‘But you’re making it sound like a total disaster,’ Joy objected. ‘You both got on really well. I know you liked him and you could see how much he liked you.’

‘He liked me,’ Ashling admitted. ‘I know he did, but he liked himself more. And I liked him but for partly the wrong reasons.’ Quietly she admitted, ‘Clodagh said I was a victim.’

‘Bitch!’

‘No, I am. Or rather, was,’ she corrected. ‘Not any more.’

‘But just because it’s all down to Marcus being insecure doesn’t mean you’re going to be friends with Clodagh again?’ Joy asked anxiously. ‘You still hate her, don’t you?’

A short, sharp throb of loss had to peak and disperse before Ashling was able to shrug, ‘Of course.’

63

On Valentine’s Day a big, impressive envelope skittered from the letter-box into Lisa’s hall. A card? Who from? Her blood racing with excitement she ripped open the envelope, then faltered… Oh.

It was notification of her decree nisi.

She wanted to laugh, but couldn’t quite pull it off. The speed with which it had been dispatched by the courts to her solicitor had caught her right out. It had taken just over two months and in her subconscious she’d been sure it would be at least three.

With panicky clarity she realized that she and Oliver were on the home stretch. The way was free and, straight down the track, she saw the end of her marriage rushing towards her.

Only six short weeks to go before the final decree was issued.

Then she’d feel better. Closure and all that.

That night she went out with Dylan. He’d been asking her out for the last couple of months – every time he came into the office to see Ashling – and she thought it might cheer her up. Especially as she’d heard not a syllable from Oliver.

Dylan collected her after work and drove her to a pub in the Dublin Mountains, where the lights of the city were arrayed below them, twinkling like jewels. She awarded him top marks for location. He also scored seven out of ten for nice hair and eight out of ten for good looks. And technically, he was very charming and full of observant compliments, so he got seven or eight for that. But she couldn’t warm to him, she found him smooth and hard and beneath his gallant conversation she detected a jaundiced cynicism that would put hers to shame.

Or maybe the problem stemmed from her. She couldn’t shake off the residue of loss that had shrouded her all day.

She drank a lot, but couldn’t get drunk, and the encounter, far from lifting her spirits, only served to depress her. And when Dylan made it very clear how much he wanted to sleep with her, it depressed her even further.

She mumbled something about not being ‘that kind of girl’.

‘Oh, really?’ Dylan quirked his mouth in a manner that conveyed both regret and contempt, and all of a sudden, she wanted to be at home.

In silence, Dylan drove her back to the city, screeching too quickly along narrow mountain roads.

Outside her house she managed to politely thank him, but couldn’t get out of his car fast enough. Once in the sanctuary of her kitchen she ate a walnut whip (she was on a ‘W’ diet and had found a loophole) and wondered, what was the world coming to when even one-night-stands no longer held appeal?

Sitting down, Clodagh crossed her legs and agitatedly bounced up and down on the ball of her foot. Dylan had taken the kids out for the afternoon and was due back any minute, and though he didn’t know it yet, they were going to talk.

Every time they met, things were civil but unpleasant. He was bitter and she was defensive, but all that was about to change.

How could she ever have thought that Marcus would do? Dylan was wonderful: patient, kind, generous, devoted, hard-working, much more attractive. She wanted her old life back. But she expected a certain amount of rancour and resistance from Dylan and she wasn’t looking forward to having to eat humble pie to win him over.

A racket of childish voices at the front-door indicated that they were back. She hurried to let them in, and gave Dylan a friendly smile which fell on stony ground.

‘Could I have a quick chat with you?’ She forced her voice to remain bright.

When he shrugged a flinty ‘All right,’ she put Craig and Molly in front of a video, closed the door and came into the kitchen where Dylan was waiting.

She swallowed hard. ‘Dylan, these past months… I was wrong, I’m very sorry. I still love you and I’d like you to –’ she choked, ‘I’d like you to come home.’

She watched his face and waited for the golden light of happiness to wash over it and cleanse away the glittery hardness that had taken up residence there since all this started. He gazed at her incredulously.

‘I know it’ll take a while to get back to normal and for you to trust me again, but we can go for counselling and all,’ she promised. ‘I was out of my mind to do what I did to you, but we can make everything all right again… Can’t we?’ she asked, when still he didn’t reply.

Eventually he spoke and he said only one word. ‘No.’

‘No… what?’

‘No, I’m not coming back.’

She had not anticipated this. Not in any of her scenarios. ‘But why?’ She didn’t really believe him.

‘I just don’t want to.’

‘But you’ve been devastated by what I… um… did.’

‘Yeah, I thought it was going to kill me,’ he agreed thoughtfully. ‘But I suppose I must have gotten over it, because now that I think about it, I don’t want to be married to you any more.’

She began to shake. This wasn’t happening. ‘What about the children?’

That got him. ‘I love my children.’

Good.

‘But I’m not going to get back with you because of them. I can’t.’

She was losing. All the power she’d thought she possessed was being revealed as a mere façade. And then something so unlikely as to be almost laughable occurred to her. ‘Have you… you haven’t… met someone else?’

He laughed unpleasantly. I did that, she thought, suddenly ashamed. I’ve made him like this.

‘I’ve met lots of someone elses,’ he said.

‘Do you mean… are you saying… you’ve slept with women?’

‘Well, not much sleeping gets done.’