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The doorbell rang and her pulse rate doubled.
Finn.
He’d changed his mind about waiting until tomorrow.
Smoothing her hair, she took a deep breath and walked to the door, feeling tall and elegant in her new heels.
She tugged open the door, a smile on her face, and almost fell over.
Sean stood there, hair ruffled, unshaven, eyes tired. In his hand was the article from the magazine, crumpled and torn in places. Eight signs that your marriage might be in trouble.
“Hi, Liza.”
19
LIZA
Liza slept badly, which tended to happen when your husband arrived unannounced and you were all dressed up and contemplating sex with another man.
She would not have slept with Finn, or so she told herself as she lay staring at the ceiling, thinking about Sean who she’d sent to the bedroom across the corridor.
It was the first time in their long marriage that they’d been in the same house and slept apart. She’d used the excuse that he must be tired after the journey and in need of a good sleep, but really it was because she wasn’t sure there was room in the bed for the two of them and her guilt. She needed to think everything through and she wouldn’t be able to do that with Sean lying next to her.
Why should she feel guilty? She hadn’t done anything. Thinking about something didn’t count, did it? Or maybe it did.
She’d felt like the one in the right, but now she felt like the one in the wrong which was what happened when you put off doing something that needed to be done.
She should have spoken to Sean right away, the moment those first doubts had crept into her head. Like spotting a weed in the garden, she should have said, Look at that! Let’s pull it up right now in case it spreads, but she hadn’t, and she’d let it spread until there were so many weeds she could barely see him through the tangled mess.
She saw now that she was as responsible for their problems as he was, because she hadn’t said anything. She’d expected him to know, as if he should have been able to read her mind after so many years. As if he had magical powers.
But life wasn’t magical, it was messy and real and never more real than when Sean turned up at the door, frantic because he’d found the article and didn’t want their marriage to be in trouble. She didn’t want it to be in trouble either, but her response to that had been to dig her head into the sand and then run away and press Pause on her life, whereas he’d immediately sped to her side.
She’d always thought she was nothing like her mother, but now she realized that wasn’t true. Being honest about emotions was easy when those emotions were positive and clear, but not so easy when there were difficult conversations to be had.
She’d lain awake for most of the night, her head full of Finn, that almost kiss, Sean, their wedding, their hopes, the girls, real life. It had all churned around like an ugly soup until she felt nauseated.
She was grateful when light slowly seeped into the room because the darkness seemed to make her thoughts dark too.
At five, she gave up and headed downstairs.
The weather had broken in the night, and a dramatic storm had turned to heavy rain. It had pounded the roof and the windows and bounced off the garden, leaving plants drooping and cowed under the sheer force of it. The weather reflected the change in her situation. Her days of solitary summer sunshine were behind her.
She walked into the kitchen and found Sean already seated at the kitchen table. One look at his face told her that he hadn’t slept either.
Their exchange the night before had been awkward to say the least. She’d broken into a sweat when she’d opened the door and found him there, not because of the heat although that had been overpowering, but at the thought of what would have happened had he arrived half an hour earlier. He would have found her laughing and flirting with Finn in the summerhouse.
She’d ushered Sean inside, appalled that he was clutching that stupid article. It hadn’t occurred to her that he might find it.
“Are you on your own? Where are the girls?”
“They’re at home. I thought this was something we needed to talk about without an audience.” He’d eyed her dress and the stack of plates she hadn’t yet loaded into the dishwasher. “You had company?”
“I had a friend over.” She’d said no more than that but she’d turned scarlet and knew he’d noticed. Funny how when she wanted him to notice things he didn’t, and when she’d rather he missed things he didn’t. “That article isn’t—”
“Isn’t what, Liza?”
“It doesn’t mean anything.”
