1. Goodbye Master Bates

CHAPTER ONE

I hadn’t planned on skipping down the office but it was the only way to stop my legs from collapsing beneath me. Today I am handing in my notice, leaving my job and perhaps, but it’s highly unlikely, I am about to make the biggest mistake of my life. I’ve recently been promoted to team leader at the large soft drinks company I work for, so the decision to leave was not an easy one. But having my dream job already in place made leaving all my friends and security that much easier. I, Ginny McLeod, friend to all, life and soul of the party (I think that’s what the curriculum read) was about to fly to the other side of the world to work on a luxury cruise liner and sail my way around the glaciers in Alaska, then squeeze my way down through the Panama canal and spend the rest of my six month contract in the sun soaked Caribbean—life just couldn’t get any better than that, could it?

Handing in my notice at work was nerve racking. I had made some great friends here and with the extra money my promotion had given me life was now better than ever, but I have to leave, I have to get away. I had thought that the last couple of months would have gotten easier, but the only distraction I had was the promotion and the extra responsibility that came with it. It just wasn’t enough; I just couldn’t get Giles out of my mind. Giles had been my partner for over three years and had consumed my whole life up until a short while ago, when I was thrown over, or rather tossed over, for DIY. The split came as suddenly as Giles used to in the days when we made love, although on reflection the last few months together had been hard work.

We used to have a fairly active social life with Giles’s friends, all of whom were public schoolboy types who quaffed a lot at each other’s efforts to be funny, but towards the end we never left the house together. It would be cheating to count the time that the chimney went on fire at eight o’clock at night and we both ran out of the house at the same time. My friends, I know, used to just tolerate him. His ability to talk about himself and the job that he didn’t have and that he never intended to have was impressive. Unless the conversation was directed towards him then he wasn’t interested. My friends were polite for my sake. As time went on invitations from friends were reduced to funerals, the only place where Giles was suitably stale.

Giles Dick, incredible how I thought his name was so cute in the beginning, when we were in love. He was just under six foot tall with light brown hair. The quiff at the front of his head was Elvis-like, I loved him regardless of his inability to move with the times, although I think he was only five when Elvis died and had no recollection of the ‘King’ other than his mother’s infatuation which, somehow, was passed on to Giles and his hair. Towards the end the most romantic thing he did was to pick up his boxer shorts that lay in a row across the floor, Saturdays, Sundays and right through to Friday. Each pair would lie there with the holes perfectly formed where he had slid them off, just waiting for me to pick them up. Is it just me, or is it not a really selfish thing to do, to leave your skiddy underpants for your significant other, i.e., ME, to pick up? I ended up supporting him and his excuses not to work because of his many allergies, as his mother had always done. Finally, when it suited him, Giles got a job. He had been there a short time when things started to change. One evening, (amongst many) I ran a bath for Giles ready for his return home from work. This may seem a rather nice thing to do for your loved one, but I had only one selfish intention in mind. Our sex life had dwindled to the spooning position as we slept, so it was desperate measures to get back that contact again.

We had gotten past the initial promises that couples make to one another in the early stages of relationships, the things that he longs to do to you and the things you promise to do for him. This is what happens in the beginning, to seal the relationship. Some people see it as trickery, but I think that seal is a fairer word. Rubbing the feet, the shoulders, making the meals, and then the noisy, this is so good (I could puke) blowjob. Don’t get me wrong. There were times when I enjoyed the intimacy and the giving, but when the passionate kiss, the one and only kiss, is over and the pressure from their size seven mitt is given to the top of your head, pushing you under the duvet, everything changes. It complicates everything. Forget about the light at the end of the tunnel. There is no light at the end of a twenty-tog winter quilt. It is no longer about love; it is about him and his penis. I loved him in every sense of the word and did all the things you do for someone you love. In the beginning even his sudden incapacity to bend over and cut his own toenails was endearing. In the beginning I would come home from work and really massage his back, and then if that wasn’t enough I would later endure the twenty-tog duvet stunt. The back rubs became tit for tat. You rub mine first and then I’ll rub yours. His rub would end up like he was stroking a pussycat and mine became just as half-hearted. But I was in love and if you make these sacrifices, in the back of your mind you think that he will always stay with you and appreciate you doing all these insane things that you never imagined doing for anyone, just for him.

