by Tracy Bloom
“What do I care?” said Daniel, now too tired to stay calm. “I will tell you what I care. I have spent the entire night caring, that’s what. No actually that’s wrong. I have spent most of the last nine months caring, trying to sort you lot out. Listening, talking, trying to make sense of the whole damn mess and now I am tired and I don’t need you telling me to fuck off. Go fuck off yourself and get on with your bloody life.”
To Daniel’s horror he watched as Matthew face crumpled again. He turned away from Daniel in embarrassment and started to weep, his shoulders rising and falling with huge heavy sobs.
An elderly couple just down the corridor were either too rude or too old to hide their stares. Daniel heard scraping and watched as the elderly woman moved her chair so she could get a better view.
Matthew’s sobs were getting louder by the minute, forcing Daniel to take action.
“Showtime’s over,” he said to his audience, but they were not to be deterred, staring innocently straight back at him.
Daniel awkwardly attempted to put his arm around Matthew. Matthew shrugged him off but Daniel persisted.
“Come on lad, you know you’ll get over it,” he said quietly. Why he always reverted to talking like his mother when trying to console someone he had no idea. In fact he realised he had just repeated his mother’s exact words after he’d told her he was in love with his male tutor at art college. He was so frustrated at his mother’s blinkered stance that he had retorted instantly that he had known he was gay since he was fifteen, when he had been seduced by David Sanderson on a scout trip.
“David Sanderson?” she had exclaimed in absolute horror.
“Yes,” he had replied.
“You are a liar. You can’t say such a thing about poor David,” she had said.
“No he did mum, honest,” he protested.
“How dare you drag a vicar’s son into this? I don’t know what is worse, pretending to be gay or blaspheming the church.”
His mother’s lack of any understanding reminded him that Matthew did deserve some sympathy even if it was from the man who had been instrumental in plotting his romantic downfall.
Daniel sat patiently patting Matthew’s shoulder, waiting for the sobs to subside. Occasionally he heard a shuffle or a cough from the couple reminding him that there was an expectant audience awaiting a performance.
“Tissues?” Daniel turned to ask them.
“Oh yes,” nodded the woman vigorously, delighted to be promoted to a speaking part as she searched through her handbag.
She pulled out a half-empty pocket-sized packet of Kleenex.
“Sorry it’s not a full pack,” she said. “I had to use some at Connie Waring’s Wake yesterday. Spilt sherry trifle down me front I did. And it was one of them funny trifles with jelly in, so bound to stain.”
“I only eat jelly when naked,” said Daniel. “Now you two. I need to have what is known as a private conversation with my upset friend here, so we need some alone time.”
“Oh we won’t make a sound,” said the old lady quickly. “We are very good at being quiet. All the funerals we go to you see. You just pretend that we’re not here. Unless you need any help of course.”
“Go away or I will report you for harassment,” Daniel shouted, losing his patience.
“OK, OK,” the lady muttered, shuffling away. “Just trying to be neighbourly. We won’t bother next time will we Bob?”
Matthew’s sobs seemed to have abated. He looked spectacularly sad, his suit crumpled, previously perfect tie all askew.
Daniel looked deep inside for some inner strength. He was tired beyond belief and emotionally wrecked but he realised his job was not quite yet complete and he would allow no-one to say that Daniel Laker was a job-half-done kind of guy.
Matthew was now just staring into space so he decided to plough straight in, in the hope that he could be tucked up in his bed with the Strip-O-Gram within the hour.
“So Matthew,” he said. “Let’s see. I guess there is a lot stuff going through your head right now.”
Matthew did not move a muscle so Daniel continued.
“Shall we break it down into manageable chunks? I always find that makes it easier don’t you?”
Matthew turned his stare towards him but still said nothing.
“OK, let’s get right to it shall we and start with you and Katy. This is the way I see it. You are unhappy. You see someone who reminds you of happy times and the world seems a better place. So much so you grab hold of it, wanting some of that happiness back. But it’s false happiness isn’t it Matthew? It’s the happiness you remember from a previous time. The happiness of first love, first sex, first everything. The most exciting time in your life. You can’t get that back Matthew. Not even if you get back the person that you shared it with. It just doesn’t work like that. Before you know it you stop talking about your favourite music, why you hate your parents and which lay-by you should make out in and start arguing over who last cleaned the toilets and why you never have sex anymore. You don’t love Katy because you don’t know her. You know teenager Katy, not nearly forty Katy. Please don’t tell her I said she was nearly forty by the way. She’d kill me.”
Daniel heard a sneeze from behind him.
“If I turn around and find you there I am calling matron,” he shouted. There was muttering and the sound of soft soles shuffling across lino.
