Life as a Venn Diagram

Tears welled up in her eyes, and she turned and slowly walked away. She handed over her documents at the desk and was waved through. At the last moment, before she disappeared from view, she turned to face me and raised her hand in a hesitant wave. I returned it, and then she was gone from sight; my last image was her back and her long red hair.

I turned away and walked back to the car, only pausing to pay the parking fee. I slid behind the wheel and let my head slump forward and rest on the cold plastic. Only time would tell if I'd made the right decision as I couldn't help feeling that the lure of Hong Kong would be hard for her to resist. After a moment, I started the engine and drove off.

One hundred and seven days later.

Mandy's three-month deadline had come and gone, and there was no sign of her.

Coming home had felt like a bit of a misnomer; the cottage was an empty shell without Mandy. And it was worse because, for the first few weeks, I kept coming across intimate reminders of her presence. So much so that I ended up packing them up and storing them in her office. My feelings about her hadn't changed; I was still desperately in love with my version of Mandy, the question that haunted me was how much of that Mandy still survived.

Mandy insisted on setting up a couple of things before she left, so I would know what she was doing and where she was. She gave me access to her agenda app and made sure I was aware she used it for all her appointments, business as well as personal. I wasn't interested in the countless daytime business meetings, the only ones I took a passing interest in were her out of hours personal commitments. She had also wanted to enable a GPS tracking app on her phone, overruling the bank's security team's objections. But I couldn't see the point, either I trusted her or I didn't— and in any case, it would only tell me where her phone was.

I'd gone back to work and buried myself in my caseload, not wanting to think about having to go back to the empty cottage. Several new patients had been admitted while I was away. Most were teenagers whose main issue was their antisocial response to overbearing parents, who believed that their precious angels needed some tender loving care. But one was a local kid who did need my help, and I was grateful to be able to concentrate on his issues.

In the beginning, Mandy was careful to call every day. She sounded upbeat, but as the days passed, I could sense the growing frustration in her voice. But for the life of me, I couldn't work out if the frustration was at the situation she found herself in, or me!

For the first few weeks, she was reasonably confident, feeling that she was making good headway in her negotiations with both the bank and with the Sung clan. The only fly in the ointment was Alan; after agreeing in principle to the divorce, he kept throwing up roadblocks.

"I've told Ang Lee what Alan's up to, and he said he will talk to him again," she told me one evening, the frustration evident in her voice. "Now he wants me to give back my apartment, and I don't see why I should. He gave it to me, and I don't see why he would expect me to give it back." She sounded equally hurt and pissed off.

"Does it matter?" I wondered. "I thought the plan was for you to move back to the UK full time, so why would you need it?"

"I know, but when I'm working out of the London office, I'll still need to come out here for a few days, every couple of months. And when that happens, we will both need somewhere to stay, as I'm never coming here again without you. Even if I don't need to, we can always sell it. I had it valued, and even though it small, because of its prime location, it's worth almost two million dollars. That's American dollars, not Hong Kong."

"That's probably the reason he wants it back," I pointed out. The money wasn't important, and I tried to get her to see that. If giving back the apartment to Alan was the key to resolving their divorce, then I was all for it. But she wasn't convinced.

It wasn't long after that, her calls began slipping to every other day, and I noticed that when I tried calling her, most of my calls would go to voicemail. After the third unanswered call in a row, I started to believe my suspicion that the lure of Hong Kong would be too great for her to resist was proving correct. Not that her lack of communication mattered, I was getting updates on her from other unsolicited sources.

I stopped calling her and resisted the urge to check her calendar. It was another week before she called, and this time I let it go to my voicemail. Before I returned her call, I checked on a few things, none of which surprised me.

I called her back, using a video call, as I wanted to see her face while we talked. She looked haggard, and there was a brittleness to her voice that I'd never heard before. "Alex, I'm so sorry. I keep meaning to call you, but I've been so busy."

"I know you've been busy," I replied. "The question is, at what? You stopped calling or answering the phone."

