Futcher & Futcher

Judy phoned Simon at six to tell him that there were sausages and broccoli in the fridge and potatoes in the cupboard and he'd have to fend for himself that evening. He hadn't minded, of course; he was used to it happening from time to time. He'd just asked her what time she'd be home; when she said it could be as late as 10 he had said he might be in bed by then because he had football training at seven the next morning.

She went back to her workstation. Taking stock of exactly what remained to be done, she realized that with any luck it might not take as long as she had thought. The list of errors or corrections that the client had emailed to her at 5.30 was long, but as she read through it she could see that most of them were typographical errors that she had picked up already or minor changes of wording to the notes that didn't alter the sense. In the end there were only three that she would need to check and draw to Maurice's attention.

Judy dated the time when things had really begun to look up for her to the day when she finally got her CA. That had been five years after the Split. Getting the job as a manager in the audit branch at Futcher's the year after had crowned that -- she had been there two years now --and she had felt at last that her life was really back on track. Futcher & Futcher were obviously not one of the big 4 international accountancy firms, but they were firmly on the next rung down and had offices Australia-wide. Being taken on by them meant that she had been accepted as a fully-competent chartered accountant and seemed to validate everything she had done to get her life back together.

The Split had come very suddenly and hit her very hard. After nearly 10 years of marriage to Tim she was still deeply in love with him, and she still believed that he had been equally in love with her until almost the very end. It had happened so quickly that she had barely had time to register that he had become somehow different, withdrawn from her; and then, one evening just after they had finished getting Simon to bed, quite without preamble, he had announced that he had fallen in love with someone else, someone called Paulette, and was leaving her.

The entire basis of Judy's life had disintegrated in that one moment. For ten years she had been Tim's wife; for eight years she had been Tim's wife and Simon's mother. She had loved that life. She had got her B. Ec before she got married, but the birth of Simon had meant that she had never done anything with it, and frankly she had wanted to be a full-time mother and hadn't cared that the qualification sat idle; she knew that she would go back to work when Simon went to secondary school. For the time being she had rejoiced in caring for them both and watching Simon grow. And then it had all gone.

For a year she had floundered. She had been in a state of shock, unable to think about anything but the pain of it, spending days on end moping about the house, crying frequently, complaining to friends and even casual acquaintances, recriminating with herself about things she might have done differently, watching daytime TV. Occasionally she got drunk.

There was no particular event that snapped her out of it. She simply woke up one morning thinking that this wasn't good enough, not for Simon and not for her, and set about getting her life together again. By sheer force of will she put her hurt to the back of her mind, shutting it off whenever it raised its head.

She concentrated first on getting home organised and understanding the financial consequences. Tim's and her joint resources had not been great to begin with, and even though the division between the two of them had been more than fair to her, it was still a division. Looking back now, seven years later, she could see that thing could have been much worse, but at the time, for a 33-year-old single woman with an eight-year-old boy to bring up, life had not been easy. It had helped that she and Tim had agreed from the outset that Simon's education was the first priority when it came to money, and both sets of parents had been able to help there a little as well, so they were able to get him to the school they wanted. Then the scholarship had been a boon, of course, although that had not come until he was twelve.

The thing she was most grateful for was that Simon himself had taken the Split pretty much in his stride. It had been terrible for him at the very beginning, when she was at rock-bottom herself, and the memory of him asking night after night when Daddy would be coming home could still make her almost physically ill. Mercifully, he seemed to accept the situation relatively quickly. Weekdays with Judy and weekends with Tim and Paulette had become just routine. Judy had to give Paulette credit for the way she treated Simon. She wasn't apologetic about her own position as Tim's new wife, and she didn't try to pretend she was Simon's mother; but she welcomed Simon at the house that she and Tim had set up, and she had developed a genuine affection for him. And of course any child will return affection if it's genuine. He had fully accepted that his parents now had separate lives and that he was part of both of them.

When she had made the decision to become a chartered accountant she had found that one advantage of being a single mother from an educated, middle-class background was that there was government assistance available to enable her to pursue the sort of ambition she had formed. She had had no qualms about making as much use of it as she could. She had been able to do the three additional subjects she needed and then her professional years by the time she turned 38. All part-time, of course, because she had had to do it all while Simon was at school.

So chartered accountant at 38 and to Futcher's at 39.

