Bryan and
Michelle Robinson boarded the train at Abbottsford Station and quickly made themselves
comfortable.
But they had barely left the station before Michelle
was asleep with her head on her husband’s shoulder.
It didn’t take much for her to succumb to the long
blinks, the cancer saw to that.
It was so unjust 30 years old and unlikely to make old
bones.
They had been up to the Winston Churchill Hospital for
the second time in just under a month.
The
Robinson’s lived in the village of Mornington-By-Mere which is a small country village
lying in the Finchbottom Vale nestled between the Ancient Dancingdean Forest
and the rolling Pepperstock Hills.
It is a
quaint picturesque village, a proper chocolate box picturesque idyll, with a
Manor House, 12th Century Church, a Coaching Inn, Windmills, an Old
Forge, a Schoolhouse, a River and a Mere.
They lived in one of the Brewery Cottages in the part of the Village
known as Manorside.
While she was sleeping against his shoulder he
indulged in a spot of people watching.
The carriage was very quiet and sparsely populated and
most of the passengers were at the other end.
But there was one young woman sitting diagonally
across the aisle from them, a tall willowy brunette with outstandingly stellar
legs.
She was very pretty and doubtless very aware of the
fact and she positively preened when she realized Bryan was admiring her legs.
So she crossed her legs slowly and deliberately so he
could marvel at them further but when he smiled at her she blushed.
The young woman’s
name was Lorraine Chapman and she was a Staff Nurse at the Winston Churchill
Hospital which was where they had met although she was also from Mornington.
As she
worked in Abbottsford, rather than commute back and forth she shared a flat
with two other Nurses, Jane Hall, and Rosie Parsons who also lived in
Mornington and worked at the Churchill.
It wasn’t a
huge flat and nor was it in the smartest part of town but it was perfect for
them as it meant that they had a place to live that was close to work, which
was ideal for them all as they worked shifts, and it meant that split between
the three of them their expenses were less than their travelling would have
been.
The three of
them were all single, all looking and all quite pessimistic regarding their
prospects in the relationship department which was how Lorraine slipped into
and adulterous affair with Bryan.
Bryan was her guilty pleasure because he was a married
man, normally a big no-no for her, but he turned out to be the exception to her
rule, which she was not entirely happy with but she seemed powerless to resist
him.
The fact that his wife was terminally ill just made
her feel even more wretched, and the wretchedness had lasted almost a year.
Their first get encounter was unplanned and unexpected
but their second assignation was anything but.
Lorraine was a Nurse but she was not nursing Michelle
so Bryan met her by chance in the coffee shop.
They were getting the train back to Shallowfield where
the Robinsons car was parked in the long stay carpark, while Lorraine would get
the bus to the quaint chocolate box
English Village of Mornington-By-Mere, like the “poor relation” such as a
mistress might fittingly feel.
As they approached the station Lorraine got up and
carried her bag to the door, and Bryan followed close behind, leaving his wife
asleep, then shortly before the train stopped, they shared a long succulent
kiss.
He knew there was no need to rush as the train
terminated at Shallowfield.
Lorraine however felt uncomfortable with Michelle only
feet away on the other side of the bulkhead and curtailed it.
The doors opened and Lorraine got off so he returned
to his wife and gently woke her and helped her gather her things together.
Lorraine was already at the bus stop when she saw
Bryan help Michelle into the car like a doting husband, but it suddenly dawned
on her that he wasn’t feigning being a doting husband he actually was one.
“My God, what am I doing?” she asked herself “He
doesn’t love me, I’m just a bit on the side”
It hadn’t dawned on her until that moment, she
imagined herself to be the love of his life, but in reality she wasn’t even
close.
She thought he was only staying with Michelle out of
duty because it would have been cruel to leave her, but in truth he wanted to
have his cake and eat it.
“I deserve better than this” she muttered and just at
that moment a car horn sounded which brought
her back from her self-pitying reflections.
She looked
up to see a car parked in the bus bay with the passenger window down.
“Can I give
you a lift Lorraine?” The driver called.
She bent
down and looked through the window and smiled broadly when she saw that the
driver was Jim Todd
She had met
Jim a few weeks earlier when he had to attend the Emergency Department at the
Churchill.
