‘He’s right,’ Pam agreed. ‘You’re not trying to punish him. You’re trying to process what happened, both individually and as a couple. Including him in the process can stop any resentment before it begins.’
Oliver turned to face me. ‘You know it’ll never happen again, right? You must believe that.’
‘I do. I don’t even think the dream was about that. It was about me. It made me feel unimportant . . . second best. It’s a horrible place to be.’
He bowed his head a little.
‘I’m not trying to shame you; I’m just telling you how I felt. Perhaps I don’t feel as secure as I used to.’
I left Pam’s office feeling both relieved and guilty. I don’t want to keep rehashing this because I have no doubt that Oliver feels like a giant arsehole already – I want to move past this. But being able to get it off my chest helped tremendously.
Thursday September 7th
I’m feeling less negative today. I hate that I do this to myself. After my shitty, disastrous relationship with my ex Alex, you’d think I’d have learned not to be so hard on myself. Why do I expect the perfect happy ending? We’re all just idiots, frantically rubbing our bits against other idiots in the hope that we’ll spark enough to start a fire. But I never feel like that’s enough. I find myself yearning for the big grand gesture to show me that out of all women, I am the best one. It’s fucking ridiculous. We should all just be grateful that another human being finds us tolerable enough to not kill us on sight.
Friday September 8th
The soles of Molly’s school shoes have already started talking so I took her into town to act outraged in the shoe shop until they issued replacements. On the way back I noticed the new Mexican restaurant Lucy had been talking about at work.
‘Shall we go and meet your dad after work and take him for fajitas?’ I asked Molly, who quickly agreed as long as she didn’t have to eat the spicy ones. ‘It’s a lovely night, we could sit outside.’
We strolled towards his office, stopping to look in bookshops and to watch some terrible dancing buskers in silver trousers, who looked like they were doing it for a bet. When we reached Oliver’s work, I stopped at the main door to call him and let him know we were downstairs intending to surprise him, but forgot that security wouldn’t let us in because we didn’t work there.
As I held the phone to my ear, I ushered Molly away from the smokers who had grouped together outside. ‘Hey, handsome. There are two women out front who want to take you for dinner. Yes, you are incredibly lucky. OK, see you in five.’
I put the phone back in my bag and sat on a nearby wall with Molly, who was getting hungrier by the second.
As I casually looked around, I noticed a younger woman on my right, mid-twenties with fabulous hair, smoking and texting with her thumbs. I still can’t fucking do that. I need to tap away with my middle finger because I’m old as fuck.
Soon Oliver appeared from the side door. I watched him walk towards us from the left, smiling and waving at Molly. And then he caught sight of something behind me that made his smile fade and his pace quicken. I turned to see the thumb-texter staring at Oliver and then at me, before quickly stubbing out her cigarette.
I didn’t register what was going on until a random stranger stuck his head round the main door and put everything into place.
‘Bethany, I know you’re on your break but you’re needed in the conference room.’
Bethany . . . BETHANY? Oh, you have got to be shitting me.
Sunday September 10th
It’s fair to say things have been a little strained over the past couple of days.
After finding out that Oliver had lied about his little kissing partner not working there anymore, I lost the plot. Not in front of Molly, of course, we still went and ate Mexican food like a normal, happily family – just one where Mummy sent texts to Daddy throughout dinner telling him she was going to punch his fucking face off.
When we got home and Molly went to bed, we had the whisper fight to end all whisper fights.
‘You had the cheek to have a go at me for still working with Frank when she was still working with you!’
‘Because I knew you’d fucking overreact. Like you’re doing now!’
‘The look on her face! She knew who we were. I felt so fucking stupid. Standing there, waiting patiently for the man who probably finger-banged her in the office.’
‘What? I didn’t finger anything, it was—’
‘Of course you did, I’m not stupid. You’d have been grabbing her tits and up her skirt like a shot. You think I don’t know how you operate? It’s your trademark move.’
‘Like I don’t fucking cringe knowing that you’ve had your boss’s cock in your mouth? I’m fully aware of your moves, too. It makes me want to vomit.’
‘Oh, fuck off.’