Two years later, at 41, she felt her life was again stable. Simon had turned 15. He was, in every way, the centre of her life, and she had to say that the way he was turning out repaid her for absolutely everything. He worked hard at school and did well. He was considerate. He wasn't interested in drugs or, after one notable and highly embarrassing occasion, alcohol. He kept out of anything that could really be called trouble. She found herself reflecting sometimes that even though they had to watch every penny and spend most of their time working, their life together was a happy one. And moneywise things did get very much better when she got to Futcher's. The pizza with Simon at Aldo's had become a weekly event instead of a special treat.

Futcher's had 29 partners of whom only six were women. The male to female ratio was more even among the managers: 23 out of a total of 57. For all assignments there was a partner responsible and at least one manager who actually did the work. The largest team she had been part of had consisted of three partners and eight managers and lasted eight months, but something like that was quite rare. The majority of audits were done by one or two managers with one supervising partner and were completed within about a month.

Judy found herself as one of a loose group of seven or eight managers working mostly with three partners, Caroline Essington, Michael Winterbottom and Maurice Levy. She was very happy with all of them. She tried very hard not to seek any concessions because of things she needed to do for Simon, but when she had to do that they accepted it willingly. Caroline was especially understanding because she had been through the whole working mum thing herself, although she had not had a divorce to cope with, and Michael and Maurice both had kids too and knew that sometimes she just had to do a particular task tomorrow morning rather than this evening.

There were no men in her life. She had not been kissed; she had not had sexual intercourse. Looking back she supposed it was a bit strange, because until the Split happened, love -- including sex, which to her was the natural expression of love -- had been her main driving force. She had never been one of those women who live purely for the purpose of attracting men, but she had been from her late teens a fully active and enthusiastic sexual being. Her sex life with Tim had been, almost to the very end, blissful; there was no other word for it.

The Split changed everything. At first she could not even think about sex; the very idea of it was repulsive to her. She had got over that of course; she was a strong, healthy woman who understood physical attraction very well; but she had deliberately put sex, romantic love, anything like that, out of her mind. She had loved; she had been grievously hurt; she wanted no more to do with it. She didn't want it. She wanted to raise her son.

So what happened on the evening of Tuesday the 27th of August came completely out of the blue.

* * * * *

Maurice had been away when Judy first arrived at the firm. He had been on vacation with Miriam in France, a vacation that they both knew would be Miriam's last in Europe, possibly her last anywhere. There were a number of days when she couldn't leave their hotel at all, and there were others when she needed a wheelchair, but it had been a good vacation. It was early September when they arrived in France and they spent only a few days in Paris before getting in the hired car and heading to the countryside they both loved. They had a week at a superb hotel right on the lake at Veyrier du Lac, near Annecy, and another week, far less luxurious but in its own way equally enjoyable, at a B'n'B in a tiny village called Étables in the Ardêche.

They finished with a few days back in Paris at the Pavillon de la Reine on the Plâce des Vosges. They had always ruled it out on previous trips as too expensive, but this time neither of them even mentioned the cost when they were planning the trip. It lived up to their hopes; the room was large and comfortable and the atmosphere of the hotel was quiet and friendly -- and it had a garden. They took a drink there each day, late in the afternoon. The early autumn weather was quite perfect, and they would linger there in the gentle warmth as the sun gradually lowered in the sky, sometimes talking, sometimes reading, enjoying the peace until finally it began to cool and it was time to go for dinner. Those few days, and especially those late afternoons in the garden, had remained in Maurice's mind as times when, despite the circumstances or perhaps even because of them, he had felt as close to Miriam as he ever had in their 37 years of marriage.

When he came back to work Judy had been working on the giant Mac-Lok project that had tied up half the firm for nearly a year, and he hadn't even met her for several months. It had been another six months before he was finally able to get her for one of his projects, as he did with every new accountant; it was the most effective way of finding out whether they were really any good.

Judy had been a very pleasant surprise. The particular assignment had not been especially difficult: the client, Simpson's, had been around for a long time and was well run and solidly profitable; but there was no such thing as a routine audit. He had arranged to have the preliminary scoping discussion with her on a Monday morning and she had only had the files since the previous Friday afternoon, but it had been obvious from the moment they started to talk that she was right on top of it. He knew the client's business well and had been expecting to have to tell her all the things to watch for, but she had already spotted all but one of them herself from her reading of the files, and worked out how to deal with most of them too. Then in the course of the assignment she'd known she knew exactly how much she could and should handle for herself and how much she should bring to him for a decision. Even when she did bring something to him, he saw that she had already thought the problem through for herself and found a solution, so that he found himself doing little more than confirming what she proposed. And she wasn't miffed on the couple of occasions when he modified something she suggested; she listened, took it in, asked a question or two, and they were both satisfied.

