The country is no longer depressed. The Republic of Ireland football team have qualified for the European Championships in France. My stomach flips a little. This will be the end of Colin around the house all summer. He will be at every game for as long as we carry on through the tournament. This makes me happy and I see long bright nights out on the road with the kids, takeaway chippie chips drenched in salt and vinegar and me stretched out across my big double bed. Peace and harmony. No one to tell me what to do or point out all the things I am doing wrong. Come on, Keano and Martin O’Neill; keep our menfolk away all summer.
Corina is muttering out loud to Facebook, seated in front of our family computer in the kitchen as I take Jade’s new purple-and-black long-sleeved leotard out of the plastic and fold it into her gym bag with a face towel. Possibly I should be washing it first, but I’m the type of person who buys new bed linen or towels and uses them immediately. Clean enough for me. We had spent an hour and a half choosing this in Dance World after I collected them from Laura’s. The assistant had actually closed the shop and we were still there.
‘That’s really pretty,’ I had said four hundred times as Jade posed in front of the mirror jumping and twirling and testing them all out.
‘I’m so bored, Mummy,’ Mark had moaned, sprawled out face down on the hard ground.
‘I know, sweetie, we are going now.’ I pulled him up onto my knee.
‘Are you really going away for two nights, Mummy? Jade said you are.’ His little lip curls downwards.
I wasn’t going to tell him until the last minute as I knew he’d fret.
‘We’ll see,’ I said.
‘You are, Mom. Dad says you’re going on a trip to Oompa Loompa Land this weekend to visit your Oompa Loompa friends.’ Jade falls into the splits, kind of, and it looks sore.
‘I want to come to Oompa Loompa Land, Mummmmyyyyyy!’ Mark roars and pulls at my jacket.
‘Come on, Jade, just get that one, otherwise you are going to be late for gymnastics. Take it off now and, Mark, Daddy’s just trying to be funny. He’s just joking, there is no such place as Oompa Loompa Land.’
‘Daddy is the greatest daddy in the entire world!’ Jade’s bright blue eyes challenge me.
‘He absolutely is and you are very lucky children to have such a terrific daddy! Now let’s go!’ I plaster a wide smile on my face.
As I stuff Mark’s football gear into his bag now, I wonder why Jade said that about her dad? I know she adores him, but it seemed a bit out of context. Corina still sits at the family computer, her legs stretched out, barefoot and noisily dips her hand in and out of the family size bag of Rancheros on the desk.
‘Gotta love pulled pork … eh, yeah, as if that’s a no make-up selfie, love!’ she snorts. ‘Come on, if you are going to do it, do it! Those are double-layered false eyelashes, for crying out loud!’ She munches away to her heart’s content.
‘Who is it?’ I approach her and lean over her shoulder rolling Mark’s blue and white football socks into a ball.
‘Ahh just some girl I know … well, actually, I don’t know her at all – we’re Facebook friends. In fact, I have never actually met her. Just going through her photos. For some strange reason, I think I saw she liked some post of mine there from months ago and I went to investigate. I always find it a bit unsettling when someone likes a picture you posted years ago, don’t you? Are you nearly ready to sit down? I want to see Gogglebox.’ She licks each bacon-flavoured finger carefully, twisting and turning them to be doubly sure. Tonight Corina is in her comfy velour tracksuit and her Uggs sit at the front door. Her wild red curly hair is all scraped back into a high bun, no bits tumbling around her face. Her eyes free from mascara. She is in fact ready for bed and she looks so young. Her face is line free. Sleep. I put her good, wrinkle-free skin all down to sleep! Corina gets bucket loads of sleep.
‘Yeah, sorry, I was so focused on not forgetting gymnastics stuff for Friday afternoon’s competition, I forgot about football tomorrow and I’d nothing washed from last week – just ready. I quickly need to pop up to Jade and take the iPad off her.’
