Never Kiss a Man in a Christmas Jumper Read online

  It didn’t seem real. I couldn’t let it be real. Our marriage had survived way too much for it to fall to pieces now. Me getting pregnant when we were both student doctors working twenty-hour days. Lucy arriving, Ollie soon after; struggling to cope on one wage as Simon carried on with his residency. The miscarriage I’d had a few years ago, which devastated us both, even though we hadn’t planned any more … seventeen years of love and passion and anger and boredom and resentment couldn’t end with an e-mail, surely?

  Except I knew marriages did end, all the time. At the school where I work as a teaching assistant, the deputy head’s husband had recently run off with a woman he met through an online betting website. Apparently they bonded over a game of Texas Hold ’Em and next thing she knew, he’d buggered off to Barrow-in-Furness to start a new life. And my sister-in-law Cheryl divorced my brother Davy after twenty-two years, once the kids had grown up and she realised he was only 10 per cent tolerable, and 90 per cent tosser.

  As you enter your forties, it feels like the bad news overtakes the good. More cheating spouses and tests on breast lumps, and a lot fewer mini-breaks to Paris. I’d seen enough marriages crumble to know the risks.

  I suppose I’d always thought, maybe a bit smugly, that Simon and I were solid. Solid as a big, immovable, maybe not particularly inspiring, rock. More Scafell Pike than Kilimanjaro, but still solid.

  ‘Mum,’ shouted Ollie, having walked into the room without me so much as noticing his size ten feet stomping through the hallway, ‘stop!’

  ‘Stop what?’ I said, wiping my hands on the tea towel. My face was wet. I hadn’t even noticed I’d been crying. I wiped that with the tea towel too.

  ‘Stop spreading mayo on that chocolate log, because it’s going to taste like puke – are you going senile or what? And are you … crying?’

  I glanced down. It looked a bit like a scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, where everybody was trying to sculpt a big hill out of mashed potato. Except ruder – because a chocolate log covered in a white creamy substance does look kind of gross.

  I scraped it all into the bin and took a deep breath. The tears were still flowing. Even if my brain wasn’t quite processing what was going on, my emotions had kicked in against my will. I swiped my fingers across my face to wipe the tears away, smearing my cheeks with chocolate mayo cake.

  Should I tell the kids or not? Was there any point, if it wasn’t real? Perhaps I needed to read that e-mail again. He had said it wasn’t to do with me. That he just had some issues to work through. Maybe he’d go on a retreat to Tibet and fix himself, and all this emotion would have been for nothing.

  Maybe I should wait and see what happened. What he had to say for himself. The Simon I knew, the Simon I’d loved for so long, wouldn’t do this. Maybe it was just a rough patch. Maybe he’d come round tomorrow, see me in my finest negligee and realise the error of his ways. He’d come crying into my arms, and bury his head in my heaving bosom … except I don’t own a negligee. Or anything more sexy than a T-shirt from the local garage that says ‘Honk here for service’ across the boobs.

  When you’ve been married for seventeen years, have two teenaged children and are almost forty, you’re more likely to be shopping at Mother Malone’s Big Knicker Emporium than Ann Summers. Maybe that was the problem. Maybe I should have been greeting Simon at the door every night dressed in garter belts and stockings, bearing a G&T with a blow-job chaser.

  ‘Come and sit down, Mum, I’ll make you a cup of tea,’ Ollie was saying, carefully taking the knife from my hands and putting it on top of the fridge. He gently placed his arm round my shoulders and guided me over to the sofa. He’s already much taller than my five foot five, and it’s disconcerting to have to look up at your own baby.

  I realised then how seriously he was taking my newfound pallor and altered mental state – he’d actually taken his iPod earphones out, and they were dangling like silver tendrils down the front of his I Heart Tolkien T-shirt.

  ‘What’s up, Mum? You look terrible. Has there been an accident? Is it Lucy? Have you finally accepted you should have let that priest do the exorcism when you were up the duff?’

  His lame attempt at humour both warmed my heart and made me feel even worse. I felt more tears welling up in my eyes, running down my face in big, fat, chocolaty drops, pooling under my chin and making my neck soggy.

