Antidote to Infidelity (6 page)

As I sit smarting, battling to
adjust my body clock, he slinks into the room, head down, eyes on the carpet.

“Okay Rosie-posie, that’s
enough, mummy’s tired,” he whispers hoarsely. “Hey, I know, why don’t you go
play Power Ranger Princesses with your brother for a bit, then bring mummy’s
presents up from under the tree?”

I have a better idea, Will. Why
don’t you leave me and my babies alone, pack your bags and go screw yourself?

Closing my eyes, I sink back
against the headboard, all wrapped up in the covers. Groggy, woozy and aching
from head to toe, I really, really don’t feel up to a showdown.

As if sensing the animosity,
Rosie looks at her daddy, then me, waiting for my approval to leave, so I nod
reassuringly. She darts out like a whippet before slamming on the brakes and
poking her head back round the door.

“But . . . but who will look
after mummy and her extweeemely poorly hand?”

Will reaches out and ruffles
her ringlets.

“Daddy will, silly. Now scoot.”

Ignoring him completely, she
stays stubbornly put.

“Erm, mummy?”

“Yes baby?”

“Are you very, extra mad at
daddy?”

“No baby, of course not!”

“You still love daddy, don’t
you?”

“Of course I do baby, why
wouldn’t I?”

Thinking of at least one
very
good reason, I look up at Will, standing there by the door, all handsome,
wide-eyed and guilty-looking, and I’m unsure whether I want to cry, hug him -
or kill him.

“Erm, mummy . . .”

“Yes, baby?”

“What’s a wanker?”

Oh, help. Little ears just
don’t miss a trick, do they? That’s my fault. I distinctly remember screaming
it - a lot - last night, whilst whacking away wildly at Will with the colander.
Knowing Rosie, she’s bound to store
that
little beauty for her first day
at school and, when reprimanded, grass me up. Honestly, it’s very seldom we
swear, but to hear the belters she blurts out at random you’d think we were
raising her in the tap room at the Dog and Doublet!

Flabbergasted by our daughter’s
colourful vocabulary, I sigh heavily, about to chide her when Will cuts in,
laying a protective arm across my bandage to present a false united front.

“It’s a huge great hunk of
iron, baby-face, to hold ships still in the sea so they don’t float off. Like
the ones we saw in Cornwall, remember?”

Appeased, she scurries off
before shattering our awkward silence with an ear-piercing, “Ryyy-aaan! Where
are you? Ryyy-aaan! I just asked daddy. I
told
you it’s not a mad thing,
you big silly, it’s just what all them huge boats has gotted!”

Will looks at me. I look at
him. We can’t help but laugh. Then I remember - I
hate
him - and yank my
hand sharply away. Big brown puppy-dog eyes glossing over, he looks fit for a
bout of cheating-bastard-crocodile-tears.

“Sal, please - don’t,” he
bleats. “How are you babe? Does your hand hurt?” 

Snarling like a cornered pit
pull, I fight off an overwhelming urge to headbutt him.

“What do you think, Will? Yes,
it damn well does so don’t you dare snivel and turn on the water works because
it won’t bloody wash. You . . . you . . .
fucker
! How
could
you?”

Giving me the long-perfected
Sally-controlling stare
,
he tries to take me in his arms, and my
nostrils welcome the delicious, soothing smell of his aftershave, but I stand
my ground, shoving him roughly away.

“You bloody bastard Will.
Making out you’re working Christmas Eve for us when really you’re out shagging
. . . you lying bloody snake.”

Jaw dropping, he shakes his
head indignantly.

“No Sal,
God
no! You
don’t understand, it wasn’t like that - at all. I
was
working yesterday.
Then out buying presents. Ones you didn’t know about, so you’d be surprised. I
know how much you love Christmas . . .”

I scowl at the floral bedside
lamp, seriously tempted to ram it down his selfish throat. My racing heart
feels like it’s in a blender.

“Oh, you know how much I love
Christmas, huh? So you thought you’d ruin it forever
by telling me
you’re leaving? You must think I’ve got twat written right across my forehead.
I hate you!”