‘In my day I had a cuppa cocoa made on water with my Enid Blyton books by my bedside table,’ sighs Corina nostalgically. ‘Not for the world and Tom Hardy naked sprawled across it would I change that for any iPad. God, the adventures that woman took me on with her Famous Five and her Secret Seven, not to mention Malory Towers and my absolute obsession with Darrell Rivers, and then I moved to St Clare’s where I swapped my obsession onto Pat and Isobel O’ Sullivan. I devoured them all. I used to pretend I was George from the Famous Five – I’d wrap a black towel around my head, turban style, one of Dad’s ties around my fluffy toy dog Max and drag him around behind me as Timmy the dog while I sneaked downstairs for a midnight feast. Which mainly involved me opening a six-pack of Monster Munch and finishing them all, then with my trusty dog I’d hide the empty packets all over the house. Behind the couch, in the overcrowded kitchen drawers. I remember my mother thinking she was getting an early onset of Alzheimer’s every time she went to get the crisps for the lunch boxes … Ahh, those were also the days, crisp sambos for lunch in school. Believe it or not I only told her that a few years ago. Actually, come to think of it Enid Blyton and her wondrous midnight feasts are to blame for the start of my overeating! I’ve just saved myself a small fortune in therapy!’
‘Different world, Corina.’ I sigh as I leave her and make my way up the carpeted stairs and peek into Mark’s room. He is fast asleep. His tiny body curled up in the foetal position with GoGo, his scruffy off-white teddy, under his arm. I love him so much. I feel a huge pang of guilt that I didn’t read another story. He’d begged. I had read four. I was tired. Drained. I still had loads to do. But was I mainly rushing my son to sleep so I could go down and drink wine with Corina? Maybe I was. Turning out his Cars lamp, I kiss him gently on his forehead and then pass across the hall into Jade’s room. American accents hit my ears through her massive soft pink headphones.
‘Time to go to bed, lovey,’ I whisper as I lift the left earphone out from her ear.
She nods and yawns and removes the headphones. She’s tired. The gymnastics always tires her of a Monday, and the late-night on Friday and Saturday. She hands me the iPad and I click it off. And you forgot about her and left her up late last night because you were drinking wine. My guilt, my Red Devil, on my shoulder pokes the black pitchfork into my brain.
Prod.
Prod.
Prod.
‘I love you, boo boo, sleep tight.’ I kiss her forehead.
‘Mom, please … don’t call me boo boo, I really hate it! Even Dad agrees it’s too babyish!’ She grinds her teeth at me as she says this.
‘Sorry, love, I … I forgot. I won’t say it ever again.’ I rub her back.
She’s just over-tired, exhausted. I leave the room.
* * *
‘Make mine a large one.’ I flop on the couch beside Corina, who has now moved into the sitting room in front of my fake, plug-in artificial fire and is watching Gogglebox.
She hands me a glass of red from the table.
‘That Scarlett girl is absolutely hilarious,’ I say as I nod to the TV and raise my glass to my mouth.
‘She should have her own show!’ I add and take a drink. A welcome bitter bite off the wine.
‘So … I think I may have met myself a keeper of a fella.’ Corina makes a wide grinning Cheshire cat face and her tongue does a wild jig outside her mouth.
‘What? Go on!’ I hit mute, slip off my flats and curl my feet under me and put a cushion over my knees. Gogglebox goes on without us in the background. Us watching them watching us.
‘Ah well … I dunno … I met him in Whelan’s last week and we just had a brilliant chat over wet elbows at the bar. He’s from Manchester—’
‘But we had lunch on Sunday,’ I interrupt. ‘And you never mentioned him!’ I bang the pillow with my free hand.
She tilts her head at me and lowers her voice.
‘Now what kinda best mate would I be if I started ranting and raving about a keeper of a fella I’d met and you going through such a bad patch with Colin?’ She raises that perfectly arched eyebrow again.
‘Are they HD brows, Corina?’ I simply have to ask at this inappropriate moment.
‘They are. Vanity Rooms in Stepaside, amazing beauty salon, and I can get yours done for free if you want them: I organised the opening for the two Jennifers, Butler and Swaine, the owners, of their newly revamped rooms the weekend before last. It was so much fun, one girl had been growing her leg hair for two years for charity and got waxed … it was like Toni & Guy at the end of a busy Saturday. Hairtastic.’
