by Holly Seddon
‘What’s this?’ Jonathan asks, a little too loudly as he points to my drink. ‘This won’t do.’ I grimace at Joe as my glass is topped up from the champagne bottle.
By the time we sit down to eat, my face feels warm and fuzzy.
Jonathan and Paula have come to ours every Christmas since I came on to the scene. Steve was adamant that we would host – he wanted to cook – and I was glad to stay home. I didn’t want my son’s Christmases dictated by someone else’s rituals.
For Paula, this time of year is visibly difficult. I know that she lost her daughter, Heidi, just before Christmas all those years ago. She never discusses it on the actual day, I think out of respect for everyone else’s mood and to allow us to be jolly.
As a double kicker, after years of trying for a baby with Jonathan, it was Christmastime when Paula told me they were done. I assume she had started the menopause but I didn’t press for details. I look at her now. Her face is more gaunt than the last time I saw her, but she is smiling at something Steve is saying. Always putting on a brave face, prioritising other people’s feelings. I’m caught in a gust of pity for her.
I slip next to Joe and rest my head on his shoulder. As he always does, he wraps his arm around me. Everything has always been so effortless between us, the love so absolute. I dare not look at Paula.
The conversation has turned to politics and Steve is in full flow. It’s a well-worn speech about his degree from the university of life. His hands splayed on the table for emphasis like thick pink tarantulas.
I feel a sudden prod between my legs and jolt upwards.
I shake my head as clearly as I can at Jonathan, who has extended his leg between mine. He makes a mock sad face but moves his foot. We agreed this could never happen again, I want to remind him, but he’s not playing fair. I gulp down more wine.
After dinner, we sit in the living room and open presents. I offer to make coffee, ‘or something stronger’, and find Jonathan trailing out after me. I fill the coffee machine with water, change the filter and pour in the beans. He steps closer, still saying nothing. He’s drunk, swaying, the same look in his eye that he had in the park: hunger.
‘I know you’re a bad girl,’ he murmurs into my hair.
‘Can you get the cups, please?’ I say, but instead I feel a hand on my bottom.
‘You should be my bad girl again,’ he says and I freeze. I breathe in, closing my eyes, as he pushes his crotch into the back of me. I exhale and feel him growing harder as I close up the coffee machine and switch it on.
‘I can’t do this to Paula,’ I say, closing my eyes and summoning up all my willpower. The machine grinds and shrieks as hot black coffee fills the cups.
‘I want to see those pictures of New York!’ I call into the other room, pointedly.
*
After a supper of leftovers, pickles and cheese, and yet more wine, we all head to our rooms, swaying a little. I scroll through the news sites to see if they’ve reported on Michael Sutherland’s death. But it’s just another unfortunate accident and nothing comes up, even on the local Kent news sites. More habit than expectation on Christmas Day, I also check the app.
One new message.
For an idiotic moment, I wonder if it will contain season’s greetings. It absolutely does not.
I’ve been given another name, another address, another challenge. The message was sent hours ago and I’m surprised by the slight smile that twitches on my lips as I open it.
Joe is tucked away in his room, his television babbling. In the next room to me, Steve snores loudly enough to rattle the roof struts.
I hear the floorboard outside my room groan just a little and set my phone in its charger as the door handle turns. Jonathan walks in carrying two glasses of red wine, a little unsteady on his feet. I hold my breath as the blood red liquid threatens to spill.
‘What are you doing?’ I whisper, shutting the door behind him. We have no locks on our bedrooms, have never had any need for them. ‘What about Paula?’
He hands me a glass, which I gulp as he appraises me. I’m wearing the red satin pyjamas that Paula bought me for Christmas. They still have the folds from being packaged and wrapped.
‘Paula’s knocked herself out for the night,’ he says, sitting next to me on the bed in his own new Christmas pyjamas. ‘Sleeping tablets’ – he shrugs at my confused face – ‘what would we do without them?’
