Sunshine on a Rainy Day: A funny, feel-good romantic comedy. Bryony Fraser
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Again. I’m still hungover, and you know it makes me a bastard. Let’s just stop. Let’s have this nice meal, and … who knows, maybe I’ll get lucky.’
‘Maybe you will.’ Jack brought our glasses over, still misted with cold, and cheers-ed.
When I arrived home the next day, our post was waiting on the table; Jack must have picked it up. Junk mail, junk mail, junk mail – and then one that was addressed to ‘Mr and Mrs Bestwick’. Jesus Christ, the ink wasn’t even dry on our marriage certificate yet. How the hell had – what was this, an insurance company – managed to get our names? Was this it, now? The choice to keep my name – which, let’s not forget, is an absolutely fucking absurd thing to even make a choice about – didn’t even matter, because everyone would just assume I was Jack’s chattel, to be named and catalogued along with his other possessions. This was why I’d always felt so uncomfortable with the idea of marriage. There wasn’t anything wrong with it, per se, it’s just that all the assumptions and faff that came with it, including the name-changing rigmarole, wasn’t something I’d ever seen myself having to put up with. And yet here I was.
I tore it in half with an ugh of despair. Jack came around the corner, carrying two cups of tea with a plate of salted-honey toast on top. ‘Bad day at school?’
‘No! Good day. I love my work. And I should clearly enjoy it while society still permits married women to actually hold down jobs that men could be doing.’
‘I’m sensing … this isn’t about your day at work.’
I held out the two pieces of the letter. ‘Awww,’ Jack said in a mock-touched voice. ‘That’s nice. How did they know?’ He looked at me, saw I wasn’t smiling, then said, ‘No, that is creepy. I get your ugh now.’ He screwed his face up. ‘How did they know?’
I relaxed slightly, realising that this wasn’t Jack’s fault. ‘I’m feeling slightly … disappeared when that happens.’
Jack put on a soft, exaggeratedly soothing voice. ‘Does Hulk want to smash the patriarchy?’ I nodded. ‘Does Hulk want to come and smash the patriarchy on the sofa with some tea and toast?’ I nodded again. ‘Does Hulk want to do that on the sofa while a man cooks and cleans tonight as a token gesture of patriarchy-smashing?’ I nodded again, smiling and giving him a kiss on the nose as I took the plate and a mug and lay full length on the sofa.
Taking a bite of the toast, I said, ‘How’s your week going?’
‘Fine. Good. Nice and busy today, which is unusual for this time of year.’
I could hear cupboards being opened and closed as Jack got things out to make dinner.
‘Jonjo thought it was funny to tease me about not being allowed out anymore, when I said I wanted to get back here tonight after closing up.’
I pulled a face. ‘Jonjo’s a dick.’
Jack stopped, and looked at me through the kitchen hatch, mouth agape. ‘Oh my god! That’s exactly what I said to him.’
‘We’re like two peas in a pod.’
Jack laughed. ‘Well anyway, besides the small matter of me abusing my employees, everything’s been fine. January sales still going well.’
‘We’re still going through the cake and prosecco I got on Monday.’
‘You teachers. Always living the high life.’
‘And I didn’t have to swear at any colleagues.’
‘Enough, enough. Alcohol and cake, and not forcing you to mistreat co-workers? They’ll be giving you the vote next.’
I threw my toast crust at him, which landed perfectly in his hair. Jack reached up, deadpan, and slowly drew it down and popped it in his mouth in one bite. ‘That’s some good toast, though I say so myself.’
‘You’ve got to have some skills if you want women to keep you guys around.’
‘Not women. Just woman. You’ll do me, thanks.’ Jack gave me a panto wink.
I found an old New Yorker stuffed down the side of the sofa and read a piece about Malala Yousafzai, while the smells of Jack’s cooking filled the flat. Maybe married life wasn’t the absolute worst thing in the world after all.
After a quiet weekend, I headed to the bar. It was crowded for so early in the week, but I found a table before Liz had arrived. She brought drinks over and hugged me.
‘So, how is life as a married woman?’ The question from her was tender, rather than wry. We clinked glasses.
‘Fine.’ She looked at me. ‘It is fine, really. Do you want to talk about Adam?’
She’d been seeing him on and off for a few years; they’d repeatedly talked about living together, but she’d always backed off. Going by his absence at our wedding, she must have backed off pretty far this time. She shrugged. ‘I dunno. Seems like a bit of a downer.’
I laughed. ‘Given the downers you’ve had from me, Liz? Please. What happened?’
She shrugged again, a bit brisker. ‘No, not tonight. Is that ok? I just … I want to think about something else.’ She stopped. ‘You know, I’ve always wanted something like you and Jack have. Is that weird?’
‘Us?’ I yelped. ‘Liz, you know better than anyone how I’ve been feeling—’
‘Yeah, but that’s just you. It’s not the two of you. You two have a better relationship than most people I know. And me and Adam, I just kept thinking, what if there’s something better, just around the corner, and I … No. Listen. I really don’t want to start on this tonight. Please. Save me from myself. Tell me about your school. Your sisters. International military policy. Anything.’
‘Well, Kat’s got a new job, which everyone’s delighted about. I still don’t really get what it is though. Some ad agency thing. We’re all going to Mum and Dad’s on Sunday to have a big meal – toast Kat, toast us, that kind of thing.’
‘That’s great news about Kat. How will you cope with the toasting to you too, though?’
I laughed. ‘You’ve met Kat, haven’t you? I don’t imagine Jack and I will get much of a look in there.’
‘Which suits you fine, I imagine.’
‘Exactly.’ I took a sip of my drink. ‘This job of hers might turn out to be the best thing that’s happened to me recently. Between Esther’s toddler, whatever spirit-lifting social-work case Ava’s currently on and the Job of the Century from Kat, I don’t think I have to worry about the focus being on us at all.’
Liz and I clinked glasses again.
By our second week of marriage, things felt completely steady again between me and Jack, enough that we spent the evening semi-ironically filling out a questionnaire Jack had been sent by his stepmum: What’s Your Newlywed Score? We had to answer things like ‘Where do you see yourself in ten years’ time?’ and ‘What’s your happiest childhood memory?’ – topics which neither of us had the courage to point out are maybe things you should discuss before the wedding, rather than after, but whatever. We opened a fancy bottle of Châteauneuf-du-Pape, a leftover from the wedding, and sat curled up together on the sofa.
Jack started. ‘Ok, what would you save in a fire?’
‘Besides you, of course?’
‘Thank god. I think you get some bonus points for that.’
I thought for a moment. ‘My picture of Grandma. Easy.’ It was the first thing I’d put up when we’d moved into this flat: a colour photo of my grandma from when she was in her thirties, back in Nigeria, in a pair of black slacks and an emerald green sweater, laughing over her shoulder at someone just beside the photographer. Although I wouldn’t be born until a few decades