‘This guy from Manchester … he lives here, right?’ It hits me.
‘No … just over on his brother’s stag, the Pimple they call him, he bought me a shot … Trevor, that’s his name, not the Pimple … I was about to ask him back to mine and then something happened.’ She leans forward and takes a long, slow sip of her wine.
‘Hang on, I’m confused: is Trevor your guy?’
‘Yes! Keep up! Or as my old auntie Betty used to say: shape up or ship out.’ She rolls her eyes at me, then she reaches up to her bun, pulls her hair free, throws her head over between her legs and scoops her red locks and redoes her bun.
‘Well? What happened!’ I throw my hands up at her.
‘Well, Ali, I decided to make him wait. Fo’ dis.’ Corina stands up and starts to do what I think they call twerking. Her bottom is extended and she is shaking it around. It’s a cross between looking like she really, really needs the loo or she’s just spilled boiling hot coffee all over her lap.
‘“Dis” is worth waiting for, no?’ Her two index fingers point at me as she is half on the ground now.
‘Er … yes … it is?’ I am starting to shake with the laughter as she is now actually on the ground.
‘Giv’us a hand up, will ya?’ She winks at me and I pull her up.
We are in stitches as she sits and goes on.
‘Think I pulled a muscle in my lower back there. So anyway, I didn’t sleep with him on the first date, or on the second or on the third, and I tell you one thing, Ali, this man is falling for me big time! He’s like a little puppy who knows there are cooked sausages in my pocket but he has to be patient and keep sniffing around until I pull them out.’
‘You have had three dates with him and never told me?’ I’m shocked.
‘I didn’t want to jinx it … that sounds so pathetic, I was all geared up to tell you about our fourth date on Saturday night but then you were in such a bad place I thought it wasn’t appropriate.’
‘You saw him four times in one week?’
‘True dat.’ She rolls her shoulders.
‘Why are you talking like that?’ I ask her.
‘Isn’t it hip?’
‘Not really, just confusing. Now go on … Saturday night, what happened?’ I drink a sip.
‘Oh, OK, sooooo …’ She picks up her glass.
There is a knock at the window and we both jump out of our skins.
‘Ffffuuucckkkiinnnggnnnoorraaabatttyyyyy!’ Corina spills red wine all down the front of her cream velour tracksuit.
‘Who the hell is that?’ I turn to the window.
‘Are you expecting someone?’ She grabs the kitchen roll from the glass table and wipes herself down.
‘No!’ I stare at my watch. ‘It’s half nine at night!’ I tiptoe to the window and pull back a tiny inch of fabric from the heavy curtains and there, his perfect nose pressed up against the glass, is Owen O’Neill.
I snap the material back. It waves and ripples before falling still.
‘Well?’ Corina is heavily breathing down my neck. ‘Will I ring the guards? I know a detective in Store Street very well … very, very well – too well, the naughty boy.’
I go red from the tip of my toes to the top of my messy bun.
‘No … It’s … it’s a … well … a work colleague of mine.’ I open the sitting room door and then stand at the front door. Corina is on my shoulder again.
‘You can stay inside.’ I urge her, holding out my hand to touch her elbow.
She eyes me up.
‘No … no, you know, I think I’ll stay with you, just to be on the safe side. You never really know that your work colleagues aren’t serial killers for sure, do you? I mean, look at Jeffrey Dahmer. Who’d have guessed looking at him across the office that that sandy-haired boy could—’
‘Shuuuush!’ I silence her with a long hiss as I slowly open the door.
‘Hey there.’ I release the word on my breath.
‘Hey, sorry, I was just …’ He stands directly under the porch light.
‘Well, hello there!’ Corina pops her head out from behind my body.
He jumps.
‘Oh, shit … Sorry, I didn’t know you had company. Hey … hello there to you too.’ He has moved from under the light now, three paces back into the front garden.
‘Come back! Sorry, I’d frighten a blind postman looking like this.’
