Half Plus Seven (26 page)

But the sticking plaster started to fray at the edges.

At first, I felt like Charlie Bucket. A golden ticket of sex-on-tap and cheese-on-toast. But it didn't last. I've learnt that it never does. A morning in bed turns into an hour in Ikea turns into an argument over door handles in the kitchen zone turns into you calling her a cunt and children looking and parents scorning turns into you pushing the trolley away and shouting you are never, never, spending your sacred Saturday morning in this godforsaken hell hole ever again. Ever. She would taunt me about the respective value of our Clubcard vouchers. My life became paralysed by inertia; unable to make plans, dream dreams, book a weekend away in three months' time for the fear that I'd do it, I'd actually do it and walk away and she'd be left over with a budget return flight and a B & B for two. Life with Deborah was like the queues at passport control. We went over and over the same piece of ground without seeming to move any further forward.

I got out.

But today I was back in, temporarily at least. We'd last seen each other over 2 years ago in the express queue at a Tesco Metro. They say you're as likely to meet your spouse in a supermarket as anywhere else. Well, I met hers at least.

‘This is Steven', she said hesitantly (the leap of faith on the ‘v' over the ‘ph' was mine and mine alone).

‘Hi, Stephen', I said.

‘Hi, I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name?' he said.

‘Bill,' she said. ‘This is Bill.'

‘Oh,' he said, his face turning less friendly with the realisation that this was
that
Bill. ‘Oh.'

My shopping basket contained only white wine and extra strength condoms. We all looked down at it and then away.

And that, as they say, was that.

Until now.

My Flakberry had beeped three days ago with a text message from an unknown number:

‘This is my new no. Please update yr records. Deborah xx'

I didn't have her old number. It was evidently a group text. I was now just an anonymous member in a group, filed away alongside old school pals and former colleagues. But still in the file.

I gave it some thought and messaged her back. I mean, how bad could it be? I'd already served soup at a Meals On Wheels for salvation; saying sorry to Debs should be a walk in the park.

If that park was full of really fucking annoying children.

‘So how do you know my mum, then?' he asked.

‘We're just old…'

‘…friends,' Debs finished. ‘Just old friends.' He slurped his Coke and looked up at the ceiling.

‘Is he Daddy's friend too?'

I said ‘no' as Debs said ‘yes' and then ‘yes' as she said ‘no'. We looked at each other and smiled and it was as if nothing had ever changed.

Except it had.

‘Kid?' I called.

‘His name is Charlie.' How apt, she'd named her first born after the third wheel in our relationship.

‘Charlie…'

He kept slurping on his Coke.

‘Charlie…'

How were you meant to get a kid's attention?

‘There's a fiver in it for you…'

He was all ears.

‘Why don't you go and play with the other kids in the ball pool over there?' Faint pre-pubescent screams of excitement and the vague stench of urine wafted over from the children's activity area at the other end of the ‘pub'.

‘I don't like other kids,' he replied.

‘I know how you feel, kid, but I'm sure your mother's told you by now that sometimes in life you have to do things you don't want to do.' I took a crisp note out of my top pocket and pushed it along the table to him. He snaffled it up and ran off. I resisted the urge to ruffle his hair as he passed.

‘Wow, you've sure got a way with the young, Bill.'

‘It's nothing, really,' I said in mock humility. ‘I'm like Willy Wonka, just without the chocolate factory.'

‘And the Oompa-Loompas,' she said.

‘And the Oompa-Loompas.'

We both smiled. It had been Debs' smile which had first attracted me to her. It was the first day of university and, full of the zest of the fresher, I'd followed the typewritten instructions left on the desk of my 1960s dorm room to attend a course registration day at 9 a.m. on a bright autumnal morning. It was to be the one and only time I'd step foot into a university building before noon in three years.

Scores of lost looking teenagers slowly trundled around the perimeter of a room lined with trestle tables manned by keeno second years wearing hoodies advertising membership of the debating society (Deb-Soc) and prepped like bad double-glazing salesmen to coax you onto a Romantic Poetry and Prose module over an Irish Literature one.

‘Byron was mad, bad and dangerous to know, a bit like all of us in Rom-Soc. You should totally study it.'

And there she was, stood in the corner being loudly lectured at by a mature student – you could always tell by their beards and local accents – on the merits of Milton. She smiled her way through the patronising, somehow still looking a little bit more lost than the rest. I knew I was going to like her from that very moment. Her green eyes had then sparkled with a youthful naivety. Today they looked like chipped marbles being kicked around by crows.

‘So,' she took a deep breath and exhaled, ‘how have you been, Bill?' She broke into nervous laughter.

‘Oh, you know me, Debs…'

‘Knew you…' she said.

‘Well, not much has changed… You knew me then, you know me now.'

‘Oh.' She looked disappointed, and down towards her latte.

This wasn't true. I had changed. I wasn't the Bill she knew, the one who broke her heart like that.

‘Well, maybe that's not strictly true. I don't drink anymore for a start.' She spat bad coffee all over the table.

‘Christ, Debs!'

‘I'm sorry, I'm sorry,' she snorted. A vaguely attractive Eastern European waitress came over with napkins to dab away the mistake. They watched you like hawks in these places.

‘Is that such a surprise?' I asked, knowing the answer. She cleared her throat and composed herself.

‘I'd have been less surprised if you'd have told me you were gay.'

‘Thanks, Deb.' I took a sip of my orange juice. The acidity hit my stomach.

