Ronnie sat back in his chair and picked up his lager, taking a long swig before banging the bottle back down on the table. ‘Nothing’s wrong.’
‘Well, I think it is. Every time I ask you anything about Karen you become, well, evasive, almost. As if you don’t want to talk about her.’
‘That’s because I don’t.’
Amber stared at him, his words taking her aback slightly. She hadn’t actually expected that. ‘Why?’ Her voice was quieter now, less confrontational.
Ronnie said nothing, just threw his head back and closed his eyes, letting out a heavy sigh. ‘I said I didn’t want to talk about it.’
Suddenly Amber noticed something she couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed before. ‘You’re not wearing your wedding ring.’
He opened his eyes and sat up, looking down at his left hand. ‘No. I’m not.’
‘Why?’
‘You’re asking a lot of questions tonight.’
‘With good reason, it would appear. What’s going on, Ronnie?’
He sat forward, putting his head in his hands. ‘It’s complicated, Amber.’
‘Okay.’ She got up and went back over to the fridge, taking out a couple more bottles of lager before sitting back down at the table. ‘Looks like we’re gonna be here for a while so we might as well have another drink.’
‘Should you be indulging in too much alcohol? I thought you were trying for a baby,’ Ronnie said, twisting the cap off his second bottle.
‘Not right this second I’m not, so shut up, drink up, and tell me what’s going on.’
He took a small swig and sat back again, looking down into his bottle as he spoke. ‘Karen and I… we aren’t married anymore.’
Amber frowned, trying to take in what he was telling her. What did he mean, they weren’t married anymore? She’d seen them get married with her own eyes, just a few weeks ago. ‘I… don’t understand.’
He looked at her, his eyes meeting hers as he carried on speaking. ‘I knew it was a mistake the second I saw her standing there, in the register office. I knew it, I felt it, Amber, right there in the pit of my stomach. It was all-consuming, screaming at me to stop it from happening but I… I couldn’t do it. I wasn’t strong enough to go with my convictions, to listen to my heart because there was no…’
‘No what, Ronnie?’
He looked back down into his bottle for a few seconds. ‘I thought it was just nerves; I thought they’d disappear and that everything would be all right once the ceremony was out of the way and we were finally married again. I thought everything would just click right back into place, but I was wrong.’
‘I still don’t understand. I mean, you seemed fine on the day; you seemed to enjoy the reception… Ronnie, I don’t understand…’
‘I guess I’m better at hiding my feelings than I thought I was.’ He looked at her again. ‘Mind you, I’ve learned from the best on that score, haven’t I?’
Amber ignored that comment and took a swig of her own beer. ‘So… so what’s … ?’ She stopped talking, because she didn’t actually know what to say. She’d been expecting him to say that he and Karen had had a big row or something, that their second attempt at marriage was just going through a few teething troubles. She hadn’t expected this. ‘You said… you said you weren’t married anymore, Ronnie. What… what do you mean by that? How can you not be married anymore?’
He leaned forward, putting his bottle of lager down and resting his elbows on the table, his hands sliding round the back of his neck. ‘The marriage has been annulled, Amber. It’s over. Finished.’
Amber’s frown deepened. ‘Annulled?’ Now she was really confused. Surely it wasn’t that easy to end a marriage so quickly, just like that?
Ronnie looked at her. ‘We had this huge row on our wedding night. It was a killer, a real battle of words, and believe me, kiddo, it appeared she hadn’t really wanted to marry me again, either… Jesus, what a fucking mess…’
Amber didn’t know what to say. What could you say in a situation like this? When you didn’t really understand exactly what was going on.
‘She’s pregnant, Amber.’
Amber’s head shot up as she stared at him, every hidden, pushed-aside feeling she was trying to keep buried flooding through her at breakneck speed. ‘Pregnant?’ Even saying the word was hard.
‘It’s not my baby.’ Ronnie’s voice was quiet, resigned, almost. Sad. And that in itself made Amber sad, too.
‘Ronnie… Oh, Jesus, I’m… I don’t know what to say.’
‘There are only a handful of reasons why you can get a marriage annulled so quickly,’ Ronnie went on, his eyes back on his lager bottle, ‘… and it would appear that being pregnant with a baby that isn’t your husband’s is one of them. Otherwise I’d have been waiting for yet another divorce to come through. She’s made a right fool of me this time, Amber. And I can’t believe I let her. Again.’
Amber was speechless. She really didn’t know what to say. ‘I… why didn’t you say something, Ronnie? I’m your best friend; I would have been there for you.’
‘You’d just married Jim, and you were so happy. You were so, so happy, Amber, and I didn’t want to throw cold water over your happiness by bothering you with my problems.’
‘Bothering me? Ronnie, Jesus, come on! What happened to my problems are your problems? It works both ways, you know.’
He got up, walking over to the kitchen window, looking out over the small back garden, which was nothing more than a decked patio area decorated with a few potted shrubs. The sun was just beginning to set, casting a warm orange glow over the cream countertops.
‘I should never have let it happen,’ Ronnie said, staring straight ahead, his hands in his pockets. Amber walked up behind him, her arms circling his waist, her chin resting on his shoulder.
‘I really thought you were happy, being back with Karen.’
‘She lied to me, Amber. She lied in the worst possible way.’ He turned round sharply, causing Amber to quickly let go of him. ‘I mean, what exactly did she think she was going to gain by lying like that? Huh?’ He leaned back against the counter, pushing a hand through his hair. ‘It’s not like you can hide a pregnancy forever, is it? What the hell was she playing at, letting things get that far?’
Amber hated seeing him like this. She wanted him to be as happy as she was, to have finally found that one person you know you’re going to grow old with. But even she had to admit that, in the back of her mind, she’d had her doubts about Ronnie and Karen getting back together. She hadn’t said anything at the time because she’d thought Ronnie was happy, and that was all that mattered. His happiness. However, if she’d had even the tiniest inkling that he’d been feeling this way she would have voiced those doubts. She would have voiced them in a heartbeat.
‘Have you talked to her? Properly, I mean,’ Amber asked, folding her arms as she watched him stare down at the ground, his hands back in his pockets.
‘Of course I’ve talked to her.’ He sighed heavily, throwing his head back and closing his eyes. ‘I’m asking myself rhetorical questions because I still can’t get my head around it all, not really. Sometimes it just feels so surreal…’
‘I’m assuming the baby… It’s Frankie Greenham’s?’ Frankie Greenham was the man Karen had left Ronnie for the first time round. He was another big-name footballer, a goalkeeper for Kenway Town, one of the league’s biggest North West-based clubs.
Ronnie nodded, his