"I have been busy; nothing is turning out to be as simple as I thought it would be."

"So, is there any progress?"

"Some," she said. "Alan is listening to reason and signed the divorce papers last week."

"That would have been nice to know."

She gave me a guilty look, "Christ, I'm sorry, I should have called to let you know."

"That's alright, I'm getting used to being the last person to know anything important about you." I couldn't help the bitterness in my voice.

I saw her suck in a breath, then after a pause, she said, "That hurts, but I deserve it. How close am I to completely fucking everything up, Alex? I don't want to lose you."

"Only you can know that. Do you want to tell me what's been going on, why you haven't been keeping in touch?"

"I'm doing everything I can to fix things so I can come back to you. All I'm doing is going to work and sleeping."

"So, you haven't been going out in the evening?"

She blanched, "No, well, Sian and Roo made me go out with them a few times. But all we did was have a few drinks."

I shook my head slowly. "Is that so..." I paused, waiting to see if she'd add anything to her statement, which didn't gel with my other information.

Both Sian and Roo had found me on Twitter and insisted I follow them so I would be able to see their posts. Their idea was that I would be able to see what Mandy got up, or more importantly, didn't get up to when she went out with them. They keep tagging me in their tweets. Their tweets were usually innocuous, but it was the comments on them that revealed so much. Did you know that Twitter will translate Chinese into English? I hadn't, but I do now.

"You might want to review the comments on your girlfriend's tweets before you say anything else," I added after waiting for her to say anything about her nights out.

"Wait, what?"

"Your friends have been posting about your evenings out with them. Did you know that their friends call you the party girl?"

I recalled one of the comments on a photo of Mandy dancing with a Chinese man, and quoted it, "Great to see party girl out enjoying herself again. We missed her."

Mandy's expression froze, and only her eyes moved, and the image shook. She must have been checking her friends' Twitter feeds, and the look of horror told me when she started reading the comments.

Which after a few moments of silence, led me to ask, "Have you any intention to come back? Should I just pack your things up and send them to you?"

"Don't you dare. Of course, I'm coming back to you. I admit I did a bit more than have a few drinks with them, but nothing you would be worried about. I just wanted to let my hair down and burn off some of my frustration."

"So Party Girl means nothing then?"

"It's a stupid name that Sian gave me when we were at university because I was bouncy and enjoyed dancing, not for any other reason. She carried on using my nickname when she moved to Hong Kong. Roo and our Chinese friends picked up on it and started using it if we went out clubbing. I love you, Alex, and I haven't and will never betray you. I'm still wearing your ring, and I don't intend to take it off."

She waved her hand at the camera so I could see the ring.

"Good," was all I could think of to say.

Mandy smiled, then she looked serious. "Alex, this is going to sound I'm making excuses, but I promise you I'm not. Please don't panic if I don't call often. It's not that I don't love you, but I'm missing you so much, and it's so hard hearing your voice and know that I won't be able to see you until it's all sorted out."

I understood what she meant; hearing and seeing her, knowing she was half the world away was hard, very hard. "I understand, but I want you to keep in touch even if it's just a text each week."

"I'll try, only the next few weeks are going to be even more manic. On top of everything else, now I've been told I have to train a man from the clan to act as my assistant, and it's an upward slog. Intelligence was not the prime consideration when Ang Lee chose him, family loyalty was, and it is making my task even harder." She gave me a cautious look, hoping to see any hint of what I was thinking in my expression.

Failing to do so, she continued, "I'm going to tell the girls that I won't be going to any clubs with them, and yes," she said before I could point out the issue with that, "I know you are going to point out that as I know about the tweets, I could just tell them to stop. Well, I won't, I promise you nothing will happen.

I considered what she had said, "I'll take you at your word then. I'm not going to call again," I told her. "If you call or text me, I'll reply, but if you are going to be as busy as you say you will be, I see no point in me calling if I can't guarantee you are going to answer."