He moves towards us and then I smell it. Whiskey. Now I know a lot about Owen and I know that he only drinks whiskey when he’s tortured. Either finishing a painting or desperately hung-over and looking for the cure. Neither of which I feel are the causes this evening.
‘Aren’t you coming in?’ Corina literally hits me with her hip bone out of the way and pulls Owen inside.
‘It’s brass monkeys out there.’ She winks at him and it’s then he knows who she is.
‘A-ha, Corina Martin, I presume.’ He’s chemically relaxed as she nods at me to close the front door and shows him into the front room. I can see Corina can’t take her eyes off him either. He’s incredibly sexy. Too sexy to be calling to my door at Gogglebox Hour with my husband on an overnighter. He’s like the Milk Tray man, all dressed in black, black jeans, his black biker jacket and black beanie hat. And apparently dangerous.
‘Yes, it is! I’m in your life drawing art class actually. I painted the basketball hoop lady? You said it was wonderfully abstract. I was legitimately trying to draw what I saw, but whatever …’ She raises her perfectly plucked, high-definition eyebrows at me in a way that tells me I need to cop myself on. A what-the-fuck look.
‘Huh? Oh, of course, you have met Owen at the City Arts Centre … in the drawing class …’ I say as I spot an imaginary fly and swipe it away.
She knows me well enough. She mutters under her breath. ‘Idontbelievethis.’ He won’t be able to decipher the mumbled words but I do.
Her words waltz around my mind.
We both stare at him as he removes his beanie hat and runs his hands over his head.
Corina makes a small noise like a mouse is caught at the back of her throat.
‘I wasn’t aware you guys were so pally-wally,’ she winks at me.
Cow.
‘Stop, Corina … Eh, can I get you a drink, Owen?’ My palms are sweaty.
Corina moves to the couch and is patting the place beside her for him to join her.
‘I don’t want to intrude …’ He is reluctant to sit until Corina pulls him down.
‘Have a glass of wine with us, sure the bottle’s open.’ She leans forward and grabs the bottle.
‘Another glass, Ali, if you will? And a damp cloth for my wine-stained tracksuit.’ Corina wants the goss.
I make my way into the kitchen and get another glass from the shelf. I cannot believe he’s sitting on my couch. He looks taller, bigger, more real. Big presence. I look at my distorted reflection in the silver oven hood. I lick my index finger and run it under both my eyes. I smooth my hair down, grab a wet cloth and I return like this is a perfectly normal situation and hand Corina the cloth and the glass. It’s Colin’s wine glass, a Waterford crystal one with big bubbles in the glass.
Suddenly the front room door opens quickly and Jade arches her head in.
‘What’s going on?’ she rubs her sleepy eyes and then she focuses on Owen and backs out of the room.
‘Sorry, boo— sorry, Jade, did we wake you?’ I follow her out quickly and shut the door behind me, leaning my back against it now. My breathing heavy and fast.
‘Who is he?’ she asks. ‘And why is yer woman Corina drinking from Dad’s special wine glass? Dad hates her.’ Jade purses her perfect rosebud lips together.
‘Shush! Thank you, Jade, that is enough! Owen is a work colleague dropping over the itinerary for Amsterdam this week … and Corina is my best friend, and she happens to be very good to you. Please have some respect. Didn’t she take you to Miley Cyrus last year?’
I move away from the door and put my hand on the small of her back. It’s a few hours’ bed-warm so I quickly remove my cold hand. We walk back up the stairs.
‘She, like, spent the entire gig on her cell phone, Mom!’ She heaves her chest out.
We walk into her room and I turn her pillow over and hold back the duvet. She slides in. I gently cover her up.
I whisper now.
‘That’s because she can’t stand Miley … but she went just to bring you.’
I can’t stand what Miley preaches myself, or that tongue!
‘She’s so fake.’ She curls up.
I exhale a slow, long, in-labour-type breath.
‘She isn’t … just because Daddy says that about her—’
She interrupts me.
‘Like, she’s so old and isn’t even married – that’s just weird.’
‘You should always take people as you find them, Jade,’ I whisper and I kiss her head. ‘I love you. They’re both leaving soon, so I won’t be long.’
