Year of Being Single (6 page)

At 2a.m. Imogen awoke to find herself sprawled face down on the carpet. Grace was next to her, curled in the foetal position. Some of her blonde curly hair was trailing onto Imogen’s left arm. And Frankie hadn’t moved from the sofa; she was now flat on her back with one leg dangling down to the floor and her mouth wide open. Imogen raised herself up, slowly; her head hurt.

‘Hey, sleepy heads! Drunkards!’ Frankie opened one eye. Grace opened both, with a start. ‘Do you want to stay over? I can just throw a couple of blankets over everyone.’

Grace rose. Her Kim Basinger in
9 and a Half Weeks
hair was sticking up everywhere and a stray piece of toast dangled from one frizzy ringlet. She had a smear of Marmite at the corner of her mouth.

‘No, thank you,’ she slurred, ‘I should get home. Daniel’s got football in the morning.’

‘Daniel’s with James, honey. Remember?’

‘Oh, yeah. I forgot.’ She looked devastated. ‘I want to go home, though,’ she said, like a small child.

Frankie reared up like a lovelier Frankenstein’s monster. ‘Me, too. I’m going home to my lovely empty bed. Thank you, though, darling.’

They hauled themselves up, with Imogen’s help and some exaggerated heaving, and staggered out the front door. Frankie had forgotten so much stuff – phone, shoes, cardi, all littered around the living room – and Grace scooted round and picked it all up for her, before shoving it in the carrier bag the bubbly had come in. Frankie could barely hold on to it.

‘I’m not kissing either of you,’ said Imogen, on the doorstep. ‘We all stink of booze and Marmite.’

‘I love you,’ slurred Frankie, going in for a hug anyway.

‘Love you too,’ said Imogen, turning Frankie like a spindle and pushing her up the drive.

‘Love you both,’ said Grace. She was veering on tiptoes up the drive. ‘I don’t know what I’d do without you.’

‘Ditto,’ said Imogen, ‘you drunken idiot. Now get to bed, the pair of you. Text me in the morning.’

She watched them weave up the drive. God, they’d all feel terrible tomorrow. But they’d feel better, too. As she closed the door on her two best friends, Imogen smiled to herself. She loved those girls. They were the best.

They may not have men now, but they had each other and that was a lot.

Chapter Five: Frankie

Today was the first Sunday Frankie had spent on her own for
years
. It had been bliss, so far, despite the hangover. God, she’d enjoyed it last night, at Imogen’s: fun, laughter, a good old drink and lots of lovely food, and at the end of it, Frankie had staggered back to calm and order. No children. No Rob. For once her house didn’t feel like the polar opposite to Imogen’s trendy one or Grace’s ridiculously clean, ordered one. She’d got into bed alone and sighed with contentment. It had been fabulous and she’d
loved
Imogen’s plan for the three of them to be single for a year. That would work for her. Easily.

This morning, she’d indulged a slight headache without being leapt all over, or being begged to put bacon on, and ‘where are my socks?’ – all the usual chaos. She’d stayed under the covers reading until ten o’clock. The day stretched wonderfully before her.

On Friday evening, Rob had picked the children up at five o’clock for his first weekend with them. He was staying at his mum’s, but she was off to Tunbridge Wells for the weekend. They had all gone off with him quite happily, even Alice. There was no clinging, or hanging on to legs, or wailing. They’d waved cheerily; she’d waved cheerily back. She knew she should be feeling sad about her children leaving her for the weekend. Guilty, even. But she couldn’t quite conjure it up. Not at that moment. Shamefully, she’d just felt relieved.

This was really going to work. She was going to be a much better mum now she wasn’t with them all the time. And an even better one now that Rob was out of the house. She didn’t
want
to be the mum who wandered round the house flinging pants angrily into laundry baskets and crashing bowls into dishwashers. The children were going to really appreciate the new, less stressed her.

As soon as they’d gone, she’d cleaned the house from top to bottom. It was perfect, and she was going to enjoy the peace and quiet for the whole blissful weekend. No kids, and no Rob. She was ecstatic he no longer lived there.

It had not been pretty, the night Rob had gone. The night she’d told him she couldn’t do it any more. It had been three whole days after Escape to GetAway Lodge.

