Page 28 of Seven Rules for a Perfect Marriage

She takes a sip. ‘I can’t think of anyone who needs a drink more than a group of unhappily married people trying to save their relationships.’

‘The official party line is that no one is unhappy, and that we’re all trying to “reinvigorate” our relationships,’ I say, feeling Jessica would be proud of me.

She smiles, showing a little gap between her two front teeth. ‘Sure.’ Then, lifting the glass, ‘Cheers.’

There’s a silence so abject that I can hear the humming of the fridge. This is why I liked my old job. I’m good behind the scenes. I can set things up so other people can flourish, or more often, so that they can skewer atricky politician. But standing in the middle of the room isn’t for me. I think sometimes it might read like I’m not trying, like I think I’m too good for it all, but it’s literally the opposite. It’s been worse since things really started to take off with the account. More parties, more events, more dinners, but most of all, more pressure. If I embarrassed myself at the pub five years ago, then the only person who suffered was me. Now if I cock it up badly enough, apparently I could tank Jessica’s livelihood too. Sometimes when we leave an event, Jessica will give me a review in the car on the way home. It started with her thanking me for going to bad parties with weak drinks so that we could ‘network’ and morphed into her explaining how I could make better small talk next time. I know she’s trying to help, to make me more comfortable, and it comes from a good place. But sometimes it feels like we leave a party and I wait for her to start listing all the ways I’ve failed.

I’m quite relieved when Ken and Sue come down and fill the room with noise, chatting about how much they like their bedroom. Verity turns towards them and I step back just a little, smiling and nodding in a way I hope is acceptable.

Eventually everyone assembles, and it feels like an awkward school disco; the crowd has separated into two tribes, lining opposite walls. What I really want to do is walk over to Jess, put my arm around her and do the small talk together. I feel more confident at these things with her by my side, but I know we’re supposed to be mingling. I can see that she’s busy chatting to Sue, maybe because Sue’s kids are all grown-up so Jess won’t have to listen to whatit’s like having little ones. A couple of the blokes next to me have already formed a little cabal, predictably talking about football, and I feel on the outs, like the kid at school trying to pretend I’m interested in the same things to fit in better. There’s a sort of frantic quality to the way that they keep repeating themselves, repeating sports clichés. They’re nervous, and I get it. If you’ve spent your entire life keeping schtum about your feelings, it’s quite the challenge to suddenly go away for a weekend and be expected to expose your innermost thoughts. A bit like being expected to take off all your clothes and bend over, really. Unlike the rest of them, I suppose I could probably bow out at this point. But even entertaining the idea feels wrong. I think, despite the nerves, it might actually be preferable to admit fallibility and join in, rather than just leading and acting like a pair of smug twats who know the answer to everything.

From across the room, I hear Jessica clinking a knife against her glass.

‘Hi everyone,’ she says. ‘I’m Jessica, this is Jack,’ as if they don’t already know who she is. She’s the whole reason they’re here. ‘Thank you so much for giving up your time to be here with us, for what we hope is going to be a really exciting, empowering weekend. We’ve got a jam-packed schedule of games, events and activities guiding you through each of our Seven Rules, which – as you all hopefully know – we believe can strengthen any relationship.’

She pauses to take a breath, obviously nervous. She’s better in front of a bigger crowd, I’ve noticed. With a group this size, you can really feel everybody in the room. She sips her drink and then carries on, a bit slower now.

‘Some of you will be here because you want to recommit to each other, some of you will be here because you’re having some significant struggles in your marriage. Having struggles in your marriage is normal – we all know that. But being unhappy for an extended period of time is not. We want you to leave at the end of the weekend with tools you can use for the rest of your lives. We’re going to ask for a lot of vulnerability and honesty from you all, and that’s probably going to feel quite weird to start with.’ People laugh lightly. ‘But we promise you, it’ll be worth it. Sometimes it’s easy to fall into patterns in a marriage, to focus on the bad and forget the qualities that you love most about your partner and what attracted you to them in the first place.’

