Ten things I couldn’t say to you

1. I’m starting to find other people attractive

When you found out about Sandra and kicked me out, we shacked up together. There wasn’t much else to do. We lived in a Holiday Inn trying not to be depressed about our circumstances or that life had turned out to be so much like Eastenders, trying not to acknowledge that the thrill we had got out of each other was about doing the wrong thing, of giving into desire. We had more sex than ever but it wasn’t the same. Bodies can tell each other things that mouths can’t.

After a few weeks in room 68 Sandra sat me down: she was going back to her husband, this had really meant something, she would miss me. I held her hand, but I knew it wasn’t true. She was just a woman who had looked more appealing than you once, and I was just a man who’d made her feel attractive when she'dneeded it most.

2. You’ve let yourself go

You put on weight after we were married. I didn’t blame you, you’d had three kids and had never been one for exercise. I didn’t even mind, to be honest. You looked okay big. But you didn’t feel attractive anymore. Even when I stroked and stroked your back desperate for you to roll over or climb on top of me, you were rigid as an ice pop. You couldn’t believe I still wanted to shag you with your new saggy, bulging body. I couldn't make you believe it. And the thought kept creeping in, under the hurt pride and disappointment, that a lot of men have affairs. Affairs are something a lot of men have.

3. The babies haven’t brought us closer together

You became dull, Cath. Some mothers do. Our light hearted in-the-park dreams of having our own little family drained you of your fire. You became the thing you’d always feared: a baby factory, cooer, a matron. Motherhood took you over completely, even your dreams. There was no room for me. You’d wake up sweating from nightmares: Hannah kidnapped from school... Nathan mauled by a tiger... Lucy dragged out to sea...

And I’d hold you, eyes still closed, and say, There, there baby, it’s okay. They’re safe. We’re safe. I’m here, I’ll look after you. That protective male crap just poured out of me, and I meant it, but more than that, I wanted to get back to sleep.

I knew that in the morning I’d get up, put my suit on, eat the breakfast that you’d made and daydream about Sandra. Because by the time Hannah was a few months, I’d already started up with her. Lucy, would be sitting on my knee, humming and eating toast, and I’d be imagining turning Sandra over, so that her pale, taut arse stuck up in the air just for me.

And all the time, from the outside, I was a picture of goodness. People would have said: Terry? Oh yeah, his family are everything to him.

And they were. You are.

4. I think we’re in trouble

You used to kiss me as I left. Dutifully. I’d feel vaguely disgusted as your Marmite lips brushed my cheek; partly with you and partly with myself for making you that way, because I felt responsible. Insisting that I wanted one more child. And one more. A trio! I used to say: one and a half each! And you’d smile, but you’d be less light-hearted than me because you still had the gristly scars from the last birth on your body.

Then one day our act collapsed. You got a phone call. A man’s voice saying, “Your husband, Terry Beckett, is having an affair. Ask him who Cassandra Worthy is, or ring 07968 395716.”

Then the phone went dead. Beeeeeep.

You did the beep when you told me, do you remember, Cath? That’s what you said word for word. “Then the phone went dead. Beeeeeep.” And I looked at you, your eyes wild in a face blank like a digestive, and I thought you’d gone mad. I thought you were never going to stop with that beep, and then you stopped and I realised that only a second had passed and maybe it was me that was mad because what was I going to do now, and what was I going to tell the kids and who was Sandra anyway?

Because I knew what I’d lost straight away. Your whole person had changed. Our history gone, just like that.

5. I think we might need to see somebody

After I’d gone you got a job two days a week in a family solicitors, joined a gym, lost all the weight. Mum kept me informed. Trying to goad me into wanting you back, not realising how I ached for it, how many times you’d shut the door on me in my best suit. She’d tell me off for being drunk, tell me I’d never be allowed to see the kids at this rate, and I’d put the phone down and drink. It was more than I could take.

It was Mum that told me. That you’d started seeing your boss. She was just trying to get us back together, Cath. She didn’t know what it’d do.

I couldn’t bear him getting close to you, living with our kids. You were still mine, Cath! I sat up at night thinking of ways I could stop it. You wouldn’t talk to me, or let me near the kids while I was acting like I was, holed up in that Holiday Inn, drinking. My imagination was out of control, coming up with ways to stop him getting any closer, ways of talking to you. After a couple of months, they didn’t seem so farfetched.

6. I think I might need to see somebody

I‘ve always had bad thoughts. When I was a teenager I had an elderly friend, I knew her from the bakery where I worked. She came in every day for bread, and I started going round to see her sometimes because it was obvious she was lonely. A nice thing to do. But the thing was, what I remember now is, as I sat across from her I would wonder where she kept her cash. While she boiled the kettle and laid custard creams on a plate I’d imagine scenarios where I found her pin number and stole her bank card, or tied her up and nicked her telly. And I didn't leave it at that. The pictures kept coming. They wouldn't let up. I had to stop going round.

