At the end of the day, after battling gridlocked roads due to an accident on Trent Bridge, I walk straight into the kitchen, where Shaun is preparing tea.

‘You’re earlier than I expected. Maize is at your mum’s, so sit down, I’ll pour you a glass of wine.’ He nods to the counter, where the bottle of the full-blooded Rioja we bought in Spain last year sits open and breathing, next to two crystal wine glasses we received as a wedding gift. We’d left one bottle unopened, vowing to drink it when there was reason to celebrate. I’m pretty certain this wasn’t what I had in mind.

‘I’ll just have some water, if that’s OK,’ I say tersely.

As a rule, I try not to drink alcohol and to eat a little more healthily during the week. It isn’t always easy to stick to it and I probably won’t manage it tonight. Judging by the smell emanating from the bubbling pan, Shaun has cooked his signature spaghetti bolognese, and annoyed or not, I’m not about to refuse that.

I sit down in the easy chair near the wall-mounted television. The news is on but thankfully has been muted. From here I have a good view of the garden, and it’s nice not to have the hum of the office in my ears.

We had the extension done two years ago. Before that, the kitchen had been adequate enough but was a long and narrow space with no room for eating. I recall a happy, boozy evening, just the two of us in the lounge with the French doors thrown open, planning the new space we’d use for family living. I loved the idea that the person doing the cooking would easily be able to interact with other family members and guests, rather than be screened off from all the fun.

This was back in the days when we still used to have friends over regularly for a late supper of seafood risotto or Shaun’s legendary spag bol, washed down with copious amounts of wine and followed by thick slices of my home-made lemon drizzle cake with good coffee.

We haven’t done the friends thing for a long time now. Both of us so busy with work and… well, with life itself. And we soon realised that awkward questions from other people were far more easily avoided when we kept ourselves to ourselves.

During the past twelve months, I found myself avoiding the kitchen living space when I could. It was too open, with nowhere to hide when the bristling frustrations crackled like electricity between the two of us. They seemed to gather strength when I spent time in there with him.

But after we made the new arrangement, the animosity seemingly dissolved into thin air, leaving me, finally, with some space to breathe.

Until he started seeing Joanne, when it became apparent that the negative feelings hadn’t really dissolved at all.

Shaun has barely been home in the evenings for the past two weeks. Looking back, I’m now realising that the way he walked around in a daze with a faint smile on his lips, should have made it obvious that he was in love.

At work, Joanne has taken to sending messages about the cases I’m working on through one of the other paralegals. I’ve barely seen anything of her apart from at the dance studio, where she appears briefly to pick up Piper, steering well clear of me.

I shift around, struggling to get comfy despite the soft cushions.

I can feel the old frustrations making a spectacular comeback, nipping at the edges of my thoughts.

‘Forgive me for insisting about the wine.’ He pushes a coaster across the coffee table and places a large glass of Rioja in front of me. I open my mouth to object, but he sits down on the adjacent sofa and speaks first. ‘It’s not a water night, Emma. I think we both need a glass of wine.’

There he goes again, thinking he knows what’s best for me.

Despite myself, I pick up the glass and take a big gulp of the ruby liquid, allowing it to sit a moment in my mouth so I can savour the intense flavours of blackberry, cherries and, I think, the faintest hint of dark chocolate.

Shaun got me into tasting wine rather than just swilling it down. It was an interest we shared, for a while, at least.

I close my eyes and track the warmth as it slides down from my throat to my stomach.

My hand moves towards the glass again and I intercept it, tuck it under my thigh. I need to keep my wits about me.

‘We talked this through at length. Our marriage… us, we’re not working. You agreed, I agreed. We can’t keep constantly going over it.’

He sighs and clasps his fingers between his splayed knees. He hangs his head and stares down at the tiled floor. He’s thirty-six in a month’s time, and I can see tiny glints of grey in the soft new growth of chestnut-brown hair at the nape of his neck.

‘I want to do my fair share, Em, and I want to spend time with Maisie too. But I’m sorry, I just can’t work around our current agreement.’

He’s not sorry at all. There’s a smugness playing around his mouth and eyes, and I stand up, suddenly furious.

‘Fifty-fifty care for Maisie and fifty-fifty on the household chores. That was the agreement.’

His eyes appraise me coolly, but he doesn’t speak.

‘I’m not willing to do more than half, so I don’t know how there’s any flexibility.’ I clench my fists to stop my fingers from trembling.

‘I’m happy to do my share, just not every night,’ he says, his manner infuriatingly laconic. ‘I could have Maisie say on a Sunday, maybe Saturday afternoon. You should be able to get your work done then.’

He stands up, struts over to the glass doors like a peacock with his chest all puffed out, staring at his own reflection. Where is the man without any self-esteem, without any real belief in his own abilities? Where is the man I married, who used to irritate me with his lack of drive and ambition? Dithering about whether he was good enough to run an evening photography course at the local college, or staring wistfully at the full-colour spreads of the freelance photographers who worked for the big national newspapers.

‘If they can do it, so can you,’ I told him numerous times. ‘You just have to believe in yourself.’

‘I’ve realised that my time is now, Emma,’ he says evenly. ‘And I intend on making it count, whatever it takes. You need to understand that.’

‘Well, whatever planet you’re currently residing on, I have a wake-up call for you. You have a daughter who deserves your time and attention.’

‘I’ve made a decision,’ he says quietly, as if I haven’t spoken. ‘It’s not something I’ve arrived at lightly, Emma. I want you to know that.’

I fold my arms. He has my full attention now, but he’s stopped speaking.

