Love Me Or Leave Me

by Claudia Carroll

  Now piss off and leave me alone. Some of us have real work to do.

  Jo.

  PS. As for ‘this is the result of what we’re going through and how it’s affecting you’? Cop yourself on, Dave. You’re not ‘going through’ anything that I can see. Other than six cans of Bulmers a night, that is.

  From: davesblog@hotmail.com

  To: Jo_Marketing_Director@digitech.com

  Re: The last of your things.

  April 17th, 9.35 a.m.

  Dear Queen narky moody-pants,

  You know why you’re acting like this and saying these things. Because this isn’t you, at least, not the real you. You’re just acting out and looking for a convenient punchbag. So enter Dave, long-suffering husband, stage left.

  That is, at least, I fecking hope it’s not the real you. Otherwise never mind about your threats of wanting a divorce. I bloody want one first. So there. So how do you like it, when it’s thrown back into your pretty and freakishly unlined face?

  In spite of what you may think, dearest insane one, I still wish you love and luck on your trip and look forward to seeing you on your return.

  Because I’m here for you. And the day may yet come when you’ll need to remember that.

  Dxxx

  PS. You told me you liked the red Ferrari print. Shattered that you lied. Oh, the deceit of womanhood, etc.

  PPS. As for your vitriolic comment re: my employment status, you know I could be in a job right now if I wanted to be. I’ll have you know, dearest one, that I was offered a telly commercial only last week, playing the part of a speaking Sky Plus box, but chose to take the principled stand of telling the casting director where he could go and shove it. Because in spite of your oft-repeated ‘career advice’ to me, I refuse to compromise my art for mere lucre.

  PPPS. I don’t really want a divorce. I don’t want one at all. In fact, I want to stay married to you forever and ever, if only to annoy you. I want us to grow old and grey together, then be the one who wheels you around the nursing home, when you’re stroke-ridden and need someone to wipe your arse. That’s a measure of how much I’m staying married to you, sweet spouse of mine.

  From: Jo_Marketing_Director@digitech.com

  To: davesblog@hotmail.com

  Re: The last of your things.

  April 17th, 9.42 a.m.

  Dave,

  As it happens, I think you’d have made a fantastic speaking Sky Plus box. Shame you weren’t offered something made of wood though, then you really could have had a chance to show off your range.

  Have to go, flight taxiing now.

  Am greatly looking forward to coming home to a lovely, empty flat, free of any and all reminders of you.

  Jo.

  PS. Please don’t tell me the subliminal reasons behind my behaviour. I know there’s nothing easier for you in the world than to conveniently blame what I’ve been dealing with personally for the breakdown of our relationship.

  But trust me, it’s broken and unfixable. It’s over.

  From: davesblog@hotmail.com

  To: Jo_Marketing_Director@digitech.com

  Re: The last of your things.

  April 17th, 11.10 a.m.

  Sweet-natured angel of mine,

  Has your flight landed yet? Because I’ve a few further points I’d like to make and given the humour you’re in these days, it’ll be more than my life’s worth to say to your face.

  Firstly, may I remind you that I’ve done absolutely everything you ever asked of me? You were the one who wanted to get married in the first place, when we’d only been seeing each other for about a year. And I use the term, ‘seeing each other’ loosely, given that you were off on business trips more often than not. So I did what you wanted and proposed.

  Then you were the one who bloody well insisted on a three-ring circus of a wedding, which was basically anathema to me, but I kept my mouth shut, just so you could have your dream day. Even though the sight of myself in the wedding photos, beaten into that poncey-looking morning suit still makes me want to vomit.

  Thirdly, you were the one who made the decision that if you were ever going to have a child, then now was your chance. Again, I had virtually feck all say in the matter, but still went along with it. I actually wanted us to have a family of our own, and for the record sweetheart, I thought we’d have made grade A parents. You’ve have instilled discipline in our kid, whereas I’d have taught them when and where it was okay to wave two fingers at anything remotely resembling authority.

