Love... And Sleepless Nights MAY 2012 by Nick Spalding Read Free Book Online

steered his mother away from sensitive questions regarding his marriage to Helena the Portuguese barmaid, and Sarah was pleased to announce she’d lost eight pounds in the last month.
    It seems like the appropriate time to drop the bombshell.
    Jamie tinks a fork on the side of his glass. I don’t know why he does this as there are only six of us present, but he likes to obey these little customs from time to time.
    ‘Stop doing that Jamie,’ his mother says. ‘You’ll set off my tinnitus.’
    ‘Sorry mum.’ He coughs and takes the legendary deep breath. ‘Laura and I have an announcement to make.’
    ‘Oh God, you’re getting a divorce, aren’t you?’ Sarah says from around the bread roll she is stuffing into her mouth.
    Jamie’s face crumples. ‘No, we are not getting a divorce. Why does everyone think we’re getting a bloody divorce? Do we give off divorcey vibes? Are you lot privy to some highly advanced precognitive abilities I’m not aware of?’ He takes a massive swig of wine in disgust and folds his arms. ‘Honestly, you try to tell people something important and they just make groundless assumptions,’ he mutters under his breath.
    ‘Don’t slouch Jamie,’ Jane tells him. ‘It makes you look like a naughty school boy. Sit up straight.’
    ‘Mum! I’m thirty two years old, for crying out loud. Don’t tell me how to sit!’
    ‘Don’t speak to your mother like that, son,’ Michael pipes up.
    ‘You do slouch a lot Jamie,’ Sarah adds. ‘You always have.’
    ‘Yeah? Well you’ve got an idiot for a face,’ Jamie sneers at her.
    ‘You’re such a badger’s sack, Jamie!’ Sarah wailed and the conversation descended into the kind of bickering only family members have perfected through decades of practice.
    It’s giving me a headache though, so I decide to nip things in the bud.
    ‘I’m pregnant!’ I say over the tumult.
    Everyone stops talking at once.
    Silence - pregnant silence, you might say - descends.
    Then Jane, looking squarely at my husband, says something that gives me a really good idea of her true feelings for me. ‘Is it yours?’ she says in a level tone.
    I’ve never stepped into a walk-in freezer, but I imagine the experience is much like our dining room at that moment.
    ‘Of course it’s mine!’ Jamie is livid. I just struggle not to burst into tears. ‘What the hell kind of shit is that to say, mother?’
    ‘Don’t swear, Jamie!’ Michael says.
    Jamie gives him daggers. ‘Oh sod off Dad, you swear like a paralytic docker when mum’s not around. You even did it when we were kids, so knock off the responsible parent act, okay?’
    Jane swings around to stare at her husband. ‘Michael Newman!’
    Michael swigs his beer. ‘Oh fucking hell woman, calm down. A bit of swearing never hurt anyone.’
    ‘Apologise to Laura,’ Jamie orders his mother in a cold voice.
    Chris, who has wisely stayed silent, slowly moves his chair backwards and removes his glass of wine from the table. There’s an air of resignation about his movements that suggest he’s been in the middle of one of these squabbles on many occasions.
    ‘Well…’ Jane begins and then pauses with a look of severe consternation on her face. You can see how hard it is for her to even contemplate the idea of apologising to another human being.
    Jamie has told me stories in the past that have made her out to be a harridan of the highest order. I’ve always taken them with a pinch of salt, knowing how he likes to embellish for the sake of a good yarn - but now I’m starting to realise he may have been telling the truth after all. The woman’s pretty much just intimated that I go around shagging other men.
    ‘Say sorry!’ Jamie snaps, and for added emphasis bangs his hand on the table. Sadly his fist hits the fork still on his plate, neatly catapulting a healthy amount of bolognaise at my head.
    Within the space of a minute I’ve been called a slut and had food thrown at me.
    This usually doesn’t