Marry Me

Europa Editions
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously.
Copyright © 2013 by Dan Rhodes, Published by arrangement with Canongate Books Ltd, 14 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1TE
First publication 2014 by Europa Editions
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
Cover Art by Emanuele Ragnisco
www.mekkanografici.com
ISBN 9781609451912

Dan Rhodes

MARRY ME

For wife-features, of course

Marriage is the only legal contract which abrogates
as between the parties all the laws that safeguard
the particular relation to which it refers.
—
GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

Author's note:
I have no idea what this means, but I'm sure it's very wise

From the moment I met her, my girlfriend wouldn't stop talking about her ex. Time and again she told me about the charming things he would say and do, and I came to learn every detail of the sun-drenched and culturally enlightening holidays they had taken together. She often told me how safe she had felt when she was by his side, and that they had experienced an indescribable quality of closeness during sex. Whenever I surprised her with a present she would be quick to tell me that his choice of gift had always been perfect, as if he could see inside her mind. ‘It wasn't to be,' she would sigh, ‘but I make do.'

Eventually, she agreed to marry me. On our wedding night, as she lay naked in my arms, she said, ‘It's funny—if things had turned out just a little bit different, it would have been him I'd just done that with, not you.'

To say my fiancée was pregnant on our wedding day would be an understatement. She was enormous, and when she reached the altar she let out a howl, clutched her belly and lowered herself to the floor, puffing and panting as she struggled to find a comfortable position for delivery. My mother rushed to her side, reached under her wedding dress and blocked the baby's exit with her hands.

‘Hurry up,' she shouted at the vicar. ‘No grandchild of mine is being born out of wedlock.'

The vicar and I did our best to keep things moving along, but we weren't helped by my bride's lack of cooperation. Instead of vows, all we heard were grunts, wails and language quite inappropriate for the surroundings. Eventually we managed to get her to agree to the terms and conditions, and after a struggle I was able to get the ring on her finger.

At last my mother was able to withdraw her hands and return to her pew. My bride carried on with her wailing, cursing and sweating. There was quite a lot of gunk by this point, and like everybody else I didn't know quite what to say or where to look.

My wife had always told me that whenever we made love she had seen it as not so much a sexual thing, more a union of souls.

‘But I thought you meant that in a good way.'

‘I didn't mean it in a bad way,' she said. ‘But let's face it, there was a pretty big hint in there; and to be honest, the “souls” thing has started wearing
really
thin.'

I asked her whether this meant that she was giving up on me.

‘No,' she said, ‘I'm not giving up on you. I'm just asking you to do it better from now on. A lot better.'

My wife was arrested for a crime she didn't commit. While she was in custody, the police sent their toughest detective around to question me about her movements. ‘Is it true that you spent the evening of Tuesday the seventeenth gazing adoringly at the suspect, and gently stroking her face?' he asked.

I told him it was.

‘But it makes no sense,' he said, scratching his chin. ‘She's so plain. Why would you do such a thing?'

‘She may not be a beauty queen,' I said, ‘but I love her with all my heart, and to me she's the prettiest girl in the world.'

‘You don't expect me to believe that?'

‘No,' I sighed, ‘I don't suppose I do. But it's true.'

I arrived at the hospital to find my girlfriend slipping away. To bring her comfort in her final hours, I asked her to marry me. She accepted, and surrounded by our immediate family and closest friends we held a ceremony where she lay. Her voice was so halting that there were moments when I wondered whether she would even make it to the end of the vows.

As soon as the ring was on her finger she began to recover, and within minutes she was sitting up. I couldn't believe what I was seeing; I would never have married her if I'd thought for a moment that she was going to live. ‘I'm off to the pub to celebrate,' I said, desperate to get away.

‘You're doing no such thing,' she snapped. ‘You still haven't put up the blind in the spare room. And have you called that man about unblocking the drain in the back yard? And it's your turn to clean the windows—inside and out this time. And it's bin day tomorrow, if you could remember to put them out for once in your life . . .' It was relentless. I couldn't understand why everybody else was so happy to see her back to her old self. ‘And let's not forget that there's the small matter of the consummation to be dealt with,' she said.

The others discreetly withdrew, and we were left alone.

‘Don't just stand there,' she barked. ‘Get on with it.'

Starlight told me she had decided to call time on our marriage. When I asked her why, she said I had become too predictable. I begged her to reconsider. ‘I don't know what I would do without you,' I sobbed.

She shook her head in exasperation. ‘I
knew
you were going to say that.'

