Forever Is Over (86 page)

“
Jemma, it
’
s not yesterday that I went out with your sister, it
’
s three
years ago. Kelly is just a memory to me now, whilst you
’
re here, sharing
a toilet with me, having the most bizarre, backwards midnight feast!
Now is not the time to feel bad about Kelly any more. We
’
ve done that.
Let
’
s move on.
”

Grabbing a rough looking towel to wipe my mouth, I replied,

“
Richie, I don
’
t know whether I can. You will always be Kelly
’
s ex.
Maybe it will always feel wrong.
”

“
I know where you are coming from, because at times it still feels
wrong to me, but other times it feels like the best thing in the world and
it feels like the best thing in the world more. We are not bad people.
Jemma, you have just sacrificed two and a half years of your life for a
crime that we both know you did not commit. You allowed yourself to
carry the can for your sister
’
s actions, so don
’
t feel bad about falling in
love with someone she abandoned three years ago.
”

I vomited a third time. Not much came out. It was just retching
now. It was becoming humiliating.

“
I didn
’
t say I was falling in love with you, Richie!
”

“
Then tell me you
’
re not!
”

“
I
’
m not! Falling implies that I
’
m still in the process of falling in
love. Listen carefully to this, Richie, as I don
’
t flatter people often, but
I have fallen in love, Richie. Every second I spent in Styal, I was just
thinking about the day I could come out and spend time with you.
That
’
s why it all feels so weird. I should feel fantastic now. I don
’
t. I just
feel guilt.
”

Richie rubbed my back as I continued to retch!

“
Look Jemma, when you
’
re sober, you are going to have to straighten
this out in your head. If you think you can handle it, I think we will be great together. If you don
’
t think you can, we can just call it quits, no
harm done.
”

“
Except that I have slept with you for a second time!
”

“
Second time?
”

“
The first was at the Birch
’
s party.
”

“
That wasn
’
t me, Jemma.
”

“
Yes, it was! Anyway, do you know what it is that is stopping me just going for this.
”

“
What?
”

“
Fear.
”

“
Fear of what?
”

“
Fear that I could be completely in love with you and then one day,
Kelly will come back, she
’
ll click her fingers and you
’
ll drop me like a
stone.
”

Even though I stunk, I looked dreadful and had vomit on my chin,
Richie placed his hand on my cheek and turned my face towards him,
before saying,

“
That won
’
t happen, Jemma. I promise you, that will never happen.
”

From the day I stepped out of prison, to the day we were married,
life was almost perfect. Granted, I had my moments of feeling t
etchy,
hopeless, in despair and totally fed up but I think God gave women
stormier waters, as we are the ones who have everything thrown at us in
life. God gave men calmer seas because he knew once their seas started
to get choppy that their boats would sink! To be fair, Richie is one of
the few exceptions to this rule, when God made Richie, he put some of the sterner stuff in.

My relationship with Richie kickstarted from when I left Styal.
In spite of the initial doubts, as each day passed I became increasingly
convinced that I needed Richie in my life. I needed him as a friend,
as a lover, as a calming influence and as a motivator when times were
tough.

Six months after leaving Styal, I moved out of Amy
’
s Mum and
Dad
’
s place and started to rent a smart, terraced house in Mill Street,
Ormskirk. My old school, Ormskirk Grammar was at the top of the
road, so if I was ever at home on a school day, it was really busy between
half eight and nine and then again between half three and four, but on
the whole, despite the odd can of Coke and Mars bar wrapper finding
its way on to my path, they seemed like good kids. I could have thrown
a few buckets of water over some buck toothed, metal mouthed minxes,
but I was hormonally challenged at that age too, so I refrained from
running the taps.

