Daddy's Gone 13.1 My phone vibrates in my pocket, I slide it out and answer, “Hey baby, where are you?” “Fee, don’t call me baby please, I’m a woman not a baby,” comes back Ali’s voice from the phone. The bottom of my stomach falls out from the realisation of how close I just came to saying Belle’s name. “I’m at home getting ready for tonight, more importantly where are you?” “I’m just getting ready to leave town, baby.” I say seamlessly. “It’s awfully quiet for central London,” she says, as more of a question than a statement. “You better not be late, we have to get all the way back and park somewhere in Covent Garden.” “I’ll be back in time,” Belle’s black BMW hatchback pulls into the car park and comes to a stop beside mine. Her face lights up when she sees me, or maybe it’s the puppies. “I promise, baby.” “Stop it!” Belle steps out of the car and the puppies instantly make a bee-line for her, yapping along the way. “What was that Felix?” “What was what, baby?” I say quickly, trying to end the conversation before Belle gets to me. “Jesus Christ, Felix if you come home with a dog I will fucking murder you.” “No dogs, baby got it. I’m just leaving, mwah.” “Don’t call...” I hang up the phone, tired and generally apathetic about her complaints. Belle comes over to me, mesmerizing wearing open toe black suede heels with a five inch gold heel she stands eye to eye with me. She’s wearing an over-sized chemise of white silk and some black shorts which cut off about three inches above her slender knees. She runs her fingers up the nape of my neck and pulls me in towards her for an embrace I could melt into. She comes away smiling, “Is one of these little babies for me?” She asks, still running her fingers up and down the back of my neck. “Because even though I’d love one I’m not sure it would be fair to leave it in the flat all day.” “Sorry, Bambi but these little things are staying with me, anyway I wouldn’t have the heart to separate them,” I tell her. “Oh you big softie,” she says kissing me again. “Yes big poor softie, these little things cost me double what I wanted to spend today because I couldn’t separate them.” I bend down and pick one of them up, then the other starts to have conniptions so I have to pick them both up. I hold them up to Belle, mimicking their pout. “Have they got names yet?” She asks. “I was thinking Hiroshima and Nagasaki,” I tell her only half joking. “They’re much too cute for names like that,” she says taking one out of my hands. “Shall we go inside? It’s starting to get a bit chilly.” “We can do,” I start then pause knowing this might not go down too well. “I can’t stay too long though.” “Why not?” She flashes me a look which is halfway between jealous and suspicious. “You really want to know?”I ask her. “Well I really did ask,” she replies churlish. “I’m going to the opera tonight,” I say, slightly confused as to why I’m on the defensive all of a sudden. “I didn’t buy the tickets though they were a gift.” She starts walking over to her front door, she’s still carrying one of my dogs though which is the main reason why I follow her. I catch her up at the door which she’s struggling to open with only one available hand. “I just don’t get how you keep doing this,” she says as though she might be starting to cry. “You see me, then you see her, it’s been months. I don’t know if I can keep doing this, Felix.” I can see this situation rapidly growing out of control. She opens the door and I follow her in. “Belle, you’ve always known I was married,” I begin dimly aware it won’t help. “You think this is easy for me?” “Pretty easy I’d imagine, yes,” she walks through her flat and plummets down onto the sofa, the black puppy totally unmoved. “Well it isn’t,” I say walking down the corridor, “I can’t do this much longer either it’s driving me insane.” I pause to put my puppy down who instantly leaves the room on an exploration mission. “All day I keep thinking I’m seeing my Dad everywhere, and he died nearly twenty years ago so don’t start telling me you’re the only one who’s stressed.” “Oh spare me, Felix!” She shouts, “So what now? This is too much? You’re ending things?” “Yes,” I start. “Oh well fuck you then!” She screams throwing the nearest thing she can at me which is a magazine that doesn’t quite make it. “You’re a fucking bastard!” I walk over to her with my arms outstretched, palms facing outwards, the black dog escapes to join the other one somewhere. “Let me finish okay?” She slaps me across the face with her left palm. “Jesus! I don’t mean with you, you fucking idiot.” It takes her a couple of seconds to register but suddenly the hate drains from her eyes, she lowers her hands and looks at me expectantly. “What?” She asks sniffing back tears. “Belle, come on, I’ve been in love with you since we first met, we both know it, it took me all of... Oh I don’t know fifteen minutes. I can’t be with anyone else, just you.” Her eyes are full of tears again, it takes me back to when I told her the opposite in the front of my car, how things have changed. “But....” She trails off. “Yeah I know, trust me I know, it’s no fucking joke.” I breathe out slowly, this is probably the first time I admit this to myself. “It’s going to be an absolute shit storm, Belle. Let me get the Executive Night out of the way okay? Then I can start sorting out this mess, but I’m not going anywhere, alright?” She just nods. “But right now I’ve got to get little Hiroshima and Nagasaki to their new home and go to this fucking opera performance.” She nods again, maybe in shock, who knows? I kiss her on the mouth softly and turn to go and find the dogs. Outside, puppies in arm, the cool air makes my burning face smart from where she hit me. On the car ride home, I sit contemplating divorce, lawyers, bankruptcy, fleeting happiness, eternal misery and death. When I get home Hiroshima and Nagasaki live up to their names, causing the implosion of my entire household. Ali climbs the walls while I sit in a cloud and ignore her. Lola is ecstatic so while Ali’s screaming in my ear I mentally turn the volume down and watch my little girl on the floor playing with her new companions. The result of this is that Ali barricades herself in our room and refuses to even go to the opera with me. For a while I toy with the idea of taking Lola, but eventually decide that she’s probably too young and it’s a school night, besides like most Russian stories there’s no happy ending. Not to mention I need someone to watch the puppies until Ali re-emerges. Then I think about taking Belle, but that sort of sick parallel is too much even for me to stomach. Eventually I decide to go alone, I take care to only take one of the tickets from the kitchen counter, not wanting to anger Ali more than I already have. I say a last goodbye to the puppies, kiss Lola on the forehead and instruct her to tell Ali of my whereabouts when she comes back downstairs. Then I leave in what is amazingly the best mood I’ve been in for a month. I sit in the Royal Opera House awestruck, predominantly by the architecture, which is bold and dramatic without being garish, but also by the performance of the show’s lead man. The show is set within the more modern context of the Russian mob, in favour of the Tsar’s court. Grygory spends the first three quarters of an hour discussing the overwhelming beauty of Marfa who has stolen his heart, and whom he intends to have as his own by any means. Unfortunately the woman portraying Marfa is so horrifically misshapen that it ruins the entire experience for me. Her head sits far too large on her tiny frame, a small pot belly makes all her costumes look ridiculous and she is so pale that she looks like a corpse. This makes me lose all respect for Grygory and subsequently renders the entire performance very droll and my giggling is frowned upon by the other spectators who don’t share my sense of humour. During the second interval I leave and spend the rest of the evening drinking champagne and smoking cigarettes at one of the balcony bars on the roof of the market. Some people try talking to me but I’m more interested in imagining how everyone is going to die at the opera.