‘So… are you going to tell me what this momentous decision is or not?’

I’m not entirely sure what I expect him to say, but I think it may well involve me staying at home and looking after Maisie while he gads off on holiday with Joanne. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he announces he’s going on a work trip somewhere.

I swallow hard at the thought. If he does say something like that, there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it. He knows that I’ll always be here for Maisie and that I have Mum to help out too.

All the equal care we’ve been striving towards was never real, not really. I see now that it’s all too easy for him to take off and leave everything to me because there’s always been an unspoken deal between us, as there must be with hundreds of thousands of other parents.

When the chips are down, the mother is the one who is expected to step into the breach.

Despite his initial confidence, Shaun is fidgeting now. Biting his thumbnail and tapping the toe of his shoe on the kitchen floor. I’ve known him long enough to recognise all the signs of his discomfort.

I widen my eyes. ‘Well? I’m waiting.’ I stand up and walk over to the kitchen counter.

‘I… I’m moving out.’

His voice is calm and quiet. He stops biting his thumbnail. He presses his fidgety foot flat to the floor and stands very still.

I slide my hands out to the sides and grip the worktop behind me.

‘I just need some space. I think we both need some space, Em.’

‘You think we need some space?’

‘Yes.’

‘But we have our space, Shaun. Yes, we have a commitment to our arrangement, but after that, we have our own space to do whatever—’

‘I just can’t do it any more,’ he says shortly. ‘This stupid arrangement, I mean. I don’t know what we were thinking of, or why you even suggested it.’

I lean back against the counter, feel the cool, hard quartz cutting into the bottom of my back.

‘Well, I’ll remind you. We were thinking of Maisie. Of how we can minimise the effect on her of us splitting up. And it might have been my suggestion initially, but you agreed with it. You agreed with all of it.’

‘I know I did. But now… well, I’ve changed my mind.’ He runs a hand through his hair. ‘I’m allowed to change my mind, because it’s not working. It just isn’t.’

I laugh bitterly. ‘I wonder why that is? There’s a sense you’re moving on to bigger and better things, perhaps?’

‘I knew you’d be like this.’ He shakes his head. ‘I want us to stay friends, for Maisie’s sake. I’m trying to make this as easy as I can, Emma.’

‘Easy for you.’ I feel the edge of the worktop grazing against my grasping fingers. ‘Not so easy for me to effectively be a single mum to Maisie, keep this house running and my own career on track. While you flounce around like a lovesick sixteen-year-old.’

‘I’ll still pay my share of the bills,’ he says.

‘That’s really good of you,’ I remark. ‘I don’t need to remind you that in a court of law, you’d be expected to do just that. Where is it you’re moving to?’

But of course I already know.

He looks at me and I look back at him. The air is thick with an awful silence that actually hurts my ears.

The love that used to bind us together has gone.

It’s melted into thin air and left behind it a space big enough to accommodate just about every negative feeling you could name.

‘I’m moving in with Joanne. I’m there most of the time now anyway.’

‘Wow. How long has it been? Is it even three weeks yet? Sounds a considered, sensible decision.’

‘What we have is very rare. I hope you find it for yourself some day.’

The draining board is full of dirty breakfast crockery waiting to be loaded into the dishwasher. He hasn’t bothered to clear up before he starts to cook dinner.

It crosses my mind to take each piece and throw it as hard as I can at him.

‘That’s quite a turnaround in opinion after your determination to keep things stable for Maisie for the foreseeable,’ I say, just about managing to keep my cool. ‘You must be taking advice from someone who’s got strong views on our marriage and our daughter’s well-being.’

He looks down at his feet with a faint smile, as if I’m conforming to every bad thing he thinks of me.

‘I’m not here to argue, Em. Just to tell you about my decision. We’ve already done the hard bit, agreeing that our marriage is at an end. This is just a change of heart about our living arrangements, that’s all.’

‘A change of heart for you, maybe. For me, it changes everything. I’ll have a house and our daughter to look after. And tell me, are there plans for Maisie to play a part in your exciting new life?’

‘Of course.’ Two dark red spots are blooming nicely on his cheeks. ‘Joanne and I are going to take the girls out for the day and explain it all to them.’

‘Sounds like you’ve thought of everything, Shaun. You’ve certainly moved fast; made more decisions than you have in the whole of our marriage, in fact.’

My eyes bore into him and he looks away.

‘Right, well, I’ll pack a few things to tide me over until we can sort out the best time to—’

‘You can take everything now,’ I say.

‘What? I can’t do that.’

‘I’ll take Maisie out for the day after dance on Saturday morning. Get your stuff out then.’

‘Emma. Why are you being so unreasonable about this?’

‘Get what you need until Saturday and go,’ I say, struggling to keep the tears at bay. ‘I don’t want you here when Maisie comes back with my mum.’

He sighs, shakes his head and then turns and leaves the room.

I sink down against the kitchen cupboards and bury my head in my hands.

My life is a failure. Just like my dad always said it would be.

I hear shoes shuffling on the floor and something being pulled from the coat cupboard. The front door opens and closes with a soft click behind him.

It feels like there’s been a power shift between us. I used to be the sure one, the main instigator of going our separate ways, although Shaun didn’t put up too much of a fight.

Now he’s just walked out on me after saying his piece. I feel stung, although I’m not sure I know why.

I sit back down and stare into the ruby depths of my wine, noticing how the glimmer of the overhead lights reflects on its surface, but deeper down, the liquid remains unctuous and dull.

As if nothing could ever burn bright enough to illuminate its murky depths.