Revenge is a dish best served cold

Lucy sat in one of the leather armchairs, sinking into its depths, and savoured the rich, earthy taste of the espresso. She nibbled at the biscotti and had a ‘recherché du temps Perdue’ moment. Remembering that first time she had tasted these delightful little morsels when on honeymoon in Venice. At the time she didn’t believe that she could ever be happier. She smiled to herself recalling and savouring, but this time the memories and not the biscuits. She looked up catching the waiter’s eye and signalled for another drink.

It had taken a lot of planning, and a great deal of patience but it had all been worthwhile and at last justice had been done. Finishing her second cup of coffee she paid her bill and left. Others in the café paid her little heed, an ordinary middle aged woman, neither pretty nor ugly. Not someone who would stand out in a crowd. Just as she had intended.

It was a fine spring evening and she decided to walk back to her flat, not in the best part of town but it would do. For now. Her walk took her through the park, which seemed inordinately full of ‘young lovers’. She smiled, once again the past making tentative inroads into the present. The gossamer threads of memory, almost, but not quite, threatening to block the present, and the plans for the future.

She saw herself, eighteen years old and so much in love. He, her first, and she thought at the time, her only true lover. Her friends looked on in envy, seeing what they thought of as an ideal couple. She stopped for a moment breathing in the scents, a mingling of memories and something indefinable, maybe the future had an aroma of its own! A couple stood by an old flowering cherry, unaware of everything even the beauty of the tree which sheltered them. Existence for them was each other. Memories almost overcame her and regrets for what she had done but these thoughts short lived when anger and revenge resurfaced. She hoped that their future would exceed what were now her expectations of young love.

He had declared that he would love her for ever, she was his soul mate his Beatrice he her Dante. They would always be together. They were until ‘the other’ came along. Lucy could never actually give ‘the other’ her true name, even in her thoughts, although she realised that all blame could not be heaped upon those shoulders alone. He had deserted her, had betrayed her had almost, but not quite, destroyed her. The smile again as she realised what she had done and what was his fate.

The flat was warm and welcoming with the lovely smell of the meal she had set in the oven earlier greeting her, almost with love. Was she happy? Almost but not quite, she was content. She had a future, he had nothing.

Sitting in the comfy old armchair, with a good book and the television for company she began to doze and memories flooded back, unstoppable this time. There were some regrets, ones for the love she once had for him, ones for the children she would never have but no regrets for her actions or his suffering.

She turned on the television.

‘The police have charged Philip Jeffries with the murder of his wife. In a preliminary hearing he pleaded not guilty’. They are still searching for the body but believe that they have enough evidence to bring him to trial.’

Lucy Jeffries looked at the photograph of herself on the screen, smiling, pretty, almost beautiful, looking up into his eyes with him smiling back. She was not that woman any more. She was Beatrice Summers, a middle aged dowdy woman who never turned any heads who managed to lose herself in crowds.

‘If anyone has any information could they please contact the police on…’

She turned off the television, settled back and began reading her book.