“Where was I? So you see you were chasing a false happiness when you should have been sorting out why you were unhappy in the first place. You and Alison are married Matthew. At some point you loved her so much that you said you would forsake all others to be with her. That’s huge. More than huge. You’ve got to find that place again with Alison. It can’t have all gone. You can do it Matthew, I know you can and it will be even better this time because you will have two kids to share it with. Two of your very own kids to love between you. And before you say it, I know that Katy could be having your child but surely it has to be better that your twins have two parents who love them and that Katy’s child has the same rather than messing it all up and doubtless screwing them up at the same time.”
Daniel sat back in his chair completely spent. He could say no more.
Matthew looked up at Daniel. Daniel waited for the words of gratitude to come forth as Matthew undoubtedly realised that Daniel was perhaps the most insightful man he had ever come across.
“Daniel,” said Matthew.
“Yes,” said Daniel expectantly.
“Will you now just fuck off?”
Daniel held his hands up finally in defeat.
“I can do no more,” he said.
“Thanks,” muttered Matthew.
Daniel patted his shoulder and disappeared to get lost finding his way out of the hospital.
Matthew sat staring at the crack in the tile in front of his chair for a very long time. Tea trolleys trundled past him, mops flicked around him and a million anonymous pairs of shoes trudged backwards and forwards, all failing to interrupt his thoughts.
After about an hour his phone bleeping finally roused him.
It was a text from Alison asking what he was doing.
He took a deep breath, stood up and walked just around the corner to her room.
She had her back to him and he thought she might be asleep. He tiptoed around to the far side of the bed.
Alison lay there silently crying.
He sat down on the chair beside the bed.
“You’re here?” she said.
“Why are you crying?” he asked.
“I’m scared Matthew,” she said in a very small voice. “What if I can’t do it? What if I let them down?”
“You won’t Alison. You could never let them down. I’m the one most likely to do that.”
“Don’t be silly. You’ll be there when they need you.”
“I hope so,” he said. He shifted in his seat and felt something dig into his side. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the copy of Childbirth withou
t Fear.
“Want me to read some of this to you?” he asked.
“No. I don’t need books now Matthew. I just need you.”
“Really?”
“Really,” she said.
Chapter 25
“She’s awesome,” Ben said for the hundredth time, staring down at the bundle wrapped in a blanket in his arms.
Katy lay back on her pillow in complete and utter exhaustion and complete and utter happiness. The day had ended so differently to how she had feared it would. Best of all had been Ben’s face when he had ventured to the weighing machine for a closer look after the baby had been cleaned up. He had turned around and given her the biggest grin ever.
“She’s a ginger! She’s a ginger!” he had shouted over to her with a big thumbs up.
Ben handed the tiny little girl over to Katy for a cuddle.
“Thanks,” she said. “For being here.”
“Well it was touch and go. Me and Braindead were in Edinburgh.”
“When?”
“Last night.”
“Last night? Why were you there last night?”
“Oh Katy. After I left you I didn’t know what to do with myself. My head was spinning like crazy, so I went down the pub obviously and Braindead was in there on his lunch break. Anyway so Rick calls on my mobile wanting to know what time we’re leaving on Friday to get to up to Edinburgh for the stag-do. I’m in no fit state to make any sense so Braindead grabs the phone and says to Rick we are leaving now. It seemed like a great idea at the time so we just walk out of the pub to the station and get on the next train to Edinburgh. No stuff or anything. We fall into the first pub we find when we get there then all I can remember is at some point Braindead picks up a call on his mobile and starts going on about Daniel.”
“Daniel? Daniel called Braindead? What time was this?”
“No idea. About eleven I guess.”
“But he was with me.”
“Well somehow he managed to fit in a right old conflab with Braindead because he just kept coming out with this stuff. Daniel was trying to get Braindead to convince me to come back. Honestly if it weren’t for the topic of conversation, hearing Braindead talk like Daniel would have been bloody hilarious. He used long words and everything.”
“So what were they saying? What made you come back?” Katy asked tentatively.
He paused for a moment.
“They made me see that I should have been thinking that this could be my baby, not that it might not, and what would I do if he turned out to be the next striker for England and I had to tell the poor lad I hadn’t even been bothered to turn up for the birth.”
“So football made you come back?” said Katy, feeling her elation wane.
“No Katy, no. That just kind of tipped it over the edge. But to be perfectly honest even on the train on the way back down I still wasn’t sure. Then Daniel was waiting for me outside the hospital and he and this nurse asked me the only really important question.”
“What the-do you really love him one?”
“No, the-do you really love her one.”
“And?”
“Well it was yes of course.”
“Really? Was it?”
“Of course it bloody was. I know I’ve never said it before but it’s not my thing you know,” he said. He took her hand and looked her straight in the eye. “I love you, I always have.”
“I love you too you know,” she said back.
“You don’t have to say that just because I did.”
“No I do, I really do and I will marry you, if you meant it that is.”
“Of course I meant it. But I do have one condition.”
“What’s that?” asked Katy, fearing the worst.
“That we never become one of those boring married couples. You know like the ones who sit in pubs and don’t talk to each other and probably never ever have sex.”
