Chapter 1: The Writing on the Lid
I Let My Husband Go To The Pub With His Guys While I Put Our Three Kids To Bed — In The Morning I Found A Lasagna In My Fridge, With "FOR DADDY" Written On The Lid
Saturday.
Ryan asked about the match at about four, in that careful way he does it, already braced for me to say no.
I said go.
I meant it, too.
He'd done six days that week.
I had the three of them — six, four, and the baby, who is eleven months and still doesn't sleep — and I told him to go and have a pint and not rush back.
Bath, stories, the baby up twice, the four-year-old in our bed at eleven with a bad dream.
I went under at about midnight with her foot in my back.
I heard him come in at twenty past one.
The stairs, the tap running, him being quiet in the way that's louder than not bothering.
He was gone before seven.
He's on earlies all this month.
I came down at half eight with the baby on my hip to get her bottle out of the fridge.
And there it was on the middle shelf.
A glass dish with a blue lid.
Not mine.
I've got the cheap plastic ones from the supermarket and I've had the same six of them for years.
This was proper.
Heavy.
The kind you buy for yourself.
Lasagna.
A full one, barely touched, covered over neatly.
And on the lid, in marker, in handwriting that was not mine:
"FOR DADDY"
I stood there with my daughter on my hip and the fridge door open until the thing started beeping at me.
I got through the day.
School run, park, lunch, nap, tea.
I didn't phone him and I didn't message him, because I knew that whatever I typed at eleven in the morning I wouldn't be able to take back at six.
At twenty past five I heard the van on the drive.
I placed the dish in the middle of the kitchen table with the lid facing up, so the writing was the first thing you'd see coming through the door.
Then I sat down opposite it and waited.
He got two steps into the kitchen and stopped.
I watched him look at the table, and then at me, and the color drained from his face.
"Okay," he said.
"I know exactly what that looks like…
But I need you to listen, because it isn't that, and I swear the real reason is so stupid you're going to be angry at me for something completely different."
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May you like
What does Ryan mean — and who made that lasagna?
Comment **"NEXT"** if you want Part 2 in the comments.