She pauses, fiddling with her bracelet and tucking her hair behind her ear. When she looks up she meets my eye, and I’m grateful that she’s being honest although it hurts that I know she’s speaking from experience. There are a few uncomfortable looks and murmurs of agreement, so it’s clear that everyone can relate. ‘Jack? Anything to add?’

I absolutely have to say something. I pick a spot at the back of the room and focus my eyes there, and then decide that it’s probably best just to be honest. ‘If any of you are feeling a bit apprehensive about this, join the club. I’m not into sharing my feelings by nature, especially not with a room full of strangers.’ I pause, worried that was rude. ‘Sorry. But you know. You are strangers at the moment.’ They laugh, much to my relief. ‘But yeah, Jessica and I agreed that if we were going to ask you to take part in this with your whole hearts, we should do the same. So we’ll be doing all the activities with you. And if I can manage tonail this “talking about your feelings” stuff, then I promise literally anyone can.’

They laugh again, and the ‘they’ includes Jessica, which makes this a dramatic improvement on last time I did public speaking in front of her.

‘So we thought we’d start things off nice and easy,’ Jess says, taking back the reins, much to my relief. ‘I know it’s been a long day of travel so tonight we’re just going to do a quick icebreaker where we go around and introduce ourselves and our other half, using rule two: always be your partner’s greatest cheerleader. We’ll give you a couple of minutes and then when you’re ready, you just introduce yourself and tell us something amazing about your partner.’

The little gathered crowd eases back as each couple turns inward, talking in low voices.

‘Can I borrow you both?’ Suze motions to me and Jess.

We follow her out into the corridor and Suze hands Jess an iPad.

‘Now you’re joining in for the weekend, they need you to sign a waiver to say that you won’t sue if you fall off anything high and that you’re not pregnant, Jessica. I don’t think they need you to say that part, Jack.’ She smiles at her own joke.

For fuck’s sake. Did she really need to ask? It’s not even been a fortnight since Clay and the gang called us into the office to demand our fertility plans and now Suze has got us confirming our barrenness on a sodding form? I can see Jessica chewing at the side of her finger, like she always does when she wants to run away.

‘Oh, yes. Of course. Great. Yep, I can do that, I can absolutely do that,’ she burbles. ‘Do you have a pen?’

My cheeks start burning for her.

Suze gives her a look. ‘It’s an iPad, Jessica.’

‘So it is!’ she agrees. She ticks the ‘not pregnant’ box and then scrawls her signature in the box. I take it and do my own form.

‘Thanks. We should go rejoin everyone,’ I say cheerfully, eager to have this exchange over with as quickly as possible.

‘You know it took me and David three years to have the twins,’ she tells Jessica, as we go back into the room. I stop. Please don’t start telling her about how it worked out for you, I pray. I don’t care that it worked out for you. I don’t care about it working out for anyone else on the whole entire planet until it works out for us.

‘That must have been really hard,’ I interrupt with a tight smile. And then I go back into the room, where everyone is laughing at whatever Grant has just said about Stuart. Verity takes longer to think about her answer than she should need to, given that she’s had the last five minutes to think of something. Eventually, without even looking at Noah, she says, ‘The children adore Noah, and he’s a very involved father.’

Not exactly being his greatest cheerleader, but it’s only the first night. Noah smiles out at the group as if she’s declared him the greatest man alive. In turn he says, ‘Verity is a wonderful mother. She’s sacrificed everything for the children. Her entire life is about them.’

I wince. The way Noah says it, I can really imagine just how much sacrifice she’s made, and I’m not convinced we should be celebrating it.

‘Your turn,’ Verity says, smiling at Jessica. ‘What does the world’s most perfect couple like best about each other?’

‘We’re really not perfect.’ Jess pauses for a moment. ‘But I love the way that Jack is so genuinely curious about the world, about people – about everything, really. He constantly tells me things I don’t know, it’s like a real education.’

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