  I stared into space while the deluge continued, barely able to breathe between sobs, lovely Ollie patting my hand and looking slightly more hysterical with every passing moment.

  He jumped up as he heard the front door slam – I don’t think he’d have cared if it was a gas salesman, or a hooded figure carrying a scythe. It was the cavalry as far as he was concerned.

  My own heart did an equally big jig – was it him? Was it Simon, coming home to tell me it had all been a mistake? Telling me he was sorry? Telling me to forget all about it? I felt so impossibly weak, so impossibly broken by his proposed absence, that the thought of him walking back through that door was like being zapped by a defibrillator.

  ‘What the fuck’s going on here?’ Lucy shrilled at us as she stormed into the living room. Not Simon after all. Someone much scarier.

  Lucy is five foot eight, most of it legs, and does a very good storm. Hands on hips, she stared down at her weeping mother, fidgeting brother, and the tea towel smeared with the remains of mayo-on-sponge. She narrowed her eyes and threw her head back. Her hair didn’t budge – probably because it was dyed midnight blue-black, straightened, and glued to her head with industrial-strength hairspray.

  ‘Tash, Soph!’ she yelled. ‘Bugger off, will you? Mommy dearest is having some kind of spaz attack and I need to deal with the dramatics … ’

  I heard a very impolite sniggering from the hallway, and a slight creak of the door as the Devil’s Daughters sneaked a peek at the crazy woman.

  They might listen to a lot of songs about the unbearable agonies of stubbing your toe on a guitar amp, but they had no empathy with a real-life human being at all. They’d be more upset at missing an episode of The Vampire Diaries than seeing me in tears, and I’d known them since they were four. They departed in a fit of giggles.

  Lucy looked down at me, not knowing quite how to behave for a change. Her usual loving approach – verbal abuse combined with facial representations of complete contempt – normally served her well, but she was clearly a bit unsettled by all the tears.

  ‘Okay, Mother, what’s the big deal? I know this is probably just some stupid retarded midlife crisis, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt – have you got cancer?’

  Momentarily thrown by a worldview where having cancer was preferable to a midlife crisis, I managed to stop my sniffling and stem the torrential waterworks. Attagirl, Lucy.

  ‘No, I haven’t got cancer,’ I said, feeling poor Ollie deflate slightly beside me with relief – he’d obviously feared something similar. But, unlike my darling daughter, he’d actually given a shit.

  ‘It’s your Dad … ’

  ‘Has he got cancer?’ interrupted Lucy, kicking her Converse-clad feet impatiently against the coffee table. She was dressed in leggings with black and purple hoops, and could have passed for the Wicked Witch of the West.

  ‘And if he has got cancer, is it in some disgusting place like his testicles? Because I’m telling you now there is no way I am going to sit around listening to people discuss my Dad’s balls—’

  ‘No, no, your Dad’s balls are fine…well, I suppose they are, I haven’t seen them up close recently…’

  ‘Oh, gross, Mum!’ cried Ollie, making gagging gestures with his fingers in his throat and pretending to vomit. Lucy looked similarly disgusted at the mere mention of me in close proximity to her father’s genitals. Clearly she preferred the theory that she had been hand-delivered by Satan’s stork.

  ‘Oh, just shut up, both of you!’ I said. ‘Your Dad, and his testicles, are okay – but he’s leaving us. No, that’s not right. Not us – me. He�
��s leaving me. For a while. Just for a bit, while he gets his head together. I’m probably being dramatic for no reason. But…well, I only just found out. He told me today. Kind of. He e-mailed me today, actually—’

  ‘Hang on a minute – did you say e-mail? Are you telling me he frigging e-mailed you to say he was doing a runner?’ asked Lucy, incredulously.

  ‘Yes, well, you know how busy he gets at work…’

  ‘Oh for fuck’s sake Mum, you,’ she replied, leaning down over the sofa and poking one of her fingers in my face so hard that I went cross-eyed, ‘are such a loser! He e-mails you to say he’s walking out and you justify it because he’s busy? This isn’t about him, it’s about you. You’re a doormat. You’ve got no backbone. You’re just a human being made of fucking jelly. No wonder he left you – you probably bored him to death!’

