Chapter 7
SHEENA
‘Darling, we need to talk.’
Gregor glanced up from his newspaper – yes, he was one of the last men in the civilised world to still read a newspaper over breakfast. He always picked it up at the local Waitrose on his way back from his morning five-mile run.
‘Uh-huh,’ he said, his head still in the midst of the pages.
Sheena said nothing, just waited, and eventually he must have clicked that she was actually asking for his full attention, and he lowered the paper enough for their eyes to connect across the kitchen table.
This was their standard practice for a Saturday morning.
At the table in the middle of their glossy white kitchen, he’d peruse the day’s news while getting started on his required protein intake for the day by having two poached eggs and smashed avocado on sourdough while she drank her black coffee.
Sheena had waited until he’d finished eating to make her move.
The extra twenty minutes it took for him to ingest his food wasn’t going to make a difference to the outcome, and besides, hadn’t she already waited for months?
First, there was the delay because she was hoping that he’d pay attention and make changes after their last big relationship discussion six months ago.
Then, there was the time that she had braced herself to break the news, but he’d ambushed her with a twenty-fifth wedding anniversary party.
And then, a couple of weeks ago, she’d psyched herself up to have the conversation one night after work, but when she’d got home, five of his mates were there because they’d decided to have an impromptu poker night.
Sheena had gone straight upstairs, climbed into bed and binge-watched at least three nineties romcoms to restore her mental equilibrium.
Since then, there just hadn’t been the right time or place. Until now.
Although, he was giving her a distracted expression that she knew him well enough to interpret as, ‘Can we get this over with so I can go back to this giddy analysis of today’s sport fixtures.’
Perhaps that was why, after months of consideration, weeks of planning, a million rehearsals of this conversation in her mind, and saying her speech aloud to Martha and Chanel over wine at their last Forty-Two Long gathering a few nights ago, she was now completely blank and didn’t know what to say.
She really had to find a new line of work, because she was, without a doubt, crap at this relationship stuff.
‘Gregor, I want to talk about us.’
His shoulders dropped a solid inch and she could see that he was having to clamp his jaw shut to prevent an audible groan.
They’d established over the past three decades that this was his least favourite topic of conversation.
If she’d said, ‘Let’s discuss how we can put your willy in a vice,’ she’d probably have got a more positive reaction.
He put the newspaper down on the table and sighed. ‘Do we have to? I’m meeting the guys for a cycle ride in half an hour.’
Jesus. In half an hour, he’d pour himself into his favourite Lycra cycling gear – the stuff that was branded with his company’s logo.
As brand manager for an obscenely expensive sportswear range aimed at the busy executive in the 30–50 range, he thought he looked great in it.
All Sheena saw was a bunch of middle-aged blokes in clothes that were designed to cling to areas they had no business clinging to.
‘This won’t take that long.’ She felt her irritation rise and made an effort to suppress it, so that this didn’t end up in either a fight or a walk-out, because she really didn’t think that she had it in her to circle back to the ‘I want to leave you’ bit again in the future.
She needed to be clear, concise and definitive.
Okay, deep breath. You can do this. You’re a bloody relationship counsellor. You can have a tough conversation.
‘At the end of last year, we spoke and I tried to tell you how unhappy I was and you said—’
‘I said I’d make more of an effort, and I have. I booked that Hogmanay trip to Loch Lomond, and then there was the party to celebrate our anniversary. And I told you I’ve been researching a summer holiday in Bali…’
‘Yes, those things are true. But—’
He rolled his eyes. Actually rolled his eyes. Like a petulant teenager. ‘Are you going to tell me that wasn’t good enough? Because, honestly, Sheena, I don’t know what else I could do.’
‘You could see me,’ she blurted, making him roll his eyes again.
She wasn’t sure whether it was a hot flush or deep irritation that was making her temperature rise.
Why was it that everything he did right now irritated her?
The way he spoke to her. The way he made some kind of weird tune when he yawned.
The way he sat in the loo for at least half an hour every morning.
‘What does that even mean? It’s all psychobabble tosh.’
Urgh, and that. The way he dismissed her words just because he didn’t agree with them.
‘It isn’t, Gregor. What did we talk about in that conversation?
What did I ask for? I need more connection.
More love. More intimacy.’ Although, she had to admit, since the sweats and the Sahara vagina had kicked in, she wasn’t exactly up for a porn star lifestyle.
‘More fun. We’re still settled into this nothingness, like two flatmates, just existing. ’
‘That’s called life.’
‘No, that’s called boredom, Gregor. I’m bored. I want something more. I know it makes me sound like I’m having some kind of midlife crisis…’ Probably because she was actually fairly convinced that she was, indeed, having a midlife crisis. ‘But I just feel that we’ve… we’ve outgrown each other.’
‘Is this a menopause thing? Because I did some research and apparently irritability and emotional mood swings are all part of…’
It was the earnest logic and air of self-satisfaction that made her snap.
‘Are you about to try to mansplain the perils of the female body to me? No, it’s not a fucking menopause thing, it’s a fucking me thing.’
He flinched at her language. She didn’t teach swearing as an effective communication tool in therapy, but how dare he blame her hormones for his lack of effort?
She regrouped, a deep breath and a quick count to five restoring her to some level of calm. This time, she managed to keep her tone low and her words non-sweary.
‘I’m sorry, Gregor, but I can’t do this anymore.’
For the first time, he leaned forward and actually seemed to be taking her seriously. ‘Wait a minute, why does this sound like a break-up conversation?’
