COLD

“Don’t worry! I’ll be there! I can’t wait to see you... I’ve missed you too...” Those words. That was my ‘loving husband’ talking. Well, not talking really; more of a hurried, excited whisper. On his phone. In our year-old baby’s bedroom. Did you know Baby Monitors pick up everything?

 “Look, got to go now... Love you too... Yes, see you Friday... Yep! Bye... Bye.” I was so bloody angry. I was shaking. How could he? How? I went into the kitchen to calm down with a glass of something. Pouring myself a huge wine; my hands shook and drops of wine splashed onto the floor. I wanted to hit something, or someone. I heard the shower running in the bathroom upstairs. Talk to your lover, then have a shower. Nice.

 My head was banging. I held the glass to my forehead; the cool glass was oddly comforting. He’d done this before, of course. I was heartbroken before, but not now. Now, I was just bloody angry. Obviously, he no longer had the power to break my heart, which came as a pleasant surprise. I heard the shower had stopped running, and he was moving around upstairs, getting ready for bed probably.

“Sammy’s out like a light!”

“David!” I jumped. I didn’t hear him come into the kitchen. He laughed about his boy taking after him as he rummaged through the fridge for a snack. His hair was still damp from the shower. There was a minty fresh aroma about him. He was muttering about the spilled wine on the floor.

“Did I hear you talking to someone?”

He didn’t answer me.

 I didn’t sleep. I lay awake listening to David’s breathing, almost wishing it to stop. I never used to feel this way about him. There was a time when we were so close, I’d wake up in the night to find that he was holding my hand. We couldn’t get enough of each other. There is a certain phrase, in a certain song, ‘I could be so content hearing the sound of your breath...’ Now? Now, I could cheerfully smother him. My indulgent thoughts were dismissed when Sammy woke up for a change. He was such a wonderful baby; he didn’t even do that ‘spit up’ thing I’d been told about. He was sleeping through now, too. Once he was settled again, it was about 4am. I walked around David’s side of the bed, where his phone was charging. We have our phones on Do Not Disturb when we’re sleeping, for Sammy’s sake, more than anything. I could see he had texts. I didn’t know who from. I decided to try something. I didn’t think it would work. If it worked, surely there’d be stories all over Mumsnet about it? I picked up his phone and held it in front of his face... Oh my god! I was in!

 I ran silently downstairs. My heart was racing, and my hands trembling. I touched Messages. They were coming from someone named ‘D’. ‘D’ had long, black hair, a pleasant enough smile, a penchant for low cut t shirts, and she was a stranger to the word ‘bra’. She also claimed to love him. I copied all the messages and sent them to my phone. The thing with anger is, it makes you reckless. So, feeling reckless, I turned his phone off, and I threw his phone in the bin, underneath some dirty nappies. I slept like a log after that.

The next morning, David was frantically searching for his phone. I said helpful things like, ‘Maybe it’s where you left it?” or “Have you tried calling it from the landline?” Or, my favorite, “Well, you do tend to leave things lying around, David.” David was slamming things around. Good.

“When’s the last time you used it?” I innocently ventured.

“Let me think… Last night... No, not last night… Maybe I... I give up...” He concluded with exasperation.

“Actually David, can you drop Sammy off at Day Care? I’ve got a busy day.”

I didn’t wait for an answer. I grabbed my coat and my bag and left. Of course, I didn’t have a busy day. I never have a busy day, not in the normal sense. I went to my favourite tea shop, sat down, ordered a Chai latte and a Cronut and got my phone out. It seems David had been talking to this ‘D’ for quite a while. He met her in Phuket. He was there for some work beano, or as David calls them, ‘conferences.’ Some messages from David seemed very desperate. ‘D’ wasn’t responding to his calls or texts. After about eight days and thirty-odd messages, he finally hears from ‘D’. Dora (I doubt this was her real name) had lost her phone and didn’t have the money to get a new one. iPhones are expensive, iPhone only. Other girls at the bar she works in will make fun of her if her phone isn’t an iPhone and say her boyfriend is ‘cheap farang’. David sends her the money for a phone. She sends him selfies, taken on her new phone. I’m not sure what to do with this information. Especially the part of the information where Dora is claiming to be pregnant. That’s if, of course, sending a photo of yourself grinning, inanely whilst holding a positive pregnancy test, counts as pregnant.

When I get home, the house is quiet and warm. I got David’s phone out of the bin. I put it next to the sink. I must have dropped off to sleep on the sofa because I’m woken by David’s shouting. He was standing in the kitchen, looking at his phone. He’s shaking.

“It wasn’t there! It wasn’t!”

Next thing, he’s pouring himself some wine and to say he gulped down two mouthfuls at the speed of light was an understatement.

“If this you, Kate, you’ve got to stop it! If you don’t stop...” He suddenly said, in a voice I didn’t recognise. I laughed. I’d heard all those threats before. He knew as well as I did. It didn’t have to be like this. But if anyone needed to stop it, it was him.

I found myself in the back garden. We made this garden together. Pre-Sammy, we had BBQs and parties. David’s interest in the garden had waned in the last year, like his interest in me, I suppose. I looked into the house through the glass of the French doors. David was on the phone. We didn’t speak for the rest of the evening.

I’m not sure where the time went, because it’s the next evening and David is talking to a woman in the kitchen. She looks a bit like Alanis Morissette, same hair, same vibe, you know? She’s smiling, tossing her hair around. Flirting. And what is David doing, you might well ask? He’s literally speaking about me like I’m not here! I am so angry. I pick up a cup and hurl it to the floor. I follow the cup with the entire contents of the cutlery drawer.

“Is she normally this violent?” The woman asks, as she lights what appears to be a tightly wrapped bundle of dried herbs. The smell is literally disgusting. David can’t speak; he’s as white as a sheet.

Who is this woman? Who is this strange woman in my house! Can’t she see me? I am angry.

“Get out of my house!” I scream into her face.

“I’m sorry David, but your wife? She doesn’t know she’s dead.”