She closes her eyes and wraps her left elbow over her face and I leave the room.
Owen and Corina are in full flow as I re-enter the room. They both give me a secretive look as Corina hands me my glass. I sit on the black leather armchair opposite them.
‘Just telling him about Jade on the bloody iPad … I’m so glad I grew up in the eighties: I did so much stupid shit and there is no record of it anywhere! Here … he’s never had an exhibition! Like, come on. I am the event exhibition queen – I know all the coolest spaces … Tell him, Ali, tell him he should exhibit!’ Her words all blurt out and I can tell she’s not so much flirting but giddy in his presence. Can’t blame her for that.
‘You really should, your work is brilliant.’ I take a long gulp of red wine and it’s oh so welcome.
‘Ah, sure, we’ll see … listen, I only popped in as I was passing … to say, er, I won’t be back in work this week. Colette’s sending me to Belfast tomorrow to an auction of the concept art room at the Belfry Centre. They are closing down, so I’m gonna fly from Belfast on Thursday evening … I’ll just see you in Amsterdam.’ He sits forward, wine glass cupped, resting on his two knees.
Corina is like a spectator at a McEnroe vs. Connors tennis final; her head is sweeping from side to side, studying our faces. Back and forth. She is onto me.
‘Oh, right, that’s good, is it?’ I hold the wine glass over my face.
‘Uh-huh, should be. Should be able to buy some good supplies.’ He is starting to look less merry, more twitchy.
Corina now has her nails in her mouth nibbling. Nibbling and staring.
‘So have you ever been to Amsterdam before, Owen?’ she asks, leaning in to him. I can tell he wants to leave now but she is like a dog with a bone.
‘I was there once actually, about five years ago now, a stag, I don’t remember that much to be honest.’ He laughs, wiping his knuckles slowly across his brow.
‘Classic!’ she says. ‘I’ve never been, I’d love to go, some amazing things to see I hear.’
‘Oh, there are … I was gutted I never went to see Anne Frank’s house!’ He hits his head with the palm of his hand. ‘Idiot!’
‘Oh, I’d absolutely love to see that!’ I butt in. ‘It’s somewhere I have always wanted to see ever since I was in school.’
‘We’ll go Friday—’ he answers me immediately, enthusiastic, and then stops himself. The word we hangs heavy in the air and as I look to Corina her mouth is hanging open, hand about to go in to nibble on a nail, all her actions seem frozen in time. Frozen in our moment. Her expression is one of absolute puzzlement. Like one trying to work out the word conundrum on Countdown with that annoying music in the background.
Owen stands now and says, ‘Thanks for the wine but I better be going – early train.’ He drags his beanie hat over his shaven head.
‘Really great to finally meet you, Corina, properly, I mean. Takes me a while in new classes to get to know students – so many of you, so few of me, you know – but Ali never stops talking about you.’ He puts out his hand and she rises slowly and takes it.
‘My pleasure, Owen, let me know about finding an exhibition space. Honestly I’d love to help … and listen … enjoy Amsterdam, don’t do anything that isn’t illegal.’ She winks at him.
I will kill her.
He turns to me. ‘Thanks again, for the wine, Ali.’
‘Fine … anytime.’
‘You just made a rhyme.’ He laughs.
‘And now I’ll do a mime.’
Ridiculously I start to do my Marcel Marceau window piece across the room and now Corina is literally paling. Horrified expression.
I stop.
He’s laughing. Hard.
‘Most excellent!’ he says and claps lightly, four fingers to bottom of palm.
‘OK, then … see you in Amsterdam, so.’ I am having an out-of-body experience and now I am feeling faint.
‘Lovely.’ He imitates my last move, still laughing at my mime.
Corina slowly zips up her wine-stained tracksuit to the very top. Tight to her neck.
‘Oookkaayyyy … Thank you for that, um, fine performance, Ali, and goodbye then, Owen, again. Till our next class.’ She offers her hand, again.
‘Cool, yeah OK, good luck.’ He shakes it briefly and turns and opens the sitting room door.
Should I walk him out or stay here?
