A Wall on Her Side

A Wall on Her Side

“Jane, honestly, why are you butting into this?” Victor didnt even look at me. He stood by the window with a glass of red, broad-shouldered and unshaken, his voice low and almost tenderalways worse than a shout. “Andrew was talking to me, you see? Me. Dont burden him with your suggestions.”

Andrew Seymour, our guest and Victors partner in a new logistics venture, stared into his plate, visibly uneasy. He shifted in his seat and picked up his fork, though anyone could see he had lost his appetite.

“I simply said there are enormous empty premises standing idle in the city centre,” I replied, calm and steady.

Victor finally turned. His gaze held an expression Id come to recognise after twenty-seven years. Not angerworse. Condescension. “Jane. Youve fed everyone, the spreads marvellous, everythings perfect. Why dont you fetch dessert, darling?”

Four more guests sat at the table. Andrews wife, Louise, shot me a swift glance, something like sympathy flickering across her faceor perhaps I only imagined it. I stood, collected a few plates, and left for the kitchen.

I lingered a moment at the sink, staring into the darkness beyond the rain-smudged glass. Streetlamps blurred gold halos through the drizzle, the kind of thin autumn rain that makes every surface gleam and the world feel smaller. I was fifty-two years old. Behind me, laughter drifted, Victors voice rang out, the clink of glassware. I took the cake Id baked that morning from the fridge and set out to serve it.

This was my life.

We lived in a well-heeled neighbourhood of a large English cityManchester, where we had built our home and our life together. Victor built it, really, when business took off, about fifteen years ago: a grand, two-storey house, garage, and garden. The garden was mine, purely because Victor had no time and the hired help never got it right. Everyone would say, “Jane, your home is exquisite. Such taste.” And Id smile and thank them, because it was my tasteevery curtain, every shelf, every currant bush beside the fence.

Only the house was in Victors name.

Id never worked in the way Victor did. After universitywhere wed metI taught graphic design at a secondary school for a few years. Then Ben was born, then Victors business began to soar. It meant relocations, events, entertaining at home, always being at his side. I quit teaching. Victor told me, “Why struggle for pennies? Ill take care of everything.” He did. Generously, even, but always in such a way that I had to either ask for money for little things, or save, quietly, from the household allowance.

Making jewellery began by accident a decade ago. I was stranded at our cottage one rainy weekend and found a box of beads Id forgotten about. By the evening, Id made a necklacesurprisingly lovely. Then another, and another. Friends asked to buy them, so I invested in tools, started with gemstones and silver fittings. This became mine. My own patch of space.

Victor regarded this hobby like he did my tomatoes. Fine, something to keep me occupied.

“You and your trinkets,” hed say occasionally. “Youre not seriously thinking of taking them to market, are you?”

I never replied. What was the point?

Ben grew up, moved to London, married, settled there. We met for holidays. He rang on Sundays, asked about my health, I asked about work. We cared for each other, but wed grown our separate lives.

I didnt have a life of my own.

I ran a beautiful home, had a husband, hosted guests twice a week, attended charity lunches so Victor could network. I was at his sidealways appropriately dressed, with the right smile. The respectable man, lovely family, elegant wife, first-class hostess. Thats a kind of work too, I realise nowone that comes with no pay and not even a thank you.

The letter arrived in February. Plain envelope, a Manchester solicitor, unfamiliar name. I tore it open at the kitchen table while Victor slept upstairs.

My mothers cousin, Aunt Nina Bell, whom Id met three times in my lifethe last at a funeral two decades pasthad died that December. She had no children. She left me a property. Not a flat. Not a little plot. An entire building, a former factory in the city centre, two storeys, built in the 1950s, three hundred and forty square metres. Long abandoned.

I read the letter three times.

Then I called the solicitor.

“Yes, Mrs Green,” he said. “Ms Bell specifically designated you her sole beneficiary. The site itself is also included in the inheritance. She acquired the freehold in the 90severythings in order.”

“Thats city centre land?” I repeated.

“In the centre, yes. Small, but a good location.”

I thanked him, hung up, and just sat there, letter trembling in my hands.

I never told Victor. Not sure why. Actually, I was sure. I could see exactly how itd gohed visit, remark it should be sold or levelled, mention someone he knew at a property firm, and suddenly thered be meetings, papers to sign, decisions made for me while I smiled beside him.

The first time, I went to see the place alonetold Victor I was visiting a friend.

