A Certain Chemistry (44 page)

“It is
not
as simple as that . . . Okay, I’ll admit that I’ve missed you sometimes, and even that I still have feelings for you, but I could never trust you again. And without trust, it’s never going to work.”

“But you
can
trust me. I’m perhaps the only man in the world you
can
trust.”

She took a mouthful of coffee and nodded slowly. “Canny . . . very canny. You have me now, don’t you? Because you know there’s no way on earth I’ll ask you to leave before I’ve heard how you’re going to try to justify a statement as utterly fucking arse-headed as that. Canny.”

I moved so I was facing her as directly as possible. “Here’s the thing about being unfaithful, Sara . . . it’s absolutely
fantastic
.”

“I think you’re losing the audience already, Tom.”

“No, listen to me. The proportion of people who are unfaithful is huge—maybe even sixty percent, I read somewhere. It’s not some kind of aberration—it’s the norm. And that should be no surprise because, as I say, it’s
fantastic
. You have all the excitement and freshness and novelty you have when you’re first getting together with someone
plus
this whole extra layer of thrilling secrecy and intrigue. And lots of sex. Who could resist that? Hardly anyone. Most of those people who
aren’t
unfaithful have simply not had the chance to be. I’m not justifying it—”

“
Lord
no.”

“I’m
not
. I’m just presenting the facts. So, how do you stay faithful when being unfaithful is something so attractive and thrilling and sexy? Something that makes you feel both desired—valued—and also like you’re seventeen again?”

“You need to not be an arsehole.”

“Good. Point one: you need to not be an arsehole. If you’re an arsehole, all else will fail—I should know, I was an arsehole. But even if you aren’t an arsehole, there are other points. Point two is that you’ve got to want to keep what you have.
Really
want to keep it—even when tempted with something as flattering, as exhilarating, and as quite simply
fantastic
as an affair. Point three flows from this, and it’s the most important one of all. You have to be completely—com
pletely
—sure that you won’t be able to get away with it. That your partner will
not
—however much you lie and plead and cajole—will
not
let you get away with it. You’ll be out. It’ll be over.
Definitely
.”

Sara took another mouthful of coffee and continued to stare at me, but she didn’t say anything.

“Don’t you see?” I said. “I
know
you’d never let me get away with it. I’m the only man in the world who absolutely
knows
that if I were ever unfaithful to you, I’d be fucked.”

She drained her mug and put it down.

“Okay,” she said. “Logical flaws. First, if I was prepared to have another try with us, then it’d show you
could
get away with it.” She got up and began to move out into the hallway. I scampered after her. “Your case only holds up if I never take you back. The second I take you back, the case for having you back collapses.”

“That, I admit, is a dilemma. But, against it, I’ll point out that all the time you
refuse
to give me another chance, I’m the perfect person to be given one. The two things cancel each other out . . . I reckon.”

She reached the front door and paused.

“The second problem,” she said, “is me. If infidelity is
so
amazing—and you’ve talked it up that much that I’m simply gagging to try it myself now—then you’re heading for heartbreak, aren’t you?
I’m
bound to be unfaithful to
you
.”

“I’m perfectly willing to take that chance.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m a fucking idiot.”

“Clearly.”

“And I still love you.”

She dropped her eyes and took a long, slow breath.

I reached out and put my hand on her arm. Touching her skin again made the hairs on my neck prickle. “I can’t know how you feel, Sara,” I said, “but if I don’t do everything I can, this one last time, to persuade you to give me a chance, then I’ll never forgive myself. I’ll be a bigger coward than I ever was before, and I’ll suffer for it for the rest of my life. Let’s try again? . . . What do you say?”

She raised her eyes, and I saw them run over my face, examining all my features before returning to look straight into me. Then she took a step forward and kissed me. Her lips were warm and soft and brought with them an embrace of ecstasy and relief. We wrapped our arms around each other and kissed harder, more deeply. I was like a man coming up after being under water until his lungs almost burst. Joy, release, elation—she opened up and I fell into her. Sara slid her mouth away from mine, returned it once more, then took it away again and stepped back from me.

“No,” she said.

“What?”

“No. I can’t try again—I don’t
want
to try again.”

“But—”

She opened the door and moved round so that it was clear my role here was to step out. “It’s tempting in some ways,” she said, “and you’ve made a reasonable theoretical case for it—don’t think I didn’t appreciate that—but, at the end of the day, it’s a bad idea.”

“Why? Fucking
why
?”