An awkward pause ensues.
‘I’ll show you out, Owen, shall I? I better be heading myself soon too, it is a school night after all.’ Corina steps in.
They leave the room and I drop like the scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz onto the couch and my hands rise to support my face.
‘Arrghhhhhh!’ I moan into my hands.
I hear the Chubb lock close with a sharp click and she returns. I stay the way I am. I hear her knees crack as she sits on the leather chair opposite me and I hear her take her glass from the table. The liquid slides down her throat. Still she waits. Still I wait. She sips again and then replaces the glass. A rattle of glass meeting glass. I take a breath in through my nose.
‘What the actual fuckity-fuck was that?’ she asks. It’s a reasonable enough question.
At last.
‘I don’t know.’ I pull my hands down the skin on my face. Eyes straining from their sockets. Showing the red blood in my veins.
‘Ali!’ Corina slowly shakes her head.
‘It’s nothing … There is nothing …’ My voice doesn’t even sound like my own.
‘Eh, excuse me? That was like being a bed sheet on the set of Mr and Mrs Smith … the sexual tension was off the radar. I want to know everything and I want to know it all right now!’
And then I start to cry.
‘Oh no, Ali … What’s wrong?’ She is off the leather chair and has her arms around me. I smell Jo Malone and Rancheros.
‘Sorry, I don’t know, Corina, it’s Colin … Things are really shit and he’s just so nice …’
‘It’s OK, it’s all going to be OK … I promise.’ She makes soothing noises and rubs my hair gently. I inhale her and I stay cocooned in the comfort of her arms until I stop crying. I’m crying for loads of reasons and they all swim into each other around my brain. Like those fucking sperms for years trying to penetrate my goddamn egg. I’m crying because I’m a fake, I’m not being honest with my best friend; I’m crying because I don’t think I want to be married to Colin any more; I’m crying because I don’t want my marriage to fail; I’m crying because Jade is slipping away from me, I miss my little girl, I miss the little girl who wanted me and only me; I’m crying because of how I feel about Owen and it’s all wrong. I’m crying because I don’t want to be a failure. Corina reaches for the kitchen roll again and tears off another sheet. It’s well-earned its more expensive cartoon endorsement option this evening that kitchen roll. Allegedly wood-chipped though it is.
She gets up and pours us both another full glass of wine. She sits beside me and when I’ve finished blowing my nose and wiping my stinging eyes I stuff the sodden piece of kitchen roll up my sleeve and take the wine she’s offering. We sit side by side on the couch.
‘I’ve never been married, I’ve never been in a relationship that lasted more than three months and I’ve never been the one to finish a relationship ever. By process of elimination, I am not the one to give you advice, love. However, I am worldly, I have opinions and morals and ideals.’ She puts her wine to her mouth and beckons for me to do the same. We both drink. She carefully places her glass back down. ‘But, Ali, this is a dangerous game. This isn’t wise or clever or even fair on anyone – never mind, Colin – I’m thinking about Jade and Mark.’ She puts her hand on my knee.
‘There is nothing going on, though …’ I break off, there is no point in pretending. I’ve gone there in my mind so many times now it feels like I have cheated already.
‘But you would dearly like there to be, right?’
‘But yeah … you’re right,’ I manage the truth.
‘And so would he, right?’ she questions.
‘I don’t know and that’s being one hundred per cent honest. I have never discussed it with him, but I get the impression … that maybe … yeah.’ My voice is small.
‘OK, well, at least nothing has happened yet. Thank God I came here tonight – this is our grannies helping with this intervention. What would have happened if I wasn’t here?’ She blows out air slowly and glugs her wine.
‘Nothing!’ I hiss at her.
‘It’s after ten, feck it, pour me another, I’m getting a cab. Is he why you are, well …’ she pauses, ‘seemingly, lately, for want of a better turn of phrase, looking for a way out?’
Her voice is soft, but I know it’s not exactly sympathetic.
‘I’m not looking for a way out, Corina, you have no idea what it’s like lately.’