One evening in particular is the reason I am taking off on this adventure of a lifetime. Giles arrived home from work in a cheery kind of mood. He walked in the door, stripped off his boiler suit and flung it in no particular direction before kissing me lovingly on the head. Perhaps ‘lovingly’ is romanticizing the scene somewhat, but it was enough for me to get a sudden stab of hope for the evening ahead. So there I was scrambling around trying to make everything perfect in the hope that we would end up in bed shagging each other’s brains out. I would pamper him with his favourite expensive bath essence (which I had bought). The bathroom itself would be transformed from the sterile ceramic place that it is to a scene from the Arabian Nights, with candles flickering all over the room. It was the only room in the house that I had yet to decorate. His bathrobe was behind the door and a glass of wine would later be produced, once he has totally relaxed back against the inflatable breast cushion, a present from Mummy darling. Fresh bouncy towels were ready for his exit so he didn't have to lift a finger and could preserve all that much needed energy for the night ahead. While he relaxed, I checked dinner and lit some more candles in the living room. With everything ready for the night of passion that lay ahead I ran upstairs to finally get out of my work clothes.

My suit now smells of roast lamb and the right sleeve of my jacket is soaked through from retrieving my glasses from the bottom of the bathtub. They had been sitting on my head but managed to slip of as I was ruffling the water into a froth of bubbles. I stand naked in front of the mirror and look at myself. I couldn’t complain about my body although I did, constantly. Giles told me when we first slept together that he fell in love with my hair and then my body and finally me as a person. I was never sure how I felt about that. I put on the lacy underwear that I’d bought in my lunch hour and slipped Giles’s favourite dress over the top. It’s not Giles’s dress, it’s mine, but he did buy it for me. I let my hair fall down my back in big auburn locks and quickly touch up today’s make-up and add a dab of gloss to my lips before smacking them together. I would like to take the time to have a shower but that will have to wait till later.

I gently opened the door of the bathroom carrying two glasses of Merlot and tiptoed across the carpeted floor in my four-inch stilettos. Giles is lying with his back to me splashing around and washing himself vigorously. I bent down behind him, smiling to myself as I pictured the evening ahead.

Taking his ear between my teeth, I bit seductively on his lobe. Suddenly Giles is screaming and then I am too. Wine is sloshing everywhere as I stagger back and at the same time Giles continues to thrash about in the bath, one hand gripped on to the side of the bath with a fist full of tissue paper, the other fixed firmly around his penis. I don’t remember how, but I must have moved around to the side of the bath to see what was going on. He stares back blankly at me, his mouth open but no sound coming from it as he concentrates on the task in hand. He looks like he is choking as his face starts to turn red. An alarm bell registers in his head telling him to breathe so he changes his breathing apparatus from nose to mouth. He continues to stare, but this time his lips are curled up and stuck to his gums from the lack of saliva, he looks like a rabid dog as he breathes noisily through the tight gaps in his teeth. I was just about to find my voice and actually say something when it's all over. I move my head to avoid its mocking leap of excitement and automatically clamp my mouth shut. If I have refused to have it in my mouth for the last three years then there is little chance that I am about to start now, especially under these circumstances.

His body trembled and then at last his muscles start to relax as he lies back closing his eyes, his chest heaving for air. It took me a few seconds to find my voice. I take a step back and lean against the wall. I notice that red wine has splashed all over my new carpet. Then I’m really angry. ‘What the hell is going on?’ I demand, stabbing the light switch with my elbow causing even more wine to spill to the floor and over my hand. The Arabian Nights candles are replaced by 100 watts of pearly whites in my effort to see the situation more clearly. My voice is trembling as I try to fathom out what I have just walked in on here.
‘What are you doing Giles?’ I said. Each word was said slowly and individually for him to understand what I was asking him. I shake at the piece of slim that is hanging off my finger only for it to wrap itself over the rim of the glass.
He just stares at me. His expression is a mixture of relief and well, relief.
‘Giles,’ I croak, ‘I think you owe me an explanation, don't you?’
‘Yes,’ he says, ‘I suppose I do.’ He pulls himself up in the bath so that his semi-erect penis is visibly bobbing up and down through what is left of the bubbles. He takes the tissue and dabs the end of it, the tissue breaks off in the water and floats away. It flashes through my mind that a few days ago I pulled my hair from the drain and a handful of tissues came with it.
Giles’s face has returned to its normal colour.
‘I was masturbating,’ he says simply. ‘All men masturbate, or didn’t you know?’ He sounded so cold as he said it, like he was talking to a complete stranger.