“I promise,” said Katy, knowing that life with Ben could never be boring. “Tell you what. We’ll even have sex on a Tuesday.”
Acknowledgements
This book was inspired by two encounters. The first, a late night conversation in a night club of one man’s experience of a hasty exit from a labour ward. The second a jaw-dropping introduction from a pregnant lady at our first ever antenatal class. She calmly introduced her female friend informing us that they weren’t lesbians and she’d bought her along because her husband had left her 5 weeks previously. This book in no way reflects their stories but they made me realise the drama (and humour) potential in the whole having a baby thing.
I must also mention all the people I know whose throw-away one-liners I haven’t forgotten and have provided some of the funnies in this book. A special mention must go to Steve and Andrea for some top comedy moments. You know what you said. Also to Tony who truly does believe that NO-ONE EVER HAS SEX ON A TUESDAY and I thank him from the bottom of my heart for discovering this fact and sharing it with me.
I'd like to thank my agent, Araminta Whitley, for believing in me and growing my confidence to continue to aim high. I would also like to mention Joanna Swainson and Madeleine Milburn who first spotted the potential in this book and sold the rights to several international publishers. You set me off on this journey so thank you.
Chris, Lee, Lucy and Guy at The One Off, who went above and beyond to design the cover for this book and take a picture of me that I actually like. True miracle workers. Thank you.
Finally I’d like to thank my family. Mickey-takers of the highest order who taught me that humour is always the answer. Jim, June, Andrew and Helen, you always make me laugh.
And last but not least, Fanny. Hope you don’t mind me taking your name in vain yet again.
About the Author
Tracy Bloom started writing when her cruel, heartless husband ripped her away from her dream job shopping for rollercoasters for the UK’s leading theme parks, to live in America with a brand new baby and no mates. In a cunning plan to avoid domestic duties and people who didn’t understand her Derbyshire accent, she wrote NO-ONE EVER HAS SEX ON A TUESDAY. It went on to be successfully published internationally so now she is chuffed to bits to have a new dream job, making people laugh and sometimes cry through her writing. Back in good old England now and cracking on with writing about other people who screw up their lives in a hilarious fashion including a sequel, NO-ONE EVER HAS SEX AFTER A BABY.
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Watch out for Tracy’s next book coming soon
SINGLE WOMAN SEEKS REVENGE
Meet Suzy, a 36-year-old advice columnist for a local paper. When yet another relationship ends badly she sets about getting revenge on every man who ever broke her heart in ways you never dreamed possible.
Chapter One
Dear Suzie
I have never written to an agony aunt before but there is no-one else I can talk to about this. You see my husband left six months ago for someone ten years younger than me who he met at a spinning class. Completely devastated, I turned to food for comfort and quickly gained twenty pounds. Then out of the blue a couple of weeks ago he turned up on the doorstep saying he was ready to come home on one condition, that I become more adventurous in bed. He left me with a list of what he had in mind, much of which included certain S&M practices that I had to research on the internet to even understand what they were. I love him so much and I a
m desperate to have him back but they don’t do the PVC outfit he is suggesting in a size 18. What should I do?
Yours desperately
Trish
Dear Trish
Buy the PVC outfit in a size 10 along with some handcuffs and a blow torch. Call your husband and tell him you will comply with all his demands and you want him to come over straight away. When he arrives, tell him that you have one condition, he must wear the PVC outfit and then you will do whatever he wants. When he has got it on, handcuff him to the bed then whip out the blow torch, turn the gas to maximum and ask him what parts of his anatomy he wants burnt off first. Then tell the lowlife never ever to bother you again – you stupid, stupid, stupid…
Suzie didn’t realize she was banging her head against the computer screen muttering the word stupid, over and over again until Drew gently took hold of her shoulders and pulled her back until she was sitting upright.
“Control, alt, delete normally works better than head-butting,” he said as he sat down at his desk next to her and started flicking the switches necessary for him to be able to start his working day.
Suzie was vaguely aware that her breathing was laboured and she was gripping the edge of the desk very hard. Oddly the office of the Manchester Herald newspaper appeared to be humming normally around her despite the fact that she felt anything but normal. She was a Jenga stack on the brink of collapse just waiting for someone to take out the wrong block.
“You okay?” asked Drew, interrupting the ferocious tapping on his keyboard and peering round to look at her stricken face.
Block extracted. Concern shown by colleague. Collapse imminent.
“Why?” she growled, trying desperately to contain her volume when all she felt like doing was screaming. “Why am I writing this stupid, bloody agony column?”
“Er, because you suggested it?” replied Drew.
“I know I bloody suggested it,” she said, her face starting to flame up. “But I didn’t mean it. It was a joke,” she said through gritted teeth. “If Gareth thinks that this is going to bring back our female readers he’s an idiot and he’s even more of an idiot for asking me to do it.”
