Clara is one of those people who makes motherhood look both honest and manageable. She’s not perfect, none of us are, well, except bloody Perfect Eleanor, but Clara is present. Patient. The kind of mum who kneels down to eye level when her kids are melting down. The kind who remembers non-uniform days and doesn’t beat herself up when she forgets one.
She’s a great mum. The kind I quietly aspire to be on my better days.
We collapse onto the sofa with steaming mugs of coffee like we’ve just run a marathon.
“How are you?” she asks, and she really means it.
I open my mouth to give the automaticfine, then pause. “Better,” I say honestly. “Actually… better.”
Her eyebrows lift. “Oh?”
And just like that, the floodgates open.
We talk about the kids, sleep regressions, packed lunches no one eats, the inexplicable rage toddlers feel when you peel their banana the wrong way. We complain about school WhatsApp groups and the unspoken competition over homemade birthday cakes. We laugh about the absurdity of it all, the constant juggle, the guilt that seems to exist no matter what you do.
Then, casually, Clara drops it.
“Honestly,” she says, grinning, “Mark and I barely get any time alone. But when we do? The sex is still so good.”
I nearly choke on my coffee.
“Clara!”
“What?” she shrugs, unapologetic. “I fancy him. Like, properly fancy him. Sometimes I look at him doing the washing up and think, how did I get so lucky?”
She laughs, completely unembarrassed.
And while I laugh along, something twists quietly in my chest.
I think about Dan.
About how easy Clara makes it sound. How she talks about her husband like she still can’t quite believe he’s hers. I feel a pang of longing, not jealousy, exactly, just the deep wish that Dan and I could feel that connected all the time, not just in tiny flashes between school runs and resentment.
We’ve been drifting for so long I almost forgot what closeness feels like.
But then I remember this morning. The look we shared. The bum squeeze. The way his grin made something in me unclench.
Maybe we’re not as far gone as I thought.
Maybe we’re just… out of practice.
The hours pass too quickly, as they always do. Before I know it, I’m back in the car, collecting Ruby from preschool. She launches herself at me like she hasn’t seen me in weeks, chattering nonstop about painting and snack time and a disagreement over a toy unicorn.
We run errands. Grab milk. Pick up a birthday card I forgot I needed. The school run blurs into its usual chaos: Oscar bursting out with energy, Sophie complaining about homework, everyone talking at once.
Then it’s home.
Dinner. Arguments over who sits where. Someone refusing vegetables on principle. Bath time. Bedtime. The familiar quiet settling over the house once the lights are out and the doors are gently closed.
I sink onto the sofa, tired to my bones, and stare at the ceiling like it might offer answers.
Dan and I said we’d try. We said we’d do something.
A dinner. Just us.
I feel exhausted. Completely drained. But I also remember him telling me to start putting myself first.
So I do something I haven’t done in a long time.
