Tasha slumped on a mossy tree stump and burst into noisy sobs. Buzz and Bean, her parents’ terriers, paused for a moment to look at her quizzically, before resuming their thorough exploration of the surrounding woodland. They were in Surrey for the weekend. The children were busy building a den with Charlie and Bertie, and Lizzie had rushed off to a parish council meeting. Tasha, needing to get away from Charlie and the kids and regroup, had taken advantage of the rare opportunity for solace, offering to walk the dogs.
The journey down had tested her already limited patience to breaking point. It was an unfeasibly warm day and the air-conditioning unit was not working, a job that Charlie had been promising to sort for ages, the car being one of the increasingly few items under his remit. The children had been hot and bothered, the car seeming to magnify the heat of the sun like a miniature greenhouse. They had become increasingly fractious the longer they had been cooped up inside, desperate to escape the minute they’d arrived. Tasha and Charlie had argued about the air-conditioning. ‘The car is your one job, why can’t you just bloody do it?’ she had muttered through gritted teeth.
‘Actually, I think you will find that I do have another job, funnily enough,’ Charlie had replied, his sarcasm doing nothing to quell her irritation.
‘I’ve been reminding you for months.’
‘And I will do it. I’ve told you. Now leave it.’
She had been fighting back emotion throughout the course of lunch, absurdly close to tears and unsure why. Now, finally alone, she let the tears roll down her cheeks freely. Taking a deep breath, she looked around her. She tried to stay present, to savour the effect of the dappled light as it sprinkled through the leaves. It was silent apart from the odd chirrup. Alone with her thoughts, Tasha was forced to admit just how unhappy she felt. It had been building up slowly but surely for months now, this feeling of frustration, of dissatisfaction. She swung between moods in the blink of an eye, veering from joyous happiness and love for her three children to feelings of intense claustrophobia, irritation and resentment at the endless monotony of being a full-time mum. She was trying not to begrudge Charlie his freedom, but she could feel herself losing the battle, becoming more short-tempered and less tolerant of his uselessness around the house, his lack of attention.
Pulling herself together, Tasha rummaged in her pocket for a tissue and blew her nose. She wiped her eyes and took a steadying breath, filling her lungs with the smell of damp earth and fresh air. Tasha knew she needed to talk things through with Charlie. She needed to tell him how she was feeling. It was madness that she was sitting here, alone in the middle of a wood, crying her eyes out. Charlie had no idea that she was so mentally unhinged. She vowed that she would address her feelings that evening and talk to him. Rosie had been right, she always felt better when they had discussed whatever was bothering her. She wanted to bring up missing Steph’s engagement drinks; she knew she should have dealt with it better at the time but it wasn’t too late to do so now. It would give her the perfect opportunity to talk through some of the dissatisfaction she was feeling. Perhaps they could even talk about her going back to work, whether retraining as a GP or to do something new. She just wanted him to listen to her, to support her.
*
That evening they went up to their room after a delicious meal with Lizzie and Bertie; both of them had had a few glasses of wine and she was feeling much more relaxed.
‘Charlie?’ she said, as they got into bed.
‘Yes?’
‘Before you go to sleep, there’s something I want to talk to you about.’
‘Right…’ He turned to face her, clearly trying to work out what she might be about to say.
‘I know I should have said something at the time, but I felt too annoyed to talk calmly.’ Charlie looked blank. She continued, ‘The evening when I was meant to be going to Steph’s?’
At this Charlie rolled his eyes and sighed loudly. ‘For God’s sake! You aren’t still going on about that, are you?’ Hardly the reaction she had been hoping for. The repressed feelings inside her welled up like a tide and overflowed.
‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ Her eyes filled with tears, which she furiously instructed to beat a hasty retreat.
‘I told you on the phone at the time that I was sorry. It was not my fault. Do you think I want to be stuck at work for hours on end, Tash? I would much rather have been home drinking wine in front of the TV.’
This incensed Tasha even more. She hadn’t meant the conversation to go like this, but he had jumped straight into the deep end. ‘How hard would it have been to send me a text? Surely that’s not too much to ask?’
‘Business meetings don’t really work like that,’ Charlie said. ‘I suppose it’s hard for you to understand…’
By this point Tasha was smarting. ‘Don’t patronise me,’ she warned through gritted teeth, mindful of Flora and Bella who were sharing a room next door. ‘Of course I understand what a business meeting is like. I’m trying to talk sensibly about this and you are just making snide remarks. For God’s sake, will you just grow up?’
‘I’m the one that needs to grow up? You have one night where you can’t see your friends and you are acting as if it is the end of the world!’
‘It’s not the end of the world, Charlie. It was important to me. The fact that you can’t see that is seriously worrying.’
‘Well, I’m not worried. I got stuck in a meeting. Yes, it would have been great if I had been able to call you with enough time to arrange childcare but we both know how unpredictable my job is. I’m sorry you missed out but it’s in the past now. You can rearrange another dinner and we can book a babysitter as backup if I can’t get home… I don’t mind paying for childcare if it keeps us from having this conversation again and again.’
‘You are missing the point. It was that dinner I wanted to be at – to celebrate with all my friends…’
‘There’s no use harping on about it, Tasha.’
‘I’m not “harping on”, Charlie. I am trying to explain how I feel and you’re not trying to understand. You’re just jumping down my throat and treating me as if I am being pathetic.’
‘Look, I’m sorry, Tash. It was unfortunate, that’s all. Now let’s agree to forget about it.’
He pecked her on the cheek and closed his eyes. ‘Night, night,’ he said. ‘Sleep tight.’
That was clearly the end of it.
Tasha felt extremely unsatisfied. That hadn’t gone to plan at all. She had meant to have a sensible discussion and explain to Charlie how she was feeling at the moment, not just about that evening but about so much more than that. As she looked at Charlie she realised just how distant she felt from him. She knew that communication was the only way to bridge the gap but conversations like the one they’d just had did nothing but make her feel worse.
She watched Charlie as his breathing became regular and deep, the sound of him sleeping. His face couldn’t be more familiar, yet it felt strangely unfamiliar. She suddenly longed for her own space, to have her own bed and some time alone. There were no spare rooms in the cottage. She contemplated going downstairs and sleeping on the sofa but couldn’t risk her parents finding her and having to explain why she wasn’t in bed. She lay awake once again, staring at the ceiling. Her head was in a spin, her emotions running high. Her heart felt as if it was beating too fast, too heavily. Tears welled in her eyes once again. She took a deep breath and told herself not to be silly. She was fine. Her marriage was fine. She reminded herself that she was blessed to have a husband and three children who she loved more than anything in the world. She tried to quell her thoughts and drift off to sleep but Charlie’s words kept replaying over and over again in her head.