What he liked most about her was that she made no fuss about herself or her situation. She was inexperienced but she accepted a full workload. She was a single mother but asked for no more concessions than any manager who had children. She had a lovely, quiet sense of humour which was very similar to his own.

She was an attractive woman, too, and another thing he liked about her was that she never made any attempt at all to play on it. She was quite tall for a woman, perhaps 5 foot 8. She had a good, strong figure which she held very straight, and she had open, regular features and a very direct gaze. Every time she walked into his office he was momentarily reminded of their first meeting, when she had been brought in to be introduced to him. As he held out his hand to shake hers their eyes had met for a moment, and he had experienced a reaction that he had previously felt only once or twice in his life; a kind of jolt of intimacy and recognition, though he could not have said what it was that he had recognised. Whatever it was, he had felt from then on that there was a relationship between them, a kind of unacknowledged understanding. Whenever they were talking together Maurice found himself thinking of that moment and, as he had done on that occasion, looking directly in her eyes. They were green and very clear.

* * * * *

Judy always liked going into Maurice's office. To begin with, it was where Maurice was, and she'd felt something special for him from the moment they met and her eyes locked for a moment with his. They were deep-set and brown and had a softness about them that made her feel, each time he looked at her, as if he were looking into her soul.

The office wasn't particularly large or fancy, but it did have a pleasant view over the park -- invisible now that it was night -- and he had some very good pictures on the walls. It was always clean and tidy and had an atmosphere of peace and efficiency at the same time.

Maurice worked mostly at a large desk, but he also had a leather sofa and two armchairs that were used when there were things that needed to be discussed. He was in the mid-fifties as best she could estimate, maybe into his sixties, and of no more than medium height. His body was solid, not slim but not fat, and his hairline had receded so that he was left with short grey hair around the sides and back of his head but none on top. Despite these uninspiring physical characteristics, he was a very attractive man. He looked strong and he looked kind. He played tennis a couple of times a week and she knew he went regularly to the gym. No matter how late in the day it was, no matter how hot it was or how hard he had been working, he always smelled clean and his shirt was always crisp and white.

Maurice didn't talk much about himself but she had picked up things from office chatter. He was married but his wife was very ill -- the prevailing opinion was MS -- and he had adult children. He and his wife loved opera and in the past they had travelled interstate for particular performances, and he was also known to be very widely read. He went to the football most weeks during the season. He didn't in the slightest pry into her own life, although he was always very interested in anything she might mention about Simon. Best of all, he was a delight to work with. He'd listen carefully while she explained something and look properly at whatever she showed him, then ask clearly and simply for any further information or explanation that he needed. One of the things that made him attractive was the way he gave his complete attention to the person he was talking to. He looked directly at her when they spoke with those soft, deep brown eyes.

This assignment hadn't been particularly difficult in itself, but the client was picky and always seemed to have some new query to raise, and every audit threw up a couple of wrinkles that needed to be sorted out in a flurry at the end. Maurice was supervising but otherwise she was handling it on her own. The client had his board meeting the following day so the audit report had to be signed and emailed off that evening, which was why they were still at the office after everyone else had left for the day.

At a little before eight she found herself walking into Maurice's office with the final version. The whole floor was deserted; the cleaners had been through an hour earlier, and even the security man had done his round. Maurice had waited back for her to finish because he as the partner was the one who had to sign the report. It was a clean bill of health for the client, which was always a relief, because any time there was any hint of a qualification the client would blow a fuse.

* * * * *

Maurice stood up as she came into his office. He was in his shirtsleeves and a tie, as was standard for the men at Futcher's, and Judy was in the female equivalent: white, high-necked, long-sleeved blouse, dark blue striped fitted skirt that touched her knees, and shoes with elevated but sensible heels. He could see from her slightly flushed cheeks and not quite perfect hair that she had been working hard.

"All done, Judy?" he asked. "Let's have a look."

He walked round to the other side of the desk. They stood side by side as she spread the report out on the desk in front of them and began to show him the parts that had been altered since the previous draft. As she took him through the changes and he read them carefully he noted not for the first time that she had a gift for expressing things clearly. "Good," he said for the first change, then "OK" for the next, "Good" again for the third ...

It took about 15 minutes to complete the review. It was fine. "OK, Judy," he said, "Done. A very good piece of work. As always, I might say."

She looked at him with those clear green eyes. "Do you want me to print you a fresh copy to sign?"

"No, this one's fine."

He reached across the desk for his pen and signed the audit report. It was already dated. He handed it to her.