‘OK, so we have all the time in the world, tell me … tell me just how bad your relationship really is, Ali. I want it all: warts, farts, slaps … whatever it may be, I want to know the whole lot.’ She sits bolt upright.
‘Oh, it’s not slaps, Corina, I promise you that. Colin has never raised a hand to me.’ I watch her shut her eyes and blow her cheeks out wide in relief.
‘Jesus, thank God.’ She blesses herself and raises her eyes to heaven.
I feel trivial in my want of her attention now. I go on because I have to; I’ve dragged her to this place with me. She only wanted to share a bottle of wine, munch on a few crisps and watch Gogglebox. Now here she is bolt upright on the couch in therapy with me again. I am such a shite friend. So self-absorbed right now and that’s just not Ali Devlin.
‘It’s … it’s … just I don’t think I’m in love with Colin any more.’ I can’t help myself. I plunge her in deeper. Ducking her head below my rising marriage tide. Submerging her in my problems.
She raises her left hand.
‘OK, so tell me stuff. Tell me scenarios. Give me specifics of how bad things are in the marriage. Give me actual examples.’ She never takes her eyes off me.
‘Terrible …’ I whimper at her.
‘More. Give me proper examples, Ali,’ she demands. ‘I want to try and help.’
‘OK, well, we just can’t get along, and I’m desperately unhappy that the kids are hearing us fighting all the time and I have zero attraction physically to Colin any more … I told you that, but what I couldn’t tell you is that I can’t stand it when he touches me. I freeze. How my skin crawls when he wants to make love to me, how I want to scream and run when we are intimate—’ My bottom lip is quivering.
‘Ali, it’s OK … it’s OK … OK … it’s OK, I get it, love,’ she interrupts. Her tone is soft. ‘You have no sex drive … no desire in you …’ She takes a long pause here. ‘But you desperately fancy Owen the artist, yeah?’ She is pointing out my problem, I see this.
‘Yeah,’ I admit.
‘You wouldn’t mind Owen having a grab of your tits now, would you?’
As coarse as this conversation is, it actually feels really good to get this off my chest. Yes, I am mortified, but maybe confessing it will make it go away. Burst its bubble.
‘No … I wouldn’t.’
‘What else is wrong with Colin apart from you not wanting to ride him at the moment?’ she asks, before adding, ‘I’m just trying to get the full picture here, Ali, I’m not trying to do anything else. I’m no Dr Phil’s wife.’
‘He’s just suffocating. I can’t make any decisions – he picks me up on every tiny little thing I do wrong. I’m changing, Corina, and he isn’t. Sometimes, a lot of the time, if I’m honest lately, I just don’t like him at all.’
‘What kind of decisions?’ she probes.
‘Oh, Corina! I dunno! I mean … I wanna shop in Lidl, he wants to shop in Aldi … I wanna go to IKEA and buy new cutlery – I hate our cutlery – he won’t let me, he hates IKEA. It’s not green enough and he says I’m wasting money, that our cutlery is fine … I wanna go on a sun holiday and lie on my back for a week reading Fifty Shades of Tom Hardy, he hates sun holidays and Tom Hardy. He wants to go on an adventure … outdoor sports. I hate adventures and I hate outdoor sports … I want to tell him that his fascination, no addiction, to Manchester United makes me cringe, and … and … and every single day he makes me feel like I’m a really terrible mother …’ I swallow a mouthful of saliva. ‘That is what’s so wrong with our marriage, Corina.’
My last words get through to her, I sense that immediately.
Her eyes dip to the floor for a brief moment and when she looks back up she says slowly, ‘Can’t you talk to him about this?’
‘No, because every time we try to have a conversation we fight and then he always blames me and accuses me of not being able to hold an adult conversation. That makes me feel even more like a shit mother. Then I back off because I don’t want the kids to hear us fighting all the time. That somehow makes me feel like a better mother. Plus, Jade is totally on his side, for some reason, and Mark just gets a tummy ache when we row and then I hate myself even more.’
‘Shit.’ Corina scratches her head.
‘Shit is right.’ I scratch mine.
‘But you do know, Ali, that this Owen guy isn’t the answer to all your prayers. He’s not going to fix you.’