  Not only that, but may I point out that I’ve stood by you through everything else that’s been heaped on us since? I’m blue in the face at this stage reminding you that what you’re soldiering through, I am too, as it happens. I know that minor, inconvenient fact tends to be overlooked by you, but just take a moment to really dwell on it, my love.

  Why would you think that a miscarriage followed by several failed IVF treatments would be any less painful for me? Where’s it written that you get to have the monopoly on disappointment and heartache and just what a fucking nightmare we’re both stuck in here?

  As an aside, on that very point, I spoke to Bash’s pal Emma about what we’ve been going through. She’s a maternity nurse and says your behaviour and the way you’re acting so unlike your usual self is actually perfectly normal. It’s just all those shagging hormones and fertility drugs they’ve been pumping into your body for the last eighteen months. That’s all and it will pass.

  Lastly, dearest love, you asked me to move out. Ergo, I did.

  But over my dead body am I going to make this divorce easy for you. No, you don’t get away from me that easily.

  Your ever-loving husband,

  Dave.

  Jo had landed in Heathrow by then, having spent the entire flight doing all the lovely calming exercises she’d been taught at the clinic she’d been attending as an outpatient. But the very second she switched her phone back on and read that particular gem, somehow every bit of the deep breathing and meditation went right out the window.

  Don’t reply, she warned herself. If Dave wants the last word that badly, then let him have it. But try as she might, she couldn’t stop herself and a few seconds later, her fingers were busy tapping away.

  From: Jo_Marketing_Director@digitech.com

  To: davesblog@hotmail.com

  Re: The last of your things.

  April 17th, 11.17 a.m.

  Dave,

  If you ever even think about discussing the ins and outs of my medical history with some random stranger ever again, I’ll not only hit you with a divorce petition, but also I’ll personally see to it that you’re hauled through the courts for breach of privacy.

  Jesus Dave?!! What next? You going to start standing on street corners, handing out flyers with photos of my lady bits on them?

  And just so you know, this is categorically NOT hormones. It’s you, driving me insane. End of.

  Jo.

  Chapter Six

  Lucy.

  ‘So you’ve really left him then?’

  ‘Be more accurate to say we left each other,’ Lucy answered, knocking back the dregs of the margarita in front of her and crunching loudly on an ice cube. It was her third and she probably should have left it at that, but somehow she found herself waving over to the barman for the same again. To hell with it anyway, she thought. My marriage just ground to a shuddering halt this week, why the hell not?

  ‘Oh Lucy,’ her pal Bianca said, shaking her head sadly and dabbing at the corner of her eyes with a Kleenex. ‘I just can’t believe it. I mean, this is you and Andrew we’re talking about. You were like the gold standard of happy couples! If you guys can’t make it, then what hope is there for the rest of us?’

  Lucy managed a weak, watery smile back at her. Bianca was a sweet, lovely girl who meant well, but who actually did nothing but make Lucy feel guilty, for having the barefaced cheek to have marital problems in the first place.

  Bianca, it had to be explained, was a die-har
d romantic, who’d watched one too many romcoms starring Jennifer Aniston, and was convinced that once you sealed the deal with a bloke and had a ring on your finger to show for it, it would inevitably lead to happy ever after. And the sad thing was that at one time, Lucy had bought into all that too.

  Whereas now she thought, what a load of my arse.

  Besides as far as Bianca knew, what she believed was the absolute truth. After all, she and Andrew had once been loved up and happy together, hadn’t they? So happy; Hollywood-ending happy. In fact, that was the whole bloody tragedy of it. Lucy had honestly thought this was her soulmate; the man she’d happily grow old with. The two of them should have ended up old and grey, worrying about their cholesterol and going off on Nile cruises, with a prescription for Viagra stuck in his back pocket on account of the age gap.

  Not, for the love of God, with her sitting on a barstool, with the hangover from hell, yet already onto her third margarita and wondering how many more it would take for her to get so completely hammered that it would somehow numb the pain a bit.