“Because it’s over. It’s the past. It’s easy to get all dreamy about the past, but the fact is, if it was that fucking great, it wouldn’t
be
the past, would it? You’ll always be special to me, Tom . . . but let’s not kid ourselves, eh? Life moves on. You can never go back—and you shouldn’t try.”

“I was looking to go forward.”

“Well put.”

“But you’re still holding the door open.”

“Aye. . . . You can call a cab from your mobile.”

I swallowed a couple of times—which was no easy matter, I can tell you—then stepped outside.

I turned back and stood there for a moment, trying to think of something apposite, moving, and yet awfully clever to say as a final good-bye.

“Good-bye, Sara,” I said.

“Good-bye, Tom,” she replied, and closed the door.

XI

Well . . . I tried.
Okay? Just for you, I gave them one more shot at it. And it wasn’t easy, I can tell you. Just getting Hugh to have that party was a job I wouldn’t wish on anyone—cheesh, the man’s like some kind of misery anchor, you know what I mean? He holds on to the bottom, and dragging him towards a little joy nearly pulls his arms out of their sockets.

Maybe Sara’s going to look back and kick herself one day—could be she’s become a bit too cool and logical, and way too stubborn, for her own good. It’s definitely tough for Tom. Men are hit harder by this—harder and longer. But then, they get to avoid the slight discomfort that comes from my not quite remembering what I’d done with the anatomy layout when I hit upon the idea of childbirth. So—it’s swings and roundabouts, really. The bottom line is what I’ve been saying all along: It Doesn’t Matter. Molecules, not magic. That’s the truth. It’s painful—but nothing mystic; think of it like food poisoning. You know the setup now, and that should make it easier. I made it involve all your senses; now I’m giving you that extra sense, the one that can hopefully take the edge off it all: a sense of perspective.

Okay? Give it a try, huh? Anyways, I’m going now—stuff to do.

See you soon.

The distorted shape behind the semitransparent glass paused for a second, then pulled the door open.

“Och—Tom! How
are
you? Lord—what’s it been? Four minutes?”

“They always come back, don’t they? In the movies you like? The men always try
one more time
after it seems it’s too late.”

“Aye . . . and can I point out that your success rate from copying what works in the movies has been—historically—fucking
tragic
?”

“Abysmal.”

“And that ‘winningly persistent suitor’ or ‘creepy bleeding stalker’ is not a call that you get to make?”

“No—you get to make that call.”

“Aye, that’s right. . . . That’s right: I get to make that call.”

“So?”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mil Millington has written for various newspapers, magazines, and radio. His website (
www.mil-millington.com
) has achieved cult status, and he is a co-creator of the online magazine
The Weekly
(
www.theweekly.co.uk
). He is currently working on the screenplay for
Things My Girlfriend and I Have Argued About
for Working Title films, and on various television projects. He lives in the West Midlands with his girlfriend and their two children. He’d really like a decent night’s sleep.

ALSO BY MIL MILLINGTON

Things My Girlfriend and
I Have Argued About

U.K. PRAISE FOR MIL MILLINGTON’S

A Certain Chemistry

“The argument it posits is chilling enough to give the romantics among you nightmares.”

—METRO

“
A Certain Chemistry
is full of those cringe-worthy moments of self-recognition you occasionally feel as a reader, and the sort of wry humour which defies you not to laugh out loud. . . . Shrewd, intelligent and very, very funny.”

—HEAT

“Millington is good at getting inside his characters’ heads and delivering smart, sharp dialogue . . . witty and amusing.”

—TIME OUT

“He has a keen understanding of matters romantic and domestic . . . delightfully true to life.”

—RED

“Cleverly written.”

—COMPANY

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2003 by Mil Millington

All rights reserved under International and
Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Villard Books, an imprint of
The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

V
ILLARD
and “V” C
IRCLED
Design are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

This work was originally published in Great Britain
in 2003 by Flame, an imprint of Hodder and Stoughton,
a division of Hodder Headline.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Millington, Mil.

A certain chemistry : a novel / Mil Millington.

p. cm.

e-ISBN 1-58836-401-1

1. Television actors and actresses—Fiction. 2. Triangles (Interpersonal relations)—Fiction. 3. Autobiography—Authorship—Fiction. 4. Edinburgh (Scotland)—Fiction. 5. Ghostwriters—Fiction. I. Title.

PR6113.I57C47 2004

823′.92—dc22

2003060027

Villard Books website address:
www.villard.com

eISBN: 978-1-58836-401-2

v3.0