  Exit Lucy, stage left, in a cloud of sulphurous smoke. I could practically feel the ceiling shake as she stomped up the stairs to her room, slammed the door, and started blasting music so loudly through her speakers that nomadic tribespeople in Uzbekistan would be wondering where the party was and if they should bring a bottle.

  Oh good. The Afterbirth again. My favourites.

  Chapter 2

  ‘Nobody else my arse,’ said my sister-in-law Diane on the phone from Liverpool. ‘There always is, Sal. It’s rule number one in the big book of rules about men – they never, ever leave a woman unless there’s someone else to go to, no matter how miserable they are. They treat their sex lives like a relay race – they always need to pass the baton…’

  Phallic imagery aside, I knew she had a point. And Di should know. She was married to my brother Mark, who was pretty much the best of a bad bunch, but they’d really gone through the mill when they were younger. He’d had affairs. She’d had affairs. It got to the stage where they needed a PA to remind them of who was shagging who. Eventually all the mistresses and toy boys became a burden, and they decided to have an affair with each other instead. Two decades on, they’re still married, so they must have done something right.

  It was the day after my exciting e-mail treat, and the kids were handling it about as well as could be expected. Lucy was out, probably scaring toddlers in the local park as she sat having a fag in the playground with the Demon Twins. Ollie was upstairs in his room, playing Lords of Legend online.

  And Simon was due to come round any minute.

  ‘But he says he needs to find himself, Di. Don’t you think there could be some truth in that? We’ve all been so busy for so long since the kids came along, and there’s his work. What if he genuinely just needs a bit of time and space?’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ she snorted, ‘of course. Let’s face it, Sal, any man who spends as much time in front of the mirror as Simon does shouldn’t have any problem with finding himself. And, as for his work, are we supposed to feel sorry for him because he’s successful? That could’ve been you if things had worked out differently. I know you wouldn’t be without the kids – well, not Ollie anyway – but if Mr Lover Lover Man hadn’t got you knocked up when you were still a student, you’d be a doctor too.

  ‘He couldn’t have done everything he has without you at home backing him up. So don’t give me that “finding myself” crap. Take my word for it, he’s got some little tart he’s shacking up with who gives him seven blow jobs a day and treats him like God. I know it’s not really in your nature, but you need to find your inner bitch. He deserves it for dumping you by e-mail.’

  ‘I know,’ I said, ‘I keep thinking I might have missed something and opening it again…For a while I convinced myself it wasn’t real, it was some kind of freaky spam …Anyway, better go – he’ll be here soon. Thanks for all the advice and I’ll try to stay tough, okay?’

  ‘Okay love, you do that – and you better not have ironed those bloody shirts!’

  I put the phone down, still marvelling at the thought of a woman who had the time – never mind the oral dexterity – to give seven blow jobs a day. How would that even be possible? She’d have to go to work with him, and live under his desk. And it could be really distracting when he was in surgery – she’d have to scrub in, and even then I’m not sure it would be hygienic…

  Had Simon and I ever reached those levels of sexual athleticism? Maybe – but if we had, we’d been too drunk to notice. I was only 21when we met, and sex at that age is all about enthusiasm, not expertise. And, in our case, it was also all about the contraception. Or lack thereof. Before long I was puking my guts up on morning rounds at St Sam’s, realising I was pregnant with the blob of cells that would become Lucy. She was a lot less trouble then.

  I spent the next four weeks vomiting. Simon spent the next four weeks planning our wedding – or at least his mother did, as soon as she found out what was going on. She was a force to be reckoned with and we weren’t left much choice. Within minutes of peeing on the pregnancy test, she told us when and where we’d be getting married. I was too tired to care really, and Simon – well, he’d come from money, and respectability, and having a bastard child in his twenties was never going to be part of the plan.

  Up until now I thought we’d made the right choices. For everything I’d given up, I’d gained tenfold. A good man, two healthy children, a nice home. It was more than most people got, and I’d been content. On the whole.

  But maybe I’d got it all wrong. Maybe I should have spent more time getting blow-job lessons at the local College of Sex. Seven times a day? Really, was it possible?

