by Daniel Hurst
45
MEGAN
2017
This is my first time in London, which is just as surprising to Craig as it is to me. He tells me that he has been here many times before, sometimes for work and sometimes to see old uni friends, but for me, this is a new experience. I’m a northern girl, but that probably shouldn’t excuse the fact that I’ve never ventured further south in my home country than Stoke.
But I’m here now. London town. The big smoke. Queenie’s back yard.
And I love what I have seen so far.
After checking into the stunning hotel that Craig booked for us both in West London, we hopped on the tube and visited Buckingham Palace, before enjoying a pleasant walk through St James Park and ending up by the Houses of Parliament on the banks of the River Thames. After snapping a selfie with Big Ben in the background, we found a lovely pub south of the river for a spot of lunch, where we enjoyed pie and mash and a couple of refreshing drinks. Then we stepped onto a riverboat that took us all the way down to Greenwich, passing by the 02 Arena, or the Millennium Dome for those of us old enough to remember it back in its less illustrious days. After some time on the Cutty Sark, an old ship dry-docked in the heart of Greenwich, we returned to the hotel, tired but full of stories about all the wonderful things we had witnessed today.
But none of them could compare to the sight before me now.
A diamond ring, sparkling beneath the bright lights of this restaurant, held out by Craig’s fingers and looking to be placed onto one of my own.
“Megan, will you marry me?”
I didn’t need the question to know what he was getting at with the ring, but it still comes as a shock when he says the words. Craig wants to make me his wife. Me. Megan from Macclesfield. Out of all the women in the world, he thinks I’m the best one for him.
I better say something before he changes his mind.
“Yes!” I cry, much to the delight of Craig and everybody else in the restaurant.
As the applause breaks out, Craig wraps his arms around me and kisses me on the lips, and I feel so happy I could weep.
The ring is on my finger. My man is smiling at me from across the table. And now the waiter is bringing us champagne.
This is the best day of my life.
At least, that’s what I had thought at the time.
46
CRAIG
I put my ear to the garage door, listening in to see if I can hear what Megan is up to on the other side. But there is no noise coming from the garage. She is probably lying on the camp bed thinking about things. Or maybe she is sitting on the exercise bench, looking at that photo and trying to make sense of it all. One thing I can be sure of is that she isn’t using the treadmill or the weights. I wonder how long it will take her to give in and do some exercise. She will be in there for a long time.
She might as well make the most of it.
Putting the key in the lock, I turn it quickly and enter the room, surprising Megan with my sudden appearance as she rolls over on the bed and looks in my direction. But she doesn’t say anything. She has obviously moved past the confused and emotional state and is now somewhere in the confused and thoughtful stage.
I’ll enjoy this. It won’t be long until she is in the confused and angry stage.
“I’ve brought you some food,” I say as I place the plate down on the exercise bench, along with cutlery and a glass of water. It’s a basic meal, just some plain chicken and a bit of rice, but I don’t think she’ll protest too much. She is probably just grateful that I am feeding her at all.
I turn back to the door but notice the open panel on the wall as I do.
“I better lock this up. Wouldn’t want the power going off again, would we?” I say as I close the door on the fuse box and lock it.
Then I head for the doorway again, not turning around for another look at my wife as I go. But then she speaks and what she says does warrant a response.
“What did you do to Sally?” she asks me, her voice faint and weak from her position on the bed.
Turning around to face her, I let her mind answer that question itself for a few moments before I put her out of her misery.
“I got rid of her.”
I enjoy the pain on my wife’s face. Then I try to leave again, happy with how things have been left. But Megan has one more question for me before I can go.
“Was it all fake?”
It’s another good question, and she deserves as much honesty as I gave her with my first answer.
“Every day,” I tell her, a smile spreading across my sadistic face. “Every single day.”
47
MEGAN
2017
It’s my wedding day. The day I have dreamt about my whole life.
The day I get to marry my Prince Charming.
It’s only been three months since Craig proposed to me in London, which I am aware is a very short engagement. But we both know what we want, and we don’t see the point in waiting. We haven’t even invited anybody to the ceremony besides my mum and a guy called Ralph, who is Craig’s best friend, although I’ve never actually met him before or seen any photos of him. But then again, men never seem to make as much fuss about their best friends as women do, I suppose.
We’re all set. We have our witnesses. We have somebody to conduct the service. And we have each other. We don’t need anything else.
No fuss. No over-elaborate seating arrangements. No need to make it more difficult than it should be. And no best friend, at least on my side.
I miss Anna every day, but today is particularly tough. That is because she should be by my side right now, keeping me calm as the clock counts down to the moment when I’ll step up to the altar, or rather the table at the front of this registry office. She would have been my maid of honour, fulfilling that critical role that would let everybody know that this was the woman who I trusted more than anybody else in the world. The groom has his best man and the bride should have her maid of honour. But Anna isn’t by my side, and I didn’t want to pick anybody else to fulfil the role because there is nobody else. She was, is and always will be my best friend.
