I can’t believe I’m complaining about the sex.
Chapter Nine
Jennifer
My eyelids flutter open, guilt shaking off the remnants of my broken dreams. It is already light, even though I know from the beginnings of the dawn chorus that it is not much after five.
The sounds of my house engulf me: a warm blanket of the familiar. Oscar’s snores, more like a man in his fifties after a night at the pub, Ed’s breath escaping in rhythmic murmurs, the cars heading along the motorway, carrying its passengers towards a new day. I take a breath, assessing how bad it is this morning. The image of Kerry flying through the air is the first taste: red coat, red boots, brakes squealing. I push out that image with a long, measured breath, but as I inhale, the image of her hands grabs me: strong hands that used to grasp her partners’ when she competed in national figure-skating championships. I breathe out again.
I brace myself for what comes next, because it always comes: The Montage. The Montage filled with Kerry’s achievements, her body jumping and swirling across the ice, first as a four-year-old then, year after year, the outfits changing as she grows, as her jumps become higher and more elaborate, the film rolling as it pans to her at school, always surrounded by popular friends, always laughing. Then to her first dates with Nessa, their beautiful faces smiling at each other with hidden secrets, their love pure, exciting: solid. The four of us together on the beach, sunburnt shoulders, lukewarm wine, sandy toes, Erica and Oscar making sandcastles together, Hailey hunting for shells.
And then, as it always does, The Montage rewinds, the crystal clear high definition of Kerry’s life switching to a grainy camcorder recording: me on the sidelines watching her skate, clapping and cheering as the medals were placed around her neck; making excuses not to join her bunch of school friends because I knew they just tolerated me. But then . . . there is Ed, he reaches his hand towards me and I step out of the grainy picture into the real world.
My feet take me into the bathroom, my reflection beckoning me towards the mirror. I take in the first hint of a tan, the splatter of freckles over the bridge of my nose; the blue of my eyes have life behind them for the first time in months; there is a sheen to my skin that has been smothered beneath grief and is only now starting to breathe.
I turn my head towards the bedroom, where I can hear Ed mumbling in his sleep. I replay our frantic lovemaking last night, thinking of all the things that I can do to make it better for him, to make it even more exciting.
Then I have an idea.
‘What? I thought it would be helpful,’ I reply, but Ed looks really mad. He’s not the type of man who gets mad. But, all the same . . . he is mad. I start to feel the seeds of doubt about my notes on how to improve our sex life.
‘You thought that by giving me a manual of do’s and don’ts when we are at it I would be pleased?’
‘But I thought that—’
He storms out of the bedroom and onto the landing, slamming the door behind him.
I scurry off the bed and follow Ed as he charges down the stairs.
‘What is going on, Jen?’ He throws the notebook onto the desk by the front door and runs his fingers through his hair.
‘Nothing is going on.’ I step towards him, reaching for his hand, pulling him towards me. Reluctantly, he follows, but when I guide his hand towards my bra he snatches it back.
‘Nothing going on, Jen? Really?!’
‘What? Just because I want my husband means there is something going on?’
‘It’s not that and you know it.’
‘I don’t understand why you’re upset. You’re always moaning that our sex life has taken a nose-dive since the kids were born.’
‘This isn’t just about the sex. I know how difficult it’s been . . . losing Kerry.’
‘Me wanting to have sex – good sex – is nothing to do with my dead sister!’
Kerry raises her eyebrows at me from over Ed’s shoulder. I ignore her.
‘If anything about Kerry’s death has taught me anything, it’s to make the most out of the life we’ve got. And life is too short for—’
‘For what? Bad sex?’
‘I’m not saying the sex was bad before—’
‘No, you’d rather give me a list of Improvements.’ He reaches over, picking up the notepad and waving it above his head, making the glass teardrops of the fake chandelier murmur gently against each other, with voices that chime. Ed scratches the back of his head. ‘I’m going to pick up the kids.’
‘Ed—’
But my voice is swallowed by the slam of the door, the whisper of the chandelier gossiping in aghast tones at Ed’s dramatic exit.
The Imaginable Death of Jennifer Jones – #3
Death by Chandelier
Jennifer Jones stands beneath the chandelier that catches the sunlight inside its delicate hands. She is tucking her green T-shirt into her jeans when a small sound niggling her senses draws her eyes up. Above the light fitting is the attic, filled with cobwebs and Christmas decorations, baby clothes and school books . . . and a mouse. The mouse twitches his whiskers as he gnaws his teeth against the leads. He likes that he has to scratch away at the surface beneath his feet before he can get to the next level. Down and down he goes, each day revealing a new challenge, a different texture, a different lead . . . this is the last of the maze, the only one he hasn’t got through. He knows he is close. The mouse stops for a moment, lifts his nose as an unfamiliar smell floats up through the new crack he has made. It smells like food: warm and inviting. Perhaps if he works even harder at this wire, he will be able to explore where the smell is coming from.
The gentle tapping sound stops, and is instead replaced with a groan, a screech. The teardrops of glass sway to one side; they panic, clattering against each other in disarray: we’re sorry, they say, we can’t help it. Plaster begins to fall like rain and she blinks back the chalky dust. Jennifer knows she should move, but the family of glass tears are falling, saturating her skin with tiny cuts, rivulets of blood coursing across the woman’s skin, flooding the carpet.
I blink.
I’m being ridiculous: ours is only a small chandelier, the most damage it would do would be to give a nasty bump on my head.
I pick up the notebook and re-read my notes. Perhaps I was a little too direct with my suggestions.
‘You went about that in completely the wrong way,’ Kerry begins, peeling an orange.
Like you’re the expert?
She ignores my remark. ‘Nobody likes to be told they are doing something wrong.’
I didn’t tell him he was doing it wrong, just that it would be better if he . . . Never mind.
‘You should have told him what he does that’s right. What you like.’
I like that it makes me feel, makes me feel . . .
Kerry begins to put on her best Aretha Franklin voice and sings, ‘. . . like a nat-ur-al womaaaan.’
I laugh. I’d almost forgotten that she loved Aretha Franklin. How could I have forgotten that? The way that she would throw her head back and belt out the chorus while she was cooking, or driving.
‘Sorry,’ she says, popping a segment into her mouth. ‘Carry on . . . it makes you feel?’
Alive.