Page 12 of Rock Paper Scissors
The wind rattles the stained-glass windows, and I’m grateful for anything that might drown out the loudest thoughts inside myhead. I wouldn’t want her to hear those. My hands still need something to do—I no longer want to hold hers and my fingers feel redundant without my phone. I take my wallet from my pocket and find the crumpled paper crane between the leather folds. The silly old origami bird has always brought me luck, and comfort. I hold it for a while, and don’t care that Amelia sees me doing it.
“I’ve been carrying this paper bird around with me for such a long time,” I say.
She sighs. “I know.”
“I showed it to Henry Winter the first time I met him at his fancy London house.”
“I remember the story.”
She sounds bored and miserable and it makes me feel the same. I’ve heard all of her stories before too, and none of them are particularly thrilling.
I wish people were more like books.
If you realize halfway through a novel that you aren’t enjoying it anymore, you can just stop and find something new to read. Same with films and TV dramas. There is no judgment, no guilt, nobody even needs to know unless you choose to tell them. But with people, you tend to have to see it through to the end, and sadly not everyone gets to live happily ever after.
The snow has turned to sleet. Large, angry droplets pelt the windows before crying down the glass like tears. Sometimes I want to cry but I can’t. Because that wouldn’t fit with who my wife thinks I am. We’re all responsible for casting the stars in the stories of our own lives, and she cast me in the role of her husband. Our marriage was an open audition, and I’m not sure either of us got the parts we deserved.
Her face is an unrecognizable blur, her features swirling like an angry sea. It feels like I am sitting next to a stranger, not my wife. We’ve been togetherallday and I feel claustrophobic. I’m someone who needs space, a little time on my own. I don’t know why she has to be so… suffocating.
Amelia snatches the paper crane from my fingertips.
“You spend too long living in the past instead of focusing on the future,” she says.
“Wait, no!” I cry, as she throws my lucky charm into the fire.
I’m up and off the tartan sofa in a flash, and almost burn my hand retrieving the bird. One edge is singed, but otherwise undamaged. That’s it. The final act. If I wasn’t sure before I am now, and I’m counting down the hours until this is over once and for all.
COTTON
Word of the year:
growlerynoun.A place of refuge or sanctuary for use while one is feeling out of sorts. A private room, or den, to growl in.
28th February 2010—our second anniversary
Dear Adam,
Another year, another anniversary, and it was a great one! Since you sold the first Henry Winter adaptation, you have been busier with work than ever before. The Hollywood studio who bought it at auction paid more for those 120 pages than I could earn in ten years. It was amazing, and I’m so happy for you, but so sad for us because now we see even less of each other than we used to. You don’t seem to need me or my input into your workas muchat all now. But I understand. I really do.
A lot has changed for you during the last twelve months,but sadly not for me. We still don’t have a baby. You kept your word about taking some time off for our anniversary though—something which had become inconceivable in recent months—so that we could go away for the weekend. You arranged for a neighbor to look after Bob, told me to pack a bag, and my passport, but wouldn’t tell me where we were going. I swapped my dog hair–covered jeans for a designer dress I’d found in a Notting Hill charity shop, and even splashed out on a new lipstick.
You hailed a black cab as soon as we left the flat for our anniversary weekend away. I thought the taxi might take us to St. Pancras… or the airport. But after thirty minutes of negotiating London’s all-day rush hour, we stopped on a residential street in Hampstead Village, one of your favorite parts of London. Probably because Henry Winter owns a house there. It’s super posh, but I didn’t think people like us needed a passport to visit, so I wondered why you had told me to bring mine.
After paying the driver, including a generous tip, we clambered out onto the pavement with our bags and you reached inside your pocket.
“What’s that?” I asked, eyeing up the small but perfectly wrapped gift in your hand. The ribbon was tied in such a pretty bow, I wondered if someone had done it for you.
“Happy anniversary,” you replied with a grin.
“We weren’t meant to exchange presents until Sunday—”
“Oh, really? I’ll take it back then.”
I grabbed the pretty parcel. “I’ve seen it now, so may as well open it. I hope it’s cotton. That’s the traditional gift for surviving two years of marriage.”
“I think it’s about celebrating, not surviving, and I didn’t know I’d married someone so demanding.”
“Yes, you did,” I said, carefully removing the paper.