The building stood in an alley behind the old theatrea part of central Manchester where Victorian villas jostle with postwar blocks and the new glass offices. The cobbled lane was quiet; trees were budding in the brisk March air.

The building looked pretty grimpeeling plaster, windows boarded up, rusted gates. But the walls were sturdy. I paced its perimeter, brushed brickwork, surveyed the roof. Still sound. I slipped inside through a side door.

Ceilings tall. Windows broad, dusty, broken. Second-storey floorboards, some rotten, mostly intact. Old tiles on the floor beneath grime. It smelt musty, ancientwood, earth, past lives.

I stood in the centre, staring at patches of sky through holes in the ceiling.

Then a feeling settled in me. Not fear, not sadnesssomething like the thrill of finding yourself in the right place at last. This was mine.

The solicitor, a pleasant man in his mid-forties, sorted the paperwork in two weeks. I collected the deeds myself; filed them in a folder kept in my jewellery room where Victor never stepped.

Nadia, my old schoolmate, worked as an estate agent. I called her and told her everything.

“Are you serious?” she said, after a long silence.

“Completely.”

“Jane, thats serious money. City centre, a building, freehold. Thats a fortune. You do realise?”

“I do. I dont want to sell.”

“What do you want, then?”

I hesitated. Then: “Do you remember when wed go to art galleries, back when we were young? At the old Arts House on Oxford Road.”

“Of course.”

“Something like that. A space for peoplean exhibition venue, studios, somewhere to learn something new. An art space, as they call it these days.”

She went quiet longer than before.

“Jane, itll take a fortunerenovations, electrics, the lot.”

“I know.”

“Do you have money?”

“Not yet. But I will.”

She didnt press. Nadia was good at knowing when to stay silenta rare skill I valued.

I started gathering money the only way I knew: jewellery. Over the years, Id made plenty Id never sold, pieces I counted my bestsilver pendants with Cornish stones, hand-woven bracelets, full sets that took weeks to finish.

Nadia set things in motion. She knew someone who ran a little shop for artisanal goods. We arranged for her to take my pieces, explaining I wished to remain anonymous; the shop took a small cut. The first batch sold out in three weeks.

“Jane, its mad,” Nadia rang to say. “They ask if youll make more! That labradorite ringthe one you didnt want to part with? Sold in two hours.”

“For how much?”

She told me the sum.

I stepped onto the balcony for air.

In three months, I sold enough jewellery to an amount Id thought unreal. I funnelled the money into a new bank account Id opened myself, at a branch near the solicitors office. Victor didnt know a thing.

Meanwhile, I sourced builders. Not anyone from Victors network, but through forums and café meetings, strictly while he was away. The team I found was small, just four of them, led by Martin, a silent fellow about fifty, who regarded the place as I did, without distaste.

“Good brickwork,” he said, tapping the walls. “New roofs a must. Some of the floor needs replacing. Whole new windows, electrics from scratch, of course. Give us four months as long as theres no hold-up.”

“No hold-ups,” I said, firm.

He looked at menot appraising, simply seeing.

“Agreed.”

Home life trundled on. I played the hostess, attended Victors events, listened to logistics talk and investment chatter. Sometimes, as he spoke, I nodded, thinking of window frames and mezzanines for canvases, of exhibition lighting.

Victor never noticed. Id always been the backgroundso the background remained.

It nearly slipped once: he found a DIY store receipt in my bag; Id picked up paint samples.

“Whats this?” he asked over dinner.

“Picked up a few things for the house,” I answered evenly.

“Some kind of primer.”

“I want to freshen the walls in the cellardamps coming through.”

He shrugged and turned back to his phone. Conversation over in half a minute.

Martin was steady, never hurrying needlessly nor dragging his feet. We talked business, nothing more. Sometimes Id visit, just stand among the hard hats, dust, and Id feel a physical sort of happinessrelief, almost. As if the air had changed.

Nadia came by in Junewindows in, walls smooth.

“Good heavens, Jane,” she sighed, wide-eyed. “This place will be stunning.”

“It will.”

“Have you thought of what to host here? I mean, you need a proper concept, these days.”

“I have. Exhibitionslocal artists, there are so many with nowhere to show. Workshops. Studio lets for those who need workspace. Little café on the ground floor. Book nook.”

“Youve already decided, havent you?” she smiled.

“Ive thought of this for three yearsjust didnt know it was possible.”

In September, I met Katiea dollmaker selling her creations at a local craft fair. She was reading while people drifted past. Unusual dolls, all hand-stitched. I picked one up.

