Love Me Or Leave Me. Claudia Carroll

her now. Yet another sign something was up. Just her bad luck, she thought bitterly, that it wasn’t what she’d automatically assumed. The first conclusion any wife in similar circumstances would jump to.

      Dawn allowed herself one final glance down at her wedding photo. With almost digital clarity, she could remember how stung she’d been that day at all the nasty, sniping comments streaming incessantly from ‘her side’; her mother and sister Eva, not to mention all her mates from work. The way they kept on griping because nothing about the commitment ceremony had been right for them; all they could do was find fault wherever they looked.

      But right at this moment, if she could go back in time, Dawn honestly thought that instead of allowing them all to get to her, instead she’d have berated the lot of them from the bottom of her hot little heart for letting her go through with it in the first place. Jesus, she’d only been twenty-two years of age! She hadn’t the first clue what she was letting herself in for! Instead of moaning about the hemp wine, the lack of a DJ playing Beyoncé and the general crappiness of the sitar music, her mother and sister, not to mention all her pals, should have physically arm-wrestled her to the floor rather than letting her go through with it.

      As for her? She must have been out of her mind not to realize this day would eventually dawn. Just not in this way. And not for the love of God, like this.

      Peeling herself off the sofa, Dawn began to haul her packed suitcases as far as the door so she’d at least be ready when her taxi arrived. Then a quick, last minute spot check around the place, to make sure she hadn’t left anything important behind. She tried to distract herself with petty, inconsequential stuff, like checking whether she’d remembered to pack shampoo, the charger for her phone and the last of the Hobnobs, just because they were Kirk’s favourites and it would bloody well serve him right.

      But whether she liked it or not, shockwaves kept searing through her like some kind of laser. She couldn’t keep it out; it wouldn’t stop intruding.

      Of course, she blamed herself for not bloody well copping on sooner. For not guessing the truth, before it had to be spelled out to her. For God’s sake, it had been exactly ten months, three weeks and four days since Kirk had even looked at her as anything other than a flatmate and pal! She could quite literally pin the last time they’d slept together down to a date. Was she really naïve enough to think that the two of them were sailing blissfully towards their silver wedding anniversary?

      Even though her brains were like mince right now, that particular date still stuck like a limpet in her addled mind on account of it had been his birthday. Not many people could tell you exactly when they first suspected something was seriously up with their marriage, but she’d been able to sense as far back as then, that something wasn’t right. She could practically smell it.

      After all this was Kirk, who’d at one stage been so unbelievably passionate, exulting in her body, barely able to keep his hands off her. He wasn’t even particularly bothered if the two of them happened to be out in public, something he tended to view as little more than a challenge to be overcome and nothing more. (Quite literally. And Dawn just thanked Christ the deer in the Phoenix Park wouldn’t ever talk and left it at that.)

      Ten months, three weeks and four days for a man who’d always been so physical and loving and … no other word for it … experimental in bed, she thought sadly. And God knows, it wasn’t as though she hadn’t made an effort. Over her dead body was she just allowing the two of them to slide into this new routine of long bedtime chats, laughs, giggles and then maybe a friendly cuddle before drifting off to sleep. Like some kind of middle-aged ’auld ones who’d slid into not having sex any more and instead just worried about their two point four kids and the variable mortgage.

      Not a chance, this gal wasn’t going down without a protracted fight. She’d more than done her bit to try and spice things up between them, hadn’t she? She’d tried her level best to recapture their first heady days and months together, when it was all sex and talking and still more talking and then rolling over for yet another bout of furious, unquenchable lovemaking. Surely no counsellor or therapist could fault her on that score?

      Flushing a bit in mortification now, Dawn thought back to what a naïve eejit she must have seemed back then. How she’d forked out on all that highly uncomfortable hooker underwear, then shoehorned herself into it, in the vain hopes that the sight of her kitted out like something from a porno movie might reignite that old spark in Kirk. After all, before they’d ever met, he’d had legions of girlfriends and a tiny part of Dawn always worried that sex-wise, she didn’t quite measure up.

      But no, nothing doing. Instead, he’d just look her up and down, smile lazily up at her and ask whether or not those knickers felt like wrapping her nether regions up in dental floss and why wasn’t she howling in agony anyway?

      Then of course, Kirk would do what he was starting to excel at lately; turn it all into a joke and pull her in for a cuddle, as the two of them just slid companionably back into their old routine. They’d always been best friends, but whereas back in those incredible early days, they’d been lovers first and best friends second, lately they’d settled into being just each other’s closest pal. And that was where it ended.

      Back then though, Dawn had known no better, so she fought and kept on fighting. She winced to think about it now but at the time, sheer desperation drove her to act like she was up for anything. At one point, in a blood rush to the head, she’d even contemplated suggesting a threesome. Last thing she herself would ever have wanted, the whole idea completely repulsed her, but then Kirk used to be up for anything sex-wise, and if this was what it would take to reignite things …

      Took her all of about ten seconds to completely scrap the idea. Sorry, but sharing Kirk with some nameless faceless one from the internet or worse still, with someone they knew and knowing Dawn’s luck, would more than likely bump into in the aisle at Tesco’s, was just unthinkable.

      But she’d lost count of the number of romantic nights à deux she’d tried to plan in their tiny flat, just for the two of them. Candles dotted around the place, romantic dinner, wine, sure you know yourself. With any luck, that would turn into one of those wonderful nights they used to have back in their early days, when Kirk would gently massage her and things naturally developed on from there.

      For the past few months, Dawn had been trying this tactic as often as she could, yet every single time without fail, you could be bloody sure Kirk would try and find some way to weasel out of things going any further than companionable hugs and cuddles.

      No, Dawn wasn’t blind and she certainly wasn’t stupid.

      What happened was just the final proof she needed.

      She was zipping up her wheelie bag and just doing a last, final spot check to make sure she hadn’t left any of her face creams behind in the bathroom, when suddenly her mobile rang.

      ‘Taxi for Dawn Madden?’ growled a twenty-a-day smoker’s voice down the phone.

      ‘Be downstairs in two minutes,’ Dawn told him, before hanging up.

      Do it quickly, she told herself. Just go now, fast while you still have some ounce of resolve in you.

      Trembling weakly, she grabbed hold of the last of her wheelie bags and slammed the door behind her.

      And just like that, she thought, my marriage is over.

      *

      ‘Jaysus love, that’s a fair amount of luggage you have,’ said her taxi driver, as he helped Dawn load up the boot of the cab with one stuffed case after another. ‘Taking a trip, are you? Airport, is it?’

      ‘Emm, no actually,’ Dawn said weakly, praying he wouldn’t try to draw her out any further. No rudeness intended, but she just hadn’t the strength to go into it, not now. She hopped into the back seat and gave him Eva’s address, praying he wouldn’t try to probe her much more.

      ‘Ahh, I get it, you’re moving flat then, are you?’ the driver said in that gravelly voice, two slitty eyes glancing at her reflection in his rear-view mirror as they sped off into the traffic.