Back To Happiness

A daily walk puts things in a different light in this reflective short story by Marie Penman.

AS the late afternoon sunshine filtered in through the blinds, Jackie sat back on the carpet and admired her work.

The smell of fresh paint still lingered, but the walls looked amazing, soothing and clean in a pale duckegg blue.

The books were all stacked on the shelves and the new pot plants were arranged in colourful tubs in the corner of the room.

Best of all, the new sofa had just been delivered and fitted perfectly, hugging the corner and looking so inviting that Jackie got up off the floor and flopped on to it.

She smiled to herself. It had taken a while to get here, but this place felt like home.

Jackie lay on the sofa and stretched out, feeling relaxed, happy and excited. Most of all, she felt completely free.

It was hard to believe that a year ago she’d felt so trapped – and not just because of the lockdown the country had been under for months at a time.

Back when the pandemic struck, Jackie had been living at home with her husband, Steve.

Married for almost 30 years, with two grown-up children who had moved out years ago, they were plodding through life, both working full-time, and discussing whether to downsize from their four-bedroom house to something more manageable.

Except they couldn’t agree on what to do next.

Steve wanted to buy a small bungalow on one of the new estates on the edge of town, whilst Jackie had her heart set on a trendy apartment in the centre.

“We have to be practical,” Steve had insisted. “A bungalow will be best for when we can’t manage stairs.”

“Oh, come on, Steve!”

Jackie protested. “We’re fifty-five, not ninety-five!”

And so the arguments had gone round in circles with no decision being reached. Then came COVID.

Suddenly, Steve, who was an insurance broker in the city and for ever away at seminars and conferences, was confined to the house, working from his laptop in the diningroom.

Jackie, an office manager in a marketing company, was also working from home, but didn’t have much to do.

For the first couple of weeks, they prowled silently around the house, and each other, making cups of tea or watching daytime TV.

At least, Jackie did.

Steve simply closed the dining-room door and tapped away on his laptop for hours.

He’d stop for a sandwich at lunchtime, then ask what was for dinner that night before returning to his “desk”.

Jackie was bemused – when was the last time they had spent so long in each other’s company, and when exactly did they run out of things to say?

In week three of lockdown, she took the government’s advice and went for a walk.

It felt nice to get some fresh air, and being outdoors cleared her head and gave her time to think about the children, about the house and about her marriage.

Did all relationships simply fade into nothingness after so many years?

The flames of passion that had burned so brightly after their wedding had gradually been reduced to flickering embers, and now might well have gone out altogether.

Jackie didn’t want to think about what that meant in the long term.

By week four Jackie had bought herself a fitness tracker and some proper

All that time stuck indoors together had made Jackie and Steve think again about the future . . .

walking shoes (the joys of online shopping!) and was walking further each day.

Five thousand steps rose to 7,000 after a few more days, then 10,000 and more, and the daily walk became the highlight of her day.

She began to recognise the same faces on her route, mainly dog-walkers and young mums with prams.

As a further example of those strange times, they all began to say “Hello” to each other, and sometimes engaged in socially distanced chats.

Some days it felt like the only conversations Jackie had were with her fellow walkers. Steve was either buried in work, or playing chess matches online.

He had signed up for a website that allowed him to play strangers from across the world and devoted hours to the five or six games he had going at a time.

“I could play you,” Jackie suggested one day. “I used to play in the school chess team.”

Steve had just smiled and said he had to focus on work.

During those strange weeks of silence and walking, Jackie often thought back to when she and Steve were first married.

They’d been so mad about each other that she had often got tearful and clingy if he told her he had to go away for a night or two on business.

Yet, these past few years, she’d begun to look forward to his trips away.

Whole days and nights when she could eat whatever she wanted and watch whatever she fancied on the TV.

Jackie started measuring her walks in miles rather than steps, and when the guidelines relaxed to allow unlimited exercise rather than just an hour a day, she packed a picnic in her bag and walked further and further each week.

Sometimes she’d be gone for hours, wandering around different parts of town or through parks or along the coastal paths.