She shrugged awkwardly. ‘Because I think it is. I want to take space from each other. I want to move out. We’ve been together for almost thirty years, for our entire adult life and I need to live on my own for a while, to figure out what I truly want my life to look like for the next forty-odd years. ’
He sat back, processed that for a few seconds, and she took consolation in the fact that he was actually listening to her for once.
Considering what she was saying. Mulling over her thoughts.
At least, those were all the possibilities that went through her mind until he said, ‘Are you seeing someone else?’
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, Gregor, no. There’s no one else. There’s never been anyone else. I’ve been with you since we were fourteen years old. I wouldn’t know what to bloody do with anyone else.’
That must have struck a chord because he immediately went right down another rabbit hole. ‘So, is it about the kids thing then?’
Sheena wondered how long she would have to bang her head off this table until she passed out and he called the paramedics. Perhaps then she could explain her feelings to one of them, and they could map it out in a way that he might actually bloody understand.
‘No, it’s not about the “kids thing”. You know I came to terms with that a long time ago.’
She wasn’t entirely sure that was true, but that was a separate issue, with no effect on the current situation.
It had been so long ago, they were teenagers, barely sixteen when she’d fallen pregnant and it had been the most terrifying experience of their lives.
Both sets of parents had been upset, and encouraged their decision not to keep the baby, but it had truly broken Sheena’s heart.
And Gregor’s too. In a weird way, though, it had made them stick together.
In today’s language, it would be called trauma bonding, but back then, she just knew that he was the only one who felt as awful as she did.
And while her school pals like Chanel and Martha had tried to make her feel better and had kept their vow of silence on the whole subject, Gregor was the only one who shared the ache inside her.
It was an excruciating pain that had pulled her down constantly over the next few years, and looking back, they’d both dealt with it by racing far too soon into decisions that could have waited.
Engaged at eighteen. Married in the registry office at nineteen, when they were both still in uni and sharing a one-bedroom studio flat with faulty electrics that tripped out every time she switched on the hairdryer.
Some therapists might look at their lives and claim they were making premature commitments as a way of validating their relationship and each other, showing that they weren’t terrible people for making the decisions that they’d made.
Maybe they were right. It was tough to be objective now, and it was even harder back then, because they’d just blocked it all out and got on with being teenagers who were already saving for a deposit for a flat while their friends were sleeping under Spice Girls posters in their childhood bedrooms. Actually, that was just Martha.
By that time, Chanel was studying fashion at Glasgow School of Art and sharing a flat with two punks and a Buddhist monk. It was a special time.
In their twenties, when their friendship group caught up and began getting engaged, married, settling down and the first invitations popped in to baby showers and christenings, they’d briefly reconsidered starting a family, but Sheena had quickly blocked it out altogether.
It was a subject that was too painful to revisit until much later, in their thirties, and by then her body refused to co-operate.
Through it all, not once, not a single time, had Sheena ever stopped to question whether they should be together.
She had no answer as to when that changed or why.
All she knew was that somewhere around forty, she’d begun to feel a creeping unease, an emptiness that was matched by the distance that had somehow opened between them.
They were no longer teenagers sticking together as they tried to come to terms with their decision.
Or twenty-somethings sticking together while they tried to block it out.
Or thirty-somethings still sticking together because they were desperately hoping for a second chance.
Now they were in their forties and all those things had gone, leaving behind two people who just didn’t light a fire in each other anymore.
That was apparently enough for Gregor, but it wasn’t enough for her.
Not now. Gregor wanted to keep things exactly as they were, while she wanted new experiences.
Great sex. Excitement. A thrilling adventure.
That’s why, much as she hated hurting him, she had to go through this excruciating conversation and make him understand why she had to go.
‘Please, Gregor, don’t make this harder than it already is.’
He shook his head. ‘Doesn’t seem particularly hard for you at all.’
Ouch. She wasn’t sure if it was the comment that stung, or the remnants of his poached eggs were beginning to make her feel queasy. ‘I’m sorry if it looks that way. Maybe I’ve just had more time to process it and I truly feel that it’s the right thing for me to do.’
His patience had obviously worn thin, because exasperation took over. ‘Don’t hit me with the marriage counsellor wish-washy language, Sheena. Next, you’ll be telling me that you need to go find yourself or some bollocks like that.’
That had actually been one of the lines she’d planned to break out, so she quickly pivoted to, ‘Okay, I won’t. I want to go. I need space. I want to see what life feels like on my own.’
‘So like a trial separation. Two weeks? A month?’
‘No.’ She had to rip the band-aid off. There was no point doing this with anything other than full honesty.
‘No. No time limit. And not a trial. I want us to separate, Gregor. Permanently. I want a different life. On my own. I want to move out. Find somewhere to live that I love. I want to travel. To meet people. To find out what I like and who I am without you.’
He stared at her for a moment, as if he didn’t recognise her, then stood up, as he said, ‘Then go. I’m not going to beg you to stay.’
She clamped her mouth shut so she wouldn’t blurt out something about that being part of the problem. There was no passion. No ‘I’ll fight for us’. Just ‘on you go, don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out’. And that pretty much said it all.
He stopped at the door, and for a second she thought she was wrong, that maybe he was going to put his heart on the line.
‘But, Sheena, I just hope you’re not making a mistake. Because if you are, there’s no coming back from this.’
With that he walked out the door, leaving Sheena feeling many things. Relieved. Sad. Resolute. And so nauseous from the emotional upheaval of it all that she had to rush to the bathroom to throw up.