Although it had been obvious what he had been doing, I had somehow expected him to have another explanation. ‘Oh dear, look what a mess I've made, must have fallen asleep and had a wet dream or something.’
I mentally take hold of myself and scream. You bloody idiot Ginny, wake up; he was shaking it up and down for pity’s sake! He prefers to do it himself, the only DIY he had contributed in a long time, I may add. We hadn’t had sex in nearly three months and here he is doing it himself.
‘But what about us, Giles?’ I screamed, ‘I want you too, I want to have sex. Why are you doing this when it’s obvious I planned this evening for us?’
Angry tears spill down my face. This evening had been a desperate attempt to feel close again. I felt so hurt I could hardly breathe.
Giles sat there making patterns with his finger in the water.
‘Look Ginny,’ he started. I didn’t like the sound of his voice. He looked very uncomfortable and couldn’t look at me. I wonder what is happening to us. Has he always masturbated? Has he never enjoyed having sex with me? How many more tissues have I pulled out of the drain? I shudder at the thought.
‘Ginny, I don’t know how to say this, so I’m just going to say it as quickly as possible.’
‘Yes?’ I say, several minutes later and still waiting.
‘Nothing, I just wanted to say that it’s normal. Everyone does it and if you begrudge me a bit of light relief then maybe you should try it yourself,’ he finished, lying back down and turning the hot water tap on with his big toe.
I knew instinctively that this is not what he intended to say, but Giles is a stubborn person and will only ever tell you something when he is ready to and not one minute earlier.

I couldn’t think what to say, so I left the bathroom and placed the sticky wine glass by the sink. I turned off the oven and with trembling hands I poured myself a large glass of wine.
For all our differences, Giles and I rarely argued and if we did I always spent days trying to make it up to him. I couldn’t stand confrontation, although I faced it every day at work, relationships were different.

As I headed towards the living room I kicked off the ridiculous stiletto shoes that should carry some kind of health warning for your feet. As I lifted one leg behind me and sat down heavily on it on the sofa, I noticed that the candles were melted nearly to the bottom and reminded myself not to buy those again. As I sipped the wine I rested my head on the back of the sofa. I lay back exhausted and watched the shadows dance on the ceiling from the streetlights outside the window. My stomach felt tight as I thought over the last few months and how things had changed. I had thought I would be happier with Giles working, instead it was worse.

It occurred to me that there was definitely more to this than Giles was letting on. I looked over at his boiler suit that he had thrown carelessly on the floor for me to pick up. I don’t know why, perhaps instinct again, but I went over and picked it up and started picking his pockets. I couldn’t find anything except a bill from some pizza place, probably where he had his lunch. I hurled it in the direction of the fire but missed. I continued my search convinced I was going to find something, but there was nothing. I went to the kitchen and took the bottle of wine back with me to my position on the sofa. As I waited for Giles to emerge from the bathroom, I thought again about the bill and lunch. He had stopped eating his favourite cheese and onion sandwiches, which I used to prepare for him to take to work. He had also started to use mouthwash in the mornings. Then quickly all the changes started coming to me. He was up before the alarm went off every morning, he was more cheery than he had ever been about work, and he had started to wear good clothes under his boiler suit. This combined with the new aftershave and the recent trimming of the quiff and the witnessing of self-gratification were all the signs. I rushed over to the crumpled up bill and unravelled it. I looked for the date, which was the day before. He had ordered one salad, two medium sized pizzas with mixed toppings, one sorbet and one Italian homemade ice cream. And, what? A bottle of fucking 1996 Brunello that cost more than my last electricity bill. The total bill came to eighty-six pounds. Giles didn’t even have that much money in the bank and I know for sure he doesn’t have any credit cards. I helped him cut them up when the bailiffs threatened to take my furniture away. There is a piece of paper stapled to the back of the bill. Acid is racing around in my stomach and climbing towards my throat. My hands have started to shake again as I flick over the piece of paper, and there it is. At the top of the receipt it says VISA and at the bottom of the receipt is a signature, my signature or as damn near it as you could get. G. McLeod.
‘You bastard,’ I scream from the door of the bathroom.
Giles was out of the bath, naked and towel-drying his hair. He stops, his hair all spiked up as he turns and looks at me. I wanted to smash the glass in his face but instead I threw the wine at it while smacking him hard across the head with my free hand. Giles is grabbing at my arms but I am almost uncontrollable.
‘You bastard,’ I scream.
Giles continued to hold my wrists in a vice-like grip and dragged me through to the living room and managed to get the glass out of my hand before I did some permanent damage.

