Page 80 of The Spare

‘What did you want to talk about?’ I say as gently as I can as we walk down the path that leads to the orangery, because she’s been silent since we headed outside.

‘Can we go in?’ she asks. ‘I’m a bit cold.’

It’s a beautiful May day, mild and sunny, but she’s shivering. ‘Sounds good to me,’ I say easily. When we reach the orangery, I pull open the door and usher her through. It’s far warmer in here. I lead her over to the stone ledge that runs the length of the building and pop her up on a section that’s free from potted geraniums so I can step between her legs and slide my hands along her jaw, tilting her face up. Her beautiful eyes are darting everywhere except at me. ‘Hey.’

‘Hey.’

‘How’re you doing?’

‘A little better.’ It sounds to me like she’s trying to convince herself, and not very well. ‘I think I’ve gained some clarity over the situation.’

‘Good. That’s great. Are you going to look at me?’ She drags her gaze to meet mine, and the pain I see in her eyes kills me. ‘Jesus Christ, sweetheart, what’s wrong?’

She visibly pulls herself together. ‘Ben,’ she whispers.

‘I’m right here.’

‘I’ve assessed the situation’—she clears her throat—‘and the only feasible conclusion is to let you off the hook.’

I frown. ‘What do you mean?’ People have been letting me off the hook all my life, if I’m honest, but I don’t want Slinks doing it. I want her to get angry, properly angry—with me, with Xav, with Ma, with her parents—for treating her like a pawn in this sick, medieval game we’ve all played with her life.

She gives me a tight little smile. ‘I think we should call time on this, don’t you?’

I’m genuinely baffled. ‘Call time on what?’ My first thought is that she means the press cycle. Does she want to speak out? Make a statement? Put an end to all the bullshit speculation, once and for all?

My hands are still cradling her jaw, and she jerks her head away from my touch. ‘On this marriage,’ she practically snaps. ‘So please don’t touch me, or I won’t be able to get this off my chest.’

I stagger back a step, stunned beyond belief. ‘What?’

She tilts her chin up. ‘You heard me.’ It’s the first glimpse I’ve seen of Old Selena in weeks, but I don’t like it. I don’t like it one little bit. And I don’t know what the fuck is going on with her, but I’m feeling blindsided here, and I won’t stand for it.

‘Nobody is calling time on this marriage. What the hell are you talking about?’

‘Don’t look at me like that, Ben. I swear.’ Her chin, still in its determined little lift, quivers. ‘My intention is to make this easy for you. You don’t have to stay.’

‘Slinks, where the utter hell is this coming from?’ I blow out an exasperated breath. ‘I know I don’t have to stay. I want to stay. You’re my wife.’

‘I know, but I’m giving you an out,’ she explains patiently.

‘An out. And why is that, exactly?’

For a moment, she doesn’t say anything, just stares up at me, her hazel eyes doing all the talking for her as they fill with their burden of unshed tears. And then she speaks. ‘Because I’ve got nothing to offer you. Why would you stay when I have nothing to offer you?’

My wife is talking. I understand that much. She’s talking about all sorts of things, like ledgers and KPIs and asset value, with great intensity. She’s speaking the language of logic and business and cold, hard facts, but all I care about is that she seems to be using all this jargon to argue two main points: that she has no ‘value’, and that she should therefore ‘set me free’.

Both are equally chilling. Not chilling—deluded. Downright horrifying.

She appears to be arguing the case for me—me—having been the victim of some sort of ‘fraudulent takeover’, where I was enticed by a carefully constructed ‘package’ that, it turns out, is ‘pretty worthless’.

Please note that all terms in inverted commas are the actual terms that Slinky is bandying about.

The terrifying thing is that she actually sounds half rational. I’m sure it’s all rational if you believe the underlying assumptions, but the underlying assumptions are, of course, absolute fucking bullshit, and I could cheerfully wring her parents’ necks for imbuing her with these insane beliefs about her lack of intrinsic value.

My beautiful wife, with tears now cascading freely down her cheeks, is treating me to an MBA-type rundown of our marriage, where she’s basically tallied up her assets and has, apparently, found the ‘balance sheet’ (her, if you will) to be empty.

That’s right.

She is conflating her self-worth with a stripped fucking balance sheet.