The Course of Love. A novel pdfdrive com

Female
Eunuch
? Do you know how much nonsense I have to fill my head with every
day of the week just so this household can function? And meanwhile all you can
do is harbor some mysterious resentment about my supposedly having prevented
you from reaching your full potential as an architect when the truth is that you
yourself worry about money far more than I do, except you find it useful to
blame me for your own caution. Because it’s always so much easier if it’s 
my
fault. I ask one thing and one thing only from you: that you treat me with

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respect. I don’t care what you daydream about or what you may get up to when
you go here and there, but I will 
not
tolerate your being uncivil towards me. You
think you’re the only one who gets bored of all this now and then? Let me tell
you, I’m not constantly thrilled by it, either. In case it hasn’t occurred to you,
there are times when I feel a little dissatisfied myself—and I certainly don’t want
you
policing 
me
any more than you want me doing the same to you.”
Rabih stares at her, surprised by the end of her speech.
“
Policing
? Really?” he asks. “That’s an odd choice of word.”
“You used it first.”
“I didn’t.”
“You did, in the bedroom: you said everything here was sensible and policed.”
“I’m sure I didn’t.” Rabih pauses. “Have you done anything that I ought to be
policing you about?”
The heartbeat of their relationship, which has been going nonstop since the
afternoon in the botanic garden, appears to pause.
“Yes, I’m fucking all the men on the team, every last one of them. I’m glad
you finally asked; I thought you never would. At least 
they
know how to be civil
towards me.”
“
Are
you having an affair?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I have 
lunch
with them occasionally.”
“All of them at once?”
“No, Detective Inspector, I prefer one at a time.”
Rabih is slumped at the table, which is covered with the children’s homework.
Kirsten paces by the larder, to which is tacked a large picture of the four of them
on a memorably enjoyable holiday in Normandy.
“Which ones do you have lunch with?”
“Why does it matter? All right: Ben McGuire, for one, up in Dundee. He’s
calm, he likes to go walking, he doesn’t seem to think it’s such a terrible flaw
that I’m ‘reasonable.’ Anyway, to get back to the larger point: How can I make it
any clearer? Being nice is not boring; it’s an enormous achievement, one that
ninety-nine percent of humanity can’t manage from day to day. If ‘nice’ is
boring, then I love boring. I want you never again to shout at me in front of the
children the way you did yesterday. I don’t like men who shout. There’s nothing
charming about it at all. I thought the whole point of you was that you didn’t
shout.”
Kirsten gets up and goes to fetch a glass of water.
Ben McGuire. The name rings a bell. She’s mentioned him before. She went
to Dundee for the afternoon once. When was that? Three months ago, perhaps?
There was some sort of council get-together, she said. How dare this McGuire

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fellow invite his wife to lunch? Is he entirely out of his mind? And without even
asking Rabih’s permission, which he would certainly never have given?
He begins his inquisition at once: “Kirsten, have you done anything with Ben
McGuire, or has he otherwise indicated that he would like in some way to do
something to—or should I say 
with
—you?”
“Don’t adopt that strange, detached, lawyerly tone with me, Rabih. Do you
think I’d be talking like this with you if I had something to hide? Just because
somebody finds me attractive, I’m not the narcissistic type who feels
immediately forced to strip off. But if someone does actually think I am rather
terrific, and if he notices that I’ve had my hair cut or admires what I’m wearing,
I don’t hold it against him, either. Surprisingly, I am not a virgin. You’ll find
that very few women my age are, these days. It’s probably even time you came
to terms with the fact that your mother wasn’t the Madonna she lives on as in
your imagination. What do you think she was doing with her evenings when she
flew around the world—reading selected passages of the Gideons’ Bible in her
hotel room? Whatever it was, I hope for her sake that it was wonderful and that
her lovers adored her—and I’m glad she had the decency never to involve you in
any of it. Bless her. Except that she gave you, through no fault of her own, some
very skewed views about women. Yes, women do in fact have needs of their
own, and sometimes—even if they have husbands they love and are good
mothers—they would like for someone new and unknown to notice them and
want them desperately. Which doesn’t mean they won’t also be the picture of
sensible concern every day and think about what kinds of healthy snacks to pack
inside their children’s lunch boxes. Sometimes you seem to believe you’re the
only one around here who has an inner life. But all of your very subtle feelings
are in the end very normal and no sign of genius. This is what marriage is and
what we signed up for, both of us, for life, with our eyes open. I intend to be
loyal to that, as much as I can, and I hope you will be, too.”
With that, she falls silent. On the counter next to where she’s standing there’s
a large pack of flour, brought out from the pantry in anticipation of a cake she’ll
make with the children the next day. She stares at it for a moment.
“And as for your complaint that I never do anything crazy . . .” The pack of
flour is across the room before he can say a word, striking the wall with such
vehemence that it explodes into a white cloud, which takes a surprisingly long
time to settle across the dining table and chairs.
“You stupid, hurtful, inadequate man—was that crazy enough for you?
Perhaps while you’re cleaning it up you’ll have time to remember how much fun
housework can be. And please don’t ever, 
ever
call me boring again.”
She goes back upstairs, and Rabih gets down on his knees with the dustpan

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and brush. There’s flour everywhere: it takes nearly a whole roll of paper towels,
carefully dampened, to get the bulk of it off the table, off the chairs, and out of
the crevices in the tiles, and even then he knows that reminders of this event will
remain visible for weeks to come. As he works he also recalls, in a way he hasn’t
done for a while, that he had good reason to marry this particular woman.
It seems especially painful, therefore, to think that Rabih may have lost her to
a fellow surveyor from the Dundee Council—and, what’s worse, just when he
has no leg to stand on and no moral authority to exert. Yes, he knows he’s being
ridiculous, but the thoughts crowd in nevertheless. How long has the adultery
been going on? How many times have they met? Where do they do it? In the
car? He’ll have to check it thoroughly in the morning. He feels nauseous. She is
by her very nature so secretive and discreet that she could be carrying on a
whole second life, he reflects, without his having a clue. He wouldn’t begin to
know how to intercept her e-mails or bug her phone. Does she really even
belong to a book club? When she said she was visiting her mother last month,
was she actually off for a weekend with her lover? What about the “coffee” she
sometimes has on a Saturday? There might be a tracker he can slip into her coat.
He is at once beyond outraged and entirely terrified. His wife is about to leave
him, or else she plans to stay but to treat him coldly and angrily for eternity. He
misses their past life so much, when all they knew was (he manages to convince
himself) calmness, loyalty, and stability. He wants to be cradled in her arms like
an infant and to turn back the clock. He thought they were going to have a quiet
evening, and now everything has come to an end.