Google Your Husband Back

by Julie Butterfield

‘And?’

  ‘And he turned up. He had his own key and he let himself in and then I saw them just for a few seconds before they pulled the curtains. Saw them in the window … kissing.’

  Fiona closed her eyes in distress. ‘Oh Kate I’m so sorry.’

  Kate nodded. It had been a little like watching a drama unfold on TV. She had been fairly certain of the path it was taking but then came the reveal, the moment when accompanied by dramatic music all suspicions were confirmed and even though in her heart she already knew what would happen, it was still a shock to see it all laid bare before her eyes.

  They sat in silence for a couple of minutes as Kate sipped at her wine and enjoyed the warmth.

  ‘Kate?’

  ‘Mm.’

  ‘Are you okay?’

  Kate looked at her anxious friend, sitting on the edge of the seat, ready to catch Kate if she swooned in grief, or pass her the tissues if the tears came streaming down again.

  ‘I’m fine,’ assured Kate in an almost dreamy voice. ‘At least I know why he left.’

  Kate swirled the wine in her glass, looking at its golden colour as it reflected the light from the fire.

  ‘You seem very – calm,’ offered Fiona still ready for the total breakdown of her friend.

  ‘Calm? Mm, maybe not calm. But I do feel more settled.’

  ‘Settled? Knowing your husband has left you for another woman has made you feel settled?’ asked Fiona in disbelief.

  Kate smiled. ‘But I know exactly what’s happened now Fee, I know what he’s done and why and now I know what I have to do.’

  ‘And what do you have to do?’

  Kate raised her eyebrows in surprise. ‘Get him back of course!’

  Fiona snorted. ‘I’m not sure I would want Stuart back after something like that. To be honest if that were Stuart and I’d just found out he’d left me for another woman I don’t think I’d be in the slightest bit settled or calm. I’d be debating between getting a kitchen knife and hunting him down or throwing myself off a bridge!’ and patting her friend on the shoulder she slipped out to see how Stuart was doing serving the casserole into three huge bowls.

  Kate could hear the sounds of the oven opening, the flavor of the casserole wafting through the room and she stared into the fire watching the light shift as a log suddenly gave way and moved the flames.

  The first dinner party Alex and Kate gave as a couple was in their tiny flat. They had invited four of Kate’s friends around and although Kate had been very blasé about it when the invitations were issued, as the date approached she started to feel very nervous. Alex had delivered the invitation one Sunday afternoon in the pub and the reaction had been one of hilarity.

  ‘Oh God Alex, you do realise how legendary Kate’s lack of culinary skills are don’t you? She can’t make toast without burning it!’

  Kate had tried to look offended but then the giggles broke through.

  ‘I try!’ she defended herself. ‘And yes, Alex is aware. There is no suggestion that I’ve tricked him into thinking I’m a wonderful cook and he’ll be coming home to coq au vin every night!’

  ‘He’ll be lucky if he comes home to a kitchen that’s still intact! Alex, you do know that she once set fire to Sarah’s kitchen trying to fry an egg?’

  Gales of laughter flooded the table and Kate waved them away with her hand, refusing to let their comments from discouraging her. Alex sat by her side, his head in his hands in mock despair but through the tangle of his fingers he caught Kate’s eye and winked at her.

  But Kate’s confidence had lessened as the great event drew near and on the day itself she was of the opinion they should just forget the whole thing and get in a take away.

  ‘Absolutely not!’ insisted Alex. ‘If I have to put up with your cooking why shouldn’t they?’

  Of course he had apologized for his remark but that took place in the bedroom and put Kate even further behind schedule. But she had soldiered on and when the doorbell rang she was in the kitchen, her hair standing on end, flour smeared across her face, something she couldn’t identify in her hair but with a three course meal ready to be served.

  The starter was creamy cauliflower soup and although Kate had followed the recipe to the letter, the result was lumps of rather soggy cauliflower sitting in a bowl of something that looked and tasted like greasy washing up water. She watched as each person bravely attempted to empty their bowl but when Sarah eventually threw in the towel and said ‘I’m sorry, I just can’t, really I just can’t’ they had all exchanged a look and Alex was the first one to break, his shoulders heaving as he tried to quell his laughter.

