidays. It helped to be with people who loved her when Daniel didn’t. And two months after Zoe’s visit, Sean and his partner on a rare trip together kept her occupied for a week. But when she was alone, Daniel’s absence remained a raw wound.

  She bought prepared meals from the supermarket and ate them out of plastic containers. She watched American sitcoms and happy-ever-after Hollywood romances. She checked her phone every few minutes. She searched for useless facts online; she spent hours on Facebook; she read blogs – trivial, interesting, proselytising, it didn’t matter; she set up home in YouTube, anything to use up time and stifle thought. And email, twenty, thirty times a day, email with all its false positives, for if you don’t send them you don’t receive them. Morning, afternoon, and all through the hours she used to sleep curled around Daniel’s body she sought artificial connection to treat her disconnection.

  ‘Ravaged. You look ravaged,’ Jamie said one morning when she arrived at the office.

  He drew the truth from her and then he forced her to go cold turkey. He confiscated her phone and iPad, he disconnected her wireless connection at home. The only item of communication technology he permitted was a mobile phone, circa 2000. It allowed phone calls and nothing else.

  She had cleared Daniel from view: his clothes and books, his whiskies, his rocket-shaped champagne opener, his armchair, his bowl for olives bought in Sicily, his special asparagus dish, as if by removing these things – mementoes of a lover, a husband – she could kill off memory. She wanted to remember neither the good times nor the bad. She removed every vestige of him with the exception of those objects that connected to her as much as to him – paintings they had chosen together, their collection of Penguin paperback coffee mugs, the tattered two-seater, the hand-crafted pasta bowls they’d bought for their fifth wedding anniversary. To remove these would render herself homeless.

  On one of their visits to Australia she and Daniel had included a side-trip to New Zealand. They took long walks through the volcanic region of the North Island, hiking over extinct volcanoes and dormant ones and others that were very much alive. The most powerful eruption in the North Island in modern times occurred at Tarawera in 1886. The series of craters at Tarawera has formed a huge long fissure thickly clad with red scoria. As they walked from the rim down the slope of the main crater, their feet sank into the scoria, and they would find themselves sliding on a raft of pebbles towards the crater floor. With each step Nina would lose her footing, and she would know she would lose her footing. The only way of stopping the slide was to flex her knees, bend at the hips and sit. Step, sink, slide with the shifting ground, sit. After Daniel left, Nina felt as if she were back on the slopes of Tarawera, slipping and sliding over volatile ground.

  Tolstoy famously wrote that happy families are alike in their happiness, but every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Let’s forget these are the words of the great Tolstoy and consider whether unhappy families, along with the individuals they spawn, really are uniquely unhappy. And the fact is there’s a sour monotony to unhappiness wherever it occurs in the well-nourished West. Wives and husbands are dumped every day. They are miserable, angry and resentful. They eat too much or not enough, they drink, they take drugs, they become promiscuous or swear off sex forever, they socialise to excess or become reclusive. Unhappiness’s repertoire is finite, limited, and bereft of originality. No need to provide a detailed account of Nina’s misery in those first months without Daniel. The pain was high voltage, it was twenty-four hour anguish, Nina knew nothing to compare. But others do. Anyone who has been tossed from a shared life and cast adrift knows exactly what she endured.

  Another winter arrived, there was snow and plenty of it. The garden looked like one of those sparkly scenes on the Christmas cards from her childhood – always so exotic in the red heat of an Australian Christmas. The lawn was lushly white, snow smoothed the low shrubs into giant cauliflowers, and the yew that dominated the small patch at the back of the house captured the snow in drips and sods. Nina would go outside via the kitchen door and stand in the brilliant whiteness, and not even Daniel’s absence could quash her pleasure.

  His removal from her life had been swift and total. In the week following the end of their marriage he had sent her an email informing her he would be collecting his belongings; he’d do so, he wrote, while she was at work so as not to disturb her. She actually laughed at this – as if the removal of his own self had not been of such critical disturbance that, in comparison, anything else was a mild rippling of the waters. He had contacted the property agent and had his name removed from the lease; as for the furniture and household goods, she could keep the lot. This was not guilt nor generosity, how much less hurtful if it were; rather, all the things that made a shared life, a shared domestic space, all the things that comprised the evidence of their years together, he no longer wanted. And it was this action, the ease with which he reduced their thirteen years to a sentence in an
email, that obliterated any hope he would return. He made no mention of the cottage in Hampshire, nor had it been raised since. The place was poisonous as far as she was concerned, but she guessed he still used it: he’d always loved it and she was sure he would not be averse to recycling any appealing aspects of their marriage. After all, during their thirteen years together, whenever he presented her with copies of his favourite books or DVDs of his favourite films or took her to special places both in England and abroad, she knew that the first wife had been similarly treated. So why not wife number three? Not that they were married yet; Nina expected the divorce papers any day, would leave the mail scattered on the mat where it fell, sifting through the letters with a hesitant toe. Any likely items she would eventually open, hours or even days later, handling them as if they were radioactive.

  Now that a full year had passed, the push and pull of his absence allowed much of life to proceed, if not as previously, at least affording some pleasure. She worked, she dined out with friends, she went to concerts and the theatre, she maintained her weekly lunch with her mother-in-law, Shirley Ryman, eighty-five years old and still seeing patients, a woman of such resilience that even after her beloved son’s delinquency – ‘He goes off with a child! What could he be thinking?’ – she had picked herself up and got on with things. ‘What else can one do?’ she said, not expecting nor indeed wanting an answer. And music: Nina listened to music whenever she pleased, she filled the house with music. She began a collection of requiems, such rousing compositions, and with over two thousand written she would never run short. It was not so much that life was looking up, rather it was moving again: there was a future without Daniel and she was living it.

  One morning, a few days before Christmas, Nina left home early, and after a moment’s dithering on the snowy verge, decided against the bus and walked instead through the dawn towards St. John’s Wood tube station. Despite living through more European winters than Australian temperate ones, she had never lost her enthusiasm for snow. Although a few minutes later, having slipped several times on the icy pavement, she considered turning back – just a moment’s hesitation before the lovely brittle air reminded her this was her favourite time of day in her favourite season of the year. Melbourne was in the middle of a heatwave – she took perverse pleasure in tracking the summer weather on the other side of the globe – and here she was surrounded by ice and snow.