"I'll scan it and email it to Mr Madden" -- that was the client's CEO -- "and I'll send the original to his office tomorrow," she said. "There won't be anyone there now."

"Good," he answered. "Would you copy me in on the email as well so that I've got it on my screen? Then come back in here and get me and I'll lock up as we go out."

"OK," she said. "I'll phone Mr Madden as well and tell him I've sent the email. I hope he doesn't decide that he wants something else changed."

Maurice smiled at her. "We'll be fine," he said. "Madden's not big on working at home. He won't look at it until tomorrow, and then it'll be too late to change it."

They both laughed.

"I'll be as quick as I can," she said. "It's late enough already."

He watched her as she walked rapidly out of the office.

* * * * *

Sending off the email took only a couple of minutes, the phone call to the client was brief and the client was grateful. Judy then went into the bathroom to tidy herself up for the trip home, which thankfully wasn't far away. To be truthful, she also wanted to get herself a bit closer to Maurice's standard of freshness. She didn't wear much makeup, but she renewed her lipstick as well as washing her hands, checking her breath and giving her hair a quick brush. Then she went back to her desk -- mere managers only had desks in a large open-plan area -- took her jacket out of her cupboard and put it on, got her bag from her cupboard and put it on her shoulder and walked back into Maurice's room.

He had heard her coming and was putting his jacket on as she came in. "All done?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered, "and I rang Mr Madden and told him it had gone. He seemed happy enough."

It happened purely by chance. They reached the door of the office at the same time. It was only half open and simultaneously they both reached to pull it wider. Their movements turned their bodies toward each other and brought them very close. They faced each other and there was another moment like that on the first occasion they had met: their eyes met and Maurice felt the same click of connection as on that occasion. Without any prior thought, without even realising what he was doing, he kissed her. The sexual jolt from it was like a punch in his stomach and his lips felt as if they were held to hers by some mysterious force; then he realised what he was doing and pulled away sharply.

Maurice could only explain to himself later that kissing her had been, or had seemed to be, the natural thing to do. He had not intended to kiss at all, not in the sense of making a conscious decision to do it; in that action of turning to walk out the door they had found themselves facing each other, Judy with her lips slightly parted and her face slightly flushed from the bustle of her rapid work, and he realised he was beginning to lean towards her to kiss her. He supposed he could have stopped; he had realised what he was doing, so surely he could have stopped doing it. But it hadn't seemed like that at the time. The kiss seemed to follow as the next thing in the natural course of events, nothing extraordinary at all. But of course it had been extraordinary, completely extraordinary.

"Judy," he started to say, but she interrupted.

"Don't," she said. It had been only an instant, but the effect on her had been electric. Her mind was clear and she knew what she wanted. She would deal with the consequences later. She stepped towards him and put her arms around his neck. She kissed him on the mouth.

Again it was as if an electric pulse ran through their bodies. This time the kiss lasted several seconds and Judy had time to become aware, to be flooded with awareness, of the warmth of his body against hers. She had to have him. She had to. But again he pulled away.

Judy saw the amazement on his face. For so many reasons it was not right. He was her superior. He was nearly twenty years older; he was married. "I'm so sorry," he said. "I'm sorry. We can't do this."

"We can," she said. "We can. It's the right thing. We have to. Come on." She kissed him again. She had her hands on his shoulders was walking backwards, pulling him with her toward the leather sofa. She kissed him again and felt his mouth respond; she pressed her body against his and this time felt the hardness down there; she took his hand and pressed it hard against her breast. He gripped it and her need was suddenly overwhelming. His need was suddenly overwhelming.

"Come on," she said again, urgently, and felt for the buckle of his belt, tugging at it until she had the belt undone. Then she began with the buttons of his trousers but it was taking too long. "You do it," she said and let him go; she hoicked up her skirt and got her thumbs inside the top of her panty hose and pushed them down fiercely; when they were at her knees she sat down on the sofa -- she felt its texture against her bare skin -- and at last got her panty hose and knickers off. Maurice had his trousers open now and had pushed them down to his knees; as she lay back and parted her legs he knelt between her knees. He was hard and big, and she pulled him to her entrance. There was no need for hesitation and he didn't hesitate. He pushed hard inside her, forcing from her an involuntary gasp.

She was filled. Filled. The feeling inside her most sensitive part took her breath away. It was quick and it was violent, unlike anything ever before. Her body took control as he thrust inside her; she thrust back, gasping each time until, wonderfully, the dam burst and she spasmed out her pleasure, feeling at the instant of highest ecstasy his seed leap deep inside her. Sounds were coming from him as well, deep groans of satisfaction as his seed continued to pump.

