Chapter Twenty-Eight
Joe
When I awoke, the first thing I realised was that I was alone in Freya’s bed, and then all the moments from the night before began cascading through my mind one after the other. Freya and I had slept together, and it seemed inconceivable after everything that had happened between us, but it was true. We’d had sex, and if I remembered correctly, and I was sure I wasn’t that drunk, it had been fucking fantastic.
I sat up, rubbed my eyes and reached for my phone. No messages, and twenty-seven emails, of which twenty-six were spam, and one was from Carl following up on an email I had sent him about the script. I put my phone down and looked around the room. My old bedroom. Our old bedroom. How had I ended up there again, and what did it mean? Apart from the pain in my head, the early signs of a certain hangover, the main feeling was one of absolute confusion.
We had spoken the night before about needing one last time together, and perhaps if it had felt like the last turgid comeback of a once famous pop star, desperately trying to get his career back on track, then I would have been happy to let it go, but it wasn’t. The sex had been the best we’d had in years. It didn’t feel awkward and hackneyed, as if we were just going through the motions, and instead it felt really, really fucking good. And it wasn’t just because I had been starved of sex, it was genuinely fantastic, and the sort of sex that made you stop and think.
I sat up, the noise of life already happening outside, and downstairs I heard the television was on, and I started wondering whether there was still some hope left for us. Yes, things had been shit for a long time, and we would need to rebuild our relationship from the ground up, but it was possible, wasn’t it? Karen had asked me what it was I was holding on to, and perhaps it was hope. Hope that Freya and I might actually be able to get back to the ‘us’ who had been so happy, but was it possible or just some ludicrous dream, like the time I thought that despite being in my thirties I could start skateboarding? That had ended up painfully at A & E with a fractured wrist, and maybe that’s all my relationship with Freya would be, too. A painful reminder that sometimes in life, we were too old to go back again.
I eventually got up, made my way back to my own room, and got dressed. I went to the toilet before I went downstairs, and I was actually a little nervous about seeing Freya again because I had no idea what she was thinking about our night together. When I reached the hallway, I realised that someone was watching a film in the living room, and when I walked in I saw Freya and Dolly together, under a blanket, watching the first Harry Potter film together.
‘What’s happening here?’ I asked.
Dolly paused the film, and she and Freya looked across at me.
‘Having a Harry Potter day,’ said Freya.
‘Oh, right.’
‘Want to join?’ said Dolly, patting the empty space on the sofa next to her.
I could tell from Dolly’s face, the puffiness around her eyes, the redness in her cheeks and the tone of her voice that she had been crying. Something had obviously happened. It had also been a few years since I had seen Harry, Hermione and Ron on the television in the living room, when for years before it felt like they had hardly left.
‘I just need to get some breakfast. Coffee?’ I said to Freya.
‘Can you give me a moment?’ Freya said to Dolly, pulling the blanket off herself. Dolly immediately reached for her phone, and Freya stood up and walked with me into the kitchen.
There was definitely an air of something between us. A frisson. Not an awkwardness, exactly, but tantalising unspoken questions and things left unsaid dancing in the air between us, while fleeting memories of the night before, our naked bodies entwined as one, groaning and moaning in passion, filled my head.
‘It’s Dolly and Maya, they’ve broken up,’ said Freya when we were in the kitchen.
‘Shit. How’s she doing?’
‘Not great, hence the Harry Potter marathon.’
‘Good old Harry Potter,’ I replied, but still, despite Dolly’s relationship problems, I wanted to at least make a pass at discussing what had happened last night.
‘Poor thing’s had her heart broken, and really needs our support. I’m going back in. Will you join us after breakfast?’
‘Umm, yes, will do.’
‘Okay, right,’ said Freya with a hint of a smile, and then she left and walked back into the living room to join Dolly for a Harry Potter marathon, leaving me alone in the kitchen, completely unsure of everything.
