What Holly's Husband Did

A laugh-out-loud romantic comedy with a twist!

Debbie Viggiano

Books by Debbie Viggiano

Lucy’s Last Straw

The Man You Meet in Heaven

What Holly’s Husband Did

Stockings and Cellulite

Lipstick and Lies

Flings and Arrows

The Perfect Marriage

Secrets

The Corner Shop of Whispers

The Woman Who Knew Everything

Mixed Emotions ~ short stories

The Ex Factor (family drama)

Lily’s Pink Cloud ~ a child’s fairytale

100 ~ the Author’s experience of Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Lucy’s Last Straw

Hear more from Debbie

Books by Debbie Viggiano

The Man You Meet in Heaven

A Letter from Debbie

Acknowledgements

For Kathryn Taussig with immense gratitude

One

‘You only do it once a month?’ asked Jeanie, her brow knitting. ‘But that’s terrible, Holly. Don’t you like sex?’

I pursed my lips and did a bit of eye-rolling for effect. If only she knew the truth. Instead I said, ‘What’s wrong with once a month?’

Jeanie pulled a face. ‘Nothing. If you’re fifty.’

‘My husband has a stressful job. Have you any idea how many mouths Alex peers into every day?’

‘Good thing Alex isn’t a gynaecologist then,’ said Jeanie with a sniff. ‘Scrutinising umpteen fannies Monday to Friday must be a major turn-off.’

‘Do you have to be so coarse?’

‘Hark at you!’ said my best friend, adopting a highfalutin voice. ‘I remember when you used to like nothing more than discussing the number of times we all did it – and how and where. Didn’t you let Malcolm Hodge give you one in the back of his dad’s car?’

‘Most certainly not,’ I lied. ‘You must be thinking of Caro.’

‘I could have sworn it was you,’ said Jeanie, her eyes narrowing with suspicion.

‘Talking of Caro, where is she?’ I was anxious to get off the subject of sex and what we’d all got up to pre-marriage. That was the downside of still being mates with two besties from your secondary-school years. Caro and Jeanie knew all my secrets, as I did theirs. The good, the bad and the downright filthy. But talking about sexual adventures as giggling eighteen-year-olds was one thing. Discussing it a couple of decades later just seemed wrong.

‘I did text her and invite her for a cuppa after the school run.’

‘Caro had to take Joe to the dentist.’

‘Really? Alex didn’t mention he was seeing Joe today.’

‘She’s taken him to an NHS dentist.’

‘Why?’ I asked in surprise. ‘Alex has always seen Joe. What’s happened to change things?’

‘Cost,’ said Jeanie simply. ‘Your hubby charges like a wounded rhino.’

‘Have you any idea how expensive it is to run your own practice?’ I replied, put out.

‘But do you have any idea how many fillings Joe needs?’ countered Jeanie.

‘Well Caro shouldn’t allow her son to scoff so many sweets,’ I huffed. ‘That boy has amalgam in every other tooth and recently had two extractions.’

‘I didn’t know that,’ Jeanie said, raising her eyebrows.

‘And nor are you meant to,’ I added hastily, realising I’d been remarkably indiscreet about patient confidentiality.

‘Anyway, enough about Caro,’ said Jeanie, topping up her mug from the enormous teapot hogging half the kitchen table. ‘You were saying…?’

‘Saying what?’ I replied, deliberately vague as I gazed beyond my kitchen window. In the late afternoon sunshine of an early and very golden September, the garden still looked beautiful, although autumn had made her presence known, touching some of the trees and turning several leaves lemon and brown.

‘You know perfectly well,’ said Jeanie crossly. ‘You were telling me about your sex life.’

‘No, you were asking nosy questions.’

Jeanie took a noisy slurp of tea. ‘It’s nothing to be ashamed of, you know. When did you go off it? Recently? Or years ago? Is that why you only had one child?’

‘For goodness’ sake, Jeanie. What is this, an inquisition?’ I picked up the teapot and stalked over to the kettle, flicking the switch.

‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you,’ Jeanie said, nodding at the kettle before helping herself to an ‘Extra Special’ biscuit. Special or not, they tasted like chocolate cardboard.

‘Do what?’ I growled.

‘There’s no water in it.’

I snatched the kettle from its base just as it made a strangled noise and puffed a scalding cloud of steam over my wrist.