  Simon had texted me to say he’d be round at 11, so he must be taking a break from his BJ schedule for at least an hour. He was always on time for everything; it was a point of pride with him, so I had exactly ten minutes left. Ten minutes left to rehearse speeches I knew wouldn’t come out right, as I didn’t have a clue how his side of the script went. I didn’t know if Diane was right about there being someone else, or how I’d cope with it if there was.

  I’d got up early, exhausted after a disjointed and dream-ridden night’s semi-sleep. My eyes were swollen and stinging from fatigue and tears. I’d walked the dog, cried, had a shower, cried, done the ironing, cried, and had a Force Ten row with Lucy, all before calling Diane. I’d also tried on three different outfits and rearranged my hair several times before giving up in disgust. I mean, where are the style guides on How To Look Good Dumped? Or What Not To Wear While Confronting Your Probably Cheating Husband? You never see that on bloody telly, and I bet it’s not just me who needs it.

  Physically, I’m not in bad nick considering I am, as my kids charmingly put it ‘halfway to dead’, but I’m definitely at the stage in life where the perfection of youth is a distant memory.

  I’m in a gym, but in all honesty the only pounds I lose are from my bank balance. I had been hopeful that the sheer effort of carrying round a membership card in my purse would reinstate me to my size 10 glory days, but apparently not. What a con.

  I still fit into a size 14, or at least most of me does. But I have a wobbly blancmange tummy that never left after childbirth, and my derrière is, diplomatically speaking, comfortable. My boobs are too big for their own good, and need an awful lot of help from a very strong push-up bra fairy. I’d ‘let myself go’, as my gran might have said.

  Eventually, after a load of fretting that did nothing but get me hot and bothered, my hair had ended up in its usual slightly unruly shoulder-length bob, and I stuck with jeans and a T-shirt. I had no idea what to go for – seductive, dignified, aloof? All I felt was shattered and confused. And I knew the fact that I was focusing so hard on clothes and preparations was just a way of avoiding the ugly truth: the fact that my marriage, and life as I knew it, could be over.

  I heard the key in the door, accompanied by an inappropriately cheery ‘Hello!’ as Simon arrived and let himself in.

  He was wearing a pair of new jeans – at least jeans I’d never seen before. Skin-tight on the thighs and boot cut. His fair hair was styled slightly differently, swept straight back and gelled rather
than parted in his traditional ‘trust me I’m a doctor’ look. And he smelled – a lot. Of some quite powerful cologne or aftershave that he’d never used around the house. He looked younger, and cooler, and actually pretty damn handsome. It was him – but not him. It was his sexier evil twin.

  ‘You’re having an affair with some little tart who gives you seven blow jobs a day and treats you like God, aren’t you?’ I said immediately.

  I just knew – from the second he walked into the room, I could tell. It wasn’t only the new style and the new smell – it was the new swagger.

  He was trying desperately to hold a serious and sympathetic expression on his face, but I could see it there in his eyes: a newfound confidence, self-belief…happiness, I suppose. The bastard.

  He sat down next to me on the sofa, taking my hand in his and looking at me with that same sympathy. The look I’d seen on his professional face so many times over the years. The one that said: ‘I am the bearer of bad news, but don’t worry, I’m here for you.’

  ‘Don’t lie Simon – I can see it all over you. There’s somebody else, so don’t deny it. How long has it been going on?’

  ‘Oh Sal,’ he said, ‘I’m so sorry…I never wanted to hurt you, I really didn’t…I wasn’t looking for this. It just happened. We’ve drifted apart so much in recent years. I honestly don’t think you’re happy either…’

  I slapped his hand away and looked straight ahead. I couldn’t bear to see that sparkle he was trying to hide, the way he was sad about destroying me, but unbearably happy for himself. The emotional conundrum of the newly freed male.

  ‘What do you mean you weren’t looking for it? Did you accidentally fall into another woman’s vagina, then?’

  ‘There’s no need to be crude about it, Sal; it’s not like that! It’s not just the sex…’ – the never-ending, headboard-pounding, scream-out-loud sex, I added in my own mind’s eye – ‘it’s more than that. I’m in love with her. You have to believe me when I say I’d never do anything to intentionally make you suffer, or the kids. I wouldn’t be doing this if it weren’t serious. But I just couldn’t go on like we were any more. You must know what I mean!’