Vasectomy

The day before the operation, Rob ran into his ex-wife, Val, in Marks and Spencers. They’d divorced twenty years earlier, having married too young. She wanted kids. He didn’t. That was one of the incompatibilities they’d discovered about themselves. For a long time, he’d felt guilty about wasting four of Val’s prime child bearing years, though he’d supported her in a demanding career, in which she’d since been very successful.

Val stood in front of him in the check-out queue. She hadn’t noticed him yet, so he took a few moments to check her out: still slim, still wearing her hair long despite the imminence of her forty-fifth birthday. She’d started wearing a little make-up and could easily pass for thirty-eight or nine.

“Val?”

She turned slowly and he recognised her expression. He’d pulled her from a daydream. She’d confessed this habit to him over a quarter of a century ago, shortly after they’d each lost their virginity to the other: I spend two hours every day living a fantasy life. Does that sound mad? It’s what keeps me sane.

“Rob,” she said. There was a smile on her lips but her eyes were sad. “How long has it been?”

“Too long. Got time for a coffee?”

“A quick one.”

Their marriage lasted from ’79 to ’83. Ten years after the divorce, Val moved to Moscow, where she met a poet ten years her junior. On her return to England, she’d had a big wedding party, which Rob attended. They no longer had any mutual friends, but, at the party, Rob caught up with several of Val’s old crowd. Politely, they asked after Ginny. He sensed that they hoped his wife had deserted him just as he’d deserted Val for Ginny. (The reasons for his separation with Val were not as straightforward as this, but memories were selective.) Rob had managed a couple of minutes with the radiant bride, congratulating her on her handsome husband and the way she’d managed to hold onto her friends.

They used to be your friends too, she’d told him.

Today the first thing Val asked was “how’s Ginny?”

“Thriving. Consultancies all over. We’re lucky if we spend one evening together during the week. How’s Alex?”

“He’s taken the kids to Moscow, staying with family.”

“You must miss them,” he said.

“Yes, I do. But life has been a bit ... tense lately. Alex is hoping to find a publisher while he’s there. Things here haven’t worked out as well as he hoped.”

Rob had never been able to understand what kind of career prospects a Russian poet expected to find in England. Alex was Val’s translator when they met. Translating was still his livelihood. Nevertheless, Rob felt bound to ask the question.

“Has he managed to publish here at all?”

“Some poems in a dual language magazine. It’s tough to get known.”

“I’ll bet. And the kids, are they well?”

“They’re great. It’s good they’re in Moscow. We want them to grow up speaking both languages. I take it you and Ginny haven’t …”

He shook his head then rushed the answer, giving too much detail. “You know how I felt about kids. Ginny was the same, only more strongly so. Her career’s pretty well established now, and I earn enough for both of us. Even so …”

“She’s still younger than I was when I had my first.”

“I know, but ...” Rob was tempted to tell Val about the vasectomy, for it proved he had meant what he’d said all those years ago - that he didn’t want to bring kids into the world, that it was too bad a place and too big a responsibility. But the rationale behind his and Ginny’s childfree state had more to do with convenience and self-centredness.

“I went to the anti-war rally in the Market Square. Justice Not Revenge. Wondered whether I’d run into you there.”

“We were under orders not to go anywhere near.”

“Orders?”

“Maybe that’s too strong a word. But you know how it is.”

“You voted for the invasion?” she asked, in a carefully neutral tone. Didn’t she read the papers? Probably not: she was a busy professional with two young kids. And why shouldn’t she assume he’d been against the war? They had bonded, twenty-five years before, over the nuclear bomb, joining the party together in order to convert it to the policies of CND. A pyrrhic victory. The party’s defeat in ’83 divided them. He’d moved to the right, got on with making Labour electable. Val abandoned politics, concentrated on her career.

“I hate the thought of innocent people being hurt,” Rob said, weighing his words. “Especially children. I’ve never been a pacifist, you know that. In most situations, though, there’s an alternative to war. Attacks only make things worse. This time, we had to do something. Fast. And, for the moment, I can’t think of anything better than what we’re doing.”

Val began to say something about Alex, the Russians and Afghanistan, but Rob was only half-listening. He was thinking that this was the first grown-up conversation they’d had since the divorce. It was their first post-divorce conversation without the sub-text how could you leave me and ruin my life?

“A politician’s answer,” she finished. “You invoke children, to demonstrate that you’re a caring person. Yet you don’t even have any children yourself.”

“Never will have,” he said, immediately regretting the outburst, for now he had to explain the remark. “I’m having a vasectomy tomorrow.”

