Insomnia

She lay beside him, listening to his snore like the rattling wheeze of an old man; and she shuffled very slightly to her left, so that a fold of the duvet fell between their bodies. He always snored, but it was worse when he was drunk, when poking him hard in the ribs was ineffective as a solution. Sometimes she could make him turn on to his side, and that helped a bit, for a short time. There was nothing she could do about it in the long run.

Apart from his noisy exhalations, and the rain lightly pattering at the window, the house was quiet. There was no chance of sleeping; she was too upset, and he was too disturbing. Her mind flickered from one hard, miserable fact to another. She hated this house, which he had chosen without her approval, and then claimed that it was because he knew how badly she wanted to move. Mildew spread across the windowpanes as quickly as she could remove it; spiders slept in dark unreachable corners; the kitchen was always so cold, and dust collected among the empty wine bottles stacked on the floor. She crept, mentally, from room to room, clearing out the rubbish and painting the walls white. She replaced the metal window frames that looked so pretty but kept the rooms in a state of chill. In her head she hired a gardener to sort out, once and for all, the enormous, unmanageable garden, which he had thought she would enjoy.

As she collected up neglected houseplants, she started to realise how many things she did just because he thought that she liked to do them. She indulged him in his indulgence of her, rather than stopping sometimes to explain that she didn’t want to live in this clutter, or spend her whole weekend trying to tame the borders and the lawn, or eat takeaway food twice a week. And she really, really did not want to get through a bottle of wine a night. Although she suspected that they did that because he wanted to, not because he thought she did.

The cat wrapped himself around her ankles as she climbed the stairs, and he leapt from the top step on to the windowsill, adding to the grubby brown smudge on the wallpaper as he went. He had gouged countless little claw-marks out of the wood, each time he jumped up to his favourite vantage point; and often managed to knock down a plant in the process. You think you know what’s best for me as well, don’t you? she muttered, as he bumped his forehead against hers, purring in competition with the snoring that still roared out from the bedroom.

In the bathroom, she closed the toilet seat and wiped toothpaste residue from the sink. This room was quite possibly the worst in the house: a stupid shape, as if it were an afterthought; and the sink always clogged up with hair, and lids from used aftershave bottles collecting on the shelf. She opened the window, to try and make it smell less damp, and then sat shivering on the edge of the bath, asking herself again what she was doing living this life, and what possible alternative there was.

Finally she returned to the bedroom. The curtains were half-open, because he refused to sleep in the dark; and dim orange light showed her that he had turned on to his side, fast asleep with his mouth open, and was snoring with a little less gusto now. She stubbed her toe on one of his shoes on her way to the wardrobe, which creaked slightly as she opened the door. As quietly as she could, she pulled a holdall down from the shelf, and carefully selected a few essentials from around the dressing table. Then she dressed in the pale light, and tiptoed back downstairs holding her shoes.

The cat followed her out of the front door, and she tried, unsuccessfully, to chase him back inside. Don’t follow me, she told him. I don’t know where I’m going.

The night air was cold, penetrating instantly between the buttons of her coat, icily insisting that she go back to bed. Up there, warmth, security, certainty. Down here darkness and cold. A car that might not start. A journey without maps. A leap of faith where there was absolutely nothing to have faith in, except herself. Warmth. Security. Certainty.