Page 34 of The Honeymoon Affair

The living-room tree is always decorated in warm shades of red, gold and green. The audiobook ends just as I finish. I turn on the lamps and uncork the wine. But before I pour it, I take a black wool dress and my black stilettos from another of my bags. I run a brush through my hair and let it flow loosely around my face, refresh my lipstick, then flop onto the sofa and stretch my legs out in front of me, leaning back against the deep cushions and gazing at the tree. There’s something about a Christmas tree that’s joyful even when you don’t feel particularly joyful yourself. But I’m finding my joy again in lying here looking at it.

Where did it all go wrong? I sip my wine and ask myself that question over and over again, even though I already know the answer. We wanted the same thing until we didn’t. We loved each other until we didn’t. We were good together until we weren’t.

Until the day I had to choose and I didn’t choose him.

The warmth and the wine make me sleepy, and it’s the sound of the front door being opened that jerks me out of the doze I’ve fallen into. There’s a scuffling in the hall, a muttered cursing, and then the door to the living room is opened.

‘Jesus Christ,’ he says as he sees me. ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ And then, ‘Oh. You’ve decorated.’

‘Welcome home, Charles.’ I lift the bottle of red from the table. ‘Freedom Friday. I brought a bottle of Monastrell. Didn’t you notice the tree in the front?’

He takes off his leather jacket and slings it over the back of the sofa. Then he sits down beside me.

‘Now that you mention it, yes. But the street is festooned with trees and lights, so it didn’t seem like anything out of the ordinary. Thanks, though. You know me and decorating.’

I do.

I pour him a glass of wine and raise mine to him.

‘Season’s greetings,’ I say, then give him a quizzical look. ‘Has Santa brought a manuscript?’

He hesitates, and I feel my stomach sink. Then he grins.

‘He absolutely has,’ he says, and clinks his glass against mine. ‘And he’s very, very happy with it.’

‘Very, very mysterious, too.’ I take a sip of wine. (Not a sip. A gulp of relief.)

‘I needed to be,’ he says. ‘It’s different. But you’re going to love it.’

‘Am I?’

‘I know it’s a very tentative first draft and needs work, but it’s got bestseller written all over it.’

‘Gosh.’ I take a more modest sip and replace the glass on the table. ‘You’re not usually so gung-ho.’

‘I’m in a gung-ho mood. A gung-ho-ho-ho mood, in fact.’

He sounds so remarkably cheery I feel the tension leave my shoulders.

‘So . . . are you going to give it to me?’ I ask.

‘I have to print it out first,’ he says. ‘The hard copy I have isn’t complete. The hotel printer decided to throw a hissy fit. I’ll do it now while I change into something more comfortable.’

He leaves the room and I hear him go up the stairs, and then the sound of his footsteps overhead. Most of the floorboards in the house were salvaged in the great makeover, but they creak a lot. Then I hear the printer whirring into action and allow myself a relieved smile. I wasn’t a hundred per cent sure Charles really was working in his island paradise, and I’m very glad he was.

I pour myself another glass of the rich red wine, and this time I drink appreciatively, enjoying its tangy blackberry flavour. I’ve always been a red wine drinker, even in the summer, when most people like to switch to whites or rosés. I’m more of a full-blooded-flavour person myself.

It’s about twenty minutes before he comes downstairs again. He’s changed into a pair of grey Hugo Boss leisure pants and a matching grey sweatshirt. He looks great in them. That’s the annoying thing about Charles. He always looks great.

‘Manuscript?’ I ask as he sits beside me and pours himself some more wine.

‘Is that all I am to you?’ he asks. ‘The man with the manuscript?’

‘Of course not,’ I say. ‘I’m eager, that’s all.’

‘It’s still printing,’ he says. ‘So while we’re waiting, tell me how things have been.’

And then, because I always tell him everything, I say that it’s been pretty shit and I admit to not having signed Francesca Clooney and missing out on Bernard Loughlin too. I say that Lucy Conway is pregnant and so probably won’t write her usual book next year, and that it looks like a small independent publisher will fold while owing money to authors, including mine. And I tell him about the boiler being on the blink, that I’ve been working in a fridge while he’s been sipping cocktails and that my assistant is leaving me. Rather to my surprise, I hear my voice wobble at the end.

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