She had been in the shower, having just got Alice to sleep. That shower was the first chance she’d had since six o’clock that morning to have some peaceful time on her own, but it was hardly an advert-quality experience. First, Tilly then Josh had banged on the door, yelling about various things and she’d yelled ‘I’m in the shower!’ until they’d gone away. Then Rob hammered on the door loudly, startling her because she didn’t know he was home from work yet, asking her where his blue joggers were. She’d shouted back that she had ‘no bloody idea’.

When she’d come out, his work shirt, pants and socks were on the floor next to the laundry basket. She disposed of them. He’d also left a coat hanger on the bed along with a pair of smelly, rolled-up black socks, which were dangerously close to her pillow. She’d picked up the socks between finger and thumb and, with a look of disgust, got rid of those too. Same with the coat hanger. She’d smoothed the cover (she
hated
a messy, un-smooth bed) and went downstairs.

In the kitchen, three cupboard doors were wide open, and a drawer had been left so far out it was in danger of crashing to the floor. It was the drawer next to the sink where he put his keys, but his keys weren’t in it. They were on top of the fridge. An empty crisp packet was on the kitchen table. A half-empty bottle of water was on the worktop, its lid off.

Typical Rob. It was nothing he need worry about; he knew she’d be along at some point, on her rounds, picking up and clearing up after him. That was her
job
. She had always hated this sorry little argument of his:
she
didn’t help
him
with his job, why should he help her with hers?

‘Domestic services,’ he called it. ‘That’s your department,’ he said, as though it was a department she had ever remotely aspired to. It was certainly a department that never
closed,
she often thought.

Usually she would sigh and go round shutting all the drawers and doors and putting things in the bin and the recycling box. That day, she’d had enough. She’d already thrown Rob’s shirt, pants and socks, and a coat hanger, out of the bedroom window.

She’d systematically gone round and opened every single cupboard door in the kitchen, then all the drawers. Then the fridge door, the microwave door and the oven door. Then she’d walked into the sitting room where Rob was on the sofa with the football on, tapping away at his phone with a vacant look on his face. He hadn’t even glanced up.

‘What’s on the menu tonight?’ he’d said. Frankie had stood right in front of him.

‘I can’t do this any more,’ she’d said, in a low voice. There was silence. He obviously hadn’t heard her. He didn’t look up; he didn’t stop tapping.

‘I can’t do this any more,’ she’d said. Louder.

‘Eh?’ Rob had said, glancing up. ‘Can’t do what? If you’re going to get huffy about cooking dinner tonight – again – we could always just have a salad. I’m not that bothered. I had a big lunch out. Steak.’

‘That’s nice for you,’ Frankie had said. And a salad wasn’t less work, she’d thought. There was all that chopping.

She’d raised her voice an octave. ‘I can’t do this – us – any more. The mess. The lack of respect. The whole lot. I’m done. I want us to split up.’ The words had just spilled out of her, like rubbish tumbling out of an overflowing bin or dirty pants spilling out the top of a laundry basket.

‘Oh, ha, very funny,’ Rob had said. ‘Sit down. You don’t have to make me anything. You can order us a takeaway if you like.’

‘I don’t want to sit down and I’m not joking,’ Frankie had said. ‘I need a break. I need a break from you. I want us to split up.’ She knew the look on her face was not normal; she knew she probably looked slightly unhinged. Deranged. She was shaking. She felt sick. Her voice sounded weird. She couldn’t believe she was finally saying this.

It was awful. He hadn’t believed her. When she’d tried again to explain why: the never-ending mess, the lack of help, how bloody overwhelmed she was; he had just not got it. She had resorted to screaming, ‘I’m sick of you!’ which had resulted in two things: the distant shriek of Alice, upstairs, startled by a post-bedtime argument that involved adult voices and not those of her older siblings, and a shout back from a palpably furious Rob.

‘Well, I’m sick of
you
!’ he had hollered, causing Alice to cry louder and Josh to exclaim from upstairs, ‘By Jove! What’s going on down there!’ He liked to experiment with different personas. The current one was a posh country gent. In previous incarnations, he’d been a barrow boy from the East End, a whiny American teenager and Julian Clary. ‘Moaning all the time, nagging all the time,’ Rob continued, his face red with anger. ‘It’s no picnic for me either, I can tell you!’

It had degenerated from there. And concluded with Rob emptying the contents of his gym bag onto the bedroom floor, refilling them with some clothes and a hastily compiled wash kit, and going to his mum’s for the night.

