Page 65 of The Woman Who Said Yes

However, the little niggles started to pile up. The way Gary picked at his food, ‘leaving’ things he didn’t like. Shunting them to the side, the way Jake had as a little boy, when he suddenly took against peas. The sloppy chewing, the metallic clashing of cutlery and then finally that remark over dinner: ‘I hope you don’t mind me saying, Andie…’ Which people only say when you are going to mind very much. Gary’s mouth twisted and his brow furrowed. Oh my God, I thought. I’ve got bad breath or a weirdly shaped vagina. Here it came: ‘I’ve noticed you have an awful lot of plugs stuck into that socket board in your living room. I think you should get an electrician to install more sockets.’ I’d stared at him across the table. ‘I’m only saying,’ he added.

On Saturday night, in bed with Phil, I couldn’t help thinking: wasn’t it better to be with someone familiar – like cooking a recipe for friends that you’ve made a million times before – than making yet another mistake? We lay on our sides in the darkness, facing each other. ‘I’ve missed you,’ he murmured. ‘I’ve missed you so much it’s been unbearable sometimes…’

‘Shhh.’ I held a finger to his lips. ‘Please, Phil, don’t. It’s too upsetting⁠—’

‘But I love you. I still love you, Andie, you know I do⁠—’

‘Phil.’ I didn’t want to hear it, and so I kissed him to stop him saying those things. I didn’t want to go over it all, or for him to say sorry yet again. And I didn’t want him to twiddle my nipples, as he’d just started doing, like he was rolling little balls of plasticine. Christ, had he learned nothing about foreplay in the six years we’d been apart? Hadn’t Constable Crouch taught him anything?

I pulled away from him and his hands fell away from my breasts. ‘Everything all right?’

All right? Of course it wasn’t all right! I’d made a mistake. A serious mistake this time. Far worse than when I’d bought a cute corduroy skirt off Vinted, clearly marked as a 12, and it turned out to be for a twelve-year-old child and I could barely cram one side of my arse into it.

I wouldn’t even call getting naked with Phil a mistake. It was more than that. More like a serious aberration of judgement – almost having accidental sex with the man I’d once attacked with a kitchen roll.

I took in his look of concern, the confusion clouding his eyes. ‘I think,’ I started, ‘that this probably isn’t a very good idea.’

‘Oh God, I’m sorry. I should go.’ Already, he was clambering out of my bed.

‘No – don’t do that,’ I said quickly. After all those hours together I still wanted him close. I could forgive the plasticine nipples thing as long as he kept to the far side of the bed and didn’t touch me again. ‘It’s late,’ I added, ‘and your car’s here⁠—’

‘You want me to sleep in the car?’

‘No!’ I laughed then as I looked up at him. He was standing over me, naked and somehow vulnerable-looking, as if he’d been fully dressed and his clothes had suddenly vaporised. ‘Don’t be silly. Come back to bed. That is, if you want to…’

‘Of course I want to.’ He frowned. ‘But only if you’re comfortable.’

‘It’s fine. We can just sleep, okay? If that’s all right with you?’

He nodded and climbed back in warily, as if I might have hidden something under the duvet – a spring-loaded trap to snap at his penis – and I couldn’t help musing, what would Marnie and Jake think if they could see us now? Their parents lying side by side, with a foot’s gap between us, having a sleepover?

And what would Sam make of this scenario? That’s what was going through my mind as Phil’s breathing slowed and deepened until he was sleeping soundly. That I was missing Sam, because since that horrible night at Eva’s do, we hadn’t messaged at all. I’d assumed he couldn’t bear to go into it all, that he wanted to be left alone. Otherwise, surely he’d have messaged me?

There was a time, when Sam had adopted that scruffy little terrier for Theo, that we’d felt closer than ever. At thirteen, Theo had reneged on his promise to do most of the walking, and so Sam and I had fallen into a pattern of going for long, sprawling Sunday morning strolls with Pip. I love the Knitwits as a gang of three, but I loved that too. Just Sam and me and a nervy little dog with a multitude of ailments and a thousand irrational fears.

All day at work today, I’ve thought about Sam. All through the training session in which retired head teacher Carol announced, suddenly, that she didn’t think volunteering was right for her – at least not this kind of volunteering, with families stretched to their limits. I thought about him as I messaged Phil at lunchtime, assuring him that I was fine, that everything was good between us, nothing to worry about at all. I thought about him at after-school Craft Club as we helped the kids to build forts from cardboard boxes, lit from the inside with fairy lights.

I’m thinking of him now I’m home, as I examine the dull jewel of Gideon’s eye, wondering whether to ask Sam to remove the glass from the frame so it can be stuck back in place, and then seal it all up again for me. But that’s not the main thing. I don’t really want to discuss a dead fish. What I really want to say is, it wasn’t how it looked! I’d got up and put on my pyjamas, for goodness’ sake. Did those look like sex pyjamas to him?

I’ve made my dinner and barely been able to eat it, and I’ve picked up my phone, on the verge of calling him, and then set it back down. What would I say, anyway? That, yes, Phil had stayed over but we hadn’t had sex? Why did I think that Sam might even need to know that? And why had he come over anyway, with croissants and a Nordic loaf? Was that code for something and, if so, what?

Yet a tiny part of me knows the answer. And, seemingly, I messed that up too, and I have a horrible feeling that the moment has gone, that it’s too late to fix it. So instead of phoning Sam, I call Eva. My heart quickens as it rings and rings.

‘Andie?’ Finally, she answers.

‘Eva. Hi.’ I swallow hard. ‘I just wanted to call you. Hope you don’t mind. I’m so sorry⁠—’

‘Andie, it’s all right.’

A silence hangs. ‘Is it?’

‘Yes it is. Honestly, I should be the one apologising. I was just upset, that’s all. I was shocked that you’d done it, but you know what? I do understand⁠—’

‘You do?’

‘Yes!’ she exclaims. ‘And I’ve wanted to call you or Sam – I mean both of you. I wanted us all to be back together again, just like it was…’ Her voice wobbles, and it triggers my tear ducts because now there are rivulets running down my cheeks. ‘But I didn’t know what to say,’ she continues. ‘I was building up to it, trying to figure out how to make things right again…’ She breaks off and I hear her take a breath. ‘But what about you? Are you okay?’

I clear my throat and wipe my eyes with the back of my hand. ‘Not really.’