Second Chance - Jane Green [103]
Saffron has passed out on a pink and orange inflatable bed in one of the bedrooms off the gallery upstairs. The children are fast asleep, Anna and Holly are in the kitchen making coffee, and Olivia is helping Paul bring logs in from the shed outside to keep the fire going.
It is almost as cold inside the house as it is outside. Holly leans back on the counter as Anna puts the kettle on the stove and practises blowing smoke rings with her breath.
‘I am really sorry,’ Anna mutters, rubbing her hands together over the gas flame of the stove. ‘I think the pipes must have frozen or burst or something. I cannot say I expected to have a load of friends down just yet.’
‘I think we’re probably all much hardier than we look,’ Holly says. ‘Anyway, I for one certainly feel spoilt by the way we live. It seems ridiculous to have all the stuff we have, and this feels sort of like getting back to basics. This barn is gorgeous, and it just makes you realize that you only need a few things to make it perfect – a sofa, a table…’
‘… beds.’ Anna laughs.
‘Well, yes, but not all the things that we all tend to collect. I just feel like I have so much, and all of it’s so unnecessary. I just don’t need all of this stuff.’
‘Paul said you’d brought most of the stuff with you…’ Anna turns to give Holly a questioning look. ‘Is everything okay?’
‘Well, I feel like saying it’s a long story, but it really isn’t.’ She takes a deep breath. ‘I think I’ve left Marcus.’
‘I should say I’m surprised, but I am not.’ Anna frowns.
‘I have a feeling that nobody is. The truth is, Anna, I haven’t been happy for ages. Years, I think. Not that there haven’t been happy moments within that time, and obviously I’ve got my wonderful children, but I think it just dawned on me really recently that the thing that’s making me so unhappy is the one thing I haven’t been able to face.’
‘Your marriage.’
‘My marriage. For so many reasons. I never see Marcus, I don’t feel that we have a marriage, or a partnership of any kind.’ Holly sighs deeply. It is good to finally talk about this, to say all these hidden thoughts out loud, the thoughts that have kept her awake night after night for months. The thoughts she was too frightened to face.
‘I don’t feel that we’re nice to each other,’ she continues. ‘There’s no kindness or respect or love. And by the way, I’m just as bad to him. It feels like we’re in a constant war of words and wits, our humour always at the other’s expense.’
‘Do you think he loves you?’ Anna asks.
Holly sighs. ‘I think he loves who he wants me to be, which isn’t who I am. I don’t think he’s the slightest bit interested in any parts of Holly that don’t fit the picture he has of me in his mind, so I’ve become someone else, a Holly I don’t recognize. And although it’s fun to step into somebody else’s shoes, to play a part for a while, it’s finite. It’s not something you can do for ever.’
‘To thine own self be true,’ Anna says. ‘My grandfather always used to say that, except in Swedish, obviously.’
‘It’s so true.’ Holly nods. ‘I haven’t been true to myself at all. I understand the reasons why I married him. On paper he seemed to be everything I thought I should want. I was completely on the rebound, and he appeared to offer such a glamorous, steady, wonderful life. I thought… well… I suppose I knew I wasn’t in love with him, but I thought we’d have a different kind of love. I thought it would grow, and I kept telling myself that passion always dies, so it didn’t matter if you didn’t have it there in the beginning, and that the important thing is that you’re best friends.’
Anna tilts her head. ‘It sounds like you never thought it was possible to have passion and a best friend.’
Tears suddenly fill Holly’s eyes. ‘I didn’t. I didn’t think I could do better than Marcus, and he seemed to adore me, and, honestly, I’d never been adored and I thought that was enough.’
‘I hope you do not take this the wrong way,’ Anna says carefully, ‘but that night we all came over for dinner, when Paul and I left, he asked me if I thought the marriage was okay.’
‘He did?