Loves Reality

Loves Reality

by T. Clarke

 

 

He felt cold. His first sensation. He was in that transient state
between sleep and near sleep where total consciousness seems a mile
away. Something hurt; couldn’t tell what. Head. His head... of
course, drunk. He was drunk. He still is drunk; must be. Far, far
too much...

 

It’s all Trisha’s fault, of course. She said ‘Yes’. Still, I did
ask her to marry me. In the maternity ward, she looked so beautiful.
Not gorgeous beautiful - washed out and tired, but still radiant and
happy beautiful.

 

Having witnessed that wonder of wonders, the birth of ones own child, I had
returned in the evening to see how our amazing offspring was coping
with life. Trisha was sitting on the side of the bed, her long
auburn hair tied loosely and hanging over her shoulder. I stood in
the doorway watching as she gently stroked the face of our beloved
daughter.

“Hello”.

“Hi”, Trisha glanced up; her eyes looked tired and drawn but they still
managed to sparkle in that special way.

It came over me quite suddenly; I hadn’t given any thought to the
idea, but here it was.

“Trish”, I said slowly; knowing
what I was going to say but not knowing quite how I was going to say
it, “Trish, I want to say how beautiful you look-”

“Tom! Don’t be so silly”.

“No, listen I want to say this. Please listen. Trish, you look so
beautiful and our child, our nameless little wonder looks so
beautiful..”

Trish looked at me with those sparkling eyes, and turned her head sideways,
she must have thought I’d already been at the Jack Daniels.

I ignored the look and continued; even more certain now it was the
right thing to say.

“Today has been an incredible experience for me.. for all of us. Ever since
the baby arrived I‘ve felt all glowy inside. This has been a
perfect day - a revelation, in fact.”

I was starting to babble. Trisha was smiling now.

“Get on with it”.

I slid down onto one knee and gently held Trisha’s hand.

“OK, look, as today has been so wonderful I thought it would be the
perfect thing - the perfect time, I mean, it is the perfect time for me to say... I love you.

Her smile grew wider; I waited for the perfect pause. Almost a pregnant
pause in fact.

“I love you very, very much. I think we are very much in love and so I
think this must be the perfect time to ask you to marry me”.

Trisha slowly leant forward until I could feel her breath on my cheek,

“Fuck Off”, she said.

He doesn’t want to wake up from his drunken stupor yet. Must be
early. Something else hurts now, leg... bed must be hard. There is
a noise; a sort of rattling.. rhythmical rattling. Will not wake up
yet.

For several months after I asked the same question on almost a daily
basis, only to get a rebuttal every time. Each time I asked I seemed
to want it just a little less than before. After all it was only a
piece of paper, we were happy together, and although I loved her; and
still wanted her, she was becoming less attractive; as the idea of
marriage was becoming less attractive.

 

I had just about reached the stage where even being together was not
necessarily the thing I wanted most, when she said it.

“Yes”.

“Yes, what?” I asked with a quizzical look.

“Yes, I will marry you”, she said, while mimicking my look with one of her own.
“After all you’ve asked me enough times”.

“But you’ve always said no”.

“It seems about right now”. She said, “Helena will be a year old
next month, my job is bringing in a few pounds, anyway you want to
get married don’t you?”

“Of course I do”, I lied, after all my pleading over the months I
couldn’t bring myself to say anything else. Changing minds was a
woman’s prerogative, men aren’t allowed.

 

It was to be late August. Family and friends had been informed.
Arrangements had been made. Including the Stag Night.

Rattle,
rattle.... rattle, rattle.... it was non-stop now. Continuous,
rattle, rattle.... must move head in a minute.. aching all over...

 

Jules arranged the stag night; it was after all traditional for the best
man to sort out that kind of thing. Jules had done a fine job, meal
at the ‘Kingsley’, pub-crawl around town, usual stuff for stag
nights.

Everyone I liked had turned up. It was going to be a great night.

Two faces I didn’t recognise however were mates of Tim’s brother,
Simon. “This is Harry and Paul”, I was informed, “Don’t mind
if they tag along with us do you, Tom me old mate?”

“Don’t have much bloody choice do I?” I laughed out loud, the early drinks had already started going to my head, “No, really the more the merrier”.

As the night wore on and I achieved my aim of getting
completely smashed, the group slowly whittled down to Jules, myself
and Harry and Paul. That was when things started to get out of hand.
It seemed Paul was a bit of a practical joker, and if he and Harry
wanted to put the groom on a train and send him to John ‘O Groats,
no one was going to stop them.

There wasn’t even a struggle; let alone a scuffle, as two drunks carried
one paralytic groom-to-be on to the train.

 

The realisation of what was dawned on him. He was aching all over and as he slowly, oh so slowly moved his head, and prised open his eyes, they focused on the bottom
of a door, the door to a train toilet. His head shot off the floor
at the speed of an express.. Bang!! The base of the loo was hard.

It was then that he thought he heard the guard over the speaker system.
“We will shortly be arriving at Preston. Please ensure that you
have all your belongings with you when you alight. Thank you for
travelling on Virgin Express”. The irony was lost on him.

He would get up, he thought. Must do it now. Must get off this train. Only one problem remained. Horror struck him
like a thunderbolt. He was totally naked.