Love Me Or Leave Me

by Claudia Carroll

  ‘Dave. Move it. Now. This is your final warning,’ said Jo, fully prepared to turn on her heel.

  And yet still Lucy wouldn’t butt out and mind her own business.

  ‘You know something?’ she said, head starting to loll slightly to one side. ‘I think you’re one veeeeery lucky lady, Jo.’

  ‘Please, can you just stay out of this! You haven’t the first iota what’s going on here.’

  ‘Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong! Jo, you have to listen to me. Because Dave here – my new best friend Dave –’

  ‘New best friends! Well, I’ll certainly drink to that!’ Dave beamed, clinking glasses with her as Jo just stood there, seemingly powerless to break up this cosy boozing session.

  ‘… Anyway if you ask me, I think our Dave here,’ Lucy slurred, ‘still loves you! Very much, too. Don’t you, Davey-wavey! He no more wants to be in a place like this than I do!’ Then dropping her voice down to an exaggerated stage whisper, she grabbed Jo’s arm and added conspiratorially, ‘And just between you and me, Jo? My sister-in-law went through the exact same thing as you, you know …’

  ‘Dave,’ Jo interrupted, beyond caring if she was being rude, ‘don’t make me go and get a manager to drag you out of here. Because if I have to, I will.’

  ‘… The whole IVF thing, I mean,’ Lucy stage-whispered kindly. ‘And it messed her round no end too. Totally changed her entire personality! Just like you! I was just telling Davey here that she went from being this lovely, kind-hearted person to this unrecognizable BITCH in the space of just a few short months … you’ve never seen a transformation like it … And you can be sure that’s all that’s wrong with you too!’

  A white-hot silence now as her words just hung in the ether.

  Afterwards, Jo remembered thinking it had felt a bit like being slapped. The exact same sensation of shock mixed with swift, sharp pain.

  Had she been hearing things? Could Dave really have done that to her? After everything that had passed between them, had he really just betrayed her to some total stranger, in public?

  Jo had said nothing though, couldn’t if she tried. Instead she just stood rooted to the spot, looking from Lucy to Dave and back again, jaw dangling somewhere round her collarbone.

  ‘Perhaps it would be timely to change the subject?’ Dave had said to Lucy, at least having the good grace to redden and look mortified at this.

  ‘No, no, hear me out!’ Lucy insisted, totally unaware of the full import of her words. ‘Jo, you gotta hear this! Anyway, after two bloody years of all these fertility drugs and clinics and treatments and sis-in-law biting the face off anything that moved, well … my poor brother was about to pack his bags and get the feck out of the line of fire. But then, on their very last round of it, whaddya know? Lo and behold, it worked! Sister-in-law was suddenly up the duff and nine months later, my gorgeous little nephew came along.’

  There was a pulsing silence while Jo fought hard to stay calm. But try as she might she couldn’t do it. A moment later, she and Dave locked eyes with each other as inconvenient tears, the kind she never allowed herself, started to well at the corners of her eyes. Next thing Dave drunkenly tried to haul himself onto his feet.

  ‘Jo …’ he said, sounding instantly sobered when he clocked exactly how upset she was, but it was too late.

  Shaking, barely in control, Jo had turned on her heel and head held high, walked out of the bar so fast, she was almost a blur.

  ‘Oh, shit,’ she could hear Lucy saying, clamping her hand over her mouth and looking apologetically over at Dave. ‘Did I land you in trouble just now?’

  ‘Well, what do you think?’ said Dave, staring after his wife.

  ‘I’m so sorry! I meant it to be a hopeful story!’

  *

  Jo could hear footsteps behind her as she raced for the lift and urgently pressed the call button. It arrived just in time for her to see Dave standing uselessly behind her.

  ‘Jo please, I’m so sorry. She didn’t mean a thing, it was just a stupid, throwaway comment, that’s all …’

  Thankfully though, the lift door slid over, so Jo didn’t have to listen to another word. She even managed to make it all the way back to the privacy of her room, before collapsing behind the door, into a fit of hysterical sobs.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Dawn.

