Page 56 of The Late Bloomer’s Playlist

Dionne Warwick

I’LL NEVER FALL IN LOVE AGAIN

David stood in my doorway, arms folded, looking every bit the father he never wanted to be. I could see him through the cracks of my duvet fort. I had both Fred and Lucy under the blankets with me, which was testimony for the household concern around my well-being. I had moved through hunger pains, slapping my lips at the occasional sips of stale water from the glass on the nightstand, and I was fairly sure there was a creeping whiff of body odour that appeared whenever I lifted an arm to wipe my face clean of tears – though I had been steadfastly blaming the smell on Fred since he arrived in the fort. My mobile was on three per cent battery so the music would stop soon. I was amazed David hadn’t thought to turn the speaker system off yet.

‘Patricia, I will kill myself if I have to listen to this song one more time.’

I hit the skip button on my phone’s front screen and changed the track from Dionne Warwick’s crooning vocals to–

‘This isn’t any better.’

The opening beats to The Jackson 5’s ‘I Want You Back’ sounded tinny inside the room.

‘Good,’ I shouted. ‘It doesn’t fit my mood anyway.’

And then I pressed the back-skip button to bring Dionne into my life again.

There was a loud groan from David and then an abrupt unveiling as he snatched the duvet off me in a clean movement. Fred looked outraged, his small head snapping up in time to throw David a cutting stare. Meanwhile Lucy, not one for confrontation, simply decided to leave the bedroom. That cat has never liked me, I thought as I struggled upright in bed.

‘I brought you tea,’ David said as he back-stepped to my dressing table to collect the mug. ‘You need to drink, and you need to eat.’

I held my hands together like a Dickensian orphan begging for food and took the hot drink from him. ‘Thank you, love.’

‘You also need to shower,’ he added when he was close enough to pass me the brew.

‘You need to be more loving.’

‘I brought you tea,’ he snapped, as though this were the pinnacle of caregiving, ‘and I’ve let you wallow in here for two whole bloody days. Now come on.’ He tapped my knee and I moved my legs to make room for him on the edge of my bed. ‘You can’t stay in here forever. You’re far too old to be pining like this.’

I narrowed my eyes at the comment. ‘I’m not sure that’s as reassuring as you intended for it to be.’

‘It’s been two days.’ He reached for my hand. ‘Have you even called her?’

‘Thirty-two times.’

‘Ah.’

‘Exactly.’ I sank lower down the bed again, taking my cup of tea with me.

‘It was quite bad in all, wasn’t it?’

‘Oh, do you really think so?’

Quite bad was an understatement and he bloody well knew it. Sheila looked as though someone had slapped her, and she was right to. There David was, with one hand resting on the bottom of my back, introducing me to my girlfriend as his wife. A low moan fell out of me at the memory. She hadn’t spoken, hadn’t shouted nor asked a single question. Instead, she’d turned to apologise to Eudora and said she needed to leave, before bolting from the restaurant. I’d made a vain attempt at rushing after her, but had failed quite marvellously owing to the – ‘Ridiculous bloody bollocking…’ – shoes that I’d been wearing, and by the time I had committed the cardinal sin – slipped my shoes off altogether and gone hurrying in Sheila’s direction – there was absolutely no sign of her.

‘Can I have the car keys?’ I’d asked David when I made it back to the table, where he was sitting across from Eudora. ‘I want to go home.’

‘I’ll come with you,’ he’d said, standing.

Then, Eudora looked as though she’d been slapped. ‘David, you don’t need to appease–’

‘No, really, Eudora, it’s okay,’ he’d reassured her and I’d stifled an eye roll.

‘You should be quite ashamed of yourself, I hope you know,’ she’d said to me, in a tone that sounded truly embittered. ‘Sheila is a wonderful woman and she deserves much better than this, as does David,’ she’d added, as though only just remembering he was there.

‘Eudora, really–’

‘I know you’ll think I’m speaking out of turn because you’re a kind man, but truly, she’s your wife and Sheila is my friend and–’