C.J. Skuse - Sweetpea - The most unique and gripping thriller of 2017

We’d planned to do so much this week – stuff we never got round to do when we’re both at work: power-spraying the bird shit on the balcony, sorting out boxes for the mythical car-boot-sale-we’re-never-going-to-do, and Craig was going to clear out the mountain of rubbish and offcuts of wood from the back of his van and then paint the bathroom. We had one day left before we both went back to work and we’d done precious little. Craig had made a start on the wall above the toilet on Christmas Eve – a little surprise for me for when I got home from work, to keep me sweet before he mentioned he’d invited the boys around again to watch Boxing Day football on Sky. But when I’d seen the colour, I did not like the colour.

‘Mineral Mist, I said!’

‘I got Mineral Mist, see?’ He held up the tin. It said Morning Mist.

I took Tink for a walk at lunch as Craig was playing Streetfighter and making bacon sandwiches and the smell was making me dribble (I’m trying not to have bread because ass). I like looking in people’s gardens on our walks. I miss having a garden. There were all sorts of Christmas debris strewn about the pavements. Smashed baubles. Strings of tinsel. Half-chewed sweets. A carrier bag blew across the road out of somebody’s bin and Tink had a conniption, probably waking up half the country. Of all the things in this world my dog hated the most, sneezes, spaniels and rogue carrier bags flying at her as if from nowhere were definitely the Top Three.

Tried teaching her Shake a Paw again, the one trick she won’t do under any circumstances – still nothing.

Craig sorted out all his unwanted Blu-rays for the car-bootsale-we’re-never- going-to-do and pressure-washed the balcony with our new pressure washer, a Christmas gift from his mum and dad. I waxed my legs and drove over to my mum and dad’s house late afternoon. All quiet on the Western Front. Still can’t get the stains out of the bedroom carpet. Craig is still buying all my lies about ‘going to Cleo’s aerobics class’ and ‘working late; so I can go over there. It’s almost too easy.

Gave Tink a bath in the kitchen sink. She doesn’t like it but puts up with it because she always gets chicken bits afterwards. As I was trying to towel her off, she legged it round the flat like she had rabies. Craig laughed too, which broke the ice. Then he said he was ‘going over Homebase’ to get me the other paint. He said he needed some new wallpaper scissors for work as well.

I said, ‘Why don’t you just have my dad’s old wallpaper scissors from his toolkit? I was going over there tomorrow to sort out Mum’s filing cabinet. I can get them then.’

He said that meant a lot to him, like Dad was giving him his blessing from beyond the grave. The hallowed Tommy Lewis toolkit that Dad carried with him like an extra limb and Craig was never allowed to touch. I thought he was going to cry.

‘They’re just wallpaper scissors, Craig,’ I said. ‘It’s not an engagement ring.’

He nodded and left the room with a distinct clear of throat. I’m terrible with crying people. How do you make them stop? I deliberately caught the wrong bus once because a woman was blubbing in the bus shelter. Didn’t know what else to do.

Do I love him? I haven’t known what love is in a long time. He says he loves me but isn’t that just something that gets said? He told me on Christmas Eve that, coupled with the hand jobs and my excellent trifle, I’m almost the perfect girlfriend. I don’t nag him as much as his mates’ wives nag them either. I asked him what would make me perfect.

‘Anal,’ he said, no hesitation. ‘What would make me perfect?’ he asked.

Well, it’d be a start if you stopped shagging Lana Rowntree behind my back , I thought. Instead, I opted for the safer:

‘You can’t improve on perfection itself, can you, darling?’

He laughed and I flicked him a V sign behind the Radio Times .

Hi ho, hi ho, it’s back to my shitty job I go. Actually, there is a dwarf where I work – he’s upstairs in the Accounts department. He’s the reason we had all our light switches moved to three feet above the ground. Madness.

