Fractured(66)

‘So tell me all about your honeymoon.’

We both laughed and waited for the other to back down.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Sarah, ‘I do believe my head wound and amnesia inquiry trumps your honeymoon trivia.’

‘OK,’ I said with a smile. ‘What do you want to hear about first? The mugging I don’t remember or all the juicy stuff that came next?’

Sarah’s suntanned face lit up with obvious delight. ‘The juicy stuff, obviously.’ But before I could commence she changed her mind. ‘You know what, I want to hear it all, every last detail.’

‘That might take some time,’ I cautioned. ‘Don’t you and David have a train to catch this afternoon?’

She gave a shrug, as though such a trifling detail was of absolutely no importance.

‘If I’m not there, he’ll just have to leave without me. We’ve only been married for five minutes – he probably won’t even miss me!’

I doubted that very much but took a long and steadying sip of wine and began to fill her in on what had happened to me since the night of her hen party.

She listened intently as I spoke, taking it all in, interrupting now and then when she wanted further clarification about something. She was also much more fascinated than anyone else had previously been by my alternate reality.

‘So what am I like in your other past? Please say I’m tall, thin and beautiful. Oh no, better yet, please tell me that Cathy has got fat and ugly. Now that really would be something.’

I laughed. ‘Sorry to disappoint you, but Cathy was even more gorgeous than she’d been when we were younger. Although a good deal nastier, I have to say.’

Sarah pursed her lips wryly. ‘No trouble imagining that.’

I looked at her carefully. Sarah had never been once to mince her words where Cathy was concerned. I was relaying events as they happened, so I hadn’t yet told her about the call I had intercepted to Matt’s mobile. I was pretty certain she was going to have something quite colourful to say about that.

‘So really, this other life you thought you were living was the total pits? Correct? Everyone was sick, or horribly scarred or dead? And all the good stuff that has gone on in your life just didn’t happen at all? Have I got that right?’

‘In a nutshell, yes.’

‘And yet you still went around trying to prove to everyone that you needed to get back to that place?’

‘Well, yes.’ I could see where she was heading with this.

‘Everyone’s right. You are crazy. Did no one ever tell you that when you conjure up a fantasy world it’s meant to be better than the real one – not a hundred times worse.’

Only she could pronounce me insane as though it were merely a charming quirk of character.

‘I do know what you’re saying. But even so, I still wanted to “go back”, if that’s the right way to put it, to what felt like my proper reality. But now I don’t. Well, not since the other night.’

‘Oohh, did something happen with Matt?’

I paused for a long second before replying, knowing my answer would register off the scale in terms of shock and astonishment.

‘No, Jimmy.’

I swear the suntan literally paled for a moment as her eyes widened in disbelief at my words.

‘Excuse me.’ She snagged the arm of a passing waiter. ‘Do you think you can bring us another bottle of this?’ She indicated our almost empty bottle of wine. ‘I have a feeling we’re going to need it.’


I didn’t know what I expected her to say when I finally finished telling her about the hotel incident. Perhaps I was expecting shock, even disappointment, at learning how readily I had been willing to cheat on Matt. What I wasn’t expecting was her unequivocal approval.

‘About bloody time.’

‘What?’

‘You heard me.’

‘Yes I did. But did you hear me? He turned me down. He just wasn’t interested. And the following day he could hardly bear to look at me. Now call me crazy, but in any of my previous lives that’s a pretty clear message of “I don’t want to do this”.’

‘Phah,’ Sarah retorted. ‘That means nothing. You’re the only person in the world who exists, as far as Jimmy is concerned. It’s the way it has always been.’

‘You weren’t there, Sarah. You didn’t see how disgusted he looked. He couldn’t get away from me fast enough.’

‘And did you ask him about it the next day, when you were coming home?’

‘No,’ I replied miserably, remembering the awkward car journey. ‘Neither of us dared to bring it up. It was just too embarrassing. Too humiliating.’