Before I have a chance to reply, he’s taken the glass gently from my hand and pushed me back onto the bed.
Greg
Christmas Day, 2019
‘You could have gone up to Scotland,’ Marianne tells him, pushing her thumb into the hollow of a satsuma and slowly peeling back its skin.
‘What, leave you alone at Christmas, hen?’
And she would have been alone. No dad, a mum she finds hard work at the best of times. And it’s not like friends would invite her; there’s no one she’s close to since Jane moved away and most of her old school friends have young kids now. And if she was alone, maybe she would start to pull at the threads. She’s noticed his moods, his stress; of course she has. He catches her frowning at him sometimes, like he’s a crossword she’s trying to solve. They’re barely having sex, that’s new. And it’s harder and harder to keep a lid on the anger bubbling in his guts all night and all day. Anger at ‘them’, those people running him into the ground; and anger at himself, for falling into their web.
‘It was your choice, Greg. I’m not taking the blame.’
OK, so he’s not the only one bubbling with anger. He stares at her, unsure how to proceed. An argument on Christmas Day; well, that would be high stakes. An elevated risk. She stares back, then does a little laugh that is anything but light-hearted and pops an orange segment into her mouth.
‘It’s no one’s fault,’ he says, trying to sound gentle. Normal. ‘I love you and I always want to be with you. I’m just a bit sad, is all.’
‘It is someone’s fault,’ Marianne mutters.
With hundreds of miles and a country border between them, the chilly relationship between wife and mother-in-law can generally be ignored. So when it rises to the fore like this, it trips him up. It was easy with Jenna, his mum knew her mum, they all grew up together and – this was the kicker – Jenna wanted to stay in Scotland.
It wasn’t Marianne’s fault that Greg didn’t want to come ‘home’ permanently, however much he loved visiting. But it was less painful for his mum to blame Marianne than to accept that her son, the love of her life as she would tell anyone, wasn’t coming back to her out of choice.
His parents’ last visit here had been a wash. His mum niggling his wife about anything and everything, turning up the Scots so Marianne had to ask her to repeat what she was saying. And Marianne was patient too, she always tried her best but it was stilted and awkward nonetheless.
‘Little English queen,’ his mum called her, not quite under her breath.
‘Wee Scottish cunt,’ Marianne had texted him while standing in the same room, and he’d laughed despite himself. Even against his lovely mum, he liked it best when he and Marianne were in on the same joke.
They’re both in their pyjamas still, presents unwrapped, turkey joint for two waiting to go in the oven. Another Christmas bottle from his dad. Greg’s playing his Rat Pack Christmas vinyl on his little record player, something that started as an irony, back when they still celebrated Christmas the weekend before and then went to their respective ‘homes’ – and which then became a tradition. He thinks she likes it too, but he doesn’t dare ask now.
He pictures his parents on their own, his dad loading the fire with logs and his mum awaiting the arrival of her widowed sister, his Aunt Audrey. He bites his croissant but can taste the morning roll ‘doubler’ that he’s missing. ‘Tattie scone wi’ square sausage and brown sauce,’ he can hear his mum explaining to a confused Marianne on their first visit, years ago.
‘It’s just …’ He exhales. ‘I don’t know. It feel
s a bit sad when it’s just the two of us,’ he says. Then realises his mistake.
*
As a child, when he’d imagined himself as an adult, he’d imagined himself as a father. Didn’t everyone? He and Jenna had even had a scare, the summer before university when they were still kids themselves. And hadn’t he felt something drop, a little melancholy clang in his heart when it turned out to be a false alarm? However absurd an idea it would have been.
But the older he got, the more he learnt of the world, the more clear it was to him that having a child was obscenely selfish. There are already too many children suffering, too many families breaking apart. And the world wasn’t equipped for this many people eating away at its resources. Just the other day, he was reading about the projected numbers of climate-change refugees on the horizon. And how many of them would fall prey to traffickers? It was all connected and it was all bad. He thought Marianne understood but in recent months she’d started dropping hints. Hints he tried to ignore until she came out and said it. ‘I want us to at least talk about whether we could consider starting a family,’ she’d said the other night in bed.
