Chapter 1

      It’s all the fault of the half-naked teenagers, or most of it, anyway. They’re staggering about drunkenly on the TV screen, and Dan is staring at them as if his life depended on it.

      “What the hell are you watching?” I say, as I come into the room bearing two mugs of extra-strong coffee to help prevent the hangover we’ll otherwise be doomed to have.

      It’s 12:30am, and we’ve been drinking geriatric drinks all night: Aunt Pearl’s way of thanking us for moving her belongings into her new retirement flat during the day. I don’t think port and lemon agrees with me, and it certainly doesn’t agree with Dan. It’s given him short-term memory loss, judging by the fact that he completely forgot to wish me a happy New Year when we heard Big Ben strike twelve on the radio, in the taxi that was bringing us home.

      Once we arrived, Dan got out of the car, unlocked the front door, and then headed straight for the sofa like a homing pigeon. One with opposable claws for operating remote controls, and a tendency to go deaf whenever wives ask awkward questions.

      I try again.

      “What is this programme, Dan?” I say.

      “God knows,” he says, taking the mug I pass him without moving his eyes away from the screen. “Brits in Ibiza, or something like that.”

      He must be able to sense my expression, as then he adds, “Probably the channel Joel was watching before he went out tonight.”

      It’s so useful having a supposedly adult son still living at home whenever you need to pass the buck. I doubt Joel would be caught dead watching this idiotic programme, not when he can view similar scenes any night of the week when he’s out clubbing – and in the flesh, as it were. God, there’s a lot of that on this TV show.

      I shift about in my seat, suddenly uncomfortably aware of what I’m now wearing: mismatched pyjamas, to go with my rather less mismatched face and arse. They say either your arse can look good after the age of forty, or your face, but never both. When you get as close to fifty as I now am, both are past their sell-by date.

      “I can’t see the appeal of half-naked teenagers, myself – not since I stopped being one,” I say. “Especially not when they’re vomiting everywhere like this lot will be in a minute. Isn’t there anything better on?”

      Dan doesn’t reply. You’d swear he’d been watching this programme for at least the last two hours and it was about to reach a thrilling climax, given how hard he’s concentrating. I repeat what I’ve just said, and then I wave at him across the room, but he doesn’t react, and then I feign a coughing fit. Still no response whatsoever – none – so I pull off one of my slipper socks and throw it at him.

      My aim’s a bit off, but I do finally succeed in getting Dan’s attention. In fact, he almost jumps out of his skin.

      “What the fuck, Hannah?” he says, fishing the sock out of his coffee, and making a face. “Why did you do that?”

      “You were ignoring me,” I say. “Too busy ogling those girls with their boobs and arses hanging out.”

      “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” says Dan, who suddenly looks quite angry. Very angry, actually. I’m not used to seeing him like that, even during the stupid arguments we’ve been having recently. He did get a bit cross when I complained about him and Joel never putting toilet-roll inners into the bathroom bin the other day, but nothing like as cross as this. Now he looks as if he can’t stand the sight of me.

      “I was joking, Dan,” I say, quickly. It’s only half a lie, but he spots it, anyway.

      “Like hell you were.”

      Dan glares at me, and then he adds, “All I wanted was to chill out in front of the TV, after a bloody long day dealing with Pearl, and it didn’t matter what I was watching, as far as I was concerned. But if I had picked this programme on purpose, then who could blame me? The only flesh I get to see these days is on TV.”

      Dan seems almost as shocked by what he’s just said as I am, and there’s silence for a moment, as we both let his words sink in. Then I swallow, and say very slowly and clearly, “You mean that’s the type of flesh you prefer. You make that pretty obvious.”

      Did I really say that out loud? I laugh, to lessen the sting, but Dan has lost his temper now.

      “You can’t say something like you just did, and then laugh as if you didn’t mean it, Hannah,” he says. “And how exactly do I make my ‘preference’ so obvious?”

      I wish I’d never started this conversation now. It’s one thing to feel inadequate, but ten times more humiliating to admit to it, and then to explain why you do.

      “I just meant,” I say, keeping my head down and staring intently at a piece of fluff on the carpet, “that you make it clear that you don’t fancy me any more. I know I don’t look like the woman you married these days, but –”

      “You don’t act like her, either,” says Dan. “In fact, you’re nothing like her. You want me to be as miserable as you are, and God forbid that either of us should have any fun. So I don’t quite get what I’m supposed to fancy about someone who’s more interested in Joel and Pearl than in me, as well as in their stupid job, and who’s so obsessed with losing their looks that they walk around with a face like a wet weekend the whole damn time. That’s really bloody attractive.”

      I’m so stunned I don’t know what to say, or where to start, so I just sit there, twisting my hands in my lap, and trying to ignore the tear that’s rolling down the side of my nose and heading towards my mouth. Dan spots it and it seems to annoy him even more.

      “I don’t know why you’re crying, Hannah,” he says. “You started this, and normally you’d be the one with the killer line to finish it. So why don’t we just get it over with? I know you’re unhappy with yourself, but now you’re blaming me for it, and making me feel like a useless husband, too. I’m sick and tired of you trying to push me into saying I don’t fancy you, so here you are: I don’t. Feel better now?”

      I think it’s safe to say I don’t, and I feel even worse when Dan and I end up agreeing