We had that conversation over a month ago, and she'd texted twice and called once. Her self-imposed three-month deadline came and went, and there was no sign of her. A week after the deadline, I broke my own rule and tried calling her. She didn't pick up, so I left a message.

"Mandy, I love you, but I don't know what's going on, and I'm running out of patience. You've had more than the three months you said you needed. I've no idea if you ever intend to come home. I can't carry on like this. I'm going to pack up all your stuff next week, and I'll put it in storage. When you have the time, call and let me where you want me to send it."

I thought for a couple of seconds and added, "There's no point calling unless you mean to come home. No more, just a few more days, no more, just one last thing to resolve. Only call if you have your flight booked; in fact, only call when you are about to board. If you are not here in ten days, I will know where I stand."

I hung up with mixed emotions. It felt good getting my frustration off my chest, but on the other hand, I wasn't leaving Mandy much wriggle room, and it could all backfire on me. And the bottom line was that I missed her, I wanted to believe I'd be fine if she never came back, but even I knew how big a lie that was.

If I was honest with myself, I was my own worst enemy. Ever since Mandy's past had come to light, I'd been trying to play the hard man. Trying to overcompensate for what I'd perceive as a betrayal of our relationship. But now I'd had time to consider the situation Mandy was in, I wasn't sure if I would have reacted any differently to the way she had.

How could I condemn a teenage girl who took the only way out of an intolerable situation and had been manipulated by the important men in her life? I wasn't happy that she'd kept so much of her life a secret from me, but I believe she had finally come clean—and I was convinced she had told me the truth when she said I was the only person she'd slept with since we first met.

Another week passed, and my phone didn't ring. I went through the cottage and reluctantly packed up the last of Mandy's belongings, and they joined the rest of her stuff in the office. I looked at all her stuff I'd packed away, but I couldn't take that last step and rent a storage unit for it.

After I placed her last box on the shelf, I sat at her desk, surrounded by all her stuff. I felt the tears rolling down my face as the harsh reality of the situation came crashing down on top of me. A situation that was as much my fault as it was hers. I couldn't help remembering all the good times we'd had. I wasn't sure if I could have survived been all the trials and tribulations Mandy had gone through since her father's death. A death she was still convinced was a suicide, but I knew it had been an execution. I can't imagine what she must have been thinking when Ang Lee's uncle was threatening to drag her off to the brothel. And then to find out the marriage to a man she had looked up to was nothing more than a business deal.

Then we'd met, and both of our lives changed. I could understand how she had felt, stuck in a world, and a marriage she had little or no control over, and then suddenly, she could see the light at the end of the tunnel. I was the same, a lonely, bitter man, and then this red-headed ray of sunshine appeared the world looked great again. All she had to do last out until the fifteen years of her servitude were over, and she could have the life she'd always wanted with me. And I'd fucked it up for her because I'd gotten on my high horse over a spoilt vacation

I had been going to wait one last weekend before calling the removal company. But now I decided her things could stay here for as long as it took for her to make up her mind.

That Friday, I was on call at the clinic, and a new patient was admitted halfway through the evening. A fifteen-year-old girl who'd tried to commit suicide was transferred from a private hospital in London. Her parents thought she was just attention-seeking, but as soon I spoke to her, I knew that her suicide had not been a cry for help but a serious attempt to end her life. I got no sleep that night as I attempted to understand her motivation.

Under normal circumstances, I would have allowed the girl to get a good night's sleep before starting any treatments. But she wanted to talk, and I wasn't going to stop her. She talked until exhaustion got the better of her, and she fell into a deep sleep to the sound of the dawn chorus. Her revelations had drawn my ire, and I struggled to maintain my professionalism.

She was still fast asleep when my replacement came on duty at eight o'clock, and my shift ended. I gave a shift report and my suspicions about the young girl to my colleague, and then with a sense of relief, I drove home. I was exhausted by the time I staggered upstairs, collapsing fully clothed on the bed, and I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

It was late afternoon when I finally woke up. I showered, and, feeling refreshed, headed downstairs. Nothing seemed to have changed. I took a container of cold cuts and a bottle of beer from the fridge. I went out onto the patio and sat down at the table.