Finding work was difficult. Once your curriculum vitae has a prison
sentence for manslaughter on it, getting employment is tricky! Luckily,
there are kindhearted souls around though who are prepared to give
people like me a second chance in life. I started off working in a mobile
caf
é
that was parked just off the M61 in Chorley. The bloke who owned
it, Eric, was an ex-con himself from old Skelmersdale, he had served
two years for handling stolen goods back in the sixties and once he went
straight, he learnt to appreciate how difficult it was for ex-cons to get
a foothold on the jobs ladder, so he started employing them. Eric used
to drive across from
‘
Skem
’
to pick me up at Amy
’
s Mum and Dad
’
s at
six o
’
clock every morning and his caf
é
would be open from half six to
half two each day. Most truckers and drivers were after sausage, bacon,
eggs and burgers, so Eric had noticed over the years that he only had
to be open for breakfast and lunch as by mid-afternoon, business began
to tail off. It was certainly different to working in a bank, but I enjoyed
it as everyone who stopped seemed to be an interesting soul with a bit
of time to tell a story.

As I managed to get through six months with Eric without killing anyone or stealing anything, I was able to graduate to a job
“
waiting
on
”
, in a coffee shop in Ormskirk,
‘
Caffeine Corner
’
. Eric had given me
a glowing reference and although providing middle class housewives
with carrot cake and coffee wasn
’
t overly taxing, it gave me a bit of
cash, which originally allowed me to offer Amy
’
s Mum and Dad some
keep, (which they refused to accept) and subsequently allowed me to
rent a place of my own. When I moved into Mill Street, I gave Richie
the option of moving in with me, but he turned it down. He said he
would help me with the rent, as he knew I would struggle to cover it
alone, but he didn
’
t believe in living with someone before marriage. I
kept asking every day from the day I visited the house for the first time
until the day I moved in!

On the day I moved in, Richie was helping me unpack everything
and I found myself becoming a little irritated with him for not taking
the plunge with me.

“
How very 1950
’
s of you!
”
I told him, once Richie had again re
iterated his feelings that it would be wrong for us to live together before
marriage.

“
I
’
m old fashioned with things like that!
”

“
So you
’
ll get home from work, have your Mum cook your tea, give
her your dirty laundry to wash and iron, pass her your plates to wash
and then you
’
ll nip on the train here, have a couple of beers, watch TV,
screw me and then nip back home to check whether your mother has
hung your jacket up and pressed your trousers for the next day! Don
’
t
try and fool me by saying you
’
re a traditionalist, you just know how to
get your toast buttered on both sides!
”

“
No, its nothing to do with that! I just have values, that
’
s all!
”

This grated with me.

“
Are you suggesting I don
’
t?
”

“
No! Stop trying to turn this around! I just don
’
t think we should
live together before we are married.
”

I softened a little each time he said this as there was an implication
that we would get married. I decided to check out whether the implication
was intended.

“
So, do you think we
’
ll get married?
”

“
I
’
d like to think so. Do you?
”
I just gave him my sexiest smile.

“
I
’
ll give you my answer when you
’
re on one knee. Not before!
”

“
A man needs to know he
’
s going to get a good response before he
asks!
”

“
Well you
’
ll know, because if I ever think we haven
’
t got a future together, I
’
ll dump you!
”

“
Come here!
”

Richie grabbed me and gave me what started out as a playful bear
hug and developed into a kiss and then ultimately resulted in sex on
my unmade bed. When I think back to those days now, the one word I
would use to describe our sex life would be - frequent! Not necessarily
long sessions, but regular, repetitive sex sessions. Back in the day, before
life wears you down, I wasn
’
t a girl for saying
‘
No
’
! Richie also had an
ability back then to re-charge his batteries in next to no time! It was
start, stop, start again ten minutes later. Once you have kids, it becomes
start, stop, start again same time, same place, next month!

Despite Richie refusing to sacrifice the joys of his mother
’
s cooking
for a place with me, he spent almost every evening at Mill Street and
our weekends were pretty much love-ins that John and Yoko would have
been proud of. The train journeys Richie was taking on a daily basis, to
and from work in Maghull and to and from my house in Ormskirk, were
becoming a bind, so he enrolled in an intensive learner driver course
and after one failed attempt, he managed to pass second time. Fifth
time overall! We celebrated like we had won the pools and he bought
a lime green Toyota Carina that set him back
£
500. Richie bought it
from an eighty year old man with failing eyesight and reactions and it
was the type of car designed with the more mature driver in mind, but
it was reliable and took us to places without us having to rely on public
transport, so it added a new dimension to our lives. We could now go
to places like the Lake District and the Yorkshire Moors, that we had
never tackled by train.