What’s Love Got to Do With It?
I can’t stop looking at them. “Are they happier than us?”
“Huh? Who?”
I nudge him with my foot. “Them. That cutesey couple over there. Do you think they’re happier than us?” He pulls a face at me and goes back to scrolling the BBC news page on his phone while I take a worried sip of coffee.
Those two have obviously been together a while – they’re sharing a coffee and they’ve got a dog. Maybe we should get a dog. They say it’s like a trial baby, don’t they? They seem very relaxed with each other. We’re not; I’m tense.
I wonder if those two argue? I bet they don’t. We argue a lot. It’s me that usually starts it; he must wonder sometimes if it’s all been worth it. I know I do. I just can’t get what she said out of my head. That last time I saw her, she was carrying a box out of their – our – house, the last one to go in the van. It had all her toiletries in it and, I guess because I wasn’t there to see her taking out the rest, it just looked really forlorn, like everything she owned was in that box – her only worldly goods a Dove roll-on and some hair straighteners.
“Building your own happiness on someone else’s misery makes for very unstable foundations,” she hissed at me as she got in the van. I ran up the steps and through the front door before she could see me crying. He tells me not to be silly – it was his choice, I didn’t do anything wrong – but still, sometimes it feels like she cursed us when she said that.