The late afternoon sun was warm on my face, and leaning back to enjoy it, I looked up. The blue sky was dotted with fluffy white clouds, and bisecting it was the sharp white line of a jet's contrail.

The line brought me back to earth; it cut through the sky like the line I'd drawn in my relationship with Mandy. It was looking more and more like I'd wasted seven years of my life on a relationship that was probably doomed from the start. I thought back, only four months ago, I was content in a relationship that, while it had the odd flaw, was the best thing that had happened to me.

Now she was on the other side of the world, and I had no idea what her intentions were. For years I thought we were the perfect couple, only to find out she'd been married for as long as I'd known her.

I took a long swallow from the bottle of beer and savored the bitter, cold liquid as it slipped down my throat. Then I pinched the bridge of my nose at the sharp stabbing pain in my sinuses, damn it, bloody brain freeze.

"Shit, shit, that hurts."

"I was going to ask you if there were any more in the fridge," a familiar voice asked. "But seeing your reaction, I'm not sure I want one now."

"It's good, just too bloody cold," I gasped, wiping the tears from my eyes. Mandy stood in the open doorway. She looked tired, her face haggard, and she looked thinner than I ever remembered. But the smile on her face was the same. There was a bandage wrapped around her wrist that extended halfway up her forearm, the one she'd had tattooed. I thought it would be the first thing she mentioned, but I was wrong.

"You didn't call."

"I tried when I got to the airport, but your phone was off." She was right, I'd switched it off the previous evening, and I didn't think I had switched it back on. I wasn't sure where it was.

I nodded, "I had it off; I was busy with a patient last night," I explained.

Mandy stepped back into the kitchen, returning a few moments later with two fresh bottles of beer. She sat down beside me and took a cautious sip. "Cold, but nice," she said.

"When did you get in?" It seemed odd talking so casually after so long apart.

"A few hours ago. I saw your car, so I knew you were here. I checked, and you were fast asleep, so I lay down on the sofa. I must have dozed off; I woke up when you came downstairs."

How had I missed her? But then I recalled going straight to the kitchen after I came downstairs.

"I see most of my stuff has been packed up."

"Seeing it lying around was getting painful," I admitted. "I haven't got rid of it; it's all in your office. The question is, are you here to collect it, or unpack?"

"I'd like to unpack if you'll have me. This has been the hardest three months of my life."

I didn't move; I needed to know more before I let her get back under my skin.

"Are you going to tell me what happened, why I haven't heard from you for the past few weeks?"

She took a long pull from her bottle, finishing the contents, then placed the empty bottle on the table. "I want you to know how much I love you. I can't count the number of times these past months I've picked up the phone to call you or the emails I've written, but each time, I couldn't make the final move. I didn't keep in touch because that was the less painful option. Everything I was trying to fix just seemed to be hurting our relationship.

She looked at me, "I thought it would be easy. I had three things to sort out: the bank, my responsibilities to Ang Lee and the clan, and the divorce, and then I could come home. The bank was simple. After a couple of weeks of being difficult, I threatened to resign and pointed out that if I did, then it was highly likely that Ang Lee would move all the Clan's accounts. That would have been the tip of the iceberg; if he did, then hundreds of others would probably close their accounts. And if that happened, it would have taken years for the bank to recover, if it even could."

"But that would have made you even more dependent on Ang Lee."

"That was the lesser of two evils. The bank had offered me a promotion to senior manager of foreign investments based in London, with minimal travel. I only had to make one concession and agree to attend the bi-monthly management meeting in Hong Kong."

That explained why she wanted to keep the apartment. "So, one down and...?"

"Alan," she said bitterly. "I underestimated how angry he would be at the divorce. When we first separated, I had agreed to keep up the impression that we were still together. I'd go out to dinner, and social events with him, things like that. Living next door to him made it easier for him to maintain the facade. The problem is that because I was willing to keep up the facade, Alan began to believe there was still hope for us."