Page 5 of Not Moving Out
‘Right.’
Joe smiled, and then I turned around to leave.
‘Freya?’
‘Yes,’ I said, pivoting back towards him.
‘Are we giving up too soon?’ he said, and I noticed subtle notes of desperation in his voice like key changes in a song. Maybe he cared more than I thought.
I looked at him with a blank face, and then I smiled. I knew what he meant, but the truth was I didn’t know the answer. It wasn’t like we had decided on a whim. It had taken eighteen months of gradual decline to arrive at this point. We had fallen into this hole and despite some attempts to clamber out of it, we appeared stuck, resigned to our fate, and neither of us knew of another solution, and so I said the only thing I could think of.
‘I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe not.’
I looked at Joe, and he smiled a sad sort of smile. He was still so handsome, but it was hidden underneath a veil of all his disappointments.
‘Okay. I just…’
‘Just what, Joe?’
A pause. Was he going to say something to alter the course of our lives?
‘It’s nothing. See you later?’
‘Okay. Bye then.’
‘Bye.’
Then I turned around, and walked away through The Lanes towards Mum’s house, but as soon as Joe was out of sight, I turned down a quieter lane, and then I stopped. I closed my eyes, squeezing them tightly together, and then I let the tears come. The tears I had been holding in all morning. There had been so many tears shed over the last eighteen months, and all of them had been because I wanted to save my marriage and the thought that it might be over scared the living shit out of me. But these tears felt different. They felt like the tears you shed not when you were afraid your marriage was over, but the tears that came when you knew it was.
Chapter Three
Freya
I was standing outside of Mum’s house in Preston Park. The ominous gunmetal clouds that had been gathering all morning had finally relented, and it had started to spit with rain. A full stop on what had already been a pretty shit morning. After crying in The Lanes, I pulled myself together and dragged myself there for a cup of tea with Mum, or in reality probably something a little stronger. She had texted on the way over.
Are you coming over this morning? Martin has a doctor’s appointment.Haemorrhoids. I have a hair appointment with Angela at two. Hopeeverything is ok. Mum x
After Mum and Dad got divorced and Dad disappeared to Jersey, Mum moved down from Surrey and bought this house to be nearer to me and Dolly, where she had lived alone until Martin entered our lives. They met in Waitrose and, according to Mum, they both reached for the same jar of marmalade and the rest as they say is history. After hearing that story, Joe and I had given him the nickname Marmalade Martin or more commonly just Marmalade.
I suppose I had always known my parents weren’t the happiest of couples, but I was still shocked when they finally announced the break-up of their marriage. I was eighteen and had just left home for university when it happened and my biggest takeaway from their split was how it made me feel. They had clearly been waiting for me to finish sixth form, and so all I could think was that they had obviously been unhappy for years and I was the only thing keeping them together. If that was the case – and they insisted it wasn’t – surely they would have been better off breaking up and being happy much earlier. I also made a pact with myself that I would never do that to my own child, and yet here I was doing the same fucking thing. I hated myself for it. Joe and I were no better than my own parents, which was a thoroughly depressing thought because they had set a pretty low bar.
I pressed the shrill doorbell, waited, and then after a moment the door opened and Mum appeared.
‘Oh, Freya, darling, there you are, you poor thing, come in, and you can tell me everything over a glass of wine,’ said Mum, who despite being home alone was dressed in a gorgeous sequined dress, had her blonde hair styled as if she was going out somewhere nice and a full face of make-up. Mum lived her life by one simple rule: Always be ready to go out!
Mum knew why Joe and I were meeting. She was the only person I had confessed everything to because, well, she was my mum and it was impossible to hide it from her. She could see the cracks in our marriage, the stunningly low disappointments, the long silences when she would come over for a Sunday roast, and the obvious air of tension between Joe and me that had become increasingly tense. She had lived that life, knew the signs to look out for and recognised exactly what was happening. She had questioned me over and over again when I had insisted my marriage was fine, and she made me tell her everything. Mum was many things, but persistent and nosy were definitely in the top five. At least with Mum, I knew that however intrusive she was, it was all wrapped up in love and good intentions.
‘Oh God, Mum, it was awful,’ I said, walking in and falling into her arms for a hug. The moment I felt her body pressed against mine, I felt a few tears loosen, escape and then slide down my face and onto Mum’s dress, but I quickly pulled myself together. Mum wasn’t much of a crier. She was solid, strong and always in a positive mood. Growing up, I hardly ever saw her cry. It felt like she didn’t believe in sadness in the same way that some people didn’t believe in God or election results. If only I had her classic English stoicism, and point-blank refusal to mope no matter what. Her upper lip was perfectly stiff, while mine often wobbled and waned.
‘Come in, sit down, and tell me all about it. I have two glasses of wine, chilled and ready to go. There’s nothing in life that can’t be sorted out with a good chat and a nice glass of Chardonnay, darling.’
I laughed. ‘I’m not sure that’s true, Mum,’ I said, walking along the hallway with the refinished oak flooring, and then into the vast glass-and-brick extension at the back of the house that contained the kitchen and dining room. After her parents had passed away, Mum had inherited some money, which she had ploughed into the house.
‘Remember Gloria Parker? Drives a Range Rover and has two cocker spaniels? She found her husband, Roger, trousers around his ankles behind a Pizza Hut with a girl half his age. A Pizza Hut, darling! She was a mess, but came over. Two glasses of wine and a few choice words later, she was like a different woman. It helps, trust me.’
‘Fine, I’ll give it a go,’ I said as we reached the kitchen, and I sat down at the island.
‘That’s my girl!’ said Mum, passing me a chilled glass of French Chardonnay. ‘Cheers!’