Determined that whoever she married would love her for who she was, regardless of what she looked like, Amethyst refused to let her suitors see her face. Throughout our courtship she went out of her way to make sure I had no idea what lay behind the impenetrable layers of scarves, balaclavas and dark glasses that she always wore. I was captivated by her lively conversation, though, and before long I knew for sure that she was the girl for me. I was over the moon when she agreed to be my wife, and as she walked down the aisle I had no idea what I was going to see when she lifted her veil. I had a strong feeling she would be either heart-stoppingly beautiful or stomach-churningly gruesome, but I knew I would love her just the same either way. When the moment came, and I saw her face for the first time, I couldn't believe my eyes.

She was reasonably pretty. Not plain, but certainly nothing special. I couldn't quite work out why she had gone to all that trouble.

I opened the front door to find my ex-wife standing there, looking even lovelier than I remembered. ‘You've come back,' I cried, overcome with joy.

‘God, no,' she said. ‘You've completely got the wrong end of the stick. The shops are shut, and my new husband needs some WD-40. You keep some under the sink, don't you?' Hunched in defeat, I went to the kitchen to fetch it. She followed, and stood watching as I rummaged for the can. ‘He's working on his motorbike,' she explained. ‘With his top off.'

Oleander told me that after careful consideration she had decided to move on to fresh challenges. ‘This has not been an easy decision to make,' she said, ‘but I feel the time is right.' She told me she felt privileged to have had such a rewarding experience as our marriage, and that her stint as my wife had helped her to develop a valuable set of skills. She thanked me for the opportunities I had offered her, wished me all the best for the future, and told me she was prepared to remain in my life for one calendar month, during which she would do everything she could to make my transition back to single status as smooth as possible.

As our wedding day approached, I became increasingly unsure about the idea of spending the rest of my life with my fiancée. I started to think quite seriously about calling everything off. As I was explaining this to my friend Demetrio, news came through that she had been horribly mauled by an escaped tiger. I rushed to the hospital and found her lying there, eyes peeping through a gap in her bandages. I knew then that I had to tell her about my misgivings.

She accused me of jilting her because she had lost her looks. Luckily, I had foreseen this possibility, and brought Demetrio along to back me up. His English isn't great, but with a few disjointed phrases and an elaborate mime he was able to verify that my doubts had already been in place. He has a trustworthy expression, and she was able to accept that my love just wasn't strong enough for us to enter into marriage. After she'd had a little cry, I reassured her that we could still be friends.

‘But what about the tiger?' she asked. She had always been so fond of animals. ‘They didn't kill it, did they?' Her eyes widened with concern. ‘Tell me they didn't kill it.'

They had killed it, though—they'd shot it through the face with a giant gun. Demetrio provided her with a speculative re-enactment of its final moments, and she fell into a fresh wave of sobs. Dealing with that kind of thing was no longer my responsibility, and after weighing up my options I decided to leave her to it.

Hoping to save our marriage, I wouldn't agree to my wife's request for a divorce. We ended up in front of a judge, who took one look at her and one look at me, and started laughing. ‘Do you seriously think I'm going to make
her
stay married to
you
?'

My now-ex-wife gave me one of her
I told you so
looks, and as usual I had no choice but to concede that she had been right all along.

‘You always try to see the funny side of a situation, don't you?' said my wife. I nodded enthu­siastically, wondering what she was going to tell me. ‘Here's a situation for you,' she said. ‘I'm leaving.'

No matter how hard I looked, I couldn't see a funny side. I asked her to help me find the humour.

‘Do you remember that time you told me I was way out of your league, and how you were worried that one day I would find somebody a lot more handsome than you, and much, much better in bed? Well, now I have. That's funny, isn't it?'

I stood frozen.

‘Couldn't you at least
pretend
to find it amusing?' she snapped, clearly running out of patience.

I had hoped never to disappoint her, and using all that remained of my strength I forced my lips into a grin. A sob escaped me, and I did my best to turn it into a chuckle.

‘That's better,' she said, picking up her holdall. ‘I don't feel so bad now.' As she walked down the garden path and out of my life, I could see my smiling face reflected in her tight, black PVC mini skirt.

I was delighted when my scientist girlfriend agreed to become my fiancée. ‘This is the happiest moment of my life,' I said.

‘Mine, too,' she replied. ‘I'm experiencing an unprecedented rush of dopamine and norepinephrine. Of course the production of these particular neurotransmitters will decrease over time, but I have a pretty good feeling that our vasopressin levels will remain adequate, and we'll be fine for the long haul. But never mind all that,' she said, taking off her goggles and unbuttoning her lab coat. ‘What do you say we release a bit of the old oxytocin?'

When I knew for sure that I wasn't going to get better, and that time was running out, I summoned all my inner strength and tearfully told my wife that she wasn't to feel bad about moving on. ‘You're a young, attractive woman with so much ahead of you,' I said. ‘I don't want you growing old alone. When you feel ready to let somebody else into your life, then you should—with my blessing.'