  Lucy had never really been much of a drinker, but these days booze was the only thing getting her through this. Lovely, lovely booze and lots of it. It was completely unlike her, not her normal carry-on at all, but then she figured, if this wasn’t a dire emergency, then what was?

  ‘None of this was your fault, you know,’ Bianca told her firmly. ‘If it hadn’t been for … well, you know. Circumstances.’

  ‘I know, sweetheart,’ said Lucy, squeezing her hand, flushing with gratitude to have a genuine pal like this in her corner. ‘Circumstances. That’s all it came down to in the end really, wasn’t it?’

  But she certainly didn’t need reminding of the circumstances that had suddenly propelled her out of her beautiful marital home with a husband she loved, to sleeping in Bianca’s spare room and effectively living out of a suitcase.

  ‘Well, all I can say is, I hope Alannah and Josh are finally happy with themselves now,’ said Bianca, nibbling crossly on the bowl of peanuts in front of her.

  ‘Are you kidding me? You can bet the pair of them are out celebrating getting rid of their beloved stepmother tonight with a bottle of Cristal …’ Lucy broke off here a bit, but then when it came to Andrew’s grown-up children from his first marriage, it was bloody hard going, keeping an even temper.

  Sweet Mother of God, where to start about Alannah and Josh? They were twins and at twenty-eight, just two years younger than Lucy herself, so initially when Lucy first came into their lives, she’d made the critical error of trying to befriend them both. I’m dating their father, she’d naïvely thought back then. So can’t we all just get along and be friends?

  Right from day one, she’d really gone the extra mile with both of them. She constantly put herself into their shoes and realized how incredibly awkward this whole icky situation had to be for both of them. After all, wasn’t this the oldest scenario in the book? A fifty-something divorcee, suddenly dating a new and considerably younger girlfriend? To his kids, she figured, I must look like the mid-life equivalent of a Porsche. Lucy had been around the block enough to know how utterly shite it must have been for the twins, and had genuinely bent over backwards trying to blend them all into one big happy family.

  But in spite of all her proffered kindness and numerous olive branches, their rudeness back to her knew no bounds and it was honestly like the more of a superhuman effort she made with them, the more they despised her for it.

  On countless occasions, she’d gone out of her way to invite Alannah to fashion shows that she was working on, or else to highly exclusive sample sales most girls would have sold a kidney to get into, mainly because fabulous designer gear straight off a catwalk was usually flogged off for half nothing. Not only that, but Lucy had regularly made a point of inviting Josh along to the flashy fashionista cocktail dos she was always getting plus ones for, where he could spend the whole night surrounded by beautiful women. Sure, what normal fella his age wouldn’t kill for that?

  Out of the goodness of her heart, Lucy had genuinely meant well. In spite of everything that had happened since and in spite of all the pain that had been caused, she’d desperately wanted them all to get along, but Alannah and Josh only sneered at her and dismissed her because she was a ‘just a model’. And of course, the two of them had her pigeon-holed as some kind of brainless, vapid party girl who’d been lucky enough to meet this older, wealthy, distinguished guy and somehow cajole him down the aisle.

  Heather Mills, they’d nicknamed her behind her back (she knew for a fact; she’d accidentally overheard), and it bloody well stung.

  But then, that was the thing about Lucy. People were always reading about her in the papers or else seeing her on photo shoots in glossy magazine ads and had her down as tough and flinty, a girl well able to take care of herself. And yet, underneath all that, she might as well have been a big, soft marshmallow. So Josh and Alannah and their never-ending petty little slights got to her on a daily basis. How could they not?

  And they never, not for one millisecond, seemed to let up. They’d never forgive her for what had happened to their family and by God, from day one they’d been determined to make Lucy pay with her heart’s blood. Whether it was her fault or not.

  Back at the bar, Bianca was now rummaging round the bottom of her handbag.

  ‘Oh … by the way, I’ve got something here you probably should see, sweetheart,’ she said. ‘I thought it would be best to show you after a couple of drinks, to … well, to lessen the impact a bit.’