Nobody else can even hope to come close.
Turning my thoughts onto something else in case my eyes water any more than they already have done and I ruin my makeup, I think about how much fun today is going to be regardless of who is here and who is missing. The only thing that matters is that Craig and I are together, and after today, we will be bonded for life. I know he is as nervous about the vows as I am, but he has told me that all will be okay, and I believe him. It was even his idea to get married so soon, suggesting that we do it as quickly as possible so we can get on with the rest of our lives together. I’m glad I let him talk me into it.
I’m glad that today is the big day.
We are going straight to the airport from here, not wasting any time in starting our honeymoon in southern Italy. After two weeks away, we will come back home and start packing because we are making the move down south. Craig has been offered the position of Head of Retail at the London branch of the Swiss bank that he works for, which comes with a steep increase in responsibilities as well as a sharp rise in salary. I was shocked when he told me how much more he would earn, but then wages are always much higher in the southern part of the country. That is the concession made for the property prices being so high, especially when compared to the north. I will have to leave my job in Macclesfield and find another job in London, but that’s okay. Craig’s wage will more than cover our new living expenses in between.
We have already been looking at houses online, and I am shocked at the cost of them but equally excited to get set up in our very first home together. I know Craig already has his eye on one particular house in the countryside, but I worry it might be a little too remote for my liking. But that’s something we can sort out at a later date.
Right now, it’s all about the wedding.
“How are we getting on?” I hear my mothe
r ask, and I turn around to see her walking into the room looking resplendent in a lilac dress with an elegant fascinator sitting on top of her head.
“I think we’re ready to go,” my makeup artist says, and I’m willing to take her word for it.
Smiling at my mother, I take in her appreciation of how I look. We have never been particularly close, certainly not as close as most mothers and daughters are, but I know she is happy for me today. She even seemed happy when I told her that Craig and I were moving down south, although I suspect that is because she is retiring soon and she doesn’t want to have to spend all her free time dealing with anything we might ask of her. She will be happy enough coming down to visit us once a year and I will be happy enough with that too.
“You look beautiful, darling,” she tells me, and I feel emotional again because it’s a rare moment of intimacy between the two of us.
But I pull myself together and get a move on because everybody is waiting for us. My father left the family when I was young, moving up to Scotland with another woman, so it will be my mum walking me down the aisle today. But that’s okay because dad doesn’t deserve to be a part of this special occasion. He walked out on the family, which means he has also walked out on times like these. I haven’t even spoken to him since I was fifteen, and he has made no effort to speak to me either.
“I wish Anna was here,” I say to my mum as we link arms and walk through the large double doors that will take us into the ballroom and eventually lead through into the room where my husband and the rest of the guests are waiting.
“Today isn’t about her. It’s about you and Craig,” she tells me, and I understand what she means, even if it comes off as a little harsh.
There has been plenty of time for thinking about Anna, and there will be plenty of time after this. But right now, my fiancé deserves all my attention to be on him, which is what I will do.
This is our time now.
Just me and Craig.
Ready or not, here I come.
48
CRAIG
Megan knows why she is now locked in the garage. She also knows why I was standing next to her in that nightclub, why I proposed to her and why I married her. It has all been part of a plan that she is only now beginning to understand. I don’t think she’ll be eating the meal that I just left her, but neither would I if I’d just found out my whole marriage had been a lie. I imagine she has lost her appetite for quite some time, which is good because it means I won’t have to take her any more food for a couple of days.
Goodnight my darling wife. Sleep well.
I know I will.
I’m back on the sofa again, sprawled out in front of the television with the remote control in one hand and a cold beer in the other. I’m fully embracing this lazy ‘stay at home’ lifestyle. I’m not saying I could get used to it, I have far too much self-respect for that, but it has been nice to have a day out of the fast lane. But tomorrow will see me go back to my usual routine. I will get up just before six, have a shave and put on my suit, before grabbing a granola bar and jumping in the car, heading to the train station at precisely 06:15. After a full day in the office, I will return home around seven, where I will open a bottle of red wine and toast to another successful week. Of course, drinking the wine will feel slightly different without my wife to share the bottle with, but that’s okay.
It just means there’s more for me.
Then it will be the weekend. I don’t have much planned, but I have been toying with the idea of taking the car out for a spin. A fine motor like mine deserves to do so much more than ferry me between my house and the train station five times a week. I might take it down to the coast, really opening up the engine on the motorway down to Brighton. Fish and chips on the seafront does sound good. Or perhaps I could go the other way, heading north, back in the direction of my real home. It has been so long since I went back to St Helens and visited friends in Manchester and Macclesfield.
