Page 15 of Seven Rules for a Perfect Marriage

This isn’t going to go down well. ‘I was really embarrassed,’ I admit. ‘So I blocked everyone I know in real life.’

They all laugh, apart from Grace who is outraged. ‘You’ve blocked me?’

‘I thought you’d take the piss,’ I counter. If I were being harsh, I’d point out that she didn’t even notice me disappearing from her timeline because she’s so busy posting hundreds of pictures of her toddler, Raffy, and her newborn, Ada.

‘Yeah, obviously I would have taken the piss,’ she laughs, refilling everyone’s wine glasses with the fancy white wine Gemma’s dad so generously provided. ‘Okay, but how did this happen?’ she asks.

I take a deep breath, and then a very large gulp of wine. ‘Jack was working a late shift on our anniversary, so I made him dinner at like, one in the morning when he got back. And then someone tagged the restaurant I recreated the menu from, and people commented a lot saying it was sweet and they wanted more date night ideas. So then I posted more about dates, and then I started posting about dating, and long-term relationships, and I don’t know. It just kept growing. And then some, like, semi-famous people reposted me and it got big really fast. But it’s the internet, it’s not like a real job or anything.’

Which is true. It’s not a job. But – and obviously I can’t tell them this because it would tip over into full-on bragging – it has started to earn me money. The first time a brand offered me cash to do a post for them I assumed it was a scam, but I went along with it just in case and to my absolute shock, a month later they paid me £500. As in, what I make in a week of work, for one post. And since then it’s happened enough times that we’ve actually got a meeting lined up with a real-life manager. Obviously it’s a side hustle (an expression that Jack truly hates) for now, but there arepeople who are making real, proper money from this. And I guess it’s not totally impossible that I might do the same one day.

Everyone looks faintly impressed and I feel myself beaming.

The music starts and after Gemma and her new husband have taken a few steps around the dance floor, they gesture for us to join them. Jack winds his arms around my waist and we sway in a very safe version of dancing together. ‘Thank you for that,’ I say. ‘It was very embarrassing and very sweet.’

‘You’re more than welcome,’ he says. ‘I told you that you had something to show off about.’

I rest my head on his shoulder.

‘It’ll probably dry up within six months,’ I say. ‘I’m going to run out of ideas eventually.’

‘I wouldn’t be so sure,’ he replies. ‘And if you get really desperate, I can always help you come up with something.’

‘True,’ I say. ‘You’re the writer, after all.’

He drops a kiss on my forehead. ‘I heard a rumour that Patrick has cigarettes.’

I laugh. ‘Let’s go mug him for one.’

Jessica

It’s the first Saturday morning since the book came out where we haven’t had publicity for the book, or work to do on it, or something book-related to fill our time. We wake up and neither of us totally knows what to do with ourselves. I sort of assumed that once the book press was over, we’d fall back into the routine we’d been comfortablewith before. But I can’t quite work out what we’d have been doing right now, in before times. I find myself thinking how much easier it would be if we had children, if their dictatorial ways decided our weekend plans. I know my friends’ routines intimately via social media. I watch their early morning cuddles in bed with sleepy toddlers and tiny prune-like babies. Their trips to ballet or football classes followed by coffee in the park, rushed lunches at Pizza Express. And I know it’s much harder work than it looks because I used to go along for the ride sometimes, marvelling at how many things you have to do in a day when you’re keeping a toddler entertained, at how quickly time seems to evaporate for them. But there’s a different kind of hard in waking up in the morning and realising there’s a vast stretch of unfilled time in front of you. Time and time again, my friends who are mothers tell me how lucky I am to have the luxury of empty time, that I can have a wee without an audience, but I wish I could make them understand what it’s like to crave sleep deprivation and total dependency from a tiny person. How I hear them talk about their boring, stressful lives and simultaneously understand and envy them.

Obviously I can’t say that. We have the luxury of time, of lie-ins and a clean, peaceful house. We’re entitled to a cafetière of overpriced coffee and all of the newspapers spread out over our huge kitchen table. We can have the kind of morning our friends would trade a limb for. I should be grateful for it. But on weekends like this one, the silence of the house squeezes around my head and I find myself climbing the walls by lunchtime.

I could ask Jack if he wants to go to a gallery, or wander the shops, but he’s lying on the sofa reading a book by someone with an unpronounceable French surname.

‘How’s the book?’ I ask him.

It takes him a minute to realise I’m talking to him. ‘Great,’ he says. ‘I’m enjoying it.’

I’ve known Jack for most of my life. I know without a doubt that this is his way of telling me to leave him alone so he can keep reading. So instead, I text Clay.

Busy?

Sleeping off a hangover.

It’s practically midday.

Yes, thank you, Matron.

Fancy a walk?

God, no.

I feel a little wave of disappointment. Apparently no one I ask wants to do anything today. My phone buzzes again. It’s Clay.

But I could be tempted to a bit of shopping.

---