‘Bugger,’ I squeaked, nearly dropping the wretched thing. Turning on my heel, I stomped over to the sink and stuck the kettle under the tap. A fountain of water immediately rose up, hitting me squarely in the chest and drenching my top.

‘It helps if you flip back the lid,’ my friend pointed out.

‘Thank you,’ I snapped. ‘I’d forgotten you had a degree in Stating the Bleeding Obvious.’

‘My, my, my,’ Jeanie blew out her cheeks, ‘we are in a tizzy today.’

‘I am not in a tizzy.’ I grabbed a tea towel and mopped my bosoms in agitation.

‘Two minutes ago you were gleefully gossiping about Alex’s practice manager and how her bunions were worse than Victoria Beckham’s, but the moment the conversation veered towards good old-fashioned bonking, you got all hot and bothered and started chucking water around the kitchen. Your face matches the colour of your kettle.’

I switched on the bright red cause of my soaking, and briefly drummed my fingernails on the worktop as we waited for it to boil. I broke off to stab a forefinger in Jeanie’s direction. ‘I’ll have you know that my sex life is AMAZING.’

‘Oh grim,’ said my daughter, pushing through the kitchen door, her customary scowl in place. Sophie, not quite fourteen, tossed a look of disgust in my direction. ‘The last thing a child wants to know is that her parents still do it. Especially at your age.’

Jeanie hid a smile in the palm of her hand while I volleyed back my daughter’s glare.

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ I blustered, my face now the colour of an aubergine and probably clashing violently with the hateful kettle. ‘Jeanie and I were… were practising our lines. We’re thinking about starting up an amateur dramatics group.’

‘In that case, you’ll be a natural…’ Sophie gave me a withering look as she raided the biscuit tin, ‘because there can’t be many actresses who are able to blush to order.’

I turned away, letting my hair fall across my flaming face as I refilled the teapot and tossed another teabag in for good measure. Behind me the door slammed. Sophie had left the kitchen – the child was incapable of shutting a door quietly. I swear that the very second my beautiful, cuddly, super sweet, smiley baby had blown out the thirteen candles on her birthday cake, she’d morphed into a sullen, bad-tempered, sneering stranger with more lip curl than an angry Rottweiler.

‘Blimey, you’re so red I can feel the heat coming off you from here.’ Jeanie picked up my latest copy of a gossip magazine and began fanning herself.

‘Oh do give over,’ I said sulkily, banging the teapot down on the table.

‘You’ll be telling me you’re menopausal next.’

‘I know someone who went through the menopause at thirty-eight,’ I huffed.

‘Holly, we both know you’re not going through the change’ – Jeanie arched an eyebrow – ‘and judging by the way you fluttered your eyelashes at the proprietor of Serafino’s Cucina last week, you’re clearly not past it either.’

‘Luca Serafino is married. I wouldn’t dream of flirting with someone else’s husband.’

‘Hmm, try telling your eyeballs that. Every time he came over to our table your pupils dilated to the size of his meatballs – and we all know how big they are.’

‘I’ve had enough of this,’ I said, feeling a rant coming on. ‘You’ll be shining lights in my eyes and threatening torture next.’

Jeanie reached across the kitchen table and took my hand. ‘Hey,’ she said gently, ‘I’m one of your oldest friends. I’m concerned, that’s all. It just seems that, well, lately you’ve not looked very happy, and I wondered if it might have to do with you and Alex.’

‘I’m deliriously happy!’ I snarled. ‘Listen, Jeanie, just because Alex doesn’t come home to a wife dressed like a French maid, who pulls him by his tie up to the bedroom, whips down his trousers and proceeds to tickle his fancy with her feather duster, does not mean there is anything wrong with us between the sheets. I mean, do you and Ray still rip each other’s clothes off the moment he comes home from the office?’

‘I’d like to,’ answered Jeanie calmly, ‘but regrettably the kids are always around.’

‘But… but you can’t possibly!’ I protested. ‘You’ve been married the same number of years as me and Alex.’

‘A year longer, actually,’ Jeanie reminded. ‘Sixteen years of wedded bliss to your fifteen.’

‘Well bully for you.’

Jeanie’s prying had touched a nerve, although she didn’t know the whole reason why. I’d considered my marriage perfectly happy until last Christmas when, quite by accident, I’d happened upon a series of flirty texts on my husband’s mobile. If the sexts hadn’t made Alex’s trousers swell, they’d certainly made my eyeballs bulge. And overnight, everything had changed.