Okay, so get this… You know that story I was working on? I’ve given it a proper English flavour.
“Get out of my house!” Maud shouted, waving a rolling pin wildly. “Thirty years I’ve put up with your carry-on, and now you’re messing about with some young girl!”
“Sweetheart, just listen…” Bernard pressed his back against the fridge, dodging her swings. “It’s just lies! Who told you this rubbish?”
“Lies?” Maud’s voice rose to a shriek. “Pictures are lies? You spending your whole wage on her is made up?”
She flung the rolling pin to the floor and snatched up her mobile. The screen lit up – there *she* was, that girl, barely twenty-five, hugging *her* husband outside a café in Leeds city centre. The next snap showed them kissing.
“Penelope next door sent them yesterday,” Maud hissed. “She ‘happened’ to see you in town. Happened!”
Bernard hung his head. His grey hair was messed up, his shirt crumpled. At fifty-eight, he suddenly felt like a pathetic old man.
“Maud, love, I can explain…”
“Nothing to explain!” Maud grabbed a jar of strawberry jam from the shelf and hurled it at him. It smashed against the wall, sticky red jam oozing down the wallpaper. “Pack your bags and sling your hook to your bit of fluff!”
Just then, the hall phone rang. Maud wiped her tears with her dressing gown sleeve and went to answer.
“Hullo?” Her voice shook with fury.
“Mum, it’s me, Dorothy,” came her daughter’s weary voice. “Can I come over? Had a big row with Charles, it’s awful at home.”
Maud looked at Bernard, still rooted by the fridge, and sighed.
“Come over, love. Only… Dad won’t be here.”
“Where is he?”
“I’ll tell you later. Just come.”
Bernard shuffled quietly into the bedroom and started stuffing clothes into an old holdall. His hands trembled, his throat felt dry. How on earth had this happened? Just six months back he’d been the happy family man, loving husband and father. And now…
Marina had come into his life by chance. He was doing some decorating at the office where she worked as an accountant. Fragile, blonde, with eyes like sea glass. She spoke softly, smiled shyly. He felt different around her – younger, stronger, needed.
Started with just nattering during breaks. Then he lingered longer than needed on the job. Within a month, he couldn’t imagine a day without seeing her.
“Bernie, what are you doing?” Maud’s voice sounded right behind him.
He turned. His wife stood in the bedroom doorway, leaning against the frame. Face red and puffy from crying.
“Packing,” he mumbled.
“And where will you go? To *her*?”
Bernard hesitated. Marina had a little flat, but he’d never seriously thought about moving in.
“Not sure yet.”
“Not sure,” Maud gave a bitter laugh. “But you knew when you slept with her? When you spent family money on gifts for her, you knew?”
“Maud, I never meant…”
“Never meant!” She came in and sat on the edge of the bed. “Thirty years together, Bernie. Thirty! Remember how we met? You were too shy to even hold my hand.”
Maud spoke softly, almost a whisper, making the words cut deeper.
“Remember when Dorothy was born? You paced that hospital corridor all night like a caged animal. When the doctor said it was a girl, you cried happy tears. Remember?”
Bernard sat next to his wife on the bed. He remembered that day at the hospital, holding that wrinkled, red little bundle – his daughter.
“And when your heart trouble started, who was there?” Maud continued. “Who sat up nights taking your temp, handing you tablets? Who kept vigil at hospital after your heart attack?”
“Maud, please stop…”
“I won’t!” She turned to face him. “I have a right to say my piece. And my piece is this: you’re a proper fool, Bernard Andrews. Swapped your family for a girl young enough to be your daughter.”
Bernard stayed silent. What could he say? That he’d fallen in love? That Marina made him feel young? That he was tired of the predictable family life, the same chats, the identical days?
The front door slammed. Quick steps sounded.
“Mum!” Dorothy called out. “I’m here!”
Maud quickly wiped her eyes and got up.
“Coming, love!”
She paused at the door and looked back at her husband:
“Be gone by morning. Leave your keys on the hall table.”
Bernard was alone. Muffled voices came through the wall. Dorothy was asking something, Maud replying in clipped tones. Then crying started – his daughter, his wife, or both.
He zipped his holdall and left the bedroom. In the lounge, wife and daughter sat huddled on the sofa. Dorothy lifted eyes red from tears to her father.
“Dad, is it true? You’re leaving us?”
Bernard stopped in the middle of the room, bag in hand. His daughter stared at him like she didn’t know him.
“Dot, it’s complicated…”
“No, Dad, it’s dead simple,” Dorothy cut him off, standing. “Either you love our family or you don’t. No other way.”
“Sweetheart, don’t be so upset,” Maud put an arm around her daughter. “Dad’s made his choice.”
Bernard put his bag down and approached them.
“Dorothy, forgive me. I didn’t want to hurt you.”
“But you did,” his daughter said quietly. “Every day. Lying, cheating, spending our money on another woman.”
“*Our* money?” Bernard sounded surprised. “I’m the one earned it!”
“You earned it, while Mum ran this house for thirty years, looked after you, raised me!” Dorothy flared. “Or d’you think that’s not proper work?”
Bernard bowed his head. He’d never thought of it like that. Maud was always *there*, always managing things, taking care of them all. It had just seemed… natural.
“Go, Bernie,” Maud said wearily. “Enough torturing us all.”
He picked up his bag and headed for the door. He turned there.
“Maud, if you need anything…”
“Won’t need a thing,” his wife stated firmly.
The door clicked shut behind him. Bernard stood on the landing, listening. Silence.
He went down to the street and got out his phone. Dialled Marina’s number.
“Bernie?” She sounded surprised. “What’s wrong?”
“Can I come over? Maud knows everything.”
Pause.
“Course you can. Only… my mate Karen’s round.”
“S’alright, I’ll wait in the street.”
“Don’t be daft! Come up. I’ll introduce you.”
Bernard hailed a cab and headed to Marina’s. On the way, he thought about what came next. Was it really all over? Thirty years wiped out by one stupid step?
Or maybe not one. Maybe he’d drifted away ages ago, just not noticed. When was the last proper heart-to-heart with Maud? When did they spend time together, beyond telly dinners?
Marina met him at the door. She looked flustered.
“Come in,” she said quietly. “This is Karen, my mate.”
Karen, Marina’s age, young and pretty, looked at Bernard with undisgu
David settled deeper into the sofa cushions, knowing that despite their comfort, the real work of building something new had just begun.