  7 p.m. on the dot. Time for their initial, private conflict resolution with Ms Kate Stephens, as their schedule had so clearly spelt out.

  Dawn was perched quietly on a sofa in the Lavender Room downstairs, about as far away as she could possibly sit from Kirk, who as ever, just sat cross-legged on the floor, eyes closed, like he was meditating and completely miles away.

  Jeez, how could he do that, she thought, fresh anger suddenly flooding through her. Just tune out of the whole situation? A situation, she reminded herself, that they were only in because of him in the first place?

  Kate Stephens, expert in mediation services, turned out to be absolutely lovely and so easy to talk to, just like everyone else round here. Late forties, Dawn guessed, small, blonde, red-faced, round and so welcoming, you almost felt like she’d start passing round mugs of tea and clotted cream scones next.

  Or else telling fortunes, she just had that kind of aura.

  ‘So Kirk and Dawn,’ Kate smiled warmly at them both. ‘The reason I’m here is to help resolve any outstanding areas of conflict and to identify any possibly contentious issues. This is just so when you both meet with our legal team to discuss division of assets which I understand is happening … emm …’ she broke off to briefly refer down to her notes. ‘Yes, you’re both booked in for that tomorrow morning and again in the afternoon. So, this is just to help us iron out any possible areas of potential difficulty before we take you through to that stage.’

  Well, that all sounds okay, Dawn thought. Nothing too scary. So far.

  ‘In fact the way I like to describe my job,’ Kate adds serenely, ‘is as a sort of mirror to reflect the relationship’s difficulties. Then together I can help you make all the vital decisions that you need to, so you can both freely move forward.’

  Must look hysterical on passport application forms, Dawn thought. Occupation: ‘A mirror to reflect divorcing couples’ relationship difficulties.’

  ‘Right then,’ Kate said, sounding a bit like a kindly primary schoolteacher now. ‘So who’d like to go first? Who’s going to be brave and kick things off for us?’

  Having avoided all eye contact since they set foot in here, Dawn now chanced a lightning quick glance over at Kirk, but still absolutely nothing doing from him. Instead, he was just focused dead ahead, still in a calm little chilled-out bubble of Zen.

  Right, she thought. If he won’t step up to the plate, then fine, I may as well get it over with. And he can bloody well sit there and listen. And just let him try to charm his way out of what I’ve got to say. Him with all his shite-talk about being an overflowing vessel of love and how it wasn’t his fault if he was put on earth to spread the love in every direction he could.

  If he even could.

  ‘Okay, I guess I’ll go first,’ she heard her own voice saying, as she focused on Kate and only Kate. Easier that way.

  ‘Excellent,’ said Kate, all smiles. ‘Whenever you’re ready, then.’

  ‘Well, you see … Kirk and I have been married for nearly three years now,’ she began, a bit shakily. ‘And for most of that time, everything was fine. In fact, more than fine, it was wonderful, we were happy. At least I stupidly thought so, until just a few months ago. When …’

  Come on Dawn, she prompted herself. You’ve got a captive audience here. Let him just sit there and hear it said out loud. Let’s hear him try to defend the indefensible.

  Let’s just see him try.

  ‘Yes?’ Kate prompted.

  ‘Well, when I first discovered Kirk was being unfaithful to me.’

  She let the sentence hang in the air for a minute. And oh God, but it felt good. Just saying i
t out loud to an impartial observer, while Kirk himself had no choice but to sit there and take it on the chin. She almost enjoyed it. In fact, she could almost get used to this.

  Kate nodded, but crucially avoided saying all the things Dawn so desperately had hoped to hear from a detached stranger. Like, ‘You poor girl. And Kirk, you utter arsehole! No wonder you’re getting divorced, Dawn love, and as for you Kirk, I only hope you go on to have a miserable life with your new fancy woman, whoever she is. And may you have an even worse break-up than this one and may you subsequently go on to be utterly miserable and end up broke and alone, living in sheltered housing and worrying about all your alimony payments.’

  ‘Tell me more, Dawn,’ was all Kate did actually say to her, sounding annoyingly impartial though and not taking sides.