It was Sunday evening, and Dolly was in her room, deep in conversation with Maya on the phone, and Freya and I were in the living room, and it was finally time to have the conversation. Yesterday we had spent the day with Dolly, trying our best to keep her mind off Maya, and we ended up watching five Harry Potter films, and I dashed out and got us fish and chips for dinner. Freya and Dolly eventually fell asleep on the sofa, and I put a blanket over them and left them to it. This morning, Freya went to Cold Water Club, and then she took Dolly out for lunch, and now, finally, Freya and I had some time alone.
‘Freya?’
‘Yes, Joe.’
‘Can we discuss what happened the other night?’
‘The night we slept together?’ said Freya, and I nodded. ‘What’s to discuss? We both wanted one last time together, it was our wedding anniversary, and I think it was lovely.’
‘It was lovely.’
‘Did it confuse things for you, Joe?’
She turned and looked at me. She was being rather glib about it, wasn’t she?
‘It didn’t confuse me, exactly, but it did make me think.’
‘About?’
‘I don’t know, Freya. Perhaps it made me wonder whether we’re giving up too soon. We definitely still have something in the bedroom.’
‘But Joe,’ said Freya, her face slipping slightly into a frown. ‘Have you forgotten about the last year and a half, and how awful it’s been? The arguments? The distinct lack of sex? The conversations where we both realised that despite how great our marriage had been, it just wasn’t any more, and it was best to go our separate ways?’
‘I haven’t forgotten.’
‘It’s just like you to romanticise things, Joe. You always have.’
‘I don’t think I do. Do I?’
Freya laughed. ‘Oh, Joe, how are you so unaware of yourself? You’ve always been a bit of a romantic. Remember the holiday to Greece?’
‘Of course. We met that couple from Essex. Oh shit, what were their names again?’
‘Kelly and Liam. They were from Basildon. He was an IT recruiter, and she was a nurse.’
‘We had a great time with them. That was the height of our sex life prior to Dolly.’
‘Yes, you’re right, but do you also remember what happened on that holiday?’
I thought back to that time and tried to think about what might have happened because, in my mind, I only had fond memories of that holiday. It was 2005, and I had just signed the deal for the first series of The Mornings , and to celebrate, Freya and I booked a last-minute package holiday to Greece. All I could remember was seven days of incredible food, sunshine, meeting Kelly and Liam, and having lots of sex with Freya. That wasn’t me romanticising anything, it was fact. Those things actually happened. Right?
‘We had an amazing time and nothing bad happened at all?’ I said, knowing I was clearly wrong about something. Small slivers of negativity had clearly slipped through the net.
‘You see, this is the problem with you, Joe, you only remember the good bits. You don’t remember the second night of that holiday when I got food poisoning, do you?’
‘Oh, yes, of course,’ I said, as it came shooting back into my memory. That was bad. Both ends until the early hours.
‘And the day we both got badly sunburnt.’
‘I mean, would you call it badly sunburnt?’
‘We spent the entire night applying aftersun to each other in the shower, Joe. And do you remember what happened on the penultimate night?’
Admittedly, I had forgotten about the food poisoning and the sunburn, but surely nothing else awful had happened that I had completely forgotten about. I racked my brains, but nothing untoward came back to me. I remembered a day trip on a boat, lots of lying on the beach, and again, more sex, and delicious food, but nothing that could be constituted as bad. I got drunk with Liam one night, which ended with me being sick in the toilet after some shots of a local and quite potent raki.
‘Nothing is coming back to me, Freya.’
‘Kelly and Liam had that huge argument by the pool, he stormed off, and she spent the entire night crying in our apartment.’
‘Oh, right, that,’ I said, although I had literally zero memory of it. Was it possible she was making it up to prove a point? ‘But that wasn’t awful, and it didn’t ruin the holiday, did it?’
‘It did for poor Kelly. Liam vanished, and she ended up flying home alone, still mostly in tears. I kept in touch with her, and it turned out that Liam had slept with one of the local waitresses, and he was going to move out to Greece! They were due to be married the following year, and she’d already put a deposit down on the venue. Poor Kelly was bereft, and yet all you remember about that holiday is sun, sand, sea and sex! All I remember is food poisoning, sunburn and one heartbroken girl crying in our apartment. You don’t see a pattern here, Joe?’
