Sushi for Beginners - Marian Keyes [165]
‘Right,’ he said quietly.
‘Come over tonight,’ she urged. ‘Please. You’re going to Edinburgh in a few days and I won’t see you for a week. I promise not to fall asleep.’
He conceded a half-smile. ‘You have to sleep at some stage.’
‘I’ll stay awake long enough for, um – I’ll stay awake long enough,’ she promised, with innuendo.
She had been neglecting him. She couldn’t actually remember the last time they’d made love. Probably only a week or so ago, but that was too long. She couldn’t help it though: she was so stressed, and knackered. It was actually a relief that he was going away.
‘If you’re too tired I don’t want to put you under pressure.’ His eyes were concerned.
‘I’m not too tired.’ She could manage one night, couldn’t she?
Roll on August the thirty-first. After that, everything would be back to normal.
*
Red-eyed and agitated, Clodagh surveyed the kitchen table. There was nothing left to iron. She’d done everything: Dylan’s T-shirts, his shirts, his underpants, even his socks.
The guilt, the guilt, the horrible corrosive guilt. She could hardly bear herself, she wanted to tear her skin off with self-hatred.
She was going to make it up to all of them. She was going to be the most devoted wife and mother there ever was. Craig and Molly were going to eat everything on their plates. She moaned softly – what kind of mother had she become? Giving them biscuits on tap, letting them stay up as late as they wanted. Well, no more. She was going to be so strict. Borderline dangerous, in fact. And poor Dylan. Poor devoted, hardworking Dylan, he didn’t deserve this. The betrayal, the terrible cruelty, the cold withdrawal of her love: she hadn’t been able to let him touch her since she’d started this affair.
Affair. Her breath spasmed in her chest – she was having an affair. She swayed with vertigo at its enormity. What if she got caught? What if Dylan found out? Her heart nearly seized up at the thought. She was going to stop this now. Right now,
She hated herself, she hated what she was doing, and if she stopped before anyone found out, she could make everything all right, almost as if it had never happened. Fired by resolve, she picked up the phone. ‘It’s me.’
‘Hi, me.’
‘I want this to stop.’
He sighed. ‘Again?’
‘I mean it, I’m not going to see you any more. Don’t ring me, don’t call to the house. I love my children, I love my husband.’
After a crackly pause, he said, ‘OK.’
‘OK?’
‘OK. I understand. Goodbye.’
‘Goodbye?’
‘What else is there to say?’
She replaced the phone, unexpectedly cheated. Where was the warm reward for having done the right thing? Instead she felt dissatisfied and empty – and stung. He hadn’t put up much of a fight. And he was supposed to be crazy about her. Bastard.
Earlier, she’d entertained a daft notion that she was going to darn the holes in Dylan’s socks in another desperate attempt to demonstrate her love for him. But as she desultorily returned to the kitchen, all her housewifely resolve melted. Fuck it, she thought listlessly, Dylan could buy new socks.
Almost against her will she ran back to the hall, snatched the phone and pressed the redial button.
‘Hello,’ he said.
‘Get over here now.’ Her voice was tearful and angry. ‘The kids are out, we have until four o’clock.’
‘I’m on my way.’
It was eight-thirty before Ashling left the office. Nauseous with exhaustion, she couldn’t face the ten-minute walk home, so she got a taxi. Slumping back, she checked the messages on her mobile. Only one. From Marcus. He wouldn’t be coming over tonight, something about having to go to a gig. Thank God, she exhaled. Now she could ring Clodagh, then go straight to bed. And in two weeks’ time, when all this was over, she’d make it up to Marcus…
As she got out of the taxi