Anguish contorting his gentle,
masculine features, Will jumps off the bed and peeks out onto the landing to
make sure the kids are out of earshot before closing the door.

“No you don’t, you know you
don’t,” he insists, pacing the room. “Who said anything about leaving you? I’m
never, ever going to leave you, you guys are my world.”

Unmoved, I nurse my throbbing
arm, fuming, “Perhaps you should have thought about that before shagging
yourself senseless with your mystery sluts!”

Fixing chiding eyes on my
furious blue ones, he frowns disapprovingly.

“Don’t be vulgar Sal, please.
It doesn’t suit you. It was
one
woman. A stupid mistake. You know me,
I’m not a bastard.”

Inhaling sharply, he sits back
down, gently touching my cheek as he adds, “I’m sorry. I’m
crushed
. I’m
still trying to work out how the hell it happened.”

Stinging inside, yet secretly
relieved to hear the word ‘one’, having imagined him casually screwing his way
through my yoga class, I slap his hand away.

“I want some honest answers
Will, then I’m off. Who is she? Huh? Who? Tell me
it’s not our Amy?”

Staring at me, open-mouthed
like a cod-fish, he grimaces.

“God, Sal, what do you take me
for. She was a stranger I met in a bar. No one you know. No one important. Just
. . . just no one. It meant nothing.
Please
, Sal . . .”

Well it means something to me,
you jerk.

“When did it happen?”

My question is met with grim,
thoughtful silence.

“
When
Will.”

“Last month.”

Last month? So it’s taken him a
whole month to tell me? Why now?

With a strangled whimper I
clutch my chest, seeking the invisible dagger that’s ripping me in two. Will
leans in to cuddle me but I’m having none of it and flinch away.

“Where?” I ask, agonised. “And
how many times did you, you know?”

I close my eyes, swallowing
hard.

Shag her?

Shag her, shag her, shag her,
Will? Oh God. Do I really want to know? Am I really ready to hear him confess
to: ‘in our bed, on the coffee table, in the bushes, on the bonnet . . . oh
dozens of times, actually Sal. Raunchy, satisfying, cock-tingling shagging,
much hotter than our boring, once-a-week military bonk . . . ’

“Twice,” he chokes, as if the
words themselves hurt. “Two stupid nights, Sal, that’s all. That long weekend
in London. If it’s any consolation, I hate myself.”

Scoffing at the stinging irony,
I hiss, “That’s a coincidence, I hate you too.”

He lowers his eyes.

“Don’t say that babe. It’s
over, I swear. Christ, it never even
began
. I didn’t tell you at
Christmas to be a prick, I did it,” his voice falters, “so you’d stay. Please,
Sal. I’m
begging
you.”

Sensing the onset of a tension
headache, I screw up my face and rub my brow. Great. So it wasn’t just an
isolated, inebriated fumble, he’d fancied her enough to go back for seconds.
Why, oh why, couldn’t he just have said what I wanted to hear? ‘Once, ’cos she
was ugly. And fat. And really
crap in bed’.

Biting the bullet, I ignore the
golf ball in my throat and press on with my interrogation.

“
Why
, Will? Tell me
that.”

He scratches his head
thoughtfully.

“Why? Why what? Why is it over?”

“No, you twat! Why did you do
it?”

Fidgeting on the duvet beside
me, he contemplates his answer.

Eventually, he says softly, “I
felt cold, Sally. Empty. So lost and alone and it just
happened
. I never
wanted to hurt you, I just needed to feel close to someone.”

Oh, roll out the violins! Poor,
neglected puppy.

Feeling sick to my stomach,
something inside me snaps. Throwing back the covers and jumping out of bed like
a jack-in-the-box, I ferret through the wardrobe for my trainers and shove them
on one-handed, babbling angrily away to no one in particular.

“Well you have hurt me. A lot.”

Scanning the room in a frenzied
haze, I swipe our mocking wedding picture off the bedside table.

