Page 13 of If I Could Say Goodbye
‘No!’ shrieks my mother while I begin to laugh, a deep vibration that tickles and steals my breath and bends me over. Channing Tatum’s two-dimensional smiling face is pushed backwards, the elasticated thread securing it, so that the mask now rests on the crown of Ed’s head. His mouth is open wide, his eyes are bulging and a flush of embarrassment floods his cheeks.
‘Judith?’ he questions, covering his family jewels with the cardboard mask of my chosen alter-ego: Kylie Minogue.
‘Edward, I was just going, I’ll just, um, grab my bag.’ She shields her eyes, but even in my incapacitated state, I can tell that she is taking in what I have long since neglected to appreciate: his broad shoulders, the smattering of blond hair that trails across his chest, leading down towards Ms Minogue’s grinning face. ‘I’ll see myself out,’ she continues, chewing her bottom lip. Ed reverses his bare behind, his bum cheeks quivering white globes beneath his tan line.
I follow Mum out through the kitchen and into the hall towards the door, her hand hesitates on the door frame as she leans in and kisses me on the cheek.
‘Don’t let me keep you from your afternoon delight,’ she smirks as I close the door behind her. I hesitate past the doorway to the lounge, where Kerry is sitting on the sofa eating ice cream out of a tub. She scrapes the bottom with a blue plastic spoon that is identical to the ones we used to get at the cinema. Her lips pull the ice cream from the spoon, which she then points at me as she talks.
‘I never really got the attraction with Kylie.’ She taps her front tooth with the blue plastic, a replica of the day we went to seeThe Notebook. ‘Rachel McAdams on the other hand . . .’ She winks at me in the same way as she had years ago. I’d been swooning over Ryan Gosling. ‘He’s not really my type,’ she had said. ‘Rachel McAdams on the other hand . . .’ It was the first time she had openly talked about being gay; she would have been about fifteen, I think.
Channing walks towards me. ‘Has your mother gone?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good, now come here, I’ve only got twenty minutes left.’
I look back to the sofa, where Kerry’s image has been replaced by the crushed velvet cushions which are so big that we can’t actually sit on the sofa with them on. I throw them onto the floor and pull my dress from my shoulders, leaving it pooling around my ankles as I lower myself onto the cushions. Channing struts towards me but I reach for him, throwing his startled face across the room.
‘I don’t want him . . . I want you,’ I say, wrapping my legs around my husband’s waist.
Chapter Eight
Ed
I know I wasn’t going to complain about the sex thing and I want to slap myself in the face right now, but. I’m going to complain about the sex thing.
Like the other day. I thought, as Jen was making an effort in that department, then so should I, and I know she fancies that Tatum Channing – or is it Channing Tatum? I always get it the wrong way around – anyway, I like to think of myself as a sensitive lover, I’ve always tried hard to make Jen enjoy our sex life. And she has never once complained. Not. Once. But now she has me doing this and that . . . Ed move your head, up a bit . . . that’s it. And then there are these orgasms that she keeps having and they’re loud. I like that they’re loud, it lets me know that she is enjoying it, but. And she keeps grabbing me. My boy. All the time, like even when we’re having dinner. There I was tucking into my bangers and mash watchingEggheadsand the next minute she’d taken hold of my boy and, well, my bangers got cold.
I can’t believe I’m complaining about the sex.
Chapter Nine
Jennifer
My eyelids flutter open, guilt shaking off the remnants of my broken dreams. It is already light, even though I know from the beginnings of the dawn chorus that it is not much after five.
The sounds of my house engulf me: a warm blanket of the familiar. Oscar’s snores, more like a man in his fifties after a night at the pub, Ed’s breath escaping in rhythmic murmurs, the cars heading along the motorway, carrying its passengers towards a new day. I take a breath, assessing how bad it is this morning. The image of Kerry flying through the air is the first taste: red coat, red boots, brakes squealing. I push out that image with a long, measured breath, but as I inhale, the image of her hands grabs me: strong hands that used to grasp her partners’ when she competed in national figure-skating championships. I breathe out again.
I brace myself for what comes next, because it always comes: The Montage. The Montage filled with Kerry’s achievements, her body jumping and swirling across the ice, first as a four-year-old then, year after year, the outfits changing as she grows, as her jumps become higher and more elaborate, the film rolling as it pans to her at school, always surrounded by popular friends, always laughing. Then to her first dates with Nessa, their beautiful faces smiling at each other with hidden secrets, their love pure, exciting: solid. The four of us together on the beach, sunburnt shoulders, lukewarm wine, sandy toes, Erica and Oscar making sandcastles together, Hailey hunting for shells.
And then, as it always does, The Montage rewinds, the crystal clear high definition of Kerry’s life switching to a grainy camcorder recording: me on the sidelines watching her skate, clapping and cheering as the medals were placed around her neck; making excuses not to join her bunch of school friends because I knew they just tolerated me. But then . . . there is Ed, he reaches his hand towards me and I step out of the grainy picture into the real world.
My feet take me into the bathroom, my reflection beckoning me towards the mirror. I take in the first hint of a tan, the splatter of freckles over the bridge of my nose; the blue of my eyes have life behind them for the first time in months; there is a sheen to my skin that has been smothered beneath grief and is only now starting to breathe.
I turn my head towards the bedroom, where I can hear Ed mumbling in his sleep. I replay our frantic lovemaking last night, thinking of all the things that I can do to make it better for him, to make it even more exciting.
Then I have an idea.
‘What? I thought it would be helpful,’ I reply, but Ed looks really mad. He’s not the type of man who gets mad. But, all the same . . . he is mad. I start to feel the seeds of doubt about my notes on how to improve our sex life.
‘You thought that by giving me a manual of do’s and don’ts when we are at it I would be pleased?’
‘But I thought that—’
He storms out of the bedroom and onto the landing, slamming the door behind him.
I scurry off the bed and follow Ed as he charges down the stairs.