‘That I like to remember the good times, and conveniently forget the bad? Is that such an awful quality to have? Also, and I’m not trying to be purposely argumentative, but is it possible that as much as I only remember the good, you seem fixated on only recalling the bad?’
I looked at Freya, and she seemed to squirm because I had obviously hit a nerve. For a moment her body stiffened up, before she relaxed and looked at me square in the face.
‘I just think that when you’re deliberating whether to save a marriage that was considered dead and buried, you can’t romanticise it just because we had one great night of sex.’
‘A great night of sex?’ I said with a smile. ‘Would you also say mind-blowing sex?’
‘Right now our daughter needs us, and we have to focus on her,’ said Freya, with a certain frankness that left me in no doubt that the conversation was over, the words ‘mind-blowing sex’ being left unanswered in the air between us.
It was Monday morning, and I was home alone working on House Shared , when the doorbell rang. Dolly was out with friends, although it was clear that whatever she was doing, Maya wasn’t involved. The telephone summit in her bedroom had resulted in them breaking up for good, and now Dolly was doing her best to move on. She had drawn a line under Maya and said she was going to try and enjoy her last summer before university. Things with Freya were still much less resolved, as far as I was concerned. She had claimed I was looking at our marriage with rose-tinted glasses, and perhaps she had a point, but I wasn’t ready to give up on our marriage yet.
I walked down the stairs, opened the front door, and standing there was a man in a suit. He was probably selling something. He was tall, and had dark hair and glasses.
‘Mrs Wallace?’
‘I mean, obviously not,’ I replied, and the man smiled at me.
‘Sorry. I’m here to see Freya Wallace about a house valuation?’ said the man.
‘Sorry? A house valuation?’
‘I was asked to appraise the house. See what it’s worth before going on the market?’
‘But the house isn’t going on the market. Sorry, who are you again?’ I said, my mind suddenly free-falling with a hundred questions.
‘I’m Daniel Masters from Brunswick & Co Estate Agents. Mrs Wallace called us and asked for a house valuation. Are you Mr Wallace, by any chance?’
‘Right, okay. Can you give me a moment?’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Daniel with a bright but slightly uncertain smile. I saw him glance at the front of the house again, checking he had the right number.
I pushed the front door until it was almost closed, and then I walked into the living room, retrieving my phone from my pocket. I was absolutely fuming. I couldn’t believe Freya had gone behind my back and arranged to get the house valued. There I was, pondering whether our marriage could be saved, if there was still some tantalising hope left, and she was already planning on selling the house. It was obvious that no matter how I felt, she had already moved on. Our night together had obviously meant nothing to her. I rang her mobile and waited.
‘Joe? You okay?’ said Freya casually.
‘No, I’m not fucking okay, Freya!’ I yelled. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you’d arranged to get the house valued?’
‘Oh shit, I forgot about that. I’m sorry, Joe. I was just trying to get things done.’
‘So, that’s it, is it? There was me thinking that maybe there was still a chance. Perhaps after our night together it had changed something, and you’ve already got the house on fucking Rightmove!’
‘Joe, please calm down. I was just being practical.’
‘Practical! Don’t make me laugh. You were being cold, Freya. Fucking heartless.’
‘Jesus Christ, Joe. Don’t turn this into something it isn’t,’ said Freya, sounding suddenly angrier. ‘We need to know what the house is worth. That’s it.’
‘Typical fucking solicitor! What happened to you?’
‘Stop it, Joe. You’re just being rude now.’
‘Whatever. I guess we’re done. That’s clearly what you want, so guess what? You can have it. Sell the fucking house and throw me out on the street for all I care!’ I yelled, and then I hung up the phone because I couldn’t take it any more. She was done with me, and so I supposed I was done with her, too. Our marriage was definitely over, and despite the man waiting outside, I sat down on the sofa and immediately started to cry. This wasn’t the first time I had wept recently, and clearly I was starting to feel the emotional pinch. What next? Would I start sobbing at EastEnders or soppy adverts featuring dogs that needed homes? Breaking down at the sight of an old photo of Dolly or an online story about a child being able to see because of the wonders of medical science? I was suddenly a proper emotional mess, and it had me wondering: Where is it all going to end?