7. You’re not listening to me

I’m sorry Cath, you won’t want to read this bit, but I need to write it. Everyone says it’s good to get it all out. Skip ahead a bit, if you want. Jump to number ten. Are you even there, Cath? I really hope you're there.

That night, I knew the kids were out because it was Mum that was looking after them. I knew he’d taken you to the theatre because it was Mum that’d told me. Her usual call. Trying to help.

And so, I let myself in. Used my key. I sat down by the bed our three children were conceived in and waited, knife in my pocket, rope in my hand, until I heard a taxi pull up outside. I heard your voice growing louder as you struggled to find your keys, the telltale sound of too much drink as you missed and missed the keyhole, then his laugh, low, joining yours as you walked inside: Ravi.

I got up, thinking there’s no way out now, Tex, calling myself by your old nickname for me, thinking you’ve just got to get on with it, mate. Make the thought reality. And so I began. I knocked the bedside lamp over, and trod heavily to the door. Your voices stopped downstairs. I felt you freeze, like I was freezing, felt the truth travel through my skeleton that the bad thing I‘d been ready for was here.

Ravi crept up the stairs. He walked as lightly as a six foot man can, stood outside the door, listening. My heart slammed against the cavity of my chest but my hand was steady, and when he pushed the door open, testing, I stayed where I was, waiting for the seconds to pass until he would cross the threshold completely. It was like clockwork, Cath. He didn’t have a chance to use the rolling pin he was gripping. The base of the lamp was too heavy on his head.

The thump of him falling must have terrified you. I think about that now, but then I just thought, I can’t have much time left. I picked him up, dumped him on the chair where you do your make-up, wound the rope around his chest and ankles, then climbed out the window, and over Abe and Shelly’s hedge.

8. We really need to talk

You were on the drive, eyes big, scrabbling through your bag when I wandered up.

“Cath!” I said, putting on a slur though I'd never been more sober. “We've got to talk...”

“Oh god Terry, there’s someone in the house! You've got to... I think they’ve hurt Ravi. Oh god, there’s someone in there and I can’t find my phone!”

It was the first time you didn’t tell me to go away. I walked past you, upstairs, and you followed a few steps behind, not wanting to be left by yourself. I could hear your breathing, more like panting, and I thought of you red-faced and sweating as you gave birth to Nathan, the way you'd fixed your eyes on me like I was the only thing worth focusing on in the world.

I slowed down then, because I was starting to be afraid of what I’d done.

“He’s upstairs, Terry, in my bedroom," you said, thinking I was uncertain.

Our bedroom, I thought, but I didn’t say that. There’d be time for all that later on.

Things were getting hazy. I’d lost sight of the plan. I couldn’t stage a rescue if Ravi had seen me when I hit him. Had he seen me? Everything was happening so quick.

Then you saw that he was tied up, unconscious, that the window was open and you gasped. You turned to look at me, and I saw you wondering what I was doing there anyway.

9. I still love you.

“I just wanted to talk to you, Cath.”

You looked back and forth,like an animal, trying to understand.

“Something’s got to give, you see...”

I sounded calm, but Ravi was coming round, and I had a horrible feeling he was going to ruin everything. I just wanted to explain, but blood was running down one side of his head, making everything seem worse than it was, and I could see you working things out.

“Heads bleed a lot, Cath, don’t worry, it’s because the skin’s so thin there. Remember when Nathan cut his head open? There was loads of blood and he was fine!”

“Terry. Get him off that chair. Abe and Shelly will be able to hear this, they’ll be round here any minute...”

Your voice had changed, and I was so scared. You sounded like a robot, but I needed to make you understand.

“It was always you, Cath. I made a mistake, but it was always you...”

“Get him OUT of that chair!”

Ravi groaned and I couldn't bear the thought of this moment being over, now, when we were just starting to talk. I walked over, to set him free, like you asked, but I couldn’t bear the idea of his voice joining in. What if he had seen me? Before he opened his eyes, before I had time to think of it, I'd stuck my fingers in his mouth.

I grabbed at the slippery muscle in there and I cut. It was just like I'd imagined. I thought that will keep him quiet for a while, alive but quiet. But you started shrieking, and I couldn’t remember what I'd been about to say. Blood bubbled out of the wound in his mouth, poured down his chin, down his shirt.

10. I’m sorry

You rushed to Ravi, trying to hold his head forward so he wouldn’t swallow all that blood, at the same time as you tried to undo the rope that held him.

“Use the knife,” I kept saying. I held it out to you, but you misunderstood.

You ran out the house - as if I'd hurt you! - and I heard you on the phone to an ambulance, the police. I lay on our bed. Ravi groaned, still tied up, and I realised I was holding something. His tongue was in my hand. Like a hot slug! It was too much. I got the giggles.

And I wanted to ask you, Are all the good things undone now, Cath?

The pillow was soft and smelling of you and I wondered if I could fall asleep. I imagined myself, all gentle and infantile, snoozing as the police burst in.