his feet hammer down the stairs and seconds later, the front door slammed.
I lay there until the bath water grew cool.
Then I got out and wrapped myself in a towel.
It was 12th August. The date we’d met, five years earlier. A day we’d always taken care to celebrate, whatever else was happening, and which this year I’d flagged on the calendar in the kitchen – a big red heart with an arrow through it and our initials. Even knee-deep in misery, the irony of his timing didn’t escape me.
Today was our anniversary.
Jamie had left me.
And I was alone.
The two weeks that followed were a bit of a blur.
Sick with misery, I turned inwards, wanting to be alone, unable to bear the thought of other people’s sympathy. As day turned to night and back to day again, I gradually became aware that Anna and Jess would wonder about my lack of contact. So I sent them texts saying I was visiting my mother and would be in touch when I got back.
Every morning I woke in a panic at the thought of a future without Jamie in it. And I constantly raked over the details of our last year together, wondering if there was something I could have done differently that would have stopped him falling in love with Emma.
I spent a lot of time in bed with my nice friends on daytime TV. And I mooched around the house, leaving a trail of scrunched-up tissues, making feverish plans that alternated between winning Jamie back and making him suffer horribly.
I was plagued with guilt about the garden and all the weeding I wasn’t doing.
The vegetable plot was usually my haven, especially in times of stress. I nurtured my plants lovingly; fed them rich compost; even talked to them because I’d heard that helped. But they were being sorely neglected.
I’d started to avert my eyes every time I passed a window, because I couldn’t bear to see their hurt stares. Rows of neglected peas, tendrils twining round sticks, crying out to be picked. And droopy green beans, used to being cosseted, huffily indignant to find themselves thirsty.
I was finally forced to text Anna with news of our split – only because Jamie and I were due round at hers for dinner that night so I had no other option.
And half an hour after that text – as I lay on my bed eating a chocolate orange I’d found in my gift drawer and watching Deal or No Deal – she was banging on the door.
I tried to ignore it.
But she rattled the letterbox and started yelling through it. ‘I know you’re in there, Izz. I can hear the telly for Christ’s sake!’
I frowned at the open bedroom window.
‘Let me in! Please!’ A pause. ‘I’m not budging till you open up.’
My heart sank.
I’d learned from experience that when Anna made up her mind about something, arguing with her was completely futile. You might as well tell Sweeney Todd to turn vegetarian.
Anna was loud and extrovert and said exactly what she thought. It might have been something to do with her red hair. Or the fact that she never had a dad to oversee discipline in the house when she was a child, just a lovely, slightly unconventional mum who had her packing her own school lunches by the time she was five.
If I didn’t go downstairs, Anna would bring a tent and a flask and camp out in my field until she gained entry.
So I dragged myself up, pulled on my dressing gown and did a horrified double take in the mirror.
I had turned into the mad woman in the attic.
Scary white face peering through a tangle of undergrowth. My dark auburn hair kinked wildly when left to go its own way. It hadn’t been within spitting distance of a hairdryer for days.
It was a wrench having to leave my sanctuary.
But as I headed down the stairs, I suddenly thought how lovely it would be to see a friendly face again after two weeks of self-imposed solitary confinement.
Tears pricked my eyes.
How could I have forgotten what an amazing comfort friends could be in times of crisis?
A warm feeling spread through me and I almost ran the last few steps.
‘At long bloody last!’ Anna shouted. ‘I’m freezing my bloody bollocks off here.’
She blew in on a gusty wind, along with a delivery of crisp autumn leaves from the beech trees outside my door, and marched straight through to the kitchen, winding off her scarf and yelling back, ‘I couldn’t believe your text saying Jamie buggered off at the weekend. That bastard has been gone three days and you never thought to mention it till this morning?’
I pulled my gaping dressing gown together and trailed after her. Having made it to the front door, I was now completely knackered.
I slumped down at the kitchen table. ‘What day is it?’
‘Wednesday. Why?’
‘Actually, it’s two weeks and four days.’ I eye her apologetically. ‘Since he left.’
Anna, who was pacing round the kitchen, boot heels clacking on the flagstone floor, stopped and spun round.
‘But your texts said you’d gone away. You’ve been here all this time?’ She fell into a chair opposite, her face softening. ‘Look at you! So calm and so brave.’ Leaning across the table, she imprisoned my hand in her freezing fingers. ‘Well, don’t worry. You’re not on your own any more.’
‘Um – good,’ I said, trying my best to look encouraged. All this messy human interaction was taking a bit of getting used to after two weeks in a vacuum. And I was aching all over. Even my skin felt sore. Every cell in my feeble body wanted to be in bed with the covers pulled over my head.
Anna gave my fingers a tight squeeze and I tried not to wince. ‘Let’s have a night out! Just you, me and Jess. And we can rubbish men to our heart’s content.’
She sighed happily at the prospect. This was Anna in her element, rubbishing men. Which was strange when she had lovely, funny, rugby-playing Peter tending to her every need and whim.
‘Or maybe a spa day would be better? Or’ – her eyes lit up – ‘how about a girls’ weekend? To Prague? Or Barcelona or something? Would that cheer you up?’
I tried to look enthused. But to be honest I was desperate to get back to Deal or No Deal. The contestants were like one big happy family. Watching it made me feel safe. And I knew for a fact that Noel Edmonds would never do the cheating thing.
But to make Anna feel better, I nodded and said, ‘Yes, that would be nice.’
I had an odd feeling it wouldn’t happen, though, and I was right because the next day I came down with the worst cold I’d had in years. As I snuffled my way through the last of the tissues (eventually resorting to the posh lilac ones