Val appeared shocked. Her eyes watered, disturbing him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“You really meant it. About not wanting kids.” She held him with that old, sad, gaze. “Four years ago, when you got in, I was expecting Ginny to get pregnant any day, complete the picture: the new politician with his happy new family. I had a baby by then. I shouldn’t mind. But I would have done.”

“I understand,” Rob said, draining his coffee to break eye contact. “I don’t know why I didn’t have it done earlier. Ginny never wanted kids.”

“Never believe people when they say that. I didn’t believe you, though it seems I was wrong.”

“I had a few wobbles,” Rob confessed, “seven years ago, when it looked like the politics was leading nowhere and I was going to be a teacher all my life.”

Val winced. “Don’t say you wanted kids when I was still single. That would be too much to bear. I like to be able to think of you holding on to one principle from your youth.”

Rob gave the rueful smile he’d perfected over the years. “It was only a wobble,” he told her.

“I’ve got to go. I’m due back in court in ten minutes.”

“Want me to walk down with you?”

“No, I need to keep my head clear, think through a closing argument. It was nice to see you.”

He stood, and they hesitated, not sure of the protocol. In another situation, he might have been able to give her a long hug, but here he had to settle for kissing her on the cheek. As she walked away, he was struck once more by what an attractive woman she was. The waitress brought his change.

“Don’t I know you? Haven’t I seen you on TV?”

Rob was not flattered, for he knew what was coming next.

“Peak Practice? Or was it The Bill?”

“Just the local news,” he murmured. “I’m not an actor.”

“Oh no, I never watch the news.”

He took the change from the saucer without leaving a tip. Then he walked back to his Talbot St office via the Market Square. Several people glanced at him. Rob looked like someone. A few passers-by knew or had met him. If they managed to make eye contact, Rob gave his eyes down, I’m too busy to stop smile. He really was someone, he reminded himself. He was really someone. He wondered, not for the first time, what his and Val’s children would have been like.

Ginny drove but refused to watch the operation. I’m too squeamish she told the doctor. It was all done in a room off the doctor’s surgery, under a local anaesthetic. Rob’s position meant he had to use the National Health Service. He could have chosen to be operated on by a consultant, in a hospital, but the wait would have been six months longer. When he was undressed, a nurse about Val’s age came in and began to talk to him. Her function was to keep Rob talking, to distract him from what the doctor was doing. Several of Rob’s friends had had the snip and spoke of it lightly. But they all had kids. Rob didn’t. And now he never would.

The nurse was good at getting him to talk. Rob had been interviewed by professional journalists who were less capable. Or maybe it was the situation. The light was very bright so he talked with his eyes closed, flinching occasionally when unanticipated pain penetrated the local anaesthetic. Despite his scrotum being severed open for her to see, he found himself telling the nurse indiscreet stories, even flirting a little. The doctor chipped in, too. He had strong opinions about the single currency. Rob wished he would concentrate on the operation. Neither mentioned the war.

“Is this what you wanted to do when you were young?” the nurse asked.

“Yes,” Rob answered honestly. “It is.”

“You must be very proud.” She said this in an earnest manner that, nevertheless, made it clear she didn’t consider Rob’s calling a noble one. She’d probably swoon if presented with Val’s Russian poet. Rob had achieved his life’s ambition at forty, at the third time of asking, just at the point when he despaired of ever escaping the classroom. But that was five years ago. He was used to how little it impressed others, never mind himself. Rob had not yet been promoted to the government. He was a foot soldier, voting fodder, good only for doing his constituents’ casework. And he’d been more effective at that in his twenties, when he was a local councillor.

The operation was done. The doctor helped him put on a new pair of underpants: Y-fronts, because they gave extra support to the scrotum. Rob made a joke about how these were the first pair of Y fronts he’d bought since he was a teenager. It wasn’t true, he realised, as soon as the words were out of his mouth. It was only in the late 80's everyone moved to boxer shorts. The nurse took him through to a little room where Ginny was waiting. He was to have a cup of tea and a biscuit before going, in case he fainted.

“How was it?” his wife asked.

“Like doing a radio interview over the phone.”

Next day, when he took a bath, his balls were black and blue and trussed up like a chicken in a supermarket chill tray. He dried them gingerly, feeling the stitches. The doctor said that these would dissolve within a week. Ginny called him down to the phone.

Who is it? he mouthed to Ginny, as he wrapped the towel around his waist.

“Val Davidof.” She offered him the phone with raised eyebrows, then returned to her office. He balanced the phone under his damp ear.

“Val, this is unexpected.”

“How did your operation go?”

