My Ex-Wife…
This tale happened some years ago, and I often find myself pondering over it, as if viewing my life from a distant shore. It was two years past, during the closing days of my assignment in Liverpool. My train ticket home to Sheffield already secured, I found myself with nearly three idle hours before departurea stretch of time that beckoned to be filled.
With hands buried in my coat pockets, I wandered the city streets, letting the rhythm of passing footsteps carry me nowhere in particular. Out of the press of the crowd, a woman approached. The sight of her halted me, for I recognised her at once.
It was my first wife, Elizabeth, from whom I had parted twelve years earlier. Elizabeth had scarcely changed, save a pallor that seemed almost spectral. I imagine the surprise of our meeting unsettled her as much as it did me.
Ah, how utterly Id loved her, painfully and fiercely soan agony that finally undid us. Jealousy ruled me then, casting its long shadow over every hour. I was haunted by suspicion, even of her closeness with her own mother. The merest delay in her return would set my heart hammering, plagued by dread and fevered thoughts.
At length, Elizabeth could bear it no more. My ceaseless questionswhere had she been, with whom, for how longdrove a wedge between us. Memory stings when I recall the evening I came home with a small puppy tucked under my jacket, thinking to cheer her. Instead, I found the flat silent and a letter upon the table.
She wrote that she could not go on, though she still cared for me. My jealous fits had exhausted her, and shed resolved to depart. Elizabeth asked for my forgiveness and begged that I not seek her out
Now, after twelve years adrift from one another, fate had swept us together in a city far from home. We spoke at length, slipping into the sort of talk that tumbles easily when you meet someone who shares your past. Time, however, crept on, and abruptly I remembered my train.
Im sorry, Elizabeth, but I must be off. My train will wait for no man, I told her, half regretful, half anxious.
She hesitated, then said, Jack, will you do me a favour? I know youre pressed for time, but for old times sake, please dont refuse me. Theres a place I must go, yet I cannot go alone. Will you come with me?
Naturally, I agreed, but pressed herOnly if its quick! So off we went, into a grand old building, moving from hall to shadowed corridor, climbing stairs and then descending again. It seemed to me then no more than a quarter of an hour, but perhaps it was longer. All kinds of people passed us in those empty corridorschildren and the elderly alike. At the time, I scarcely wondered what they might be doing there, and followed Elizabeth as if in a dream.
At last she entered a doorway, pausing to look back at me. There was a strange tenderness to her expressiona farewell, I sensedas she softly said, How strange, that I could never live with you nor without you. The door closed gently behind her.
I stood waiting, uncertain and anxious, resolved to ask her what she meantbut she never returned. Suddenly, the spell broke. I became vividly aware of the time; I was late, and my train was due to depart! Looking about, a cold dread seized me. The building was deserted and crumbling, window frames gaping and empty.
The grand staircases were gone, replaced by planks over yawning voids. With difficulty I made my way down and out into the street. By the time I reached the station, my train had departed an hour before, obliging me to purchase a new ticket.
As I stood at the counter, the news came: the train I had missed had derailed and tumbled into the river. There were no survivors.
Two weeks later, determined to understand the unexplainable, I managed to trace my former mother-in-law, Margaret Collins, through the records office. She told me, her voice gentle yet resigned, that Elizabeth had died eleven years earlier, merely a year after our divorce.
I scarcely believed her, insisting she feared I might resume my old jealous ways. Yet, when I asked to visit my former wifes resting place, she agreed without hesitation.
An hour or two later, I stood before a gravestone, sunlight glinting off its polished surface, and gazed at the etched smile of the woman I had loved all my daysa woman who, in ways inexplicable and tender, had, it seemed, saved my life.
