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TWELVE

Alistair finally comes home on Monday evening.

He appears to have had a haircut and is clean-shaven.

Martha narrows her eyes at him as she watches him walk through the front door with his overnight suitcase, his overcoat, his work bag, the smell of outdoors on him, the smell of trains and unknown places.

She sucks down hard on the urge to yell at him. Instead, she stares at him passive-aggressively and says “Hi” with a chip of ice in her tone.

“Martha,” says Al, removing his bag from his shoulder, unlooping his cashmere scarf, “darling. I am so, so, so sorry.”

She can’t find words, so she shrugs petulantly.

The boys are at their father’s, Nala is in bed, the house is quiet and still.

“So, what was the emergency this time? I see you had time to get a haircut.”

He absent-mindedly puts a hand to his head. “Ah, yes. There was a barber’s in the hotel. Seemed a good use of my time.”

“You stayed in a hotel with a barber’s?”

“Yes, the same one I always stay at.”

“I didn’t know it had a barber’s.”

“Well, it’s more of a hair salon, really. But they do very good men’s haircuts.”

“I could have cut it myself.” She hates the way she sounds, the sourness of her voice.

She imagines it in his ears, ears that have been away from her for three full days, filled with the sounds of other people’s voices, fresh, interesting people, probably women too, women who don’t work eight-hour days in a flower shop and come home with red-raw hands and burnished cheeks, women who wear tailored office attire, fitted sweaters, heels even, who straighten their hair and contour their faces and look like they just stepped out of a magazine.

And then he comes home to a messy cottage and a wife with a voice like acid, and this cold, hard silence.

“I didn’t want to ask,” he says, his voice soft and kind. “You’re always so busy. I thought it would take one more job off your plate.”

The softness of his tone takes the top layer off her anger and resentment. “I just wish… Al—why can’t you be more organized? Why do you just… disappear? Not give me at least some warning? It makes me feel so powerless. Like you hold all the cards. Like you have the controls.”

He sighs and lets his head flop. Then he looks back up at her again and she sees a sheen of tears across his eyes. “I am so, so, so sorry, Martha. I can’t even find the words to tell you how sorry I am. I’m hopeless. It’s this stupid job. It’s my ADHD.”

Oh God . Martha bites down on her need to shout again.

The ADHD. He was diagnosed a couple of years ago and now he uses it as an explanation for every last fuckup and oversight.

And she wants to sympathize and be kind, but sometimes she just wants to tell him that she knows people with ADHD, she knows children with ADHD, who are more considerate, organized, and reliable than he is.

That he cannot use it as an excuse for absolutely everything.

But she can’t say that, because that’s what an uncaring bitch would say, and she does not want to be an uncaring bitch.

She tucks her hair behind both ears and stands up.

She had resisted the temptation to get into her bed clothes when she showered after work.

Part of her wanted to do it just to fuck him off, to make a statement about her mood.

But another part wanted to look delicious for him, to make him relish getting home, wonder why he ever went away, make him forget about the women in formfitting clothes.

So, she’s in a cashmere sweater and skinny black jeans and her curly hair is up, how he likes it, and she wears golden hoops and has bare feet, her toenails painted a creamy beige, scent behind her ears, a glass of wine in her fragrant, moisturized hand.

“How was it?” she says. “The work thing?”

Al works for a hospitality company that provides training for hotel and restaurant staff at high-class establishments.

He’s a director there: he doesn’t have to do much fieldwork and mostly works from home since Covid.

But sometimes they call him in, like the big guns, and he has to drop everything and travel across the country at short notice.

He gets put up in fancy hotels and treated like a demigod.

And then he comes back here, to dirty nappies and moody teens and a wife who is finding it increasingly difficult to hold back her resentment.

He sighs, picks up some letters from the console, and leafs through them noncommittally.

“Fucking nightmare,” he says. “Fine-dining brasserie in Glasgow. Staff are all school-leavers. Sweet as pie, but not a clue.” He puts the letters down and sighs, then stops and stares at Martha.

“I really missed you,” he says. “I missed you so much.”

Martha blinks slowly. “I tried calling,” she says, “but it just kept going to voicemail.”

“Yes. I had it on silent. I’m so sorry. It was intense. And I’ve messaged the Airbnb in Normandy. She couldn’t give me a refund, but she’s given me a credit, so we can go another time.”

He had time to message the Airbnb, but not enough time to message her?

She can’t. Not now. She shakes her head slightly and then sighs loudly. “Great,” she says. “Let me look at my diary.”

Then he opens up his arms to her and she walks into them, glad he’s here, glad it was only three days, not three weeks, glad that he still loves her. And she wonders what happened to the woman she used to be.