Damn it, it didn’t smash!
Stupid shatter-proof glass! Where’s my
coat?

“That’s a pathetic excuse,” I
scream at him. “Pathetic, that’s what it is. If you wanted affection, you could
have tried getting in the middle of Rosie and Ryan, like I do, every bloody
night!
Or you could have come to
me
. But hey, why bother? I’m only your wife.”

Rolling his eyes, Will
retrieves the photo, wipes it with his sleeve and replaces it with a clatter.

“Come to
you
? When?
How
?
I can never get near
you! You’re always cosied up with the kids,
shopping or out with you man-eating friends.” He waits, clocking my wide-eyed
fury before icing the cake with, “Or let’s face it Sal, at the ice hockey
surrounded by sex-mad sportsmen. You’re
really
in your element then,
aren’t you?”

Oooh, the cheek! How dare he?
How dare he try to turn this round and make it my
fault?

We stare each other out, like
sumo wrestlers about to tango. Suddenly claustrophobic, I feel like my lovely
lilac walls are crushing in on me. I want to stick my head in a brown paper bag
and chill out before I go hyper, but my emergency stash is downstairs in the
vegetable rack.

“You absolute jealous pig. I’m
not the one on trial!” I wail, aiming a vicious kick at his shin.
Thankfully, or unluckily, he dodges and it misses by an inch.

“Well, now you’ve got all
that
off your chest, I’m gone. For good. Goodbye Will.”

Lunging for the door, I yank it
open and slip through the tiny gap just as he grabs for my wrist.

“Babe - wait, please! You need
to wait . . .”

No way Jose. I’ve heard enough.

Blotting him out, I thud across
the landing and scurry down the carpeted stairs, avoiding the creaky
third-from-bottom step with a stag-like leap.

Will catches up just as I dash
through the twinkling fairy-lit archway into the darkened lounge, where my
father-in-law - pissed as a newt and nestled like a stuffed pig in our rocker -
looks up from his paper, nods approvingly and lets out a long, low whistle.
Then, just to add insult to injury, he gives his son the old thumbs up before
winking at me and turning his attention back to the sports pages.

As I root to the spot, frozen,
starkers and blushing like a beacon, Will shoots his father a reproachful look.

“For God’s sake dad. Honestly!”

Snatching two large, brown
cushions off the settee and strategically placing them over my naughty bits, he
whispers in my ear, “I was about to say Sal, if you’d have just
waited
.
. . my parents are here and you might like to put some clothes on.”

Call me a pushover, call me a
mug, call me what you will, you’re probably right. I’ve got a sickening feeling
I’m setting myself up for a huge fall, but five days on, following tears,
tantrums and a series of soul-searching heart-to-hearts, I’ve decided Will
isn’t leaving after all - and neither am I.

As it’s the festive season,
we’ve agreed on a temporary, emergency reconciliation for the sake of the kids
- but it doesn’t erase the fact that he’s a sly shit head, and in the days,
weeks and even months leading up to Christmas, our marriage has become, well, a
bit of a pig’s ear actually.

I’m not convinced I’ve done the
right thing, letting him stay. In truth, I feel like I’ve put a plaster on a
wound that probably needs stitching. It’d be just my luck for gangrene to set
in.

Maybe I’m soppy, maybe I’m a
sucker or maybe I’m just plain stupid, but somehow we’ve managed to get through
the last few days without anyone finding out our nasty little secret, without
upsetting our babies and without the need for a solicitor. Yet.

Well, I say no-one knows -
that’s not strictly true. My best friend Rowan does but she’s very tight-lipped
and Will doesn’t know she knows. He called her to watch Rosie and Ryan on
Christmas Eve whilst he played finger FedEx, telling her I’d ‘had a little
accident’. What he
didn’t
tell her is whose lying, cheating fault it
was.

No, he’s adamant no one should
know. Then again he would be, wouldn’t he? Because he’s a dirty dog who’s
shitting himself that my outraged pals are gonna crack him one with their
brick-filled handbags. But I had to tell
someone
, didn’t I? I’m female.