“Did you make these yourself?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“How long have you been doing it?”

“Seven years.” She eyed me. “Do you like them?”

“Very much. Im Jane. Im opening a small art venue nearby, and I need people to work or exhibit there.”

Katie put her book down.

Our group began to grow. Katie knew two artists. One brought along a sculptor, who was friends with a ceramics teacher desperate for a proper studio. By October, I had a list of a dozen waiting for the launch.

The money was nearly gone. I had a handful of pieces left to sell. Martin still needed his final fee, and we required lighting and signage.

I parted with my best setthe one Id meant to keep. Silver and amethyst, two years in the making. Nadia called a day after she brought it in.

“Jane, it went within an hour! The buyer said shed never seen anything like it. Asked if there was more.”

“Theres no more,” I said.

“Are you upset?”

“No,” I replied. It was true.

The new arts space opened in early November. Id made no splashjust posted online, inviting anyone interested. Sixty people turned out on that first evening.

Victor was away on business. Id told him I was with Nadia. He said, “Fine, Ill sort my own dinner.”

I stood in the hall, watching people gaze at the work, talk, pick up Katies dollsand my hands shook not with fear, but the strange happiness of seeing a long-held dream materialise.

Martin came too. He stood by a wall, surveying the place.

“Turned out well,” he said.

“Thank you,” I replied.

“No, thank you,” he nodded.

Things moved faster than I imagined. Studios were snapped up. Ceramics courses were over-subscribed. The café on the ground floor, run by a young woman called Sophie, grew busy by Decemberdrawing not just tenants. Local journalists ran a piece. Then another.

One afternoon, a neighbour from across the lane, a pensioner, stopped me on the street.

“Thats yours, is it?” he nodded at the building.

“Yes, it is.”

“Ive lived here all my life, and this is the first thing worth coming through this alley for. A good thing, that.”

I thanked him and couldnt stop smiling all the way home.

Victor found out in January. Not from me, but from a business contact whod spotted my name in the local paper, pictured at the opening. He mentioned it over dinner.

“Jane,” Victor said that evening, once everyone had left, “theres something you need to tell me?”

I cleared plates, taking my time.

“Yes,” I said. “Make yourself some tea. Sit down.”

I told him everythingabout the inheritance, the building, the renovations, the jewellery. He listened in total silence. His face was unreadable: that business mask of his.

When I finished, he was quiet, then said, “You kept this from me.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

I met his gaze. He actually wanted to knowor thought he did.

“Because if Id told you, Victor, youd have made every decision for me. It wouldve become your project. Not mine.”

“Thats not fair.”

“It isnt,” I agreed. “Neither is never once asking me, in twenty-seven years, what I actually wanted.”

He rose, mug in hand, and stood at the window.

“Do you want me to say Im proud of you?”

“No,” I answered. “You dont need to say anything.”

He didnt.

We spent a few more months together in the same house, but something had shifted. No drama, just a gradual, silent changelike when frost slowly gives way to thaw.

And then came the ball.

Every February, the Manchester Charity Ball brought together the citys business and civic folk. Victor always attended. This year, an invitation arrivedaddressed to me. A committee member called, saying they were introducing a “Best New City Space” award, and my “Bell House”named for Aunt Ninawas on the shortlist.

“Will you be able to attend in person, Mrs Green?” she asked.

“I will,” I replied.

I told Victor that dayI wasnt hiding it. He looked at me as you look at a stranger whose face you only half know.

“Congratulations,” he said stiffly.

“Thank you.”

I bought my dress myselfnavy blue, well-cut, understated. I wore my own jewellery: a labradorite ring Id made as a replacement and garnet studs.

At the ball, we were seated at separate tables. Victor, as always near the mayor and committee; me, among the nominees. I caught his eye as I sat down. He nodded. I nodded back.

The hall was beautiful: gilt plasterwork, crystal chandeliers, an air of old Manchester. Crowds, music, the smell of lilies. I sat upright, recalling that only last year Id have been scraping plates in the kitchen while laughter carried through the wall.

When my category was announced, I walked to the stage. My legs felt heavy, but my steps were steadyno one could tell.

The chairman made a speech about the city needing spaces like ours. Then he named me, handed me a small crystal statuette and an envelope.

“Would you like to say a few words?”

I took the microphone. Silence fell. I saw Nadia with her husband in the back, beaming at me. And I saw Victor. His face was unreadableneither pride nor resentment. Something in between.