Jackie had never been a fan of exercise – running looked too hard; the gym seemed too competitive – but walking suited her. It was solitary, relaxing and strangely soothing.

She could feel her fitness improving and noticed that her clothes were feeling looser.

Could it be that after umpteen failed diets over the years, she’d finally found a way to shift the few extra pounds?

One night over dinner, Jackie brought up the subject of the house sale again.

“There’s not much we can do for now, is there?” Steve remarked as he shovelled pasta into his mouth.

“The estate agents are all shut and we can’t view any properties.”

“Well, how about I do a bit of DIY on this place, so we can put it on the market once lockdown ends?” Jackie suggested.

Steve shrugged. “Whatever you think.” He finished his pasta and headed back to his laptop.

Jackie sighed. Had he always been so robotic?

As April turned into May and the sun came out, Jackie tidied up the garden, cutting back overgrown bushes and renovating the lawn.

She still went on her walk every morning, but in the afternoons she set herself a chore to do in the house: either cleaning the fronts of kitchen cupboards or repainting the bathroom.

She dug around in the cupboard under the stairs and found several leftover tins of paint.

Once she’d worked out which rooms they were for, she repainted all the walls, just to freshen things up.

She fixed wonky door handles and regrouted the bathroom tiles; unblocked drains and reorganised the cupboard under the sink; sorted out her wardrobe and made up bags of stuff to take to the charity shop.

In short, she off-loaded what she didn’t need.

She went through the kids’ rooms, which were still full of junk even though they’d both moved out years ago, and got rid of bags full of unwanted clothes and books.

She cleared out DVDs and old magazines that seemed to belong to a bygone era and decided to aim for a minimalist look in the house.

It was amazing how much clutter could accumulate over 30 years! What exactly was the point in hanging on to it all?

By the time summer arrived, Jackie felt fitter, slimmer and less encumbered. She liked it.

She began to think about what she could get rid of next.

Then, on her walk one day, she had bumped into Carol, an old friend of hers from university.

They chatted for a while and, afterwards, Jackie remembered advice Carol had given her years ago, when Jackie had been sharing a flat in her second year at university with a girl called Sarah.

Sarah complained constantly, was never happy and often criticised Jackie for no good reason. Carol told Jackie to move out and find a new flat.

“It’s negative energy, Jackie – you don’t need that in your life.

“Surround yourself with positive energy and you’ll get on much better.”

And it was true. Jackie had moved out of the flat and immediately felt a lot happier.

She thought about her life now and wondered if it had too much negative energy in it.

She needed to make changes. As soon as the lockdown restrictions lifted, she booked an estate agent to value the house, and was shocked and surprised by how much it was worth – much more than either of them had expected.

Over dinner, she told Steve about the sudden and unexpected wealth they would have when they sold the house, and said it was time to decide whether to buy a bungalow or an apartment.

Steve stopped cutting his pork chop and looked at Jackie.

“Or we could buy both . . .” he said.

Jackie held his gaze. Was he saying what she thought he was saying?

“You mean, an apartment for me and a bungalow for you?” she asked hesitantly.

Just like that, without any drama or tears or fights, they agreed that their marriage was over, that they’d be happier apart and that it was time to plan for a different future.

“It’s negative energy, Jackie – you don’t need that”

Months later, Jackie was still amazed and delighted at how easy the whole process had been.

Now, she was living alone (and mortgage free!) in a stunning new apartment, with a lump sum in her bank account and the freedom to do whatever she wanted.

The children had been shocked when they’d told them they were getting divorced, but it came down to a simple fact: they didn’t want to spend the rest of their lives with each other.

It seemed so flimsy, explaining it to friends and family.

Steve had bought his bungalow on the new housing estate and was now “friends” with a woman he’d met through work.

Jackie was relieved – at least now she wouldn’t have to worry about him starving to death.

She smiled to herself and got up off her beautiful, comfy sofa.

Then she headed into her clean, minimalist bedroom and put on her shoes.

One thing hadn’t changed – it was time for her daily walk!

The End.