He lived and
worked up at Mornington Field, living in apartment 3 of Lancaster House, which
was converted from the old Officers Mess and he worked at Topliss Engineering.
It was while
he was working at Topliss that he received the injury that lead him having to
visit the Winston Churchill Hospital.
After he got
a nasty cut on his hand courtesy of a jagged piece of aluminium.
Lorraine was
on duty on the day and just happened to get lucky and get the good looking
engineer with a cut hand rather than a vomiting homeless man or a boil on an
octogenarians arse.
During the
hour they spent in the cubicle together she spent as much of the time looking
into his blue/grey eyes as she did the wound on his hand.
But she
cleaned, stitched and dressed the wound and said goodbye fully expecting to
never see him again.
So no one
was more surprised than she was to run into him at the Old Mill Inn one evening
in the spring, but apart from exchanging smiles and half a dozen words they
went their separate ways.
Which was
why she was so pleased when she saw him through the car window.
“That’s ok”
she said “I’m going to Mornington”
“So am I” he
replied
“Oh ok then thanks”
she said through the open window “As long as it’s not out of your way?”
“It’s not a
problem” She said to him.
So Lorraine
opened the door and got in, the door made that whirring sound as the window was
raised as she belted herself in.
“Are you
sure it’s not out of your way?”
“Not at all”
he replied “I live there now”
“Well that’s
promising” she thought
A week after Jim picked her up from the bus stop
Lorraine was at her dad’s house in Windmill Cottages when there was a knock at
the door.
She opened it to find Bryan Robinson standing on the
door step.
“Hello gorgeous” he said with a smile, a smile that
she used to succumb to but now she saw it for what it was, a leer.
“Hello Bryan what are you doing here?”
“Well I have half an hour to spare and I thought of
you” he replied and stepped inside
“Oh how romantic” she retorted and closed the door
They were in the lounge and Lorraine could feel his
eyes undressing her.
“So where does Michelle think you are?” she asked
“I told her I needed a walk to get some inspiration”
he replied
“A lie then” She said bitterly
“Well I think what we do is pretty inspirational” Bryan
said.
“What a characteristically glib response” Lorraine
said disappointedly
Lorraine Chapman was a nurse and had been having an
affair with Bryan Robinson for nearly ten months until she realized that he
loved his wife and was just using her for sex.
She had come to the conclusion that she deserved
better than him and so did his terminally ill wife Michelle.
She described to her friends that she and Bryan were
dating but in truth it was never more than an affair, sordid and shameful.
Their affair had started after his wife was diagnosed
with a terminal brain tumour but that wasn’t why he was seeking solace, he
would have done the same thing had she been in rude health.
Lorraine found the guilt over the affair was consuming
her as much as the tumour was consuming Michelle’s brain.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with you Lorraine I thought what we had was
quite memorable” Bryan said
“I’m glad you thought it was memorable because it’s over”
“What?” he exclaimed
“For you it’s never been more than guilt free sex, but I feel the guilt,
and if I thought for a moment that you truly loved me then I could carry on” she said
“But you don’t so this unbearable betrayal is at an
end”
“And what? You think the guilt will ease if I was to
leave her?”
“Leave her?” she said
“You don’t want to leave, you’ll never leave her, and
only death will induce her to leave you, but I don’t want you to leave her, we
would tear each other apart within a year and every time I looked at you it would
be a constant reminder of what I had done, what we had done, to an innocent
woman”
“But I do love you” he said
“No you don’t” she replied “you lust for me, but
that’s not the same thing is it?”
“But I thought you loved me” he said
“I thought I loved you too” Lorraine said “but I was
wrong”
“So what about….” he said nodding towards the stairs
“What? A last hurrah” she retorted “I don’t think so”
He remained silent while she slipped her coat on then he said
“Then she must never know about us”
“Seriously?” Lorraine said “you really imagine that she doesn’t know?”
Just then a car horn sounded out in the lane so she picked up her bag
“I’m going out so you need to leave”
He showed him the door and then followed him out and after locking the
door she opened the passenger door of Jim’s car and got in.
And as they drove
out of Mornington-By-Mere, which was the beating heart of the Finchbottom Vale,
she looked at the man beside her and knew he was the beating heart of her life.
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