‘Where’s Dad going?’ Harry had said, appearing on the landing.

‘Oh, just to Nana’s,’ said Frankie. She still had the shakes. ‘He’s going to do a few jobs for her.’

‘Really?’ said Harry in mocking disbelief.

‘Yes,’ said Frankie. ‘Go and get on with your homework.’

She had watched Rob, through the bedroom window, getting into his car. At first he stepped over the clothes and coat hanger on the drive, then he opened the boot of the car, retraced his steps and shoved them inside.

She didn’t feel sad; she only felt relief. Any guilt that threatened was swept away by the thought that he was angry too. Angry rather than distraught. That made it slightly easier for her. She didn’t want to
destroy
him. She just wanted him to go away.

Frankie shook the horrible memories of that night from her mind. It was done, he was gone, and she now had the rest of a luxurious Sunday before her. She was going to spend much of it on the sofa with chocolate and a couple of box sets. She was going to wallow in the marvelousness of this new kind of Sunday.

At 2p.m., whilst enjoying
Grey’s Anatomy
and a bar of Dairy Milk, she was rudely interrupted by a text.

Rob.

This is hell.

Tell me about it
, she texted back.
(She had a silly urge to add ‘stud’, for old time’s sake, but decided that was madness.)

Blimey, it’s hard work.

Tell me about it,
she texted again, then switched her phone off. Single for a year?
Easy peasy lemon squeezy
. Make it a lifetime.

Rob brought them back late by half an hour. Despite having the time off, she was really happy to see their little faces. He said he couldn’t find his car keys. He said after much frantic searching they were eventually found inside Alice’s shape-sorting pot. How they’d laughed, he said.

Frankie didn’t laugh. ‘You need to be more responsible now.’

The smile on his face faded and he looked angry. It had obviously been a
long
weekend.

‘I shouldn’t
have
to be more responsible!
You
should be doing all this! You should be being my wife!’

‘Tough – now maybe you’ll appreciate what I did for you.’

‘What? Ruin my life?’

The children looked slightly stricken. Frankie hugged them all fiercely in turn, then bundled them in and up the stairs to watch a DVD, leaving her and Rob to pull stony faces at each other on the doorstep.

He sighed. ‘I’m moving into one of my brother’s empty buy-to-let flats next week, for the foreseeable. It’s about ten minutes’ drive away.’

‘How nice.’

‘Can I come back the weekends that I don’t have the kids, and work on Kit?’

Rob was building a kit car. It was a sort of giant yellow Meccano car, which he kept in the garage and added bits to when he could afford them. When it was done, it was going to be a flash-looking sports car with one of those noisy, throaty engines and one day, presumably, he would just drive off in the bloody thing,
alone
– it only had two seats. Frankie had always been quite resentful about Rob and Kit.
She
didn’t have time for a hobby! Imagine if she locked herself in the garage every weekend, only coming out to demand bacon sandwiches and cups of tea.

‘No,’ Frankie said. ‘I just want to be left alone.’

‘But you won’t see me! You don’t see me for hours at a time when I’m in there.’

‘Quite. So no, you’re not doing it. Sorry.’

‘You’re being a bit of a bitch, you know, Frankie.’

‘Maybe I am. Maybe I’ve been pushed to it.’

His next sentence was said with a kind of venom. ‘I’m actually wondering if you might be slightly mentally ill.’

She laughed, loudly. ‘Ha! That would be convenient! Well, don’t think about sending me off to some sanatorium, Sue Ellen style.’ He looked blank. He hadn’t been a
Dallas
fan, as a kid. He didn’t watch much telly, in the eighties; he was always out on his bike or doing Airfix in his room. ‘Then you’d have to have the children full-time. You’d have to give up your job!’ He didn’t look suitably chastened, so she decided to get herself on a roll. ‘Don’t forget, you’ve only been allowed the luxury of that lovely job all these years
and
have children, because I’ve been supplying the childcare and the –’ she sneered ‘–
domestic services
.’

‘What?’ Rob’s face was a picture. A picture of a man who’d been told something totally outlandish. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. My job has allowed
you
to be a nice little housewife and mum and swan round all the time!’

‘
Swan round!
I’ve been bringing up your children and making sure your life runs smoothly. What a bloody cheek!’