‘I can’t do this now,’ he’d said, hiding in the bathroom until he was sure she was asleep.
‘You always said you felt the same,’ he says now.
‘I was barely out of university,’ she says, as she always does. ‘I didn’t know I was condemning myself for life.’
‘Condemning?’ The word stings him. He knows she wants a conversation about this, but the idea that their life together as a twosome is a prison sentence feels like a cold knife in his back.
‘I like it just being us,’ he says, trying to keep his voice level. ‘Aren’t we enough?’
‘That’s not fair, Greg. Wanting children isn’t the same as not wanting you. Other people have both without being made to feel guilty about it.’
‘So you’re outright saying you want to have children now?’ he asks. She’s never been this overt before and he wonders if it’s just seasonal exaggeration or something deeper.
She says nothing for a moment, picks at a little hole in her pyjamas. He meant to buy her new ones for Christmas. Wanted to do a lot of things. ‘I’m saying,’ she starts, her eyes filling with tears so he has to repress the urge to reach for her. ‘I’m just saying that I’d like to be able to at least talk about it without you shutting me down. That’s all.’
‘But you told me you didn’t want children and I believed you.’
‘I wasn’t lying,’ she cries, exasperated. ‘I was just really young!’
‘So I can’t trust anything you said back then,’ he says, knowing he’s being an arsehole but bolted onto this track now. ‘If you can just throw your hands up and say, “I was younger then so it didn’t count.”’ He’s being blunt but this isn’t fair of her; if he’d said he wanted kids then refused to have them, she would be devastated. Why is it OK this way round?
She opens her mouth to argue but he presses on, trying to make her see his point of view. ‘You were younger when we got married,’ he pleads. ‘You were younger when we said “forever”. Younger when we said “I love you”. Younger when you said you’d be faithful to me and only me.’ He thinks of the postcards and doubles down. ‘You can’t pick and choose when to tell the truth and when to—’
‘Lie?’ she shouts. ‘You accuse me of lying because I don’t want to give up on a chance to have a child with my husband?’
He shakes his head slowly, allowing even more disappointment to leak out.
‘It doesn’t make me a liar not to realise that everything I said, in our earliest fucking days, was written in stone and never to be revisited! This isn’t fucking fair, Greg! I just want a conversation!’
‘Life isn’t fair, Marianne. Life isn’t fucking fair. What kind of cunt wants to bring a child into this shitty, unfair, fucking world?’ He steps towards her and she sags, deflated. ‘Not. Fucking. Me. That’s who.’ He jabs his own chest so it hurts. ‘And if you don’t like it, go an’ ask your wee boyfriend to knock you up.’
‘Go fuck yourself,’ she spits. ‘And merry fucking Christmas.’
She slams the door to their bedroom and he hears her body hit the bed. He pictures the warmth of it. The insides of it. Red blood leaking around a scalpel incision, soaking into their sheets. He thinks of Kenza, Talia, Helen, all the others. He thinks of the clients sleeping peacefully, relief settling on their faces, a stay of execution for Christmas even if their bank balances are drained. He thinks of every pair of eyes that have stared back at him over the chipped meeting table at work. He thinks of Ana. Of Marija. Of the thirteen thousand question marks still out there. He thinks of his wife, smiling coyly at her collection of postcards. Big picture, little picture, it’s none of it nice to look at.
He stares at the closed bedroom door as the alarm sounds for him to get the turkey into the oven.
Yes, only a cruel bastard would bring a child into this.
Samantha
Friday, 31 January 2020
I woke up late and alone on Boxing Day, a furious hangover ricocheting through me. The feeling of stupidity and recklessness followed me for weeks, but I’ve not seen Jonathan since. I haven’t heard from him either. They cancelled dinner plans with us last month and the relief was palpable. Whether through his own shame or something else, he seems to want to leave our indiscretions in the past. Since then, I’ve been focused on my own body rather than his.
