***
The night before Valentine's Day
Red-hot fury stormed through my body as I called my husband again. It was now almost midnight, and I hadn't heard a word from him all day…not since he'd left at ten a.m. this morning with a kiss and a promise to be home by six. He hadn't answered my countless calls or texts either.
"Hey, baby." He finally picked up, and surprise, surprise, his voice was slurred.
"Where are you?" I exploded. "You said you'd be home by six. It's almost midnight!"
"S-sorry, baby. Time got away from me. We had a-a lock in so decided to s-stay. On my way home now."
God, he sounded way more hammered than usual. Considering he'd started drinking at eleven a.m., it wasn't a surprise.
"You're sleeping on the couch." I hung up on him, my hands shaking in anger.
Midnight came and went, and by one a.m. I decided to head to bed. Fuck him. I didn't care if he fell into a ditch and passed out. I was that pissed off. All that worrying, calling and texting, and the whole time he'd been drinking and laughing away with his friends.
It was almost two a.m. before I heard James finally stumble home.
Chapter 5
Zara
The whole living room smelled like a pub that had been left dirty after a hard day of drinking. In the summer.
I wrinkled my nose and crossed to the front door, yanking it open in an attempt to let fresh air circulate the stale room.
Even though I was mad at him, my gut wouldn't relax until I heard his key in the door and his fumbling steps echoing down the hall. I ignored his looming shadow over me, taking care to take up all of the bed so he was left in no doubt that I was deadly serious about his sleeping elsewhere. It was a long time before I could fall asleep.
I glared down at James as he snored away on the couch without a care in the world. New waves of fury rippled through me, and I resisted the urge to pour ice-cold water over him.
I had gone to sleep in the wee hours of the morning with dried tears streaked down my cheeks. But when I woke up a few hours later, my devastation had moulded into a new type of anger—one that I'd never experienced before.
I was so fucking tired of his inconsideration and his blatant lies. Maybe to him, he thought that coming home later than he promised was a form of low-level deceit—but to me, it just showed how little he cared about my feelings. How little he cared about our home life and the hard work I put in to try and keep everything together and running smoothly. How little he cared that, despite being a full-time mum, cook, cleaner and taxi driver, I was also trying to maintain and sustain our relationship so that it didn't grow stale.
And all for what? I spent way too many nights tossing and turning with tears leaking down my cheeks at his constant displays of disrespect.
Unable to take his peaceful slumber anymore, I aggressively shoved open the curtains covering the sliding doors that led to our balcony. Bright sunlight shone through the sheer curtains, hitting James square in the face.
I watched as his features scrunched up immediately against the bright light before he groaned in exaggerated agony. His arm immediately covered his face.
"What the fuck, babe?" His voice sounded like he'd swallowed a load of razor blades. He blinked up at me before he moaned again and closed his eyes.
A small part of my annoyance bled away at his obvious pain. I wish I had a couple of cymbals to clang above his head.
"I can't fucking believe you," I hissed, trying to keep my voice down so I didn't wake the girls. "You said you'd be home early, and that you wouldn't drink that much! Now you're hungover as fuck, and we're supposed to be going out to dinner tonight."
"Fuck." He scrubbed a hand down his face and made a pathetic attempt to sit up, but could only manage to slide up onto his elbow. "Sorry, Zara," he croaked. "We can still go out. I'll be fine by tonight."
He was not, in fact, fine by that night.
For the whole day he'd parked himself on the couch, barely moving. He played half-heartedly with the girls, wincing every time their voices rose in the slightest decibel. I knew he was hoping I'd tell him to go to bed and sleep the rest of his hangover off—but I wasn't that generous. Not when he'd been out for the whole day and night yesterday without checking in once.
By the time Rachel arrived, James had showered, shaved and looked relatively normal. Except he was still yawning loudly nearly every twenty minutes and had bags bracketing his eyes.
I wasn't in the mood to go anymore, but Rachel had been booked, the restaurant had a high cancellation fee due to Valentine's Day, and the girls were looking forward to a girly night with their favourite big cousin. So I had no choice but to suck it up and make the best of a shitty situation.
But by the time we were seated at the restaurant, James had spent most of the time yawning in my face and picking away at his food. Alcohol wasn't even on the cards for him, opting instead for a fizzy drink.