* * * * *

In the washroom as he cleaned and tidied himself, Maurice remembered a moment, in Paris, in the garden of their beautiful hotel, with Miriam. It had been one of her very good days and it was beautifully warm in the soft, late afternoon sun. She had a glass of wine. There was little noise of traffic; the sounds of the city seemed muffled and remote; birds sang. After one of their silences, Miriam spoke.

"There's something I've been meaning to say to you for a long time." Her voice sounded dry and a little strained, but clear and unwavering, and she was looking straight in front of her, not at him. She continued: "Don't say anything now, and when I've said it I don't want you to respond. I want to say it, and then it will have been said, and nothing more at all.

"So. You know I love you. I know you love me. We both know I am going to die, but neither of us knows when; perhaps quite soon, I hope quite soon really, but maybe not for a long time. And I know you'll be there till the end, whenever it is." There was the briefest of pauses, then, "Another thing I know is that you love sex. We both do. Or did. But I can't do it any more, not with this thing." She meant the disease. "You know I can't do it and you don't ask me to and I appreciate that more than I can say; but I know that you miss it."

There was a slight tremor in her voice now, but it remained clear.

"So what I want to say is that it's okay for you to go elsewhere. That's it. That's what I want to say. I don't want to know if you do and I don't want to know if you don't, but I'm telling you that it's okay if you do. You are doing everything for me. I'm telling you that you can do that for yourself if you want." Pause. "That's it. That's all. Don't say anything at all. Nothing. Just know that it's okay."

Maurice had sat for a moment, absorbing what she had said. For an instant he felt tears begin to form behind his eyelids, but they retreated. He understood what she had said. He understood why she had said it. He understood why she did not want any response. In truth, he did not know what he would have said if she had wanted him to respond. She was right, he did miss the sex -- his body missed the sex ¬-- but he had not thought of looking beyond himself for relief. Right at that moment he did not feel that he would ever want to. He said, "Thank you. I understand. I won't say anything."

It had returned to his mind from time to time, not often, but occasionally. Sometimes in bed -- he and Miriam were in separate beds now -- just before sleep came, sometimes when his eye was caught by the swing of a hip or the expression on a face, it would come, the need of the body and then the memory.

Now he thought about what Judy had said. She had said it was the right thing. He knew she was honest. He returned to his office. Judy was there waiting for him, ready for her journey to her home.

"Judy," he said, "I've been trying to sort out my thoughts. You said it was the right thing to happen, but one thing I know is that that should not have happened. We both know the reasons why. It can't be undone, but I've been thinking about what happens now. I want to know what you think should happen now. Will you tell me?"

She looked at him, considering. "I've been thinking too," she said, "I'd like to say one thing first. Two things. You said it shouldn't have happened and I guess in a way I agree with that. But I don't think it was wrong and I don't regret it. I'm glad it happened. One part of me, nothing to do with work, has been dead for a very long time. I'll say it. The sexual part of me has been dead. Since my ex-husband and I split up. I think what just happened was it waking up at last, and I'm grateful for that, more grateful than I can say, really. What happened was a good thing."

She paused. "The other thing is that although I don't think it was wrong, I agree that it shouldn't have happened. We're colleagues, you're my boss, I'm your employee. But if there's fault, it's fault by both of us. This was not something you did to me. It was something we both did. Please don't feel bad about it."

"I do feel bad about it," he said. "Well, bad about it in one way. Not in every way. Thank you."

"You asked me what I think we should do about it," Judy said. "My answer is that I don't think we should do anything about it. It's happened and I'm not going to say we should try and forget about it -- I'm certainly never going to forget it, and I think -- I hope -- it may have changed my life from now on. But that's all personal. Here at work I would like to go on exactly as we've been going on until now. I like working here. I like working with you. I don't want that to change. Can we continue as before?"

Maurice was silent for a few moments, thinking. "I would like to. It can't be exactly the same because I am not going to forget of what we've just done any more than you are. But I think we can work together in the future as we've worked together in the past. I hope so anyway. One think is certain, though, and that's that it can't happen again. Ever."

"Of course not," she said. "It won't."

* * * * *

In the lift on the way down he offered her a lift home in his car, but she declined. When the doors of the elevator opened on the ground floor she said, "Good night, Maurice," and he said, "Good night, Judy," and she left the elevator. He watched her walk to the door of the building until the elevator doors closed.