‘You’re looking really good, Mum,’ Joe says as I stroll into the kitchen wearing my gym stuff. I’m heading to an early class this morning.
‘Thank you, love,’ I say quietly. I don’t want Steve to hear and investigate. He hasn’t asked me any more about my ‘affair’, and hasn’t mentioned the speeding ticket again, but I don’t want to ram it in his face either. If he thinks I’m getting in shape for someone else, he’d clearly rather not know.
I wonder how long he imagines us remaining in this limbo now. How far his patience will stretch. Joe was so tiny when we first adopted these roles that decades were the same as forever, but now our son is nearly an adult.
I’ve gone to the gym a couple of times a week for years but it’s always been half-hearted. I’ve sat in the sauna more than I’ve lifted any weights. But now I need my body to be ready for anything. I’m not getting in shape for a man, I’m getting in shape for my own protection.
Joe is excited by my new interest in fitness, asking me about weights and running, about the new gym I’ve joined and why that one over the old one. Have I tried kettlebells? What about spinning? This is his area – I think he’d much rather be a personal trainer than the doctor he’s being groomed to be – and it’s lovely to be able to pick his brain and, let’s be honest, bask in the praise.
Lifting Michael Sutherland nearly wrenched my back out and I’ve had to run from situations several times now, barely able to see straight for the exertion. My new intense workouts – replacing the mornings I used to spend at the charity – are another way to build my armour. But as far as Steve knows, I’m still being ‘mugged’ for my time by the kind and horribly paid staff at the animal charity.
I told Alice before Christmas that I wouldn’t be back in the new year. I blamed fatigue, the constant onslaught of sadness bleeding into my life in ways that I was struggling to conquer. It wasn’t a lie, it just wasn’t the only truth – and either way, it didn’t matter. She hugged me and thanked me for the years. I drank in the smell of her fabric conditioner and probably stayed in the hug too long. She wouldn’t touch me if she knew the full truth.
It’s a convenience that Steve doesn’t know where I am each day. More than a convenience, it’s something of a thrill.
‘I feel stronger than I’ve ever felt,’ I tell Joe, as he pretends to arm wrestle me.
*
Monday, 3 February 2020
Today’s target, Andrew Mackintosh, is shorter than me. The overalls the DIY store has given him trail like pyjamas, two sizes too big. He’s lo
ading planks of wood onto a trolley, slow and methodical. It’s unfathomable that he was once a trusted professional. He’s not like a man at all, wrinkling his nose and shoving his misshapen wire glasses back up it. More like a mole. Something that chews its way through soil in the dark.
His eyes are shadows. I dare not look at them. As if they have sucked in all the light of everything they shouldn’t have seen. I don’t want it reflected back at me.
In my trolley, I have a small bathroom mirror, discounted by 35 per cent. I’ve picked up a few house plants and a limp tomato plant that I intend to nurse back to life. Steve would like that, home-grown tomatoes.
In my pocket, wrapped carefully, I have a burner phone pre-loaded with everything Andrew Mackintosh needs. I am simply a courier today.
‘Can you help me, please?’
I tower over him and he looks up, annoyed.
‘With what?’
I visibly bristle, as if astonished by his insolence. Me, a customer, being treated like that. ‘Well,’ I say, a little shrill. ‘There’s no need for that tone. Is your manager here?’ I look around, hand on my chest. Distressed.
He sighs. ‘What can I do for you, madam?’
I have, of course, already worked out the CCTV black spot. It hangs over a very specific section of the nail and screw pick ’n’ mix. Too low value to be worth the effort. ‘Nine millimetre slotted screws,’ he mumbles after leading me there, then makes to leave the aisle. I catch his wrist with my hand, hard. Snapping onto him like the jaws of life.
‘Ow,’ he says, but quietly. Funny how guilty people react so differently. ‘What do you want?’