“Fine, fine. Nothing to it.” He hadn’t told Ginny that he’d met Val. Nor had they told anyone else about the vasectomy. In his game, it was best to let people assume you hadn’t had children because you weren’t able to.

“Rob, I know you’re not my MP, but I’m in trouble. Alex isn’t coming home. He’s still in Moscow. I think he’s got a woman there. I only found out today when a cheque bounced. He’s cleaned out all of our accounts. I got him on the phone. He says he’s keeping the children.”

“He can’t do that.”

“I know that and he knows that and we both know that the law can take years. Is there any way you can help?”

Rob felt a surge of affection and anger that led him to speak recklessly. “I’ve had several cases like this. We’re bosom buddies with Moscow at the moment. It shouldn’t be too hard to send some ex KGB round there, beat Alex up and get the kids on the next plane home.”

“Don’t joke, Rob. This is deadly serious.”

The sad resignation in her voice reminded him of guilty conversations after he told her he was leaving. He backtracked.

“It wasn’t entirely a joke, but I was too flippant. I’m sorry. You must be in a dreadful state. Listen, I’m a bit sore. Ginny’s got a meeting and I can’t drive. Would you come here? Bring any information I might need. I’m going to get dressed, then make a phone call.”

Val got the kids back in time for Christmas. Alex had never really intended to keep them. He was using his offspring as a bargaining chip to get better maintenance payments after the divorce. Thanks to Rob’s intervention and influence, the Russian wouldn’t get maintenance, would only see his kids under strict supervision.

On Boxing Day, Val rang. She wanted to have the couple to dinner to say thank-you.

“You’ll like her,” Rob said to Ginny.

“Do either of us really want another needy woman as a friend?”

“Val won’t be needy for long. She’s attractive, well off…”

Ginny, to his surprise, agreed to go. A bigger surprise was that the two women did get on. They had plenty to talk about. Especially, of course, him. Ginny liked to drink at the weekends. Val topped up her own drink only an inch for every fresh glass she poured Ginny. Rob, unable to relax with either woman in the presence of the other, played with Val’s kids. They were a lot of fun, climbing all over him, hanging on every word of every story he read aloud.

“You should have stayed married to her,” Ginny said, in the taxi home. “Those would have been your kids.” She was slaughtered.

“If Val and I had had kids, they’d be teenagers now. They’d hate both of us but especially me, because of my job. Though, come to think of it, bringing up two kids, I wouldn’t have had time to go to all those meetings and butter up all those selection committees, so I wouldn’t be an MP. I’d still be a crummy teacher, knackered every evening and marking ‘til midnight while Val earned five times my salary. Val wasn’t interested in my career. Without you pushing me, backing me, I wouldn’t have made it as far as I have. You know that, don’t you?’

‘Just doing my job.’ Ginny squeezed his thigh. ‘Want to know what she told me, on the third bottle of wine?”

“What?”

“She told me she never stopped loving you. And I said to her. He’s not in love with you. He’d fallen out of love with you by the time I met him.’

‘What did she say to that?’

‘She said I know.”

The taxi driver stared ahead, pretending not to listen. Ginny nodded off. Rob considered Val. She would get stronger soon, find a new bloke. He and Ginny would go on, which was what they both wanted. He would keep his job for the foreseeable future. A majority of their electors might hate the war, but there was no viable alternative. The occupation would go on for the foreseeable future too, for there was no way to end it. There was nothing for Rob to worry about, nothing at all.

The driver asked which route to drive home. Rob told him, then closed his eyes and recalled playing with Val’s kids. How innocent and free he’d felt around them! He would like to spend more time with those kids.

He was ready for another affair, that was one unspoken reason he’d agreed to the vasectomy. Ginny didn’t want to know what he got up to in London any more than he wanted to know how she occupied herself on her nights away. In Nottingham, he was meant to behave. But Ginny was often gone at weekends, leaving him with time on his hands.

If he put it to her carefully, Ginny might be happy for Rob to spend some of that time with Val’s toddlers. Ginny didn’t regard Val as a threat. They were history. Val was only a year or two away from becoming a judge. If she let Rob back into her bed, she wouldn’t get possessive, risk any kind of scandal. His ex had a fire Rob missed: in bed and elsewhere. She would try to make him vote against the government. And maybe he would. Once or twice. In middle age, small acts of rebellion were expected, even allowed.

His wife stirred as the cab drew up outside their house.

‘I’m going to make you very happy tonight,’ Ginny whispered in his ear. Her hand stroked his groin. Then she fell asleep again.

He carried Ginny into the house and put her to bed. Ten minutes later, when he was sure she was fast out, he dialled Val’s number.

She answered on the first ring.