Page 29 of Sleep

“You’re a surprising man.” I had to smile a little.

“Your type?” He wasn’t going to let me get away from that one, was he?

“Mark Quinton,” I admitted. “And my ex-husband. Nobody has ever compared. But I can see now that Finley was wrong for me. He and I were kids both with an extreme need to be the one in control. Our relationship could never have ended in any other way than it did.”

“In a Shakespearean tragedy,” he filled in.

“But nobody died.”

“Yet.”

He made me laugh. There was a glimmer of something in the air between us.

“This life story does not contain any gruesome deaths…yet,” I agreed. “But stop interrupting, Jonny.”

“I do like it when you call me Jonny.”

I put my finger over my lips, shushed him. I was talking. Controlling? Me?

“I married Finley on a whim, then cheated on him a few weeks later. The two years we were together were a constant push and pull, disaster looming around every corner. Then when we finally broke, I was devastated. Truly so, but that’s when I met Mark, and he was so different from everyone else. Where Finley was stern and handsome and cool to the bone, a straight line from A to B, Mark was like this, I don’t know, shiny, sparkly glittering whirlwind, and everyone loved him and wanted to be with him, and I was right there in the crowd drawn in by whatever shitty drugs he was spreading in his wake.”

“Drugs?”

“You said it yourself. Like your mother. Everyone was mesmerised by him. He just had to stand there, and people would be clinging to him. Like a bloody religious experience, it was. Only problem was… he liked me. He liked me enough that we actually became friends, and I always thought that our friendship was all good. Yes, I loved him, desired him, and I thought if I could just look after him and nurture him and love him, then one day he would realise that he couldn’t live without me.”

“Normal.”

“Not normal. Pathetic.”

“Human. I’ve read all the classics. I was addicted to Greek tragedies for a while. Wrote my dissertation on old German folklore. Things never change. Human nature is hard to discard. Hence, normal.”

“And you work in construction.”

“I pretend I work in construction. I sit at a desk and have an army of people who manipulate other people to give me what I want.”

“And what do you want?”

“Results. Big shiny buildings. Money in the bank.”

“You have all that.”

“I know.”

“But you’re still deeply unhappy.”

Snort.

“Jonny, you live alone in a glass penthouse. I feel I should somehow rescue you, climb up a rope and haul you over that balcony rail.”

“Alas, I have no Rapunzel hair to throw you, though I think that may be your department, given that I’ve already rescued you. I found you crying on a bench, remember?”

“Arsehole. Stealing my thunder.”

“I’m the prince in this fairy tale.”

Now I snorted. What were we like?

“This is my life story. You asked for it, so stop interrupting.”

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