Page 9 of Not Moving Out
Freya and I ate the rest of our food in a strange, uncomfortable silence before tidying everything away in the same strange, uncomfortable silence. Tonight hadn’t gone how either of us had imagined, and I think we were both feeling a little unsure about what was going to happen next. It felt like the last six months had all been leading up to today: when we would separate, tell Dolly and then put the wheels in motion. The nights we had spent in deep conversation talking about our marriage. What had happened. Could we fix it? Should we get couples’ counselling? We had spent so many hours talking, trying to work out a solution, our marriage like a giant jigsaw puzzle we just couldn’t complete, no matter how we looked at it, and we had looked at it from every possible angle, but now that we had decided to put the puzzle pieces back in the box, everything felt underwhelming. Despite us agreeing it was a positive decision to separate, as we got ready to head upstairs to bed, it felt like anything but.
The spare room was at the front of the house, and it contained a bed, a wardrobe and my desk. I had chosen that room for my office because the window looked directly out to the street, so I could hear the mutterings of conversations, the whir of traffic and life, which inspired me when I wrote. Plus, it got the morning sunshine, which was when I worked the best. The room was large, airy and had a wonderful light to it, but now it was also my bedroom I felt a slightly different vibe. More student accommodation than modern workspace.
‘Everything all right?’ said Freya, poking her head around the door.
‘Thanks for putting sheets on the bed. You really didn’t have to.’
‘It’s fine,’ said Freya, and then we had another painfully long silence.
‘What did your mum say about it?’ I asked finally.
‘Just that it would be okay in time. She got over Dad, and her friend Gloria is now a lesbian, so you know, second lives.’
‘Right, okay, sounds… encouraging?’
‘Yes. I suppose.’
Another pause.
‘Marmalade has haemorrhoids,’ said Freya finally.
‘Oh, blimey. Poor Marmalade.’
‘Poor Mum, actually. She has to apply cream to the affected area.’
‘What a pain in the bum!’ I said, and we both laughed, more out of nerves, it seemed, than with genuine laughter, but it helped. ‘This is fucking weird, isn’t it?’
‘It is, but it’s day one, Joe.’
‘Right, day one. I hope Dolly is okay.’
‘She’ll probably be angry at us for a few years.’
‘A few years?’ I said incredulously. ‘I hope it isn’t that long.’
Freya stood by the door and looked at me, and I don’t think either of us knew what to say next. Day one of separation and it all felt strange and surreal. This was the woman I had spent so long married to, seen naked from just about every possible angle imaginable, and now we were acting like awkward, hormonal teenagers.
‘Night, Joe.’
‘Night,’ I replied, and then she left me alone in my new bedroom.
I hadn’t moved all my stuff into the room yet, but I had enough to begin sleeping in there for the night. I lay in bed listening to the gentle hum of traffic outside. I heard Dolly moving around the house as it got late, and she went back downstairs to get some more food. I thought of Freya in our old bedroom, and despite being in the same house I had been in for the past fifteen years with the same people, it was the first time I had felt alone in it.
Chapter Five
Freya
Three years before Joe and I sat in a coffee shop and made the arrangements for our separation, we were in bed one night, side by side; he was on his phone, and I was on mine. I was doomscrolling through my Facebook feed when I noticed something odd, and on further inspection, it seemed my initial suspicion was proved correct.
‘I think Emily and Nick have broken up!’ I said.
‘What? Emily, your old university mate Emily, and tall Nick?’ replied Joe, resting his phone on the bed for a moment.
‘I was just looking through some photos she put up on Facebook, and Nick’s not in any of them. It’s just her and the kids.’
‘That doesn’t mean they’ve broken up, though, right?’
‘It doesn’t, but then I went back through her old photos, and noticed a pattern. Nick’s not been in any photos for a good six months. He was in photos, and then he wasn’t. I cross-checked that with her Instagram account and it’s the same. She even deleted all the photos of them together. Nick’s been cancelled!’