  Kate graciously took away the bowls so no-one felt obliged to eat any more and to a drum roll from Alex she produced her next offering which was lasagna. It looked promising, it looked exactly as a lasagna should look. Unfortunately, it tasted nothing like a lasagna should taste. The filling was a grey mince with large swathes of still crisp onion, the sauce was thin and watery a little like curdled milk and the lasagna itself was chewy and raw in the middle and crisp and burnt on the edges. Again everyone battled their way through as much as possible amid many sniggers and calls for Kate to resign but several bottles of wine helped some of the dish to disappear. The desert was perfect. As Kate brought the cheesecake to the table the occupants fell silent. There it sat on the plate, shining and delicious. Kate cut deep into the centre and even the most amateur cook could tell the texture was perfect. She slid a large serving onto each plate and as she sat back waiting for them to take a bite, all she could hear were soft appreciative murmurings.

  ‘Bloody hell, Kate – this is gorgeous!’

  ‘Oh Kate, it’s lovely!’

  Kate sat at the head of the tiny table wedged up against the kitchen door and smiled regally, accepting the praise heaped on her shoulders.

  ‘Did you really make this yourself Kate? ‘

  Everyone looked in her direction.

  ‘Of course not!’ exclaimed Kate. ‘We had to have something we could eat. This came from the bakery down the road. Cheers everyone!’

  The night was a huge success, their friends departed happy and full of cheesecake and Alex and Kate looked at the piles of washing in the sink.

  ‘Let’s do it tomorrow,’ whispered Alex in Kate’s ear. ‘Right now I think I should take my little cook to bed.’

  Kate giggled and turned round in his arms to view the left over piles of food.

  ‘I’m not a natural am I?’ she asked a little despondently.

  ‘No,’ agreed Alex ‘but there are other things you are very good at which is why I’m going to take you into the bedroom right now so you can show me your skills’

  Kate let him move her out of the kitchen and into the equally tiny bedroom. ‘Maybe I need to practice more?’ she mused as Alex began to unbutton her blouse.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about it,’ he mumbled into her neck, ‘let’s think of other things instead.’

  But Kate did think about it and even as Alex pushed her down onto the bed she couldn’t help worrying that in a couple of years when Alex came home from work he would want more than washing up water cauliflower soup and grey lasagna for tea.

  The very next day Kate enrolled on a cookery course.

  Another log shifted, causing the fire to flare and Kate to return to the moment. And now Alex had gone. It wasn’t Kate’s cooking, she was sure of that. She’d become quite a superb cook and Alex had walked into the kitchen every night to delicious aromas and a superb meal, with lasagna now one of her signature dishes. And he hadn’t left because she didn’t keep the house tidy. She had followed Marcia’s example and their house had become a shrine to all things fashionable and neat and she could put her own mother to shame for highly polished surfaces. But Kate had done something wrong and Alex had left.

  Now she had to persuade him to come home and then she would address whatever flaws she had, whatever mistakes she had made and she would make absolutely certain that he never felt the
urge to leave again. She could change. She’d changed already into what she had believed was the perfect wife. She could change again. If Alex needed high heels and whispered dalliances then Kate would make sure he had them- in his own house, in his own bedroom. If he needed laughter and partying and more fun, then Kate could provide all those things. Maybe she’d taken her eye of the ball, overlooked Alex’s needs but it was nothing that she couldn’t address. She could put it all right, she just had to make Alex come home.

  Chapter 9

  The wind was blowing and icy sheets of rain were hitting the windows as Kate sat at the kitchen table.

  She was still writhing with shame at her lack of control the previous evening. Her calmness at discovering her husband was now with another woman had remained as she shared the news with Fiona and Stuart. It had remained as Stuart drove her home and helped her carry Millie indoors. It had remained as Kate climbed into bed and let her exhausted body sink into the mattress. But at two o’clock in the morning, when Kate had woken up sobbing at the image of Alex and Sandra Maddison framed in the window with their arms wrapped around each other, the calm had disappeared and in its place was a frantic and heartbroken Kate.

