The Jealousy Man and Other Stories

‘So what plans have you got for the summer?’ I asked Trevor as I raised the Thermos cup to my mouth.

Trevor, Monique and I were sitting on separate stones and facing each other. Behind us was a wall some twenty metres high, and before us a softly undulating landscape of meadows. Most of it was uncultivated, here and there we saw cows. On clear days like today, from the top of the wall, you could see the smoke from the factory chimneys hovering over Sheffield. We had finished climbing, the sun was already low in the sky, and we were just taking a short break for food before heading back. The hot cup scorched my raw fingertips, and the cup felt slippery because I had just rubbed Elizabeth Arden’s Eight Hour Cream into my fingers — that’s a ladies’ cosmetic first produced in the 1930s, but as I and hundreds of other climbers had discovered, it was much better for rebuilding new skin than any patented climbers’ cream.

‘Don’t know,’ Trevor answered.

It was difficult to get him talking today. Same with Monique. On the drive from Oxford, and also while we were climbing it was me — the one with the broken heart — who did the talking. Joked. Kept the spirits up. Of course I saw them exchanging looks that said who’s going to tell him, you or me? But I adroitly avoided giving them a suitable opening. I had filled any silences in the car with meaningless chitchat that would almost certainly have sounded frenetic had it not been on the subject of climbing, where all talk sounds frenetic. This was to be a one-day trip, since Monique needed the rest of the weekend to prepare for her finals, so perhaps they intended to wait until we were almost home so that they wouldn’t have to spend hours in the car with me after dropping the bombshell. On the other hand, they were probably desperate to get it over with, confess their sins, swear it would never happen again, accept my disappointment, even, perhaps, my tears. But after that my forgiveness too, my magnanimous promise that yes, we could pretend it had never happened and continue as before. Yes, and perhaps grow even closer now that we had a foretaste of what it was we risked losing: each other.

We climbed trad-routes only the whole day, meaning we had to fasten our own bolts in places the mountain allowed it. Naturally it’s a much riskier way of climbing than using permanent bolts, since a wedge you’ve just pushed into a crack can easily be jerked out if you fall. But strangely enough, given my disturbed state of mind, I had climbed well. And very relaxed, almost oblivious to danger the harder it became to fix good, secure supports. Things seemed the other way round for Trevor and Monique, Trevor especially. Suddenly he wanted bolts knocked in everywhere, even on the easier passages, which meant the climbing took an irritatingly long time.

‘What about your summer plans?’ asked Trevor and took a bite of his sandwich.

‘Work a bit for my father in Athens,’ I said. ‘Earn enough to visit Monique in France and finally get to say hello to her family.’

I smiled at Monique, who returned my smile awkwardly. She has probably forgotten, though it was only three months ago that the two of us had pored over the map, picking out vineyards and small peaks and pleasurably going over a few practical details as though we were planning an expedition to the Himalayas.

‘We’d better tell you,’ said Trevor in a low voice, staring down at the ground.

I felt myself grow cold, felt my heart sink in my chest.

‘I’m planning a trip to France too in the summer.’ Trevor went on chewing.

What the hell did he mean? Weren’t they going to tell me what had happened? About this slip-up that was behind them now, Monique who had been feeling so alone because I had been neglecting her, Trevor who had succumbed to a moment of weakness, no excuses, of course, but the remorse they felt, the promise that, of course, it would never happen again — wasn’t any of this going to come out? Trevor was going to France. Did the two of them... were the two of them, were they going to follow the route Monique and I had planned?

I looked at Monique, but her gaze too was fixed to the ground. It dawned on me. It dawned on me that I had been blind. But I had been blind because the two of them had put my eyes out. Something big and evil and black surged up inside me. It couldn’t be stopped, it was as though my stomach twisted and a stinking, yellow-green spew was trying to force its way out. There was no way out; mouth, nose, ears, the sockets of my eyes, they were all sewn shut. So the spew filled my head, driving out every sensible thought, surging and bursting inside me.