‘Wow, Bill, just wow. What the hell brought that on?'

‘Oh, I don't know, a few things really…'

‘Like?'

‘Oh, you know, work I suppose…'

‘But you always used to drink
for
work. “It's part of the job, Debs” you'd say…'

‘Well, I suppose it is, but the less time I have to spend in bars with lonely clients, the better really…'

‘Right.' She looked unconvinced. ‘So what are the other things?'

‘What?'

‘You said there were a few things…'

‘Oh, right.' She still never forgot a word you said. I was forever being pulled up on pissed-up promises made without the slightest intention of fulfillment.

‘Well, you could put it down to a Sister Gina, I suppose.'

She spat coffee all over the table again.

‘Debs!'

‘Fucking hell, Bill, have you turned God squad? Is that what this is all about?' The waitress again came to mop up, this time leaving a roll of tissue on the table for the spillages of the next revelation.

‘God squad?!' I said.

‘Sister Gina? A nun convinced you to quit drinking?'

‘Oh, fucking hell no. God no. She's a psychic.'

‘A psychic?!'

‘Yeah…' I realised this sounded almost as ridiculous.

‘You really have changed.' I sipped my orange juice and longed for the dull bite of alcohol. A bead of sweat became apparent on my left temple. And then my right.

‘Yes, I suppose I have. That's why I wanted to see you actually…'

‘To invite me to a seance?'

‘No, Debs, not to invite you to a seance.'

‘That's good because I'm not sure I would want to go to a seance with you. All of my dead relatives hate you.'

‘Thanks for the reminder.'

The sound of hyped children battled with the songs of Simon and Garfunkel interpreted through the pan-pipe for background noise.

‘I wanted to say sorry.' Her green eyes trained on mine.

‘Debs, I'm sorry.'

‘Well,' she swallowed hard, ‘that's okay Bill. It's okay that you're sorry. It all happened so long ago that it seems like another lifetime away. It is another lifetime away.'

She was too kind. She was always too kind. My actions would have still haunted a Buddhist seven reincarnations down the line. So, where to begin? At the beginning I suppose. Well, you already know the beginning, and a fair bit of the middle. The bit I fast-forwarded was the end. So now for the slo-mo and director's commentary. It's the least you deserve this far down the line.

The pill wasn't working for Debs. Well, when I say it wasn't working, it was
working
but it wasn't ‘working'. It was making her fat (it wasn't) or moody, or moody because she was fat (she wasn't) or fat (she wasn't) because she was moody. So she came off the pill, and I came, well, not into her. Well, that was the plan at least. And the plan worked for a while. It was hard for it not to really; we barely touched each other. If it had been in the early days, we'd have bankrupted ourselves with the rubber bill. Deep down, I couldn't help thinking she'd concocted the whole thing to put the final nail in the sexual side of our relationship. But I was scratching that itch with so many others, it mattered little.

She paid half the rent. She swept the floors. She made sure we had in-date milk. Okay, she didn't put out, but there were plenty of fish in the local pond for that. Until one night I stumbled into the one bedroom of our flat; drunk, high and emotional.

A night with Trent had been cut short when he left – with the coke – to go fuck the intern he'd been manipulating since the last one caught onto his bullshit. I'd nursed a beer and chaser with the bedside manner of a back-street abortionist while weighing up the options for the rest of the dark hours: go home and sleep under the roof I shared with my live-in girlfriend, or go hunting for a score under the stars from the men who lived nowhere. Choose your own adventure. I rolled the dice.

I don't have to tell you what happened.

But it'd been a bad hit. I'd gone south, inside myself, emotional; wanting to put things right. What the fuck was I doing taking drugs with strangers on the street when I had a home to go to and work in five, four hours? I was going home. To talk to Debs. Just maybe not with words. I tripped over my jeans getting into the bed. She stirred.

‘Did you have a nice evening?' Evening. It was always ‘evening'. It was a fucking night, not an evening. I pulled up close to her.

‘Bill, what are you doing?'

‘Sssh.'

‘I'm tired, Bill.'

‘Sssh.'

If I didn't insist, then I demanded. You know what I mean. You've been there.

‘Bill, we don't have any condoms.'

‘I'll pull out…'

I didn't pull out.

A month passed.

Then six weeks.

Seven.

Eight.

‘Bill… I'm…'

I wasn't ready. She wasn't ready. We weren't ready.

I wasn't ready.

An appointment was booked at the Grove Banks Medical Centre. 2.15 p. m. on the 24th September. Ask for Dr Drake on reception.

I thumbed complacently through
National Geographic
magazines, lost in a photo-led feature on the world's longest waterfall range. The spray showered my subconscious. A gap of quiet hung in the air. Behind the door, silent screams soaked in the blurred colours of a collection of Rothkos placed tastefully on the walls.

After it was done we drove to her mother's house. I sat sipping tea in the front room, unsure if she knew the reason she'd prepared the spare room was so her daughter could convalesce after killing her unborn grandchild. I thought it best not to bring it up.

We said our goodbyes, me hinting at a crucial few days on the Henderson account, her mum nodding and Debs' green eyes looking more lost than ever. I got back into the car and knew exactly where I was pointing the wheel. I went where I always went, even if the places were different.

The girl was the same. A different body, different perfume, but the same.

The next morning the latch on the front door opened. Soft footsteps in the corridor. The bedroom door was eased open. One eye looked up at Debs and her mum, holding an overnight bag and the weight of yesterday. The girl was still asleep. The bedroom door was shut, and then the front.