The only sound that can be heard is my wailing. I knew I wasn’t making much sense as I called him every name under the sun and underlined all the signs, all the things that pointed to his affair. If only I could stop crying and give him a chance to say something. If only he would try and deny it, try and justify it. We must have looked ridiculous sitting on the sofa. Giles naked next to me, still gripping my wrists tightly as I bawl. We stay like that until Giles finally trusts me enough to let go of me. All my energy is drained out of me. Giles got up and without a word he climbed the stairs to bed. I couldn’t sleep at all. I finished off the bottle of wine.
There was no more alcohol in the house, except for a box of chocolate liqueurs. Sometime later, I rach for the phone and call Iona, my best friend. We analysed it in every possible way, but the outcome was the same, he was definitely having an affair.

We talked for hours, even though poor Iona had work the next day. I knew I wouldn’t be able to go to work. It was light when I finally nodded off on the sofa, only to wake less than an hour later with Giles standing in the living room looking down at me with a coffee in his hand.
The memory of last night comes back to me.
‘You have one week to get out,’ I say. ‘I am going to stay with Iona. Make sure you’re not here when I get back.’ My voice sounded different to me as I laid out the list of instructions.
Giles just nodded and turned to go. More awake now, I start to throw some abuse at him as he grabs his boiler suit off the floor and leaves.
‘Wanker, don’t even think about coming back because it’s over, you lying bastard,’ I screamed, running to the door after him. He just kept on walking. It still upsets me that we never got to talk about what had happened to us and where we had gone wrong.

It was like being involved in a hit-and-run or forgetting a half-finished book on the Aeroplane. He just walked away without a word and there was no end to the story, which up until now has left me dangling, suspended in thin air. This break-up was the best thing that could have happened to me, it really was, it just hasn’t sunk in yet.

So, this is why I am leaving my job. All my friends and work colleagues knew what was going to happen today and for the most part, they were happy for me. They were also happy to have a little bit of excitement around the office to break up what was normally a fairly predictable day. One week from today I would be joining a cruise ship, but happy as I am to have gotten my dream job I am naturally apprehensive. Ever since I got the job I have thought about the life I have, my friends, my house and the security all those things actually give me. The bottle-shaped radio jukeboxes that I had collected as prizes just didn’t seem like much of an incentive anymore and anyway my family were sick of getting them as gifts. Each of my nephews’ and nieces’ bedrooms are like merchandising warehouses, with everything from bedspreads to mouse pads and all in the company colours of red and gold.

As I neared Sue the office manager’s desk I slowed down and automatically straightened my jacket. Natalie, her assistant, smiled up at me. With my recent promotion I was now considered to be management, hence Natalie chirping at me.
‘Morning Ginny, how may I assist you?’
I’m sure that was an American accent I just heard. The company has gone nuts with their training seminars. This is a leading American soft drinks company in England and I prefer to speak English with my own Scottish accent, but it looks like it’s too late for Natalie.

As newly appointed team-leader I was supposed to spend five minutes each morning before the call centre opened speaking to the team in ‘team-building language,’ as we had been trained to do. Morale-building words were quoted including ‘It can happen here, right now and to you’, and ‘Time, all you have is time, make the call and decide what is best for your client and believe in you, believe in what you want from that call’. I could hardly keep the smile off my face as my friends and colleagues stared up at me from their desks and headphones, knowing full well how much I hated having to read all that crap. It became seriously irritating to the point where I knew I had to get away, far away. So I brushed the cobwebs from my Diploma in Travel and Tourism and made the call, and now my ship is waiting for me. They chose me, possibly from hundreds of other applicants.

When Sue finished her phone call Natalie ushered me in. I sat down and handed the short letter over. When she finished reading it Sue looked up, pulled her glasses off and placed them on the table in front of her.
‘Let me be the first to congratulate you, Ginny,’ said Sue, sliding her chair back and coming round the desk to hug me. She hadn’t noticed that the entire office floor had come to a standstill, waiting for some kind of scene to take place. Why they would expect anything similar I don’t know. Sue’s farewell speech was kind and even generous, recalling how great I had been in dealing with difficult customers and saying how the company would miss me. It was true. I hadn’t been promoted for my cutting edge sales pitch but for my ability to pacify the most difficult customers. It was worth resigning just to hear it. I passed Natalie on the way out. She was smiling with a coat hanger in her mouth while saying something about being sure to have a nice day. I made my way up the office as a different person.