  She had dialed Alex’s mobile number with shaking hands and when his bleary voice answered she had been unable to restrain herself as she screamed at him.

  ‘How could you Alex,’ she had sobbed uncontrollably down the phone. ‘How could you do that to me, to Millie.’

  Alex had been shocked to hear his wife’s voice, shocked at the raw emotion she had poured down the phone and shocked that she seemed to know so much when he had told her so little.

  ‘Kate I don’t know what you think …’

  ‘I know where you are Alex,’ Kate had screamed. ‘I know where you are and who you’re with. I know!’

  Kate thought she had detected the soft murmur of another voice in the background. ‘She’s there isn’t she, next to you? In bed with you!’

  ‘Kate it’s two in the morning. I don’t think this is the time or place to be having this conversation. I think …’

  ‘When were you going to tell me?’

  ‘Tell you what?’ Alex had asked warily.

  ‘Tell me about Sandra Maddison,’ Kate had screamed. ‘When were you going to tell me about her Alex?’

  There had been silence, more whispered asides in the background.

  ‘Kate there isn’t…’

  ‘Don’t lie to me! Don’t make it worse by lying to me.’

  ‘Kate please, we’ll talk but not right now. Let’s talk later.’

  His voice had been desperate and it occurred to Kate that he was feeling disapproval at both ends of the phone.

  ‘I know you’re with her,’ she had whispered, her voice suddenly soft, almost enticing. ‘I know what you’ve done but it’s okay Alex. Just come home and we’ll sort it all out. Come home and it’ll be okay.’

  ‘Kate I can’t…’

  ‘Come home Alex!’ Kate had shouted, ‘come home!’

  In the end Alex had promised to contact her later so they could talk.

  ‘When?’ Kate had demanded.

  ‘Soon,’

  ‘Tomorrow?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe we should take a little bit of time away from each other first …’

  ‘No! phone me tomorrow, I need to speak to you Alex.’

  ‘Look Kate please stop. We’ll talk, soon okay. We’ll talk.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’

  ‘Oh God Kate, I don’t know.’

  Again the whispered voices.

  ‘Alex I need …’

  ‘I’ll phone soon,’ and then he was gone leaving Kate holding the phone and sobbing for the rest of the night. She had been out of bed and downstairs before six o’clock in the morning, staring at the phone and waiting for Alex to call. At 8.30 she had sent him a text saying that now was a convenient time to speak. Her phone remained silent. At 8.35 she decided the message obviously hadn’t gone through so she sent another, and another and another. When Fiona called in after taking her children to school she found Kate sitting at the kitchen table, sobbing frantically and sending the nineteenth message to Alex saying she was waiting for his call. Fiona had taken her phone away from her and listened to how Kate had lost control and phoned Alex the previous night.

  Kate had cried and cried and Fiona had said nothing, just held her friend closely. Eventually Kate had calmed down and taken several deep breaths.

  ‘Why isn’t he phoning me Fee? He promised he would. He said he’d phone me so we could talk.’

  ‘But he didn’t say he would phone today Kate.’

  ‘Well he said he would try.’

  ‘Maybe he’ll phone tomorrow honey. Or the day after. Maybe it is best if you have a few days to get your thoughts in order. Maybe...’

  ‘No! He’ll phone today, I know he will. He knows I want to speak to him.’

  ‘Well he’s probably busy at work, or in a meeting - or something.’ Fiona dried Kate’s tear sodden face for the umpteenth time.

  ‘He’s probably just waiting for the right time, this isn’t a conversation he wants to have in front of the office Kate.’

  ‘Or in front of Sandra Maddison,’ Kate responded bitterly.

  ‘Exactly. So he’s just got to find the right time.’

  ‘And when will that be? A five minute slot between finishing work and going back to her? Is that what I’ve become, an inconvenient conversation he needs to make in the car park!’ and the tears were back as Kate lay her head on the kitchen table and sobbed.

  ‘I shouldn’t have phoned him Fee.’

  Fee had shrugged. ‘Well maybe it did him good to realise you know what he’s up to. A dose of reality.’