‘I know that, Corina. I wish to God he wasn’t in the picture and that I didn’t fantasise about him, but you asked so I’m telling you,’ I pant.
‘He knew Colin was away tonight, right?’ Her HDs rise again.
‘I think I told him over a shared lentil soup at lunch.’
‘A shared lentil soup?’ Her eyes pop out of her head. ‘Like off the same spoon? In your place of work! What are yee, Mickey Rourke and Kim Basinger?’
‘No! Well, yeah, we shared a spoon, but I bought it. He just tasted it.’
‘Oh, for feck’s sake.’ She stands. ‘He’s dangerous, Ali. He shouldn’t be coming here at night like that with the children asleep upstairs. He should be staying far, far away from you. I’m guessing he knows all you just told me about Colin though, right?’
I nod. ‘Most of it, yeah.’
‘And I’m guessing he’s totally single, free-as-a-bird available?’
Again I nod.
Corina sits back down now on the couch and lifts her glass from the table. She swirls the dark red liquid as she stares into Colin’s huge bubble wine glass.
‘Like I said, I can’t tell you what to do. But I wouldn’t throw all this away without trying to fight for it. And I especially wouldn’t have an affair, Ali. Shitty people have affairs, horrible people. That is not you.’
The Gogglebox credits roll and we look each other in the eye.
‘I better Hailo. I’ve to be in the convention centre at seven thirty.’ She rummages in her bag for her phone.
‘I feel like a total tit,’ I whisper the words hard at her.
She doesn’t look up for a minute and then she does.
‘Love is blind, lust is fleeting. The Owen thing … it will pass.’ She stands again. ‘Four minutes, gotta love the Hailo app.’ She stuffs her scarf into her bag.
I stand and walk over to where she’s pulling on her dark brown ankle Uggs by the door.
‘Thanks for listening.’ I hug her tightly.
‘I love you, Ali. God, I only want for you to be happy. If he was hitting you, then that would have been a totally different situation. I’d have you and those kids in my house by now and the guards up Colin’s arse. But this is different … and look, if things can’t work with Colin, then so be it, but you owe it to those two beautiful little people upstairs to at the very least give it a try. Couples’ counselling, yeah?’ she advises again in as many days. She winks at me.
I nod my head and for the first time I feel maybe there is a chance for Colin and me. Maybe just maybe therapy can help us. You always hear the cases, don’t you? Of marriages that survived a crisis and became stronger than ever.
‘You’re right, thanks. What would I do without you?’
‘Well, ye’d have a clean liver for one.’ She winks at me again.
Her phone rings.
She slides across the answer button.
‘Thanks, Rajah, I will be right out.’
We walk to the door and as I open the front door I hold it ajar for a second.
‘I never heard properly about Trevor, he sounds great.’ I scratch my head again; my anxiety is through the roof.
‘Next time.’ She seems suddenly tired now as she kisses me on the cheek. I look down; the headlights from the taxi cab illuminate my driveway and her ankle Ugg boots.
I watch her slide into the back seat and I make a mental note of the driver and the registration plate as we always do. Closing the hall door quietly, I make my way through the living room and the kitchen tidying up as I go. The family computer is purring at me so I sit and I log out of Corina’s Facebook account and enter my own details. My messenger pops on my screen four new messages, all from Owen O’Neill.
I just presumed you were alone
Sorry
Did I make things awkward for you?
Incredible mime my friend!
I laugh out loud. I can see he’s currently on Facebook via the chats so I type back.
Why didn’t U call? Send.
Nah Corina’s totally fine, she knows the shit I’m goin through with Colin. Send.
He’s typing back.
I just called in on a whim
‘Backfired’
I type:
No was delighted 2 see U … It’s fine. Send.
I’ll miss U 2morro. Send.
I sit and wait. He is still active.
I’ll miss you more
My breath escapes in a burst of excitement. I can’t say anything else. I mustn’t. I hover the cursor in the shape of a little white arrow now over the X in the red box at the top of my screen. Then I click it and the page closes down. I go to bed.