  ‘Ehh … I’m guessing it’s a decree nisi that Alannah and Josh made Andrew sign, with a gun pointed to his head?’

  ‘Not quite that bad, but …’

  Apologetically, Bianca held up a copy of that evening’s Chronicle. And there it was in glorious Technicolor for all the world to see.

  LUCY BELTER AND HER SUGAR DADDY HIT THE ROCKS! EXCLUSIVE.

  ‘Oh, you’re kidding me,’ Lucy groaned, head in her hands.

  ‘Sorry. Thought you’d be better off seeing it with a few drinks on you.’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake, I’m way too sober for this. Where’s the barman with our refills?’

  Bianca looked at her worriedly. ‘Do you really think that’s a good idea, love? It’s just you’ve got that huge photo shoot first thing in the morning and you really need to look the biz.’

  ‘Just one for the road then,’ said Lucy, though she wasn’t even sure she meant it. Alcohol was just about the only thing getting her through this whole nightmare.

  ‘Right then, if you insist,’ said Bianca doubtfully. ‘Though I’m warning you, I’m making you drink buckets of water with it too. You need your beauty sleep.’

  Bianca was a stylist and acutely aware of how important it was for models to look fresh and camera-ready at all times. As she headed off to the bar, Lucy smiled fondly after her and silently blessed the girl for being such a stalwart. God knows, she needed her mates around her now. Then her eye fell on the headline and in spite of herself, she winced again.

  There was a downside of living your life in the public eye and Lucy was very well-known, not only as a model, but thanks to a regular slot she had on Good Morning Ireland! as a ‘fashionista and trend commentator’. In other words, after any major red carpet event, Lucy was your go-to personality to sit in a hot TV studio and pass comments like, ‘If you ask me, all Angelina Jolie needs is a nice, light spray tan and a Supersize Big Mac meal in that order.’

  And amazingly, TV gigs really started to take off for her. Producers told her she was a born natural and audiences seemed to relish her gutsy, down-to-earth, no-nonsense approach.

  Lucy loved what she did and most of the time was happy to see stories about herself in the papers; after all, it was part and parcel of her job, she reckoned. A job she’d worked bloody hard at since she’d first been ‘discovered’ at the tender age of fifteen. Her family wasn’t wealthy and privileged like Andrew’s; she’d had to graft for everything that cam
e her way in life. But amazingly, right from day one, her career seemed to just take off. Six feet tall, with Nordic good looks and cheekbones you could nearly slice ham on, she was a natural. In next to no time, she was earning some serious money for herself, between catwalk shows and magazine shoots.

  But Lucy was shrewd and streetwise and took absolutely nothing for granted, knowing that a model’s sell-by date was short and a dole queue was potentially just a heartbeat away from her. So she took on every single modelling gig that was offered to her, slogging, slaving and grafting for everything that came her way.

  You need a model to stand shivering in a bikini in the middle of Grafton Street in February to advertise sun holidays? Lucy was your first port of call. Or you need a glamour gal to climb naked into a giant vat of cold beans, just so you could promote some new reduced fat range? She was your gal. No job too big, too small or too mortifying. And recession or no, miraculously the money kept rolling in.

  Of course the downside of having a public profile was that for months now, all sorts of sleazy tabloids were running features speculating on the state of her marriage. As far as possible, she did her level best to avoid reading any of that crap, but still. Hard not to feel like your nerve endings were lying jangled and exposed every time you glanced at a byline that screeched into your face,

  THEY WERE A MISMATCH FROM THE WORD GO!

  Alannah and Josh, she thought bitterly, must be having a bloody field day with all this.

  Just then, a song came on the bar’s music system. ‘True Love’ by Cole Porter. And completely unbidden, a memory surfaced, something Lucy thought she’d buried deep inside and worked bloody hard at keeping there. But in spite of her best efforts, the recollection still bubbled to the surface.

  No, she warned herself, feeling her bottom lip start to wobble. Don’t sink under. It’s just a silly love song; DO NOT let it get to you. You’re doing so well. All you’ve got to do is stay strong.