‘I just meant … ’ I begin,
but Mark shakes his head.
‘I can’t meet you again.
If I do and Donna gets wind …
She caught me once before.’
‘Doing what? Consoling one of Connor’s lovers?’
‘Funny.’
A child passing the pub chases a butterfly.
His mother smiles, shouts, ‘Keep out of the road!’,
placidly pushing an empty pram.
In her hand is a half-sucked lollipop.
‘I know how to be without him
because of how things were, but not like this.
I can’t win him back.
Or win him at all.
You know?’
Mark takes off his fedora, places it
between us
on the table.
‘He never found your break-ups easy.
He fell apart a few times. He struggled.’
‘He always seemed fine.’
‘He said that about you too.’
‘We only ever broke up when I’d had enough
of his indecision and ended it.
He just waited for me to crack and call him,
started trouble at home
so he had an excuse to take me back
whenever I eventually got in touch.’
The table next to us is free,
just a residue of cashews and crisps
left on crumpled packets.
Someone has left behind a calculator.
I have an urge to clean up,
leave the space ready.
Mark leans in. ‘You don’t know Rebecca.’
‘How do you mean?’
Finally it feels like conspiracy,
and I want Mark to malign her,
chronicle a ruined marriage,
your imprisonment,
pain.
‘She isn’t the sort of woman you leave,’ Mark says simply.
‘Well, he’s left her now,’ I snap.
Outside, the butterfly still spins in the breeze.
‘And she’ll never have to know what happened
or how he felt. There’s a blessing.’
‘I suppose she could still find out.’
I drain my glass.
Mark lifts his chin.
‘No, she won’t, so don’t even think about it.’
The table next to us fills with a loud group.
‘My round,’ I say, and leave him to worry,
forgetting he isn’t you
and doesn’t deserve to be terrorised.
I thought Mark would be enough.
But I need more.
I want him to tell me you loathed Rebecca.
I want him to tell me our love shattered you.
I want him to tell me that if you were alive
you would have picked me
eventually.
When I return to the table I set down the drinks.
‘Tell me I exist,’ I say.
Paul sends a message:
Get milk.
But all the organic semi-skimmed has sold out.
They have full-fat organic, blue-top,
regular semi-skimmed, green-top.
I approach a shelf-stacker.
‘Could you look in the back to
see if you’ve any green-top organic?’
She bites her pierced lip.
‘Cow udders are filled with pus.
It gets infected from over-production.
Makes no difference what you buy.’
She is right: choice is a myth.
What’s written on a label
is rarely what’s inside.
‘I’d like you to look. In any case.’
She returns with a bottle of organic green-top.
I put it into my basket,
head to the end of the aisle for cereal.
Paul opens the milk for tea.
‘Hard day?’ He eyes a hole in the
toe of my sock.
‘Uh huh.’ I search for my slippers.
I am glad to be so unsexy.
I would hate to be wanted.
I was eleven and Nora was fourteen when she said,
‘You were an accident.
Mum didn’t want you.’
I wouldn’t believe her.
We were sitting on the wall
behind our house,
legs scratching against the brickwork,
chucking raisins at pigeons.
We were still in our velvet Irish dancing dresses,
heavy shoes,
feet dangling limply.
Nora had won three trophies and several medals that morning
at a feis in South London.
I hadn’t placed in any dance –
my sister was the star.
Inside, Mum and Dad were watching TV in separate rooms.
My friends were jealous we had two televisions
but I never explained why,
just made out we had money,
when anyone with eyes could’ve seen the state of the place.
Nora continued:
‘You don’t look like dad.’
I’d only recently learned about sex,
what happens to bring about babies.
In biology I’d asked, ‘But how do they get inside?’
The teacher sidled up to me.
‘How do they get in there?
Don’t you have any friends, Ana Kelly?’
Everyone on my bench laughed.
I pushed my little finger into the gas tap.
Behind me, in a tank, the fish stank.
Nora explained on the walk home.
It sounded like an ugly operation.
‘I’m not saying you’re illegitimate.
But it’s possible.’
She twisted my arm until it burned
and hopped down from the wall.
‘But it would explain why I’m pretty
and you’re plain.’
That night Mum gave us Rice Krispies for dinner
and tried to pretend it was a treat.
Dad did a bunk and got home three days later
wearing new trainers.
I can’t remember our curtains ever being open.
The first time
we made love
we knew
that’s what it was
before we’d taken off our coats.
The possibility of
turning it into
a one-night stand
never stood a chance.
We agreed to meet far from North London
at Paddington train station,
then went for tea,
and there was a second kiss.
And a hotel.
And.
We planned that first time
without admitting to it
and when it came
we both knew:
there could be
no simple full stop.
You read Raymond Carver aloud
while I made instant coffee – all the hotel had,
plus long-life milk.
‘Do you read to Rebecca?’
You sniggered and it pleased me.
‘Rebecca reads to Rebecca.’
‘But she reads to the boys? She must.’
I longed to hear how she failed.
‘She used to when they were little.
Less so now, you know.’
I nodded but made a sound that was disapproval.
‘What’s Rebecca like?’
I studied your expression.
Was I permitted to talk about her?
We rarely mentioned our spouses
despite describing every other trifle of our lives.
‘Rebecca is smart and busy and a vegetarian.’
‘Why did you marry her?’
I was pushing, poking,
assessing how easily that bond could bruise.
I hoped you would admit it was doomed.
You reached for a pillow and sat up