Page 42 of The Work Husband

TWENTY

I didn’t say anything about what Zahra had told me – not to Sam or to anyone else – because she’d asked me not to. Actually, she’d begged me not to.

But over the course of the next week, I found myself dwelling on her situation the second my mind wasn’t actively focussed on anything else. What must it be like to be obliged to marry someone?

And not just marry them. I could – if I tried really hard – imagine that working out okay, like the plot of a trashy romance novel: woman finds herself left with no alternative but to get hitched to her neighbour (nice and convenient), in order to save the family farm (for example). Oh but wait, turns out he’s gorgeous and wanders round in ripped jeans with no top on (showing off his equally ripped six-pack), and before you know it their initial animosity turns to passion (the abs aren’t the only equipment he’s naturally gifted with) and then mutual respect (he’s a true feminist deep down) and they live happily ever after (with plenty of shagging, for good measure).

But Zahra’s situation wasn’t like that fantasy. She wasn’t just having to marry this bloke – a second cousin, whose family, as far as I could tell, had loads of political influence whereas hers had loads of money. She was having to abandon everything – her life in London, her dreams of doing a PhD, all the freedom she’d cautiously come to take for granted.

He might be boring, I realised. He might have zero sense of humour. He might have nothing at all in common with Zahra. She didn’t know because she’d only met him a handful of times. He was definitely a lot older than her, she’d told me. So at least he might die soon and then she’d be free to marry someone she actually wanted to spend her life with, I told myself by way of consolation.

Not that it consoled me much. And I’m sure it wouldn’t console her at all.

All this should have made me more grateful than I already was for Sam: his normalness, his decency, the fact that he loaded the dishwasher in the evenings and didn’t expect me to have babies before I was ready.

You know, advanced-level man stuff like that.

But it didn’t. My worry about Zahra, added to my worry about Ava, made me edgy and prickly.

Sam seemed to be in my way when I wanted to clean my teeth in the mornings. The snuffling noises he made when he slept, which weren’t even proper snoring, got on my nerves in a way they never had before. The way he’d ask me what I fancied for dinner and then ask me again ten minutes later because he hadn’t listened to my reply made me want to brain him with the air fryer.

Not that I would, obviously. I loved him. That was the whole point – that was why the whole Ava thing was a problem.

Still, my irritability around him worried me almost more than the actual things that were making me irritable. Was this the ick setting in, and if so, was there any coming back from it?

I hated myself for even thinking that about him, and tried to convince myself that it must be my period being almost due that was making me feel like such a total bitch.

On Friday, though, matters with Sam came to a head.

It was another boiling-hot day. The Tube home from work was rammed and then stopped dead in a tunnel for almost fifteen minutes. It seemed as if everyone in the world was on holiday, apart from me and the million others who seemed to have crammed themselves into that stifling Central line carriage.

By the time I got home, I was sweating, exhausted and absolutely furious with the world.

I let myself into the flat, threw down my bag and kicked off my shoes. I’d make myself a cold drink and sit outside on the balcony, I decided – a bit of fresh air would calm me down.

Only Sam was already out there. And he hadn’t heard me come in because he was on his phone.

‘It’s okay,’ he was saying. ‘Don’t worry. You’ll be all right. It’s all part of the process. I’m here; I’ve got you. I’ll see you on Sunday, okay?’

There was a pause, during which I stood by the glass door, still and silent, watching and listening, feeling like Charlize Theron in a scene from Atomic Blonde. Normally, that thought would have made me giggle, but what I heard next banished all thoughts of laughter from my mind.

‘It’s going to be fine, Ava.’ There, he’d said her name. At least now he wouldn’t be able to deny it was her he was talking to. ‘I promise. If I was there, I’d give you a cuddle, but that’ll have to wait. Message me any time. No, it doesn’t matter. Okay. Bye.’

He put his phone down on the table and pulled off his headphones. Then he turned round and saw me.

The look on his face told me everything I needed to know. It wasn’t guilt – or not only guilt. It was a kind of weary resignation, as if he’d known that at some point, I’d see or hear something properly, undeniably bad and now I had.

For a moment, neither of us said anything. Then I said, ‘You were talking to Ava.’

The expression on his face didn’t change. ‘That’s right.’

‘And you’re seeing her on Sunday.’

‘Correct.’

‘To give her a cuddle.’ I’d never known that word could sound so harsh.

‘It’s not like⁠—’