“I want to thank those who believed in this place before it even existed,” I said, “the artists, the teachers, everyone who came and stayed And my Aunt Nina, who left me so much more than a building.”

It was a short speech. The room applauded. I walked off, figure in hand, and returned to my seat.

Nadia rushed over during the pause, hugging me tight.

“Janedid you see his face?” she whispered.

“I did.”

“And?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Nothing special.”

Victor found me after, once the dancing began.

“That was a fine speech,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“You look well.”

“Victor,” I said, “dont.”

He hesitated.

“We need to talk. For real.”

“I know,” I said. “We willat home.”

The discussion was longnot a row. We were both past raised voices, truthfullyours had always been a quieter exhaustion. Sitting across from each other, seeing the familiar turned foreign.

I told him I wanted a divorce.

He was silent for ages. Then, “Is there someone else?”

“No. I simply want a life of my own.”

“You have your own life. Now.”

“Yes. I want to keep italone.”

He paced the room.

“The house?” he asked quietly. “What about that?”

“The house is yours,” I said, level. “But the land beneath its mine.”

He stopped dead.

“What?”

I explained evenly: years ago, the freehold for our homes plot was registered through Aunt Nina. A technicality Id discovered only after inheriting Bell House. The solicitor pointed it out; my lawyer confirmed it. The plot beneath our family home belonged to me.

Victor staredtruly taken by surprise.

“Youve known long?”

“I found out during the inheritance process.”

“And you kept quiet.”

“Yes. As you have, about plenty besides.”

He sat down.

We talked for hours. No shouting. No tearsjust two weary, middle-aged people seeing each other at last, or perhaps remembering each other after years apart.

The divorce took three months, amicable and dignified. I left Victor the house, but only after my solicitor set out clear terms. The settlement went into Bell Housewe expanded the café, opened a new gallery upstairs.

I rented a flat. Small, in the same neighbourhood as Bell House. Fourth floor, view over weathered rooftops and a gnarled linden tree, blossoms scenting the air every springeven through closed windows.

That first night, I woke at three, lying in silence. No voices or footfalls, no soft breathing beside me. Just the hum of cars below and the gentle English rain.

I was fifty-three. Alone and unafraid. That felt momentous in itself.

A year passed.

Bell House was thriving. Three permanent craftspeople had studios, ceramic classes ran thrice weekly and were booked months ahead. Sophie turned the café into something warm and welcoming, wooden tables and black-and-white old Manchester photos on the walls; every Friday, a jazz quartet played into the night.

Katie sold all her dolls, had a waiting list for commissions. We became friends the way people do when they meet, precisely, at the right time.

Nadia told me sometimes, “Jane, youve taken ten years offor fifteen!”

“Just getting my sleep at last,” Id laugh.

I still made jewellery, not for money now but for myself. Evenings in my flat, lamp on, silver and gems laid out, and Id work, quietly. Time for myself and no one elses.

I ran into Victor by chance one day in December. I was just leaving a café near Bell House; he was heading the other way, our eyes meeting.

He looked olderperhaps, or maybe I was only seeing him anew.

“Jane,” he said.

“Victor. Hello.”

We stopped. Not an awkward pause, just the gap between two people who once shared everything and now had nothing left to say.

“How are you?”

“Good. You?”

“Fine,” he replied. A beat. “I hear youve opened a second gallery?”

“Yes, just last month.”

“Well done.” He meant it this timesincerity, not the old patronising note. Simply a statement.

“Thank you.”

Another pause. He shuffled his feet.

“Listen,” he began. “Ive a professional query, if you dont mind. Im thinking of renting a space for a small showroom, central location. You dont know, do you, whos renovating property round here? Someone reliable.”

I looked at him, and deep inside me a little echo stirredold instincts, the habits of twenty-seven years. Always answering, always smoothing, helping, managing things for or beside him. It was ingrained.

I smiled.

“No, Victor,” I said, quietly. “Im afraid I dont.”

He was surprisednot offended, simply taken aback.

“Fair enough,” he said. “Understood.”

“Good luck,” I replied.

“And to you.”

We walked off in opposite directions. At the corner, I paused, collar up against the dry, bracing cold. From a side street, the scent of Christmas firs spilled from a market stall.

Tonight Id go to Bell HouseKatie would be hanging her latest series, people would come, Sophie would surely bake, the jazz would swing, voices and laughter lighting the windows bright.

I turned up my collar and walked on.