  ‘You see … I guessed something was up,’ Dawn told her evenly. ‘I’d sensed it for a while. For a long time, in fact.’

  At that, she chanced a quick, surreptitious glance down to where Kirk was sitting on the floor, but still he was giving absolutely nothing away. Just staring out the window as late evening sunlight streamed in, utterly focused on a sycamore tree outside.

  ‘And is there anything you’d like to say at this point, Kirk?’ Kate asked.

  Yeah. Because I’m all ears, Dawn thought coldly.

  ‘Just let her speak, let her finish, she deserves to have her say,’ was all Kirk said though, softly and barely audibly, almost under his breath.

  ‘Please go on then, Dawn.’

  ‘Well, I felt … that is I knew something wasn’t right and it had been worrying me sick. I’d done everything I could to try and get us back on track again because … well …’

  And here it came, the icky part. The bit Dawn had bloody dreaded, where you had to tell a total stranger that your husband who once couldn’t keep his hands off you, had over time started to make you feel like you’d about as much sex appeal as a potted geranium.

  ‘Keep going. You’re doing really well.’

  ‘Well … we’d been living under the same roof more like brother and sister really, than anything else. For months on end. It was starting to drive me mental.’

  Again no reaction from Kirk. No attempt to deny it. Not even the merest eyelid flicker, nothing.

  ‘And how did this make you feel?’

  How do you bloody well think? How would you feel? Like a sack of potatoes prancing round him in highly uncomfortable dental floss knickers and see-through bras, that’s how. When I might as well have gone round our flat with a t-shirt on that said, ‘Unsexiest woman in the world.’

  ‘At first, I was worried sick,’ was what she actually answered though. ‘So then – well, I started to dig a little deeper. Because all the signs were there, I’d just chosen to ignore them. And when I finally discovered what was going on behind my back … under my own roof, a lot of the time … I mean, can you just imagine?’

  Kirk, she noticed out of the corner of her eye, had finally started to focus on her now, calm and serene and cross-legged on the floor. Making absolutely no attempt to defend himself, just letting her have her say.

  So on Dawn went, growing bolder by the second, it felt.

  ‘You ask me how I felt,’ she went on, ‘and the answer is … just so worthless. Valueless. Like the past three years of my life counted for absolutely nothing. Like I’d been a complete eejit for not guessing sooner. Because when it came down to it, the blindingly obvious had been staring me in the face for so long.’

  Only the truth. Flashing back, Dawn rewound back to just a few short months ago, when she’d first gone to Kirk’s computer to check something. (In actual fact, her bank balance and what a lampshade she’d put on eBay was now bidding for.)

  And there it fecking well was. Her first tiny clue. A whole series of emails in glorious Technicolor, right on his computer screen. Gobshite hadn’t even the sense or the good taste to delete them, just in case she chanced on it. Almost, she clearly remembered thinking at the time, as though he actually wanted her to see. Worse, as though he felt he had absolutely nothing to hide.

  And now she saw that Kirk was still calmly listening, making absolutely no attempt to contradict her or to jump in till she’d had her say.

  They hadn’t been living together for so long now that Dawn had almost forgotten he was like that. A listener. Even if someone was calling him a lying, cheating bastard of a husband, he’d just sit there and take it and continue to take it till they eventually ran out of expletives and were left with steam coming out their ears. And that was usually when he’d launch into one of his ‘love and peace’ speeches. Or else the one Dawn had nicknamed the John Lennon memorial speech because it went something along the lines of, sorry for making you bawl crying.

  ‘Hmm, I see,’ Kate nodded sagely. ‘And again Kirk, can I ask if you’ve got anything you’d like to say at this point?’

  But Kirk was now single-mindedly concentrating on Dawn and Dawn only, worry and sadness etched all over his beautiful, tanned face.

  ‘We don’t have to do this,’ he said softly, just to her, acting like Kate wasn’t even in the room. ‘You and I are bigger than this, don’t you see? This negativity, all these accusations, you and I don’t need it. We can rise above this. This isn’t who we are.’

  And next thing, in one of his fluent yoga moves that Dawn could never master on account of the way her knees cracked, Kirk was up off the floor and right over beside her, gently cupping his hand over hers.