Megan has never met any of my real friends. She thinks my best friend is a guy called Ralph, but he was merely somebody who I hired to stand next to me on my sham of a wedding day.
He did a good job, to be fair. She never suspected a thing.
Maybe I could drive up north on Saturday morning, getting there for lunchtime and checking into a hotel, before calling my old mates and surprising them with my spontaneous visit. Then, after a boozy night in the Northern Quarter of Manchester, I could have a hearty breakfast at the hotel before making the drive back down south to prepare for another week at work, while also checking on my wife in the garage.
I’m sure she won’t mind me going away for the weekend. She probably wouldn’t care if she never saw me again, although she will want to get out of that room before she loses me.
I’ll sleep on it. Maybe I’ll go to Manchester. Maybe I’ll go to Brighton. Or maybe I’ll sit right here on the sofa all weekend, drinking wine and scoffing pizza.
Who said married life was tough?
49
MEGAN
2017
Married life is bliss.
I’ve got a Cosmopolitan in one hand, a good book in the other, and my head is resting against the back of a sun lounger. The sun is beating down on me, tanning my pale English skin, and if I were to look up from the pages of my novel then I would be met with the sight of the blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea. My husband is lying beside me on his own sun lounger, a beer and a thriller book occupying his time.
Everything is perfect.
I could stay like this forever.
Alas, nothing lasts forever, not even a honeymoon as perfect as this one. We will be leaving this beautiful part of the world tomorrow and flying back to the drab weather of the country that we reside in. But it’s not all bad news.
At least I won’t be going to back to work.
As if these last few weeks couldn’t have got any better after the wedding and the time we have spent in the South of Italy, Craig made me smile even more at dinner last night. It was there, as he tucked into his meatballs and I savoured a delicious Bolognese, when he told me that he wanted me to be a stay-at-home wife.
To say I was surprised was an understatement. I actually coughed up a little piece of pasta when he said it, which was embarrassing considering the calibre of the restaurant we had been dining in at the time.
But he had been serious.
He had told me that he was earning more than enough for the both of us and that he thought it would be good for me to give up the rat race and spend my days doing things that I enjoyed around the house. While that did sound delightful, I pointed out that I was very young to retire and voiced my concerns about the chance of boredom seeping in after the initial novelty had worn off. But my wonderful new husband was insistent, reminding me how much I moaned about having to get up early every day and get on a train back in Macclesfield, offering me the chance to give up that tedious routine now that we were moving down south.
Maybe it had been the red wine we had been drinking or perhaps it was just because it sounded so damn good. Whatever it was, I had found myself saying yes, and now I am looking forward to a stress-free, work-free life when we return to England.
The future is exciting, and it’s all thanks to Craig, the brilliant man sunbathing beside me on this beach. What would I do without him? Well, besides having to work my arse off every day in a boring admin job, I would be single, frustrated and unloved. Instead, I’m getting tipsy on cocktails on this sandy beach overlooking an impossibly blue sea and the holiday isn’t going to stop here. I’ll have just as much free time back in England where I no longer have to clock in and clock out in an office.
Did I say how amazing my husband was?
“Check it out,” Craig says, and I turn to see him pointing out to sea.
Looking out across the calm water, I spot the paraglider in the clear blue sky, effortlessly floating above the sea and making a dangerous hobby look so simple.
“Oh my god, I would never do
that,” I say to Craig, shuddering at the thought of being so high up.
“I wouldn’t mind a go,” he tells me, but I shut that idea down straight away.
“No way, you might die!”
“I’m not going to die. It’s perfectly safe,” he replies, laughing at my panic.
“Nope. I’m sorry. I’m not going to be a bitch of a wife, but there are some things that I must put my foot down on and this is one of them.”
“Oh really?” he says, closing his book and turning his body to face me. “And what if I go and do it anyway?”
Smirking, I close my book too and turn my body to face him, mirroring my husband and reducing the gap between us.
“Then I would have to punish you,” I say, a mischievous look on my face.
“And what would that entail?” he asks, showcasing his own cheeky grin.
“Why don’t we go back to the hotel room right now and I’ll show you.”
Ten seconds later, we’ve gathered up our belongings and are scurrying hand in hand across the sand in the direction of the hotel. We had vowed to spend more time out in the sun today instead of being in the bedroom so much, but what can I say?
It’s our honeymoon.
And I’m the luckiest woman in the world.
50
MEGAN
I’ve got to be the unluckiest woman in the world. Not only has my whole marriage been a lie, but I’m now locked in a room from which there is no escape. Craig hasn’t visited me for at least a day, although it’s hard to know the exact amount of time that has passed since I don’t have a clock in here, nor do I have any windows to see the sun rising and setting. But it must have been a day because my stomach is rumbling incessantly from lack of food and I haven’t heard any sound on the other side of the door for a long time.
Craig must be out. But where is he?
More importantly, when is he going to come back?