Jurgen Klinsmann is not dissolvable in water

Sammy couldn’t get to sleep and lay listening to the noises of the night.

As ever, Dave had gone straight to sleep and was grunting and snoring to himself.

Suddenly Dave spoke, it wasn’t mumbled, but articulated clearly, as if he were making a speech. “Jurgen Klinsmann is not dissolvable in water,” he said.

After that there was silence.

Sammy sat up in surprise at the sudden announcement. Dave showed no signs of being awake. She used the light of her phone to examine his face as she poked him in the side, but he was clearly sound asleep. He had simply been talking in his sleep.

Sammy lay awake listening to Dave breathing in and out, half anticipating his next announcement, but he had nothing to add.

She tried to imagine the dream Dave had that led to him stating so categorically that Jurgen Klinsmann is not dissolvable in water. She couldn’t think of any plausible scenario.

Why Jurgen Klinsmann? Dave didn’t even like football. It had been years since she’d even heard the name mentioned.

Lying there in her marital bed, late that night, Sammy realised that despite living together for four years there were elements of Dave that she really didn’t understand. The whole dissolvable Jurgen Klinsmann thing for one.

Despite sharing a house, a bank account, a surname and regularly merging their bodies in intimate pair bonding, Sammy and Dave remained entirely separate entities.

If they’d had children, Sammy thought, it might have been different. Maybe their dreams would have merged with the shared worries of parenthood. But work had gotten in the way, children were seen as a long term goal, like moving to Surrey.

All Sammy could think about that night was Jurgen Klinsmann. It represented all she didn’t know, all she could never understand, about Dave.

It was still dark when Sammy crept out of bed, quietly packed a suitcase with essentials, and walked out of Dave’s life forever.