  Kate lifted waterlogged eyes to her friend. ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘Well it can’t hurt, can it.’

  ‘I don’t know. I was reading on Google yesterday …’

  ‘Oh let’s not go back there Kate!’

  Kate ignored her. ‘I was reading on Google yesterday about what you should do when your husband leaves and it said that one thing you definitely shouldn’t do was phone him constantly and scream at him. It will just make him relieved to be out of the relationship.’

  ‘But it is a perfectly natural reaction Kate.’

  But Kate has sighed and shaken her head. ‘No, I need to think carefully about how to get him back and I don’t think that phone call helped.’

  Eventually Fiona had gone home and Kate had put Millie down for a nap and flicked open her computer.

  She phoned Fiona later that afternoon.

  ‘Oh God Fee, do you think we were in a zombie marriage and I just didn’t notice?’

  ‘A what!’

  ‘A zombie marriage. On Google it says that some couples get stuck in zombie marriages, it seems to be working okay on the outside but it’s quite dead on the inside.’

  ‘A zombie? You think Alex was a zombie?’

  ‘No not Alex,’ said Kate impatiently. ‘Our marriage, maybe it had turned into a zombie marriage and I was too stupid to realise.’

  ‘Well was your marriage dead on the inside?’ queried Fiona.

  Kate thought. ‘Well I didn’t think it was. I mean, I still loved Alex and he still loved me and we did still talk and enjoy spending time together so …’

  ‘So maybe neither of you were zombies Kate. Stop looking for excuses for Alex. He is having an affair and he left you.’

  Kate cried out in pain and Fiona carried on hastily. ‘Oh - I’m so sorry honey I didn’t mean it to sound like that. It’s just that you’re looking for a reason Alex left but you already know the reason. He was having an affair. Stop trying to find something you did wrong.’

  ‘But the affair is the effect not the cause Fee,’ said Kate seriously, ignoring her friend’s deep sigh. ‘Yes he had an affair but why?’

  ‘Because he’s a tosser?’ suggested Fiona.

  ’Be serious ...’

  ‘I am being seri
ous Kate! The man left you with a nine month old baby because he wanted to sleep with another woman. Maybe he should start reading Google and work out just why he’s such a waste of space.’

  The conversation finished.

  An hour later Kate phoned Fiona again.

  ‘Oh my God Fee,’ she wailed down the phone. ‘I devitalized him!’

  Fiona stopped chewing her sandwich. ‘You did what to him?’

  ‘I devitalized him. Our marriage had become devitalized. No wonder he had to find someone else.’

  ‘Deviralised?’

  ‘No! Devitalised! It’s when the passion goes and you become two units instead of one. I put Millie and the house and the ironing and everything else first you see, our focus had become about our daily tasks and not our love.’

  ‘Right,’ said Fiona faintly.

  ‘I drained the love from him.’

  ‘Hold on a minute Kate. What were you supposed to do with Millie. Put her on the back burner so Alex could keep his vitality? Stop cleaning so he feels better about himself?’

  ‘Well no, obviously I needed to care for Millie as well but I let the passion disappear from my relationship with Alex .…’

  ‘So you still look after Millie, you still clean and cook and iron but as soon as Alex arrives home from work you turn on the passion. Never mind making him something to eat, washing his clothes, looking after his daughter – you should have just had him right there and then in the kitchen?

  ‘Well no …’

  ‘So what are you on about Kate? You’d just had a baby for crying out loud. If he felt things had got a bit routine and mundane he could have just helped out a bit more so you had the energy to seduce him again.’

  The conversation ended.

  ‘Fee – we lost our emotional connection. I forgot to appreciate him and I stopped making time for him in my …’

  ‘For the love of God Kate if you don’t stop reading all this twaddle I will come round there and take your computer away!’

  ‘But it’s important that I …’

  ‘No, it is not at all important. Alex has left because he is miserable excuse of a man who is having an affair and has walked out on his wife and baby! And if he did all that because he was in a sulk and feeling left out because his wife was actually daring to pour love and attention on her daughter – on his daughter, that just makes it much worse! Are you getting the picture yet Kate?’