Today went as all days at the Gazette go – long, coffee-stained and dull. The first half was me telling anyone who asked what a good Christmas I had and some dull-as-ditch tasks of inputting local schools’ thank-you letters to Santa, updating the website and making coffee in the new £5,000 (yes, that’s £5,000!) coffee machine. There were four new mugs in the staffroom – Christmas presents no one wanted at home but which everyone wants at work because they’re clean. I nabbed one with dinosaurs on and the words TEA-REX. Hardy har.

The usual New Year signs have gone up everywhere, unstained and laminated. Signs telling professional adults helpful things like IF YOU’RE LAST OUT OF AN EVENING, PLEASE TURN OFF ALL THE LIGHTS and PLEASE WASH YOUR OWN CROCKERY. The toilets are full of them: PLEASE ONLY FLUSH TOILET TISSUE DOWN THE TOILET. PLEASE REPLACE TOILET PAPER IF YOU USE THE LAST PIECE. PLEASE TURN OFF THE TAPS AFTER USE . There’s even one as you leave, saying, PLEASE LEAVE THESE FACILITIES AS YOU FIND THEM – THANK YOU.

I’d like to suggest some new signs for the office, specifically for my benefit and/or amusement:

PLEASE REMEMBER TO WIPE YOUR ASS AFTERWARDS FOR THE GOOD OF YOUR GUSSET.

PLEASE CLOSE ALL DOORS QUIETLY, STAY HOME IF YOU ARE SICK, OR AT LEAST TRY TO DIMINISH YOUR SNEEZES – NOISE-SENSITIVE PSYCHOPATH IN THE BUILDING.

PLEASE DO NOT WEAR CROCS TO WORK – THEY ARE AN INSULT TO FOOTWEAR (MIKE HEATH –T HIS MEANS YOU).

DON’T DRINK SO MUCH OF THE OFFICE MILK – MIKE HEATH THE MILK THIEF THIS MEANS YOU TOO, WHAT WITH YOUR DAILY OVERFLOWING BOWLS OF CEREAL AND SIX CAPPUCCINOS.

PLEASE DON’T EAT CHEESY NACHOS OR FRIED BREAKFASTS AT YOUR DESK – THE SMELL MAKES US ALL WANT TO VOM.

PLEASE DON’T TELL RHIANNON LEWIS WHAT YOU DID AT THE WEEKEND – SHE WAS ONLY BEING POLITE.

The Gulp Monster – aka, Claudia Gulper, our desk editor – is responsible for the signs. She puts pass ag labels on her food in the staff-room fridge with the same marker. I stayed late tonight to help her with her article on the mismanagement of power-station funds, which she hopes is going to win her some big journalism prize (it won’t). I asked her to look at my unsolicited article about the rise of drug-related crime and we talked about my theory that the ladies’ dress shop Paint the Town Red was the hub of distribution. I thought it could earn me some extra Brownie points.

More fool I.

I’d liked Claudia for about five minutes when I’d first started at the Gazette as a receptionist but, nowadays, she treats me like some kind of home help. She insisted on giving me endless boring ‘News in Brief’ snippets to type up or deaf Golden Wedding couples to interview, and once shouted at me in front of everyone for missing three semi-colons in the Fun Run results – not to mention a billion other reasons for me to want to jump through the fucking window. I long ago decided she was just a pubic louse on the vaginal wall of the cunt witch from Hell. I’m glad her third round of IVF failed and her husband left her. No spawn deserves that for a mother.

Craig was cooking when I got home (guilt food, obvs). Pasta from scratch with home-made pesto. Since I only had an apple and a black coffee for breakfast and just a salad for lunch, I allowed myself a troughing.

It’s safer to have than to have not, isn’t it? Even if the Have is crap. And if you’re not with someone, you get questions about it, All. The. Time. When you’re hooked up, that all stops. You feel embraced in the safety of having someone. And other people are contented because they don’t have to worry about setting you up on blind dates or going out in couples with a walking gooseberry bush.