  ‘Don’t touch me,’ she said stiffly, instinctively sliding up the sofa from him. ‘Don’t you ever touch me.’

  He looked hurt, she noticed. Bloody good enough for him.

  ‘You must know how sorry I am. I never meant for any of this to –’

  ‘Leave it, Kirk. I’m sick of it. I’m tired of your excuses and all your ridiculous speeches about how you’ve so much love to give and how you don’t want to lose me. Because you know what it amounts to? A big pile of shite-ology! Just like reiki healing, Kirk, which by the way, I also happen to think is a load of dog poo. And while we’re on the subject, the astro-chart reading you gave me for my birthday? Eva and I laughed ourselves silly over it and she even suggested we use it as loo roll.’

  ‘But I thought –’

  ‘I thought we were husband and wife and that meant something to me! I’d have said anything! I’d have said mass if I thought it would make me fit into your world that bit better. But then, you’d know all about lying, wouldn’t you? You and your double life!’

  ‘It’s okay,’ he said, putting his hand in the small of her back and immediately going to massage it. She baulked though, and he instantly stopped. ‘Just let it out, Dawn. All the anger, the harshness and acrimony. Let it all go. Verbalize it, then visually imagine it all inside a pink balloon, that’s just floating away from you …’

  ‘Oh, will you shut up about bloody pink balloons! Because you want to know something? Getting married to you was a horrible, awful mistake and everyone is right, my mother and Eva and everyone. All I can do now is try to extricate myself from it as quickly as I can!’

  And having held it together for so long, the tears were finally threatening.

  ‘We don’t have to do this,’ Kirk said, looking like a hurt little boy. ‘Not here, not like this, not now. You know I never stopped loving you … not once … and I never will either. Nothing has changed between us, not a thing. I still love you as much as I did the day I first committed to you. Loving someone else doesn’t mean I love you any less. I love all women, you know that. And there’s no reason why you and I can’t continue on, just as we were …’

  ‘How could you, Kirk!’ Dawn yelled at him for all she was worth. ‘In our flat, in our bed! How could you have done that to me? You lied to me, you deliberately misled me and all I can do is sit here and hope to God you suffer for it. You’re the one who’s always banging on about karma, aren’t you? So why don’t you try shoving that in one of your pink balloons?’

  ‘
Please, both of you!’ Kate tried her best to interrupt the pair of them. ‘Let’s just try to stay cool and detached. Remember, there’s never any need for raised voices!’

  Too late though. Now that the two of them were physically locked in a room together and had actually started to communicate, after months of enforced silence, there was suddenly no shutting them up.

  ‘I never lied to you,’ Kirk said, still so annoyingly serene that Dawn wanted to screech and fling a vase at him. ‘I never led you on … it was never my intention to …’

  ‘To what? To do what exactly, Kirk? To have an affair right under my nose? Why can’t you for once in your life, accept that you can’t just do whatever you want, whenever you feel like it? Your actions have consequences for other people around you … in this case, me!’

  ‘You have to understand that …’

  ‘That what? That you and your lover just accidentally fell into bed together and things went from there? Is that what you want me to believe? Just how stupid do you think I am! What kind of an eejit do you take me for anyway?’

  ‘You know that isn’t what I think at all –’

  ‘Oldest cliché in the book, isn’t it? The wife is the last to know! So just how long had things been going on between the pair of you before I walked in on you? Care to tell Kate all about that?’

  Kate, meanwhile, was up on her feet now, like a schoolteacher in a classroom she could no longer control.

  ‘Please, I really must ask you both to lower your voices and to stay nice and calm for me. All of this is getting us absolutely nowhere!’

  Dawn completely ignored her though.

  ‘So will you tell her or will I, Kirk?’

  ‘You’re not even attempting to listen to me –’

  ‘I asked you a question!’

  ‘And I need to talk to you. But not here and not like this!’

  ‘Fine, if you won’t, then I will.’

  A pause while Kirk just looked at her. And suddenly, feeling scarily in control of the whole situation, Dawn turned back to where Kate looked like she was practically about to call security.