Page 67 of Isn’t It Nice We Both Hate the Same Things

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

Fuck Josie: I visit Shaun.

One week after my cast removal, still a little unsteady on my feet, I catch an Uber over to his new rental apartment, late morning, with a six-pack of beer.

Opening the door, his posture is stooped – shoulders sagging under his own weight – and his face etched with lines. His hair, short and blond and once neatly combed, is now streaked with grey. Face unshaven.

‘Charlie.’ He visibly relaxes, a weary smile breaking.

‘Shaun.’

We come together in a hug, and the tension eases from his upper body.

‘How are you?’ he says, gesturing to my leg. Then, my arm.

I’m still regaining my strength, but I’m healing and the aches are subsiding and the itching long gone – it fills me with glee. ‘It’s like remembering how to walk again.’ I kick out my right leg and jiggle my foot, as if showing him that everything is operational. Bit wobbly, but functional. ‘You?’

He shrugs, arms slapping down against his sides. ‘Oh, you know, surviving.’ Then he opens the door wider. ‘Come inside.’

Boxes are piled in the corner of the living room and paperwork is strewn across benchtops.

It’s a three-bedroom, two-bathroom rental on the ground floor, with a small concrete courtyard out the back.

The place feels stripped bare, has that ‘just moved in’ vibe.

No artwork, no photos, not even a cushion on the stock standard three-seater grey sofa.

He thanks me for coming. ‘Didn’t expect to hear from anyone.’

‘You haven’t heard from the others?’

‘Just you,’ he says. ‘And Dave.’

‘I’m sorry.’

He shrugs, gives me a What are you gonna do? look. ‘I knew it’d happen.’

‘Did you? I didn’t.’

He smiles. ‘I know,’ he says. ‘Thought you had balls, coming to Josie’s fortieth.’

‘She was my friend.’

With a double take, he looks at me when I say was , his expression unreadable.

‘The kids?’ I ask, looking around. There is evidence of them having been here – toys scattered, tiny shoes in the hallway, packet snacks on the kitchen counter.

‘Josie picked them up this morning. We’re trying to work out a roster.’

I drop my bag onto the kitchen table, pull out a stack of papers. Printed this morning, and stapled. I hand them to him.

He flicks through the pages, frowns.

‘Recipes,’ I explain. ‘Ones my mother has sent me every day since she found out about me and Dave. They were a huge help. Thought I’d pass them on.’

Couldn’t think of anything else , I want to say. Wanted to help, but also knew you’d be fine on your own, in the end.

There’s a silence in the room, while he reads a few of them. Runs a finger down the ingredients. And as I take another glance around the room, I feel foolish. Shaun has two young children; he knows how to take care of himself. He doesn’t need my mother’s recipes. He will think me an idiot.

‘Thank you,’ he says, and I realise he’s teared up. His cheeks puffed, his lips a firm line, as he tries to hold in emotion. Like he’s trying to make himself as small – as unnoticeable – as possible. ‘You have no idea.’

He holds those pages with such a delicate touch, I feel compelled to tell him that I can forward them over email too.

A few minutes later, each of us nursing a beer, we’re outside in his courtyard.

Have sunk into a couple of durable, steel-framed black chairs.

Shaun’s legs are crossed, a hand resting on the cushion.

He looks out over the courtyard, and then turns to me.

‘Josie thought it would be contagious, you know.’

‘When you left Dave,’ he continues, ‘she was acting like it was some kind of disease. “Don’t stand too close.” She wanted to find out what went wrong. Didn’t want it happening to us.’

‘She told you this?’

‘Didn’t need to.’ He sips. ‘Saw it on her face. In how she acted.’

‘You know that’s ridiculous, though, right? I’m not contagious.’

And suddenly, he’s chuckling, head tipped back. Such a stark contrast to how he usually acts, it feels foreign to see it. It’s been such a long time since I’ve witnessed him like this. A laugh that colourful, hidden.

‘You should’ve seen her,’ he says. ‘These past few months. It was like we’d just met. She was pretending to be happy. She had this whole ruse going.’

But I’m not thinking of the ruse. Or how in love she wanted them to seem. I’m thinking of all the times she dismissed him, and how she spoke of his uselessness. How drunk she got at the dinner party. How easily she snapped at him.

‘She was awful to you.’

He points at me, to correct. ‘Only when she couldn’t contain it.’

‘Still not a good thing, Shaun.’

And he curls that finger back, tucks it behind a thumb, and retreats. Looks away, embarrassed.

‘Are you okay?’ I ask, and he nods.

‘Don’t you worry about me.’

‘I think it’s been a while since someone worried about you, Shaun.’

‘I’m fine.’

‘ Are you ?’

And he looks at me, and it’s the most assured I’ve seen him since I arrived. ‘I really, really am. I knew what would happen, when this ended. When I ended it.’

How did you know, and I didn’t? I want to ask.

‘I drove home from work last week,’ he starts.

‘And I parked outside the house. The house we’d worked so hard to buy.

We’d spent years saving, and months looking.

It was everything we both wanted. And I could hear the kids inside, these high-pitched screeches they do when they play.

And I sat in my car. Just sat there, for almost twenty minutes.

Because I didn’t want to go inside. And I just knew. ’

It sounds achingly familiar.

‘That I needed to leave her.’

‘Oh.’

‘And I sat there for another fifteen minutes, and I just let myself enjoy what normality I had left, before I blew everything up. Looked at that house, and my wife’s car in the driveway.

Listened to my kids. Even ran a hand over that hedge out the front before I walked into the house. Last time, you know?’

‘Right.’

‘And then, later that night, after the kids were asleep, I drank half a bottle of wine and told Josie I didn’t want to be married anymore.’

He sips, not meeting my eye. ‘So, yeah, I’m fine. I knew what I was doing. I knew what was going to happen.’

He puts his beer down on the ground beside his feet, then extends a hand to me. Raises an eyebrow. Your turn , he’s saying. And I realise I’m expected to share.

‘I had no idea what was going to happen. I was an idiot.’

‘You’re not an idiot.’

‘I was an idiot,’ I repeat. ‘Walked into that fortieth thinking everything would be the same.’

‘Josie made me wear white pants that night.’

‘I know,’ I say. ‘They didn’t suit you.’

‘They’re in the bin now.’

‘Where they should remain.’

He chuckles, and silence ensues. I could tell him about Dave’s daughter. About what I found when he was in hospital. But telling someone that was the reason we split would be a lie. To him, and to myself.

Dave’s daughter was my getaway car out of that relationship. Just like Dave was my getaway car out of my hometown.

‘I fell out of love with him,’ I say, and he looks at me. ‘That’s it, really. We weren’t right for each other, and it took a long time to figure that out. And an even longer amount of time to do something about it.’

He nods, satisfied. And then takes a deep breath in, looking out at that courtyard again. And smiles.

I realise he’s right. He’s going to be perfectly fine.

‘Do you need company? I’m seeing Quinn this weekend. You should come.’

He hides another smile. ‘You starting a club for divorced people?’

‘Why? You want to join?’

‘I’ve got the kids this weekend, but thank you.’ Then, checking the time, he makes a hissing noise. ‘Christ, lunch time already. You hungry?’

‘I could cook? Let me see what Mum’s sent today.’

But then I check my emails, and I scroll and I scroll and I scroll. Past the lawyer’s emails and the spam emails. Past the sales alerts and the appointment reminders.

But there is nothing from my mother.

For the first time in almost six months, my mother has forgotten to send through a recipe.